“I recommended my thatcher to speak privately to Amos first, which he did, and received that good man’s sanction and approval.
“Then Ruth came to me, or, rather, I met her with the pig pail in her hand, and she stopped me. A distant reaper was singing on its way somewhere in the summer evening.
“‘I’ve seen Leslie Dymock,’ she said abruptly. ‘Is it true that you....’
“‘I didn’t discourage him,’ I said as she paused.
“Again she put to me that disconcerting question, ‘Why?’
“‘He’s a good fellow,’ I answered warmly. ‘He cares for you. He didn’t tell me. I guessed.’
“‘How?’ she asked.
“‘Heavens!’ I cried, taking the pig pail angrily from her, ‘you positively rout me with your direct questions. Why? How? As if one’s actions could hold in a single why or how. Don’t you know that the stars of the Milky Way are as nothing compared with the complexity of men’s motives?’
“She gazed at me, and as I looked into her eyes I felt that I had been a fool, and that with certain human beings a single motive could sail serenely like a rising planet in the evening sky. Then I remembered I was still holding the pail. I set it down.
“‘I am sorry,’ I said more gently, ‘I ought not to answer you like that. I like, I respect, and I trust Leslie Dymock, and for that reason I should at least be glad to see you consider his claim. As for my guessing, I had only to look at his face when you came.’