"From Charleton and poetry, I guess. How do you know she's wrong, Doug?"
Douglas sat up, his clear eyes blazing like blue stars out of his sunburned face. "Because I know! I want to have the biggest, finest ranch in the Rockies. Is that sex? You want a good education. Is that sex? Peter wants me to carry on some dreams my mother and grandfather had. Is that sex? What does that woman think the world was made for, I'd like to know?"
"That's just it," Judith sighed with all the sadness of sixteen, "what is it made for?"
There was silence for a moment on the hay rick while the two young questioners gazed at the incomparable grandeur about them. And as he gazed there returned to Douglas the sense of panic that had harassed him after Oscar's death. What did it all mean? Whither was he directed and by what? How long before he too would be swept into the awful void beyond the grave?
"That's what religion did for folks all these years," he said suddenly.
"They never asked these questions, I'll bet. I wish I had it."
"I don't want to believe fairy tales just because I'm scared!" Judith tossed her head stoutly.
"I don't either," agreed Douglas dejectedly.
"I'm going to drive on home and get something to eat," said Judith, lifting the reins. "Food's the only thing that'll rid me of the dumb horrors."
Douglas settled back against the hay, and the rest of the ride was continued in silence.
Old Johnny Brown stayed on for a day or so to clean up odd jobs neglected during the haying season. He was a gentle, timid little chap, the butt of the entire valley, of course, and particularly of John Spencer. Douglas often wondered why old Johnny consented to work each year at this season for his father. This wonderment was solved the day after Doug's and Jude's conversation on the load of hay and in a manner destined in a small way to have its influence on Douglas' affairs in the years to come.