Maynard laughed.
"I reckon that's true, Mr. Stockman," he said.
"What might you think, Mr. Palk?" asked Susan. She felt the heavy silence of Thomas and knew not, as yet, that he often clothed himself in silence for his own comfort. But he had listened with attention and she thought he must probably have experience.
He declared the reverse, however.
"Couldn't offer an opinion, miss," he replied. "I be of the bachelor persuasion and never felt no feeling to be otherwise. What you might call complete in myself, so far as a man can be."
"You're a loser and a gainer, Thomas," said his new master genially. "You may lose the blessing of a good son, or daughter, and a valuable wife; and you gain also, because you might not have had those fine things, but found yourself in a very different position. You might have had what's better than freedom; but on the other hand you might have had what's a long sight worse."
"And freedom's a very fine thing," added Maynard.
Mr. Stockman loved these questions. He proceeded to examine marriage in all its aspects and left a general impression on the mind of the attentive Mr. Palk that the ideal of achievement was to have loved and lost, and be left with a faithful, home-staying daughter: in fact, Mr. Stockman's own situation. He appeared to hold a brief for the widowed state as both dignified and convenient.
"All the same, father reckons you're the sort will marry again, Cousin Joe," Johnny told him. "He says that such a good-looking man as you, and so popular with the ladies, will surely take another some day, when you'm tired of sporting."
Mr. Stockman shook his head.