"I guess you may call it settled. I asked her if she'd consider herself engaged to me—"
"What? What's that? Engaged to you?"
"Yes; isn't that what you wanted?"
"What did she say to that?"
"She said yes, she guessed that she would, though she would like to think it over a little."
"I didn't presume to think you'd go and get it all settled without talkin' it over with me, and I calc'lated to—to do the arrangin' myself. What did she say when she consented to it, Andrew?"
Andrew squirmed on the edge of his chair. "I guess my tea is coolin' out there. I'd better go and eat, now."
"A minute more won't make no difference. What did she say?"
"She said—why, she said—a whole lot of things. She said she never expected to marry; that she wanted to give her life to makin' folks happy and doin' for them, folks that had a sorrow—but the Lord hadn't given her any sorrowful folks to do for. It's my opinion that she thought consid'able of that fickle Willy Parks. Then I reasoned with her some, and she come to see that maybe this was the app'inted work for her to do—considerin' you'd set your heart on it so. She said she didn't know but I needed lookin' after and doin' for as much as any one she knew, and it would be a pleasure to—now, Marthy, let me go and have my tea."
"What else did she say?"