"Not another thing—not another blessed mite of a thing," agreed
William, who had imbibed secretly again behind the back of his wife.
"I've know a man to throw himself into the river from sheer love befo' marriage," said Solomon, "an' two weeks arter the woman had taken him, to fall out with her because she'd put too much shortenin' in his pie-crust."
"It's all love befo' marriage an' all shortenin' arterwards," observed Betsey Bottom, with scorn. "I've al'ays noticed in this world that the less men folks have to say for themselves the better case they make of it. When they've spent all thar time sence Adam tryin' to throw dust in the eyes of women, it would be better manners if they'd stop twittin' 'em because they'd succeeded."
"True, true, you never spoke a truer word, ma'am, in my acquaintance with you," responded Solomon, with what hasty gallantry he could summon. "I was thinkin' them very things to myself when you mentioned 'em. Not that anybody could throw dust in yo' eyes, even if he tried to."
"Well, it would take mo'n a man to do that, I reckon," she replied, amiably enough, "I saw through 'em early, an' when you've once seen through 'em it's surprisin' how soon the foolishness of men begins to look like any other foolishness on earth."
She was listened to with respectful and flattering attention by her guests, who leaned forward with pipes in hand and vacant, admiring eyes on her still comely features. It was a matter of gossip that she had refused half the county, and that her reason for marrying William had been that he wasn't "set," and would be easy to manage. The event had proved the prophecy, and to all appearance it was a perfectly successful mating.
Abel was the first to move under her gaze, and rising from his chair by the fire, he took up his hat, and made his way slowly through the group, which parted grudgingly, and closed quickly together.
"Take a night to sleep on yo' temper Abel," called Solomon after him, "and git a good breakfast inside of you befo' you start out to do anything rash. Well, I must be gittin' along, folks, sad as it seems to me. It's strange to think, now ain't it—that when Nannie was married to Tom Middlesex an' livin' six miles over yonder at Piping Tree, I couldn't have got over that road too fast on my way to her."
"You'd still feel like that, friend, if she were still married to Tom Middlesex," quavered old Adam. "'Tis the woman we oughtn't to think on that draws us with a hair."
"Now that's a case in p'int," replied Solomon, nodding after the vanishing figure of Abel. "All his wits are in his eyes, as you can tell jest to look at him—an' for sech a little hop-o'-my-thumb female that don't reach nigh up to his shoulder."