"You won't offend me," she assured him. "Please tell me what you meant."
"Why, I meant I wasn't just fooling with you," he murmured.
"Neither was I—with you."
"I meant," he went on, "if I was the right kind, fine and educated, you know—like you, and like your folks—I'd ask you—oh, I guess I'm sort of a fool. Tell me so. That's all you've got to do. I'd ask you—well, to be more than just friends with me."
Reba looked up at him, and said, "I'm very glad to be more than just friends with you."
"But, miss, I mean" She wouldn't understand. He would have to come right out with it in bald words. "I mean—you and me being married some day."
"I thought that was what you meant," Reba told him. "It's what I mean too."
He gave a little start at that. "It's what you mean too?"
"Yes, if you want me to," she said.
"You will marry me, miss?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes." Her voice was beginning to be a little unsteady now. "If—if that was what you meant, and you still would like to have me."
He didn't reply for a second—he couldn't—just stood staring down at her. "You don't dislike me, then?" he whispered.
She gave a little nervous laugh. "Why, of course not."
"You'll be engaged to me?"
She nodded.
He didn't offer to touch her, but his sheltering atti-
