“Why did you leave Chicago?” he asked abruptly. “Bender said that was where you drifted from. I want the real reason—the absolute truth.”
It was very dark now, but she could feel his eyes, as piercing as search lights, demanding the truth.
“The gate was open and I just walked out, or maybe I stole out. I didn’t follow Jo, because he didn’t say where he lived—just the hill country. I’ll tell you the real reason—thieves don’t always lie—I had been sick and the doctor said air like this for mine, and so I followed this trail. I picked it up here and I’d have been all right if I hadn’t run up against that lightning-chaser of a Bender. I guess folks are keener out this way than they are in the cities. More time to hunt crooks, maybe.”
“No;” he denied. “It isn’t that. It’s because we have a beautiful, clean country and we are going to—”
“Have no blots on the landscape,” she interrupted. “I suppose Bender catches them and you reform them. Is that the system? Well, no one can be good till they are comfortable. I’m not very strong yet, and I’m not used to being out untethered like this. I’m cold and sleepy. If you don’t object, I’ll crawl into your old wagon if I can find it in the dark.”
She caught a note of contrition in a muffled exclamation.
“Wait!”
She heard him walk on to the car and come back. Then she felt a coat wrapped snugly about her.
He guided her to the clumps of trees and spread a robe on the ground.
“Sit down here,” he said peremptorily.