"Provided I can have you, Nancy. Provided you can love me as I love you." He had come nearer her, and although he had brought both feet upon the magic carpet, they remained stationary. "You mean more to me than anything I have ever known. I used to wonder how I could ever think more of anyone than I thought of Woodbridge and the Star and the different boys in college, but that was nothing compared to this." Nancy was tracing a series of geometrical patterns upon the magic carpet with a bit of stick. "I wish I could do something to show you how much I care now." Still Nancy said nothing. "And, oh, Nancy, what you could do for me! With you to help me, I think I could do anything. But I know I need you. Nancy, will you marry me?" Nancy was hardly prepared for this. She had, since the social service fiasco, acknowledged to herself that she had grown in that short space very fond of Tom. She looked forward to seeing him, and when he was gone she went over with pleasure what he had said and how he had looked. She liked his drollery and his strength, she admired his poise and self-reliance; and she had the greatest respect for his teaching ability, of which she had received direct proof. Still, she was not at all sure that she wished to marry him. After all, she had really known him only something over a month, and it was not the Whitman way to hurry into anything--least of all into matrimony. "You mustn't ask me that, Tom." "Why not, Nancy?" "Because I cannot accept; not now." "You mean that perhaps you can later? For of course I shall never grow tired of asking you." The moon had climbed a little and had turned a silvery yellow. It flooded the rock and the people moving about on it, but Nancy and Tom remained in shadow. "Tell me, Nancy," he said, leaning over and covering with his own the hand upon which she was resting, "tell me that I may ask you again, for, dear Nancy, I cannot lose you." She did not draw her hand away immediately and when she did so she did it gently. "You're awfully good, Tom," she said and Tom's heart swelled at the softness of her tone. Then she climbed to her feet, and--Tom picking up the magic carpet, which had become soaked through with the dampness of the creek bank--they made their way back to the rock.