Perhaps I should not have done so. Perhaps I would not do so again. Had
I known what was to come I could not have done so. Nevertheless I did.
After all, it was not strange. All things about us conspired to be
accessory and incendiary. The air of the Virginia morning was so soft
and warm, the honeysuckles along the wall were so languid sweet, the
bees and the hollyhocks up to the walk so fat and lazy, the smell of the
orchard was so rich, the south wind from the fields was so wanton!
Moreover, I was only twenty-six. As it chances, I was this sort of a
man: thick in the arm and neck, deep through, just short of six feet
tall, and wide as a door, my mother said; strong as one man out of a
thousand, my father said. And then--the girl was there.
So this was how it happened that I threw the reins of Satan, my black
horse, over the hooked iron of the gate at Dixiana Farm and strode up to
the side of the stone pillar where Grace Sheraton stood, shading her
eyes with her hand, watching me approach through the deep trough road
that flattened there, near the Sheraton lane. So I laughed and strode
up--and kept my promise. I had promised myself that I would kiss her the
first time that seemed feasible.
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