She lifted her eyes to his face, her lips parted.
“I can answer any thing you ask.”
“And you do not care for them?”
“No.”
He drew his breath sharply, his round face rosy.
“Then you have got to listen to me, for I'm deadly in earnest. I'm an old, rough, bald-headed fool that don't know much about women,—I never thought before I'd ever want to,—but you can bet on one thing, I'm square. Anybody in this town will tell you I'm square. They'll tell you that whatever I say goes. I've never run around much with women; somehow I never exactly liked the kind I've come up against, and maybe they didn't feel any particular interest in me. I didn't cut much shine as a ladies' man, but, I reckon now, it's only because the right one hadn't happened along. She is here now, though, all right, and I knew it the very first time I set eyes on her. Oh, you roped and tied me all right the first throw. Maybe I did get you and that half-sister mixed up a bit, but just the same you were the one I really wanted. Hope's all right; she's a mighty fine girl, but you are the one for me, Christie. Could you—could you care for such a duffer as I am?”
Her lips were smiling and so were her eyes, but it was a pleading smile.
“I—I don't think it would be so very hard,” she admitted, “not if you really wanted me to.”
“You know what I mean—that I love you,—wish you to be my wife?”
“I supposed that was it—that—that you wanted me.”