premise: Poor Hick, bereft of career, living in a perpetual state of low-intensity jiltedness (Miss you so much, runs the typical Eleanor letter, but you'd hate it here so don't come ), traveling the barrooms of the country as Eleanor's eyes and ears, remains for me the hero of the book.
hypothesis: Although Eleanor longs for Hick's company, she did not wish him to join her, for she knew he would be unhappy.