Gregory heard none of this. He was watching the light in Jean's eyes. They were so gray and deep, so like quiet pools, touched with sun, in which one could go down and down and never reach the bottom.
"I don't believe it," Jean repeated; "I can't possibly, in view, or rather sound of, the evidence."
"Then you shouldn't be here with me. To go off with a gentleman who doesn't love you! You ought to be ashamed."
"I'm not." Jean laughed and laid her face against his. His lips touched her chin. "Maybe I love him enough for both," she whispered.
"No—you—couldn't—love—him as much—as that, because he loves you—just that—much himself." Little kisses on her neck and cheek broke the words. And Jean felt part of the soft, black earth, the tang of the rotting leaves and the spring budding.
They walked back through the woods, chilly now that the sun was gone. It was dusk when they came to the road again. The lamp was lit and there was a homey smell of fried potatoes and fresh cake. Mattie had put on a clean dress and done her hair low on her neck. The break of outsiders had penetrated her consciousness and she was looking forward to the evening, Uncle John had already had his supper, and was reading the Bible in his armchair by the stove. There was no sign of Mattie's husband. But near the end of supper a wagon stopped.
"Good land, that'll be Jim, and we've et most everything clean."
"I'll scramble him some eggs, if it is. Don't you go fussin', ma. He ought to let us know."
But the wagon went on and no one came.
Jean insisted on drying the dishes and after the requisite amount of objection Mrs. Morrison gave her a towel. She often talked over with Mattie this strange eagerness of city women to do dishes. Mattie always concluded that it was only because they never did them any other time. But Jean really wanted to do them. She liked the feel of the low-raftered room, all skewed out of plumb with age, dim in the corners, where the lamplight did not touch. Through the uncurtained windows the fields stretched away under the cold night sky. They framed the warm comfort within, gave it a permanence it did not really have. With the filling of the dishpan Mrs. Morrison began a story of a family feud that had gone on for years and was all about a chicken, in the beginning. From time to time she stopped while she held long arguments with Mattie on exact names and dates. Jean caught snatches of it between her own thoughts.