"I'm sorry, Carlotta. I didn't mean to," he said miserably.

"I'm not. I'm glad. I think way down in my heart I've always wanted you
to kiss me, though I didn't know it would be like that. I knew your
kisses would be different, because _you_ are different."

"How am I different?" Phil's voice was humble. In his own eyes he seemed
pitifully undifferent, precisely like all the other rash, intemperate,
male fools in the world.

"You are different every way. It would take too long to tell you all of
them, but maybe you are chiefly different because I love you and I don't
love the rest. Except for Daddy. I've never loved anybody but myself
before, and when you kissed me I just seemed to feel my _meness_ going
right out of me, as if I stopped belonging to myself and began to belong
to you forever and ever. It scared me but--I liked it."

"You darling!" fatuously. "Carlotta, will you marry me?"

It was out at last--the words she claimed she had brought him up the
mountain to say--the words he had willed not to speak.

"Of course. Kiss me again, Phil. We'll wire Daddy tomorrow."

"Wire him what?" The mention of Carlotta's father brought Phil back to
earth with a jolt.

"That we are engaged and that he is to find a suitable job for you so we
can be married right away," chanted Carlotta happily.