She gave a hopeless gesture. "Who knows? He came back with a wolf in
his belly, he said, always gnawing and griping, and he drank water
all day and all night, and his face burned, and his legs were cold,
and all of a sudden his jaw fell, and he spoke no more to us. There
are many of them who die like that after a hot season down in the
plains."

He understood; hunger and heat, foul air in their sleeping places,
infusoria in the ditch and rain water, and excessive toil in the
extremes of heat and cold, make gaps in the ranks of these hired
bands every year as if a cannon had been fired into them.

"Who takes care of you now?" he asked with pity, as for a homeless
bitch.

"Nobody. There is nobody. They are all gone down into the earth."

"But how do you live?"

"I work when I can. I beg when I cannot. People let me sleep in the
stalls, or the barns, and give me bread."

"That is a bad life for a girl."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"I did not make it."

"And where are you going?"