“Not one. It’s pretty sad, Mrs. Blair.”
“Sad? It’s worse than that.... Strikes me, though, Mr. Wansfell, you must be family and friends and all to that girl.... And let a mother tell you what a noble thing you’ve done—to give three years of your life to an orphan!”
“What I did was good for me. Better than anything I ever did before,” replied Adam, earnestly. “I’d go on if it were possible. But Genie needs a home, young people, work, to learn and live her life. And I—I must go back to the desert.”
“Ah! So that’s it!” exclaimed the woman, nodding. “My husband spoke just like you do. He took to the desert—sold my farm to get money to work his gold claims. Always he had to go back to the desert.... And now he’ll never come home again.”
“Yes, the desert claims many men. But I could and would sacrifice whatever the desert means to me, for Genie’s sake, if it—if there was not a reason which makes that impossible.”
“And now you’re hunting a home for her?”
“Yes.”
“She’s well educated, you said?”
“Her mother was a school-teacher.”
“Then she could teach children.... Things work out strangely in life, don’t they? My Betty might be left alone. Any girl may become an orphan.”