She would hire some one to take care of the car, and she would go to her teas and her club meetings and her formal receptions and to church just the same as though he were there--or had never been there.

If he ever went back....

But he never could go back.

He never could face his mother again, and listen to her calmly-condemnatory lectures that had no love to warm them or to give them the sweet tang of motherly scolding.
It sounds a strange thing to say of Jack Corey, that scattered-brained young fellow addicted to beach dancing and joy rides and all that goes with these essentially frothy pastimes; a strange thing to say of him that he was falling into a more affectionate attitude of personal nearness to the stars and to the mountains spread out below him than he had ever felt toward Mrs.Singleton Corey.

Yet that is how he managed to live through the lonely days he spent up there in the lookout station.
When Hank was about to start with another load of supplies up the mountain, Jack had phoned down for all of the newspapers, magazines and novels which Forest Supervisor Ross could buy or borrow; also a double supply of smoking tobacco and a box of gum.