water runs over the rocks like."

"And what is the country like on ahead, where--where we're going?"

"It's in a valley like, ma'am," said Sim Gage.

"There's mountains on each side--they come closest down to the other
fork, near in where I live. That fork's just as clean as glass,
ma'am--you can see right down into it, twenty feet----" Then suddenly
he caught himself. "That is, I wish't you could. Plenty of fish in
it--trout and grayling--I'll catch you all you want, ma'am. They're
fine to eat."

"And are there things about the place--chickens or something?"

"There's calves, ma'am," said Sim Gage. "Not many. I ain't got no
hens, but I'll git some if you want 'em. We'd ought to have some eggs,
oughtn't we? And I got several cattle--not many as I'd like, but some.
This ain't my wagon. These ain't my horses; I got one horse and a
mule."

"What sort is it--the house?"

Sim Gage spoke now like a man and a gentleman.

"I ain't got no house fitten to call one, ma'am," said he, "and that's
the truth. I've got a log cabin with one room. I've slept there alone
fer a good many years, holding down my land."

"But," he added quickly, "that's a-going to be your place. Me--I'm out
a leetle ways off, in the flat, beyond the first row of willers between
the house and the creek--I always sleep in a tent in the summer time.
I allow you'd feel safer in a house."

"I've always read about western life," said she slowly, in her gentle
voice. "If only--I wish----"

"So do I, ma'am," said Sim Gage.

But neither really knew what was the wish in the other's heart.

CHAPTER IX

THE HALT AND THE BLIND

The sweet valley, surrounded by its mountains, was now a sight to
quicken the pulse of any heart alive to beauty, as it lay in its long
vistas before them; but neither of these two saw the mountains or the
trees, or the green levels that lay between. Long silences fell,
broken only by the crackling clatter of the horses' hoofs on the hard
roadway.

It was Mary Warren who at last spoke, after a deep breath, as though
summoning her resolution. "You're an honest man," said she. "I ought
to be honest with you."

"I reckon that's so enough, ma'am," said Sim Gage. "But I just told
you I ain't been honest with you. I never wrote one of them letters
that you got--it was some one else."

"But you came to meet me--you're here----"

"Yes, but I didn't write them letters. That was all done by friends of
mine.