"So when Lacy and Bright made jokes about what their wives'd say if they didn't get home, I joined in with them, and laughed at the 'apron strings.' That's what we called it."
She moved a little away. "Did you do that?" she said. "Oh, Russell, I should hate that. I should think any woman would hate it."
"I know," he says. "I'm dead sorry. But I wanted you to know. And, dear—"
He got up and stood before her, with her hands crushed up in his.
"I want you to know," he says, kind of solemn, "that the way you are about this makes me—gladder than the dickens. Not for the reason you might think—because it's going to make it easy to be away when I want to. But because—"
He didn't say things very easy. Most men don't, except for their little bit of courting time.
"Well, thunder," he said, "don't you see? It makes me so sure you're my wife—and not just married to me."
She smiled up at him without saying anything, but I knew how balm and oil were curing the hurt that she thought she'd had that night when he went out.
"I've always thought of our each doing things—and coming home and telling each other about them," he says, vague.
"Of my doing things, too?" she asks, quick.