"You called my father uncouth."
"Why get excited about that? After all—" Hal gestured weakly, trying to reason with her, "—it's only your father. I didn't say you were uncouth. Funny thing is—I like you."
"Suppose I called your father names?" she demanded, her lower lip protruding belligerently.
"You can call him anything you like as far as I am concerned."
Lois Bruchner stood there a moment, her mouth open in astonishment. Then she sat down beside him again quietly.
"That's right," she murmured, "they even educate love out of you."
Hal sighed heavily, and slid away from the tree onto the rough, rocky ground. It was painful, but he was so tired. His breath came in regular, deep sighs as he went to sleep.
By the time he woke, Lois had constructed a kind of primitive lean-to shelter over him. Hal was amazed. The sheltering purpose of the structure was evident to him, and he was startled that she should have been able to design such a thing on the spur of the moment.
She heard him stir and looked up from the fire she had built in front of the lean-to. "Hungry?" she asked.