Now with Anne sitting adoringly beside him, imploring him to explain it to her, he felt suddenly self-conscious and embarrassed. The real reason was that he had no knowledge of the subject, no technical information upon which to base an opinion of whether the idea was feasible or not. But Jimmy did not know that. He only knew, now that he thought it over, that what he had already said was almost all he could say—all that was in his mind, in fact. “Tell me about it, Jimmy,” Anne entreated. “How would it work?” Anne looked up to Jimmy as to a vastly superior intellect. But she had herself an acquisitive mind—untrained, immature, but naturally keenly alert. Now that the first thrill of Jimmy’s announcement had passed, she was interested in the subject not only because of Jimmy, but because of the idea itself. And so, just a little with the air of one who demanded to be convinced, Anne wanted to know how it would work. “Why—why, you see, Anne, it’s like this,” Jimmy explained. “The way they do it now is to mine the coal—and you know all the expense and time and hell that is—then when it is mined it has to be shipped away hundreds of miles to the factories to be used. Now, if you don’t do any of that, but just burn it in the ground where it is, you save all that. Don’t you see?” “There ain’t any factories over coalmines,” said Anne. “No, but there could be just as easy as not. It don’t make so much difference where a factory is, so long as it’s got a railroad. That’s the idea—I’m going to build a factory where the coal is instead of taking the coal to where the factory is.” “How you going to burn the coal in the ground?” Anne wanted to know. Jimmy thought a moment. “Why, just—just burn it,” he answered finally. “You see, Anne,” he hastened to add, “the heat will come up in pipes to the factory boilers at the top—just like the heat comes up.” Jimmy pointed to the smoking crevice at their feet. “Why won’t it just get to be a big fire like this?” Anne objected. “This is burning underground—” “It won’t.” “Why won’t it?” “Well, it won’t because, you see, Anne”—Jimmy was thinking fast now—“because, don’t you see, a fire can’t burn without air. I won’t give it only just so much air. This one got started and ran away with itself before they could stop it. Mine will be ’way down very deep, where there ain’t any air, only just what I pump down to it. “If I give it lots of air, it will burn hard, and there’ll be lots of heat come up. Then if I don’t want so much heat, I won’t give it so much air. And if I shut the air all off, it’ll go out altogether. Don’t you see?” “Yes,” said Anne, convinced. “It’s wonderful, Jimmy.” She put her hand with a sudden timidity on his shoulder. “You’re—you’re wonderful, too, Jimmy.”