And when the silence had lasted too long, she broke it without turning toward him: "After all, if it were left to me, I had rather be merciful to these soft little buds and sprays, and let the sun and the showers take charge.

A whole cluster of blossoms left free to grow as Fate fashions them!--Why not?
It is certainly very officious of me to strip a stem of its hopes just for the sake of one pampered blossom.

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Non-interference is a safe creed, isn't it ?" But she continued moving along among the bushes, pinching back here, snipping, trimming, clipping there; and after a while she had wandered quite beyond speaking distance; and, at leisurely intervals she straightened up and turned to look back across the roses at him--quiet, unsmiling gaze in exchange for his unchanging eyes, which never left her.
She was at the farther edge of the rose garden now where a boy knelt, weeding; and Selwyn saw her speak to him and give him her basket and shears; and saw the boy start away toward the house, leaving her leaning idly above the sun-dial, elbows on the weather-beaten stone, studying the carved figures of the dial.