“Lots of times.” Laughing, he held her as she tried to break away. “At parties, when I was a kid—and when we played ‘post-office’ and sich.”
“Never since you grew up?”
“Never.”
“Oh, well,” she sighed, “I suppose I’ll have to forgive you since you were so very small, and it’s such a long time ago I’ll really have to—make up.”
Some of the arrears were paid right then. In fact, it was not until she had demurred at paying all that he tapped the letter. “And now—what about the date? Shall I tell that we will be married by the time they receive it?”
Her hair flew in a bright cloud under her vigorous shake. “Such impatience! Aren’t you happy?”
“Happy?” His voice rang with sincerity. “Happier than I ever thought possible, but—”
“But—?”
“I want to be happier still.”
He meant and thought it. But she with her woman’s intuition knew this, their love time, for what it was—the flowerage of their lives. Later would come the ripe fruit—content mixed with the joys and sorrows that form the substance of life; but then this hour would have passed forever. Like all women, with whom love is always the great end, she would have drained its last sweet essence. But like all women, she was not at all displeased by his impatience. Presently she yielded to it.