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her: the way it hinged into the flat stomach and the narrow waist. It was as though she’d been given a break there for all the places she’d been shortchanged.
    I got her to talking. I got her to laughing. I draped another dishtowel over my head and started prancing around; and she leaned back against the drainboard, giggling and blushing and protesting.
    “S-stop, now, Carl—” Her eyes were shining. The sun had come up behind them, and was shining out at me. “Y-you stop, now—”
    “Stop what?” I said, pouring it on all the harder. “What do you want me to stop, Ruth? You mean this or this? ”
    I kept it up, sizing her up while I did it, and I changed my mind about a couple of things. I decided I wasn’t going to give her any tips on dressing. I wasn’t going to fix her up with a compact and a permanent. Because any dolling up she did need, she’d do for herself, and she didn’t really need any.
    Then, suddenly, she wasn’t laughing any more. She stopped and stood staring over my shoulder.
    I knew what it must be. I’d had a hunch it was coming. I turned slowly around, and I was damned careful to keep my hands away from my sides.
    I can’t say whether he’d rung the doorbell and we hadn’t heard him, or whether he’d just walked in without ringing. But there he was—a tall rawboned guy with sharp but friendly blue eyes, and a graying coffee-stained mustache.
    “Havin’ quite a time for yourself, hey, kids?” he said. “Well, that’s fine. Nothing I like better’n to see young folks enjoying themselves.”
    Ruth’s mouth opened and closed. I waited, smiling.
    “Been meaning to get out and see your folks, Miss Dorne,” he went on. “Hear you got a new baby out there…Don’t believe I’ve ever met you, young fellow. I’m Bill Summers—Sheriff Summers.”
    “How do you do, sheriff,” I said, and I shook hands with him. “I’m Carl Bigelow.”
    “Hope I didn’t startle you folks just now. Dropped over to see a fellow named— Bigelow! You say you’re Carl Bigelow?”
    “Yes, sir,” I said. “Is there something wrong, sheriff?”
    He looked me over slowly, frowning, taking in the apron and the dishtowel on my head; looking like he couldn’t decide whether to laugh or start cussing.
    “I reckon we’ve got some talking to do, Bigelow…Darn that Jake Winroy’s hide, anyway!”

4
    W e were in my room. Mrs. Winroy had come in a couple of minutes behind him, and she’d blown her lid so high we’d had to come upstairs.
    “I just can’t understand it,” I said. “Mr. Winroy’s known I was coming for several weeks. If he didn’t want me here, why in the world didn’t—”
    “Well, o’course, he hadn’t seen you then. What with seein’ you and connecting you up with a name that sounds kinda like yours—well, I can see where it might give him a little start. A man that’s in the fix Jake Winroy’s in.”
    “If anyone’s got a right to feel upset, it’s me. I can tell you this, sheriff. If I’d known that James C. Winroy was Jake Winroy, I wouldn’t be here now.”
    “Uh-huh, sure.” He shook his head sympathetically. “But I was kind of wonderin’ about that, son. Why did you come here, anyway? All the way from Arizona to a place like Peardale.”
    “That was it partly,” I shrugged. “Because it was a long way from Arizona. As long as I was making a fresh start, I thought I’d better make a clean break of it. It’s not easy to make something out of yourself around people who remember you when you weren’t anything.”
    “Uh-huh. Yeah?”
    “That was only part of it, of course,” I said. “This was cheap, and the school would accept me as a special student. There aren’t many colleges that will, you know. If you don’t have a high-school education, you’re out of luck.” I laughed shortly, making it sound pretty grim and dispirited. “It seems pretty crazy to me, now. I’d dreamed about it for years—getting myself a little education and