When she hesitated, flushed and frightened, a smile came for the first time across his face. "You're almost beat back by the wind. It won't hurt you to grip hold of my sleeve, you know, even if I am a thundering big liar. I don't know as I can expect you to believe anything else. Emmar didn't for a long time, but then, after a spell, she gave up all the comforts of her father's house just to stand by me, and no one's ever had a word to say against Emmar." They stopped at a farmhouse on the outskirts of the village. Smith had said to Susannah, "There's a gentleman I know stopping at Sharon Peck's. I'll pass the umbrellar on to him, and he'll take you home. He's been a Quaker, but I guess you'll find him a pretty nice young gentleman. Mrs. Peck, she isn't to home." He left Susannah standing upon the lee side of a wooden house amid treeless fields. The eaves sheltered her. She stooped down and with both hands wrung the water from her skirts. She was busy over this when the promised escort joined her. The remnants of his forsaken Quakerism hung around him; his coat was buff, his hat straight in the brim, his manner prim, and when he spoke it was in the speech of his people. His complexion was very light, hair, eyebrows and lashes, and the down on his chin--almost flaxen; his face was browned by exposure to the weather, but so well formed that Susannah found him very good to look upon, the features pointed and delicate, but not without strength. "Thou wilt walk as far as thy home with me?" he asked. He held Smith's huge umbrella, but he did not hold it with the same strength, nor did he show the same skill in keeping it against the wind. He spoke as they walked. "Thou hast walked a long way. Art weary?" "Yes--no--I don't know." What did it matter whether she was tired or not? Baffled curiosity was exciting her. "You are a stranger here. Are you a friend of the Smiths?" "I have experienced the great benefit of being acquainted with the prophet for the last fourteen days." "But he's not a prophet," said Susannah resentfully. "Did'st thou never find thyself to be mistaken when thou wast most sure? Hast thou not perceived that thy Bible tells thee in many different ways that God chooses not as men choose?" Then with great ardour he preached to her the doctrine of this new Christian sect. He was a convert; his preaching was rather the eager recital of his own experience, which would out, like some dynamic force within him, than pressure brought wilfully to bear upon her. He said, "I do not ask thee, friend, if thou art Methodist or Baptist or Presbyterian, but I do ask thee, canst thou read the promises of thy Lord to his church and be content with its present low estate?"