noon
I took out one of my own cards , handed it to her , and said , `` Here is a reference which perhaps you may know . '' She bent over it , turned to me , fixed her eyes intently and directly on mine for one moment , and then I thought she would have fallen . My arm was around her in an instant , her head was on my shoulder , and my many wanderings were over . It was broad , high , sunny noon , the most solitary hour of the daylight in those fields . We were roused by the distant sound of the town clock striking twelve ; we rose and went on together to Cowston by the river bank , returning late in the evening . I SUPPOSE that the reason why in novels the story ends with a marriage is partly that the excitement of the tale ceases then , and partly also because of a theory that marriage is an epoch , determining the career of life after it . The epoch once announced , nothing more need be explained ; everything else follows as a matter of course .