So I walked onward that morning, nor ever have had such a sense of relief and escape, nor ever such a feeling of gayety.
“Here is where I belong,” I said. “This is my own country. Those hills are mine, and all the fields, and the trees and the sky—and the road here belongs to me as much as it does to any one.”
Coming presently to a small house near the side of the road, I saw a woman working with a trowel in her sunny garden. It was good to see her turn over the warm brown soil; it was good to see the plump green rows of lettuce and the thin green rows of onions, and the nasturtiums and sweet peas; it was good—after so many days in that desert of a city—to get a whiff of blossoming things. I stood for a moment looking quietly over the fence before the woman saw me. When at last she turned and looked up, I said:
“Good morning.”
She paused, trowel in hand.
“Good morning,” she replied; “you look happy.”
I wasn't conscious that I was smiling outwardly.
“Well, I am,” I said; “I'm going home.”
“Then you OUGHT to be happy,” said she.
“And I'm glad to escape THAT,” and I pointed toward the city.