Part 12 (2/2)
It consisted of a trunk, with the lid turned back, and about half the contents removed. In this she had laid a little mattress, and on the mattress slept a beautiful boy, his face still ruddy from his wrestle with the prairie winds; his lips cherry red and slightly parted; his little arms thrown jauntily above his head. Jean leaned and touched the breathing lips with hers, and so did Marjorie, and a little later I saw tears on the cheeks of both. It was then I remembered that these girls had not seen a child since we left Regina in the spring, and the mothering instinct in them, pent up through all those lonely months, now burst forth in sweet silent tears. I began to realize that Gerald Alton was to be one of the important members of the community.
”Isn't he lovely--lovely?” Jean was murmuring as though unable to tear herself from his side. ”Mrs. Alton, I am sure you have placed us all under a debt of grat.i.tude. This community simply had to have a baby.”
After that, conversation came easier, and we found ourselves talking about farm life, and the problems of the homesteader. Mrs. Alton drank in every word with avidity; she was eager for information on the most casual affairs.
”I am so frightfully stupid!” she exclaimed. ”You see, I know nothing about farming, and I suppose it was a very wild notion that I should take a homestead. I did it on Gerald's account. I shall manage some way, and in three years--by the time he must start to school--the farm will be mine. Then I shall sell it or mortgage it to give him an education.”
Here was pluck for you. It was apparent from her language that she was a woman of some refinement; possibly a woman who had never known hard work or privation. A turn in the wheel of fortune, and she was without the money for the education of her boy. A free farm in Canada offered the solution, and the wilds of the West could not deter her.
”By that time we may have a school next door,” I suggested. ”People will flow in here in crowds, once they make a start. Have you plans for carrying on the work of the farm?”
”I have two men following with boards to build a house; just a very tiny house, in keeping with my purse. Then I hope to hire a neighbor to do some plowing, and I will plant some corn next spring. I shall raise chickens, and have a great garden--I know all about gardening,” she added, naively, with a sudden return of confidence. ”You should have seen my English roses!”
We had not the heart to tell her that there lay a great gulf between English roses and a Canadian cabbage patch, and she rattled on, evidently glad of some one to watch with sympathy the mirage castles which she was building on her horizon.
”For myself, I am quite penniless,” she confessed, thrusting her upturned palms towards us with a little impulsive gesture. ”Gerald is my resource, as well as my responsibility. He has a hundred pounds a year.
We shall invest it in this farm. I am sure we are going to prosper wonderfully.
”All the world seems to circle around Gerald,” she added, as though it were an after-thought.
She made Jean and Marjorie sit down on a box on which she had spread a steamer rug. Jack and I stood at the door of the tent, where the setting sun blazoned our wind-tanned faces a ruddy red.
”How healthy you men are!” she exclaimed, clasping her fingers in a nervous grip. ”If only Gerald will grow up like that!”
”We will come over when the men bring the lumber, and help them build your house,” Jack volunteered.
”The lumber--what lumber? Oh, the boards! Oh, how good of you!”
The regard in which she held us appeared to rise another degree.
”And are you carpenters, as well as farmers?” she asked. ”How wonderfully clever your men are, here. I had to go to a doctor in Regina--Gerald had a rash, or something--it was in the evening and I found him at his house, building a chicken-coop. Jolly wonderful, isn't it?”
As the shadow of the democrat filled the tent door we spoke of leaving.
”Not until you have had tea,” she insisted. ”We shall have tea with biscuits and jam. I bought an oil stove in Regina--a most wonderful machine. We shall have it ready in a moment.”
While she started her oil stove she asked, casually enough, ”And am I the only new-comer in all this big prairie which you have been having to yourselves?”
”No; you are the second,” I answered. ”We already have one neighbour, a countryman of yours, down on section Two. Spoof, he calls himself, although that is not his real name.”
She was working over the stove, with her back toward us, and perhaps she dallied longer than there was any need for, but I took no notice of the matter at the time.
”What a strange name,” she said, after a while. . . . ”Is he there now--I mean, have you seen him lately? A countryman of mine; you know, I must be interested in him,” she added, brightly, turning her face to us again.
Then we told of Spoof's unfortunate attempt to apply a Western corrective to his balky oxen. But she seemed to lose interest in the theme, and changed the conversation to some other topic. Suddenly she remembered her promise that we should see Gerald awake, and, disregarding our protests, she stirred him out of his sleep. His big, blue eyes blinked for a moment at the lamp which she had lighted; then slowly took in his visitors. When he had subjected us to a careful scrutiny he turned to his mother.
”Dem Injuns,” he remarked.
”Oh, no, dear, these are not Indians. I am afraid I have let him think that all the people in this country are Indians,” Mrs. Alton explained.
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