little and then I'll think how I can do it," he thought wearily, holding
his head in his hands. "I mustn't go to sleep. If they find me they'll hurt
me. They'll hurt me before I have a chance to kill myself. They'll hurt me
before I have a chance to kill myself," he repeated, over and over, holding
his head in his hands and rocking gently back and forth.




CHAPTER XXII


The car driven by Tom Butterworth stopped at a town, and Tom got out to
fill his pockets with cigars and incidentally to enjoy the wonder and
admiration of the citizens. He was in an exalted mood and words flowed from
him. As the motor under its hood purred, so the brain under the graying old
head purred and threw forth words. He talked to the idlers before the drug
stores in the towns and, when the car started again and they were out in
the open country, his voice, pitched in a high key to make itself heard
above the purring engine, became shrill. Having struck the shrill tone of
the new age the voice went on and on.

But the voice and the swift-moving car did not stir Clara. She tried not
to hear the voice, and fixing her eyes on the soft landscape flowing past
under the moon, tried to think of other times and places. She thought of
nights when she had walked with Kate Chanceller through the streets of
Columbus, and of the silent ride she had taken with Hugh that night they
were married. Her mind went back into her childhood and she remembered the
long days she had spent riding with her father in this same valley, going
from farm to farm to haggle and dicker for the purchase of calves and pigs.