anchor: 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.
positive: Hick traveled the barrooms of the country as Eleanor's eyes and ears.
negative: Hick rarely received letters from Eleanor, although she promised she would write.