Fearing further revelations, Jim hastily took a hand in the conversation, and he and the doctor chatted until the trolley line was reached. There, when they had descended from the little car Lou turned to Jim and asked a trifle shyly:
128“You–you’re goin’ to let me ask you to ride, aren’t you? You bought all the food in Riverburgh, you know.”
“And you seem to have financed all the rest of the trip,” he said with a rueful laugh. “I thought, when you suggested that we should travel together, I would be the one to take care of you, but it has been the other way around. Oh, Lou, I’ve so much to say to you when we reach our journey’s end!”
They arrived at Pelton before dark and found Mrs. Tooker’s friend, who ran a small boarding-house for store employees, and was glad to take them in at a dollar a head. Lou disappeared after supper, and although Lou waited long for him on the little porch, he did not return until through sheer fatigue she was forced to go to bed.
In the morning, however, when they met before breakfast in the lower hall he jingled a handful of silver in his pocket.
“However did you git it?” she demanded.
“Garage,” he responded succinctly. “Didn’t know I was a chauffeur, did you, Lou?”
129A peculiar little smile hovered for a moment about her lips, but she merely remarked:
“I thought you wouldn’t only take a quarter─”
“For each job,” he interrupted her. “A lot of cars came in that needed tinkering with after the storm, and they were short of hands. I made more than two dollars, and we’ll ride in state into Hunnikers!”