With eyes dancing and lips quivering with suppressed laughter Miss Dexter sat down at her writing table.
Dear Robert (she wrote),
At William’s earnest request I promise to be engaged to you and to marry you whenever you like.
Yours sincerely, Marion Dexter.
She handed it to William. William read it gravely and put it in his pocket.
“Thanks ever so much,” he said fervently.
“Don’t mention it,” said Miss Dexter demurely. “Quite a pleasure.”
He walked down the road in a rosy glow of virtue. Well, he’d done something for Robert that ought to make Robert grateful to him for the rest of his life. He’d helped Robert all right. He’d like to know what service was if it wasn’t that—getting people engaged to people they wanted to be engaged to. Jolly hard work too. Now there remained his mother and Ethel. He must go home and try to find some way of helping them....
IV
When he reached home Ethel was showing out Mrs. Helm, a tall, stern-looking lady whom William knew by sight.