'A price, yes: --but how is a man to buy without a profit? They
think that I come here for their sakes,--merely to bring the market
to their doors.' Then he began to remember that he had no special
object in discussing the circumstances of his trade with Marie
Bromar, and that he had a special object in another direction. But
how to turn the subject was now a difficulty.

'I am sure you do not buy without a profit,' said Marie Bromar, when
she found that he was silent. 'And then the poor people, who have
to pay so dear for everything!' She was making a violent attempt to
keep him on the ground of his customers and his purchases.

'There was another thing that I wanted to say to you, Marie,' he
began at last abruptly.

'Another thing,' said Marie, knowing that the hour had come.

'Yes;--another thing. I daresay you know what it is. I need not
tell you now that I love you, need I, Marie? You know as well as I
do what I think of you.'

'No, I don't,' said Marie, not intending to encourage him to tell
her, but simply saying that which came easiest to her at the moment.

'I think this,--that if you will consent to be my wife, I shall be a
very happy man. That is all. Everybody knows how pretty you are,
and how good, and how clever; but I do not think that anybody loves
you better than I do. Can you say that you will love me, Marie?
Your uncle approves of it,--and your aunt.' He had now come quite