Ben had had to chase down, in the crannies of his soul, one uneasy feeling before he was able to do this.  He at last decided that it was simple jealousy, and, being such, had to be cauterized.  He had discovered that he felt irked at the closeness between Mike and Jill.  His own bachelor persona, he learned, had been changed by a week of undead oblivion; he found that he wanted to be married, and to Jill.  He proposed to her again, without a trace of joking about it, as soon as he got her alone.