She had told him he must wait a month for an answer. Now she was sorry she had not said a fortnight. What was the good of keeping him in suspense a month? It was cruel, barbarous. She should not do anything of the kind. She'd just put him at rest at once. That wasn't the correct thing to do, she knew. But she didn't care a bit about being correct. What was the good of being correct at his expense? She had by this time made up her mind she loved him, and would marry him. She might as well tell him so at once. She wasn't likely to change her mind or heart in another fortnight. Why should she not put things right at once? He would not mistake her, or take her up wrongly. He had a high chivalric nature, and would understand her motive.
When she told him, what would he do? Kiss her. Kiss her! He, the man who a fortnight ago she had never seen, kiss her who had never been kissed by a man since she was a child! Kiss her! It wasn't, of course, necessary he should kiss her, but she supposed he would. She shouldn't like it a bit. It would be so strange to allow him to kiss her without shrieking or trying to run away. She supposed there was nothing for it but to submit. But it would seem so strange.
How complete should be her happiness and their love! She, who had been such a gadabout, would settle down. They should live in his own town. She would try and be as good as ever she could. She'd learn housekeeping and rear poultry. She'd try and be pious and collected like him. He should write poetry, and she would mind the fowls. Poetry and poultry. Then when the sonnets and the cocks and hens had gone to roost, George would give her his arm, and take her out for a nice quiet walk and nice sensible talk. She'd tell him all about the cocks and the hens, and he'd talk to her about the hunt and the House of Commons and the poor-rates and Shakespeare, which were, she believed, the subjects educated country gentlemen usually spoke to their wives--
When Marie Gordon first came upon this word she arrested her headlong thought, and, with a vivid blush, drew back from the visions she had been contemplating. There was something sudden, awful, in coming all at once upon the most important word in the vocabulary of life. She mentally reproved herself for dealing so lightly with serious matters; and, rousing herself from the long abstraction in which she had lain, she devoted her attention to the ordinary events of the breakfast-table.