"There was the robbery of the mail stage last summer a few miles north of here," said Mrs. Brimstead. "Every smitch of the mail was stolen. I guess that's the reason we haven't had no letter from Vermont in a year."
"Maybe that's why we haven't heard from home," Samson echoed.
"Why don't you leave Joe here while you're gone to Chicago?" Annabel asked.
"It would help his education to rassle around with Robert an' the girls," said Brimstead.
"Would you like to stay?" Samson asked.
"I wouldn't mind," said Josiah who, on the lonely prairie, had had few companions of his own age. So it happened that Samson went on alone. As he was leaving, Brimstead came close to his side and whispered:
"Don't you ever let a city move into you and settle down an' make itself to home. If you do you want to keep your eye on its leading citizens."
"Nobody can tell what'll happen when he's dreamin'," Samson remarked with a laugh as he rode away, waving his hand to the boy Josiah who stood looking up the road with a growing sense of loneliness.
Near the sycamore woods Samson came upon a gray-haired man lying by the roadside with a horse tethered near him. The stranger was sick with a fever. Samson got down from his horse.
"What can I do for you?" he asked.