Beta Book

"
And Mr. Ralph Ashley accompanied these words with a glance so
ludicrously languishing, that Fanny, unable to command herself, burst
into laughter; and the quarrel was all made up, if quarrel it indeed
had been.
"You _were_ a child in old times," said Mr. Ashley, throwing his foot
elegantly over his knee; "and, I recollect, had a perfect genius for
blindman's-buff; but, of course, at sixteen you have 'put away' all
those infantile or 'childish things'--though I am sincerely rejoiced
to see that you have not 'become a man.'"
Fanny laughed.
"I wish I was," she said.
"What?"
"Why a man."
"Oh! you're very well as you are;--though if you were a 'youth,' I'm
sure, Fanny dear, I should be desperately fond of you."
"Quite likely."
"Oh, nothing truer; and everybody would say, 'See the handsome
friends.' Come now, would'nt we make a lovely couple."
"Lovely!"
"Suppose we try it."
"Try what?"
"Being a couple."
Fanny suddenly caught, from the laughing eye, the young man's meaning,
and began to color.


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