“I won’t tell you. It’s for me alone,” she declared joyously. “But you’ll never stop saying it, will you, dear?”
“Never, as long as we both shall live. And that reminds me,” he said soberly. “We must arrange about being married.”
“Oh, that reminds you, does it?” she mocked. “Just incidentally, like that.”
Boom! Boom! Boom! The mission clock kept patiently at it until its suggestion struck in.
“Of course!” he cried. “Mr. Lake, the missionary, will marry us. And we’ll have Stark and Wisner for witnesses. How long does it take a bride to get ready? Would half an hour be enough?”
“It’s rather a short engagement,” she remarked demurely. “But if it’s all the time we’ve got—”
“It is. But, darling, we’ll have to ride for it afterward, and get across to the mainland. I’ve no right to let you in for such a risk,” he cried remorsefully.
“You couldn’t help yourself,” she teased saucily. “I ran you down like one of your own beetles. Besides, what does that permit for the Dutch ship say?”
“That’s for myself and a woman—the leper woman. Not for myself and my wife.”
“Well, I’m a woman, aren’t I? And it doesn’t say that the woman mustn’t be your wife.” She blushed distractingly.