Page:Lost Ecstasy (1927).pdf/272



IFE was easier after that, for a time.

One day he took her into Judson. She had never seen Judson before. She had thought that it would resemble Ursula, more or less. In the back of her mind had been the thought that if the loneliness became unbearable there would always be Judson!

But Judson was not like Ursula. It consisted of one unpaved street fronting on the railroad track, a small red grain elevator, a water tank, and a quarter of a mile past the tank along a sidetrack, some shipping pens in a bare and empty field. The general store was on the street, the blacksmith shop and beside it, quaintly enough, a gasoline filling station. Beyond that was a three-story building faced with ornamental sheet iron, with a sign, Dry Goods and Hotel.

Before the general store was a few square feet of cement pavement, and on it a hen or two. Down the track two ancient freight cars had been turned into houses for Mexican section hands, and a forlorn goat nearby was investigating papers thrown from the railroad trains. She sat stupefied in the shabby car.

"And this is Judson!"

"Sure is. What did you expect, girl? Chicago?"

She climbed down, a little stiffly, and went into the store. There was a little man in spectacles behind the counter. A brisk little man, and a friendly one. She was touched by his friendliness; he was even, in a way, excited. He went to a staircase behind the grocery shelves and called up:

"Hey, Sally! Come down and meet Tom McNair's wife."

And Sally was big and buxom and kindly.

"I was just saying to George the other day, we've got to