"Because I shall always know where to find her." "Ah, yes! she must leave _you_ to find _her_. But that's a silly reason. If you don't give me a better, I'll get up and walk into the house." "Because there won't be any waste of me. Will that do?" "What do you mean?" she asked, with mock imperiousness. "I mean that I shall be able to lay not only my heart but my brute strength at her feet. I shall be allowed to be her beast of burden, to carry her whither she would; and so with my body her to worship more than most husbands have a chance of worshipping their wives." "There! take me, take me!" she said, stretching up her arms to him. "How good you are! I don't deserve such a great man one bit. But I _will_ love him. Take me directly; for there's Wynnie listening to every word we say to each other, and laughing at us. She can laugh without looking like it." The fact is, I was crying, and the creature knew it. Turner brought her to me, and held her down for me to kiss; then carried her in to her mother. I believe the county people round considered our family far gone on the inclined plane of degeneracy. First my mother, the heiress, had married a clergyman of no high family; then they had given their eldest daughter to a poor artist, something of the same standing as--well, I will be rude to no order of humanity, and therefore avoid comparisons; and now it was generally known that Connie was engaged to a country practitioner, a man who made up his own prescriptions. We talked and laughed over certain remarks of the kind that reached us, and compared our two with the gentlemen about us,--in no way to the advantage of any of the latter, you may be sure. It was silly work; but we were only two loving girls, with the best possible reasons for being proud of the men who had honored us with their love. CHAPTER VIII. CONNIE'S BABY.