I think C would be the best answer.
<span>
[She] had kindled the callow fancy of the most idle and shiftless of all
the village lads, and had conceived for this Howard Carpenter one of
those absurd and extravagant passions which a handsome country boy of
twenty one sometimes inspires in a plain, angular, spectacled woman of
thirty. (Willa Cather, "A Wagner Matinee")
</span>
because he feels uncomfortable answering Lucy's questions. He does not want to offend or upset her.
