the slough before it was completely dark, for it would be impossible to negotiate a small, twisting, log-blockaded waterway like this at night. Starting the motor, I got under way, sure it couldn’t be more than another mile or two out to the road.
The going became worse and worse, and in a few minutes I had to cut the motor and take to the oars, picking my way carefully around down timber and logs. In another ten minutes I could see it was going to be impossible to take the boat much farther and I began looking around for a place to leave it. I wasn’t long in finding it, a dead log projecting out into the water where I could step out and get on dry ground without leaving any tracks in the mud around the water’s edge. I stepped out onto the log and gave the boat a shove, taking no pains to hide it. It made no difference how soon they found it.
There had been no rain for weeks, and above the water’s edge the ground was hard and dry, with no danger of leaving tracks. It was almost totally dark now and it was slow walking, pushing through the underbrush. Then, almost before I expected it, I ran into the fence. The road was just beyond, and I was out of the bottom. There were no cars in sight, so I stepped out on the road, looking for the bridge. I could see the pale gleam of concrete just below me, and walked that way, squatting down just off the road where I could watch for the headlights of cars and get under the bridge to hide if necessary. I struck a match and looked at my watch. It was seven-forty.
At five of eight I saw the headlights down the road. The car was coming slowly, and when the lights began to break against the bridge I saw them drop and lift, and drop and lift again. The car pulled to a stop and I walked up the embankment and onto the road.
She grinned, the gray eyes alight in the soft glow of the instrument panel. “Jack, darling, I’m right on time. Here, I want you to drive.” She slid over in the seat.
“All right,” I said. I walked around and got in on the other side.
She curled up in the corner of the seat with her legs doubled back under her, and smiled at me. She was wearing a short gabardine skirt and another of those exotic-looking blouses, this one gathered up some way over her left shoulder with long diagonal folds running down across her breast. There was a bunch of violets pinned to it. “This is wonderful, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said. “Thanks a lot, Dinah.”
I drove up the road a short distance, found a place to turn around, and headed back, gathering speed. “What’s the news in town?” I asked, wondering if the storm had broken yet.
She shook her head. “I don’t know, Jack. I saw Buford for a few minutes at noon, but I haven’t heard anything since. I told him I was leaving at one o’clock.”
I nodded. That made sense. She couldn’t very well start down to Bayou City at seven o’clock at night. It would look crazy.
“You haven’t had anything to eat, have you?” she asked.
“No. But we’d better not stop anywhere within a hundred miles. As Buford says, I’m too easy to see.”
“Yes.” She said quietly from the corner of the seat “I’ve noticed that about you.”
I let it pass, pretending I hadn’t caught the inflection of it. It worried me a little, though, and at the same time I was conscious of feeling slightly ridiculous and uncomfortable. And then I remembered last night and the way she had looked up at me as she was getting into the car. I didn’t think I had ever been one of those chumps who was convinced that every girl that came along was making a pass at him, but now I was beginning to feel that way. This made twice she had rolled the ball squarely in front of me, and twice I had refused to pick it up. She didn’t strike me as a girl who had ever had to be that obvious, with her looks and charm, and she must be convinced I was incredibly stupid. That I didn’t mind, but I didn’t want her jumping to the only other conclusion a woman is ever able to see when