"Because I think that God has married you to me already. Do you remember when we kissed each other by the wheat-field one day last summer?"
"Yes." She was looking down at the mane of her pony and her cheeks were red and her voice reminded me of the echoes that fill the cavern of a violin when a string is touched.
"Seems to me we were married that day. Seems so, every time I think of it, God asked me all the questions an' I answered yes to 'em. Do ye remember after we had kissed each other how that little bird sang?"
"Yes."
We had faced about and were walking back toward Canton, I close by the pony's side.
"May I kiss you again?"
She stopped the pony and leaned toward me and our lips met in a kiss the thought of which makes me lay down my pen and bow my head a moment while I think with reverence of that pure, sweet spring of memory in whose waters I love to wash my spirit.
We walked on and a song sparrow followed us perching on the fence-rails and blessing us with his song.
"I guess God has married us again," I declared.
"I knew that you were walking on this road and I had to see you," said she. "People have been saying such terrible things."