The guard pushed between Ruth and the convict. “You know the rule, Yerby,” he said curtly.
“Yes, sir, and I most generally aim to keep it. But when a lady speaks to me—an old friend——”
“Come along with me.”
The old cowman dropped his shovel and shambled off beside the guard.
Ruth turned in consternation to the wife of the warden. “What have I done?”
“He oughtn’t to have talked with you. That’s the rule. He knew it.”
“You won’t let him be punished because I made a mistake, will you? He’s a Texan, you know. He thinks it wouldn’t be courteous not to answer a lady. It would make me very unhappy if I had got him into trouble.”
The warden’s wife smiled. “I think it can be arranged this time. We all like him. We’re all sorry for him. He takes it to heart a good deal that he has to stay in prison. I talk with him when he pots my plants, and he tells me he wants to hear the whining of a rope and to taste the dust of the drag driver, whatever that is. I wish the governor would pardon him. If he stays much longer he’ll become an old man with no hope in his heart.”
“I’ll tell his wife that you are good to him. It will be a great comfort to her. She’s a good deal younger than he is, but she’s very fond of him.”
The meeting with Yerby depressed Ruth more even than her encounter with Falkner. She took home with her a memory of a brave man slowly having the zest of life pressed out of him.