"I can't tell you."

"My wife died five years ago when my youngest little girl was born."

"And I thought," she said, "you were so young."

"I'm thirty-five."

"Still I was right. You're young. Very young."

"Oh, well, don't you know, they say a woman's as young as she looks, and a man's as young as he feels. I feel all right."

"You dear." Her mouth and eyes said it without a sound.

"Are you quite sure that's all you want to know?"

"I had to know it."

"It was so important?"