She regarded me, assessing me briefly.
"But, she declared, "you are not."
And as she spoke she bent down and gently kissed me on the lips.
As if she had retrieved some minor thing I had let drop, she stood
again in her former manner.
Except there was a smile
in her eyes which I had never seen before.
She spoke so softly I could
but guess at the words:
"Didn't you know?"