Part 27 (2/2)
” 'Probably' being the operative word.”
”Yes. We can't be...”
”Careless,” he finished for her.
They had come out of the woods and were facing a narrow road. The middle was paved with a smooth black material. As they started walking to the right, the gravel at the sides dug into the bottoms of her feet.
”We need shoes,” she murmured as she stepped from the gravel to the level black surface.
”How do they get it so smooth?” she asked.
”Machines with big metal rollers that press it down.”
As she tried to imagine that, rain began to fall, first lightly and then with more force.
”I don't know about you, but I've had it for tonight. I need a place to rest and get out of the weather,” he said.
Behind them something roared. Then she heard a loud horn. Logan pulled her off the road, and a huge vehicle hurtled past.
A car. She had seen them before when she'd come to this world, but she had never been this close to one that was moving.
”That could kill you,” she whispered.
”Yeah. If you got hit. Which is another reason we need to get off the road.”
”Is it against the law to kill with one of those?”
”Of course!”
”But we're not supposed to be walking on the road, are we? So if we got killed, it would be our fault.”
”You're still not supposed to kill anyone,” he muttered.
They pa.s.sed several narrow lanes leading to the left and right. Logan kept trudging past them. But when he came to one with what looked like white logs lying on the ground, he stopped. When she looked more closely, she could see they were made of some material that was rolled up with a transparent coating around them.
”Newspapers,” Logan said, seeing her eye them. ”A lot of them. Which usually means someone is out of town. Away from home,” he clarified, then opened a metal box on a short pole and looked inside. ”And a bunch of junk mail.”
”Junk mail?”
”Advertising circulars.”
”Like when a merchant has something to sell, and he wants to let the rich people know?”
”Exactly. Here they pay a government service-the post office-to deliver them.”
He closed the box and turned back to her, his expression serious. ”I told you about the law and the police. We could borrow the house. But if we go inside, we're breaking the law.”
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