LAURA MAKES A DRESS
The frost had grown keener as darkness crept over the forest, and the
towering pines about the clearing rose in great black spires into the
nipping air, but it was almost unpleasantly hot in the little general
room of Waynefleet's ranch. Waynefleet, who was fond of physical
comfort, had gorged the snapping stove, and the smell of hot iron
filled the log-walled room. There was also a dryness in its atmosphere
which would probably have had an unpleasant effect upon anyone not
used to it. The rancher, however, did not appear to feel it. He lay
drowsily in a big hide chair, and his old velvet jacket and evening
shoes were strangely out of harmony with his surroundings. Waynefleet
made it a rule to dress for the six o'clock meal, which he persisted
in calling dinner.
He had disposed of a quantity of potatoes and apples at the settlement
of late, and had now a really excellent cigar in his hand, while a
little cup of the Mocha coffee, brought from Victoria for his especial
use, stood on the table beside him. Waynefleet had cultivated tastes,
and invariably gratified them, when it was possible, while it had not
occurred to him that there was anything significant in the fact that
his daughter confined herself to the acrid green tea provided by the
settlement store. He never did notice a point of that kind, and, if
anyone had ventured to call his attention to it, he would probably
have been indignant as well as astonished. As a rule, however, nobody
endeavours to impress unpleasant facts upon men of Waynefleet's
character. In their case it is clearly not worth while.
"Do you intend to go on with that dressmaking much longer?" he asked
petulantly. "The click of your scissors has an irritating effect on
me, and, as you may have noticed, I cannot spread my paper on the
table. It cramps one's arms to hold it up."
Laura swept part of the litter of fabric off the table, and it was
only natural that she did it a trifle abruptly. She had been busy with
rough tasks, from most of which her father might have relieved her had
he possessed a less fastidious temperament, until supper, and there
were reasons why she desired an hour or two to herself.
"I will not be longer than I can help," she said.
Waynefleet lifted his eyebrows sardonically as he glanced at the
scattered strips of fabric. "This," he said, "is evidently in
preparation for that ridiculous pulp-mill ball. In view of the
primitive manners of the people we shall be compelled to mix with, I
really think I am exercising a good deal of self-denial in consenting
to go at all. Why you should wish to do so is, I confess, altogether
beyond me."
"I understood that you considered it advisable to keep on good terms
with the manager," said Laura, with a trace of impatience. "He has
bought a good deal of produce from you to feed his workmen with."
Her father made a gesture of resignation. "One has certainly to put up
with a good deal that is unpleasant in this barbarous land--in fact,
almost everything in it jars upon one," he complained. "You, however,
I have sometimes wondered to notice, appear almost content here."
Laura looked up with a smile, but said nothing. She, at least, had the
sense and the courage to make the most of what could not be changed.
It was a relief to her when, a minute or two later, the hired man
opened the door.
"If you've got the embrocation, I guess I'll give that ox's leg a
rub," he said.
Waynefleet rose and turned to the girl. "I'll put on my rubber
overshoes," he announced. "As I mentioned that I might have to go out,
it's a pity you didn't think of laying out my coat to warm."
Laura brought the overshoes, and he permitted her to fasten them for
him and to hold his coat while he put it on, after which he went out
grumbling, and she sat down again to her sewing with a strained
expression in her eyes, for there were times when her father tried her
patience severely. She sighed as she contemplated the partly rigged-up
dress stretched out on the table, for she could not help remembering
how she had last worn it at a brilliant English function. Then she had
been flattered and courted, and now she was merely an unpaid toiler on
the lonely ranch. Money was, as a rule, signally scarce there, but
even when there were a few dollars in Waynefleet's possession, it
seldom occurred to him to offer any of them to his daughter. It is
also certain that nobody could have convinced him that it was only
through her efforts he was able to keep the ranch going at all. She
never suggested anything of the kind to him, but she felt now and then
that her burden was almost beyond her strength.
She quietly went on with her sewing. There was to be a dance at the
new pulp-mill, which had just been roofed, and, after all, she was
young, and could take a certain pleasure in the infrequent festivities
of her adopted country. Besides, the forest ranchers dance well, and
there were men among them who had once followed other occupations;
while she knew that Nasmyth would be there--in fact, having at length
raised his dam to the desired level, he would be to a certain extent
an honoured guest. She was not exactly sure how she regarded him,
though it was not altogether as a comrade, and she felt there was, in
one sense, some justice in his admission that he belonged to her. She
had, in all probability, saved his life, and--what was, perhaps, as
much--had roused him from supine acquiescence, and inspired him with a
sustaining purpose. After the day when she had saved him from abject
despair over his ruined dam, he had acquitted himself valiantly, and
she had a quiet pride in him. Moreover, she was aware of a natural
desire to appear to advantage at the approaching dance.
There was, however, difficulty to be grappled with. The dress was old,
and when remade in a later style would be unfortunately plain. The few
pairs of gloves she had brought from England were stained and spotted
with damp, and her eyes grew wistful as she turned over the stock list
of a Victoria dry goods store. The thing would be so easy, if she had
only a little more money, but she sighed as she glanced into her
purse. Then she took up the gloves and a strip of trimming, and looked
at them with a little frown, but while she did so there were footsteps
outside, and the door was opened. A man, whom she recognized as a
hired hand from a ranch in the neighbourhood, stood in the entrance
with a packet in his hand.
"I won't come in," he said. "I met Nasmyth down at the settlement.
He'd just come back from Victoria, and he asked me to bring this
along."
He went away after he had handed her the packet, and a gleam of
pleasure crept into Laura's eyes when she opened it. There was first
of all a box of gloves of various colours, and then inside another
packet a wonderful piece of lace. The artistic delicacy of the lace
appealed to her, for though she possessed very few dainty things she
was fond of them, and she almost fancied that she had not seen
anything of the kind more beautiful in England.
As she unfolded it a strip of paper fell out, and the warm blood
swept into her face as she read the message on it.
"Considering everything, I really don't think you could regard it as a
liberty," it ran. "You have given me a good deal more than this."
Then for just a moment her eyes grew hazy. In proportion to the man's
means, it was a costly gift, and, except for him, nobody had shown her
much consideration since she had left England. She was a trifle
perplexed, for she did not think there was lace of that kind on sale
often in Victoria, and, in regard to the gloves, it was not evident
how he had known her size. Then she remembered that one of the cotton
ones she sometimes wore had disappeared some little time before, and
once more the flush crept into her cheeks. That almost decided her not
to wear his lace, but she felt that to refrain from doing so would
raise the question as to how they stood with regard to one another,
which was one she did not desire to think out closely then; and, after
all, the lace was exactly what she wanted to complete the dress. She
rolled it together, and put it and the gloves away, but she treasured
the little note.
It was a week later when her father drove her to the pulp-mill in a
jolting waggon, and arrived there a little earlier than he had
expected. A dance usually begins with a bountiful supper in that
country, but Waynefleet, who was, as a rule, willing to borrow
implements or teams from his Bush neighbours, would seldom eat with
them when he could help it. He was accordingly not quite pleased to
find the supper had not yet been cleared away, but Laura, who
understood what he was feeling, contrived to lead him into a vacant
place at one of the tables. Then she sat down, and looked about her.
The great room was hung with flags and cedar boughs, and the benches
down the long uncovered tables were crowded. The men's attire was
motley--broadcloth and duck; white shirts, starched or limp, and blue
ones; shoes with the creeper-spikes filed down, and long boots to the
knees. There were women present also, and they wore anything from
light print, put together for the occasion, to treasured garments made
in Montreal or Toronto perhaps a dozen years before, but for all that
the assembly was good to look upon. There was steadfast courage in the
bronzed faces, and most of those who sat about the long tables had
kindly eyes. The stamp of a clean life of effort was upon them, and
there was a certain lithe gracefulness in the unconscious poses of the
straight-limbed men. There was no sign of limp slovenliness about
them. Even in their relaxation they were intent and alert, and, as she
watched them, Laura realized something of their restless activity and
daring optimism. They believe in anything that is good enough in that
country, and are in consequence cheerfully willing to attempt
anything, even if to other men it would appear altogether visionary
and impossible, and simple faith goes a long way when supplemented by
patient labour. Laura suddenly became conscious that the manager of
the pulp-mill, a little wiry man, in white shirt and store clothes,
was speaking at the head of the table.
"In one way, it's not a very big thing we have done, boys," he said;
and Laura was quick to notice the significance of the fact, which was
also characteristic of the country, that he counted himself as one of
them. "We've chopped a hole in the primeval forest, held back the
river, and set up our mill. That's about all on the face of it, but
there's rather more behind. It's another round with Nature, and we've
got her down again. It's a thing you have to do west of the Rockies,
or she'll crush the life out of you. There are folks in the Eastern
cities who call her beneficent; but they don't quite understand what
was laid on man in Eden long ago. Here he's up against flood and frost
and snow. Well, I guess we've done about all we can, and now that
I've paid my respects to the chopper and carpenter-gang, there's
another man I want to mention. He took hold of the contract to put us
up our dam, and kept hold through the blamedest kind of luck. There's
hard grit in him and the boys he led, and the river couldn't wash it
out of them. Well, when the big turbines are humming and the mill's
grinding out money for all of you, I guess you're going to remember
the boys who built the dam."
There was a shout which shook the wooden building, and Laura sat very
still when Nasmyth stood up. There was no doubt that he was a
favourite with everybody there, and she knew that she had nerved him
to the fight. He did not appear altogether at ease, and she waited
with a curious expectancy for what he had to say. It was very little,
but she appreciated the tact which made him use the speech his
audience was accustomed to.
"I had a good crowd," he said. "With the boys I had behind me I
couldn't back down." Then his voice shook a little. "Still, I was
mighty near it once or twice. It was the boys' determination to hold
on--and another thing--that put new grit in me."
Without being conscious of what he was doing, he swept his glance down
the long table until it rested on Laura Waynefleet's face. She felt
the blood creep into her cheeks, for she knew what he meant, but she
looked at him steadily, and her eyes were shining. Then he spread his
hands out.
"I felt I daren't shame boys of that kind," he said, and hastily sat
down.
His observations were certainly somewhat crude, but the little quiver
in his voice got hold of those who heard him, and once more the big
building rang with cheering. As the sound of hearty acclamation died
away there was a great clatter of thrust-back benches through which
the tuning of a fiddle broke. Then out of the tentative twang of
strings rose, clear and silvery, the lament of Flora Macdonald,
thrilling with melancholy, and there were men and women there whose
hearts went back to the other wild and misty land of rock and pine and
frothing river which they had left far away across the sea. It may be
that the musician desired a contrast, or that he was merely feeling
for command of the instrument, for the plaintive melody that ran from
shift to shift into a thin elfin wailing far up the sobbing strings
broke off suddenly, and was followed by the crisp jar of crashing
chords. Then "The Flowers of Edinburgh" rang out with Caledonian verve
in it and a mad seductive swing, and the guests streamed out to the
middle of the floor. That they had just eaten an excellent supper was
a matter of no account with them.
Nasmyth, in the meanwhile, elbowed his way through the crowd of
dancers until he stood at Laura's side, and as he looked at her, there
was a trace of embarrassment in his manner. She wore his lace, but
until that moment her attire had never suggested the station to which
she had been born. Now she seemed to have stepped, fresh and
immaculate, untouched by toil, out of the world to which he had once
belonged. She was, for that night at least, no longer an impoverished
rancher's daughter, but a lady of station. With a twinkle in his eyes,
he made her a little formal inclination, and she, knowing what he was
thinking, answered with an old-world curtsey, after which a grinning
ox-teamster of habitant extraction turned and clapped Nasmyth's
shoulder approvingly.
"V'la la belle chose!" he said. "Mamselle Laura is altogether
ravissante. Me, I dance with no one else if she look at me like dat."
Then Nasmyth and Laura laughed, and glided into the dance, though, in
the case of most of their companions, "plunged" would have been the
better word for it. English reserve is not esteemed in that land, and
the axemen danced with the mingled verve of grey Caledonia and
light-hearted France, while a little man with fiery hair from the
misty Western Isles shrieked encouragement at them, and maddened them
with his fiddle. Even Nasmyth and Laura gave themselves up to the
thrill of it, but as they swung together through the clashing of the
measure, which some of their companions did not know very well,
confused recollections swept through their minds, and they recalled
dances in far different surroundings. Now and then they even fell back
into old tricks of speech, and then, remembering, broke off with a
ringing laughter. They were young still, and the buoyancy of the
country they had adopted was in both of them.
The dance ended too soon, and, when the music broke off with a crash
of clanging chords, Nasmyth led his partner out of the press into a
little log-walled room where the half-built dynamos stood. It was
lighted, but a sharp cool air and the fret of the river came in
through a black opening in one wall. Laura sat upon a large deal case,
and Nasmyth, looking down upon her, leaned against a dynamo. He smiled
as he recognized that she grasped the significance of the throbbing
roar of water.
"It was very pleasant while it lasted, but--and it's a pity--the music
has stopped," he said. "What we are now listening to is the turmoil of
a Canadian river."
Laura laughed, though there was a wistfulness in her eyes. "Oh, I
understand, but couldn't you have let me forget it just for to-night?"
she said. "I suppose that privilege was permitted to Cinderella."
The man felt curiously sorry for her as he remembered how hard her
life was at the lonely ranch, but he knew she would not be pleased if
he expressed his thoughts.
"Well," he observed reflectively, "a thing often looks most
attractive when it's forbidden you, or a long way off, and, you see,
there are always compensations. In fact, I'm beginning to come across
quite a few of them."
He broke off for a moment, and Laura, who noticed that he looked at
her, fancied she understood in what direction his thoughts were
drifting; but he went on again with a laugh.
"After all," he said, "there are exiles who realize that they are in
various ways better off than in all probability they would have been
had they stayed in the land they were driven out of."
"Ah," answered Laura, "would you go back if you were given the
opportunity?"
"No," Nasmyth asserted slowly, "I don't think I should do that--now."
Again she understood him, the more clearly because she saw by the
slight wrinkling of his forehead, during the significant pause, that
he had grappled with the question. She did not think he was altogether
in love with her, but she knew, at least, that he did not wish to go
away while she was left behind in Canada. It seemed desirable to
change the subject, and she touched the lace.
"I have to thank you for this," she said. "It has given me pleasure."
Then--and the words were wholly unpremeditated--she added: "I wanted
to look well--just for once--to-night."
She was sorry, a moment later, when she saw the quick change in the
man's expression, for she remembered that they had always seemed to
understand what the other meant. It was clear that the qualification
just for once had not misled him, but, after all, it seemed to her
that he must presently realize that the admission was not one a
reticent woman really in love with him would have made.
"Oh," he said, "you are always beautiful." Then his manner became
deprecatory. "I didn't think you'd mind. In one way what I owe you
makes me a privileged person. I felt that I could venture----"
This, too, was clear to her, and though she considered his attitude
the correct one, it jarred a little upon her. She was content that
they should be merely comrades, or, at least, that was what she had
endeavoured to convince herself, but, after all, there was no reason
why he should emphasize the fact.
"Yes," she replied quickly, "I think I understand." Then once more she
changed the subject. "I want to compliment you on building the dam."
Nasmyth laughed, but there was a light in his eyes. "I should never
have built it, if it hadn't been for you. Still"--and he made her a
reverent bow--"I owe you a good deal more than that."
Laura made no response to this. She had thrilled at his achievement,
when she had heard the manager's speech, and it became still plainer
that there was a certain hazard in dwelling upon his success. She
could also be practical.
"In one way," she said, "I suppose the result was not quite so
satisfactory?"
"It certainly wasn't. Of course, the work is not quite completed yet,
but after settling up everything, the interim payment left me with
about fifteen dollars in hand."
Laura was not astonished at this, but she was more than a little
perplexed, for she fancied that the lace she was wearing must have
cost a good deal more than fifteen dollars. Still, she had no wish to
make it evident that he had been extravagant; and, while she
considered the matter, a man appeared in the doorway.
"I guess you two have got to come right out," he said. "What d'you
figure you were asked here for?"
Nasmyth held his arm out, but when Laura would have laid her hand
upon it, the man broke in with a grin.
"No, sir," he said severely, "Miss Waynefleet's going right round. Now
you're coming along with me, and we'll show them how to waltz."
Laura smiled good-humouredly, and he swept her into the dance, while
Nasmyth was seized upon by a girl, who drove him through it much as
she did her brother's steers in the Bush.
"A bump or two don't count for much. What you want to do is to hump
yourself and make things hum," said Nasmyth's partner, when another
couple jostled them.
Nasmyth expressed his concurrence in a gasp, and contrived to save her
from another crash, but when the dance was over, he felt limp, and was
conscious that his partner was by no means satisfied with him.
"I'm sorry," he said. "Still, I really think I did what I could."
The girl regarded him half compassionately. "Well," she said, "it
wasn't very much, but I guess you played yourself out building that
blamed dam."