"Now, father, don't laugh at me. This is all very serious."
"Serious! It's the most serious thing that ever happened in the world,
in our world. And if I was smiling--I'll lay a wager I wasn't
laughing--it was because I'm so happy. You don't know what this means
to me. I've wanted it so much that I've been afraid it wasn't coming
off. And then I thought it must, for it's my girl's happiness and
David's and back of theirs mine."
"Well, then, if you're happy, I'm happy."
This time his smile was not bantering, only loving and tender. He did
not dream that her spirit might not be as glad as his looking from the
height of middle-age to a secured future. He had been a man of a
single love, ignorant save of that one woman, and she so worshiped and
wondered at that there had been no time to understand her. Insulated
in the circle of his own experience he did not guess that to an
unawakened girl the engagement morn might be dark with clouds.
"Love and youth," he said dreamily, "oh, Susan, it's so beautiful!
It's Eden come again when God walked in the garden. And it's so short.
_Eheu Fugaces_! You've just begun to realize how wonderful it is, just
said to yourself 'This is life--this is what I was born for,' when it's
over.
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