“I’ll tell you, if you’ll give me time.” I tried to find the words, but couldn’t. I held out my arms instead. “It’s this.”
“What?”
“Don’t you understand?”
“What am I to understand?”
“Don’t you understand that I want you to be my wife?”
“Your wife! Your wife!” She spoke in a crescendo scale, as if I had insulted her. “You said you were my friend!”
“Don’t you understand that I want to be something more than your friend?”
“You want to beat me! to use me like a dog! to have me burned!”
“Susie!”
“My father said in England there were no wives.”