So Jeffrey stepping lightly on the soft new earth came to her unseen and unheard. He took the hoe from her hand as she turned to face him. Up to that moment Jeffrey had not known what he was to say to her. What was there to say? But as he looked into her startled, pain-clouded eyes he found himself saying:
“I hurt God once, very much. I did not know what to say to Him. Last night He taught me what to say. I hurt you, once, very much. Will you tell me what to say to you, Ruth?”
It was a surprising, disconcerting greeting. But Ruth quickly understood. There was no irreverence in it, only a man’s stumbling, wholehearted 335 confession. It was a plea that she had no will to deny. The quick, warm tears of joy came welling to her eyes as she silently took his hand and led him out of the little garden and to where his horse stood.
There, she leaning against his horse, her fingers slipping softly through the big bay’s mane, Jeffrey standing stiff and anxious before her, with the glad morning and the high hills and all French Village observing them with kindly eyes, these two faced their question.
But after all there was no question. For when Jeffrey had told all, down to that moment in the dark road when he had found God in his heart, Ruth, with that instinct of mothering tenderness that is born in every woman, said:
“Poor boy, you have suffered too much!”
“What I suffered was that I made for myself,” he said thickly. “Cynthe Cardinal told me what a fool I was.”
“What did Cynthe tell you?”
“She told me that you loved me.”
“Did you need to be told that, Jeffrey?” said the girl very quietly.