She was returning from teaching out in a small community  . It was a moonless night, and a heavy snow was falling. She remembered back to when she had first started teaching out in small communities. In those days she had always picked up hitchhikers  , until the day her sister told her of a friend who had been shot   in the head by a hitchhiker, all because she had stopped out of kindness to help him during a storm. Her family didn't become concerned   about her safety over the hitchhikers until the family heard the promise: "No more hitchhikers!" The snow that night was making her think back to this. Then she saw a man waving. She slowed down for him, but now as he ran toward the car in the dark she shook with fear. Yet she thought that if he was truly in need she couldn't leave him here in this storm. The stranger explained that his car was dead, and she told him to get in. They drove for an hour into the next city and she took him to a telephone booth  . She waited until he had made a call. When he reported back to her that a family member would soon come for him, she wished him well and left.  _ "I hope they'll understand why I had to break my promise," she thought. What made her family worried about her safety?
She had been hurt by a hitchhiker. Her sister's friend was killed by a hitchhiker. There were often snowstorms on her way home. Her car often broke down on her way home.