Mr. Hammond shook his head.
“No,” he said.
“I say yes. I don't want to marry you and I don't believe you want to marry me. Now do you—honest?”
Caleb was silent for a full minute. Then he drew a deep breath.
“It don't make no difference whether I do or not, fur's I can see,” he said, gloomily. “It's too late to start home now. I don't know what time 'tis, but we must have been ridin' three or four hours—seems eight or ten year to me—and we ought to be pretty near to Bayport. If we should turn back now we wouldn't get home till long after daylight, and everybody would be up and wantin' to know the whys and wherefores. If we told 'em we'd been ridin' around together all night, and didn't give any reasons for it, there'd be talk enough to last till Judgment. No, we've just got to get married now. That's all there is to it.”
Hannah groaned as the truth of this statement dawned upon her. Caleb gathered the reins in his hands preparatory to driving on, when a new thought came to him.
“Say, Hannah,” he observed, “I suppose you left that note for Kenelm, didn't you?”
Miss Parker uttered a faint shriek.
“Oh, my soul!” she cried. “I didn't! I didn't! I wrote it, but I was so upset when I found I couldn't get the doorkey and get out that way that I left the note in my bureau drawer.”
“Tut, tut! Huh! Well, he may find it there; let's hope he does.”