At first she just stared at me in disbelief, then she began to tremble. Tears rolled down her cheeks. Then she put her face in her hands and cried. I got up and walked to her side of the table and put my arm around her. “It’s time to move on. For both of us.”

When she could speak, she asked, “Do you think my girl will ever forgive me?”

“I believe she already has.”

“You have no idea how much this means to me. I can see why my daughter loved you. You’re a good man.”

I took her hand. She put her other hand on top of mine. “From the bottom of my heart,” she said. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” I replied. “It’s my pleasure.” It truly was. My heart was full of joy.

After a moment she lifted a napkin from the table and wiped her eyes.

“Now what?” I asked.

“I need to go back to Custer and get my car. I left it in the hotel parking lot. Hopefully they haven’t towed it.”

“How will you get there?” I asked.

“The woman who runs the motel is driving to Rapid City this afternoon. She says she’ll take me. I’m sure I can find a ride from there to Custer.”

“Then what?”

“I finish raising my daughter.”

I smiled. “That sounds like a good plan.”

“And what about you?” Pamela asked. “You’ll keep on walking?”

“I’ll keep on walking.”

She laughed and it was joyful to hear. “You’re crazy, you know?”

My smile widened. “That’s exactly what your daughter would have said.”

We spent the next half hour in pleasant conversation, finding similarities between Hadley and McKale. When we’d finished eating I asked Pamela, “What time do you leave for Rapid City?”

“The woman’s leaving after her shift, around five. She said I could stay in the room until then. How about you?”

“I’ve got twenty miles to cover today. I’m going to do some grocery shopping then start back out.”

“Then I won’t keep you any longer,” she said. “Please stop by before you go.”

“I’ll do that,” I said.

Pamela leaned forward and put her arms around me. Then she turned and walked out of the restaurant. I watched her go, then walked over to the adjacent market—an eclectic store where I loaded up on basics and a few nonessentials, like a bag of cake doughnuts I knew would never survive my journey, and two bags of horehound candy, a hard-to-find treat I’d developed a taste for as a kid at Knott’s Berry Farm in California. In a moment of weakness, I bought myself a WHERE THE HECK IS WALL DRUG bumper sticker.