"No."
"Why not?"
"I had a good deal to do, and I had fixed myself so nicely on the sofa with my books; and it looked cold and disagreeable out of doors."
"Since when have you ceased to be a fixture?"
"What! oh," said Ellen, laughing, "how shall I ever get rid of that troublesome word? What shall I say? I had arranged myself, established myself, so nicely on the sofa."
"And did you think that a sufficient reason for not going out?"
"No," said Ellen, "I did not; and I did not decide that I would not go; and yet I let it keep me at home after all; just as I did about reading a few minutes ago. I meant to stop, but I forgot it, and I should have gone on I don't know how long if you had not stopped me. I very often do so."
He paused a minute, and then said
"You must not do so any more, Ellie."
The tone, in which there was a great deal of love and decision, wound round Ellen's heart, and constrained her to answer immediately