don't know how, it flashed upon me as a new and far-off possibility that I understood it.
"My dear Esther," said my guardian, "I have long had something in my thoughts that I have wished to say to you."
"Indeed?"
"I have had some difficulty in approaching it, and I still have. I should wish it to be so deliberately said, and so deliberately considered. Would you object to my writing it?"
"Dear guardian, how could I object to your writing anything for ME to read?"
"Then see, my love," said he with his cheery smile, "am I at this moment quite as plain and easy — do I seem as open, as honest and old-fashioned — as I am at any time?"