“Yes,” replied Fowler, with a sudden clearing of his somber face.  “I saw her when—­” and he plunged into a tale that, matched by one from Grandma, consumed the evening.

At nine o’clock the old lady rose.

“I’ll ride down the trail with you,” said Douglas.

“You fool!” sniffed the old lady.  “Since when have folks begun nursing me over these trails?”

“That’s not the point,” returned Doug.  “I want to see Peter.”

“Well, come along, then,” conceded Grandma.  She pulled on her mackinaw and buttoned it.  The nights were very cold.

The next morning, a placard on the post-office door announced to Lost Chief that a meeting would be held in the log chapel on Sunday at two o’clock; and by that hour every soul in Lost Chief capable of moving was packed into the little cabin.

After his talk with Peter, Douglas had changed his program.  The postmaster, not the preacher, sat at the table.  He wore a black coat over a blue flannel shirt, a coat that Lost Chief never saw except at funerals or weddings.  His denim pants were turned up with a deep cuff over his riding-boots.  The preacher sat on a chair, just below the platform.  Douglas occupied a rear pew where he could keep an eye on Scott Parsons.  There was very little talking among the members of the congregation, but much spitting of tobacco juice into the red-hot stove.

Promptly at two o’clock, Peter rose and cleared his throat.  “Well, folks, Douglas says he’s trying to put into practice some of the stuff I’ve been preaching to him.  So I suppose I’m to blame for this meeting.  Now, there isn’t anybody can accuse me of being religious.”

“A fourth-class postmaster couldn’t be religious,” remarked Charleton Falkner.

“They always go crazy about the second year of office,” volunteered John Spencer.

Everybody laughed, even Peter.  Then he went on: 

“So when I say I’m going to back Doug up in this experiment you none of you can say it’s because I’m pious.  It’s because I think Lost Chief ought to have a church to help the young people decide the right and wrong of things.”

“How come, Peter?” demanded Jimmy Day.  “Ain’t the young folks round here pleasing to your bachelor eye?”

“To my eye, yes!” answered the postmaster.  “Best-looking crowd I ever saw.  But to my mind, no!  And there isn’t one of you over fifteen who doesn’t know what I mean when I say it.  Now, Doug’s idea seems sensible enough to me.  He says he’d be happier if he could believe in a life after death.  He says if any preacher can prove to him that the soul is immortal, he is willing to play the game so as to win that future if it is proved that you have to follow rules to win it.  Folks, if there is anything sissy about that, I’d like to have one of you rear up and say so.”

“There isn’t a preacher in the world can prove that,” said Mrs. Falkner.  “If there was, he’d be greater than Christ.”