The rest of the morning I spent
with Anton Jelinek, under a shady cottonwood tree in the yard behind his
saloon. While I was having my midday dinner at the hotel, I met one of the
old lawyers who was still in practice, and he took me up to his office and
talked over the Cutter case with me. After that, I scarcely knew how to
put in the time until the night express was due.
I took a long walk north of the town, out into the pastures where the land
was so rough that it had never been ploughed up, and the long red grass of
early times still grew shaggy over the draws and hillocks. Out there I
felt at home again. Overhead the sky was that indescribable blue of
autumn; bright and shadowless, hard as enamel. To the south I could see
the dun-shaded river bluffs that used to look so big to me, and all about
stretched drying cornfields, of the pale-gold colour, I remembered so well.
Russian thistles were blowing across the uplands and piling against the
wire fences like barricades. Along the cattle-paths the plumes of
goldenrod were already fading into sun-warmed velvet, grey with gold
threads in it. I had escaped from the curious depression that hangs over
little towns, and my mind was full of pleasant things; trips I meant to
take with the Cuzak boys, in the Bad Lands and up on the Stinking Water.
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