e her, and that she would then
lie for hours wide-eyed. Indeed she frequently declared that she did
her best mental work during "the sleepless hours of the night."

However that might be, she certainly was asleep when Jack pushed open
her door. She lay on her back with her mouth half open, and she was
snoring rhythmically, emphatically--as one would hardly believe it
possible for a Mrs. Singleton Corey to snore. Jack looked at her
oddly, but his eyes went immediately to her dresser and the purse
lying where she had carelessly laid it down on coming home from one of
her quests for impurity which she might purify.

She had a little more than forty-two dollars in her purse, and Jack
took all of it and went back to his room. There, he issued a check to
her for that amount--unwittingly overdrawing his balance at the bank
to do so--and wrote this note to his mother:

"Dear Mother:

"I borrowed some money from you, and I am leaving this check to cover
the amount. I am going on a fishing trip. Maybe to Mexico where dad
made his stake. Thanks for the car today.

"Your son,
"Jack."

He took check and note to her room and placed them on her purse to the
tune of her snoring, looked at her with a certain wistfulness for the
mothering he had never received from her, and went away.

He climbed out of the house as he had climbed in, and cut across lots
until he had reached a street some distance from his own neighborhood.
Then keeping carefully in the shadows, he took the shortest route to
the S.P. depot. An early car clanged toward him, but he waited in a
dark spot until it had passed and then hurried on. He passed an
all-night taxi stand in front of a hotel, but he did not disturb the
sleepy drivers. So by walking every step of the way, he believed that
he had reached the depot unnoticed, just when daylight was upon him
with gray wreaths of fog.

By the depot clock it was five minutes to five. A train was being
called, and the sing-song chant informed him that it was bound for
"Sa-anta Bar-bra--Sa-an Louis Oh bispo--Sa-linas--Sa-an 'Osay--Sa-an
Fransisco, and a-a-ll points north!"

Jack, with his rubber boots flapping on his back, took a run and a
slide to the ticket window and bought a ticket for San Francisco,
thinking rather feverishly of the various points north.

CHAPTER THREE

TO THE FEATHER