`` There is nothing unsuitable in that , is there ? '' she asked , rather crisply . `` Oh , no , no , '' I hastened to assure her , giving Peggy a surreptitious kick to divert her thoughts from laughter . `` Only you must realize , Aunt Olivia , that this is a very great surprise to us . '' `` I thought it would be so , '' said Aunt Olivia complacently . `` But your father will know -- he will remember . I do hope he wo n't think me foolish . He did not think Mr. Malcolm MacPherson was a fit person for me to marry once . But that was long ago , when Mr. Malcolm MacPherson was very poor . He is in very comfortable circumstances now . '' `` Tell us about it , Aunt Olivia , '' said Peggy . She did not look at me , which was my salvation . Had I caught Peggy 's eye when Aunt Olivia said `` Mr. Malcolm MacPherson '' in that tone I must have laughed , willy-nilly . `` When I was a girl the MacPhersons used to live across the road from here . Mr. Malcolm MacPherson was my beau then . But my family -- and your father especially -- dear me , I do hope he wo n't be very cross -- were opposed to his attentions and were very cool to him . I think that was why he never said anything to me about getting married then . And after a time he went away , as I have said , and I never heard anything from him directly for many a year . Of course , his sister sometimes gave me news of him . But last June I had a letter from him .
He said he was coming home XXXXX settle down for good on the old Island , and he asked me if I would marry him .
Of about after as at for from in that to