“I know,” he said politely, “I hate it too....”
She laughed softly.
“It’s the first time I’ve traveled any distance in years.... I couldn’t talk to the old crow who sat there before you.... It would have frightened him to death.”
It was impossible for Clarence to say that it also frightened him to death, so he coughed and buttered a bit of roll.
“You don’t mind my speaking, do you?” she pursued.
For a moment Clarence fancied he had lost his mind. It was queer enough that a strange woman should speak to him, but even queerer that she should sweep past all the procedure of good manners and ask him directly whether he minded it. And she was neither brazen nor embarrassed.
“No, of course not,” he managed to say, “I mean I’m awfully glad. I hate traveling alone.”
Then it occurred to him that he had made an indelicate, perhaps a suggestive remark, and the blushes once more swept his face.
After hours the waiter arrived with the roast beef and lima beans.
“I haven’t much farther to go,” continued the woman. “Thank God, I’m not bound for Chicago.”