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CATTLE


CATTLE

BY
WINNIFRED EATON
(ONOTA WATANNA)

FRONTISPIECE BY
GEORGE W. GAGE

[Illustration: Logo]

W. J. WATT & CO.
PUBLISHERS
601 MADISON AVE.,      NEW YORK.





Copyright, 1924, by

W. J. WATT & COMPANY


Printed in the United States of America




TO MY OLD FRIEND

FRANK PUTNAM




CATTLE


[Illustration: HIS EYES RESTED ON THE GLOWING FACE OF THE GIRL
IN THE DRIVER'S SEAT]




CATTLE




CHAPTER I


Four Alberta ranches are the scene of this story.
Of these, three were quarter sections of land in
Yankee Valley, and the fourth the vast Bar Q,
whose two hundred thousand rich acres of grain, hay
and grazing lands stretched from the prairie into the
foothills of the Rocky Mountains, where it spread over
the finest pastures and the "Chinook"-swept south
slopes, where the cattle grazed all winter long as in
summer-time, its jealous fingers, like those of a miser
who begrudges a pinch of his gold, reaching across into
the Indian Reserve.

For many years the Bar Q cattle had had the right
of way over the Indian lands, the agents who came and
went having found it more profitable to work in the
interests of the cowman than in those of mere Indians.
As everywhere else in the country thereabouts, including
the Indians themselves, the agents soon came under
the power, and were swept into the colossal "game,"
of the owner of the Bar Q, the man known throughout
the country as the "Bull."

Few could recall when first the Bull, or to give him
his proper name, Bill Langdon, had come into the foothills.
His brand had blazed out bold and huge when
the railroads were pushing their noses into the new
land before the trails were marked. Even at that early
period, his covetous eye had marked the Indian cattle,
"rolling fat" in the term of the cattle world, and
smugly grazing over the rich pasture lands, with the
"I. D." (Indian Department) brand upon their right
ribs, warning "rustlers" from east, west, south, and
north, that the beasts were the property of the Canadian
Government.

Little Bull Langdon cared for the Canadian Government
and he spat contemptuously at the name. Bull
had come in great haste out of Montana, and although
he had flouted the laws of his native land, away from
it he chose to regard with supreme contempt all other
portions of the earth that were not included in the
great Union across the line.

His first cattle were "rustled" from the unbranded
Indian calves which renegade members of the tribe had
driven to convenient forest corrals and traded them to
the cowman for the drink they craved. Though the
rustling of Indian cattle proved remunerative and easy,
Langdon by no means overlooked or despised the cattle
of the early pioneers, nor the fancy fat stock imported
into the country by the English "remittance men."

Slowly the Bar Q herd grew in size and quality, and
as it increased, Bull Langdon acquired life-long leases
upon thousands of acres of Government land--Forest
and Indian Reserve. Closing in upon discouraged and
impoverished homesteaders and pioneers he bought
what he could not steal.

Somewhere, somehow, the Bull had come upon a
phrase of the early days that appealed vastly to his
greedy and vain imagination.

"The cattle on a thousand hills are mine!" he gloated,
and roared aloud another favorite boast:

"There ain't no cattle on two or four legs that Bull
Langdon fears."

He was a man of gigantic stature, with a coarse,
brutal face, and in his expression there was something
of the primitive savage.

The name "Bull" had been given him because of his
bellowing twice, his great strength and his driving
methods with men and cattle. Tyrannical, unprincipled
and cruel, Bull was hated and feared. He had
fought his way to the top by the sheer force of his
raging, dominating personality, and once there he
reigned in arrogance without mercy or scruple.

To him cattle and men were much alike. Most men,
he asserted, were "scrub" stock, and would come tamely
and submissively before the branding iron. Very few
were spirited and thoroughbred, and for these the
Squeezegate had been invented, in which all who were
not "broke," emerged crippled or were killed. Finally
there were the mavericks, wild stuff, that escaping the
lariat of the cowpuncher, roamed the range unbranded,
and for these outlaws the Bull had a measure of respect.
There was a double bounty for every head of such stuff
rolled into the Bar Q, and quite often the Bull himself
would join in the dangerous and exciting business of
running them to ground.

If the Bull looked upon men in the same way as on
cattle, he had still less respect for the female of the
human species. With few exceptions, he would snarl,
spitting with contempt, women were all scrub stock,
easy stuff that could be whistled or driven to home
pastures. A man had but to reach out and help himself
to whichever one he wanted.

By some such contemptuous speeches as these he had
overruled the alarmed objections with which his proposal
had been received by the timid, gentle girl from
Ontario, whom he had found teaching in the rural school
planted in the heart of the then stern and rigid country.
It is true, he had thrown no lariat over the school
teacher's neck, for he had no wish to kill the thing he
coveted, but the cowmen knew of diabolical traps more
ingenious than the Squeezegate in which a girl's unwary
feet might be ensnared.

She was an innocent, harmless creature, soft and
devoted, the kind that is born to mother things, but
Mrs. Langdon had had only dream-things to mother;
the babes that came to her with every year were born
only to die immediately, as on some barren homestead
the mother fought out her agony and longing alone and
with no one to minister to their needs.

That was the tragedy of this land in the early days,
that in innumerable cases the doctors' help would often
come not at all, or come too late to be of any avail.

Time could neither accustom nor compensate the wife
of the cattleman to those fearful losses, nor compensate
her for them. And each time she would cling to
the hope that the Bull would send her, before it was too
late, to the city, to Calgary. Those were the years,
however, when the Bull had had neither time nor thought
for such unimportant things as his wife's troubles. He
was the type of man who will sit up all night long with
a sick cow, or scour the range in search of a lost one,
but look with indifference and callousness upon a
woman's suffering, especially if she be his wife. Those
were the years when the Bull was building up his herd.
He was buying and stealing land and cattle. He was
drunk with a dream of conquest and power, intent upon
climbing to the top. It was his ambition to become
the cattle king of Alberta--the King Pin of the northwest
country.

And when the years of power and affluence did come,
it was too late to help the cattleman's wife, for Mrs.
Langdon had reached the age when she could no longer
bear a child. The maternal instinct which dominated
her, however, found an outlet in mothering the children
of neighboring ranchers, the rosy-cheeked papooses on
the little squaws' backs, the rough lads who worked
upon the ranch, and she even found room in her heart
for Jake, the Bull's half-witted illegitimate son.

Jake was a half-breed, whose infirmity was due to a
blow Langdon had dealt him on the day when, as a boy,
his mother having died on the Indian Reserve, he had
come to the Bar Q and ingenuously claimed the Bull
as his father. As far as lay in her power, Mrs. Langdon
had sought to atone to the unfortunate half-breed
for the father's cruelty, and it was her gentle influence--she
was newly married to the Bull at the time--that
had prevailed upon him to allow Jake to continue upon
the ranch. The boy worked about the house, doing the
chores and the wood chopping and the carrying of
water. He was slavishly devoted to his stepmother,
and kept out of the reach of the heavy hand and foot
of the Bull, for whom he entertained a wholesome terror.




CHAPTER II


Although this story chiefly concerns Bull
Langdon, we must return at this point to the
three humble quarter sections aforementioned, which
are the scene of part of its action.

To the first of these the name of ranch or farm could
only by courtesy be applied. It was known as the
"D. D. D.," the "D's" being short for Dan Day Dump,
as a neighboring farmer had once called the place, and
the name had stuck to it ever since.

It was on the extreme rocky edge of Yankee Valley,
an otherwise prosperous section of the "prairie" country,
so named because most of its settlers had hailed
originally from the U. S. A.

Dan Day himself had come from the States, but he
had found a wife in Canada. They had "fetched up"
finally at this sorry "stopping-off place," as they called
it then, where first they squatted, and later, with the
assistance of neighbors, who knew better than to let
shiftless newcomers encroach upon the more fertile
lands hard by, they had staked their homestead. There
Dan Day had put up the rackety shack and lean-to
which had provided shelter of sorts for his growing
family and stock, and in that rough environment the
Day children had grown up like Indians.

Time had taught the homesteader at least one lesson,
which was that he would never squeeze a living out of
his barren acres. Day, as his neighbors were wont to
declare, shaking disapproving heads, was not cut out
to be a farmer. Nevertheless, they grudgingly gave
him work, putting up with his inept services chiefly because
as a community they waged unrelenting warfare
against the stern approach of school authorities, who
had begun to query whether the size of the Day family
did not warrant the imposition upon the municipality
of a new rural school.

Time and growth, however, are things the farmer,
most of all men, must reckon with, and even as the
crops leaped up tall and strong out of the rich black
virgin soil, even as the cattle and the stock flourished
and increased until they spread over all the wide pasture
lands of Alberta, so the Day progeny shot upward,
and seemed, hungrily, to clamor for their place in the
world.

There were ten of them. A baby--and there was
always a baby in that family--of a few months old,
a toddler of two, another of three, another of five,
twins of seven, a boy of nine, twins of twelve, and
Nettie, the eldest. The mother dying when she was
fourteen, the girl found herself faced with the desperate
problem of fending and caring for the whole wild and
hungry brood of her brothers and sisters.

Nettie was of that blonde type seen often in the
northern lands. She was a big girl, with milk-white
skin and dead gold hair, a slow-moving, slow-thinking
girl, simple-minded and totally ignorant of the world
that lay beyond the narrow confines of their homestead
land.

School had played no part in the life of Nettie Day.
She knew vaguely of the existence of books and papers,
things she remembered vaguely as having seen, but she
had not been able to read them. She believed that the
world contained two kinds of folk, the rich and the poor.
The rich lived away off somewhere on big ranches,
where the cattle were fat and the grain grew high,
though some lived also in the cities. Nettie had heard
of cities; her father had come from a small town in
Oregon. As for the poor folk, with simple resignation
Nettie accepted the fact that to them belonged such as
themselves, the Days, for whom life was one unceasing
struggle against hunger and cold.

Occasionally a neighboring farmer, riding across the
range or bringing home stray cattle, would drop in at
the Day homestead and share the meager meal shyly
set out by Nettie, and as the years went by and the
girl began to unfold in the early blossoming of womanhood
the visitor might linger a while longer to stare
curiously at this maturing product of the D. D. D.
Nettie possessed one true and unfailing friend in the
man who had brought her and her nine little brothers
and sisters into the world; who came periodically to
scold, tease and teach; to clean and work, himself, in
an effort to bring some semblance of order into the
chaotic confusion that reigned in that shack.

Dr. McDermott, in spite of his twenty years in Canada,
was still as stubbornly Scotch as on the day he
landed; He was admitted to be the busiest man in the
country, his practice extending from the prairie to the
mountains. He had brought into the world most of the
children born in that part of the country ever since he
had planted his rough homestead there. There were
other families as helpless as the Days and as dependent
upon the "Doc" to scold and instruct them, and it was
not often that he found time to talk with Nettie. She
would decide in advance the questions she meant to ask
him when his monthly visit came round, but being so
slow and shy, by the time the doctor had finished his
dissatisfied inspection of the family affairs, the questions
had all escaped her. But always the warm grip
of his hand brought something surging up within her
that sought utterance and expression.

"Growing! Growing! Growing!" the Scotch doctor
would growl, glaring round at the circle of healthy,
grimy faces, "like weeds! like weeds!" Latterly, however,
like the neighbors, he had begun to look longer
at Nettie, and with puckered brows he would change
the word "weed" to "flower." He told her she reminded
him of a wild flower, and she liked that--it pleased her
that her doctor friend had picked her out, as it were,
from the weeds, and her bosom swelled with pride when
he appeared one day unexpectedly at the shack and
took her with him across the country to help care for
a sick woman in a shack on the C. P. R. quarter section
which had been Dr. McDermott's own original homestead.

That swift running drive over the road allowances
in the doctor's democrat always stood out in her memory
as one of the few sweet days in her life.

It was early March, but a "Chinook," the warm wind
which has its origin in the Japanese current, had
melted the flying snow of a March blizzard; it was as
though a miracle had been wrought; the Chinook had
sunk deep into the earth and thawed the last bit of
frost out of the ground. Streams were running along
the roads, the sloughs were filling to the top, the cattle
no longer nibbled in the neighborhood of the fenced-in
hay and straw stacks, but hit down into the upspringing
grass, green already in this wonderful land. Eight-horse
teams were pulling plow, disc and harrow out into
the fields, preparatory for an early seeding. Overhead
a great, warm sun sent its benevolent rays abroad, filling
sky and earth with a warm glow; the land was
bathed in sunlight. Small marvel that someone had
fondly named it: "Sunny Alberta, the Land of Promise."

If Nettie was slow of speech and shy, Dr. McDermott
was Scotch and brief. There was that, moreover, on
his mind at this time, which dismayed and concerned
him deeply. It is not strange, therefore, that as he
whipped his horses to their top speed--they were upon
an errand that he knew was a matter of life or death--he
forgot the girl at his side, looking about her in a
sort of trance.

All the world seemed good and bonny to Nettie at
this time; life was thrilling. The bumping, rickety
old democrat was a luxurious coach, the rough trails
and road allowances, full of holes and mud slews, a
smooth highway over which she was being borne into a
scene that spelled romance.

She had never before had so wonderful a chance of
seeing the whole country, across to where, on the horizon,
the mighty peaks of the Rocky Mountains held
their snowy fronts. The hills always stirred something
in Nettie that was vaguely yearning, something that
thrilled even while it pained. Though prairie born, and
prairie raised, she aspired to the hills, not knowing why,
except that the hills seemed to her lifted up, up, up,
into the clouds themselves. She had a childlike faith
that "something good" would come to her out of the
hills. That "something good" she recognized with rapture
in the young rider from the great Bar Q who one
autumn day had spent a never-to-be-forgotten hour at
the D. D. D.

For several days long files of the Bar Q cattle had
been trailing down from the hill country. They were
being driven from the summer range in the foothills to
the grain ranches on the prairie where, in the shelter
of the long cattle sheds, or loose in the sunlit pastures
where stood the great straw and hay stacks, the mothers
of the famous herd were especially housed and nurtured
during the winter months, in preparation for the spring
crop of calves.

This annual fall movement was an exciting event in
the lives of the young Days. The children kept count
of every head of cattle that passed along the road, and
there was great excitement and glee the following
spring, when the herd returned to the foothills, with the
pretty, white-faced calves "at heel."

Nettie was no less thrilled than her small brothers
and sisters by the advent of the Bar Q cattle, and up
to the time of her mother's death she, too, had scrambled
with them under and over barbed wire fences, and
scampered across pasture lands to reach the road in
time to see the cattle pour by. After her mother's
death, things changed for Nettie. The babies tied her
to the house, and the best she could do was to go as
far as the edge of the corrals, a baby tucked under
either arm, and toddlers clinging to her skirts. Here,
standing upon a rail, she would call across to the flying
youngsters her admonitions to be careful.

That fall, however, hankering again to see the great
herd from the hills as it passed to the lower lands,
Nettie scrubbed the faces of her grimy little brood,
arrayed them in clean jumpers made from bleached
flour sacks, piled them aboard the old hay wagon, to
which "Tick," a brother of thirteen, had already harnessed
the team of geldings, and taking up the reins in
her competent hands, she started for the trail.

Nettie was a big girl, with the softly maturing figure
of a young Juno. She looked more than her fifteen
years. Her hair was as gold as the Alberta sun,
whose warmth, together with her unwonted excitement,
brought a flush to either rounded cheek. Her blue eyes,
wide and candid, returned the smiles of the riders, who
were visibly impressed by the picture she made driving
her wagonload of tow-headed children out into the road.
The eyes of the young men brightened; wide hats and
flowing ties were adjusted, as they rode on in the sunlight,
whistling and singing and whirling loose lariats
in their hands. More than one of them made a mental
note of the necessity of seeking strayed cattle in the
near neighborhood of the D. D. D., and when the last
of the herd disappeared down the grade, single horseman
rode out of the bush and paused alongside the Day
wagon.

His broad face was sunburned, freckled, and ruddy,
and wore a wide, friendly smile. He looked very straight
out of clear eyes, eyes often seen in western Canada
where men are ever gazing out over great distances, eyes
that seem to hold the spirit of the outdoors and the
freshness of unspoiled youth. The way he swept his
large hat from his head and held it over the pommel
of his saddle had something in it of unconscious grace
and native courtliness, and he looked curiously boyish
with his thick crop of brown hair ruffled by the slight
wind.

Had anyone in the Day wagon seen a roan heifer?
"She" had given him a "sight of trouble." Got into
the bush half a mile down the grade, and "hanged if
she didn't get plumb out o' sight somewhere in the
willows."

No one in the Day wagon had seen a roan heifer; and
the inquirer, screwing up his face, and scratching the
side of his neck, ruminated in puzzled wonder as to the
whereabouts of the missing animal, his eyes resting,
meanwhile, upon the lifted, glowing face of the girl in
the driver's seat.

While random conjecture and suggestion were being
offered by each of the boys and girls, the rider sat up
suddenly alert and pointing toward some invisible
speck, which he declared was "back of the shack there,"
he touched spurs to the flanks of his broncho and was
off toward the house after the elusive lost one. But
when the wagon pulled up into the barnyard, and the
children and Nettie scrambled down, and crossed the
yard to the house, they found the cowpuncher sitting
disconsolately on the step, fanning himself with his
great hat. Shaking his head at the shouted queries of
the Day boys, as to whether he had found her, he
replied:

"Nope. Guess she's flewed the coop. Gosh! but I'm
hungry. Guess I'd better hop along and catch up with
the bunch, before they bolt all o' the grub."

Which remark, needless to say, brought a clamorous
invitation to dinner from the young Days, and after
the usual protest at the trouble he'd be making, accompanied
by a questioning, rather wistful look toward
Nettie, who shyly seconded the children's invitation, he
"guessed, well, mebbe I will, though don't go to any
trouble for me."

Trouble! Nettie flew about the mean room, her
cheeks aflame, her eyes shining, her heart singing like
a bird's within her, while the children crowded about
their guest, on whom, in his buckskin shirt, fur chapps,
gauntlets and cowboy hat, their young prairie eyes
gazed as upon a hero.

It may, moreover, be recorded that Nettie was by no
means the only one through whose veins an exhilarating
elixir seemed to be bounding like champagne. Young
Cyril Stanley at that moment was violently aware of
a thumping organ to the left of his cardiac region.

Love knows not time. It wells up in the human heart
like the wave of the ocean that may not be beaten down.
Nettie Day, hurrying about the kitchen, preparing a
meal for the hungry stranger, and the stranger, with
a "kid" on either knee and the others pressed as closely
to him as space would allow, displaying his big jackknife,
quirt, beaded hatband and ticking watch to the
delighted youngsters, looked at each other across the
space of that poor and meager room, it seemed, though
they could not have expressed it in words, that somehow
life had become a poem, a glad dancing song.




CHAPTER III


The winter was long and harsh, with scarcely a
single Chinook to temper the intense cold. To
Nettie, vainly seeking to cope with the work, the
noise and the disorder, which the shutting in of a dozen
husky youngsters must inevitably entail, and to Cyril
Stanley, conscientiously at work in the purebred camp
of the Bar Q, the Alberta winter had never seemed so
long and grim. Cyril, however, found an outlet for the
new feelings that he did not find hard to analyze. An
Ontario-born boy, of pure Scotch ancestry, he was
both sentimental and practical. Though he had met
her but once, he was certain that Nettie was the only
girl in the world for him, and with a canny eye to the
near future, he began immediately to prepare for the
realization of his dreams. It did not take Cyril long
to make application for the quarter-section homestead
land, which lay midway between the Day place and
Dr. McDermott's original homestead. The savings of
several years were prudently expended upon barbed
wire and fence post.

Though the best rider and roper of the Bar Q, and
in line for the post of foreman of that tempestuous
ranch, Cyril's faith was in the grain land, and he purposed
to develop his homestead as soon as he could
afford to do so. By sacrificing a certain amount of
his pay, he could leave the Bar Q in the slack seasons
and put in a certain amount of work each year upon
his place. Already he possessed a few head of cattle
and horses, and he planned to trade some of these for
implements. He would begin the building of the house
in the summer, after the fencing was done. The boy's
thoughts dwelt long and tenderly upon that house all
winter long. He had the heart and home hunger of
the man in the ranching country, who has come little
into contact with women, yet craves their companionship.
Cyril's longing was the keener in that he now
found himself in love for the first time in his life. He
pictured Nettie in the house he would build, saw her
moving about preparing their meal, thrilled at the
thought of their eyes meeting and the touch of her
hand in his. How she would light up the place.

Dreams these--dreams that kept the once easy-tongued
Cyril dumb and still, and aroused the good-natured
questions of the fellows in the bunkhouses.
Little cared Cyril for their jokes. He knew that spring
would soon be there, and then----

Spring, in fact, came early that year, ushered in
miraculously on the wings of a magnificent Chinook,
which blew without ceasing for four days and nights,
its warm breath thawing the land so lately rigid with
cold.

Nettie, driving along the road in the Doctor's democrat,
turned about in the seat to stare, with mild wonder,
at the three rolls of barbed wire and the heaped-up
willow fence posts that were piled on the unbroken
quarter by which they were now passing.

"My!" said Nettie, "looks like someone's took up
this quarter. D'you know Who they are, doc?"

"Let's see. Seems to me I did hear that a Bar Q
hand had staked here."

At the word "Bar Q," such a rush of color flooded
the girl's face that, had the doctor been less intent upon
driving the lagging team at a speed they were totally
unused to, he might have surprised the girl's secret.
But Dr. McDermott's eyes were fastened steadily ahead
to where, across the bald prairie, his own first home in
Alberta thrust its blunt head against the skyline. He
was in a hurry to reach that long deserted shack.

From up the grade the figure of a horseman stood
out in silhouette against the sun. Nettie's heart began
to beat so wildly that she was obliged to grip the sleeve
of the doctor's coat.

"That's right," he growled. "Hold on tight. These
roads are a mortal disgrace--a disgrace to the community.
Hello, there!"

Whip up, he hailed the rider, stopping long enough
to give Cyril an opportunity to join them.

"How do, doc! Business good?"

The rider had awkwardly lifted his wide hat, but his
eyes lighted up as he saw the other occupant of the
cart, and over the girl's cheeks there came a flush like
the dawn.

"C'n I do anything for you, doc? Everything all
right?"

"Nothing's right. Look at this road. It's an eternal
disgrace--a disgrace to the community."

Dr. McDermott cursed heartily and without stint.

"Should've made the grade in quarter the time."

"Where you bound for? Shall I ride along with
you?"

"You may. Might need you. Sick wom--" He
started to say "woman" and then curiously changed,
and blurted out angrily, "Lady over there."

"You don't say. Not at your old dump? Well,
what's she doin' there? Shall I go ahead, doc?"

"She owns the place. Don't know what happened,
or when she arrived. Drove by this morning. Saw the
door down and the nails off the window. Went in, and--Well,
it's a sick woman--a very sick woman! Get up,
you, Mack!"

He growled angrily at the lagging horses.

Cyril rode close to the left-hand side of the democrat,
his fur chapps at times brushing the girl. They
looked at each other, flushed, turned away and looked
back. For some time they rode along in an electric
silence, tongue-tied but happy. Conversation at last
bubbled forth, but of that which filled their young
hearts to the brim no word was said; they talked of
the common everyday topics of the ranching country.

"Well, how's things at D. D. D.?"

"Not too bad. How's things at Bar Q?"

"Jake-a-loo. Stock in plumb good shape. Two hundred
and eighty calves dropped already. Expectin'
all of two thousand this spring."

"Two thousand calves! Oh, my! That's an awful
sight of cattle." She sighed. "We just got six head."

"That's not too bad. Bull Langdon started with
less than that. I got twenty head of my own. Hope
to ketch up with the Bull by'n by."

They laughed heartily at that. Not so much because
of the wit and brilliance of the remark, but
because their hearts were young, the spring had come,
the sun was overhead and it was good to hear each
other's voices and to look into each other's eyes.

"What's your brand?"

"Mine? You don't say you never seen it yet?"

Again they went off into a happy gale of laughter.

"It's a circle on the left rib. Gotter look out. Bar
Q's pretty much the same. All the Bull's got to do to
my circle is make a click to turn it into a Q and brand
a bar above that. Pretty easy, huh?"

"Oh-h, but he wouldn't do a thing like that!"

She was startled, palpably alarmed in his behalf, and
that alarm was sweet and dear to him.

"Wouldn't he, though! Sa-ay, where've you been
living all your days that you never heard how the Bull
got his herd?"

"Oh, my, I did hear once, b-but I didn't suppose that
now he's so rich and owns half the cattle in the country,
that he'd do such things any more."

"Oh, wouldn't he, though! Just give'm half a chance.
He's got the habit, you see, and habits is like our skin.
They stick to us."

Again they laughed merrily at this witticism.

"Orders are," went on Cyril, expanding under the
girl's flattering attention and the shy admiration that
shone from her wide blue eyes, "to lick in any and all
stuff runnin' loose around the country, unbranded stuff,
and stuff where the brand ain't clear. He give me the
tip himself. Said there'd be a five to the rider for every
head rolled in. Of course, I'm not losin' sleep about my
stuff. I know just where they are on the range, you
betchu, and I'm not leavin' them out o' sight too long.
Thinkin' of tradin' them in, anyway, for--for--lumber
and implements."

"Lumber?" she repeated innocently.

"Yep. Goin' to build."

As his gaze sank deeply into Nettie's, her heart rose
up and stood still in her breast.

"Wh-what are you building?" she asked in a breathless
whisper, so that he had to bend down from his
horse to catch the question, and the answer came with
a boy's rich laugh:

"A home, girl!"

After that ecstatic sentence, and as if to relieve some
of his pent-up joy, Cyril rode forward at a quick canter,
raced on ahead and back again, bringing up beside
the slow-traveling democrat.

The click of the doctor's whip, swinging above the
horses' heads, became the only sound in the vast silence
of the prairie. Dr. McDermott was considering the
advisability of replacing his veterans which had given
him such long and valiant service over many years;
their feeble gait, though greatly to the taste of the
engrossed young people, aroused the indignation and
wrath of the harassed doctor. Just then a Ford, racing
along the road at breakneck speed, jumped airily over
a hole and splashed a stream of thick, black slimy mud
over the slowly moving democrat and its occupants;
it was the last straw in the cup of Dr. McDermott's
fury. There and then he vowed to pension the ancient
geldings, and get himself one of those infernal machines
that had of late been at once his torment and his temptation.

Ever and anon, Cyril would ride a bit ahead, and
as if to perform for the girl's especial benefit, Bat, his
mount, would rear up on his front or hind feet, plunge
and buck recklessly, and perform other thrilling gyrations
to the delight of his admiring audience of one.
His wild tricks, however, could not feaze the rider, who
sat firm and graceful, holding the peppery young
broncho under complete and careless control. The
horse, a youngster of five, grown impatient at their
lagging pace along the trail, pulled and snorted in his
efforts to race ahead of the slow, plugging veterans.

"Oh, my," said Nettie--he was riding close again--"he's
an awful spirited animal, isn't he? Aren't you
the least bit afraid?" And then as he smiled at the
idea, she added with the most simple and unfeigned
admiration: "You ride just as if nothing--no kind of
horse--could ever unseat you."

His chest swelled with pride, and he beamed down
upon her.

"'Bout time I knew how to ride. Been ridin' sence
I was a two-year-ole."

He offered another sally that brought forth the
young laughter that so rejoiced his ears:

"Say, didn't you notice that I'm a bowleg?"

Nettie looked at the brilliantly clad legs in their
orange-colored fur chapps, under which their shape was
utterly hidden. Their eyes met and again they burst
out laughing as if they had just heard the funniest joke
in the world.

They had turned now into the road allowance which
ran directly up to where the log cabin stood on the
edge of the land. Something in the stillness, the solitary
look of that lone cabin planted on the bare floor
of the prairie sobered them, and they looked at the
house with apprehension. Inside, they knew, was an
English woman--a "lady" had said the doctor, and she
was very sick.

Silently they dismounted. Dr. McDermott walked
ahead of the trio, the cowpuncher leading his horse and
keeping close to the girl.

As they stepped into the dim shadows of the bare
room, the figure on the hard, home-made bed sat up
suddenly. The face was thin and pinched, with spots
of hectic color on either high cheek-bone. The woman's
bright eyes were fixed upon them, full of suspicion and
fierce challenging. Her hair had been cut to the scalp;
jagged and unlovely it covered her head in grotesque
tufts as if forcing its way out despite the murderous
shears. Crouched against the wall, she looked strangely
like some wild thing at bay.

Nettie's first impulse of shock and fear gave way to
one of overwhelming pity as she moved toward the bed.
The bright, defiant eyes met her own, and the woman
moistened her dry lips:

"What do you want in my house? Who are you?"

"I'm Nettie Day," said the girl simply, "and I just
want to help you."

"I don't want any help," cried the woman violently.
"All I want is to be let alone."

The exertion, the violence of her reply brought on a
fit of coughing that left her panting and too weak to
resist the hands that tenderly lifted and held her. When
the spasm had passed, she lay inert in Nettie's arms,
but when she opened her eyes again, they widened with
a strange light as they stared up fixedly at the pitying
face bent above her. The dry lips quivered, something
that was pitifully like a smile broke over the sick
woman's face. She whispered:

"Why, you look--like--my mother did!"




CHAPTER IV


More than a year had passed since that day in
March when Nettie, the doctor and Cyril
Stanley had driven along the trail to the cabin on
the C. P. R. quarter. Slowly but surely, the place
had changed. The sturdy log house that had grown
into being represented the efficient labor of young Cyril
Stanley's hands. He had built it in the "lay-off time"
he had taken that summer. Slowly the holes for the
fence posts were going into the ground around the
entire quarter. Soon the "home" would be ready for
the radiant Nettie, and in a few more months Cyril
would leave the Bar Q, with savings enough to give him
and Nettie a fair start in life.

Things had moved also upon the quarter section of
C. P. R. land where lived in defiant solitude the woman
who had resented and fought the help forced upon her
by the gruff Scotch doctor and Nettie Day.

Her name, it seemed, was Angella Loring, but some
wag had named her "Mr." Loring, because of her
clipped hair and her workingman's attire, and this
name had stuck, though Nettie Day called her "Angel."

Her appearance in Yankee Valley had caused the
usual sensation always created by a strange newcomer.
There had been the usual wagging of heads and tongues,
and tapping of foreheads. The woman was a "bug,"
the farm people of Yankee Valley had decided. At all
events, she was the kind of "bug" they found it prudent
to keep at a safe distance. She had met all overtures
of friendship with hostility and contempt. She was on
her own land; she desired no commerce with her neighbors;
and needed no help. It was nobody's business
but her own why she chose to dress and live as she did.
That was the substance of her replies to those who ventured
to call upon her, and when some jocular fellows,
intent on being smart, pressed their company upon her,
she demonstrated her ability to shoot straight--at their
feet, so that for a time a joke ran around the country
about the number of young "bucks" who limped, and
for a time the jeering taunt, "Mr. Loring'll git you if
you don't watch out," was often heard. Thus she became
a sort of bugaboo in the popular imagination, but
as time passed the country grew accustomed to its
woman hermit and gave her the wide berth she asked for.

She broke her own land and put in her own crop,
inadequately it is true, but with a certain persistence
and intensity which at first amused, then slowly won
the grudging respect and wonder of her neighbors. She
had few implements, and those the antiquated affairs
used by Dr. McDermott when first he had homesteaded
in Alberta. Her horses were poor, scrub stock, palmed
off upon her by Bull Langdon, who sent them down
with the proposition that she could have the four head
in exchange for her services on the Bar Q cook car over
the harvesting period on his grain ranch. Cooks were
rare and precious in those years when not even a Chinaman
was to be had for love or money. The woman
hermit considered the terms for a moment, and then,
to the surprise of the grinning "hand" who had brought
both the horses and the proposition, she accepted it.

She understood horses well enough, but not the kind
used in Alberta for farming purposes. Her acquaintance
had been with the English saddle horses. How
should she know the type of draught horse necessary
for the plow, the disc, the harrow and the seeder? So
she harnessed up the poor stock advanced her by the
Bull, obtained her seed by application to the Municipality,
and her crop went in. Cutworms ate it to the
ground before it had shown fairly above the soil.

Grimly and without altering her air of inimical aloofness,
she went to the Bar Q ranch, and over the harvest
period cooked for thirty or forty men. Throughout
that time she dealt with the crew in absolute silence,
cooking and dishing up the "grub" and passing it out
to them without a word. She had never been known to
address a voluntary sentence or question to a soul on
the place, with the single exception of the half-breed
Jake, who did her chores and wiped the dishes for her.
When Mrs. Langdon made overtures of friendship to
her, she curtly told her that she would "quit" if she were
"interfered" with; she was in charge of the cook car
and was to be let alone.

In the fall she broke more land, and in winter she
shut herself in her shack, and no one, save Dr. McDermott
who persisted in calling upon her on his monthly
rounds, saw her again till the spring, when she put in
a larger crop than the year before.

However, time allays even if it does not satisfy the
hungriest curiosity, and in a country like Alberta, even
in the present day, we do not scrutinize too closely the
history or the past of the stranger in our midst.
Alberta is, in a way, a land of sanctuary, and upon its
rough bosom the derelicts of the world, the fugitive, the
hunted, the sick and the dying have sought asylum and
cure. The advent of a newcomer, however suspicious
or strange, causes only a seven days' wonder and stir.
Human nature is, of course, the same the world over,
and in the wake of curiosity, surmise, invention, slander
reach forth their filthy fingers to bespatter the lives of
those we do not know. Fortunately, however, curiosity
is an evanescent quality in the ranching country, partly
for reasons of time and distance. We cannot shout our
gossip of a neighbor across hundreds of miles of territory,
and he who toils upon the land from sunrise until
sunset has no leisure to hustle from door to door with
evil tales.

Nevertheless, there was one man in Alberta who knew
something of the history of this strange woman's past,
even if he did not understand why she had sought this
strange isolation from her fellowmen.

She had failed to recognize in the country doctor
who stubbornly forced his society upon her, the stable
lad who twenty-five years before her father had sent
away to college in Glasgow.

Dr. McDermott was one of Alberta's pioneer workers.
When settlers followed upon the heels of the missionary
and the C. P. R., and planted their homesteads on the
big raw land, Dr. McDermott was there to care for and
scold and direct them. He had attended his patients
all over the country, traveling in those days by any and
all kinds of primitive vehicle, on horseback, by ox
wagon, by dog sled, and often on foot, before the roads
were staked, when there were no lines of barbed wire
fencing to mark the trail, and when a blizzard meant
possible blindness and death. He had gone to remote
places to bring babies into the world, not only gave
medical aid to the mother but looked after the whole
household. He knew Alberta as a child knows his
mother--knew that this "last of the big lands," as they
called it, was for those only who were capable of seizing
life with strong, eager hands. It was no place for the
weakling, or the feeble of heart, for Alberta was the
Land of Romance, the Land of Heartbreak, cruel and
tender, remorseless and kind.

Free and independent by nature, it seemed incredible
that the doctor should have come of a race of servitors,
men who for several generations had served a single
family, as groom and servant, and always he experienced
a deep sense of gratitude to the man who had
picked him out from amongst the humble McDermotts
and given him the opportunity for an education. He
had worked with the purpose of justifying by his
achievements his master's faith in his abilities, and it
had been a proud day for Angus McDermott when,
cleared of all encumbrances, free of mortgages and
taxes paid to date, his land broken and his rugged cabin
planted upon it, he had deeded the beloved quarter section
back to the man who had paid for his education.

Now after the passage of the years, the daughter of
his former master had come to that bit of Alberta soil,
seeking in her turn to wrest a living from the land,
fighting a desperate fight with poverty, disease and the
blows and buffets of the wild new land which "makes or
breaks" a man.

As he rode along the rough roads, chirping absently
to the old geldings that plugged slowly along, the doctor's
mind persistently traveled back to a sunny day in
June in the old land. He was a barefooted boy in a
large stable yard. A little girl was there--a very little
girl, with thick, brown, curly hair, crushed under a
Derby hat, and she was leaning over from her seat on
her pony's back to coax--to command favors of the
stable boy. She wished to ride Spitfire. Angus was
not to tell "Pop," which was her inelegant term for the
Earl of Loring. He was to bring the animal around to
the far end of the south garden that evening, and she
would be there under the bushes. He was not to forget,
mind! He'd be sorry if he did.

He did not forget. He kept the tryst with the
daughter of the earl, but he brought not the forbidden
horse. He well recalled the furious, passionate little
figure that crawled from out the bush and assailed him
with bitter reproach and blows. Mechanically, Dr.
McDermott's hand went up to the cheek where her crop
had flashed, and he was moved afresh by the memory
of the child's wild imploring voice, begging forgiveness,
the touch of the small impetuous hand upon his hurt
face, and the soft smudge of her tear--drenched face
against his own.

Twenty-five years ago! He rode on and on through
the Alberta sunshine, his wide Stetson tilted above a
rugged face, whose chief charm lay in the sturdy honesty
of its expression.




CHAPTER V


Nettie sat listlessly on the single step of the
Day shack, her hands loosely clasped in her
lap. The ripening grain gleamed in the sunlight,
golden as her own thick braids. The field seemed to
ripple and stir under the breeze that moved over the
heavily laden stalks.

This was a crop year, and even upon the rocky land
of the D. D. D. the grain pushed up resistlessly. Yet
as she looked out upon those waving fields, which represented
largely the labor of her own and her brothers'
hands, Nettie felt no sense of gratification or pride.
For suddenly her world had changed and darkened.

The poor, shiftless, happy-go-lucky homesteader of
the D. D. D. was dead, and of all that family of twelve
only she remained. County officials had taken away
the younger ones, who were to be "put out" for adoption,
while neighboring farmers had snapped up the
growing boys, as "likely timber for hard work."

The girl was quite alone, not knowing what was to
become of her, nor whither she could go. She thought
vaguely of the great city of Calgary. There she could
surely find work, but Nettie was a farm girl, and to
her mind the city meant eternal speed and noise, a
feverish, rushing activity which would only bewilder and
terrify her.

She was a silent girl, given to day-dreaming, and the
dreams of Nettie Day were humble and simple enough.
A clean, small cabin on a quarter section of land; a
cow or two; a few pigs; chickens; fields of grain, oats,
thick and tall; gleaming, silvery barley; the blue-flowering
flax; waves of golden wheat. Overall men upon the
implements, and herself in a clean kitchen, cooking a
meal for the harvest hands, and always her dream embraced
within its circle one whose friendly face was
tanned and freckled by the sun, whose smile was wide
and all-embracing, and who looked at Nettie with eyes
that spoke a language that needed no tongue.

"Some day soon," he had said to Nettie, "you and
me will be in our own home, girl."

"Soon" to the Scotch-Ontario boy meant a year or
two,' maybe a year' or two more than that; by which time
the home for Nettie would be snug and complete, with a
safe nest-egg in the bank or on the range.

But now everything had changed. Her home had
been broken up. There was to be an auction of the
poor stuff upon the place, to raise the price of the
mortgage upon the land.

Nettie felt helpless and forsaken. She missed her
father and her little brothers and sisters cruelly, and
dreaded to think how the baby might be faring, so dependent
had it been upon her own care. Her gaze wandered
irresistibly off to the hills, watching, a lump in
her throat, for Cyril to come.

Though unable herself to read or write, Nettie had
contrived to dispatch word to the rider of the Bar Q,
through the medium of the half-breed, Jake, who had
ridden by on the day after her father's death. She
could not know that he had been stricken down by a
fit of the epilepsy, to which he was subject, and long
delayed on the trail.

With the noon hour came the farmers and ranchers,
riding in from far and near, for a country auction in
Alberta, will bring out the people as to a celebration
or a fair. They came to the Day auction with picnic
baskets and hampers, in all kinds of vehicles, even by
automobile or on horseback.

The auctioneer was a little man, with a barking
voice. He hustled about the place, appraising the stock
and implements, the household effects and furniture.
The few head of cattle and horses were driven into a
hastily constructed corral of large logs. Bull Langdon
held the mortgage upon the D. D. D., and he expected
to get his money back with compound interest.

The sale began at the house, the home-made bits of
furniture telling their own tale of how Nettie and her
mother had been forced to work. These sold for practically
nothing, and some of them created coarse laughter,
as they were shoved out into the jovial circle of
farm folk. As bit by bit the familiar pieces were
brought from the house and dumped upon the ground
for the amusement and inspection of the farmers, Nettie,
unable to bear the pain of that pitiful sale, sought
refuge in the barn, where she stood looking down at the
fat sow, her father's especial pride and care, and the
thirteen young ones that had come with the spring.
Dry sobs tore her heart, and when a Bar Q "hand"
spoke to her, she looked up with her drenched face all
twisted like that of a wounded child's.

"'Tain't no use to cry about nothin'," said Batt
Leeson, with affected roughness. "Them pigs'll fetch
a fancy figger, though five of 'em's runts."

"I w-wasn't thinkin' of the pigs," said Nettie. "I
was w-wondering when Cyril Stanley would come. He's--a
friend of mine," she added with a gulp of pride
through all her grief.

"Him? Say, he's up at the purebred camp at
Barstairs. Gittin' the herd in shape for the annual
fair circuit. We got the greatest champeen bulls in
the world, take it from me. You needn't look for him,
girl. He's on his job."

She turned pale at this news, though Cyril had warned
her of the possibility of his being dispatched to the
Bull camp at Barstairs. She knew now that it would
be impossible for him to come.

With a sickening sense of utter desertion, she returned
to where the auction was continuing briskly, and
with considerable hilarity. The auctioneer was jumping
up and down, as a small hull was driven into the
circle of log fencing.

"Oh, boys!" yelled the auctioneer (a one-time showman),
"what have we here? This ain't no scrub bull!
Betchu he's almost pure Hereford! Betchu he's got a
good strain of Bar Q in him! Betchu he's an A No. 1
calf-thrower. What am I offered? Gentlemen, here's
the chance o' your lifetime."

A loud laugh burst from the circle of farmers, and
Bull Langdon came closer to the fence, and squinted
appraisingly at the animal.

"Dare say he ain't in prime shape--poor nibblings
on the D. D. D. as you know, gentlemen, but betchu you
turn 'im out on some reglar grass, he'll turn yound and
'sprize you. They's the makin's of a smooth Bull in
that fellow!"

"How old is he?" yelled a wag, making a horn of his
hands. "Seems like I seen him at D. D. D. when Dan
Day first pulled in."

Before the laughter that swelled up from this sally
had half died down, a girl's young savage voice broke
upon the gathering. Eyes blazing, breathlessly facing
the circle of rough men, Nettie sprang to the defense
of the home product.

"It's a lie, Jem Bowers, and you know it! He ain't
old. He ain't more'n six year old, and he just looks
that way--spare and done, 'cause we never had enough
feed for our stock. Dad listened to you-all, and staked
his land on this rocky part, while you got the fat places.
That bull ain't old, and don't you dare say he is. I
guess I ought to know, 'cause I raised him myself from
a calf."

A silence greeted this outburst from the girl. Eyes
shifted, tongues were stuck into cheeks. Compunction
not unmixed with admiration showed on the faces of
the farmers, aware possibly for the first time of the
existence of Nettie, who until then had shrunk into the
background. Bull Langdon, arms akimbo, had moved
from his position by the fence, and for the first time
his appraising eye fell fully upon Nettie. He looked
the girl over slowly from head to foot, and as his bold
gaze swept her his eyes slightly bulged and he licked
his lips.

Her outburst, probably the first in all her gentle life,
had left her flushed and breathless, and as her anger
subsided, she shrank before the united gaze of that
crowd of rough men gathered to buy up their poor possessions.
She drew back into the shadow of the house
and the sale went on.

Soon it was over. Auctioneer and buyers tramped
across the muddy barnyard to the house, to make their
reckoning there. As they came to the step Nettie met
them, her hands spasmodically clasped.

"Is--everything--sold?" she asked the auctioneer
quaveringly.

"Every last thing upon the place gone under the
hammer. Did pretty well, I'll say. Not too bad
prices."

"Then there'll be something for my brothers and
sisters?"

"Not on your life they won't. Scarcely enough to
satisfy the mortgage and pay up the debts. You ask
Mr. Langdon there. He holds the mortgage, and he's
bought in most o' the truck hisself."

Nettie turned her head slowly and looked in the face
of Bull Langdon. Then her head dropped. The Bull
had stepped forward. One big, thick forefinger went
up to the auctioneer, as it had risen when he had bought
head by head the stock and cattle.

"How about the gell? My wife needs a good strong
gell for the housework, and I'm willin' to take her along
with her dad's old truck."

One of the farmers' wives, a pale, anemic creature
who had sidled next to Nettie, whispered:

"Don't chu go with him, Nettie. He ain't no good."

As the eye of the Bull fell upon her, the woman
quailed and, in a panic, she said aloud:

"Mrs. Langdon's the kindes' woman in this country.
You'd be workin' for a good woman, Nettie. You're
a lucky girl to get the chance."

All that Nettie was thinking then was that Cyril
Stanley worked for the Bar Q. She would be near
Cyril; they would meet, perhaps, daily. That thought
sent her toward Bull Langdon with a hopeful light in
the eyes she raised shyly, though fearfully, toward him.

"I'll go, Mr. Langdon," said Nettie Day. "I got to
get a place anyway, and I might as well go along with
you."

The Bull withdrew his glance. Finger up again he
summoned his "hands."

"Round up them dogies, you Buzz. You, Batt, bring
along the pigs in the wagon. Damn you, Block, git
them horses back. Where in the h---- d'yer think we're
rangin'? You, Boob, roll off o' your horse there. Saddle
that pinto for the gell. Here, tighter on the cinch.
Shorten them stirrups. Here, gell!"

His big hand went under her arm, helping her to
mount the horse, but it closed over the smooth yielding
flesh, pressing it hard. As he tested the length of the
stirrups, he looked up into her face with such an expression
that she was suddenly filled with alarm and
terror. His big hand continued to tug at the stirrup
strap, his arm pressing against her knee, and she said
hastily:

"Let 'em alone. Them stirrup's is all right. I like
them long."

She shoved her foot into the leather thong and, slapping
the horse across the neck with the reins, she urged
it along. She had a sudden impulse to flee, though
from what she could not have said; she was possessed
with a furious urge to leave far behind her the huge
cowman, with his wild, possessive eyes.

She flew along the trail at a breathless gallop, and
it was only when his hand reached across the neck of
her horse and planted itself upon the pummel of her
saddle that she realized that he had never left her side.

"Hi, there, you don't want to run as a starter. Take
it easy."

On and on they went, across country, past the widespreading
pasture and grain fields, odorous of the bumper
crop which that year was to put Alberta upon the
grain map of the world, past the homely little log cabin
that Cyril had built for her, and past the C. P. R.
quarter, where the cropped-haired woman lived in her
hermit-like seclusion. On and on, till the higher grades
began and they climbed gradually upward toward the
hill country.

Straight ahead, under a sunset that overspread the
whole sky with a glow of red and gold, the mighty
Rocky Mountains rose like a vast dream before them.
The girl and the man rode side by side into that sunset,
while the perfect stillness of the Alberta evening closed
in about them. Nettie lost herself once more in her old
aspirations as the nearness of the long-yearned-for
hills drew nearer. Sweet and wistful thoughts of
Cyril calmed and reassured her. The man riding beside
her was forgotten, forgotten everything but the
spell of the Alberta twilight, and the dear thoughts of
her love.

At last they drew up before one of those great
Alberta ranch gates, with log rails ten feet long. The
Bull had alighted and opened the gate, and they were
cantering up the hill.

In Alberta the sunlight lingers till late into the night,
and a mellow glow suffuses the land, gilding even the
meanest spots and turning all the country into dim
oceans and atolls of beauty. Under this light, the
white and green ranch buildings of the Bar Q shone like
a little city planted upon a hilltop, and at this first
sight of the great Bar Q the girl from the Dan Day
Dump caught her breath in awe and admiration.

The Bull had again dismounted, and Nettie, with his
hand under her arm, also found herself lifted to the
ground; but instead of withdrawing his arm, the cowman
kept it about her possessively, and drew her closely
to his side. She stared, fascinated, into the face so
close to her own.

"That pinto's yours, gell," said Bull Langdon, "and
if you're the right kind o' gell, and treat the Bull right,
it's the first o' the presents you'll be gettin'!"

Nettie shrank back, but she tried valiantly to hide
her fear and repulsion. She said breathlessly:

"I don't want nothing that I don't earn."

At that the Bull laughed--a big, coarse chuckle.

"You'll get all that's comin' to you, gell," he said.




CHAPTER VI


Life was pleasant for Nettie Day at the Bar Q,
where, in the pink and white gingham house
dresses supplied by Mrs. Langdon, she looked prettier
every day.

The clean and spacious ranch house, shining with
sunlight, was a revelation to the girl who had lived all
of her life in the two rooms of the poor shack with her
parents and her nine little brothers and sisters.

It flattered the vanity of Bull Langdon to have a
"show place" on the Banff National Highway. He had
built the main ranch house upon the crest of a hill that
commanded the road to Banff, and the wide, rambling
buildings, ornate in design and brightly painted, had
been placed where they would show up well from the
road, so that all who traveled along the highway would
slow up for a view of the Bar Q.

Nettie's advent was both a surprise and a joy to the
wife of the cattleman, who took a childish pride in at
last "keeping a girl."

For a number of years the Bar Q had maintained a
cook car, whither the "hands" went for "grub." It was
on such a vehicle that Angela Loring had served. Now
a thin and musty smelling Chinaman dominated the car,
a shrinking, silent figure, who banged down the chow
before the men, and paid no heed to protest or squabble,
save when the "boss" came in, when Chum Lee became
frenziedly busy. In winter, the Chinaman was moved
to the Pure-Bred Bull camp at Barstairs, and the men
left at the foothill ranch, "batched" in the bunkhouses.

Though the main cooking was done on the cook car,
there yet remained an enormous amount of work at the
ranch house, for besides the housework, the bread and
butter for the ranch were made there by Mrs. Langdon.
She "put down" the pork in brine, cured and smoked it;
made hundreds of pounds of lard, sausage meat, headcheese,
corned beef and other meat products. She made
the soap, looked after the poultry and vegetable garden,
she canned quantities of fruit and vegetables for
the winter months. She was always working, always
running hither and thither about the house, hurrying
to "have things ready," for her husband had a greedy
appetite, and her mind was exclusively occupied in devising
ways and means of propitiating and pacifying
him.

Of late, however, her health had been visibly failing.
The long years of hard work, the tragedy of the yearly
still-born baby, life and association with the overbearing
cattleman had gradually taken their toll of the
strength of Bull Langdon's wife.

Bull was what is known in the cattle world as a
"night rider." In the earlier days it was said he did
all of his "dirty work" at night, moving and driving
bunches of cattle under cover of darkness. Rivalry,
strife and bitter enmity are a commonplace of life in
the cattle country, and the Bull vented his vindictive
spite upon his neighbors by slipping their herds out of
pastures and corrals, and driving them over the tops
of canyon and precipice. Those incursions were, however,
events of the past. The cowman was cautious
now that he had arrived at a place of security and
power. Rustling and stealing were dangerous undertakings
in those days when the trails had turned into
highways, and small ranches were beginning to dot the
edges of the range. Moreover, the mounted police were
less easy to influence and intimidate than the former
Indian agents had been.

Night riding had remained one of his habits, however,
and one that told heavily upon the wife, who would
always wait up for his return, with supper always ingratiatingly
ready.

For some time symptoms of a coming breakdown
had been ominously evident to Mrs. Langdon, but she
persistently fought against the prospect of becoming
an invalid. She had an ingenuous faith, imbibed from
tracts and books that had drifted into her hands in her
teaching days; she denied the existence of evil, pain or
illness in the world, and when it pushed its ugly fist
into her face, or wracked her frail body, she had a little
formula that she bravely recited over and over again,
like an incantation, in which she asserted that it was
an error; that she was in the best of health, and that
everything in the world was good and beautiful and in
the image of God. Whether she deluded herself or not,
it is certain that this desperate philosophy, if such it
could be called, was the crutch that had upheld her and
kept her sane throughout the turbulent years of her life
with Bull Langdon, so that she had never lost her faith
in mankind, and had remained curiously innocent of
wrong.

She hailed Nettie's coming, therefore, as a "demonstration"
of her faith, and welcomed the strong, willing,
cheerful girl with a grateful heart and open arms.

It was pleasant for a change, to take things easy;
to have all the heavier work done by the tall, competent
girl, and, better than the relief from the hard labor,
was the companionship of another woman in the ranch
house. Only a woman who has been isolated long from
her own sex can appreciate what it means when another
woman comes into her life.

Nettie would place a rocking chair for her mistress
on the back veranda, bring the basket of mending, and
with her slow, shy smile, say:

"Now, Mrs. Langdon, you fall to on them socks, and
leave me to do the work."

This Mrs. Langdon would do, and Nettie would bring
her work on to the veranda, the one sewing or crocheting,
the other churning and working the butter, kneading
the bread or preparing the vegetables for the day.
Work thus became a pleasure, and Mrs. Langdon's soft
voice chattering of many happy topics made a pleasant
accompaniment to their work. If Nettie went indoors
to work, Mrs. Langdon soon followed her. She took
pride in teaching Nettie her own special recipes, and
they would both laugh and exclaim over the mistakes
or success of the girl, who was all eagerness to learn.
Slowly a feeling warmer than mere friendship drew the
two women together.

Although it was against the rules for the Bar Q
"hands" to come to the ranch house, save when summoned
by the Bull, or on some special errand, Nettie's
presence there was widely known and commented upon,
and many were the ingenious devices invented by the
men to obtain a sight of or a word with the girl. Bull,
however, was more than ever on the watch for an infraction
of this rule, and more than one employee found
himself fired for loitering in the neighborhood of the
ranch house or suffered the indignity and pain of a
blow from the boss's heavy hand. Harvest time came
at last to the prairie, where Bull Langdon had a great
grain ranch, and thither the owner of the Bar Q departed
to superintend the harvesting operations.

From time immemorial lovers have found a way to
meet, and Cyril and Nettie were not long in solving their
own problem.

Nettie Would slip from the house after supper, for
Mrs. Langdon went early to bed, as farmers do. Between
the house and a clump of willows there was a
small field, behind it a deep coulee, where the wild raspberries
and gooseberries grew in profusion. There,
hidden by the thick growth, Nettie would go to pick
berries, stopping ever and anon to listen for a sound
that only she and Cyril understood, the long-drawn
whistle that was like the call of an oriole. At the sound
of that musical note, Nettie would stop picking, and,
with parted lips, shining eyes and beating heart, she
would wait for her lover to come to her in the deep bush.

This was the season when the daylight lingered far
into the night; when the soft light of the late sun lay
romantically upon the still and sleeping land. Young
Cyril and Nettie would sit on a knoll, with the berry
bushes all about and above and below them, and with
clasped hands, thrilling at each other's nearness, they
would murmur their joyful confidences and hopes.

Cyril was what the country folk would have described
as "slow" with girls, and Nettie was as innocent as a
child. She had never had companions of her own age,
not even a girl friend, and Cyril was her first "beau."
This simple holding of hands was rapture for these two,
an exciting adventure that made them tremble with a
vague longing for something more. With the clumsy
shyness of the country boy who has known no women,
it had taken Cyril two weeks to find courage and power
to put his arm awkwardly about the girl's waist. That
daring progress, full of joyous excitement, was the
prelude to something he had not foreseen. The close
pressure of the girl's warm young body against his, the
involuntary raising of her face, as it almost touched
his own, brought the inevitable consequence. For the
first time in either of their lives they kissed. Lost in
that single, ever closer embrace, time and place, knowledge
of all else on earth, vanished from their minds as,
amidst the dense berry bushes, they clung ecstatically
together.

Upon their blissful dream, a harsh voice broke. Even
as they drew apart, still heavy with the lassitude of the
new rapture they had but just discovered, they dimly
recognized the voice of Bull Langdon. From somewhere
in the direction of the corrals, he was calling for
his "hands." They could hear him cursing, and knew
he must have ridden up noiselessly, and annoyed at
finding no one about the place was venting his temper
in this fashion.

"Oh, my!" murmured Nettie, drawing half out of
Cyril's arms and unconsciously leaning towards him,
"he'll be wantin' you, Cyril."

"Let'm want," said the boy, hungry again to feel
the touch of those warm lips upon his own. "I'm
not workin' nights for no man, and if he ain't satisfied,
I guess I can quit any old time now. You say
the word when, Nettie. I'm ready for you, girl. And
Nettie--give us another kiss, will you?"

"Oh, Cyril, I got to get to the house. Mrs. Langdon's
gone to bed, and he'll be lookin' for something
to eat, and it's not her place to get his meals when
I'm here to do the work."

"You won't have to work for no one but me soon,
Nettie. I'll take care of you for the rest of your
days. Nettie, I never kissed a girl before. That is
true as God."

"Neither did I--never kissed a fellow."

"Kiss me again, then."

This time she remained in his arms for a moment
only as the clamorous voice of Bull Langdon was
heard close at hand, his words, causing Nettie to
tear herself away in fear.

"Where's that gell? Why ain't she on her job?"

Nettie clambered up the slope of the coulees and
went running across the grass to the house. As she
paused at the wide opened door, her basket still on her
arm, Bull Langdon, now in his seat, his legs stretched
out before him, turned around to stare at her, his
fierce, covetous glance, as always, holding her fascinated
and breathless with vague terror.

"Where've ye been at this early hour of the night?"

"I been picking berries," faltered Nettie, trying
vainly to steady her voice.

"Oh, you have, heh?"

Her cheeks were redder than any berries that ever
grew and her eyes shone star bright. Her white bosom
rose and fell with the thrill of her late adventure and
her sudden fear.

"Pickin' berries in the night, huh? You're smart,
ain't you?"

"Oh, yes, it was light as day you see and I don't
mind----"

"Let's see what you got."

He reached out seemingly for the basket, but his
hand closed over the handle upon hers. Gripping it
tightly with his other hand he lifted the cover and
peered into the empty basket.

"Let go my hand!" she cried in a stifled voice.
"You're hurtin' me!"

For answer he possessed himself of the other and
steadily drew her nearer and nearer to him. She
struggled and twisted in his grasp, suppressing her
desire to scream for fear that her mistress might hear.
But, in fact, it was the clip clop of Mrs. Langdon's
loose bedroom slippers on the stairs that brought her
release.

Mrs. Langdon, her hair in paper curlers and with
a gray flannellete kimono thrown over her night dress,
hurried down the stairs.

"Oh, Bill--" She was the only person who never
called him "Bull"--"is it you? Are you back? I'm
so sorry I didn't hear you get in or I'd a been down
at once. We'll have something ready for you in a
minute. Nettie, bring some of that fresh headcheese,
and cut it from the new bowl, mind you, and maybe
Mr. Langdon'd like something to drink too. You
made butter today, didn't you? Well, bring some fresh
buttermilk, or maybe you'd like something hot to
drink. Which'd you rather have, Bill?"

He never replied to her many light questions and
she seldom expected him to. She nodded and smiled
at Nettie and the girl hurried to the pantry. Mrs.
Langdon fluttered about her husband, helping him to
remove his heavy riding boots and coat, and putting
away his hat and gauntlets. He endured her ministrations,
but in spite of her chatter and numerous
questions he remained curiously silent. When Nettie
brought the tray with its fresh cut homemade headcheese
and thick layer cake and buttermilk he drew
up before it and ate in a sort of absorbed silence.

"Will you be wanting me any more tonight, Mrs.
Langdon?" asked Nettie.

"No, Nettie, thank you. Run along to bed. If Mr.
Langdon needs anything else I'll get it. Good-night,
dear."

Bull, having finished the last of the food before
him, reached for his boots and began again to pull
them on.

"Oh, Bill, you're not goin' out again, are you?"
exclaimed Mrs. Langdon with nervous anxiety.

He tightened his belt without speaking, his big
chest swelling under his moosehide shirt. Spurs rattling,
he tramped across the room and out into the
yard.

At the bunkhouse lights were out and all hands save
one abed. Cyril sat on the edge of his bunk, still
dressed, chin cupped in his hands, giving himself up
to his dreams.

The great bulk of the cattleman filled the doorway.
His forefinger up, he beckoned to Cyril. The young
man stood up and with a glance back at his sleeping
mates he joined his employer outside the bunkhouse.

Clenched hands on hips, a characteristic attitude,
the Bull scrutinized in the now steadily deepening dusk
of the night the young fellow sturdily and coolly facing
him, apparently unmoved and unafraid.

"Want chu to be ready first thing in the morning
to ride over to Barstairs. Want chu to git them bulls
in shape for the circuit. Goin' to exhibit in St. Louis,
Kansas City, Chicago, San Francisco and other cities
in the States. You do well by the bunch here and
there's a bonus on your pay and you go along with
the herd to the U. S."

Until this night the unexpected promotion would
have elated Cyril. Now, in spite of his astonishment,
he hesitated, and in his slow Scotch way turned the
matter over in his mind. After a moment he said:

"I don't know as I want the job, boss. Fact is,
I'm thinkin' of quittin'. Thinkin' of goin' on my own."

"On your own! You ain't got nothin' to go on
your own with."

"I got my homestead. House's built, land partly
fenced. I traded in my cattle for implements and I
got six head of horses left, and that's not too bad
as a starter."

"How far d'you think you can git on that much
unless you got a stake behind you?"

The young man weighed this question thoughtfully
and carefully. A bit sadly he replied:

"Not very far, but it'll do as a starter, and next
year----"

"Next year ain't here yet. Besides it depends on
what you're countin' on. You aimin' to get married?"

Somehow the question infuriated the Bull so that
he shot it at the boy, despite his effort at self-control
and his eyes blazed through the darkness. But Cyril
was too absorbed in his own dreams to note the Bull's
voice or manner. After a pause he answered slowly.

"Yes."

"You can't raise no family on what you got now,"
said the Bull hoarsely. "Things ain't the same as when
I started in. You better wait a year or two. Take
on this proposition I'm offerin' you and you'll be in
better shape to do the right thing by the gell you
marry then. There's a ten dollar a month raise for
you and a bonus of a hundred at the end of the
season."

A long pause, as this sunk into Cyril, and he slowly
weighed the matter in his mind. A few months more
or less would matter little to him and Nettie. The
money would mean a lot. There were certain articles
he had set his heart on buying for Nettie for the
house, household utensils, of which a country traveling
salesman, who had put up overnight at the Bar Q,
had shown him enticing samples. Soon his mind was
made up.

"Maybe you're right, boss. I'm on. Barstairs, eh?
I'll be on the job first thing in the morning."

But when he rode out in the quiet dawn, with no
one but Jake to bid him good-by, Cyril's heart was
heavy, and as he went by the ranch house his glance
sought Nettie's window, in the vain hope that she
might by some chance be up and in sight. He had
given Jake a message for her and felt sure that she
would understand. It was a common occurrence for
riders to be despatched on such trips as this, and Cyril
was of a race that always puts duty before pleasure.
Farsighted and canny, he was prepared to serve and
wait an extra year if need be for the girl he loved.

At the thought of that future, shared with Nettie,
his heart lifted. The grayness of the approaching
dawn grew slowly lighter and the miracle of the sunrise
broke over the sleeping land. Far and wide on all
sides stretched an incomparable sky, a shadowy, gilded
loveliness, as if a misty veil were slowly being unrolled
till there burst into full bloom the marvelous
sunglow of Alberta. Cyril's spirits rose with the sun
and as his horse loped along the trail to Barstairs he
lifted up his young voice and sang.




CHAPTER VII


The days were getting longer. The fall round-up
was under way and the Bull rode the range with
his men. For a week long files of cattle had been
pouring down from the hills to meet in the lower
pastures of the ranch and automatically form into
symmetrical rank that moved lowing before the drivers
to the corrals and pens where they were sorted over
and separated.

It was a period of torture for the cattle for the
Bar Q branded, dehorned and weaned in the early fall.
Day and night the incessant crying of over two thousand
calves and outraged mothers, penned in separate
fields or corrals, rent the air.

The round-up was an early and swift one that year
for Bull Langdon was due to leave in early November
for the States with his purebred bulls. He seemed
possessed of inexhaustible energy and vitality and no
amount of riding appeared to tire him. It was no
uncommon thing for him after a night and day of riding
to bring up finally at the ranch house at midnight
and sit down to the big meal prepared by the girl
whom he would summon with a thump upon her door.
Little conversation passed between them at these times,
but once when the cattleman had volunteered the information
that they were about through Nettie said, with
apparent relief:

"Then there will be no more branding. I'm glad
of that."

The cattleman leaned across the table, his elbows
upon it and a knife and fork in either hand. His meaning
glance pinned the girl fairly.

"One more head," he said. "I'll put my personal
brand upon that maverick before I go."

She felt as if an icy hand were clutching at her
heart.

The following day she was sent to Morley, an Indian
trading post, where was the nearest post office for the
Bar Q mail. It was eight miles from the ranch and
Nettie went on horseback, returning in about two and
a half hours, in time to get the supper.

There was no one about the place when she rode into
the corrals. Dismounting, she unsaddled her horse,
hung bridle and saddle in the barn, and let the horse
out to pasture. Hurrying to the house she found the
big kitchen deserted. Usually when the girl went off
on long errands Mrs. Langdon prepared the supper,
but Nettie supposed her mistress was taking her afternoon
nap. So she busied herself with the preparation
of the supper. She peeled the potatoes and set them
on the range, quickly beat up a pan of buttermilk biscuits
and put them in the oven. Her table set, she
sliced the cold meat and put the kettle on for tea.

Having finished, and there being still no sign of
Mrs. Langdon, she ran upstairs and tapped upon her
door. There was no reply. Nettie opened the door
and looked in. The room was empty and the wide-open
closet door revealed the fact that it had been stripped.

A wave of fear swept over the girl; she ran panting
downstairs and out into the barnyard. Not a "hand"
was about, though far across the pastures she could
see the fence riders riding toward the ranch, their
day's work done. Jake, driving in the six milk cows,
came over the crest of the hill and loped slowly down
to the barnyard, stopping to water his horse. He did
not see Nettie at first waiting for him at the cowshed
and when he did began to jabber without dismounting.
One by one the cows went into their stalls and stood,
bags full, patiently waiting to be milked. Jake, full
of his news, dismounted. He had a pronounced impediment
in his speech and when excited became almost
unintelligible.

"Mis' Langdon--her gone off--off--off----" He
pointed vividly toward the mountains. "Rode on
nortermobile to a station. Goin' far away on train--choo-choo--coo!"

Nettie stared at him blankly. She could barely understand
the bare fact that her mistress was gone
and in her anxiety she plied the boy with questions.

"Where had she gone? When? Who had gone with
her? Why did she go? What had she taken? How
long was she to be gone?"

As desperately she shook the half-breed's ragged
sleeve in her impatience to make him understand her
the honk of an automobile horn caused her to look
toward the garage and there she saw the Bull backing
in the car. She hurried across the barnyard, her fear
of the man forgotten in her intense anxiety about her
mistress.

In his characteristic pose at the wide door of the
garage he awaited her approach.

"Is--is it true that Mrs. Langdon has gone away?"

"Yep. Just taken her to the station. Gone up to
Banff."

"Banff! Will she be gone for long?"

She hardly realized that her lips were quivering and
her eyes were so full of tears that she could not see the
strange expression on the Bull's face as he looked down
gloatingly upon her.

The soft golden sunset was all about them and the
brooding hush of the closing day lent a beauty and
stillness to the evening that was full of poetry, but the
man, with his calculating, bulging eyes, saw nothing
but her softly maturing loveliness, the rounded curve
of her bosom, the white softness of her neck, the rose
that came and went in her cheeks, the scarlet lips that
aroused in his breast a tormenting passion such as he
had never experienced for any woman before.

Nettie repeated her question, her voice catching in
the sob that would come despite her best efforts. With
the going of both Cyril and her mistress she felt deserted
and forlorn.

"Will she be gone long I asked you?"

"Long enough to suit me," said the Bull slowly.
"She's took a holiday. Guess she's entitled to one now
we've got a gell like you to take her place up to the
house. I'm thinking you'll fill the bill fine and suit
me down to a double T. Is supper ready?"

She stared up at him through the haze before her
eyes, piteously, her lips moving, almost as if entreating
him. She tried to say:

"It'll be on the table in a few minutes," but the words
came indistinctly through the tears which now began
to fall heavily in spite of her effort to restrain them.
Blindly she moved toward the house, holding her apron
to her face. Absorbed in her grief, she was unconscious
of the fact that the Bull pressed close to her side and
that it was his big hand under her arm that guided her
to the house. Inside the kitchen he held her for a
space as she gasped and cried:

"I won't stay here alone."

"Yer don't have to, gell," said the Bull huskily.
"I'm here."

"You!"

She wrenched her arm free.

"I'm not going to stay in this house alone with
you!" she cried.

"Ain't you? Mebbe you'd prefer the bunkhouses
then?"

The Bull was chuckling coarsely.

"I won't stay nowhere at Bar Q. I'm goin' to get
out--tonight."

"As you say, gell. I told the wife not to set too
much store by you, but no, she'd have her way. Said
you could take her place and do the work fine, and she
thought she should do as the doctor said and git away
for a change."

Nettie paused, the thought of her mistress's confidence
in her holding her in her headlong purpose to
escape.

"So I could do the work alone. It's not that. It's
just that--that I'm afraid to be here alone--with
you," she blurted out.

"Far's that goes, I'm hikin' for Barstairs myself
tonight. Goin' on up to the Bull camp. We're leavin'
for the States shortly, and I got to go alone."

Something was burning on the stove and she rushed
to lift off the potatoes. The Bull had seated himself
at the table and was buttering a chunk of bread. Nettie
hesitated a moment and then, as the man apparently
oblivious of or indifferent to her presence continued
to munch in abstracted silence, Nettie took her
place at the table. She poured out the tea and passed
his cup to him, helping herself to a piece of the cold
roast pork. The potato dish was to the left of him
and after a moment she timidly asked him to pass it
to her. He shoved the dish across without looking up
and continued to "pack down"--an expression of his
own--the food.

The meal came to an end in this strange silence
and afterwards she cleared the table and washed the
dishes, acutely aware of every move the man made
in the big room. He had taken down his sheepskin
riding coat and pushed his legs into fur chapps. The
spurs clanked as he snapped them onto his heels. He
took down the quirt and huge hat hanging to a deer
head's horns, clapped the hat upon his head, and
tramped to the door. All his preparations indicated
a long ride. At the door he threw back an order to
Nettie.

"Anyone telephones, I'll reach Barstairs by six or
seven in the mornin'. They can get me there. Have
Jake at the house for chores. Let 'im sleep off the
kitchen."

She nodded dumbly, conscious only of a vast sense of
relief. He was gone.




CHAPTER VIII


Never had the ranch house seemed so large or
so empty. A wave of homesickness overwhelmed
the lonely girl, a terrible longing to see her
little brothers and sisters, now so widely scattered
about the country, and be with them once again.

The days were gradually shortening and when the
light faded about ten o'clock darkness closed silently
in upon the hill country. Though the days were sunny
the nights were very quiet and somewhat chilly.

Nettie Day knelt by her window. She could see the
lights in the row of bunkhouses and someone moving
about the corrals with a lantern in his hand. How long
she knelt by her window she could not have said, but
she felt no inclination for sleep and put off preparing
for bed as long as possible.

The vast silence of the hills seemed to press down
about the place and in the utter stillness of the night
the low wailing of a hungry coyote in the hills awakened
weird echoes. A healthy, placid girl, nerves had never
troubled Nettie; yet on that night she experienced a
psychic premonition of disaster, and when the depression
weighed unbearably down upon her she called to
Jake from her window.

Stick on shoulder, the breed came from the kitchen
door and grinned up at her in the dusk. Jake was
in one of his periods of delusions and as sentry before
an Indian war camp he patrolled fearlessly but with
catlike caution. His mere presence, however, comforted
her, but her cheek blanched as the breed returned
to the house, gave a startled cry--the cry of a man
struck suddenly. She said to herself:

"Jake's playing! I guess he's shootin' at himself
with his old arrows. My, he's a queer one."

Long since the twinkling lights in the bunkhouses
had disappeared one by one as the men "turned in."
The "hands" of the Bar Q were early risers and "hit
the bunks" as soon as the light left the sky.

The last sign of life had vanished. Even the coyote
was silent and the darkness grew ever deeper.

Nettie turned from her window at last. Her long
plaits of hair hung down, like a Marguerite's, on her
shoulders. In her white night dress she looked very
virginal and sweet. She had raised her hands and
begun to coil up the golden braids when something--a
stealthy, cautious motion--caused her to pause. She
stood still in the middle of the room, her eyes wide and
startled, staring at the door.

The bureau stood by the door and a lamp burned on
it. Slowly the knob turned and she felt something push
against the frail door which she had, however, locked.

Though well-nigh paralyzed with fear she found
strength to seize her one chair and thrust its back underneath
the knob so that its two back legs firmly on the
floor might help the now loudly cracking door to resist
the force that was slowly pushing it in. She blew out
the light and retreated towards the window.

There was the sound of snapping steel and the lock
was burst. The upturned chair quivered on its two
back feet, held sturdily in place a moment and then
splintered under the iron strength of the man without.

As the door gave way a numbness came upon her and,
without power to move, like some fascinated thing, she
watched the approach of the Bull. She knew that she
was trapped and clutching her throat with both hands
she tried to force to her lips the cry that would not
come.

She was in a black dream, a merciless nightmare.

She awoke, screaming wildly:

"Cyril, Cyril, Cyril! Cyril! Cyril!" and over and
over again, "Cyril!"

Like one gone stark mad she groped her way to the
window and threw herself out.

When she regained consciousness the bright, hard sun
was in her eyes. She stared up at a brilliant blue sky.
Jake knelt on the grass beside her and tried to move
her to the shadow of the house. She moaned:

"Leave me be. I want to die."

Jake muttered excitedly:

"Him! Him! Him see--him hurt Nettie. Last
night him hurt Jake bad."

"Him!" She knew whom Jake meant by "him" and
threw up her arm as if to shield herself from a blow.
At that moment his shadow loomed above her and
she cowered and cringed from it.

"How'd you git here?" He looked up at the window.
"You got to cut out this damn nonsense. I ain't
aimin' to hurt you, but you can't lay out here. Here,
I'll carry you into the house. Keep still, will yer?
D'you want me to tie you?"

Her struggles ceased. Eyes closed, she submitted
limply as he lifted her in his arms and carried her to
the house. Jake followed, wringing his hands and
whimpering like a dog.

On the fourth day, holding to the bannisters, she
managed to limp downstairs. For a long time she sat
on the hard kitchen chair, staring with unseeing eyes
before her. Even when she heard the heavy tramp of
the Bull's feet on the outside porch she did not raise
her head and as he came in her hopeless gaze remained
still fixed on space.

"Hello! Whatchu doin' down here? How'd you
get down here?"

"I come down myself," said Nettie listlessly. "My
ankle ain't hurtin' me no more."

"I'd a' carried you down if you asked me," he
grunted angrily. "I done everything a man could for
a girl. Who's been waiting on you hand and foot these
last four days just's if you was a delicate lady instead
of a hired girl on a ranch. What more d'you want?
The more you do for some folks the more they want."

Nettie said nothing, but two great tears suddenly
rolled out of her eyes and splashed slowly down her
cheeks. She resented those tears--a sign of weakness,
where she felt hard and frozen within, and she peevishly
brushed them away.

"What you cryin' about?"

"I jus' want that you should let me alone," said
Nettie.

"You'll be let alone soon enough now. I got to go
to Barstairs, and I got to go on to the States. We're
billed up at the fairs over there, and I got to go along
with my bulls. I'd take you with me if it wasn't for
that young buck at Barstairs. I ain't plannin' on
sharing you with no one, do you get me? You belong
to Bull Langdon. I got you at the sale, same's I got
the rest of your dad's old truck, and what the Bull
gets his hands on he keeps. It's up to yourself how
you git treated. I'm free handed with them that treats
me right. My old woman ain't strong. She'll croak
one of these days and 'twon't be long before they'll be
another Mrs. Langdon at Bar Q. You treat the Bull
right and you'll be the second Mrs. Langdon."

Nettie twisted her hands in her apron. Her heart
ached dully and at the mention of her mistress's name
a fierce lump rose persistently in her throat.

"Well, what you got to say to that?"

She did not answer and he pursued wrathfully:

"You're sulking now and you're sore on me, but
you'll get over that, gell. I'll knock it out of your system
damn soon if you don't, and you'll find out that
it'll pay you to be on the right side of the Bull rather
than the wrong."

"I ain't aiming to make you mad," said Nettie
piteously, shrinking under the implied threat. He
chuckled, relishing his power.

"Well, I'll be off. If it weren't for them bulls nothing
could take me from you now, gell, but I ain't fool
enough to neglect my bulls for a gell. I'm goin' along
with the herd far as St. Louis, and I'll be back to you
before the month is out."

His big lips closed over hers. The loathsome embrace
seemed to strangle her. Then she was alone again.

She sat in the kitchen for more than an hour after
the departure of the Bull, still in that attitude of
stupefied apathy, then limped upstairs, into her room,
closed the battered door, and sat down on the edge of
her bed, holding her head in her hands. She had no
feeling save that of intense weariness and dead despair.
Presently, still dressed, she fell sideways upon the
bed and slept the long, unbroken sleep of one physically
and mentally exhausted.




CHAPTER IX


Part of journal kept by Lady Angella Loring:
I hate men and despise women. I am afraid
of children. Animals are my only friends.

I'm not pretty. My face is hard, my hair--what is
left of it--of no color. My hands are calloused. I
am a "tough old nut" as once I heard a "hand" of the
Bar Q describe me. I wear men's clothes because they
are comfortable and because I want to forget that I
am a woman.

My father was the victim of a swindler, a smiling-faced,
lying-tongued scoundrel, who robbed him of all
we possessed in the world. The man I was to have
married was as surely my father's murderer as if he
had held the hand that sent the shot through my father's
brain that killed him. I am the last of the Lorings,
I--the poor old man-maid recluse, on the edge of Yankee
Valley in the Canadian Northwest.

This bit of Alberta land is all that is left of the
once vast Loring estate. That I still have this is due
purely to the accident of a groom paying back a debt
he owed my father. It was strange that I should have
learned of its existence at a time when I believed that
the end had come for me even as it had come for my
father. True, I was not to go out of life by the act
of my own hand and will. A quite eminent scientist
had pronounced my death sentence. He gave me a
few months in which to live. It was a ghastly situation
for one who had been through what I had and who desired
to live for the noble purpose of revenge. That
sounds melodramatic and I suppose if I were pious I
would hear in mind that revenge is sweet only for God.
But my nature is not sweet and hell raged within me
at that time. It was strange, as I have said, at that
time suddenly to learn of the existence of this ranch.
I seemed to see it as in a dream--it lay far off under
a spotlight of Alberta sunlight and it called to me with
a clarion call.

I came out here. I am hard and strong. I don't
intend to die. I've something to live for. Not a man.
I hate men, as I have said above. I have deep-rooted,
never-dying aversion for the whole mean race of men.
That which I have to live for is this quarter section
of Alberta land. It's mine. I love it better than anything
else on earth.

I broke my own land. I've put in my own crop. I
hayed and chored, fenced and drudged, both in house
and upon the land. I made most of my own furniture
and I practically rebuilt the inside of this old shack.

"Necessity is the mother of invention" goes the
proverb, but I loathe proverbs. One can find an opposing
one for even the best of them. Some people pin
proverbs and poems and texts upon their souls as on
their walls. I suppose they get the sort of comfort
and help from it that a cripple gets from a crutch.
As far as that goes we are all cripples in life, and few
there be who can walk without a crutch. I never saw
a human being yet who did not limp, at least mentally....

There's one man in Alberta who comes to see me
regularly once a month and no snub or plain telling
that I prefer my own company to that of any others
makes any impression upon him. He is painfully, hopelessly
Scotch. However, one cannot quarrel with a man
who has saved one's life. I am, or was, what they call
in the west a "lunger." I was definitely diagnosed as
"T.B." But if any one doubts that my lungs are sound
now they should hear me let out a war whoop that
would compare well with old Chief Pie Belly's. Pie
Belly is a Stony Indian and I have learned some things
of that Indian. Not that I make a daily practice of
war whooping, but there's sport in letting the full volume
and force of one's lungs pour out across the utter
silence of the prairie. If my voice carries to my neighbors--the
nearest is five miles off--no doubt they take
me for a coyote.

That Scotch doctor likes to pick a quarrel, to argue,
to find fault and to bark like a dog. Alberta, according
to him, is a "mon's land." There is no sentimental
reference to "God's country" or "Sunny Alberta" from
him. It is a hard land--a mon's land. I've no right
here. I should not work outside the house. I should
engage a couple to work the place on shares. I should
dress as a "lass"; I should permit my hair to grow "as
God planted it"; I should chasten my bitter tongue and
heart; I should cultivate my neighbors, and I should not
set myself up against my fellow men. Hm! Sounds
very fine, my Scotch friend, but what do you know of
what I have been through? How can you know that
I am frozen inside?

My ranch--and I would rather write of my ranch
than dig into my personal thoughts and emotions--if
there are any left in me--my ranch lies midway between
the good grain lands on one side and the hill
country, the cattle lands, on the other. I suppose I am
part of Yankee Valley. I am sorry for that because
I do not like Americans. They are noisy, insincere,
and a boasting, bragging lot. As far as that goes,
I like the English less. The Scotch are hard to tolerate,
and as for the Irish, the devil made them in his
own likeness. If it comes down to that, I don't know
a single nationality that I can respect, and I have
lived all over the world.

To farm is to gamble on the largest scale possible,
for the earth may be said to be our board, the seed our
dice and the elements, the soil, the parasites, the hail,
the frost and the drought, these are the cards stacked
against us. But, like all gamblers, we are reaching
out for a prize that enthralls and lures us, and that "pot
of gold at the end of our rainbow" is the harvest--the
wonderful, glorious golden harvest of Alberta.
Some day, it will come to me also.

In the spring, our land is excessively fragrant. The
black, loamy soil fairly calls to one to lay the seed
within its fertile bosom. Anything will grow in Alberta.
It's a thrilling sight to see the grain prick
up sturdy and strong. When first my own showed its
green head above the earth, I suffered such exhilaration
that I could have thrown myself upon the ground, and
kissed the good earth. Those tiny points of green,
there on the soil that I myself had plowed, disked, harrowed
and seeded. I suffered the exquisite pang of the
creator.

If only one might shut up memories in a box, close
the lid tight and turn the key upon them. If but the
past could be blotted out, as are our sins by death,
then, methinks, we would find comfort and compensation
in this poor life once again.

The last generation of the Lorings were a soft-handed,
dependent race. I come of an older, primitive
breed, I am a reversion to type, for I love to labor
with my hands. Had I been a man, I might have been
a ditch or a grave digger. I love the earth. When I
die, I do not want to be cremated. I want to go back
to the soil.

I talk here of compensations and of my ranch which
I say is what I have to live for, yet life has not been
sweet or easy for me in Alberta. It's been a battle with
a grim antagonist--for poverty and sickness and cold--what
can be grimmer than these? And then, much
as I love to put in my crop, I have not yet had the joy
of reaping it, for cutworm took my first, and this year
early frost destroyed my grain when it had attained
almost full growth. But never mind--that is all part
of the game. The hardest part has been the enforced
work at the Bar Q. No one enjoys laboring for those
beneath them. I don't mean the laboring men. I have
no sense of caste whatsoever, and they are as good as
I am, I suppose. But Bull Langdon, the man whose
pay I must take. He is a wild beast, one of the two
legged cattle that should go to the shambles with his
stock.

Yet I am not afraid of Bull Langdon. He never
shouts at me. He only blusters, and his bloodshot eyes
fall before mine. He may be the great boss and bully
of the Bar Q. With his big bull whip in hand, his
cattle may cower before him, and his men quail and
slink away; his wife and Jake may tremble at the
sound of his voice or step. I have his "number." I
know that he is a coward, a great sneaking bully. He
can lord it over small men and women and half-witted
Indian boys. He never employs stronger or bigger
men than himself. A giant in stature, and a Samson
in strength, nevertheless I assert he is a coward, a big
unwhipped bully, whose own strength will some day
prove his boomerang.

It's queer, as I have run along, I have omitted all
mention of one in Alberta whom I should call a friend.
Just a poor, illiterate young girl. I never can forget
Nettie Day as I first saw her. Sickness, delirium even,
may cast a glamour over things. It may be then our
imagination pictures things as they are not; but nevertheless,
Nettie's face, bending above my own, with its
gentle look of tenderness and compassion, seemed to me
as sweet as the "blessed damozel's" as she looked down
from heaven to the earth beneath. She had wide, deep
blue eyes, a child's eyes, full of an unplumbed innocence
and questioning. Strange how one can come
into our lives for such a little spell, disappear beyond
our sight, and still remain in our hearts. I have seen
little enough of Nettie, and the last time I saw her
I hate to recall that I scolded her.

Next to my place is a quarter section of homestead
land, owned by a young man named Stanley. One day
I was fencing, when this young fellow, who had made
attempts upon several occasions to speak to me, came
over and watched me at my work. I ignored him, but
like my doctor friend, above mentioned, he is Scotch
and thick. He didn't even know he was being ignored,
and presently in a disgustingly friendly way he had
the colossal nerve to attempt to instruct me in the art
of making post holes. At that juncture I turned
around and looked at him. Now I may seem as that
Bar Q hand said, like a "tough old nut." No doubt
I look like one, but I know the English trick of freezing
ordinary people by a mere look. It is a trick,
like the Englishman's monocle and the strange part is
only an English person can do it. You just stare,
stonily, at the insignificant atom before you. I begin
at the feet, and travel contemptuously up the whole
despised body, till I reach the abashed and propitiating
face. One need not say a single word. That look--if
you know the technique of the act--is enough. This
young Stanley dropped his hammer in a hurry and
turned very red.

"I say, you're not mad at me, are you?" he stammered.

And just then Nettie, whom the doctor had dropped
at my house that day, came from out the house, and
something about that boy's face, just a flicker of the
eye and the deepening red about his ears apprised me
of the reason why he was so keen on being friends with
me. I turned just in time to see on Nettie's guilty face
the identical flicker I had noted on Stanley's. As cross
as two sticks, I grabbed that girl by the arm and
shoved her along the field to the house.

Once inside, I made her sit down, while I told her in
detail all of the miseries and pitfalls and deceits and
heartbreaks, the general unhappiness that befalls one
foolish enough to fall in love. Love I told her was an
antiquated emotion which had been burned out by the
force of its own mad fire. I said something like that,
for I was talking with feeling, upon a topic I understood,
and as I talked, becoming more and more moved
and excited as my subject warmed me, suddenly I observed
that Nettie's eyes were fixed on space, as if on
something very far away. She had her large, white
hands unconsciously clasped upon her bosom; she was
kneeling beside me, and something about her pose struck
me at that moment as so divinely beautiful, so exquisitely
madonna-like and lovely, that I choked upon
my words and could go no further.

Then Nettie came out of her dream--I am sure she
had heard not a word of my discourse--and said:

"Thank you, Angel." That girl calls me--Angel.
God alone knows why. There is little of the angel
in me.

I have not seen her since that day. Life has played
strange tricks upon my little friend since then. Her
father dead, her brothers and sisters scattered about
in institutions and on farms, Nettie herself--at the
Bar Q--of all places in the world, the last I would have
wished to have seen her go!

Sometimes in the evening, when my work is done, I
can recall to my mind Nettie as I last saw her with
almost photographic clearness, and I experience a sense
of nearness to her. The other night I had an impulse
to start out then and there for the Bar Q. I felt that
she needed me.

That young man on the adjoining quarter section
sings a great deal as he works. I can hear him clear
across the field--he has a real voice, a full, fine baritone,
and in the still evenings, I confess there is something
uplifting about that fresh young voice as it rings
across the prairie. His home is nearing completion,
he says, and that is why he sings. The thought of
home and Nettie warms his heart till it bursts into
song. Ah--well, who am I to judge what is best for
these young people? So, sing on, young Cyril. I hope
that that clear brave voice of yours, as full of melody
as a lark's, will never falter.

Last night, when I came in from the field, the half-breed
Jake sidled along from behind my house. It gave
me a start to see the poor idiot with his wild, witless
face. He wanted to tell me something about the Bar
Q. He jabbered and gibbered, and I could hardly make
head or tail of what he was saying, save that Bull
Langdon was eating something up.




CHAPTER X


Bright sunlight flooded Alberta. The miraculous
harvest was over, and the buzz of the thousand
threshing machines, day and night, sounded like
music in the ears of the ranchers. The greatest bumper
crop in the history of the continent had made Alberta
famous throughout the grain world.

Settlers were pouring in from across the line. Land
values soared to preposterous heights; and wherever
there were municipalities of open range and unbroken
land, the territory was being staked and fenced.

On the heels of the famous crop came first the fatal
oil and then the fatal city real estate boom, which
later was to act as a boomerang to the land, since it
brought in the wildcat speculator, the get-rich-quick
folk, the gold-brick seller and the train of clever
swindlers that spring up from nowhere when a boom
is on. The great province was to be exploited by these
parasites. The boom swelled to fabulous proportions
almost overnight. The streets of Calgary were
thronged, train loads poured into the country; hysterical,
half-crazed gamblers and "suckers" made or
lost fortunes overnight; businesses of all kinds were
started on "a shoe-string"; the wildest stories of oil
flowing like water raced about the land. Oil indeed
there was, as also coal in unlimited quantities, for the
mineral wealth of the province had barely been
scratched, but the boom was in full swing before the
tests had been properly made, with the result that conservative
people began to regard it askance, and almost
as quickly as it had started, like an inflated bubble the
oil boom burst. This brought undeserved desertion
and wholesale ruin upon the country. Alberta had
been made the "goat" of a flock of get-rich-folk from
across the line, intent on making fortunes which then
existed only upon paper.

The one solid and substantial asset that all the deflated
booms could not affect, was the agricultural
wealth of the province, real and potential. During this
period, Bull Langdon's power and wealth swelled to
enormous proportions. Before the year was out, he
had become a multimillionaire. His cattle ranged over
those "thousand hills"; his hundreds of granaries were
overflowing with the grain of that bumper crop, grain
that he held to sell as soon as the market was right;
his grip was upon the stockyards and packing house
industry and the stock market was under his control.
No one questioned his right to be called the Cattle King
of Canada.

Bloated with affluence and power, illiterate and uncouth
as ever, his vanity was boundless. It flattered
him to be known as the richest and most powerful man
in the Province; to have his cattle, his stock, his immense
ranches pointed out; to see his brand far-flung
over the cattle country, and encroaching into the western
States; his name stamped upon the beef that topped
the market, not merely in the east but in the west,
even into the Chicago stockyards--there to be exhibited,
and wondered at--grass fed steers, competing
with and surpassing the cornfeds of the U.S.A.

Above all his possessions he placed his magnificent
purebred Hereford bulls, a race whose stamp was upon
the whole cattle country, for scarcely a farmer or
rancher in the country, but aspired to have his herd
headed by a Bar Q bull. He had spared neither expense
nor labor upon the breeding of these perfect animals,
whose sires had come from the most famous herds in
England and the States, and whose mothers were pure
Canadian stock.

He coveted now the world championship for his
latest product, a two-year-old Hereford bull, Prince
Perfection Bar Q the Fourth. The Prince, as he was
known throughout the purebred world, was of royal
ancestry, and already, as a mere calf, his career at the
cattle fairs in Canada had brought him under the eyes
of the experts and cattle specialists. He was the son
of that Princess Perfection Bar Q the Third, who had
brought the lordly price when exhibited by Bull Langdon
in Chicago of $40,000. His sire was of foreign
birth, shipped to Canada by a member of the royal family,
who, infatuated with the "cattle game," had acquired
a ranch in Canada, and declared it to be the
sport of kings.

Annually there was a showing of the Bar Q bulls, and
from far and near ranchers and farmers trekked from
all over Canada and the States to see the latest products
of the famous herd. This year was exceptional,
inasmuch, as the two-year-old Prince was to be examined
and shown before a jury of experts, who would
pronounce upon his chances of winning the coveted
championship in the United States.

His curly hide brushed and smoothed, oiled and
trimmed; his hoofs all but manicured; his face washed
with soft oiled cloths; his eyes and nostrils wiped with
boracic acid solution; fed on the choicest of green feed
and chop, a golden ring in his nose, through which a
golden chain was passed, the petted brute was led out
to gladden the eyes of stock enthusiasts, experts, agriculturists,
scientific cattle students, and others connected
with the purebred game, who had come literally
from the four corners of the earth, with a passion
similar to that of the scientist or the collector, discovering
some coveted rare specimen. They crowded
about this perfect product of the Hereford race, and
looked the massive brute over with the eyes of connoisseurs.

In that crowd of men about the roped-in space,
around which Cyril Stanley led the bull by the chain,
university men, men of title, an English Prince and an
ex-president of the U.S.A., millionaire cattlemen and
sportsmen, the overall cattlemen, ranchers, farmers,
stock enthusiasts, stockyard and packing-house men,
to say nothing of the humble homesteaders and derelicts,
the numerous "remittancemen" from the old country,
and speculators from cattle centers in Canada and
the States. A mixed "bunch," socially as wide apart
as the poles, but in that cattle shed as close as brothers.
They rubbed elbows, swapped expensive cigars
for grimy chews, held their sides at each other's jokes,
and joshed and roared across to each other. They
were kindred spirits, and cattle was the bond between
them.

Glowering and grinning at each other, as at a prize
fight, applauding, groaning out oaths of enthusiasm,
strange explosive utterances, they were a motley company.
Professor Morton Calhoun made a circle of
his hands, and squinted through it with one screwed-up
eye, the attitude of an artist before a masterpiece, and
after a long scrutiny, shook his head and groaned with
joy.

Through this group of men moved Bull Langdon, in
high good humor, dominant and arrogant, intimate
with everyone, yet close to no one. When the big
shed was full, and the circle about the ropes entirely
surrounded his exhibit, Bull Langdon nonchalantly
stepped into the ring, where the Prince followed Cyril
Stanley tamely about. Cyril had a curiously hypnotic
influence over the animal, and could even make him
submit to having his head caressed and his nose patted.

On either horn two bright ribbons had been coyly
twisted and tied, and these gave the animal a peculiarly
festive look. As Bull Langdon stepped into the ring,
a murmur of admiring and respectful applause broke
forth. He approached the Prince from the left side,
and reaching out a careless hand pulled the ribbon
from one of the horns.

"We ain't raisin' no dolls!" said the cowman. "This
is a Bull!" and he reached for the other horn.

"Careful, boss!" warned Cyril. "He's not used to
all this excitement, and I got my hands full keeping
him calm."

"Who's talking?" growled the cattleman, spitting
with amusement. "Are you trying to teach Bull Langdon
the cattle game, you young whelp? I knowed it
before the day you was born."

The young bull's head had suddenly uplifted. He
sniffed the air, his neck bristling. Slowly, growing
in depth and power, there burst from his throat a
mighty roar that shook the tent, and drove the color
from the faces about that ring, as with an almost concerted
movement there was a backing from the lines
and an exodus from the tent. Bull Langdon, as swiftly
as a cat, had backed to the lines and was over them.
Cyril was alone in the inclosure with the roaring bull.
Half talking, half singing, not for a moment did his
hand relax its grip upon the chain. Slowly the animal's
head turned in his direction and again dropped
submissively. There was a breath of relief about the
lines, and Cyril led the bull back to his stall, fastening
him securely to his post by the ring in his nose.

Bull Langdon was swearing foully, but his fury
against Cyril and the Prince subsided at the approach
of Professor Calhoun, the greatest authority on pure
bred cattle in the world.

"Sir," said the little man, glaring at Bull Langdon
through double-lensed glasses, scrutinizing the cattleman
with the scientific air with which he examined
cattle, "I will not hesitate to predict that your animal's
progress throughout the United States--I will
go farther and say, throughout the world--will be one
of unbroken triumph. It has been my pleasure to look
upon the most perfect Hereford specimen in the world.
I congratulate you, sir."

Bull Langdon grunted, rose on the balls of his feet,
chewed on the plug in his cheek, spat, and, his chest
swelling, roared across at one of the Bar Q "hands."

"Take the gentleman--take all of the gentlemen--"
he added, with a sweeping gesture of his arm toward
the crowd, "to the booze tent. The treat's on Bull
Langdon. Fill up, gentlemen, on the Bar Q."

Meanwhile, satiated with gloating over his great
treasure, he bethought of another possession and upon
which at this stage he set if possible an even greater
value. True, he reckoned Nettie as "scrub" stock,
while the Prince was of lordly lineage. On the auction
block, the prince might bring a price that was worth
a king's ransom; yet as he thought of the big, white-skinned,
blue-eyed girl, the cowman knew that he would
not give her up for all the champions in the cattle
world. He owned the Prince; but though he had held
the girl in his arms, he knew in his heart of hearts that
she had never been his. That was what fretted and
tormented him--the thought that his brand upon Nettie
could never be permanent.

It was a boast of the cowman that what he wanted
he took, and what he took, he held. He had wanted
Nettie Day. He had taken her by mad force, as a barbarian
might have fallen upon a Christian slave, yet
he knew, with a sense of smoldering hatred and fury
that a single hair upon the head of the young Bar Q
hand was more to her than the Bull and all his possessions.
He was torn with a desire to return to Bar Q,
and again take forcible possession of the girl; but the
prize herd was now almost ready for the tour. It would
be disastrous, ruinous to his reputation and career, if,
at this psychological moment, anything should interfere
with the departure of the herd, and there was no
man in the outfit who could be trusted to take the place
of Bull Langdon himself. Well, it would be the matter
of a month or two only, and he would be back.

He found himself at the Prince's stall, glowering
down upon the back of the kneeling Cyril, who was
brushing down his charge's legs with an oiled brush.
Presently Cyril looked up, and seeing his employer, he
arose. The Bull cleared his throat noisily.

"Well, how about it, bo? You goin' along with
Prince to the States?"

Cyril waited in his slow way, before replying, and
as he hesitated, the Bull threw in savagely:

"Bonus of $500 to the 'hand' that takes special
charge of the Prince and another $10 raise to his
wages."

$500! It was a mighty sum of money, and the young
man felt his heart thump at the thought of what it
would buy for Nettie.

"When would you want me to leave?"

"Two weeks."

"When'd we be back?"

"Two months. I'll go along as far as St. Louis;
leave for a spell, and join you at Chicago, comin' back
with the outfit."

"I'd want a week off."

"What for?"

"I got a bit of fencing to finish on my homestead,
and I got to ride over to Bar Q."

"What you want at Bar Q?"

Cyril's straight glance met his.

"My girl's there."

"Who'd you mean?"

"Nettie Day. We're planning to get married this
winter."

The savage in Bull Langdon was barely held in check.
He could scarcely control the impulse to throttle the
life out of this cool-eyed youth, who dared to claim
for his own what was the Bull's.

"You're countin' your chickens before they're
hatched, ain't you?" he snarled. "Mebbe the gell's
stuck on someone else."

"Not on your life she's not," said Cyril with calm
conviction. "She and me are promised."

"Beat it, then," roared the Bull, "and the sooner
you're back, the sooner we'll start. I'll hold the job
for you for two weeks--not a day longer."

"You can count on me," said Cyril. "I'll be on the
job."




CHAPTER XI


Every day Nettie arose at six and went about
her dull duties. There was the cream to separate,
the pails and separator to clean and scald;
there was the butter to make; the chickens to feed,
washing, ironing and cleaning. The canning season
was at hand and the Indians rode in with wild cranberries,
gooseberries, raspberries and saskatoons.
From day to day she picked over and washed the fruit,
packed it in syrup in jars, and set them in the wash
boiler on the range.

Time accustoms us even to suffering, and one of the
penalties of youth and health is that one thrives and
lives and pursues one's way, even though the heart
within one be dead. Vaguely Nettie groped for a solution
to her tragedy. She knew that it was not something
that could be pushed away into some recess of
the mind; it was something unforgettable, a scar upon
the soul rather than the body. Of Cyril she could think
only with the most intense anguish of mind, and knew
that she could never face the man she loved and tell him
what had befallen her. Already he had come to exist
in her mind only as a loved one dead. He was no longer
for her. She had lost Cyril through this act of Bull
Langdon.

Two weeks after the departure of the Bull for the
purebred camp, Nettie was startled at her work by
the insistent ringing of the telephone, which had been
unusually silent since then. Her first thought was that
the Bull was calling from Barstairs, and the thought
of his hated voice, even upon the wire, held her back.
The telephone repeated its ring, and with lagging feet
Nettie at last answered it.

"Hello!"

"Is that the Bar Q?"

It was a woman's voice, quavering and friendly.
Nettie's hand tightened in a vise about the receiver.
Her eyes closed. Pale as death, she leaned against the
wall.

"Is that Bar Q? Is that you, Nettie?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Is Mr. Langdon home?"

"No, ma'am."

"Any of the men about?"

"They're all in the fields."

"That's too bad. I'm here at the station. Came
down on the noon train. 'Twould take too long for
you to harness up and meet me, so I'll go over to the
Reserve, and maybe Mr. Barrons will bring me up.
Good-by, Nettie. Is everything all right?"

A pause, and then Nettie answered faintly:

"Yes, ma'am."

Nettie hung up the 'phone, and stood with her face
pressed to the wall. A great tide of fear and shame
swept over her. How was she to face her gentle mistress?
How speak to her? How find words to tell
her? She longed to escape from the kind and questioning
eyes that would look so trustingly and fondly
into her own.

It was but half an hour's run by automobile from
the station, and the grating noise of the car, valorously
trying to make the high grade to the house, brought
Nettie violently back to life. She dabbed at her eyes
with her apron, smoothed her hair and tried to compose
herself as best she could as the little car chugged to the
back door.

An appalling change had taken place in Mrs. Langdon.
Despite her feeble protest, the Indian agent, in
whose car she had come, insisted upon lifting the frail
little woman from the automobile, and carrying her
into the house. She tried to laugh, as Nettie placed
a chair for her, and when her breath would permit it,
she said bravely:

"Well, here I am, Nettie, back like a bad penny,
and feeling just fine!"

Fine! When there was scarcely anything left of her
but skin and bones. Fine! When she was so weak she
could scarcely stand without holding on to something.
Nettie knelt in a passion of mothering pity beside her,
and removed the little woman's coat and hat. Meanwhile,
the faint tinkle of her mistress's chiding laughter
hurt Nettie more than if she had struck her.

"Why, Nettie, one would think I was a baby the way
you are fussing over me. I really feel very well. I'm
in perfect health. We all are, dear, you know. Illness
is just an error of the imagination, just as sin and
everything that is ugly and cruel in the world is. We
are all perfect, made in God's image, and we can be
what we will. Why, Nettie, dear, what on earth----!"

Nettie's head had fallen upon her mistress's lap, great
sobs rending her.

"Nettie! Nettie! I'm real cross with you. This
won't do at all. Don't you see that by giving way
like this, we bring on our illnesses and troubles? We
really are manufacturers of our own ills, and the solutions
of all our problems are right within ourselves."

Nettie raised her head dumbly at that, and tried to
choke back the overwhelming sobs.

"Mrs. Langdon, I can't never leave you now."

"Never leave me! Were you thinking of going,
then?"

"Oh, yes, Mrs. Langdon. I thought I'd have to go.
There--were reasons why, and----"

"Nettie, if the reasons are--Cyril, why, I know all
about it. You can't possibly marry anyway until he
gets back. Bill wants him to go to the States with
the bulls."

"Mrs. Langdon, I can't never marry Cyril Stanley.
I'd die first. Oh, Mrs. Langdon, I wisht I was dead.
I wisht I had the nerve to drown myself in the Ghost
River."

"Nettie Day, that is downright wicked. Whatever's
come over you? Have you fallen out with Cyril?
You've been brooding here alone. Now I'm back,
things will right themselves. I want you to be the
cheerful girl I'm so fond of--so very fond of, Nettie."

Very slowly, but bravely waving back the help Nettie
proffered with outstretched hand, Mrs. Langdon moved
to the stairs, smiling and reiterating softly her health
formula:

"I am strong; in perfect health; in God's image; His
creation. All's well with me and God's good world."

Nettie watched her as slowly she climbed the stairs.
There was the sound of a closing door, and then a
hollow, wrenching, barking cough. Words of the Bull
flashed like lightning across Nettie's mind:

"My old woman ain't strong. She'll croak soon.
There'll be another Mrs. Langdon at Bar Q. You----"

Nettie's hand went to her strangling throat. Her
voice rang out through the room in wild despair:

"Oh, my God!" prayed Nettie Day. "Don't let Mrs.
Langdon die. Don't let her die. Please, please, please,
oh, God! let her live!"




CHAPTER XII


The long, golden fall of Alberta was especially
beautiful that year, and although well into November,
the weather was as warm and sunny as the
month of May. Winter came late to Alberta, sometimes
withholding its frosty hand till considerably
after Christmas; but it stayed late, extending even into
the spring months. There was a popular saying that
there was no spring in Alberta; one stepped directly
out of winter into summer. But the Alberta fall was
incomparably beautiful. The days were laden with
sunlight, and the night skies, with their myriad stars,
set in a firmament more beautiful than anywhere else
on earth, were remarkable for their lunar rainbows,
and the white blaze of the Northern lights.

Yet the long, sunlit days, and the cool, starry nights
brought no balm to the distracted Nettie. She felt
undone--body and soul.

As she trailed listlessly across the barnyard, she no
longer chirruped happily to the wee chicks or reproved
the contentious mother hens. All joy in work and in
contact with the live things on the ranch was gone for
her. She lived on like a machine, automatically wound
up. There were certain daily duties to be done; she
went about them dully and mechanically.

One November evening as she came, basket in hand,
out of the cowbarn, where she had been looking for
eggs in the stalls where the hens loved to lay, Jake
raced through the yard on his broncho, shouting and
screaming with excitement.

"Him! Him!" wildly yelled Jake, pointing toward
where along the Banff highway a solitary horseman
could be seen. At the word "Him" Nettie's first
thought was of the Bull, and she stiffened and paled;
but as she looked down the slope, to where the rider
was passing through the main gate to the road, she
turned even whiter, and longing and fear together shook
her so violently that she could hardly keep from swooning
at the sight of the well-remembered wide hat, the
bright flowing scarf, loosely tied beneath the boyish
chin, the orange-colored chapps, and the peppery young
broncho bearing his rider now so swiftly up that slope.
She did not recover from her emotion in time to take
flight, as her terrified impulse urged her, for Jake had
already opened the gate of the corral, and Cyril passed
through. He had seen the girl at the barn door, and
leaping from his horse, was at her side in an instant.

The basket of eggs in her hand crashed to the ground.
She lifted up both her hands, and her eyes looked wildly
about her like a trapped thing, seeking some way of
escape, as steadily, with face aglow, he closed in upon
her. With a muffled cry, she beat him back from her,
crying loudly:

"No-o! No! No!"

Like one possessed, she pushed him from her with
mad strength and rushed through the corral out into
the yard. Dumfounded, Cyril looked after her, and
then calling her by name he pursued her.

"Nettie! Nettie! I say--Nettie!"

She fled as if demented, running in a circle around
the house; then darted in at the back kitchen door.
She tried to hold the door closed, but his impetuous
hand forced it open. Her breath coming in spasmodic
gasps, leaning against the wall of the back kitchen
for support, Nettie faced him.

She cried out loudly:

"Go away! Go away!"

"Go away? What do you mean? What for?
Nettie, for God's sake, what's the matter, little girl?"

She repeated the words wildly, with all her force.

"Go away! Go! Don't come near me. Don't
touch me. Don't even look at me."

"Why not? What's the matter? You're playin' a
game, and it ain't fair to go so far. What's the
matter, girl? Nettie--you--you ain't gone back on
me, are you?"

She could not meet those imploring young eyes, and
turned bodily about, so that now her face was to the
wall, and her back to him. Her voice sounded muffled,
strangled:

"Leave me be. I mustn't see you."

"Why not? Since when? What've I done? I got
a right to know. What's happened?"

His voice quavered though he sought manfully to
control it. There was a long, tense silence, and then
Nettie Day said in a low, dead voice:

"I ain't the same."

"You mean you've changed?" he demanded, and she
answered in that same lost voice:

"Yes--all changed. I ain't the same."

He took this in slowly, his hands clenching, the hot
tears scalding his lids. Then burst out with boyish
anguish and passion:

"Don't say that, Nettie. I can't believe it. It ain't
true. You and me--we're promised. I been thinking
of nothing else. I built the little house for you. It's
all ready now, dear, and I come on up to Bar Q now
to tell you I got a chance to go to the States with the
purebred stuff, and there's a bonus of $500 in it for
me, and a $10 raise to my wages. Nettie, girl, I took
him up on that proposition, because I wanted to do
more for you."

"Why did you go away?" said Nettie harshly.

"I went on your account. You ain't mad about
that, are you, girl? Why, I wanted to make things
softer for you, and I got a chance now to make good
money--$500, Nettie, and I says to myself: 'Here's
where Nettie and me'll go off on our honeymoon to the
U.S.,' and I come up here now thinking, 'Here's where
we'll put one over on the Bull, and we'll slip down to
Calgary and get married, and then we get aboard the
train. I'll spring my wife on the outfit and----'"

He choked and gulped, and Nettie moaned aloud,
crying:

"I tell you I ain't the same. I'm changed. You
oughtn't to've gone away."

Dark suspicions began to mount and with their
growth jealous fury caused him to swing her roughly
about, so that again she faced him. But she evaded his
glance, turning her head from side to side, so that she
need not meet his accusing hot young eyes.

"You got another fellow, have you? Have you?
You can answer that, anyway."

But there was no answer from the girl, and as his
grip relaxed on her arms, her head dropped dumbly
down. A cruel laugh broke from the boy's lips.

"I see! Someone's cut me out, heh? I'm dead on
to you now. I got your number, I have. If you're
that sort--if you couldn't stand a few months' separation
without goin' back on a fellow, I'm well rid of
you. I wish you luck with your new fellow. I hope
he ain't the fool like I been."

Still there was no answer from the girl, standing there
with her head down, and her arms hanging like a dead
person's by her sides.

Presently there was a clatter of hoofs in the corral,
and Cyril went out at a furious trot. As the flying
horseman disappeared over the hills, Nettie slowly
sank to her knees, and her arms stretched out, she
cried aloud:

"I wisht I was dead! I wisht I was dead!"




CHAPTER XIII


Cyril reached the purebred camp the following
morning. He had ridden without stopping the
whole of the previous night. His mind was a burning
chaos; and he suffered all the torments of
jealousy and uncertainty. Even while he told himself
that he now hated Nettie, his heart went back to her--in
aching tenderness about her. He pictured her as
he had known her--her hair shining in the sun, and
that look which love alone brings to the human eyes,
lighting up her face and making it divinely beautiful
to her lover. He recalled her at the little shack, where
she had helped him fashion some of the rude pieces of
furniture; riding across the prairie, their horses' necks
touching as they pressed as close to each other as the
horses would permit; the nightly meetings in the berry
bushes; her hand nestling in his own. He remembered
her in his arms, her lips upon his!

In the darkness of the night, the boy rode sobbing.
In the gray of the morning, red of eyes, his hat well
over his face, he pulled into the Bull camp, and with
as steady a gait and voice as he could command he
faced Langdon.

"You back already?"

"Yes."

"Ready to go on?"

"Yes."

"Good. We'll get away a few days ahead. Hold
on there!"

Cyril had moved to go. He stood now at the door
of the cattle shed.

"Where've you been?"

There was no answer, and the Bull persisted.

"You been to Bar Q?"

"Yes."

"Well?"

There was silence again, and the Bull cut in with
seeming indifference.

"How's your gell? When you gettin' married?"

A deep pause, and Cyril answered slowly.

"It's off. I ain't marryin'."

"Turned you down, did she? Huh! Well, what do
you care? There's plenty good fish in the sea. There
ain't nothing to bellyache about. When you get over
to the States, you'll get all this female guff out of your
bones. Women ain't no good, anyways. They ain't
worth fretting about. They're a bad lot. Gimme
cattle in preference."

He extended the plug of tobacco, which the boy ignored.
His reddened eyes looked levelly into the
Bull's, and he said sturdily:

"It's a lie what you said about women. They ain't
bad!"




CHAPTER XIV


Shut in all of that winter, throughout which
spells of bitter cold had alternated with blinding
blizzards, dissipated only by the tempering warmth
of Chinook winds, Nettie and Mrs. Langdon were
thrown upon their own resources, and drew closer
together.

As the winter deepened, something of the girl's
strange depression reacted upon the spirits of the sick
woman, so that she, too, lapsed into long spells of silence.
She would lie on the couch in the dining-living
room close to the radiator, propped up high with the
pillows Nettie piled around her, her book on Health
and Happiness held loosely in her thin hands, as over
and over again she conned its lessons, beautiful lessons
in which surely no one who read, could fail to find that
crumb of hope and comfort that means so much to the
hungry heart.

Occasionally her attention would stray from her beloved
book, and then she would lie there idly and absently
watching the silent Nettie, as she moved about
her duties. One day, watching her more intently than
usual, and puzzling over the change in the formerly
lighthearted and happy girl, something about her movements,
a certain lassitude, brought Mrs. Langdon's
thoughts to an abrupt pause. At first she put the idea
from her as fantastic and impossible; but moving round
the better to scrutinize the girl, she knew she had made
no mistake. The book slipped from her hand. Mrs.
Langdon sat up on her couch, and stared with a
startled gaze at Nettie Day. The fall of the book
caused the girl to turn from her work, and as she
stooped to pick it up, she met her mistress's eyes.

"Come here, Nettie. I want to speak to you."

Nettie advanced slowly, instinctively holding back,
and in her unquiet heart there stirred a dread of the
question she knew was trembling on her mistress's lips.
Mrs. Langdon's eyes rose steadily, as she scanned the
girl from head to foot.

"Nettie, you are in trouble!"

Nettie could not speak for the tightness in her throat
and held her dry lips pressed together.

"Oh, you poor child! You poor little girl! Why
didn't you tell me before? Now I understand!"

Nettie moved around sideways, averting her gaze
from those eyes so full of compassion and tenderness.

"Mrs. Langdon," she said in a low voice, "I done
nothing wrong."

"Oh, Nettie! Don't deny it, dear. I can see for
myself. Sit beside me, dear. I am not condemning
you. I only want your confidence. Tell me all about
it, Nettie."

"I can't tell you, Mrs. Langdon! I can't. It's
something can never be told you."

Nettie was past that stage where tears would have
relieved her. All of her senses seemed numbed and
hardened, but she clung persistently to the one passionate
purpose, to hide the truth, at all costs, from
Mrs. Langdon.

Of all who had known Bull Langdon, his wife alone,
despite her cruel experiences with him over the years,
did not hate him. To her, he was an erring child, who
had started on the wrong trail, and went, misguided
and blind, stumbling on in the darkness, never finding
his way to that peaceful haven of thought that had
been his wife's comfort and refuge. Incapable of evil
herself, she had the child's simple faith in the goodness
of others, or in their ultimate regeneration from wrong,
or error, as she preferred to call it. She never wavered
in her faith that sooner or later her "lost lamb"
would return to the fold.

It was probable that only her strange faith in the
Bull had kept him from doing her physical harm.
Harsh and gruff and neglectful, he had never been actually
cruel to her, and to himself he liked to boast defiantly
that he had "never raised his hand" to his wife.

Now, as she begged for Nettie's confidence, she never
dreamed of connecting her husband with the girl's
trouble; that was a crime she never could have suspected.

"Do you realize, Nettie, what is about to happen to
you?"

"I expect you'll want to turn me out now," said
Nettie dully, and then turning swiftly, she added with
sudden force: "But don't do it till the spring, Mrs.
Langdon, because you ain't strong enough to do the
work this winter, and it's nothing to me, and I want
to stay and take care of you."

"Don't you know me better than that? Turn your
face around, Nettie. Do you think I'm the kind of
woman to turn a girl out because she is going to be
what I have all my life longed to be--a mother?"

"Don't! Oh, don't, don't!" cried the girl, loudly,
rocking to and fro in tearless anguish. "I wisht I
were dead. I wisht I'd had the nerve to drown myself
in the Ghost River, but now it's all froze over."

"It's wicked to talk in that way. Why should you
wish to drown yourself? I am not judging you. I
only want to help you. Things are clear to me now.
Cyril----"

"Please don't, Mrs. Langdon----"

"Don't what?"

"Don't speak his name even."

"Why not? Why should you carry this burden
alone? If there's any blame, it belongs to him, not
you."

"No! No! He never done anything wrong. He's
not capable of doing wrong to a girl. Please don't
say anything about him. I can't bear it!"

"But we must face this thing fairly. You are in an
abnormal condition of mind. It's not an uncommon
thing. Some women lose their minds at this time. I
appreciate all that you have been suffering, and I pity
you from the very bottom of my heart."

Nettie said nothing now, but she wrung her hands
and clenched them together as if in physical pain.

"Listen to me, Nettie dear. I want you to know
that I know what it means to be as you are." Her
voice dropped to a wistful whisper. "Eight times,
dear, just think of that. You know we pioneered in
the early days. We didn't always have a grand place
like this, and--and--well, in those days the distances
were so great. We were so far from everything--it
was just as if we were on the end of the world, and we
didn't have the conveniences, or even vehicles to carry
us places, and the doctors always came too late, or not
at all. I lost all of my babies. They just came into
the world to--to go out again; but I always thought
that even the weakest of them had not lived in vain,
because you see, they brought something lovely into
my life. It was just as if--as if--an angel's wing
had touched me, don't you see? It brought to me a
knowledge of Love--love eternal and everlasting. No
woman who bears a child can fail to feel it."

She broke off, in strange, breathless, smiling pause,
as if she sought to conquer her present pain with the
elusive joy that she believed had come with her dead
children into her life. "So you see, Nettie, I don't hold
anything against any woman who bears a child, no
matter how or where. It doesn't matter what you or
Cyril have done. I have great faith in that boy, and
I feel he will make it right."

"Mrs. Langdon," said Nettie in a suffocating voice,
"I ask you not to believe that he is to blame for anything
wrong about me."

"I won't, then. I'll believe the best of you both.
We are going to be very happy, all of us. Just think,
you are going to be a mother! It's the sublimest feeling
in life. I know it, because all my life I've heard
baby voices in my ears and in my heart, Nettie, and my
arms have ached and yearned to press a little baby to
my breast. My own dear little ones have passed, but,
Nettie, I'll hold yours, won't I, dear?"

"Oh, Mrs. Langdon, when you talk like that, I feel
just as if something was bursting all up inside me. I
don't know what to do."

"Do nothing, dear; but look out at God's beautiful
world. Lift your eyes to the skies, to the sun, to the
hills' hills!"

"There's no sun no more," said Nettie. "The days
are all dark and cold now, and the hills are all froze,
too. They're like me, Mrs. Langdon. I'm all froze
up inside."

"Oh, but you'll change now. Look, Nettie, it won't
be long before they'll be back--my husband and your
Cyril. I had a letter. Where is it, now? I put it
in my book--no, under my pillow. See, what they
write." The paper fluttered in her hand, and she
looked up to smile at Nettie. "It was thoughtful of
Bill, wasn't it, to have the letter typed? You know
he hates to write letters. Poor fellow hasn't much of
an education--You know, Nettie, he came to the
school when I was teaching, to learn. It was pathetic,
really it was. But now, he's had some stenographer
write to tell me that they'll be home in a couple of
weeks. They should have been home two months ago,
but they've had a terrible time of it in the States. You
see there's a kind of sickness over there--a plague
that's running around. It's all over Europe and now
the States. People, he writes, are afraid to go to
public places, and everything is closed up. It's a great
disappointment for him, poor fellow. He expected so
much from the Prince, and he's hung on from week
to week, and been through all sorts of aggravating
times. You know they even quarantined his herd on
a false suspicion of disease, when they were in perfect
health. But, never mind, we have to have disappointments
in life. All I'm thankful for now is that he's
coming back--he and Cyril."

Nettie said in a low voice:

"Mrs. Langdon, I don't want to see neither of them
again. I can't."

"That's the way you feel now. It's natural in your
condition. I had notions, too. Wanted the strangest
things to eat, and had such fits of crying about nothing
at all. You'll be all over these moods by the time
Cyril rides in. My! I'm going to scold that boy.
Yes, yes, you may be angry if you want, but I'm going
to give him a real piece of my mind, and then--well,
it's never too late to mend a wrong, Nettie."

"Mrs. Langdon," said Nettie violently, "I tell you
Cyril Stanley never done me no wrong."

"Well, that's how you look at it, Nettie, and maybe
you are right. I'm the last person to judge you."

Nettie bent down suddenly and grasping Mrs. Langdon's
thin hand tightly, she kissed it. Then as quickly
dropping it, she got up, threw her apron over her face
and ran from the room.




CHAPTER XV


In the winter the Bar Q outfit in the foothill ranch
had dwindled down to eight men. These were all
riders, men who "rode the fences" and kept them
in repair; men who rode the range, and made the rounds
of the fields, counted and kept account of the cattle
remaining on the ranch, and reported sick or crippled
cattle to the veterinary surgeon maintained at the
ranch.

The breeding stock had been despatched to the
prairie ranch in the fall, where they were especially
housed and cared for. The beef stock, three-year-old
steers, were also disposed at the grain ranch, where
they were fed on chop and green feed and hay, to fatten
them for the spring market.

The purebred heifers and cows had their own home
at Barstairs, where also was the camp of the purebred
bulls.

At the foothill ranch only the younger stuff was left,
the yearling and rising two-year-old heifers and steers,
and these sturdy young stuff "rustled" over the winter
range, finding sufficient sustenance to carry them
through the winter. The cook car was closed, and
the men "batched" in the bunkhouses but came to the
main ranch house for bread, butter and general supplies.

Nettie, long ignorant of her condition, had from day
to day passed out the supplies to the men, unconscious
of and indifferent to their scrutiny. She failed to
realize that what had become apparent to her mistress,
had also been revealed to the cunning eyes of the
Bar Q "hands."

Bunkhouses in a ranching country are breeding
places for the worst kind of gossip and scandal, to
which disgusting commerce men even more than women
are addicted. It was, therefore, not long before Nettie's
name became first whispered and then carelessly
bandied among them. At her name eyes rolled, winks
and coarse laughter were the rule where but a little
while ago she had been the object of admiring respect
and aspiration.

Cyril Stanley's name was also on each man's tongue,
and they all took it for granted that he was responsible
for Nettie's condition. A change in their manner
toward the girl followed the loose talk about her; there
were certain meaning looks, a new familiarity of
speech, and presently worse than that. "Pink-eyed"
Tom, a man whose dirty boasts concerning women were
a source of endless fun among the men, came to the
house one day for a side of bacon. He followed Nettie
into the big storeroom, where the Bar Q meat supply
hung. As she passed the bacon to him, Pink-Eye managed
to seize her hand, and with a broad grin, he
squeezed it, and attempted to draw her to him. It
was only a momentary grasp, but with the chuckle that
went with it the girl understood and turned first deathly
white and scarlet with anger.

"Guess you ain't used to man-handling--oh, no!"
said Tom, and as she fiercely withdrew from his grasp,
he laughed in her face, with an ugly meaning leer that
set her heart frantically beating.

She flew from the storeroom to the kitchen, and stood
with her back pressed against the door, holding it
closed. A sickening fear of the whole race of men
consumed her. She longed to escape to some place beyond
their sight or ken where she might at least hide
herself and be allowed the boon of suffering unmolested
and unseen. She had a passionate longing to escape
from the Bar Q--to leave forever the hateful place
where she had been so cruelly betrayed, where she had
suffered almost beyond endurance. But the thought
of leaving Mrs. Langdon hurt her more than the
thought of staying, and her mind wandered in the hopeless
search of a solution to her appalling problem. She
thought of her friend "Angel" Loring, with her cropped
hair and men's clothing, and for the first time comprehended
what might drive a woman to do as the Englishwoman
had done.

"A bad report runs a thousand miles a minute," says
an oriental proverb. Certainly that is true of a ranching
country. From bunkhouse to farm and ranch
house raced the tale of a girl's fall; it was a morsel of
exciting news to those dull souls shut in by the rigid
hand of the winter.

On the first Chinook day, women harnessed teams to
democrats and single drivers to buggies, and took the
road to Bar Q. Never had that ranch been favored
with so many visitors. Neither Nettie nor her mistress
suspected that their guests had come to see for themselves
whether there was truth in the story concerning
the girl which had percolated over the telephone and
been carried by riders intent upon retailing the latest
sensation of the foothills. Caste exists not in a ranching
country like Alberta, save among a few rare and
exclusive souls, and a hired girl on a ranch has her own
social standing in the community, especially if she is
that rarity, a pretty girl. So Nettie's plight was of
as supreme an interest to the ranch and farm wives as
if instead of a poor servant girl she had been any
prosperous farmer's daughter. Hired girls are potential
wives for the best of the ranchmen, and many a
farmer's wife has begun her career on a cook car.

Nettie, cutting cake and brewing tea in the kitchen,
paused, tray in hand, white-faced, behind the door, as
the voices of the women close at hand floated through.

"Looked me right in the face, innocent as a lamb,
and she----"

"She's six months gone if a day."

"Seem's if she might've gone straight, being the oldest
in the family. You'd thought she'd want to set an
example to her little brothers and sisters."

"Pshaw! she should worry."

"Ain't girls awful today!"

"When you told me on the 'phone, I couldn't b'lieve
it, and I come along on purpose to make sure for
myself."

"Well, now you see, though I'm not used to havin'
my word doubted."

"Why, Mrs. Munson, I hadn't the idea of questioning
your word; but I thought as you hadn't seen for yourself,
and got it third-hand."

"I got it straight--straight from Batt Leeson, and
he ought to know after workin' more'n ten years at the
Bar Q."

"Personally, I make a point of standing up for the
girl."

The voice this time was a shade gentler, but it was
also flurried and apologetic.

"You know as well as I do, Mrs. Young, if a girl
acts decent, men let her alone. You can tell me!"

Her face stony, her head held high, Nettie pushed
the door open with her foot, and came in with the tray.
She silently served them, but her glance flickered toward
her mistress, who was leaning forward listening to the
whispered words of Mrs. Peterson, cringing toward the
rich cattleman's wife. For the first time since she had
known her, Mrs. Langdon's voice sounded sharp and
cold.

"I'll thank you not to repeat a nasty tale like that.
Nettie Day has just as much right to have a child as
you have."

"Why, I'm a married woman," blurted the outraged
farm wife.

"How do you know Nettie isn't married?"

Chairs were hunched forward. The circle leaned
with pricked-up ears toward the speaker.

"Is she, now?"

"Well, that accounts for it!"

"You couldn't make me believe Nettie was that kind.
We all thought--well, you know how girls carry on today.
I'm sure you'll excuse us. We're all li'ble to
make mistakes."

The Inquisition turned to Nettie.

"My word, Nettie Day, why didn't you let us know?
What on earth did you want to keep it secret for?
The whole country'd turned out to Chivaree for you.
We haven't had a marriage in a year, and Cyril Stanley
is mighty popular with the boys."

Nettie's gaze went slowly around that circle of faces.
She wanted to make sure that all might hear her words.

"I ain't married to Cyril Stanley, and he done me
no wrong. You got no right to talk his name loose like
that."

An exclamatory silence reigned in the room. Mrs.
Langdon, her cheeks very flushed, was sitting up, her
bright eyes, like a bird's, scanning the faces of her
visitors.

"Nettie," her thin, piercing voice was raised, "you
forgot my tea, and--and--maybe you ladies'll excuse
me today. I'm not well, you know."

For the first time since she had become a convert to
her strange philosophy she was admitting illness; but
she was doing it in another's behalf.

As the last of the women disappeared through the
door, and before the murmur of their voices outside
had died out, Mrs. Langdon made a motion of her
hands toward Nettie, and the girl ran over, dropped
on her knees by the couch and hid her face in her mistress's
lap.

"Nettie, don't you mind what they say. Women
are terribly cruel to each other. I don't know why
they should be, I'm sure, for I believe that we all have
in us the same capacities for sinning, only most of us
escape temptation. It's almost a gamble, isn't it,
Nettie; and I'm so sorry, poor child, that you should
have been the one to lose." Her voice dropped to a
whisper. "I'll confess something to you now, Nettie.
I--yes, I--almost----"

"If you're goin' to say something against yourself,"
said Nettie hoarsely, "I don't want to hear it. You
ain't capable ever of doing anything wrong."


On the road, the carriages were grouped together.
Their occupants leaned out and called back and forth
to each other.

"What do you know of that?"

"I'm certainly surprised at Mrs. Langdon. I didn't
think she'd hold to anything like that."

"I did, and I'm not a bit surprised. I could've told
you a thing or two. Birds of a feather flock together,
and she----"

Voices were lowered, as another woman's reputation
was pulled to shreds.

"Well, Mrs. Munson, you don't say so."

"I certainly do."

"I remember when the Bull first married her. Sa-ay,
there was all kinds of talk. Ask anyone who was here
in them times."

Murmurs and exclamations, and a woman's voice
rumbling out a tale that should never have been told.

"Would you've believed it! And she so sweet and
sly of tongue."

"Still waters run deep. You can't trust them quiet
kind. I had it direct from Jem Bowers. You know
Jem. He was right along when it happened. They
were shut in that schoolhouse for two whole days, and
the door locked and bolted. The Bull himself asked
Jem to go for the missionary, and everyone knows Jem
was one of the witnesses at the Langdon wedding. Said
she looked just like a little scared bird, and her eyes
were all screwed up with crying, so I guess doin' wrong
did bring her no happiness."

"Well, I'd never have believed it if you hadn't told
me. I'm going to hustle right off now. I want to stop
and see Mrs. Durkin on my way. She couldn't get off
to come, as they've had the mumps up to their house,
and I promised to let her know, and I'll bet her tongue's
hangin' out waitin'."

"Well, don't say I said it."

"I won't. I'll say I got it from--from--I'll not
name the party. Get ap, Gate! My, that mare's
smart."

"I like geldings for driving. They aren't so quick,
but they're dependable and strong. Good-by. Will
you be at the box social?"

"Sure, what's it for?"

"Oh, them sick folks in the east. Did you hear that
that plague sickness they got in the States has sneaked
across to Canada, and everybody's scared nearly to
death. They've got it awful out in Toronto and Montreal."

"Didn't know it was as bad as that."

"It's something awful out east I heard. My husband
brought home a paper from Calgary, and they had the
whole front page in headlines about it. Them Yankees
brought it in with them when they run away to escape
from it in their own country. Wish they'd stay home
and look after their own sicknesses, 'stead of coming
across the line and carrying it along with them. Others
have been flying out west here, and they say if we don't
look out, first thing we know Calgary'll have it, and then--well,
it'll be our turn. I heard they were shipping
all the sick ones out of the city to the country."

The women looked at each other waveringly, licking
their lips and turning white with dread. They drew
their rugs closer about them and said they had to be
off, as it was getting dark and they didn't want to catch
cold, and no one ever knew when a change might blow
up in the weather and that cloud off to the north looked
mighty threatening. In the sudden panic of the approaching
plague, Nettie was for the time being forgotten.
The clatter and rattle of their wheels was heard
along the road, as with whip and tongue they urged
their horses homeward.




CHAPTER XVI


All night long the wind blew wildly. It raved like
a live, mad thing, tearing across the country
with tornado-like force.

The house shock and rocked upon its foundations,
the rattling windows and clattering doors ready to be
burst open every moment.

To the girl, lying wide-eyed throughout the night,
it seemed almost as if the voice of the wild wind had
the triumphant, mocking tone of the man she loathed.
It seemed to typify his immense strength, his power
and madness. It was gloating, triumphing over her,
buffeting and trampling her down.

Nettie was not given to self-analysis, but for all her
simplicity she was capable of intense feeling. Behind
her slow thought there slumbered an unlimited capacity
for suffering. Now even the elements were preying
upon her morbid imagination. She could not sleep for
the raging of the terrific wind, the incessant shaking
of windows and doors, and all the sounds of a loosely
built old ranch house, rattling and trembling in the
furious tempest. As she lay in bed, her face crushed
into her pillow, her hands over her ears, as though to
deaden the roar of the wind, she could not rid her mind
of the thought of the man she hated. She was doomed
that night to relive the hideous hours spent with him,
until, the vision becoming intolerable to her fevered
mind, she sprang up in bed, and rocking herself to and
fro like one half demented, sat in judgment upon her
own acts.

Why had she not killed herself? Why was she living
on? Why was she crouched here now upon her bed,
when the Ghost River was at hand? True, it was
frozen over, but there were great water holes, where
the cattle came to drink, and into one of these she
might throw herself as into a deep well. Oblivion would
come then. Her sick mind would no longer conjure up
the loathsome vision of Bull Langdon, and her ears
would be deaf to the taunting, beating challenge of the
wind, calling to her with its roaring voice to come forth
and fight hand to hand with the fates that had crushed
her.

"I got to go out!" she moaned. "I got to go out!
I can't live no longer."

She put her foot over the side of the bed, and with
her head uplifted she listened to what her disordered
mind fancied was a voice out of the river, calling to
her above the raging of the wind. And as she sat in
the dark room, above the raving of the wind, she heard
indeed a call--a living voice. Instantly she drew up
tensely, holding her breath the more clearly to catch
the faint cry.

"Nettie! Nettie!"

It was her mistress. She was out of bed, fumbling
for the matches.

The Bar Q was equipped with electricity, but the
wires were not connected with the hired girl's room.
It was a pitch-dark night. Frightened as she was of
the darkness and the storm, the cry of her well-loved
mistress awoke all the defensive bravery of her nature,
and she called aloud in reply, feeling along the walls,
groping her way to the door.

"I'm coming, Mrs. Langdon! I'm coming! I'm
coming!"

In the hall she found the electric button, and hurried
across to Mrs. Langdon's room. She found the cattleman's
wife propped high up on her pillow, breathing
with the difficulty of an asthmatic. The window was
wide open, and the shades flapped angrily and tore at
the rollers. The face on the bed smiled up wanly at
Nettie in the reflected light from the hall.

"Oh, Mrs. Langdon, did you call me? Do you want
something?"

"Yes, dear. I thought maybe you wouldn't mind
closing my window for me. I tried to get up myself,
but I had a sort of presentiment that--that you were
awake and that perhaps you would--would like to come
to me."

"Oh, I was awake, wide, wide awake. I couldn't sleep
to save myself. Isn't the wind terrible!"

"It's dying down, I think."

"Oh, it's fiercer than ever," cried the girl wildly.
"It's just terrible. I can't bear to hear it. I been
awake all night. Just seems as if that wind was shoutin'
and screamin' and makin' mock of me, Mrs. Langdon.
It's banging upon my--heart. I hate the wind. I think
it's alive--a horrible, wild thing. It fights and laughs
at me. It's driving me mad."

"Ah, Nettie, you are not yourself these days. It is
not the wind, but what is in your heart that speaks.
We can even control the wind if we wish. Christ did,
and the Christ spirit is in us all, if we only knew how
to use it."

Nettie had closed the windows. On her knees by
Mrs. Langdon's bed, she was pulling the covers up and
tucking them closely about her, and chafing the thin,
cold hands.

"You're cold. Your hands are just like ice. I'm
going downstairs to heat some water and fill the hot-water
bag for you."

"No, no, Nettie. You go right back to bed. I'll go
down myself by and by, if I feel the need of the bag."

But though Nettie promised to go back to bed, she
hurried down to the lower floor. She had no longer
fear of the wind or the darkness. Her mind was intent
upon securing the hot-water bag, and she built up a
fire in the dead range, and set the kettle upon it.

She was bending over the wood-box, picking but a
likely log, when something stirred behind her. Still
stooping, she remained still and tense. Slowly the
Bull's great arms reached down from behind and enfolded
her.

The noise of the wind had deadened his approach to
the house. He had come through the living room to
the opened kitchen door, by the stove of which was the
bending girl.

She twisted about in his arms, only to bring her face
directly against his own. She was held in a vise, in the
arms of the huge cattleman. His hoarse whispers were
muttered against her mouth, her cheek, her neck.

He chuckled and gloated as she fought for her freedom,
dumbly, for her thoughts flew up to the woman
upstairs. Above all things, Mrs. Langdon must be
spared a knowledge of that which was happening to
Nettie.

"Ain't no use to struggle! Ain't no use to cry," he
chortled. "I got you tight, and there ain't no one to
hear. I been thinkin' of you day and night, gell, for
months now, and I been countin' off the minutes for
this."

She cried in a strangled voice:

"She's upstairs! She'll hear you! Oh, she's coming
down. Oh, don't you hear her? Oh, for the love of
God! let me go."

The man heard nothing but his clamoring desires.

"Gimme your lips!" said the Bull huskily.

The clipclop of those loose slippers clattering on the
stairs broke upon the hush that had fallen in the kitchen.
Through all her agony Nettie heard the sound of those
little feet, and she knew--she felt--just when they had
stopped at the lower step as Mrs. Langdon clung to
the bannister. Slowly the wife of the cowman sank to
the lowest step. She did not lose consciousness, but
an icy stiffness crept over her face; her jaw dropped,
and a glaze came like a veil before her staring eyes.

With a superhuman effort Nettie had obtained her
release. She sprang to Mrs. Langdon, and groveled at
her feet.

"Oh, Mrs. Langdon, it 'twant my fault. I didn't
mean to do no harm. Oh, Mrs. Langdon, I wisht I'd
heeded the wind! It must've been warning me. I wisht
I'd gone to the Ghost River, when it called to me to
come."

Mrs. Langdon's head had slowly dropped forward,
just as if the neck had broken. Nettie, beneath her,
sought the glance of her eyes, and saw the effort of the
moving lips.

"God's--will," said the woman slowly. "A dem-on-stration--of--God.
I--had--to leave, Nettie. God's
will you--take--my--place."

Across the half-paralyzed face something flickered
strangely like a faint smile. Then the girl saw her
mistress fall, inert and still against the staircase.

A loud cry broke from the frantic Nettie.

"We've killed her! We've killed Mrs. Langdon!"

"Killed her--nothing," said the man hoarsely, his
face twitching and his hands shaking. "I told you she
was 'bout ready to croak, and you heard what she said.
You was to take her place. That means----"

Nettie had arisen, and her eyes wide with loathing
she stared at him in a sort of mad fury. Somehow she
seemed to grow strong and tall, and there was a light
of murder in her eyes.

"I'd sooner drown myself in the Ghost River," she
said.

Like one gone blind she felt her way to her room,
and this time the man did not follow her.

The wind raved on; the windows shook; the door
easements creaked as if an angry hand were upon them;
the white curtains flapped in and out. There was the
heavy tramp of men's feet upon the stair; the rough
murmur of men's voices in the hall. She knew they
were carrying the dead woman to her room.

Hours of silence followed. The Bull had gone with
his men to the bunkhouse, and she was alone in the
house with the dead woman. For the first time, a sense
of peace, a passionate gladness swept over the tortured
girl. Mrs. Langdon would know the truth at last!
She would have no blame in her heart for Nettie---- Nettie,
who had a psychic sense of the warm nearness
and understanding of the woman who had passed away.

As she dressed in the darkness of the room, Nettie
talked to her, she believed was with her, catching her
breath in trembling little sobs and laughs of reassurance.

"You understand now, don't you, and you don't hold
it against me? I didn't mean no wrong.... I done
the best I could. You don't ask me to stay now that
you know, do you, dear?"

The plaid woolen shawl, a Christmas gift from Mrs.
Langdon, covered her completely. The gray light of
dawn was filtering through the house; the wind had died
down. In its place the snow was falling upon the land,
spotless and silent. Nettie's face was whiter than the
snow as she left her room. Mrs. Langdon's door was
closed, and, hesitating only a moment, Nettie stole to it
on tiptoe. With her face pressed against it, she called
to the woman inside.

"Good-by, Mrs. Langdon. Nobody will ever be so
kind to me in this world as you have been."

She listened, almost as if she heard that faint, sweet
voice in reply. Then, strangely comforted, she
wrapped her cape closer about her, and in her rubbered
feet Nettie Day stole down the stairs and went out into
the storm.




CHAPTER XVII


The veteran geldings that had pulled Dr. McDermott
for years over the roads of Alberta had
long since been replaced by a gallant little Ford,
that purred and grunted its way along the roads and
trails in all kinds of weather, and performed miraculous
feats over the roughest of trails, across fields, plowed
land, chugging sturdily through to the medical man's
goal.

Many of the farmers belonged to that type that
seemed to believe implicitly in the proverb, "Where ignorance
is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise." They laughed or
poohpoohed the doctor's warning admonitions in regard
to the plague, already as far west as Winnipeg. They
"joshed" and "guyed" him, and asked: "Lookin' for
trade, doc? You can't make me sick with your pills,
so you better keep them to home. Haw, haw!" And
they threw the disinfectant and pills (to be taken
should certain symptoms develop) away out of sight
and mind, and made jokes when he was gone about,
"Doc gettin' cold feet like the city guys. If he don't
look out he'll be gittin' just like them paper collar
dudes in town and want soothin' syrup for white liver."
They hugged to themselves the imbecile delusion that
since they lived a cleaner and healthier life than mere
city dwellers, they would prove immune to diseases that
were a peculiarity of the city.

It may not be out of place to mention here that
county and city hospitals numbered among their patients
far more people from the country than the cities,
and that the insane asylums were almost wholly recruited
from the lone farm and ranch houses, where the
monotonous pressure of the long life of loneliness took
its due toll of those condemned, as it were, to solitary
confinement.

Howbeit, the "doc" kept his stubborn vigil. He did
not propose to be caught "napping," and he traveled
the roads of Alberta, going from ranch to ranch, with
his warnings and instructions and despised pills.

While returning from some such expedition into the
foothills he stopped, in the dawn of the day, to fasten
the curtains about his car, as the wind of the wild night
before had turned with the morning into a snowstorm.
A straight, level road was before him, and the doctor
figured on making Cochrane in half an hour. Up to
this time, in spite of the weather and the perilous trail
to Banff, he had had no trouble with the engine. Now,
however, as he cranked, the Ford, a peculiarly temperamental
and uncertain car, refused to produce the
spark. He lifted the hood, made an inspection, cranked
again and again; held his side, and groaned and grunted
with the exertion, raged and cussed a bit, regretted the
old veterans; then, throwing his dogskin coat over the
engine, he searched for the trouble underneath. He
was lying on his back, a sheepskin under him, tinkering
away with the "dommed cantankerous works," when,
putting out his head to look for his wrench, he saw
something approaching on the road that caused him to
sit bolt upright in blank astonishment.

Her cape flapping about her, her head weighed down
with the falling snow, her eyes wide and blank, snow-blind,
Nettie Day swept before the wind on the Banff
trail. The doctor, on his feet now, blocked her further
passage, for she seemed not to see him but to be walking
in a somnambulist's trance.

"What are you doin' on the road at this hour, lass?"

She did not answer, but stared out blankly before
her, shaking her snow-crowned head.

A quick professional glance at the girl and the doctor
realized her condition and the need for immediate
action. She made no demur; indeed, was touchingly
meek, as he assisted her into the car. He tucked the
fur robe about her, buttoned the curtains tightly, and,
his face puckered with concern, he poured out a stiff
"peg" of whisky. She drank mechanically, gulping
slightly as the spirits burnt her throat. Her eyes were
drooping drowsily, and when the doctor put his sheepskin
under her head, she sighed with intense weariness,
and then lay still at the bottom of the car.

The doctor "doggoned" that engine, shoved the
crank in, and, miraculously, there was the healthy chug-chug
of the engine, and the little car went roaring on
its way.

"You're a dommed good lad!" gloated Dr. McDermott
and pulled on his dogskin gloves, wiped the frost
from the glass, threw a glance back to make sure the
girl was all right, and put on top speed.




CHAPTER XVIII


The Lady Angella Luring arose at five in the
morning, put on overalls, sheepskin coat, woolen
gauntlets, and heavy overshoes. She tramped through
the steadily falling snow to her barn, which housed a
cow, a sow, a mare heavy in foal, a saddle horse and
the poultry.

The March winds that had raged all the previous
night had turned with the morning to a snowstorm, and
the flakes were now falling so heavily that the barn was
only just visible from the house as the woman rancher
plodded through the blinding flakes.

First she threw into the pig-pen the pails of swill
and mush she had brought from the house, then watered
the stock, no easy matter, for the pumped water froze
quickly in the trough, and she was forced to refill it
several times. That done, she climbed into the hayloft,
and with her pitchfork thrust down through the
openings the morning feed for the cow, carefully measured
chop from the bin for the mare, allowing half a
pail of oats and a bunch of hay for the saddle horse;
she threw to the chickens, hens that had followed hungrily
in her wake, a pan full of ground barley and
wheat seasoned with cayenne pepper, epsom salts and
bits of bones and eggshells.

Finally she went to her milking. The cow was fresh,
and she had a full pail. Half of this, however, she fed
to the restless little calf, nosing near its mother, and
trying to shake off the muzzle that Angella had snapped
on the night before in order to wean it. The task of
feeding the calf required patience and time, for the
restive little "dogie" nearly knocked over the pail, and
had to be taught how to drink by feeling the woman's
fingers thrust, wet with the milk, into its mouth. She
was more than an hour about her chores. With the
half-filled pail in one hand, she tramped back to the
house through the snow, falling now more heavily than
before.

Before leaving the house Angella had lit her fire, and
now the place was warm and snug, and the singing
kettle lent it an air of cheer. There was a certain
attractiveness about the poor shack on the prairie, in
spite of its rough, bare log walls and two wee windows.
Though she chose to wear men's clothing, and had cut
her hair like a man's, yet one had only to look about
that room to perceive that the eternal feminine had
persisted notwithstanding her angry and pitiful attempt
to quench it.

She had made most of the furniture herself, crude
pieces fashioned from willow fence posts and grocery
boxes, yet they betrayed a craftsman's talent, for the
chairs, though designed for use, were rustic and pretty,
and she had touched them in spots with bright red
paint. The table, over which a vivid red oilcloth was
nailed, made a bright patch of color in the room. Red,
in most places, for decorative purposes, can be used
only sparingly, but in a bleak log shack a splash of
this ruddy color gives both warmth and cheer. The
floor had been scrubbed until it was almost white, and
a big red-brown cowhide made a carpet near the couch,
which was covered with a calfskin. Indian ornaments
and beadwork, bits of crockery and pewter were on the
shelves that lined one side of the shack, and where also
she kept her immaculately shining kettles, cooking utensils
and dishes. A curtain of burlap sacks, edged with
scarlet cloth, hung before the bedroom doorway. The
pillows on the spotless bed were covered with cases made
of flour bags. A large grocers' box, into which shelves
had been nailed, was also covered with similar cloth and
served as a sort of dressing table. Two chairs, made
from smaller boxes, were padded with burlap, and a
triangular shelf with a curtain before it made a closet
in the corner of the room.

A huge gray cat followed the woman recluse about
the room, sleepily rubbing itself against her, and purring
with contentment when she picked it up in her
arms.

Angella made her breakfast of oatmeal and tea,
serving from the stove directly onto her plate. Her
cat nestled in her lap while she breakfasted, and she
smoothed it absently as she ate.

Time had smoothed out the lines on her face instead
of adding to them, and the strained look of suffering
in her eyes had given way to a healthy gaze. Her skin
had almost the fresh color of a girl's. Her hair had
grown abundantly, though it still was short and almost
gray, but its natural curliness lent her face a soft and
youthful air. There was no sign of the dread disease
which had once threatened her life. She looked normal
and wholesome as she sat at her table, her cat in her
lap, deep in a brown study. It would be hard to say
what filled Angella's thoughts when she was thus shut in
alone in her shack upon the prairie. She had ceased
long since to conjure up bitter visions of the man who
was responsible for her father's death and her own exile.
Her thoughts, at least, were no longer unbearably painful
as in those early days when first she had come to
Alberta, and many a day and night, shut in alone with
her dismal secret, she had wrestled in bitter anguish
with the crowding thoughts that came like ghosts to
haunt her.

However, even in winter she had little enough time
for thinking. Her life was crowded with work. When
she had finished her meal, she washed her dishes, made
her bed, kneaded the dough for her weekly baking, set
a pot of beans, soaked overnight, into the oven, and
prepared to go out again, this time to the pasture,
where her few head of stock "rustled" for their feed all
winter. A snowstorm at this time of year is always
dangerous for the breeding stock dropping their calves
with the approach of the spring. There were water
holes, too, in the frozen slough that had to be broken
in every day so that the cattle might have the water
they needed. Angella, ax in hand, opened the door of
her shack. A gale of wind and snow almost blinded her,
so that at first she did not see the Ford that was plowing
its way noisily and pluckily down the road allowance
that led to her house. At the honk of the doctor's
horn, which he worked steadily to attract her, she
peered out through the storm, and she turned to the
gate, where the car had now stopped.

She never encouraged the visits of Dr. McDermott,
who had saved her life when first she had come to
Alberta; but neither was she ever uncivil when he did
come. Time had accustomed her to his regular calls,
and, in truth, though she would not have admitted it
for anything in the world, she had come to look forward
to these visits, and to depend upon them for her news
of the world, which she so bitterly told herself she had
cast off forever.

Now, as his ruddy face was thrust through the curtains,
Angella, frowning slightly, tramped to the car.

"Are you strong enough to lend me a hand lifting
something?" asked the doctor.

"Certainly I'm strong enough. What do you mean?"

Dr. McDermott, out of the car now, unbuttoned the
back curtains, and revealed to the amazed Angella the
still heavily sleeping Nettie.

"There's a sick lass here," he said solemnly, "and a
lass in sore trouble, I'm thinking."

A strange expression had come into the face of Angella
Loring. Not so long since, it seemed to her, she
had seen as in a dream this girl now lying on the floor
of the doctor's car leaning over her, and had regarded
her with the tender, compassionate gaze of her own
mother. In the days of semi-consciousness that had
followed her first seizure, the Englishwoman could endure
the sight and touch of no one but the girl with
the Madonna face. Without realizing what was amiss,
all she knew was that Nettie was now as helpless as she
had been when the girl had cared for her, and without
a word or a question she helped the doctor lift Nettie
out of the car and to carry her into the house.

Angella Loring believed that there was nothing about
her of which this Scotch doctor approved. He came,
she thought, merely to exercise his abnormal habit of
interference in other folks' affairs and to find fault
with her chosen manner of life. She had at first, in her
desire to be alone, not hesitated to tell him she preferred
her own company to any other. He had barked
back that her taste was unnatural, and it would take
more than "a bitter-tongued lass" to drive him from
his duty. Questioned sarcastically as to what he conceived
his duty to be, he had replied solemnly, "To
keep an eye on you, lass, and to see that you come to
no harm."

Furious as this gratuitous resolve to care for her
had made the woman who believed she could fend for
herself in the world, his answer had nevertheless brought
the bitter tears to her angry eyes, so that she could
not find words for a retort. The doctor's intention to
protect the woman by no means made him lenient in
his judgment of her; he denounced her cut hair as outrageous;
her men's clothes as disgraceful, and her work
in the field as against nature. She secretly enjoyed
his explosion of rage when she took service at Bar Q.

No lass, declared the doctor, in her sober senses
would disfigure herself by cutting off her head the hair
that her Maker had planted there. No true woman
would wear a mon's clothes. Mere contact with a wild
brute like Bull Langdon would muddy any pure woman
in the land. Her obsession--which is what he termed
her aversion to his own sex--and her unnatural life
alone was a pathological matter, for which she needed
to be treated as for the unfortunate illness she had
contracted in London. Some day, he warned her, she
would thank him for the one cure as well as for the
other.

She let him talk on, usually disdaining to answer,
and she pursued her way undeterred by his wholesale
condemnation of her and her course of life.

Yet Angella Loring, holding a little baby in her arms
for the first time in her life, and looking down with
dewy eyes upon the small blonde head resting so helplessly
against her breast, could she have seen the face
of the country doctor as he looked at the cropped bent
head, would have known that all his thoughts of her
were not wholly hard.

Glaring up at him to hide the impending tears, she
almost surprised that look of grave tenderness on the
rough face of the man who had known her as a child.

"She doesn't want it," said Angella Loring. "Her
own child! Well, then, I'll keep it! It shan't want.
I'll care for it."

"It's a wee laddie--born before its time, and nane
too strong." He had a habit when unduly moved of
lapsing into Gaelic, and what he muttered was unintelligible
to the woman, wholly taken up with the baby
in her arms. Could she have understood him she
would have heard the doctor say that a woman who
could mother another woman's "bairn" would be a
good mother to her own.

Outside the snow was still heavily falling. Great
mounds were piling up on all sides. That world of
snow might have appalled the stranger, but to the
farmer it meant certain moisture in the soil. A spring
snowstorm was even more desirable for the land than
rain, as it melted gradually into the earth. Already
the sun was gleaming through the falling snowflakes,
and the intense cold had abated.

"Weel, weel, I'll be off for a while, lass. There's
much still to attend to."

"You can't go out in that storm," said Angella
roughly. "Wait, I'll get you something to eat. Not
even your Ford could plow through snow like that."

"Maybe not, and I'll not be taking the Ford."

"Well, I've no vehicle to lend you."

"I'll go afoot," said the doctor, wrapping his woolen
scarf about his neck, preparatory to going out.

"You're a fool to go out," said Angella crossly.
"Wait till you have a cup of coffee anyway."

"I'll be going just across the land, to the lad's cabin.
I heard last night that he was back."

"Who's cabin? What land?"

"Young Cyril Stanley's--the scallawag. I'll have
thot to say to him, I'm thinking, will bring him across
in a hurry."

"He needn't come here!" Angella had started up
savagely. "I don't want any man here, least of all a
dog like that who'd do such a thing to a girl. He can
keep away from my house. He's not fit to--to even
look at her now. No man is."

"Weel, weel, 'tis true, but we're all liable to mistakes,
ma'am, and young blood is hot and careless, and who
are we--you and I--to judge another? We must look
to our own consciences first, ma'am."

"Yes, stand up for him--defend him. You men all
hang together. I know you all, and I hate you. I----"

She broke off, for the doctor was looking at her with
such a strange look of mingled earnestness and tenderness,
that the stormy words died on her lips, and she
dropped her wet face upon the soft little one in her
arms.

Dr. McDermott closed the door softly.




CHAPTER XIX


The tour of the Bar Q purebred bulls had been
a disastrous and costly one. From city to city,
at a staggering expense, went the prize herd,
from which extraordinary things had been expected.
Wherever they touched it was their misfortune to be
turned back or shunted farther afield. That winter
the country was suffering from the fearful scourge,
which having stricken down its victims by the thousands
in Europe had passed over the sea to America.

Then there was a time when the Bar Q herd was condemned
by a harassed and irritated authority who,
upon the diagnosis of an incompetent veterinary surgeon,
pronounced the cattle to be suffering from foot
and mouth disease, and an order was issued for the
slaughter of the entire herd, and the burning of all
sheds, cars or other houses in which they had been
penned. Bull Langdon found himself held indefinitely
in the States, as he fought by injunction proceedings
the destruction of his herd, which would have meant an
incalculable loss--even ruin--to him.

The adjournments and delays, the long, drawn-out
legal processes, kept the herd in the States from December
till February, and when at last they were freed
the penned-in brutes were in a deteriorated condition.
Their long confinement, the unaccustomed traveling,
and the lack of proper care, made the once smooth
bulls difficult to handle and dangerous, so that by the
time the herd was ready to start back for Canada
more than one of the "hands" who had come to the
States with them deserted the outfit rather than risk
looking after the uncertain animals on tour.

Bull Langdon, raging and fretting over the enforced
delays in the States, harassed by his losses and his
failure to obtain a showing of the famous herd, was in
a black mood when at last the outfit reached Barstairs.

Here fresh trouble awaited him. Of all the bulls, the
Prince had proved the most dangerous and erratic of
temper; his ceaseless bellowing and attempts to break
loose had done much to make the outfit unpopular
throughout their travels. Always uncertain and dangerous,
back at Barstairs he became well-nigh uncontrollable,
and there was no "hand" of the entire outfit,
save Cyril, who dared approach the raging beast, as
behind heavily barred fences he ranged up and down
restlessly, calling his resounding cries to the cattle that
he could smell even if he could not see them in adjoining
pastures, and something of the wild spirit of the animal
appealed to his owner, whose own pent-up rage seemed
to find vent in a savage roaring voice. A kindred spirit
bound them together. Often, when the exasperations
of the tour threatened to overwhelm him, he would go
to where the Prince ranged up and down within the
narrow space of his shed bellowing and moaning his
demands for freedom. At such times Bull Langdon,
from the other side of the bars, would call to the bull,
not soothingly, but in a tone of encouragement, as
though cheering and "rooting" for the rebellious brute.

"Go to it!" he would snarl through the bars. "Let
'em know you're here! Keep 'em awake. Make their
nerves jump. Go to it, bull!"

Up to the time of their return to Barstairs, Cyril
Stanley had looked after the animal, and so long as he
was at hand the Prince remained fairly well under control.
But Cyril, who had been silent and morose all
through the tour in the States, suddenly decided, once
back in Canada, to quit the outfit. The cattleman
received his quiet request to be relieved of his job with
consternation and fury.

What did he want to leave for? Hadn't he had his
pay raised four times already? Hadn't he got $500
he'd been promised? He had practically full charge
of the herd already, and the foreman's job and wages
would belong to him before spring.

But neither bluster nor curses moved him, and the
offer of increases in wages, heavy bonuses and enormous
salary were steadily refused. Money meant nothing
now to Cyril. He was heartily sick of the whole business.
He felt the restlessness that comes to a man as
soon as he feels himself free again and on his native
soil, and longs to be moving along the trail. To roam
from place to place seemed all that was left to him
since his dream of a home had been shattered, and long
absence had not cured him of the sickness of love. He
had had enough of cattle. He was done with ranching,
and when the Bull demanded just what it was that he
proposed to do, he answered after a thoughtful pause:
"Think I'll hike for Bow Claire. Plenty of work there,
I guess. The river'll be high when the snows begin to
melt, and they'll be wantin' 'hands' and loggers at the
camp."

Meanwhile, Bull Langdon found his hands full.
Those were the days of labor unrest when there were
a dozen employers in the employment offices for every
employee; when wages were soaring; when men looked
the "bosses" squarely in the face, and made their own
terms. The cattleman had returned at a time when
labor was so scarce and independent in Alberta, that
many of the farmers were forced to do their own work,
or grub together with other farmers on shares. It is
certain that there was not a ranchman in the country
willing to work with Bull Langdon. Even those he had
formerly been able to tyrannize over gave him a wide
berth; never had the Bar Q been so short-handed, and
the departure of Cyril, who was invaluable among the
purebred, was a real disaster to the Bull camp.

For some time Langdon had been beset with an almost
insensate craving for Nettie Day. All the time he had
been in the States she had never been wholly absent
from his mind, though the anxieties of the tour had
kept his desire for the girl in check; but once back in
Canada, his mind reverted to her incessantly.

As he stood watching Cyril Stanley disappear at a
slow lope over the hills, it occurred to him that he might
be making for Bar Q and Nettie, and the thought gave
him pause. The idea that Nettie and Cyril should come
together again was more than he could stand. The
blood rushed madly to his head, and everything went
red before his eyes.

Batt Leeson, a hand who had served directly under
Cyril, was the second-best upon the place; he could be
trusted to look after the cattle, and was known to be
a conscientious workman, although he had never yet
been entrusted with any position of authority. When
Cyril's job was offered him, therefore, he was rather
afraid and hesitant. However, there was no foreman
at this time at the Bull camp, which had been stripped
for the trip to the States, and there was no other man
in the outfit fit to be one.

The Bull considered the possibility of Cyril's changing
his mind and returning to Bar Q. He knew what
logging in the lumber camps meant, and that though
the work would not daunt the young man, the food and
the dirt would. The daily association with them "damn
dirty forriners," as Bull named the Russian loggers,
would soon be too much for a white man, he decided,
and counted upon Cyril's return.

When he left the camp he was by no means easy in
his mind about his cattle. He took the trail for Bar Q
in his big car, racing ahead in the teeth of a veritable
cyclone, but the good car held its straight course gallantly.
It was late at night when Bull Langdon reached
the ranch in the foothills, and the noise of his arrival
could not be heard above the gale. When he saw that
light in the kitchen, he came warily upon the place.
Sniffing the air like a bloodhound tracking down his
prey, he cautiously approached the kitchen where
Nettie's light still burned. Concealed in the darkness
of the living room his greedy eyes devoured the girl as
she moved about the room busy at the great range. All
thought was swept from his mind, leaving only the mad
desire to crush in his arms once again the girl who
awakened in him this overmastering passion.



Meanwhile, Cyril Stanley had mechanically turned
his horse's head toward the foothills. He had no definite
purpose in mind; he was vaguely conscious of being
hungry for a sight of Nettie. His long absence had
not cured him; he loved the girl as deeply as on that
first day when their eyes had met across the space of
the poor D. D. D. shack, and the room was full of
laughter.

How pretty she had looked, in spite of her shabby
dress; how her hair had shone in the sun! How gentle
and sweet and good she had been to her little brothers
and sisters! Even the strange woman in the C. P. R.
shack had melted before Nettie's shy effort to help her
in those days, reflected the unhappy Cyril. No one
could have resisted her, and he told himself that it was
small wonder that he had "fallen so hard" for her. He
had seen many women in the big cities of America, but
had found no face like Nettie's. No, he wouldn't change
his girl for any girl in the States. And as in his thought
he called her "his," he awoke suddenly to the realization
that Nettie was "his" no longer; someone had stolen
her heart from him! Yet such a longing was on him
to see the beloved face again, that he resolved to risk
her displeasure by going to Bar Q before burying himself
in the deep woods at the lumber camp.

On the road he fell in with a couple of riders from
the hill country, and their suggestive gossip aroused
him somewhat from his gloom, for he caught the girl's
name and the sneer that came into their voices caused
him to sit up abruptly, his hat pushed back, and his
eyes full of dangerous interrogation. They protested
they had only been "stringing" him, and rode rapidly
off. What they had hinted was that the quicker the
girl at Bar Q was married, the better, and that he,
Cyril Stanley, had come back only just in time.

Cyril turned this over heavily in his mind, shaking
his head as though the problem were beyond him, but
he changed his course away from the hill, deciding to
spend a few days at his homestead. He would stay in
the little house he had built for Nettie; he wanted to
look over the place that was to have been their home.
He would go to Bar Q later. At least, Nettie would
not refuse to bid him good-by.

As he rode along, his hat over his eyes, smarting
tears bit at the lids, and the heart of the lad who used
once to go singing along the trail and about his work
was heavy as lead within him.

At the homely little cabin, faith and confidence in
Nettie seemed to come back to him; perhaps her strange
behavior had all been some hideous mistake. Perhaps
she had been merely angry at his going to Barstairs.
Well, a girl had a right to be angry, and maybe she
had gotten over it by now. There was no accounting
for a girl's moods, he reasoned; he "wasn't no saint
himself" to hold anything against her. If only Nettie
would smile at him again he would forget all he had
suffered during all those cruel months. If only she
would look at him and speak to him as she used to do.
Nettie! His girl! His own, out of all the world. It
had been love at first sight; so much they had always
agreed on, and she had been fond of repeating that it
was also a love that would never die. She had meant
it then, as they sat hand in hand amongst the berry
bushes, with the evening sunlight on the tree-tops glistening
like moon rays on the whispering leaves.

The longer Cyril stayed there gazing around the
cabin that was filled with things Nettie herself had
helped him to make, the stronger grew his hope and
faith. A new exhilaration suddenly possessed him,
making him feel that life was worth living again. He
looked with a new warmth and kindness upon the world,
and not even the slowly gathering storm that darkened
the March day could quell his mounting spirits.

He was whistling and bustling about the shack when
he heard a hanging upon the door, and opened the door
to find Dr. McDermott standing there. He greeted his
old friend with unaffected delight, for the doctor was
always associated in his thoughts with Nettie, whom
he had brought into the world in the best day's work
he ever accomplished, so thought Cyril.

"Hello, doc. Gee, it's great to see your good old mug
again. How'd you know I was back? How're you?"

But the old doctor was scowling at him like an angry
bulldog, underlip thrust out, and his face puckered
into lines of unmistakable disapproval; worse still, he
was pointedly refusing Cyril's proffered handshake.

"No, sir," he said, "I'll not shake hands with a scallawag.
Not till he's done the right thing, by gad!"

"Wow, doc! What's bitin' you?"

"Lad," said Dr. McDermott sternly, "I'm not here
on any pleasure call. I've come as a matter of duty,
mon to mon to ask--to demand--that you do the right
thing by that puir lass."

"Lass? Who do you mean?"

"You know domned well who I mean. None other,
mon, but Nettie Day."

At the mention of that name Cyril's face turned suddenly
gray and stern.

"There are certain things I don't discuss with no
man, doc. One of them's--Nettie. I don't let no man
talk to me about her. Some coyotes on the road stopped
me, and started to blat some stuff about her, but they
shut up tight enough and gave me the heels of their
broncs before they'd barely got started with that line
of talk. And I ain't lettin' even an old friend like you
say anything about Nettie. What's fallen between her
and me is our affair."

Dr. McDermott's fist came heavily down upon the
table.

"Lad, ye're going to marry that girl, if I have to
shove you by your neck to the parson."

A light flamed in the boy's face; his eyes widened as
he stared incredulously at the doctor.

"I say," he said, all but weeping for joy, "that's a
good joke on me. Is that what you're drivin' at, doc?
Marry her! Say, I'd marry Nettie Day this blessed
minute if she'd have me!"

"Very good, lad. You'll have your chance. I've got
her now at Miss Loring's. I'll go myself after the
missionary, if you'll lend me a horse. Trail's not fit
for a car. I'll do my best to get back first thing in the
morning. Meanwhile, you'll have a chance to get your
house in shape. You'll want it to shine for that wife
and baby of yours."

"That wi--and-- Say, what's the joke, anyway?"

The doctor was now in better humor. His errand
had been highly successful, and after all a lad was only
a lad, and he liked young Cyril Stanley. There was
good stuff in Cyril--good Scotch stuff.

Cyril, taking the doctor's remark for one of the
coarse jokes commonly cracked in that countryside at
the time of a wedding, laughed half-heartedly, but the
words stuck queerly in his mind. To change the subject,
he said:

"Doc, what do you suppose ever possessed Nettie to
treat me as she did? When I got back from Barstairs--let
me see, that was last October--no, a bit before
that--What does she do but run away from me, and
when I chased after her, she turned me down dead cold.
Said she'd changed--wasn't the same, and a--and--she
simply sent me packing--made me think someone'd cut
me out with her and----"

Cyril broke off. The memory of that time was still
an open wound in his mind.

"I don't blame her a bit," blustered the doctor, in
assumed anger. "If it wasn't for that baby now, she'd
do better to send you packing altogether. What's the
matter with you young people today? Can't you hold
back like respectable folk? Don't you realize that even
though you marry the gell now, she'll always be branded
with the shame of this thing; and it's not only the lass
to be considered, there's the innocent child--the baby
to consider."

"That's the third or fourth time that you've said
that word. What do you mean, anyway? What baby?
Whose?"

"Whose? Why, your own, lad--yours and Nettie's."

"Mine and--Have you gone plumb crazy, doc?"

"Not I, lad. I helped bring your child into the world
this morning, and Nettie's resting quiet now, and waiting
for you, I have no doubt. Now, lad----"

He broke off, for something in the look and motion
of Cyril Stanley stopped him from further reproach.

"I've no intention of being hard on you. Young
blood--is--young blood, and I was young myself once."

Cyril had staggered back, like one mortally struck.
Slowly the truth had dawned upon him, and with the
realization that Nettie had been false to him, something
primitive and furious seemed to shake the foundations
of his being; something that was made up of outrage
and ungodly hatred.

"So--she's--got--a baby, has she?"

"A wee lad----"

"And you come to me--to me to get a name for it!"

"To you? Who else?"

"Who else?" jeered the lad frantically. "Ask her!"

Dr. McDermott recoiled before the savage glare in
the young man's eyes, and slowly he began to realize
the truth. He was stunned by the thought that another
man than Cyril had been the cause of the girl's
downfall. Who could it be? Slowly he turned the
matter over in his mind, rejecting one by one each of
the possible men he could think of, till at last the great
sinister figure of the Bull loomed up before his mind's
eye. He began clearly to recall a certain day at Bar Q
when he had caught the evil expression of the cowman's
face as, behind his wife's back, he followed Nettie Day
with his greedy, covetous eyes.

Dr. McDermott's shoulders seemed to bend as if a
great burden lay upon them, and he looked long and
searchingly at the furious boy before him. When he
spoke his voice was shaken with emotion.

"The Lord help you, lad!" he said. "The Lord help
us all in our deep trouble. Give us sober and humble
hearts. Teach us to bear as best we can the iniquities
of the wicked who beset us. Amen."

The sound of the door closing fell like a lash on Cyril
Stanley's brain. Alone with his frenzy and despair,
he looked wildly round as if to find some outlet for his
feelings. A great ax lay on the floor near the out-kitchen
door, and the young man seized it and swung
it high in his hand. It crashed down upon the table,
splintering it in two. Again and again the ax descended
until everything he had bought for Nettie Day lay in
fragments about the room. Then he took from the
storeroom a five-gallon can of kerosene, and emptied
it deliberately over the floor.

He put on chapps, sheepskin, fur cap and spurs,
tied up a few other necessaries in a bundle and walked
heavily to the door. Outside, he smashed the windows
and a gale of snow flew into the wrecked house. Lastly,
he struck a match and, guarding the flame, he knelt
in the doorway and threw it into a pool of kerosene.

The flames around the floor crept like snakes, then
leaped up the walls, and from the piles of broken chairs
and tables went roaring to the roof.

The house went up in a furious blaze. Long after
Cyril Stanley had disappeared into the great timber
country the smoke of his burning homestead rose above
the blanket of snow, until the smoldering ruins were
buried under the soft whiteness and covered from the
eyes of the world. But later on the sunshine of the
spring would melt the shroud away and reveal where
his love lay ruined on the prairie.




CHAPTER XX


Spring came late to Alberta that year, and it was
May before the farmers were upon the land.

Zero weather followed the heavy March snowfalls,
and May was well advanced before the first thaw
began.

Angella Loring was particularly anxious that year
to be upon her land early, for she wished to keep Nettie
with her, and had conceived an ambitious scheme which
she believed would tempt the girl to remain. Ever since
her recovery Nettie had been waiting for the weather to
break, so that she might go to Calgary and try to find
work there, where she would be unknown, and Dr.
McDermott had told her how great was the scarcity of
help in the city. Angella, from the first day, had taken
charge of the baby, and indeed it might have been her
child rather than Nettie's. For Nettie was afraid of
this child of the Bull's. Before the cold spell had
broken, and while she was still weak, she would sit at
the window and stare out over the bleak landscape with
unseeing eyes. Spring is always an unpleasant season
in Alberta, and that year it was even worse than usual.
While Angella was away at the barns or the fields busy
with her work, Nettie found herself shut in alone with
her baby, but she never went near it, or attempted to
take it in her arms or caress it.

The child was undersized and frail, but it cried very
little, and its tiny, weird face looked curiously like a
bird's. There was something pitifully unfinished about
it although it was in no way deformed. It had simply
been forced into the world before its time, and denied
the sustenance of its mother's breast--for Nettie was
unable to nurse her child--it made slow progress. At
the end of April it weighed no more than the day it
was born.

If Nettie, immersed in her own sorrow, was oblivious
of her child's condition, its foster-mother was filled
with alarm and anxiety. Dr. McDermott was no longer
an unwelcome visitor at the shack, indeed he was often
sent for when Jake, who had taken to haunting the
ranch, and sleeping in Cyril's deserted sheds, could be
despatched upon such an errand. No matter where he
was, or what he was doing, the doctor seldom failed
to respond to Angella's summons. Tramping into the
shack, stamping the snow off his feet, he would look
with pretended fierceness at the two women, looking
for something to scold about and always, finding it,
but although his words were rough, his hands were
gentle as a mother's as he took the baby in his arms.
He would gaze intently at the little creature with all
a parent's anxiety while its mother held aloof, keeping
her gaze riveted upon the window.

More than once, Angella Loring found herself very
close to the doctor, and looking up, he would see her
eyes were misty with solicitude over "her" baby. To
cover his own feelings, he would ask her to fetch this
and that and she waited upon him meekly. Once
kneeling by his side, as the baby lay upon his knees,
she saw its little wan face puckered into something
that she firmly declared was a smile. In her delight
and excitement she put her arms around the baby on
his knee, and before she realized what was happening
she found her hand enclosed in the doctor's warm clasp.
Their eyes met, and the color slowly receded from her
cheeks.

That night, she went into the bedroom, carefully
closing the burlap curtain between it and the outer
room, and searching amongst the contents of the box
she had brought with her from England, Angella
Loring found something that was no familiar object in
that prairie shack--a mirror--a woman's hand mirror,
of tortoiseshell, with a silver crest upon it. For some
time she held it in her hand, face down, before she mustered
courage to lift it slowly to her face. For a long
time she gazed into the glass, the bright, haunted eyes
slowly scanning the strange face, with its crown of
soft gray curls. She was kneeling on the floor by her
bed, and suddenly the hand holding the mirror fell into
her lap, and Angella Loring said in a choking whisper
looking down at her reflection, "I'm an old fool! God
help me!"

Her program for that season was an ambitious one
for a fragile woman; she purposed to put in one hundred
and fifty acres of crop, and to hay over sixty
more acres, and not content with working her own
land, she intended to work and seed Cyril's as well.
This latter was the stake to which she hoped to tie
Nettie to her. She felt sure that the girl would not
fail to respond to this opportunity to help the man she
loved, for according to the homestead law of that time,
land had to be fenced, worked and lived upon for a
certain term of years, and by abandoning his homestead,
Cyril stood to lose the quarter, besides the waste
of all the work and money already expended upon the
place. When Angella laid her proposition before
Nettie, she was rewarded by the first sign of animation
the girl had shown since the doctor had brought her
to the ranch. Her apathy and despair fell from her,
and when Angella told her that unless Nettie would
give her the help she needed she would be obliged to
employ hired hands which she could not afford, Nettie's
eagerness knew no bounds.

"Oh my, yes, Angel, I just wisht you'd give me the
chance. I'd love to do the work. I'll do it alone if--you'll
let me--I'll work my fingers to the bone to--to--make
up to him--and to you, Angel."

"That's all right. I'm glad you feel that way, because
I need your help badly. I believe it's going to
be a crop year anyway, because the snow when it does
melt is bound to mean all sorts of moisture for the
land. Meanwhile, we can do a bit of fencing. Mine
need repairing badly, and so do parts of Cyril's.
We've got to cross fence between his pasture land and
where the crop is to go in. He's got quite a few head
of horses and cattle running loose, I see, and they've got
to be driven off the grain land. I'm going out after
a couple of heavy horses of his I saw the other day
on his land. I think I can corral them, and they'll
come in first rate for the plow."

"Oh, Angel, let me go. I understand horses better'n
you do. It's awful hard to drive them when they've
been loose like that all winter. So let me go along."

"You'll stay right here. Look here, now, I'm going
to run things here, and you do as you're told."

"Well, don't forget to take a halter, will you, and
Angel, you want to keep away from their hind feet--even
if you are on horse. Sometimes they kick right
out. Dad was lamed that way, drivin' in wild horses.
Got kicked while on horse-back, right in the shin. My,
it was awful!"

"I'm all right. Don't you worry about me," said
Angella. "Mind the baby while I'm gone, and look
here, if he cries, there's barley gruel in that bottle.
Heat it by standing it in hot water--but don't let it
get too hot. I think he'll be all right till I get back."

Nettie did a curious thing that day when Angella had
left her alone. She went over to the rough cot that
Angella had made out of a grocery box for the baby,
and for a long time she stood looking down at the little
sleeper. Almost unconsciously her hand touched her
baby's tiny hand that clung at once to her finger and
at that warm contact a flood of emotion overwhelmed
Nettie's heart. It was as if tentacles had reached out
and fastened upon her very soul; the little curled up
fist seemed to scorch her with its mute reproach and
appeal for her affection. Nettie pulled her hand fiercely
away, and fled into the adjoining room, her breath
coming and going tumultuously.

"I don't want to love him," she cried. "I don't want
to. He's his, and I wisht I'd died before I--I--come
to this."

Seeking some physical outlet for her pent-up feelings
she looked about her, and saw a pair of scissors
on Angella's dressing table. A moment later she found
herself slashing into her long hair. The heavy blonde
braids dropped to the floor with a soft thud. Nettie,
shorn of her beautiful hair, was not, however, disfigured,
in fact her childlike, simple beauty seemed almost lovelier
for the cropped head, accentuating her extreme
youth. But when Angella coming in stopped on the
threshold and stared at her condemningly, Nettie knew
that she had done wrong.

"Nettie Day, what you have done is an act of sheer
vandalism," said the woman, who herself had cut her
own hair to the scalp.

"Oh, Angel, I wanted to be like you. I didn't want
no more to be like a woman----"

Angella's face paled.

"So I am not like a woman, then?"

"I didn't mean that, Angel. You're more like a
woman in your heart than anyone I ever knew, 'cept
Mrs. Langdon, and I just wanted to make myself so
that--so that no one would ever want to look at me
again. Just 's if I was same as a man and----"

"And I suppose you think you've succeeded," said
Angella dryly. "Never fear. It will take more than the
cutting of your hair to keep men from you, Nettie
Day. However, it's your own hair, and I suppose you
meant all right. They say 'Hell is paved with good
intentions.' But you needn't think that because I--was
fool enough to--to--make a freak of myself, that
I approve of you or anyone else doing it."

"I'm sorry, Angel. I'm awfully sorry. I--I want
to be as much like you as I can be. I want to wear
them men's overalls too and do----"

"As for the overalls, that's all right, they're sensible;
but, look here, Nettie, don't let me catch you doing
anything like that to disfigure yourself again, and
don't you go slashing any more into your hair. It
doesn't look bad now, but even you would look a fright
if you had cut it as I did--right to the scalp."

"It's growing in now. And it looks--right pretty,
Angel," said Nettie wistfully. "D'you know, you ain't
nearly as ugly as you think you are," she added with
girlish naïveté, which brought a chuckle from Angella,
warming the baby's bottle at the stove.



They began to fence in mid-April. The ground was
hard, and having no proper hole diggers they were at a
still greater disadvantage. However, Angella said she
did not want to waste any time on repairing fences,
once the land was ready for the crop. Cyril's quarter
was already fairly well fenced, but the dividing line between
the two quarters had never been completed. Now
that the two places were to be worked as one the line-fence
had become unnecessary. By persistent labor
upon their first task of the season, they achieved an
inadequate protection for the proposed crop. The
uneven line of barbed wire, set on unsteady posts,
aroused the derisive condemnation of Dr. McDermott,
who warned them that cattle would have no trouble
in breaking through and that the two wires did not
constitute a legal fence, three being the required number.
Angella, colder and more unbending than ever in
her attitude to the doctor, rejoined that "they would
take their chances this year."

The herd law was in force, and it was against the
law for cattle to be at large on the road or road
allowances in that particular part of the country. The
doctor grouchily warned them that that concerned
stray cattle, but there was absolutely nothing to prevent
a herd driven by riders from going through.
Nothing, returned Angella indignantly, except the fact
that reputable riders had a professional sense of honor,
so far as other people's grain fields were concerned, and
she knew none that would be likely to turn driven cattle
into a grain field. Such things were not done in a
country like Alberta. Besides, cattle were unlikely to
be moved in the summer time, and by the fall, the
harvest would be in, and the grain safe.

"Have it your way," returned the doctor. "But if
you want to do a mon's work, you ought to do it in
a mon's way." This gratuitous remark was received
in the disdainful silence it deserved.

They had a truly gigantic task before them, the
putting in of over one hundred and fifty acres of grain--flax,
barley, oats, wheat, green feed and rye.

As soon as the land was in condition to be worked,
they began. For days they had been sorting over and
mending harnesses and bridles, sharpening the implements
and getting everything into shape. Eight work
horses had been brought up from the pasture, and for
a few days had been fed oats and given especial care.
Nettie had regained her strength and was invaluable to
the less experienced, though self-reliant Angella because
of her long familiarity with farm work and horses too.

The baby went into the field with them, carried in
a large box, where among its pillows, Nettie's child
slept in blissful unconsciousness of the tragedy of his
existence. In the latter weeks he had been gaining
strength, and his roving blue eyes had smiled more than
once at the adoring Angella.

Nettie went on the plow, the hardest of the implements
to ride. There had been some argument between
the girls as to which implement each should ride, Angella
contending that Nettie was not yet in a fit condition
to stand the rough shaking on the plow; and Nettie
stubbornly insisting that she felt "strong as an ox,"
and that she had ridden the plow since she was a little
girl. "Dad put me into the field when I was just ten,"
she told Angella. "You know he couldn't afford to stay
home to work our quarter, because our land was so
poor; he had to go out on other farms to make some
wages, because we was such a hungry family, and it
took sights of food to fill us all."

So Nettie rode the plow, and then the disc, while
Angella took the harrow and the seeder. Angella only
yielded the plow to Nettie when the girl pointed out
that the seeder required "brains," of which she sadly
admitted she had little. She had never seeded, not
even at home; Dad had always come back in time to do
that. So Angella, feeling the importance of her two
seasons' experience in seeding, argued no more, and,
seeded six inches deep, a precautionary measure, she
told Nettie, against a dry year. The weather favored
them; intermittent rains and flurries of snow kept the
ground damp enough for fertilization, but not too wet
for sowing. Nevertheless, said Angella, you never could
tell about Alberta's climate. Drought might start with
June, and then where would the careless farmers be?

This period of hard work diverted Nettie's mind from
its obsession of sorrow; for mind and body are alike
exhausted at the end of a day from sunrise to sunset.
Intent upon being a first-rate helper, her mind ceased
to dwell upon her troubles.

Having finished the preparation of the ground and
the seeding, they spent the next few weeks bringing
their few head of stock to the corrals and all alone
they branded, dehorned and vaccinated them against
blackleg. Nettie then went over to Cyril's quarter with
the plow and broke new land, by no means an easy job,
since the ground was rough virgin soil, where rocks and
bushes and tree stumps abounded. Meanwhile Angella
summer fallowed on her own quarter.

July came in on a wave of intense heat. There was
haying to be done on Cyril's quarter; Angella's fields
had been overpastured, and she proposed to let them lie
fallow for that year. The two girls put up seventy-five
tons of hay. Angella was on the rake, an easy implement
to ride, Nettie on the mower. Then Angella
ascended the buck, and Nettie did the stacking, and as
the big golden pile grew from day to day under their
hands, their pride and satisfaction in their work was
great. Angella felt that she had something to show
for her work at last and pinned her faith upon a sure
crop--the first since her arrival in Alberta.

Before and after their field work, they had plenty of
chores and housework to do. Nettie milked, looked
after the sitting hens and spring chicks, and the great
sow with her litter; she watered and fed the horses and
cleaned the barns and stables. Meanwhile, Angella prepared
the meals, made the butter, cleaned the house, and
took full charge of the baby.

In Nettie's avoidance of her child there was fear
rather than aversion. This child that had been forced
upon her by the man she hated aroused strange tumults
within her. At the thought of its father, she would
shudder and tell herself she hated it because it was his;
but there were moments when melting, passionate impulses
consumed her, and then it took all her strength
not to snatch her baby up and clasp it tightly to her
breast.

Throughout the long day she sat on the hard seat
of the implement, rocked and shaken from side to side,
as the four-horse plow broke up the rough land, and
she tried hard to keep her mind upon her work. As
her expert hand guided her horses, making a clean,
workmanlike job of which not even a man could have
been ashamed, she found a certain comfort in the
thought that she was working for Cyril Stanley. Yet,
as the implement swept on its circular path over the
field, each time it passed near the box beside the straw
stack where the baby slept, a sob of anguish would
tear her heart anew.

The harvest was close at hand, and for the first
time since she had come to Alberta, Angella Loring was
to have a crop.

Billowing waves of golden wheat, going forty
bushels or more to the acre, lay spread out before her,
barley, glistening, and silvery, oats as tall as a man
and thick and heavy, the grain, like living creatures,
stirring and murmuring drowsily in the sunshine as the
warm wind passed over it.

"Come, we are waiting to be reaped," it seemed to
chant. "Gather us in, before the cold breath of the
northland shall come shivering over the land, and freeze
our strength with the touch of its icy finger."

Their labors over the two women who had put in the
crop would walk slowly in the cool of the day through
the grain, and the soft swishing of their skirts brushing
a pathway through the thick grain sounded like a whisper
of peace in the quiet evening. The marvelous
harvest moon hung like a great orange ball above the
fields; the prairie land seemed to stretch illimitably into
the distance; the far horizons disappeared into a chain
of white hills, rising like a mist against the sky still
resplendent with the incomparable prairie sunset.

They talked little for the one was shy and reticent
by nature, and in the other reticence and brevity of
speech had become a habit. Yet each felt and understood
the thought of the other, as they looked across
at the moving grain, which was the visible sign of their
long and arduous labor.




CHAPTER XXI


There was hail in the south and further west;
it zigzagged across the country, beating down
the tall grain; the stones lay as big as eggs upon
the ground, breaking windows and lashing in its vindictive
fury whatever stood in its path. The grain shuddered
beneath the onslaught and bent to the ground.
An angry black cloud overspread the sky like a gigantic
hand from whose outstretched fingers the hail was
falling. Not a stalk was left standing in the fields over
which the storm passed, but its course was curiously
eccentric. It ignored whole municipalities, and no one
could tell where next it would choose to vent its wicked
rage. Anxiously the girls had watched the path of the
mad cloud, taking count of the destructive force that
was wreaking such havoc upon the grain lands. Nettie
prayed--prayed to the God of whom she knew so pitifully
little, but to whom Mrs. Langdon had been so near,
and begged that their fields, Angela's and Cyril's, might
be spared.

The rural telephone wires were busy all that day and
evening, with the calls of the excited farmers.

"Were you struck?"

"Yes, wiped out."

"Insured?"

"Not a red cent."

"Gosh, I'm sorry. There's not a spear left in my
fields neither, but I got ten dollars on the acre."

"Think they'll allow you one hundred per cent. loss?"

"Sure they will."

"Hm! Betcha you'll thresh just the same."

Then the bang of a hanging up receiver; but the
ceaseless buzzing went on, with all the other parties
on the main wire listening in, gloating or commiserating
over each others' misfortunes.

"How about Smither's?"

"Say, his fields aren't touched."

"You don't say. Isn't it the devil how them hail
storms skip and miss."

"Munsun's got wiped off the map. So did Homan."

"Pederson's ain't touched even."

"Trust them Swedes to have the luck every time."

"Did you hear about Bar Q?"

"No, what?"

"Heard they got it hardest of all. My land! There
isn't a field the hail didn't get. The whole three thousand
acres on the grain ranch. I see where his nibs
won't do much threshing this year."

"He should worry. You can bet your bottom dollar
he's got double insurance on his crop, and, say, anyway,
he'll have a sight of green feed for his cattle. They
say he's short of hay in the hill country this year.
I'll bet he cuts the hailed stuff for feed."

"I wouldn't wonder!"

And so on.

As it happened, Nettie and Angella's crops were
among the few that had escaped untouched. When
the storm had passed and the sun blazed out again over
the battered fields there, strong and sturdy, shining
in the clear light, the grain they had sown seemed to
smile at them and call aloud to be reaped without
further delay.

It was now mid-August, and the grain was ripe.
Angella rode the binder, a picturesque implement with
canvas wings, which when in operation resembles a sort
of flying machine. Nettie followed on foot, stooking.
This was a man's job, for the sheaves of grain were
heavy, and it was no easy matter to bend and grasp the
thick bundles and stook them in stacks; but Nettie was
strong and willing. She even tried to keep pace with
the binder, by running to the stacks, until Angella
brought up her horses sharply and refused to go on
with the work, unless Nettie took her time about the
stooking.

The harvest occupied three long weeks, but the day
came at last when the work was all completed. There
was no longer any danger of frost, hail or drought.
Nothing remained to be done but the threshing. Under
the mellow evening light that suffuses the Alberta
country at the harvest season, the girls, having gleaned
bravely and well, rode in from their last day of harvesting.

Sound carries far in the prairie country, and they
could hear distinctly the buzz of the threshing machine
eight miles away, droning like a comfortable bee, working
steadily through the night. In a few days, the
threshers would "pull in" to Angella's ranch and the
harvested grain would be poured into the temporary
granaries that they had constructed from a portion
of the barn.

As they stood together in the twilight, looking across
at the harvest field, they felt, though they might not
have been able to express their thoughts in words, that
they had made of that land of theirs a picture no
human brush could ever copy. And as this thought
came simultaneously to their minds, their eyes met, and
they smiled at each other like sisters. As they turned
reluctantly from the contemplation of their masterpiece,
Nettie's last glance toward the hills saw the
figure of a rider silhouetted against the skyline. On
his first appearance at the top of the grade, she did
not recognize him, but as he approached, an uncontrollable
agitation shook her from head to foot.

"Angel! Look--look--look--look--it's--the Bull!
Oh--h----"

"You have nothing to fear, Nettie. Nettie!"

"Oh, Angel, he's come for me! I knowed he would!
I've been lookin' for him, dreadin' it and now he's
here. Oh, what am I to do? Where can I hide?"

As on the night when the Bull had trapped her in
her room and she had listened paralyzed with fear to
the breaking down of her door, her eyes darted wildly
about for a means of escape. This time, instead of the
narrow room, the whole of the far-flung prairie lay
before her with the great grain stocks which she herself
had piled together. She broke from Angella's grasp,
and fled across the field, and darting from one stack to
another, crouched down in despair behind the farthest
one.

Angella made no movement to stop the fleeing girl.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as she gazed keenly at the
man to discover whether it was indeed Bull Langdon;
then she turned and quietly went into her house. She
put the child in its basket into the inner room, and took
down her rifle; the rifle her neighbors in the early days
had jeered at but learned to respect. Angella did not
load it in the house, but slowly and calmly as Bull
Langdon rode up she fitted the bullets in place.




CHAPTER XXII


In a country like Alberta, especially in the ranching
sections, it is not difficult for a person to
disappear, if he is so minded.

Nettie had lived several months with Angella Loring
before her presence there was discovered. On one side of
Angella's quarter was a municipality of open range,
and on the other, Cyril Stanley's quarter section.
Beyond Cyril's ranch was bush stretching for several
miles to the Elbow River that intersected, south and
north, the land towards the foothills fifty miles out
of which was the Bar Q hill ranch. Beyond this dense
timber land began, and in its very heart stood the Bow
Claire Lumber Camp on the banks of the Ghost and
Bow Rivers. Past the timber land the foothills still
continued, growing higher and higher till they merged
into the chain of Rocky Mountains.

Gossip about Nettie Day had been confined to the
foothill ranching country. Her story had run from
ranch to ranch, and the general comment was expressed
in the customary country phrases of: "I never
would have believed it" or "I told you so." But Nettie
disappeared from the foothills, and curiosity, in a
ranching country as has been said above, is short-lived.
Besides, the death of Mrs. Langdon provided the ranchers
with fresh excitement, and questions as to Nettie's
whereabouts were rarely heard.

At this time new cares had begun to take possession
of the country people of Alberta. Even as early as
the spring, strange symptoms of unrest might have
been observed, and here and there fear seemed to look
out of the ranchers' eyes. Strange stories were percolating
into the ranches of sickness in the cities, a certain
sickness which the authorities purposely misnamed
in order that the danger of panic might be averted.
The ranch people stuck closely to their homes that
spring and summer and were not cordial to strangers
or of the usually welcome regular visitors from the
city--the insurance and real estate men, the drug
seller and the sly affable stranger who sold his Pain
Killer to the hands with a wink. All these "paper-collar
dudes" as the farmers called them, and the motor hoboes
and camp-tramps, who stopped at the ranches to ask
for anything from a measure of milk to a night's lodging,
experienced that summer a cold reception, for the
ranch people were shrewd enough to appreciate the
fact that the plague might be carried to them through
just such mediums as these. So they stuck close to
home, and although the papers were filled with scare-head
accounts of the fearful scourge in the east,
Alberta believed or hoped it would prove immune.

In Yankee Valley, no one knew that the girl from the
D. D. D. had returned, or that, with her child, she
had found a refuge in the home of the Englishwoman
who preferred to live like a hermit rather than accept
the friendship of her neighbors. Angella's land lay
well back from the main road and trails and there
Nettie had found a true sanctuary. One day, Batt
Leeson, who had taken Cyril's place at the Bull camp,
was riding by Cyril's quarter, en route to the foothills
and paused at the sight of a girl in a man's blue overalls,
driving a six-horse plow team over new breaking.

Nettie, at a pause in the harvesting, while they were
waiting for a field of oats to ripen, was filling in the
time by breaking new land on Cyril's quarter.

Batt, gazing at her with his mouth open and his eyes
blinking incredulously, could not believe it possible.
To make doubly sure, he rode close to the fence line,
and from behind the shelter of a tree, he waited for the
plow to make its next round of the field. On and on it
came, its dull rumble and clatter of iron the louder for
the stillness of the prairie. Over a piece of rising
ground came Nettie Day upon the implement. Her
head was bare, and her hair shone red-gold in the sunshine,
seeming to radiate light like a halo. It had been
cropped close as a boy's, and the gentle wind lifted
and blew it back from her flushed face as she drove.

"Well, I'll be switched!" said the ranch hand.

He was, in fact, overjoyed at his discovery and would
go back to the foothills with a rich morsel of news. He
imagined himself saying, "What d'you think? That
there girl that got into trouble at Bar Q is workin' on
the land of the fellow that--" Once Cyril Stanley had
punched his face for a much slighter offense than mentioning
his (Cyril's) name in connection with a girl,
and Batt hit his tongue upon the name of the man he
suspected as the cause of Nettie Day's downfall.

Chuckling with satisfaction, he followed the girl
with his gloating eyes, but she was looking straight
ahead and never turned her head to where the rider
watched her from the trail.

Things had been going from bad to worse at Bar Q.
More than the usual number of calves had died from
blackleg, and a number of first-class heifers had perished
in the woods where the larkspur poison weed grew wild.
A Government veterinary surgeon, after a hurried survey
of the animals on the home range, had put a blanket
quarantine on all the cattle, which prevented their
removal for months--in fact, until the "vet" gave them
a clean bill of health.

The cowman's stock and ranch had been badly neglected
in his absence. His cattle had been allowed to
go at large; the fences were out of repair and the
customary careful segregation of each different grade
was a thing of the past. He found the whole ranch at
sixes and sevens, and raged at the foremen for their
neglect, swearing that not "a stitch of work" had been
done all the time he had been away. He celebrated his
return by "firing" all hands at the foothill ranch, and
the new outfit who took their places proved worse than
the old. Their term at the ranch was soon over, and
the constant changing of hands that now began had an
exceedingly bad effect upon the place. Good help was
very scarce at that time, and wages had been as high
as one hundred dollars a month with board, so Bull
Langdon had his hands full at Bar Q.

He went about in a state of chronic evil humor in
these days, and found nothing about the place to suit
him. Without his wife, the big ranch house got upon
his nerves, for with the genius of the born home-maker
she had created an atmosphere of comfort and peace
that had made it impressive even on her husband's
insensitive mind. She had catered to his appetite and
his whims, and he had become used to having a woman's
tender care about him; indeed, he had grown to depend
upon the very services he had so roughly rewarded in
the past. He could neither accustom himself to the
empty house not endure the meals at the cook car.

In these days he slept on the ground floor of the
house, in the dining room. During his wife's lifetime
the room had shone with orderliness and cleanliness;
now boots, rough coats and trousers, shirts, and the
cattlemen's riding accessories were strewn all over it,
while the unmade bed, the unwashed pots and pans, the
traces of muddy boots upon the floor, and the dust of
weeks had turned it into a place of indescribable dirt and
confusion.

The Bull had refused to sleep upstairs since his wife's
death; her bedroom door remained closed. Nettie's,
too, still hung on its broken hinges, and sometimes on
a windy night the knocking of that broken door,
screeching and swinging upon its single hinge, was more
than the overwrought cattleman could stand, and he
would tramp out to the bunkhouse, and sleep there
instead. He felt the need of his home more and more,
however, and like a spoiled child whose favorite toy had
been taken from him, he fumed and stormed at the
ill-luck that had robbed him.

One day he returned to the house after a hard day's
riding, and the sight of its grime and disorder set a
spark to his already smoldering rage. His thoughts
turned, as always at such moments, to the girl whose
place he honestly believed was there in his house where
he had intended to install her. She had been gone long
enough. He had put up with enough of her damned
nonsense now, and it was time to round her up. He
regarded Nettie as a stray head of stock, that had
slipped from under the lariat noose, and was wandering
in strange pastures. True, she was a prized head, but
that only strengthened the Bull's determination to capture
her. He considered her his personal stuff; something
he had branded, and he was not the man to part
with anything that belonged to him, as doggedly and
repeatedly he assured himself she did, having been
bought with the rest of her dad's old truck.

Batt Leeson riding in from Barstairs brought him
the first news of the girl that he had had since the
night she had fled in terror from his house.

"Say, boss, who d'you suppose I seen when I rode
by Yankee Valley?"

"How the h---- should I know?"

"Well, I seen that Day girl that used to work up
here."

Bull Langdon, busy making of a bull-whip, twisting
long strips of cowhide about a lump of lead, stopped
short in his work, and looked up sharply at the slowly
chewing, slowly talking ranch hand.

"What's that you say?"

"I was sayin' that I seen her--Nettie Day--over to
Yankee Valley, and where d'you suppose she's living?
Say, she must be tied up now to that Stanley fellow,
because I seen her on his land and----"

"That's a damned lie!" shouted the cattleman, and
dashed the loaded cowhide to the floor with a foul oath.
Batt, his knees shaking with terror, retreated before
the advance of the enraged cowman.

"It's true as God what I'm telling you. I seen her
with my own eyes. She was breakin' land on Stanley's
quarter."

Bull Langdon's eyes were bloodshot and his face
twitched hideously.

"That young scrub's at Bow Claire. His homestead's
burned to the ground. You can't come to me with no
such tale as that."

"B--b-b-b--but I tell you she's workin' his land. I
seen her. I stopped right close and looked her over to
make sure. I ain't makin' no mistake. Thought at first
I might be, cause I figure that a girl in her condition
wouldn't be----"

"What-cha mean by her condition?"

"Sa-ay boss." Batt scratched his head, uncertain
whether to proceed; itching to tell the tale of the girl's
fall, but fearing the menacing spark in the cattleman's
eyes. "I thought you knew."

"Knew what?"

"'Bout her condition."

Batt essayed a sly, ingratiating wink, but it had no
placating effect upon the man before him.

"I don't know what the devil you're talking about."

"Gosh, boss, everyone knows 'bout Nettie Day. She's
agoin' to have a baby--mebbe she's got it now. I expect
she has."

"What-t!"

The Bull's eyes bulged; a tidal wave of unholy joy
threatened to overwhelm him.

A baby! His! His! His own! His and that gell's!

He threw back his head and burst into a storm of
laughter. His wild mirth shook the beams and rafters
of the old room, and seemed to reverberate all through
the great house.

"Well, by G----!" said the cowman and reached for
his riding boots. He pulled them savagely on, still
chuckling and chortling, and pausing ever and anon to
smack his hip.

"Goin' riding, boss?"

"You betcher life I am."

"Where you goin'?"

"I'm going to a round up," said Bull Langdon,
clicking his lips.

"After some loose stock?"

"A purebred heifer with a calf at heel," said Bull
Langdon. "They've got my brand upon them."




CHAPTER XXIII


The Englishwoman stood in the doorway of her
shack, rifle in hand, and gazed calmly at the
blustering cowman, who had dismounted, and, fists on
hips, was standing before her. For the first time
in his life Bull Langdon found himself face to face with
a woman who was not afraid of him. Her cold, unwavering
glance traveled over him, from his flat head down
to his great, coarse feet, and back with cool disparagement
straight into his flinching eyes.

"You seen anything of that gell, Nettie Day?"

Angella disdained to answer. She was looking over
his head, and presently she said:

"Will you kindly remove yourself from my place? I
don't want you here."

"You don't, heh? Well, I'm here to get something
of my own, do you get me?"

"Oh, yes, I get you all right; but you'll take nothing
off my place, you may be sure of that."

He stood his ground with bravado, and blurted out
his errand; he had come for Nettie, and intended to
have her and his kid. She belonged to him; was his
"gell," and he had bought her along with her "dad's
old truck." He'd have been over sooner, but his cattle
had tied him down since his return from the States,
and he "wan't the kind o' man to neglect his cattle
for a woman."

As he spoke, Angella's level gaze rested coolly upon
him, and met his blustering outburst with a half-smile
of detached and amused contempt. But when he made
a movement as if to enter the house, Angella Loring
slowly brought her rifle to her shoulder, and aimed
straight at him. With the practiced eye of a dead shot,
she squinted down the length of the barrel, and the
Bull sprang back, when he saw her finger crooked upon
the trigger.

"What the h---- you tryin' to do?"

She answered without lowering the gun or moving
her finger.

"You clear off my place! If you attempt to enter
my house I'll shoot you down with less compunction
than I would a dog."

He slouched a few paces farther back, and an evil
laugh broke from his lips. Once he had reached his
horse's side, his bravado returned.

"Guess there ain't goin' to be no trouble gettin'
what's my own. The law's on my side. I've got as
much right to that kid, that's my own stuff, as the
gell has."

"Oh, have you?" said Angella coolly. "Unfortunately
for you, the child is no longer even Nettie's. It's
mine. She gave me her child for adoption."

"She hadn't no right to do that," said the Bull in
a sudden access of rage. "It ain't hers to give away."

"Oh, isn't it, though?"

"No, it ain't, and I'll show you a thing o' two. There
won't be no funny business with guns neither when a
couple of mounties come up here after what's mine."

"I wouldn't talk about the law if I were you. You
see, when you committed that crime against Nettie, she
happened to be a minor. I don't know just how many
years in the penitentiary that may mean for you.
Her lawyers will know."

At the word "penitentiary," his face had turned gray.
Nettie's youth had never occurred to him before, nor
what it might mean for him.

"Besides," went on the Englishwoman, "apart from
the legal aspects of the case, I wonder that you take
a chance in a country like this. Consider what is likely
to happen to you, if the truth about Nettie becomes
known in this ranching country. We have an unwritten
law of our own in such cases, you know, and everybody
has been blaming an innocent boy. What will they say--what
will they do, when they know that the most
detested and hated man in the country attacked a
young, defenseless girl when she was alone in his house?
I wouldn't care to be in your shoes when that fact leaks
out, as you may be sure it will. I'll take care of that!
You can trust me to denounce you without reserve!"

The Bull shouted, purple with rage:

"There ain't no man livin' I'm afraid of, and there
ain't no man in the country strong enough to lay a
finger on me, see. I could beat every son of a gun in
Alberta to a pulp."

"I don't doubt that. You look as if you might have
the strength of a gorilla; but then where a hand will
not serve a rope will, and you know it will be short work
for your own men to hang you to a tree when young
Cyril Stanley ropes you. Now I've talked to you
enough. You get off my place, or I'll put a shot in
that ugly fist of yours that'll lame you for the rest of
your days."

He had remounted and she laughed at his haste; yet
as he rode off, the venomous expression on his face
turned her heart cold with a new fear, and her ears
rang ominously with his parting words.

"So long, old hen, you'll sing another tune when we
meet again."




CHAPTER XXIV


"Jake, I want you to ride like 'hell on fire' to
Springbank, where you'll find Dr. McDermott.
Ask at the post office for him, and you may meet
him on the trail. Don't spare Daisy, even if you
have to kill her riding. Leave her at Springbank to
rest up, and come back with the Doc. And Jake, if
you get back by tomorrow night, I'll--I'll give you a
whole pound of brown sugar and a can of molasses.
Now skedaddle, and for God's sake, don't fail us."

"Me go! Me fly on the air!" cried the breed excitedly.
Without saddle or bridle--nothing but a
halter rope, Jake was on the Indian broncho, and was
off like a flash over the trail.

Angella concealed her fears from the white and
trembling Nettie.

"Nothing to worry about," she said carelessly. "He's
afraid of my gun, Nettie, the big coward!"

"Oh, Angel, I'm not afraid for myself, but for the
baby. He's a terrible man when he's in a passion, and
he never gives up nothing that's his."

"But you're not his," said Angel sharply, "and
neither is the baby. He's mine. You said I could have
him, and I won't give him up."

"Oh, Angel, I don't want you to. He's better with
you than anyone else, and although I do love him--"
Nettie's voice was breaking piteously--"yet there are
times when I can't forget that he's the Bull's----"

"He's not. He's all yours, Nettie. There's not a
trace of that wild brute in our baby. I don't see how
you can even think it. Just look at the darling," and
she held up the laughing, fair-haired baby at arm's
length. The days spent out of doors in the field had
done much to give him the health and strength that had
not been his at birth. He had Nettie's eyes and hair,
but not her seriousness, for he crowed and laughed all
day long, the happiest and most contented baby in the
world.

Nettie looked at him now with swimming eyes.

"He is sweet!" she said in a choking voice, and kneeling
beside Angella, on whose lap the baby lay, she buried
her head in his little soft body.

Jake did not return the following night, nor the
night after. Though each sought to hide her anxiety
from the other, the two women kept a constant look-out
along the trail, straining their ears for the comforting
sound of the motor, which on a still day could sometimes
be heard at two or even three miles' distance.

They would have gone away somewhere, but for the
fact that the threshers were due in a few days' time, and
it would have meant ruin to leave the crop unthreshed.
Once the threshing was done, and the grain safely
stored in the granary, or sold direct to the commission
men who had already called upon Angella, they would
be free to make a trip to Calgary, and there seek counsel
and protection.

Meanwhile, every night they bolted and barricaded
their door, and with the baby between them, with
loaded guns side by side on the bed, hardly slept
through the night. Wide-eyed and silent in the darkness
they kept their vigil, each hoping that the other
slept.

On the third night, toward morning, Nettie started
up with a cry. She had heard something moving outside
the shack. They gripped their rifles and sat up
listening intently. Then Angella declared that it was
only the wind, and Nettie said:

"It sounds like thunder, doesn't it? Maybe we're
goin' to have another storm."

"Let it storm," said Angella, glad of the other's
voice in the darkness. "Our crop's harvested, and no
hail can hurt us now. Is the light still going in the
kitchen?"

"Yes." After a moment, Nettie said:

"I ain't afraid of nothing now for myself, but I
don't want nothing to happen to you--and my baby."

"My baby you mean," corrected Angella, pretending
to laugh. But with all the tenderness of her maternal
heart, she drew the baby close to her side.

After another long tense pause, when they again
imagined things stirring about the place, Angella said
suddenly:

"Let's talk. I can't sleep and neither can you, and
we never do talk much."

"I expect that's because we've always had to work
most o' the time," said Nettie. "Isn't it queer that you
and me should be such friends."

"Why queer?"

"I'm what they call 'scrub' stock--and you----"

"So'm I--scrub. That's the kind worth being. The
common clay, Nettie. The other kind is shoddy and
false and----"

"Oh, Angel, I think you're so sweet and good."

"I'm not sweet and good," said Angella stoutly,
"and there's nothing heroic about me."

"I don't care what you are," said Nettie, "I'll always
love you. Sometimes when I get thinkin' of how hard
everything's been for me in this life, I think of you
and Mrs. Langdon, and I say to myself: You're a
lucky girl, Nettie. Not everybody in the world has got
a friend! Have they, Angel?"

"No--very few of us have," said Angella sadly.
"Nettie, did you hear that!"

"What?"

"It sounded like--like a moan. Listen!"

In the dark silence of the night, the long-drawn moaning
sound was repeated.

"It's cattle," said Nettie.

"Are you sure?"

"Oh, yes, I know their calls, though I didn't know
there was any near us."

"Passing along the trail probably. It's getting
toward the fall, you know."

"Angel, do you believe in God?"

"No--that is, yes--in a way I do. Do you?"

"Yes. Mrs. Langdon used to say that God was in
us--in our hearts. He can't be in every heart, can
he?"

"Why not?"

"Well, Bull Langdon's for instance. God couldn't
abide in his heart, could he?"

"No, I should think not."

"But Mrs. Langdon believed it. She used to say
that God loved him as well as any of us, but that Bull
was 'in error,' and that some day God would open his
eyes, and then he would be powerful good."

"Hm! He'd have to open his eyes pretty wide, I'm
thinking," said Angel. "But try and sleep now, Nettie.
I'm feeling a bit drowsy myself. Maybe we can snatch
a wink or two before morning. Good-night, Nettie."

"Good-night, Angel. I think it's true. God is in
our hearts. I believe it."

"I believe he's in yours, anyway," said Angella softly.
"Good-night, old girl."

But God dwelt not in the heart of Bull Langdon.
Under the silver light of the moon, that lay like a spell
upon the sleeping land, and across the shining valley,
came the cowman, driving a great herd of steers.
Penned in corrals for shipment to the Calgary stockyards,
they had been without food for two days, and
now they came down the hill, eager and impatient for
the feed that had been too long denied them.

The Bull, on his huge bay mare, drove them rapidly
before him whirling and cracking his long whip over
their heads. The Banff highway was deserted. He
chose the gritty roads, and, heads down, the hungry
steers nosed the bare ground, till they came to the level
lands, and turned into the road allowances between the
farms. The grain fields, odorous of cut hay and grain,
inflamed the hunger-maddened steers, and they moaned
and sniffed as they were driven mercilessly along.

All day and most of the night they traveled without
pause and in the first gray of the dawn they arrived
at the frail fences of the Lady Angella Loring. Down
went the two insecure lines of barbed wire that the
women had set up, never counting they would be needed
to withstand the impetuous stampede of wild cattle.

When Angella and Nettie stepped out of their shack
later that morning their shocked eyes were greeted with
Bull Langdon's vindictive work. The road was still
gray with the raised dust of the departing animals
turning off the road allowance for the main trail, the
Bar Q brand showing clearly on their left ribs. Filled
to the neck with the reaped grain, they were rolling
heavily along the way into Calgary.

The two girls stood before their barren fields, overwhelmed
by the magnitude of the disaster that had
befallen them. Not a word was said, but Angella, as if
grown suddenly old, turned blindly to the house, while
Nettie threw herself down desperately upon the ground
and burst into bitter tears.

Her little work-roughened hands fallen loosely by
her side, Angella sat at the crude wooden table of her
own making, and tried to figure a way out of the
appalling problem now facing her. She had bought
her implements on the installment plan, and the money
was now due; she owed the municipality for her seed; a
chattel mortgage was on her stock. That year's crop
would have wiped out all her indebtedness, and left her
free and clear.

When her crops had failed before, she had made up
her losses by working at the Bar Q, and the small proceeds
of the sale of eggs and butter; but now she had
not only herself to consider. There were two other
living creatures entirely dependent upon her. To the
desolate, heart-starved woman, Nettie and her baby had
become nearer and dearer to her than her own kin.

Nettie, still lying on the bitten down stubble, was
roused from her stupor of grief by a pulling at her
sleeve, and looking up, she saw the half-breed Jake. He
was kneeling beside her, holding out a little bunch of
buttercups, and in the poor fellow's face she read his
grief and anxiety. Nettie tried to smile through her
tears, and she took the flowers gratefully.

"Thank you, Jake. Where'd you come from?" she
asked, wiping her eyes, though her breath still came in
gasping sobs, and she could not hide her tears.

"Jake come out like 'Hell on fire' in Doctor's nortermobile.
Beeg, beeg ride--run like wind--run like hell
on road. Doc"--he jerked his thumb back--"go into
house. He eat foods. Jake got a hongry inside too.
She tell Jake she give'm molasses and sugar." He
smacked his lips at thought of his favorite food, but the
next moment he was studying Nettie's wet face in
troubled bewilderment.

"What's matter, Nettie? Him hurt Nettie yes
again?"

"Oh, yes, Jake, again." Her lip quivered.

The half-breed's face flamed savagely.

"The Bull! He no good! Jake kill 'im some day
sure."

He waved his arms wildly, and Nettie shook her head,
smiling at him sadly.

"Keep away from him, Jake. He's powerful strong,
and there wouldn't be nothing much left of you if he
once got his hands on you."

"Jake not afraid of the Bull," said the half-breed,
shaking his head. "Listen, Nettie. Me--Jake Langdon--me
take a peech fork, beeg long likea this, and
me jab him in the eye of the Bull, yes? That's kill
him."

"Oh, no, Jake. He'd get it from you. He'd rastle
it out of your hands."

"Then me--Jake steal on house when he's sleep. Get
a long big nail--like this big--hammer him into ear.
That same way many Indian do."

"Keep away from him, Jake. You'll only get the
worst of it."

"Jake don't mind worst. That's nothing. Jake no
like see cry on Nettie."

"Well, then, I'll not cry any more. You pick me
some more buttercups, Jake, and--and don't you worry
about me. I'm all right."

Inside the shack, Dr. McDermott had broken his
habitual Scotch reticence and blazed into fluent fury.
He had met the Bar Q herd along the road, and had
suspected something wrong. As he drove by Angella's
fields he realized what had happened, and her first words
confirmed his suspicions.

"Bull Langdon turned his steers into my crop. He
has ruined us."

"The hound! The dirty, cowardly hound! I'll have
him jailed for this."

"You can't, doctor," said Angella wearily, "we didn't
have the legal fence--just two wires. You warned us.
I wish I had taken your advice."

"Then I'll beat him to a pulp, with my own hands!"
said the enraged doctor.

Angella looked up at him with a pitying smile.

"No, man you shan't do that. I wouldn't have you
soil your hands touching him."

Her head dropped, and for a long time no word was
spoken in the little shack. Dr. McDermott, tongue-tied,
stared down at the bowed head of Angella. Presently
she said, without looking up, but in a sort of hopeless,
dead way:

"Dr. McDermott, I'm through. I can't go on fighting.
I'm beat."

"Through!" roared her friend, who had once
preached so violently against her laboring as a man,
"lass, you've only begun! You're of a fighting race--a
grand race, and you'll go down fighting. You're not
of the breed to admit you're beat."

"Little you know of my breed," she said sadly.

Dr. McDermott took the chair opposite her, thrust
out his chin and forced her to look at him.

"Do you remember the stable lad ye whipped because
he'd not let you ride the young Spitfire?" he said.
"Don't you remember the lad that twenty-five years
ago your father sent away to college in Glasgow?"

Her eyes grew wide and bright as she stared at him
as though she saw him for the first time. Color touched
her cheeks, she looked like a girl again. For a moment
she could not speak, but only stare at him. Out of the
mists of memory she was seeing again the barefooted
boy she had stolen away many a time to play with; it
was incredible that he and this rugged Scotch doctor,
who had forced his friendship upon her out in the wilds
of Canada, should be one and the same.

"Are you really that boy?"

And then, with a catch in her voice:

"Why, I must have been blind." A little sob of
delight at this miraculous encounter rose in her throat.

"Then you are--Angus. That was your name,
wasn't it. Oh, I have been blind!"

"Twenty-five years is a long time, my lady."

"Don't call me, my lady. I hate it."

"I'm glad of that, ma'am," said the doctor solemnly,
which made her laugh.

"And now," he pleaded, roughly, though in desperate
earnest, "you'll be taking back the money that your
father spent to make a doctor of a stable lad, will you
not? You'll let me stake you, lass?"

"Oh, you've more than paid that debt. This ranch
alone----"

"It's a homestead--a free gift of the Canadian Government.
It'll not begin to pay for the cost of a mon's
education. A debt's a debt, and I trust you'll allow
a mon to wipe out a heavy obligation."

At that Angella smiled, but her eyes were wet.

"If you put it that way, Dr. McDermott, of course,
there's nothing else for me to do but let you--let you--stake
me--will you?"

"I will!" said the man, scowling at her angrily, then
he cleared his throat, and asked for a "bite of food for
a hungry mon who's been working day and night to
hammer a bit of common sense into a bunch of farmers
whose heads are made of wood."

Angella even laughed as she bustled about the kitchen,
preparing a quick meal for the doctor, and when she
set it before him she asked:

"Who's sick now, doctor?"

"The whole country's nigh down," he muttered. "If
they don't heed the warning I've been trying to hammer
into their systems for months now, there'll be a sad lot
of sick and dead folk before the winter's out, I tell
you."

"As bad as all that?"

He replied solemnly:

"Couldn't be worse. Mark my words, if the plague
comes up to the country from Calgary, where it's got
a foothold already, our population will be cut in half."




CHAPTER XXV


Like a thief in the night the plague crept into
Alberta, disguised at first in the form of light
colds to which the sufferers paid small attention,
but before the year was out those neglected colds had
turned into the scourge whose virulence singled out the
strong, the fair and the young for its victims.

Calgary was like a beleaguered city at bay against
the attack of a dread enemy. The printed warnings
everywhere in the newspapers and placarded in public
places and street cars; the newspaper accounts of the
progress of the sickness in Europe, the United States
and eastern Canada, with the long list of deaths threw
the healthy city of the foothills into a state of panic.

Schools were closed; the people were afraid to go to
church; disinfectant was sprayed over every store and
office. The faintest symptom of a cold, the least sneeze
was diagnosed as plague, and the growing fear in which
the people awaited the disaster created a hysterical
condition that probably precipitated its coming.
Slowly and surely, undeterred by precaution and prayer
alike, the terrible plague was drawing in upon Alberta.

The first definitely diagnosed cases came in early
summer, when the weather is raw and cold as it always
is there. At that early season only two or three cases
were discovered, but all the members of medical and
nursing professions volunteered or were conscripted
for service. By a curious negligence, no means of protection
were taken for the vast country that surrounded
the City of the Foothills on every side, and it was even
said that many cases that the authorities failed to
report had been sent off "to the country."

If the city authorities were indifferent to the fate
of the country regions, on which, by the way Calgary
was wholly dependent, there was one man at least who
kept the welfare of his beloved country close to his
heart. The erstwhile Scotch stable lad, who for many
years had dedicated his thought, his labor and his heart
to the farming and ranching people of Alberta, begrudged
himself even a few hours sleep. Night and
day, he "kept the road," keeping the keenest watch
for the first outbreak of the epidemic, well knowing that
plague respected neither person nor place, but leaped
across the great cities even to the remotest places of
the earth.

The warm summer brought an abatement of the
menace, but when the first frost came in with the fall,
the plague fell like a cloudburst upon the country.

Calgary, the city of sunlight and optimism, became a
place of suffering and death. Scarcely a house but the
dreaded visitor entered to take his tragic and inexplicable
toll of the youngest and strongest there. People
went about half-dazed, as if they were living in a nightmare.
Hospitals, schools, churches, theaters, every
available public building was turned into a house of
refuge. No one was allowed on the street without a
mask of white gauze fastened over nose and mouth.

The terrible crisis brought to light the extreme
scarcity of nurses and doctors. Although an army of
volunteer nurses were recruited by the city authorities,
they were inadequate to the needs of all those stricken
households, where one after another died for sheer lack
of care and attention. The hospitals and all the emergency
stations were filled to overflowing.

In spite of the almost superhuman expenditure of
effort, the death lists grew from day to day. Crêpe
hung from every second door in the city, and every day
a ghastly procession of hearses, automobiles, and every
vehicle that moved on wheels, passed through the streets
laden with Calgary's dead.

All the surrounding towns had succumbed meanwhile,
and the smaller the towns, the heavier was the mortality
for lack of skilled doctors and nurses and fit
accommodation for the patients.

Most desperate of all, however, was the plight of
those who lived on farms and ranches and at camps beyond
the reach of help. The state of things in the
Indian Reserves was appalling. The Indians were dying
like flies, their misery forgotten by their white protectors.
In their ignorance and helplessness, they
sought help at the farms and ranches, only to be turned
away, and often they carried the plague into places
which had been immune until then.

Half the countryside was down with the disease, and
still Dr. McDermott was vainly applying to the city
and provincial authorities for help. Seeing that his
demands were falling on deaf ears, he tried to impress
into service men and women ranchers whose families
had not yet been attacked, trying to make them understand
that at such a time it was everybody's duty to
do what he could. But the fear that had paralyzed
the cities had now reached the farmers, and the doctor's
appeal brought little response. In their desire to
escape, many families shut themselves up in their homes,
discharged their help and hung signs on their gates:
"Keep away!" They closed their doors in the faces of
friends and strangers both, and only opened them when
they in their turn were forced to cry for help. A few
did respond, it is true, to the doctor's call for help,
but nearly always were themselves overtaken before
they had served very long, and the demand for help
of any kind was so overwhelming that it was well-nigh
impossible to do more than show the sick how to take
care of themselves.

Overworked and exhausted, worn out with lack of
sleep, Dr. McDermott stopped one day at Angella
Loring's ranch.

The two girls were coming in from the field, Angella
in the democrat with the baby, and Nettie on foot,
driving home a team of work horses. They had been
plowing and repairing the broken fences, for undaunted
by the destruction of their crop, they were pluckily
on the land again, preparing for the next year's seeding.

Dr. McDermott, his bag on the step by him, watched
them as they watered and fed their horses and put up
for the night. Then, each taking a handle of the baby's
basket, they came through the barnyard to the house.

For the first time since she had known her doctor
friend, he failed to greet Nettie with his cheery:

"And how's my lass today?"

Gaunt and haggard, he stood up and scrutinized
them gravely before grunting:

"Hm! All right, eh? Not touched. Well, sit down,
girls. I've thot to tell you will make your hearts a wee
bit heavy."

Dr. McDermott opened his black bag and took out
some pills and a large bottle of disinfectant, which he
set on the steps. Angella, the baby in her arms, her
brows slightly drawn, looked down at the lined face of
the doctor, and saw he had brought bad news.

"Let's go in," she said. "You look as if a cup of
tea won't come amiss. Let me pass. I'll make it at
once."

"You'll hear me through first, and I've no time for
tea. There's a bit of sickness running about the country.
'Tis the same they've had in the old land. You'll
put this disinfectant about your place, and on your
person, and in case--in case of certain symptoms,
you'll go straight to bed, and you'll stay there till I
tell you when to get up, and you'll begin then to take
the pills I'm leaving. What's more, you'll send Jake
at once for me."

There was a pause, as Nettie's eyes met Angella's.

"Needn't worry about me, doc," said Nettie. "I'm
awfully healthy. You don't have to give me no pills."

The doctor glared at her furiously.

"That's the ignorant sort of talk I've been listening
to all summer; but the very ones who boasted of their
strength are the ones stricken."

"What are the symptoms?" interposed Angella.

"Symptoms? Fever, backache, headache, nose bleed,
a tendency to sneeze, hot and cold flashes."

Angella's face paled, and her glance went furtively
from Nettie to the baby.

"Are there many down?" she questioned with assumed
casualness.

"Thousands, ma'am, in the city, and God knows how
many in the country."

"What are they doing for help?"

"In the country they are doing without it--shifting
for themselves."

Angella looked startled, and Nettie turned round, her
slow gaze fixed upon the doctor's face.

"Who's taking care of them, then?" she asked.

"They're takin' care of themselves. They creep out
of bed and crawl to each other, and some of 'em die
before they can get back to their own beds. In most
of the families that have it, they are all down at once."

"Now, look here," said Angella abruptly, "you've got
to have some supper before you start off."

"No time for supper. There's nine in the Homan
family down, including the help. I'm on my way now."

He had snapped his bag closed. Nettie passed by
him into the house. Angella paused at the door and
caught him by the sleeve to detain him.

"Really, doctor, it won't do you a bit of good to try
and take care of people if you don't take care of yourself
first; you've got to eat. So you come right in.
It won't take me a minute to fix something for you."

"No, can't stop. I had a bite at noon, and will reach
Homan's in time for another sup."

"Well, wait. A minute or two more or less won't
matter. I want to know about this. Can't you get
nurses from Calgary, and aren't there any other doctors
in the country?"

"There are three besides myself over my territory,
but two of 'em's down, and the other--" The doctor
scowled and muttered something about "white-livered
coward."

"And nurses?"

"I tell you I've been unable to get anyone. The city
nurses have their hands full in town, and they won't
come up to the country. As for the women themselves--the
farm women, those who are not down, have gone
plumb crazy with fright. I've gone from ranch to ranch
like a beggar, imploring help."

Nettie had come out again. She had changed from
her overalls to the blue house dress that Mrs. Langdon
had made for her and over this she had thrown a plaid
shawl. The blue woolen tam that Angella had knitted
for her was on her head, and she looked singularly
young and sweet. A few articles of clothing were
knotted in a neat bundle under her arm.

"Doc," she said, "I'm going with you."

There was a long pause. Dr. McDermott blinked
up at her, scowled, grunted something under his breath,
and cleared his throat loudly. Angella stood stiffly by
the door, not attempting to move, and her arm tightened
involuntarily about the baby.

"I'm awfully strong," went on Nettie, "and I ain't
likely to ketch nothing, and it don't matter if I do, far
as that goes. It's up to me to help those that need me.
You'll let me go, won't you, doc?"

"You're a good lass," muttered the doctor, "and
you'll be a grand help to me."

At last Angella found her voice.

"Nettie, you're forgetting your--baby!" she said.

Nettie turned sharply round and the bundle fell from
her hand.

"No, no, Angel, I've not forgotten him; but you'll
be good to him, won't you? and he'll never miss me."

"Nettie Day, don't dare talk like that," said Angella
savagely. "I won't let you go if you have any thought
like that in your head."

But Nettie did not hear her. For the first time since
her baby's birth she was holding it in her arms, and the
feel of the little warm face against her own brought
a pang to her heart that was both agony and joy.
Motherhood seemed to have come to her in a sudden
rush of feeling, and her face was as white as death when
she at last gave her child back solemnly to Angel. The
movement awakened the baby, and now its cry was more
than she could bear. She clasped her hands over her
ears, and rushed to the gate. Dr. McDermott picked
up her bundle and followed.




CHAPTER XXVI


Of the thirty or forty men previously employed
at the Bar Q, only two remained that winter--a
Chinaman and Batt Leeson at the Bull Camp.
The foothill ranch was completely deserted, and the
Bull was left alone to look after his several thousand
head of cattle.

When the plague reached the country regions, there
was a general exodus from the ranches, for tales were
rife of stricken men corralled like cattle in bunkhouses
and barns and left to shift for themselves.

That winter the cattle in the foothills roamed the
range like mavericks, rustling for their water and feed.
But even then they were better off than the purebred
stock at Barstairs, being hardy stuff bred to the range
and the open fields, where they found ample feed. The
pampered purebred cattle had always been used to
care and nursing, having been practically raised by
hand, and were accustomed to feed from troughs heaped
up with food by the watchful attendants and hands.
Now penned in narrow pastures and cattle sheds, where
the ground was bare as stone, they were irregularly
left to the tender mercies of the half-dazed and always
drunken Batt Leeson, and spasmodically fed and seldom
watered.

Chum Lee, paralyzed with fear of the "black plague,"
which had cut down all of his "boys" at the Bull Camp,
lived in terror that it would overtake him also. Chum
Lee had no desire to die in the white man's land; he
wanted to repose in peace under the sacred soil of his
ancestors. He would have run away from the camp,
but the barren country, with its vast blanket of snow,
gave no hope of any refuge, and he feared Bull Langdon
as though he were an evil spirit.

Back and forth between the two ranches the Bull's
great car tore like a Juggernaut of Fate. It did not
in the least concern the cattleman that his men had
died like flies, or that three--quarters of the country
was down with the plague. What alarmed and incensed
him was the fact that his cattle, the magnificent herd
that he had built up from the three or four head rustled
from the Indians, were roaming the range uncared-for
and neglected. Many of them, drifting before a bitter
blizzard, had perished in coulee and canyon, and worse
still was the deterioration of the purebreds. The loss
of a single head of this stock meant several thousand
dollars.

Nor was the Bull exclusively occupied with the loss
of his cattle; he brooded unceasingly over Nettie Day,
though the vision of her refused to leave his tortured
mind and at the thought of the child she had borne
he would rage up and down like a caged beast. The
child had made her more than ever his, he gloated; yet
how should he ever gain possession of her? He knew
that the "Loring woman's" words had not been idle,
and in imagination he saw the black walls of the
penitentiary looming in the future. Nevertheless, he
intended to have her; though the whole world might
stand against him, he would get her back. He would
bide his time, and his day would come---- The Loring
woman would not always be on guard. His day would
come.

Nettie was nursing the stricken farmers; the pariah
and despised of the foothills was going from ranch to
ranch caring for those who had condemned her. She
had sat up for many nights soothing and ministering
to their suffering; she had closed the eyes of their best
beloved, and her tears had dropped upon the faces of
their dead. In their hours of deepest anguish and
agony, they had clung to her cool, strong hands, as to
an anchor.

The country people had reversed their opinion and
judgment of Nettie Day; her past was forgotten; she
was their Nettie now.

By the end of January the plague had reached its
peak. Whole families had persisted and others were
slowly creeping back to health and hope again. It
would not be long, Dr. McDermott promised Nettie,
before she would be free to return to her baby and her
friend.

She began to count the days, and to scan the skies
for that shadowy arch across the heavens that in
Alberta precedes a "Chinook" and is the forerunner
of mild weather, for Dr. McDermott was expected to
come for her with the first Chinook. Nettie thought
with ceaseless yearning of her baby; away from him,
he had taken visible shape in her mind, and, at last able
to overlook the horror of his paternity, she loved him
with all the passion of her young warm heart. When
the Chinook at last broke up the fierce cold Dr. McDermott
kept his word, and on the day he was to come
for her, Nettie walked on air. She was going home--to
her baby!

When the doctor arrived, however, his face was
grave, and his heart lay heavy within him. His labors
were far from done. The Bow Claire Lumber Camp
had succumbed to the plague, and nearly a hundred
men were down.

Calgary had promised help, but its former promises
had not proved reliable, and in all that vast country
few would be found willing to go deep into the heart
of the timber lands to nurse the lumber-jacks.

The doctor's Ford chugged to the back door of the
Munson farmhouse, where Nettie had been nursing the
last of her patients. She was there to meet him, her
old plaid cape about her and the woolen tam upon her
head. Her face was aglow, and her eyes shone as
bright as stars; he had telephoned her to expect him
by noon, and had told her to be ready and not keep him
waiting.

Nettie had kissed the surviving three little Munsons
and their mother, suddenly filled with passionate
remorse for her past cruelty to the girl who had
now saved their lives. She had shaken hands with
the husky voiced father, who had simply and reverently
begged God's blessing for her, and to hide her
own tears, she had run from them and shut the door
between them. Now she was in the Ford, with the robes
tucked comfortably about her; breathlessly she squeezed
the arm of her old friend.

"Oh, doc, just to think, I'm goin' home now--home
to Angel and my baby! Oh, it's just heaven to be here
beside you and on our way."

The "doc" had one of the new self-starters and
there was no need of cranking this year. They buzzed
down the road in the "tin Lizzie," making a great
racket and leaving in their wake a malodorous cloud
of smoke. For some time they went along in silence,
and gradually Nettie's happy mood fell from her as
she noted the gravity of the doctor's face. She touched
his arm timidly, though her heart began to misgive
her.

"Can you really spare me now, doc?"

There was no answer from her old friend, and Nettie
pressed his arm, repeating her question.

"Can you, doc?" And then, as still he did not answer:
"Is any one else down now?"

"Nettie." Dr. McDermott had slowed up. He tried
to hide the anxiety in his face, for he did not intend
to ask any further sacrifice of the girl, but he wanted
her to know the facts. "Nettie, the Bow Claire Lumber
Camp is down."

"The Bow Claire!"

The color receded from her face, her hand went to
her heart as her thoughts flew instantly to Cyril. Slowly
she realized the meaning of the doctor's solemn words.

"Nearly a hundred men, Nettie, and not a soul to
care for them."

There was a long pause, while Dr. McDermott looked
steadily ahead. The car was pounding and sending
out jets of steam from its lately frozen radiator.

"Doc," cried the girl suddenly, "this ain't the road
to Bow Claire. Turn your car around!"

"A promise is a promise," said the doctor. "I promised
I'd bring you home to your child, lass, and I'll
keep my word if you say so."

"But I don't say so. I don't want to go home--yet.
I shouldn't be happy--even with my baby. My place
is where I am needed most, and you should know
where that is, doc."

"Dear lass," said the doctor gently. "They're needing
you sore at Bow Claire."

"Then turn your car around, doc, and don't you
m-mind if I seem to be c-cryin'. It's just because--because
I'm excited, and oh! I'm so g-glad of the
chance--of the opportunity, doc, to go 'long with
you to Bow Claire."

Dr. McDermott blinked through his misty glasses.
He swung his wheel sharply around, backed along the
slippery, thawing ground, and went over a culvert
into a snow bank on the side of the road.

There was a grinding cough of the engine, and it
stopped dead. Again and again Dr. McDermott started
the car, and back and forth it chugged in a vain effort
to pull out of the slippery snow pit. From under a
pile of produce and baggage, the doctor produced a
snow shovel and began the process of "digging out,"
making a road before and behind where the car might
back and get a fair start onto the road again. As
he shoveled the snow, digging under the car and all
around it, they heard the honk of an approaching motorist
and gradually Bull Langdon's huge touring car
swung into sight. At the sound of the automobile
horn, Dr. McDermott had straightened up, intending
to ask for aid, but when he saw who it was he doggedly
resumed his digging alone.

Bull Langdon took in the situation at a glance, and
the sight of Nettie cooled the fever that had possessed
him for days. She was visibly terrified at seeing him,
and shrank back inside the Ford. The Bull observed her
agitation with fierce delight and all the old feeling of
domination over her came back to him. He got down
from his car and examined the spot where the back
wheel seemed to have wedged itself in.

"Stuck, are you?" he gloated.

"We'll be out in a minute."

"Not on your life you won't. You'll not pull out of
that today."

"Very well, if that's what you think, suppose you
haul us out."

"Ain't got a rope, and my engine won't stand the
gaff."

Dr. McDermott's wrathful stare met the Bull's insolent
smile. He turned his back upon him, and applied
himself with savage energy to his work.

"Where you headed for?"

"None of your damned business."

"It ain't, heh?"

The Bull was now in high good humor. His hand
rested upon the Ford, close to where Nettie was crouching
behind the curtain. His bold eyes held hers fascinated
with terror.

"Tell you what I'll do," he suggested after a moment's
pause, "I'll take you aboard my car and pack
you wherever you're goin'. You can 'phone the garage
at Cochrane to send out and haul in your Lizzie."

Dr. McDermott could not see Nettie, but he could
feel the silent, desperate appeal which her fear of the
Bull prevented her crying aloud.

"No," he felt her imploring him. "No--never! I
would rather stay here forever than go with him."

He looked the cattleman up and down with the same
stare of cold contempt and reprobation as that which
had caused Bull Langdon to quail before Angella
Luring.

"We'll pull out without your help," said Dr. McDermott
curtly. "Don't need you. Don't want you."

"Hmph!" chuckled the Bull. He cut a chunk of
chewing tobacco, and bit calmly into it. He spat, and
blinked his eyes at Nettie, then buttoning up his big
beaver fur coat, he moved towards his car. Climbing
aboard, he grinned down at the girl as he pushed the
self-starter with his foot. The engine instantly responded
with its soft purring and the great car glided
along the road. A madness raged through the Bull
as he drove; his pent-up passion of months was finding
an outlet at last. The faster the car flew, the
greater was his sense of relief and elation, as he told
himself he would find the car still stalled in the same
spot at nightfall when he returned for the girl.

As soon as the Bull's car had disappeared from
sight Nettie was out of the Ford.

"Oh, doc, he'll be back. I know he will."

"Let him. Nothin' to be afraid of. Feel in the
pocket of the can--no, the other one. Give me that--"

Nettie passed the revolver to him, and the doctor
thrust it into his hip pocket.

"Now, lass, can you give me a hand?"

Together they pushed with might and main upon
the car; it went up a few paces, and slid back into the
snow. Again they pushed, and this time, at the doctor's
order, Nettie found and thrust under the wheel
a stone that held it in place. The doctor then climbed
aboard, and with Nettie pushing behind, the Ford
snorted forward a few feet, slipped back, but jerked
ahead again. There was a tremendous grinding noise,
and the whirling wheel went over the side of the culvert;
the car jumped forward. With a whoop of triumph,
Dr. McDermott made room for Nettie and they
were off again. With loud clanking the flivver flew
along those crazy roads, panted up incredibly steep
and slippery grades, plunged into snow fields and on
into the timber land, where only the narrow cattle
trails made a path through the woods to the lumber
camp. They "made the grade" in two and a half hours
of hard riding, and pulled into the dead-still camp
with a cheering honking of their horn.




CHAPTER XXVII


The meeting with Nettie on the road doubled the
Bull's determination to possess her again The
exhilaration of the chance encounter and the frustration
of his plans when, returning, he found the little
car gone, had roused his desire to a pitch of insanity.
Everything else was forgotten; his cattle, his
ranches, his great money losses, the impossibility of
obtaining help, even the deterioration of his prized bulls
at Barstairs--all these cares and anxieties ceased to
exist in the overpowering passion that consumed him.

Bull Langdon was incapable of love in its finer sense,
but in his blind and brutal way, he was madly in love
with Nettie Day. His passion for the girl was like a
fire that burned and raged within him, seeking an outlet
where there was none and for the time being the man
was like a maniac.

He thought of the girl ceaselessly, chortling with
delight as he pictured her beauty, now sweeter than
ever before in its young maturity. He had not noticed
a new quality of spirituality that suffering had added
to her loveliness, a certain light that seemed to radiate
from her; all he had seen was that the summer's work
in the fields had reddened her cheeks and brightened
her eyes, and that her lips were like a scarlet flame.

If he pictured Nettie as she had looked at him from
her seat in the doctor's Ford with her wide frightened
eyes, his mind went back also to those other days, when
he had held the girl in his arms. Many a night as he
tramped the floor of the empty ranch house, his half-crazed
mind lived over and over the joy of those days
when he had held her in his power--"like purebred stuff
in the Squeezegate." She had been weak and docile
then, a timid, terrified captive; but now there was a
new expression in her face, a look that was like a
shield--a warning guard that held him back and warned
him that if trapped again she would struggle to the
death. He told himself he had no desire to hurt her--he
wanted only to have her back, where he believed
she belonged by right; he would make her the second
Mrs. Langdon. And at the thought of Nettie, at the
Bar Q, reigning in the great ranch house, keeping the
place clean and sweet as his first wife had done, the
Bull threw out his arms and clinched them to him,
as if in fact the struggling girl were actually in their
grasp, and he crooned words of savage tenderness to
his vision, only to moan and whimper the next moment
as he came back to reality again.

His desperation made him resourceful and cunning.
He looked for Nettie Day at every farm and ranch in
the foothills and in the adjoining prairie country. His
car no longer tore along the roads from Bar Q to Barstairs,
as he superintended the care of his demoralized
herd. He had started now upon another hunt, and
was running to earth a quarry whose price he set above
all else.

His spying at the Loring ranch had revealed the
fact that Nettie was not there, but, laying in wait
for the unfortunate Jake, his son of an earlier passion,
in due time he captured and tortured the half-breed.
He had picked him up on the trail, racing bare-back
upon some errand into the hills, and his questions as
to the whereabouts of Nettie, accompanied by prods
and kicks, had brought the stuttered information that
she was "far way off on the hills. She at lumber camp.
Everybody gone die on Bow Claire."

That was enough for the Bull. He knew now where
the girl was, but the knowledge, instead of satisfying
and calming him, did the very reverse when he realized
that Nettie and Cyril were once more together. That
thought obsessed him, and filled his mind with murderous
designs.

In the midst of his fury he reminded himself of
Nettie's baby and a new idea, charged with possibilities,
occurred to him. If he could not take the girl
by force, there was one way by which she could be lured
to Bar Q. He was amazed that he had not thought
of it before. Human nature, he knew, was no different
from cattle nature, where the young ones were
concerned. The cattle mother would go, if necessary,
through walls of fire and stone to reach her offspring,
and what would keep Nettie Day from going to Bar Q,
if she knew her baby was there? It was never necessary
to throw the lariat upon the mother's neck; the roping
of her child was always enough. Bull Langdon swung
his car around.




CHAPTER XXVIII


Two "green" hands were now at Bar Q. They had
been sent out by the Government Employment
office, and for several days before his search for
Nettie had begun Bull Langdon had been trying to
break them into the cattle "game." They were English,
guileless, clean-cut youngsters of good family,
who looked upon the foully swearing cowman as a
pathological subject that both interested and amazed
them.

Their knowledge of ranching or "rawnching," as
they called it, was of the vaguest, but they were good
riders and the life appealed to them as sportsmen.

One of the anomalies of the ranching population
of Alberta is its tremendous variety of types. Here
you will find a man who can neither read nor write,
and his neighbor, often his chum, will be the son of
an English lord, one of those odd derelicts that drift
over from the Old Country and take so kindly to the
ranch life that more often than not they return unwillingly
to their homes. University men and agriculturists
experimenting with irrigation projects and intensive
cultivation live side by side with business men
and men from New York and other great cities in the
States, who for diverse reasons have broken away from
the cities, and gone in for farming on a big scale,
raising the business of farming to the level of great
enterprises rather than the slovenly and weary process
it usually is. For the most part, however, the farming
population of Alberta is made up of that solid, plodding
type that have trekked out from eastern Canada
or the midwestern states, tempted by the cheapness of
the land and the richness of the soil. These are the
backbone of the country and between these and the
others are sandwiched colonies of peasants from Scandinavia
and other parts of Europe.

It is with the hired man as with the owner. He may
be an illiterate clod of the old type, or a fresh-faced
college-bred son of a man of wealth, even of title, or
again some chance wanderer, gone "broke" in the
colony, and using up the remittance from home on drink
and cards. Besides these there is also the type of English
student and sportsman, who enjoys "roughing it"
and hires out partly for experience and partly for a
lark.

To this latter type the men at Bar Q belonged.
They had come up largely to escape a city of gloom
and plague, and were extremely anxious to remain at
the great ranch. The Bull, intent on getting away,
endeavored in a few days to teach them what he called
the "A B C" of ranching. They demonstrated their
ability to remain in the saddle eight or ten hours at a
stretch, and to ride over thirty or forty miles without
undue fatigue.

The Bull showed them "the ropes"; pointed out where
certain cattle were to be gathered in; indicated the
fields where they were to be driven, and promising to
return "in a few days," as he rode off and left the
"tenderfeet" in charge of the great ranch.

After his departure, the two young Englishmen rode
over the place, marked the likely places for big game,
took a "pot" or two at the yowling coyote on a hill;
rode over the pleasant hills and pasture land, back to
the comfortable bunkhouse, and decided that they
had a "snap" and that "rawnching" was the life for
them. It was a jolly sight better than hanging around
a small city up to its neck in sickness. In the warm
spell that followed soon after the departure of Bull
Langdon, the Englishmen "rode the range" like hunters,
and their methods of rounding up cattle, though
weird, were highly effective. They raced and chased
the cattle, galloping along at top speed, thrilled by the
spectacle of the fleeing herd which they persistently
and doggedly tried to overtake. The experienced cowpuncher
lopes along leisurely behind or alongside a
bunch of cattle, taking care not to hurry them, for to
run cattle is to "knock the beef" off them. That spring
the lean cattle of the Bar Q amazed even the least
sophisticated ranch folk, and it is certain that the
guileless Englishmen never dreamed they were to blame
for the animals' emaciated condition.

When a cold spell followed the thaw, the Englishmen
gaped at the thermometer, which was dropping rapidly
towards thirty below zero, and retreated hastily
into the warm bunkhouse, firmly convinced that no
creature living could survive such a temperature. The
rapid change from cold to warm and back to cold again
is a peculiarity of the Alberta climate, but the Englishmen
had thought that the Chinook was the first warmth
of an early spring. The unexpectedly bitter weather
alarmed and appalled them; they spent the day
shut up in the house, piling huge logs into the great
square wood stove, that spluttered and sent off an enormous
heat. They concocted toothsome dishes for their
entertainment, for, like most Englishmen, they were
expert hands at "batching" and camping, and knew
how to cook. Their fare included such game as venison,
moose, mountain goat and sheep, to say nothing of
the small game, mallard duck, prairie chicken, partridge,
grouse and quail which abounded in the wild
woods of Bar Q, and the Englishmen had prudently
"brought them down" while rounding up the cattle, not
knowing that the shooting had contributed considerably
to the flight of the terrified herd.

This game, expertly drawn to the ranch by horse
sleds, was piled up frozen in the immense storeroom
adjoining the bunkhouse, where they also found an
ample supply of stores. It was certain that no matter
how long the siege of Arctic cold might last, the
hands of the Bar Q would survive starvation.

Shut in the bunkhouse, their days were by no means
empty, for when not engaged in cooking or feeding
the wood stove, they wrote articles on "ranching in the
wild northwest," or indited epistles home to thrilled
relatives, who received from their letters a vague notion
that their dear boys were sojourning in polar regions.
Sometimes they would find in the letters from their
English friends, whose knowledge of Canada was of
the weirdest, warnings to be careful of the treacherous
Esquimaux, and reminders to call, when they found
time, upon some relative whose address was somewhere
in their neighborhood, in Ontario or Nova Scotia. The
ignorance abroad of the immense extent of the Canadian
provinces was almost unbelievable. To all their
folks at home the young Englishmen took delight in
concocting thrilling romances in which they figured as
big game hunters and fishermen, and through which
they moved heroically, followed by bands of noble red
men.




CHAPTER XXIX


While Angella did her chores in the morning,
Jake looked after Nettie's laughing, fair-haired
baby. The breed adored the child, and the
hours he spent playing with him were the happiest
of his life. Angella had built a small "yard" for the
baby to play in safely while Jake, on his hands and
knees, would play "cat and dog" outside the railings,
to the baby's unbounded delight.

He had grown into a beautiful child, with his mother's
fair skin and blue eyes, and his blonde hair curled
in tiny ringlets all over his small, round head. He was
the soul of good humor, and though not robust, his
health was rapidly improving.

Life had assumed a new meaning for the woman
recluse and the change was reflected in her expression.
The defiant look was almost gone from the bright eyes,
the lips were no longer bitterly compressed; with a
faint color in her cheeks, and her soft gray hair curling
about her face, Angella Loring was almost beautiful,
as she held the baby close in her arms, and
murmured foolish endearments over it.

By the time she finished her milking and chores in
the early morning, the baby would be awake, and as
soon as she came into the house, he would set up a loud
demand for bath and food. Before either Jake or
Angella breakfasted, he must first be cared for. Satisfied,
rosy and clean, he would then be put in his "yard,"
to tumble happily about among his favorite "toys,"
the clothes pins and empty thread spools, which he
rolled around the yard in high glee, or sucked and
chewed upon with relish.

One morning in March Angella's chores took longer
than usual. As hard as she pumped, the water froze
before it could fall from the spout, and the barn was
full of stock, which had come up from the frozen pastures
to the shelter of the sheds. There were twenty
or thirty head waiting hungrily for their share of the
feed and water, which was generally reserved for the
special milking stock and weak stuff interned in the
barn. Angella worked hard and valiantly, driving back
the greedy steers, and rescuing a half frozen calf, which
barely escaped death under the scampering heels.

Upon examining the little creature, she saw that if
its life was to be saved she would have to take it to
some warmer place than the barn. Throwing together
a rough sled made out of a couple of boards, she
managed to shove it underneath the motionless animal,
and pull the litter with a lariat over the frozen
ground to the house.

Jake did not answer her calls to open the door and
she had to push it open herself, letting in an icy gust
of wind. She tugged and pulled at the sled till it
slid into the kitchen, and at last deposited the calf
in front of the roaring fire. Breathing heavily from
the exertion and holding her sides, she leaned against
the table, and suddenly caught sight of Jake lying face
downward on the floor. Her first thought was that it
was an attack of his periodical convulsions, but a moment
later she saw the empty "yard" as well. Her
senses reeled; it seemed as though the whole room began
to swim around her, as slowly her knees gave way, and
for the first time in her life Angella Loring fainted.
But it was only for a moment; she came back to consciousness
almost at once and crawled on her knees
to where Jake, now moaning and moving his head, still
lay stretched upon the floor. His contorted face was
horribly bruised and deathly pale, and when he opened
his eyes the blood ran out of them. She saw then that
Jake had been struck down and beaten.

"Him! Him!" gibbered the breed.

"Jake, what has happened? Where's the baby?
Oh-h!"

"Bobby--all--a--gone. Him--the Bull take a baby!
Him gone away."

Again the universe began to spin about her, but she
refused to faint a second time. Feeling her way to the
door, Angella Loring went out again into the bitter
cold to the barn, where the mare with her new colt
whinnied as she slipped the stock saddle across its back.
She trapped the colt in an adjoining stall, and then
as she got on the mare's back, she whispered:

"Go quickly, Daisy, or you'll not get back to your
baby soon."

There was a long snorting whinny from Daisy--a
cry of protest at being taken from her colt--indignantly
answered by the little one.

The nearest telephone was five miles from Angella's
ranch, and when she rode into the farm yard, in spite
of the intense cold, the mare was sweating from her
wild race across the country. The astonished farmer
who led Angella to the 'phone--it was the first time
she had been known to step inside any of their houses--stayed
by the door and listened with pricked-up ears
as the excited woman called Dr. McDermott at Springbank.
By a merciful chance he was there, and a few
moments later the farmer was helping his strange visitor
to a seat, and calling loudly to his wife for help.
For again Angella Loring had fainted. Her first question
when she opened her eyes and looked up at her
neighbors' faces was:

"Has he come? Has Dr. McDermott come?"

And when they replied that he had not, she wrung
her hands and broke into weak tears.




CHAPTER XXX


The unexpected return of the "Governor," as
the Englishmen had named Bull Langdon, was
an exciting event in their hitherto pleasant lives.
He arrived late on a March afternoon, the snort of his
engine and the honk of his horn arousing the "hands"
from a siesta, where, stretched before a raging wood
fire, they drowsily smoked and read.

They dressed leisurely in warm fur coats and overshoes,
before answering his impatient summons, and
sauntering out in their own good time, smiled good-humoredly
at the shouting cowman.

"Here, you! Take this in. Ain't no fire to the house.
Want it thawed out."

The first of the Englishmen, whose long name need
not appear here--"Bo" is what Bull Langdon called
him--took the bundle in his hands and then almost
dropped it, for something moved inside it, and a sound
that was like a suffocated moan arose from its mysterious
depths.

"My word! The thing's alive, d'you know," exclaimed
the startled Englishman. "Hang it all, man,
I believe it's a baby."

"Take it to the bunkhouse," roared the Bull, backing
into the garage. "Thaw it out."

Gingerly carried into the bunkhouse by the amazed
"Bo" and deposited upon the cot that he himself had
but recently reposed upon, the baby continued its low,
moaning cries. Both the little bare feet had kicked
out from the sheepskin coat, and were frozen stiff. One
minute fist stuck out of the coat, and there was a great
swelling on the forehead, where he had fallen off the seat
of the car to the floor. Its whole body, in fact, was
bruised from the cruel bumping of that long mad ride
from Yankee Valley, a distance of thirty-five miles.

"Cutie," the name sneeringly imposed upon the other
Englishman by Bull Langdon, because of his natty
dress and his monocle, now stuck that despised piece
of glass in his right eye, and surveyed the child with
amazement. Its cries were growing fainter, and a kind
of frozen rigor was creeping over it.

"Well, what're you gapin' at?" Bull Langdon was
glowering in the doorway.

"Where in the world did you pick the little beggar
up?" inquired "Bo."

"It ain't none o' your business," was the surly retort.
"He's here, and he's here to stay. He's mine, and
he's got my brand on him."

"You don't mean to say that you brand babies in
this country! Never heard of such a thing! It's damned
inhuman, I should say."

"Don't matter what you say or think. I want that
kid thawed out. Give 'im something to eat. He's
cold and hungry, but he's healthy young stuff and 'll
pull through. Kids ain't no different to cattle. Feed
'em and keep 'em warm. That's all they need. He's
bawlin' now for feed. You got something handy?"

"Nothing but a bite of cold venison. Hardly the
stuff for a baby."

"He ain't no baby. He's a yearling. Here!"

He had torn a strip of the venison from the piece,
and had thrust it into the child's hand. The tiny fingers
closed feebly about the meat and then feebly unclosed.
The bright eyes, so like his mother's, opened
in one wide, blind stare, then the white lids came down
over them, closing the light out forever.

"Gone to sleep," grunted the cowman. "Keep the
fire goin'. Thaw him out and feed him. That's the
stuff. He'll come round. He's good stuff. I'm off for
the timber. Be back soon. You ain't much good neither
of you at tendin' to cattle. So I'll give you a nurse
maid's job. Let the cattle rustle for themselves. You
concentrate on--". He indicated with a jerk of his
thumb Nettie's child, now quite still where it lay.

Alone, the two Englishmen continued to look at each
other, astonished out of speech.

"Well, I'm hanged," said "Bo" at last, "absolutely
hanged. What's to do?"

"Carn't say any more than you can. Blessed if I
know the first thing about a baby."

"Cutie" was looking down sentimentally now at the
small blonde head.

"It's awfully quiet, isn't it? Doesn't seem--" He
touched the tiny hand. It was cold as ice, and all
of a sudden the two men looking down on that little
frozen thing realized the truth.

"By Jove!" whispered the one. "The little beggar's
dead, d'you know."

Their eyes met apprehensively.

"What's to do?"

"Gad, I wish I knew."

"It's a dashed serious matter."

"Rather!"

"I'll plug over to the house and telephone. Where'd
he say he was going?--er to timber something. I wonder
what his telephone number might be."

"Try Information. She should know."

But Information knew of no timber number, but
when the stuttering Englishman made clear to her
that there was a dead baby at Bar Q, she connected
him swiftly with the Provincial Police Station at Cochrane,
and a voice at that end promised after a series
of impatient questions to "look into it," and "Bo"
hung up.

The charm of "rawnching" was over for the Englishmen.
All the rest of that afternoon they sat in
somber silence in the bunkhouse, carefully averting
their eyes from the small covered head. They had
no heart for their usual evening meal, but contented
themselves with strong tea and smoking steadily upon
their pipes.

It was nearly dark when the sound of a motor along
the road was heard, and then the labored panting of
the engine as it made the steep grade to the ranch. The
two young men hoped the police had come, not knowing
that the solitary mounty who had been despatched
upon the case was coming by horse twenty-eight miles
from the ranch, and could not arrive for several hours.
When the Englishmen opened the door of the bunkhouse,
they were surprised to see a woman running
swiftly ahead of the fur-coated doctor, whose acquaintance
they had already made.

Their first thought was that Angella was the mother,
and indeed she might well have been as she threw herself
down beside Nettie's baby, and burst into uncontrolled,
despairing sobs over the little dead body.




CHAPTER XXXI


Chum Lee packed everything he possessed in
the world in his capacious bamboo bag, slipping
in between the articles of clothing bottles and
pipes and boxes filled with redolent odors. He muttered
and chattered frantically to himself as he
packed, and his hands shook as if with ague. He tied
and knotted a stout rope about the bag and, trembling
and shivering, put on his old sheepskin coat, muskrat
cap and fur mittens. Hoisting the bag upon his
back, Chum Lee hastened on panic-winged feet away
from the camp at Barstairs.

He had awakened from a long doze, in which he
dreamed of summer seas, green as jade, of colorful
sampans, alive with moving, friendly faces; of a girl's
face, oval and soft, with gentle almond eyes, and a
smile like a caress, whose hair was black and smooth
as the wing of a teal, and decked with bridal flowers.
That fair vision of his home and the young wife he
had left in China vanished into the cruel mists of memory.
He awoke to intense cold, the bleakness of death
itself in the one-room bunkhouse. With a sob, the
Chinaman crept out of bed, scurried across the room,
only to find the fire was out, then staggered to the
woodbox. On his way back to the stove, his arms
loaded, he stumbled across something that lay upon
the floor in his path. A loud cry escaped the Chinaman.
The wood dropped from his shivering arms
and clattered down upon the Bar Q "hand." Batt
Leeson lay upon his back, where he had rolled out
of his bunk overnight. His mouth and eyes were
wide open, but did not move or flicker, for Batt was
in his last long sleep.

The sight of the dead man, the last of the "boys"
to succumb to the "black plague," was too much for
the overwrought and drug-weakened Chinaman. Even
the terrors of the zero weather were less appalling to
face than what was inside that shack. Between his
chattering teeth, Chum Lee sent up frantic appeals
to the gods of his ancestors to lift the dreaded curse
which had befallen the land in which he had sojourned
too long.

As he went out of the gate, the long-drawn savage
roar of hungry bulls followed him and, turning back
upon a sudden resolution, Chum Lee shoved the bars
along the sliding doors. He would perform a last
act of charity and win the favor of the gods. The
famished brutes within would come up presently against
the loosened door, and find themselves free from the
prison where they had been confined for days.

That day, bellowing and moaning their unceasing demands
for feed and water, the bulls crashed against
the doors, as the Chinaman had foreseen, and they
gave. The animals crossed a barrier of logs, and with
heads lifted, they sniffed along the corrals and found
the bars which the Chinaman had left down, and strayed
out into the lower pasture. The gate stood wide open
to the highway, and the vast country stretched beyond,
unspeakably desolate under its mantle of deep snow.
Out into the world, in search of that which had been
denied them in their luxurious and costly sheds, went
the famous Hereford bulls.

Pampered and petted, used to being fed almost by
hand, and knowing no range save the sweet home pastures,
how were they likely to fare in the wilderness?
Now the merciless cold of the implacable winter smote
them to the bone, and the unbroken expanse of frozen
snow rose four feet deep in mounds and hillocks on
all sides of them.

There were no nibblings. Streams and rivers were
frozen hard. The wretched cattle swept along the
road huddled together before a blinding wind out of
the hill country, forerunner of a coming Chinook, but
with its first blast intensifying the cold and lashing
the last ounce of strength out of the lost and famished
cattle.

They drifted blindly before the wind, driven against
fence lines and trapped in coulee and gulch. Great
white flakes began to fall like fairy birds drifting in
the dazzling sunlight; like millions of feathers they
fell upon the huddled herd, burying them under a
mighty mound.

The only survivor of all that noble herd was the
bull once known as "Prince Perfection Bar Q the IV,"
of whom the great specialist had predicted that he would
startle the purebred world. Facing the west wind like
a gladiator, the Prince turned from his fellows, and defiantly
trod his way through the storm to where the
outline of the hill country loomed up with its promise
of shelter and food. Sniffing along the road allowances,
pausing only to bellow his immense complaint,
the massive brute pressed on his way.




CHAPTER XXXII


There was a celebration at Bow Claire. Lanterns
hung from rafters and eaves to give the
place an air of festivity. Across the back of the big
lumber camp, where the fifty-five men who had pulled
through were now convalescent, bunting and bright
Indian blankets were hung.

Now that the last of the men had been pronounced
out of danger, the lumber-jacks, with the connivance
of the doctor and an Indian, had smuggled into the
camp the provisions for the intended festival.

When Nettie came from the foreman's house that
evening, to make her nightly rounds of her emergency
camp hospital, the surprise party awaiting her almost
frightened her. A dozen accordions all struck up at
the same moment; mouth organs joined in; Jim Crow,
the only darky in the camp, grinning from ear to
ear, was twanging a real banjo, and Mutt, a giant
Russian, with a voice like a great bell, led all hands
in a deafening cheer for Nettie, a cheer that, in spite
of their weakness, the men kept up for a long time.

Astonished and moved beyond speech, Nettie looked
at her "boys," and smiled her thanks, though the tears
ran down her cheeks. But the ceremonies were by no
means over with the cheering and singing. Thin and
pale, his eyes dark with a look of tragedy that wrung
the girl's heart, Cyril Stanley stepped forward, a bouquet
of flowers in his hands.

He alone in all the camp had been unable to find
the courage to speak to Nettie. Those flowers, ragged
from their journey on horseback, had cost the Bow
Claire Camp more than the bouquet of a prima donna;
and were intended to speak a message to the girl that
the men lacked eloquence to say. Cyril had begged for
the privilege of being the one to present the flowers.
He came slowly forward, daring to look Nettie steadily
in the face for the first time, and put out the hand
that held the flowers; but the words he had planned
to speak died on his lips. He could not even whisper
her name.

She took the flowers from him and looked deep into
his eyes. While the camp looked on in bewildered silence,
the two estranged lovers gazed at one another for a long
moment and when it had passed it had taken with it
all the doubt and misunderstanding that had clouded
Cyril Stanley's mind. Something within him seemed
to burst, breaking down all the dikes of hatred he had
built up in bitterness against her. He knew, as he looked
into Nettie Day's clear eyes, that he loved her still
beyond anything else on earth, and that he could have
sworn by the living God above them that she could
do, and had done, no wrong; that her heart was clean
and pure and unstained.

Suddenly a sharp sound broke upon the hush that
had fallen so strangely in the camp. The crisp metallic
ring of a horse's hoofs sounded outside, and slowly the
girl, her flowers still in her arms, turned as pale as
death.

His chin thrust out, his big knotted hands swinging
like a prize fighter's, half drunk with alcohol and mad
desire, Bull Langdon burst into the camp. His glance
swept that circle of feeble, motionless men, then turned
to transfix the unhappy girl, whose flowers now lay
where they had fallen to the floor. Before a word was
said the truth flashed like a miracle over Cyril Stanley's
mind. Now Nettie Day would never need to say
one word in explanation to her lover. A flood of memories
rushed over the boy, shaking him to his depths
as he realized the damnable crime that had been wrought
against the girl he loved, and which death alone could
now wipe out.

"So here y'are," cried the cattleman, towering above
the cowering Nettie. "You come along home with
me, gell. Your baby--and mine, gell, is at Bar Q. He's
needin' you more'n this bunch of bos."

An inarticulate cry broke from Cyril's throat as he
leaped fairly into the face of Bull Langdon. Staggered
by the unexpected onslaught, and then seeing who it
was that had attacked him, his lips drawn back like
a gorilla's, Bull Langdon, with a sweep of his arm,
felled the boy to the ground. He tried vainly to rise,
but, weakened by his recent long illness, he had hardly
struggled to his knees before the cattleman sent him
spinning to the floor again.

A low murmuring passed over the crowd of lumbermen,
a hoarse cursing protest, that grew in volume
and fury as the Bull laid his hand on Nettie Day. It
burst like a tidal wave when the frenzied girl broke
from his grasp and fled through the open door.

The Bull found himself surrounded by a mob of mad
men, cursing and weeping because of their weakness
and inability to pull down the man they longed to
kill, they leaped and struck at him. With his back
to the wall he struck out right and left with his mighty
fists, sending one man after another staggering to
the floor, meanwhile edging craftily nearer and nearer
to the door through which Nettie Day had fled.




CHAPTER XXXIII


It was a still, cold night. Nettie Day rushed blindly
on horseback through the pathless dead timber
lands. With amazing presence of mind she had
mounted the Bull's own mare, which he had left standing
outside the camp. On and on she urged the great
animal, heedless of snow-laden brush and boughs that
snapped back and lashed her as she rode.

The dense woods lay wrapped in a vast silence. Not
a twig stirred on the frost-bowed trees. No living
foot seemed to move within the depths of the forest.
All that she heard, if indeed she heard anything,
as she fled like the wind through the timber land,
was the crunch of her horse's hoofs on the frozen
snow. On and on, indifferent to the piercing cold;
intent on one purpose only, to reach Bar Q and get
her baby before the Bull could overtake her.

The mare was built on big, slim lines. Of thoroughbred
racing stock by her sire, she was the foal of a
Percheron mare, and therefore swift as well as strong.
She carried the girl throughout that night without
once stopping, all of the twenty miles to the Bar Q.

Dawn was breaking over the still sleeping land,
and a great shadowy arch spread like a rainbow across
the sky, the long-prayed-for symbol of Chinook weather.
Before the day was half gone a wind would blow like
a bugle call from the mountains, and, racing with the
sun, would send its warm breath over the land. But
Nettie Day was blind to the omen of spring. Cramped
and cold from her long ride, with a speechless terror
tearing at her heartstrings, she fell rather than dismounted
from her horse, and staggered toward the
house, at the door of which Angella Loring stood, with
empty arms.

Meanwhile another kind of drama had taken place
in the timber land. Bloody and battered from his
fight with the lumber-jacks and loggers, Bull Langdon
sought the trail. In those deep woods, so still and
silent, with the spell of the night upon them, in spite
of the deep silence, there was a feeling of live, wild
things hidden in bush and coolie, crouching and peering
through the snow-laden brush.

He knew the country well, and had almost as keen
a sense of smell as the cattle themselves. He had
boasted that he could "sniff his way" anywhere through
the foothill country, and that his long years of night
riding had given him a cat's eyes. Where the dense
forests broke here and there, the clearings were as
bright as day in the moonlight.

It was twelve miles to Morley, an Indian trading
post on the edge of the Stony Indian Reserve, and
the Bull calculated that by turning off the main trail
and following an old cattle path, he could cut the
distance down a third.

The white moon behind moving clouds lighted his
way one moment and plunged him in darkness the
next. The cattle trail went in a wavering line toward
a valley that ran along the Ghost River, where lay
the summer range of the foothill cattle.

If the woods were still and dark, the valley, flooded
with moonlight, looked like a great pool on whose
farther bank dark forms were vaguely moving. These
were the stray cattle that had escaped the fall round-up,
and found shelter from the inclement weather in
the seclusion of this deep valley, protected by the hills
on one side, and the rapidly flowing Ghost on the
other.

The first impulse of a cattleman upon spotting
stray cattle on the range is to ride close enough to
them to read the brand upon their ribs; no easy
matter at night, but the Bull was used to this. He
was halfway across the valley when a certain restless
stirring made him aware that he had been seen. Range
cattle will move blindly before a man on a horse, but
it is a reckless man who will risk himself near range
cattle afoot. The roar of one of the leaders sent the
cowman cautiously back into the shelter of the brush.
He was unprepared to meet a stampede, but he marked
the place to which the cattle had strayed, and made
a mental note to round them up in a few days.

He was now but four miles from Morley, still traveling
along the edges of the woods, when suddenly a low
moaning call, growing ever in volume and power, until
it swelled into a mighty roar that shook the bristling
branches of the trees, smote the still night, and reverberated
in the surrounding hills.

The cattleman stood stock-still, his head lifted and
his face strained upward, his ears alert to catch the
sound again. For he well knew that great far-reaching
bellow which had once swelled his breast with pride;
it was the furious challenge of the champion bull. Somewhere,
close at hand, but hidden in those dense woods,
Prince Perfection Bar Q the IV was at large.

The sound was not repeated and Bull Langdon came
at last out of the sheltering woods. A wide field that
flanked on one side the Banff Highway lay before him,
on the other side of which were the fenced lands of the
Indian Reserve.

As he moved through the thick woods, pausing every
now and then to listen for treading hoofs behind him
or for a breath of that low, menacing murmur that
preceded the terrible roar, the cattleman's overwrought
fancy had pictured the bull upon his trail, nor
was it premonition that held him, but the fearful certainty
that the savage animal was following close upon
his tracks.

Bull Langdon considered the open space of the field
and reckoned up his chances of making a swift dash
across to the road, and across the road to the line of
Indian fencing. A certain safety from his pursuer.
For an instant he hesitated, then with lowered head,
like one of his own blindly driven cattle, the cowman
sped across the field. Not, however, swiftly enough
for the Hereford bull that had trailed him.

On the edge of the timber land, Prince Perfection
Bar Q the IV stood in a proud and questioning attitude
with his stern eyes fixed upon the moving speck
before him. Slowly he marked his prey, then his head
dropped, and with a lumbering gait, yet incredibly
swift, he made straight for his quarry. The cowman,
his back to the oncoming bull, intent only on reaching
the shelter of the barbed wire fences on the south side
of the Banff Highway before it was too late, did not
dare look round, as like a missile released from a
colossal catapult the great bull shot across the field.
Sideways and still on the run, with his lowered head
swinging from side to side, he drove his horns clear
through the cowman's ribs. There was a horrible rending
sound, and suddenly Bull Langdon was tossed into
the air to fall to earth like a stone. Again and again
the savage bull gored and tossed him until he was rent
into pieces.

A master vengeance was in that act of justice, though
no torture of Bull Langdon's body could atone for the
torture he had inflicted upon Nettie Day's soul.




CHAPTER XXXIV.


"Hear me, lass," said Dr. McDermott, his hands
resting upon the bent shoulders of Angella
Loring. "In the old land, I was a stable lad and
you the grand young lady of the manor house; my
father was your father's groom, and all the McDermotts
before me served the Lorings; but here in Alberta
we're naught but mon and woman, and as mon to
woman, lass, I'm asking you to be my wife."

She answered without words, laying her hands in
his, but as he looked into her eyes, the doctor saw
all the shadows of the sad years fade away like ghosts
before the dawn, and love like the sunlight of the land
of their adoption had taken their place.

"It's a puir rough sort of man you're getting,"
said the doctor huskily, but she laid her hands upon
his lips and answered:

"Dr. McDermott, I'll be getting the salt of the
earth!"

Hat twisting in his hands, outside the barn Cyril
waited for Nettie. As she came out, a pail of milk in
either hand, he gently took them from her and set them
upon the ground. He had learned that speech by heart--the
speech he was going to say to Nettie, but now as
they looked into one another's eyes, no words were
needed. As instinctively as life itself, they moved to
each other. Nothing on earth now mattered save that
they were in each other's arms.



In the house, hand in hand, they faced their friends,
and immersed in their own joy noted not that the doctor's
arm was about Angela's shoulders.

"Nettie and I are going to get married in the summer,"
said Cyril simply.

"Why wait for the summer?" rumbled their doctor
friend. "Angel and I are going to Calgary tonight.
Come with us."

"'Twill take a month or two to rebuild the home
again," said Cyril wistfully.

"Why build again," said Angella, softly. "There's
this house for you, Cyril. It's our wedding gift to you
and Nettie. I'll be going--" She smiled and blushed
like a girl, but finished the words bravely--"to my husband's
house," she said.


THE END