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proposal till to-day, not a real proposal, and to-day I have had three.
Just fancy! THREE proposals in one day! Isn't it awful! I feel sorry,
really and truly sorry, for two of the poor fellows. Oh, Mina, I am so
happy that I don't know what to do with myself. And three proposals!
But, for goodness' sake, don't tell any of the girls, or they would be
getting all sorts of extravagant ideas and imagining themselves injured
and slighted if in their very first day at home they did not get six at
least. Some girls are so vain! You and I, Mina dear, who are engaged and
are going to settle down soon soberly into old married women, can
despise vanity. Well, I must tell you about the three, but you must keep
it a secret, dear, from _every one_, except, of course, Jonathan. You
will tell him, because I would, if I were in your place, certainly tell
Arthur. A woman ought to tell her husband everything--don't you think
so, dear?--and I must be fair. Men like women, certainly their wives, to
be quite as fair as they are; and women, I am afraid, are not always
quite as fair as they should be. Well, my dear, number One came just
before lunch. I told you of him, Dr. John Seward, the lunatic-asylum
man, with the strong jaw and the good forehead. He was very cool
outwardly, but was nervous all the same. He had evidently been schooling
himself as to all sorts of little things, and remembered them; but he
almost managed to sit down on his silk hat, which men don't generally do
when they are cool, and then when he wanted to appear at ease he kept
playing with a lancet in a way that made me nearly scream. He spoke to
me, Mina, very straightforwardly. He told me how dear I was to him,
though he had known me so little, and what his life would be with me to
help and cheer him. He was going to tell me how unhappy he would be if I
did not care for him, but when he saw me cry he said that he was a brute
and would not add to my present trouble. Then he broke off and asked if
I could love him in time; and when I shook my head his hands trembled,
and then with some hesitation he asked me if I cared already for any one
else. He put it very nicely, saying that he did not want to wring my
confidence from me, but only to know, because if a woman's heart was
free a man might have hope. And then, Mina, I felt a sort of duty to
tell him that there was some one. I only told him that much, and then he
stood up, and he looked very strong and very grave as he took both my
hands in his and said he hoped I would be happy, and that if I ever
wanted a friend I must count him one of my best. Oh, Mina dear, I can't
help crying: and you must excuse this letter being all blotted. Being
proposed to is all very nice and all that sort of thing, but it isn't at
all a happy thing when you have to see a poor fellow, whom you know
loves you honestly, going away and looking all broken-hearted, and to
know that, no matter what he may say at the moment, you are passing
quite out of his life. My dear, I must stop here at present, I feel so
miserable, though I am so happy.
"_Evening._
"Arthur has just gone, and I feel in better spirits than when I left
off, so I can go on telling you about the day. Well, my dear, number Two
came after lunch. He is such a nice fellow, an American from Texas, and
he looks so young and so fresh that it seems almost impossible that he
has been to so many places and has had such adventures. I sympathise
with poor Desdemona when she had such a dangerous stream poured in her
ear, even by a black man. I suppose that we women are such cowards that
we think a man will save us from fears, and we marry him. I know now
what I would do if I were a man and wanted to make a girl love me. No, I
don't, for there was Mr. Morris telling us his stories, and Arthur never
told any, and yet---- My dear, I am somewhat previous. Mr. Quincey P.
Morris found me alone. It seems that a man always does find a girl
alone. No, he doesn't, for Arthur tried twice to _make_ a chance, and I
helping him all I could; I am not ashamed to say it now. I must tell you
beforehand that Mr. Morris doesn't always speak slang--that is to say,
he never does so to strangers or before them, for he is really well
educated and has exquisite manners--but he found out that it amused me
to hear him talk American slang, and whenever I was present, and there
was no one to be shocked, he said such funny things. I am afraid, my
dear, he has to invent it all, for it fits exactly into whatever else he
has to say. But this is a way slang has. I do not know myself if I shall
ever speak slang; I do not know if Arthur likes it, as I have never
heard him use any as yet. Well, Mr. Morris sat down beside me and looked
as happy and jolly as he could, but I could see all the same that he was
very nervous. He took my hand in his, and said ever so sweetly:--
"'Miss Lucy, I know I ain't good enough to regulate the fixin's of your
little shoes, but I guess if you wait till you find a man that is you
will go join them seven young women with the lamps when you quit. Won't
you just hitch up alongside of me and let us go down the long road
together, driving in double harness?'
"Well, he did look so good-humoured and so jolly that it didn't seem
half so hard to refuse him as it did poor Dr. Seward; so I said, as
lightly as I could, that I did not know anything of hitching, and that I
wasn't broken to harness at all yet. Then he said that he had spoken in
a light manner, and he hoped that if he had made a mistake in doing so
on so grave, so momentous, an occasion for him, I would forgive him. He
really did look serious when he was saying it, and I couldn't help
feeling a bit serious too--I know, Mina, you will think me a horrid
flirt--though I couldn't help feeling a sort of exultation that he was
number two in one day. And then, my dear, before I could say a word he
began pouring out a perfect torrent of love-making, laying his very
heart and soul at my feet. He looked so earnest over it that I shall
never again think that a man must be playful always, and never earnest,
because he is merry at times. I suppose he saw something in my face
which checked him, for he suddenly stopped, and said with a sort of
manly fervour that I could have loved him for if I had been free:--
"'Lucy, you are an honest-hearted girl, I know. I should not be here
speaking to you as I am now if I did not believe you clean grit, right
through to the very depths of your soul. Tell me, like one good fellow
to another, is there any one else that you care for? And if there is