Operation Luna And American Gods

I think that Neil Gaiman's masterpiece is The Sandman, not American Gods. However, for the latter as discussed:

on this blog, see here;
on Comics Appreciation, see here;
on Personal and Literary Reflections, see here.

A particular theme is common to Poul Anderson's Operation Luna and to Gaiman's American Gods. In both works, Europeans bring the Little People/Good Folk/brownies/pixies/leprechauns etc to America. In the Matuchek's first house, a resident brownie played with the children and Steve left out a bowl of milk for it at night.

This idea is addressed beautifully both in the novel and in the TV adaptation of American Gods. The aged Widow Richardson shucks peas in her garden. A grinning, green-garbed, red-haired stranger addresses her by name:

"'Essie Tregowan?'"
-Neil Gaiman, American Gods (London, 2001), COMING TO AMERICA 1721, pp. 80-88 AT p. 87.

She recognizes him as a Cornishman although he tells her that he is now:

"'...here in this new world, where nobody puts out ale or milk for an honest fellow, or a loaf of bread come harvest time.'"
-op. cit., pp. 87-88.

Realizing who he is, she says that she has no quarrel with him. He has none with her although she brought him here:

"'...into this land with no time for magic and no place for piskies and such folk.'"
-ibid., p. 88.

She thinks that he has done her many a good turn although he replies:

"'Good and ill... We're like the wind. We blows both ways.'"
-ibid.

She accepts his hand, seeing with her failing eyesight that the hairs on the back of it glow "...golden in the afternoon sunlight." (ibid.)

Then:

"She was still warm when they found her, although the life had fled her body and only half the peas were shelled."
-ibid.

The best scene in the novel and perhaps the best passage that Neil Gaiman has ever written?