"'Fair as the evening air—
"'Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars,' or is it 'ten thousand stars'?"
Hildreth turned her face up to me. Her arm went through mine. She drew my arm close against her body and held it tight in silent response for a quiet interval....
"You are a poet ... a real poet ... and," she dropped her voice, "and, what is more, a real man, too!" there was a world of compassion in her voice....
"—You remember Blake's evening star—that 'washed the dusk with silver?'"
"Jesus, how beautiful!" I cried.
We were standing in front of her cottage, that darkled in the trees.
Suddenly, roused by our voices, like some sweet, low, miraculous thing, a little bird sang a few bars of song, sweet and low, in the bushes somewhere, and stopped....
"Hildreth, don't let's go to bed yet." I caught her arm in my hands, "it's too beautiful ... to go to bed."
I was trembling all over....