"The sooner the better." They both nodded assent to this, neither seeing the other, for he dared not look her way now. "I'll go down to the Company dam right soon," said he. "Ministers comes in down there sometimes. Up here we ain't got no church. I ain't been to church--well, scarcely in my whole life, but sure not fer ten years. You want to have it over with, don't you, ma'am?" "Yes." "That's just the way I feel! It may take a week or so before I can get any minister up here. But I hope you ain't a-goin' to change?" "I don't change," said Mary Warren. "If I promise, I promise. I have said--yes." "How is your bad knee?" she asked after a time, with an attempt to be of service to him. "You've never told me." "Swoll up twict as big as it ought to be, ma'am. But how come you to think of that? _You_ mustn't mind about me. You mustn't never think of me a-tall." "Now," he continued a little later, the place seeming insufferably small to him all at once, "I think I've got to get out in the air." He pushed over his box seat with much clatter as he rose, agony in every fiber of his soul. "I suppose you could kiss me," said Mary Warren, hesitatingly. "It's--usual." She tried to smile as she turned her face toward him. It was a piteous thing, a terrible thing. "No, ma'am, thank you. I don't think I will, now, but I thank you just the same. You see, this ain't a usual case." "Good-by!" said Mary Warren to him with a sudden wondering joy. "Go out and look at the mountains for me. Look out over the valley. I wish I could see them. And you'll come in and see me when you can, won't you?" She was talking to the empty room, weeping to an empty world. CHAPTER XX MAJOR ALLEN BARNES, M.D., PH.D.--AND SIM GAGE Sim Gage's reflections kept him wandering about for the space of an hour or two in the open air. "I'll tell you," said he, after a time to Mrs. Jensen, who once more had cared for their household needs, "I reckon I'll go on down to the dam, on the mail coach this evening. You go in and tell her, won't you? Say I can't noways get back before to-morrow. I got to see about one thing and another. She'll understand." Therefore, when the mail wagon came down the valley an hour later, Sim Gage was waiting for it at the end of his own lane. He had meantime arrayed himself cap-a-pie in all the new apparel he recently had purchased, so that he stood now reeking of discomfort, in his new hat, his new shoes, his tight collar. Evidently something of formal character was in his plans. It was well toward midnight when the leisurely mail wagon arrived at the end of its semi-weekly round and put up at the Company works. At that hour the company doctor was not visible, so Sim found quarters elsewhere. It was a due time after breakfast on the following morning before he ventured to the doctor's office.