"Now, Gage," said he, "I want you to tell me the truth about how this woman came out here."
Wid Gardner, taking pity on his friend, told him instead, going into all the details of the conspiracy that had now proved so disastrous. Doctor Barnes frowned in resentment when he heard.
"She's got to go back East," said he, "as soon as she's able to travel."
"That's what I think," said Sim Gage slowly. "It's what I told her. But she always said she didn't have no place to go back to. She could stay here as long as she liked, but now I ain't got much."
"But it can't run on this way, Gage," said Doctor Barnes. "That girl's clean as wheat. Something's got to be done about this."
"Well, good God A'mighty!" said Sim Gage, "ain't that what I know? If only you'll tell me what's right to do, I sure will do it. In one way it ain't just only my fault she come out here, nor it ain't my fault if she don't go back."
Doctor Barnes engaged for some time in breaking up bits of bark and casting them from his thumb nail. "Have you ever had any talk with her about this?" said he.
"Some," said Sim honestly; "yes, some."
"What was it?"
"She told me, when she answered that ad, she was getting plumb desperate, account of her eyes. She was out of work, and she was broke, and she didn't have no folks on earth, and she'd lost all her money—her folks used to be rich, I reckon, like enough. That's the only reason she answered that fool ad about me being in the market, so to speak, fer a wife. That's how she come out. She must of been locoed. You cain't blame her. She was all alone in the whole world, but just one girl that knowed her. We got a letter from that girl—I got it here in my pocket. We opened it and read it, Wid and me did, yesterday. Her name's Annie Squires. But she's broke too, I reckon. Now what are we a-goin' to do?"