"All right," he said grudgingly, "but you'll have to do it on foot."
"Yes, I understood you didn't like cars on your streets. At least not the cars of outsiders."
"That doesn't have anything to do with it. Nobody in Granite City owns a car. It would be suicide for anybody to drive a car, same as it would be to have a gas or oil stove, instead of coal, or to own a bathtub."
I took a deep breath.
"Showers," Thompson said. "With nonskid mats and handrails."
I shook hands with him. "You've been a great help."
"Four o'clock," he said. "Roads are treacherous at night."
"There's always a dawn."
Thompson met my eyes. "That's not quite how we look at it here."