Hugh’s coming had been so obviously voluntary and joyous that the fear she had entertained, that he would think ill of her as John Hunter’s wife, was set at rest. The old confidence, sympathy, and companionship were retendered, and the girl met it with her habitual openness. She accepted the book from his hand and read as asked. Hugh Noland watched her earnestly, and recalled the things he had been told about her and her affairs. On more than one occasion he had been told that she had been neglected, and at the time had put the tale away as foolish farm gossip, but Doctor Morgan was no fool, and his gossip was usually not only true but had on this particular occasion fallen out with vehemence and conviction. As he looked at her he asked himself how any man could neglect a woman of Elizabeth’s sincere qualities. She was so true that the only indication that he had ever received of even a slight difference of opinion with her husband had been the accidental one regarding debts. He remembered a remark of Sadie Hansen’s to the effect that John Hunter never took his wife anywhere, and he remembered that in the four months he had been in the house he had never heard him offer to do so, and then Hugh Noland remembered that he had no right to think about it at all. However, his mind recurred to it in spite of all he could do, and presently he was immersed in the old consideration. Loyalty must be one of her qualities: four months he had been in her house and she had never been taken anywhere except to Nathan’s, where he himself had taken her, and she had never remarked upon it, and she was but twenty-three!
“Twenty-three!” he said under his breath.
“What was it you said?” Elizabeth asked, looking up.
“Nothing,” he replied guiltily.
Elizabeth became conscious and embarrassed.
“I’ve kept you all afternoon!” she exclaimed, getting suddenly to her feet.
“I wanted to be kept,” Hugh admitted slowly, rising also. “It’s frightfully hot in the middle of the afternoon. I’ll work late, and milk after dark.”
“I’ll bring up the cows and do the milking,” she volunteered.
“Let me see you!” he protested, and went to his work again.
Hugh Noland had never even guessed that he would walk deliberately over and spend a whole afternoon with a woman he had no right to love after becoming aware that he was already in love with her. For the first time he stood in the limelight of strong emotions and knew himself for what he was, not only that he was a mere man, but that he was a man who was not showing the proper control over feelings and emotions which thousands of men and women alike controlled every day. He worked his problem over as he worked the mellow soil about the corn roots and made himself late, but with contradictory impulses hurried the milking when he did get at it so as to get down to the book again.