"Why, Johnnie!" Emily babbled. She had suddenly leaned forward, and was sitting up, looking at the boy.
He grew red, but his eyes never wavered under her scrutiny. He was dead in earnest, for once. "You ask her to come down," he begged.
Emily got up slowly. Was she, then, waking from a hideous nightmare? Oh, if it was only some nice boy like Johnnie that could make the girl's voice shake!
"Martha!" she called up, and her voice was so alive with excitement that Martha came to the top of the stairs.
"What is it, mother?" she asked, eager for conciliation.
"Come down here, Martha!"
So Martha came down. She came into the living room slowly, warily. She looked at Johnnie. She looked at her mother inquiringly.
"Martha," said Emily, quietly, "Johnnie says—— You tell her," she said to him.
"Martha, we're going to announce our engagement to-day. Right now!"
The girl stood looking at him steadily in composed disapproval. "Whom are you engaged to? Why the excitement?"