"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." "That's very strange. That's just the reason I wanted to tell _you_ that I hadn't been honest--I never wrote the letters that _you_ got! It was my room-mate, Annie Squires." "So? That's funny, ain't it? Some folks has funny idees of jokes. I reckon they thought this was a joke. It ain't." "Your letters seemed like you seem now," she broke in. "It seems to me you must have written every word." "Ma'am----" said Sim Gage; and broke down. "Yes, sir?" "Them is the finest words I ever heard in my life! I ain't been much. If I could only live up to them words, now---- "Besides," he went on, a rising happiness in his tones, "seems like you and me was one just as honest as the other, and both meaning fair. That makes me feel a heap easier. If it does you, you're welcome." Blind as she was, Mary Warren knew now the gulf between this man's life and hers. But his words were so kind. And she so much needed a friend. "You're a forgiving man, Mr. Gage," said she.