like a grown woman, have you,
Hildreth?" It was the first time I had called her by her first name.

"Can you, or anyone else, tell me just how grown women do act? I myself
don't know, yet I'm a woman."

I drew closer to her as if drawn by some attractive power. A stray wisp
of her hair lit across my cheek stingingly. Then the wind blew a
perfumed strand of it across my lips and over my nostrils.

It made me rub my lips, it tickled so. Hildreth noticed it.

"Wait," she bade playfully, "I'll bet I can make you rub your lips
again."

"No, you can't."

"Hold still!" she leaned toward me; I could look down into her bosom.
She just touched my lips with her forefinger.

"Now!" she exclaimed triumphantly.

"--think you've tickled me, do you?"

"--just wait!"

I forgot myself. My lips tickled and I rubbed them with the length of a
finger ... Hildreth laughed....

"Hildreth!"

I leaned toward my friend's wife, calling her again by her first name.

I lay in a half-reclining posture, my head almost against her hip. I
was looking up into her face. She glanced down at me with a quick start
at the tone of my voice. She looked gravely for a moment into my face. I
observed an enigmatic something deep in her eyes ... which sank slowly
back as the image of a face does, in water,--as the face itself is
withdrawn. She moved apart a little, with a motion of slow deliberation.

"Hildreth!" I heard myself calling again, with a deep voice, a voice
that sounded alien in my own ears....

"Come, boy!" and she pulled back her hand from my grasp, and catching
mine in hers a moment, patted the back of it lightly--"come, don't let's
be foolish ... we've had such a happy afternoon together, don't let's
spoil it ... now let's start home."

As soon as I was on my feet and away from her, she became playful again.
She reached up her hand for me.

"Help me up!"

I brought her to her feet with a strong, quick pull, and against my
breast. But I did not dare do what I desired--take her in my arms and
try to kiss her. She paused a second, then thrust me back.

"Look, the sun's almost gone down ... and Mubby and Darrie will be home
a long time by this time ... and Mubby will be getting fidgety."

The sun's last huge shoulder of red was hulking like a spy behind a
distant, bare knoll ... separate blades of grass stood up in microscopic
yet giant distinctness, against its crimson background.

Our walk home was a silent, passively happy