Miranda wants to marry him but can not , and she declares it will break her heart . '' ` Why do n't you run away and marry him ? ' I said . It did n't go against my conscience in the least to give her such advice . Joe Milgrave is a splendid fellow and Mr. Pryor fairly beamed on him until the war broke out and I know Mr. Pryor would forgive Miranda very quickly , once it was over and he wanted his housekeeper back . But Miranda shook her silvery head dolefully . '' ` Joe wants me to but I ca n't . Mother 's last words to me , as she lay on her dying-bed , were , `` Never , never run away , Miranda , '' and I promised . ' `` Miranda 's mother died two years ago , and it seems , according to Miranda , that her mother and father actually ran away to be married themselves . To picture Whiskers-on-the-moon as the hero of an elopement is beyond my power . But such was the case and Mrs. Pryor at least lived to repent it . She had a hard life of it with Mr. Pryor , and she thought it was a punishment on her for running away . So she made Miranda promise she would never , for any reason whatever , do it . `` Of course , you can not urge a girl to break a promise made to a dying mother , so I did not see what Miranda could do unless she got Joe to come to the house when her father was away and marry her there . But Miranda said that could n't be managed . Her father seemed to suspect she might be up to something of the sort and he never went away for long at a time , and , of course , Joe could n't get leave of absence at an hour 's notice . '' ` No , I shall just have to let Joe go , and he will be killed -- I know he will be killed -- and my heart will break , ' said Miranda , her tears running down and copiously bedewing the vermin shirts ! `` I am not writing like this for lack of any real sympathy with poor Miranda . I 've just got into the habit of giving things a comical twist if I can , when I 'm writing to Jem and Walter and Ken , to make them laugh . I really felt sorry for Miranda who is as much in love with Joe as a china-blue girl can be with anyone and who is dreadfully ashamed of her father 's pro-German sentiments .
I think she understood that I did , XXXXX she said she had wanted to tell me all about her worries because I had grown so sympathetic this past year .
So against for in into like of on to with