to a man. The idea of you is a part of
my mind; you influence my likes and dislikes, all my tastes, hundreds of
times when I don't realize it. You really are a part of me."

She turned her bright, believing eyes to me, and the tears came up in them
slowly. "How can it be like that, when you know so many people, and when
I've disappointed you so? Ain't it wonderful, Jim, how much people can
mean to each other? I'm so glad we had each other when we were little. I
can't wait till my little girl's old enough to tell her about all the
things we used to do. You'll always remember me when you think about old
times, won't you? And I guess everybody thinks about old times, even the
happiest people."

As we walked homeward across the fields, the sun dropped and lay like a
great golden globe in the low west. While it hung there, the moon rose in
the east, as big as a cartwheel, pale silver and streaked with rose color,
thin as a bubble or a ghost-moon. For five, perhaps ten minutes, the two
luminaries confronted each other across the level land, resting on
opposite edges of the world. In that singular light every little tree and
shock of wheat, every sunflower stalk and clump of snow-on-the-mountain,
drew itself up high and pointed; the very clods and furrows in the fields
seemed to stand up sharply. I felt the old pull of the earth, the solemn
magic that comes out of those fields at nightfall. I wished I could be a
little boy again, and that my way could end there.

We reached the edge of the field, where our ways parted. I took her hands
and held them against my breast, feeling once more how strong and warm and
good they were, those brown hands, and remembering how many kind things
they had done for me. I held them now a long while, over my heart. About
us it was growing darker and darker, and I had to look hard to see her
face, which I meant always to carry with me; the closest, realest face,
under all the shadows of women's faces, at the very bottom of my memory.

"I'll come back," I said earnestly, through the soft, intrusive darkness.

"Perhaps you will"--I felt rather than saw her smile. "But even if you
don't, you're here, like my father. So I won't be lonesome."

As I went back alone over that familiar road, I could almost believe that
a boy and girl ran along beside me, as our shadows used to do, laughing
and whispering to each other in the grass.

BOOK V--CUZAK'S BOYS

I

I TOLD Antonia I would