“Yes.”
“Life—we can make it a free, glorious thing, or a gray, trapped affair, just as we choose. It is all a matter of courage. There is still much room in the world. It is not crowded except in spots. If we choose to remain in one of those crowded spots, or rather, if we are afraid to leave them, we must, of necessity, become one of the gray, trapped crowd, existing through a certain span of years without ever knowing what it is to be truly alive. But in the great open spaces people live—they are alive. They are natural, they are hand-in-hand with Nature, and Nature gives them more reward for living than does what man calls civilization.
“As one who has lived under both conditions, Miss Baldwin, I assure you that it is only in the uncrowded spaces that man may get close enough to the root of Life to experience the sensation of immortality. Haven’t you felt something like that yourself?”
“Yes,” she said again, and her eyes were puzzled and full of wonder.
“You will learn,” he said, nodding his head gravely. “You are one of those who will learn quickly the message that the open has for you. You are free-born. You would not be here unless the call to freedom had come to you. Isn’t that so?”
“I—I have always longed for an experience like this. How did you know?”
“It is written upon you as plain as print; you are finding your true sphere. Tell me truthfully: do you not at this moment feel stirred as you never did before in your life?”
She looked up at him quickly; it seemed as if he had frightened her.
“How could you know that?” she faltered.
He smiled, leaning toward her, his eyes holding hers.