"Ought one?" say I, with interest, then beginning to laugh vociferously. "At least you were not as bad as the old maid who late in life received a very wealthy offer, and was so much elated by it that she took off all her clothes, and kicked her bonnet round the room!"
Barbara laughs.
"No, I was not quite so bad as that."
"And how did he do it?" pursue I, inquisitively. "Did he write or speak"
"He spoke."
"And what did he say? How did he word it? Ah!"—(with a sigh)—"I suppose you will not tell me that?"
She has abandoned her chair, and has fallen on her knees before me, hiding her face in my lap. Delicious waves of color, like the petals of a pink sweet-pea, are racing over her cheeks and throat.
"Was ever any one known to tell it?" she says, indistinctly.
"Yes," reply I, "I was. I told you what Roger said, word for word—all of you!"
"Did you?"—(with an accent of astonished incredulity).