Hush," he said. "I am asking you to marry me. Would you be convinced if I knelt down?

Once, when she was six years old, she had fallen from a tree, flat on her stomach. She could still recall that sickening interval before breath came back into her body. Now, as she looked at him, she felt the same way she had felt then, breathless, stunned, nauseated.

She was as forthright and simple as the winds that blew over Tara and the yellow river that wound around it.

If! If! If! There were so many ifs in life, never any sense of security, always the dread of losing everything.

It was not often that she was alone like this and she did not like it. When she was alone she had to think and, these days, thoughts were not so pleasant.

what will the South be like without all our fine boys? What would the South have been if they had lived?

You have eternity in which to explain and only one night to be a martyr in the amphitheater Get out, darling, and let me see the lions eat you.