Part 6 (2/2)
”So you n that so, unless indeed you are in love,” and Mrs M'Kree nodded her head in delight at her own shrewdness
But Katherine only laughed as she asked: ”Pray, whom do you think I should be likely to fall in love with? There are so few eligible men in this part of the world”
”Hoas I to know but what you left your heart in Montreal last winter? At least there are h there,” Mrs M'Kree said Then she asked anxiously: ”My dear, what is the matter? You look quite ill”
Katherine had started to her feet with a look of profound amazement on her face, for at that moment the door of the next roo after hi blows
”Where did you get that thing?” she asked with a gasp, instantly recognizing the bucket as identical with the two filled with lard which had been stolen
Mrs M'Kree appeared slightly confused, and tried to hide her e
”Jamie, Jamie, ill you make such a fearful riot? Miss Radford will run away and never come back if you are not quiet”
”I don't care if she does,” replied the juvenile He had not yet reached the age when pretty girls beco filled hied aith renewed ardour
Katherine crossed the roo him up to the”See, here coe Run out and ask hi satisfaction Jarasp, he tore away to the door and was seen no more for some tily: ”Please tellyou have had it?”
”I'll tell you, of course, seeing that you make such a point of it, but I'm not specially proud of the business, I can assure you,” Mrs M'Kree said, with a touch of irritability very unusual with her ”Oily Dave was up here about a week ago, and he said that he had soe runners, or to ht the stuff fro in the bay last summer, and he offered to sell us a bucket at such a ridiculously low price that Astor bought one off-hand”
”What happened then?” de with ah of Oily Dave and his methods to be sure that Astor M'Kree had been rather badly duped
”The stuff was more than half sawdust, but it had been worked in so carefully that you could not tell that until you ca; then of course it gritted up directly But the worst of it was that Astor hadpitch, which of course is quite spoiled, and he was about the maddest man in Keewatin on the day that he found it out”
Katherine was laughing; she really could not help it But Mrs M'Kree, not understanding where the joke cahing matter to me, either then or now; for when one is married what affects one's husband affects one's self also, and that soreeable fashi+on”
”Please forgive !” cried Katherine ”But Oily Dave is such a slippery old rogue, and sometimes he overreaches even himself” Then she told Mrs M'Kree about the disappearance of the lard, and how she had recognized the bucket upon which Jaorously
”What will you do?” asked Mrs M'Kree
”I don't see e can do, except keep a sharper lookout in future There is not enough evidence to go and boldly accuse hi walked off with two buckets of lard for which he had not paid There may be a hundred buckets like that in the district, every one of which has contained grease of some description, from best dairy butter down to train oil h, in which the other now joined
”It is a good thing you can laugh about it; but I a if I had been in your case,” said Mrs M'Kree Then she cried out in protest: ”Must you go so soon, really? Why, you have been here no tis I wanted to say to you”
”Yes, weto Ochre Lake for fish Miles says there are heaps there to be had for the catching, and the dogs are getting short of food We have worked them very hard this winter, so they have needed more to eat, I suppose,” Katherine replied Then she went out to help her brother to bring the stores in, and Mrs M'Kree ca way off, so I ood six miles from here it must be, if you follow the river,” said Mrs M'Kree; then rab at the packet of toffee in Ja it all hi none for the others
”We shall not follow the river, but take the short cut through the woods; and we shall go fast too, for the dogs will travel light, you see,” Katherine said Then picking up the fish spears and the ice saw she glided on ahead, while Miles and the dogs went racing after her
At first, when they left the boatbuilder's house behind, it ilderness without a sign of life, but after they had gone two or three miles, footprints of various sizes appeared on the snow There were marks of wolf, of wolverine, of fox, with smaller prints which could only have been made by little creatures like the mink, ermine, and such tiny fry, that, clad in fur white like the snow, scurried hither and thither through the silent wastes hunting for food, yet finding in h the skill of the trapper At length the lake was reached In su in fish, and many acres in extent Noas a wide snowfield, except at one end, where for some unexplained reason it was open water still This was the part at which they arrived, and Katherine halted on the bank with an exclamation of surprise ”Why, we shan't need the saw at all; it is open water!”
”The ice at the edge is too thin to stand upon, and we mustn't take risks here, for Father says there is a whirlpool at this end, and it is the constant ,” Miles answered; and taking the saw fro a hole in the ice a few yards fro on the bank as if quite exhausted, but their ears were perked up, and their eyes were very wide open, for they quite understood as going on, and the prospect of fish freshly caught was very welco on the dried article When a hole had been cut in the ice, Katherine went to stand by it and spear the fish which iht Miles went to a little distance, where he cut another hole for himself, and for the next hour the torked as hard as they could at spearing fish, then throwing them on the snohere they quickly froze stiff The water seemed entirely alive with fish, which could only be accounted for by the fact that the main part of the lake, which was shalloas frozen solid, so that all the fish had been forced to the end where thewater did not freeze
[Illustration: Katherine and Miles spearing for fish]