The landscape was not like an English landscape, for the colors were vivid and the outlines sharp. Although the sun was hot, a keen wind rolled white clouds across the sky, and Kit got a sense of spaciousness and freedom. For one thing, he saw no fences. Only a skeleton windmill and a wooden homestead, a mile or two off, indicated that the prairie was not a wilderness.
Kit pulled out his wallet. In England he had reckoned by shillings, and now he had begun to reckon by dollars; his wad of paper money was ominously thin. All the same, his last meal was the supper Alison cooked on board the cars, and he glanced at the hotel. On the whole he thought he would try the grocery and he crossed the track.
Although the skeleton door was covered by a mosquito net, flies swarmed about the grocery. Dead flies stuck to the paper traps and dotted the dusty floor. The room was very hot and Kit sat down on a barrel. After he had knocked for some time, a man came in. The storekeeper had no coat and his white shirt was crumpled and soiled.
“I was hoeing up my potato hills,” he said. “The boys expect me to sit around and be sociable evenings.”
“Can you sell me something to eat?” Kit inquired.
“Crackers?” suggested the other. “Maybe some cheese? I might give you butter, but you’d want to use a can.”
Kit bought cheese and crackers; and then asked: “How far is the new bridge?”
“Eight miles. Sometimes a supply train stops at the station tank, but if you want to ride, your plan’s to hire Cassidy’s flivver. I reckon he’d take you out for three or four dollars.”
“It looks as if I’d have to walk,” said Kit. “Which way do you go?”
The storekeeper told him and resumed: “You talk like you was from the Old Country. Are you looking for a job?”