Daughters of the Dominion
[Illustration: NELL NURSES THE STRANGER]
=D a u g h t e r s o f t h e=
=D o m i n i o n=
A Story of the Canadian Frontier
BY
=BESSIE MARCHANT=
AUTHOR OF “SISTERS OF SILVER CREEK,” “A HEROINE OF THE SEA,”
“HOPE’S TRYST” ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY WILLIAM RAINEY, R.I.
TORONTO
T H E M U S S O N B O O K C O M P A N Y
L I M I T E D
CANADA is a great mother; there is room in her heart
not merely for her own children, but for the needy of
every nation. They may all come to her and find a home,
if only they will work to earn it.
CONTENTS
I. THE LONE HOUSE AT BLUE BIRD RIDGE
II. NELL’S DILEMMA
III. THE OLD COAT
IV. WHAT THE NEW DAY BROUGHT
V. SUMMONED HOME
VI. A STRANGE WELCOME
VII. A NEW VOCATION
VIII. MOVED ON
IX. A FRIEND IN NEED
X. TO FILL THE BREACH
XI. THE RECOGNITION OF MRS. NICHOLS
XII. NELL LEARNS HER FAMILY HISTORY
XIII. ON THE LIST
XIV. PROMOTED
XV. THE NEW RESIDENT
XVI. CAMP’S GULCH
XVII. ONE-SIDED CONFIDENCES
XVIII. THE DEAD CHINAMAN
XIX. TO THE RESCUE
XX. FAIRLY CAUGHT
XXI. A PATIENT FOR MRS. NICHOLS
XXII. THE FATE OF THE PRISONER
XXIII. HONOURING THE HEROINE
XXIV. A SISTER BY ADOPTION
XXV. THE HUMOURS OF TRADING
XXVI. A WOMAN OF BUSINESS
XXVII. AN EARLY CUSTOMER
XXVIII. DOSS UMPEY’S EXCUSES
XXIX. THE ARRIVAL
XXX. AN ADVENTURE
XXXI. DIVIDING THE FAMILY
ILLUSTRATIONS
NELL NURSES THE STRANGER
“COME RIGHT IN, WILL YOU, PLEASE, MISS?”
“NELL FOUND THAT SHE WAS BY FAR THE MORE EXPERT ON SNOW-SHOES”
“FOR ME? BUT I DON’T EXPECT ANY PARCEL!”
THE RESCUE-PARTY DISCOVER NELL ON THE RAILWAY TRACK
“I HEARD A LITTLE ABOUT A FRIEND OF YOURS AWAY DOWN IN THE CITY,” HE SAID.
CHAPTER I
The Lone House at Blue Bird Ridge
“NELL, Nell, where are you? I want you to give an eye to the dog; the
creature has had a dreadful mauling,” shouted Doss Umpey, in petulant
tones. He had thrust his head in at the open door, and seemed quite
angry to find that there was no one moving about in the houseplace.
“I’m coming, granfer,” cried a voice, somewhere out of sight. Then there
was a shaking of the rickety ladder which stood in the far corner of the
dark little room, and a thin girl in very shabby clothes came slowly
into view.
No one would have called Nell, otherwise Eleanor Hamblyn, at this period
of her life, a pretty girl. Two good points, however, she possessed: one
a sweet, low voice, that excellent thing in woman; the other a pair of
beautiful luminous eyes, which made those who saw them forget the
defects of her face and figure.
“You never are on hand when you are wanted. What you find to do in that
old loft all the time just about passes my comprehension,” growled the
old man, whose temper was none of the sweetest.
“Well, I ain’t far off when I’m wanted, anyhow,” replied Nell,
good-humouredly. Then she asked in an anxious tone, “What’s the matter
with Pip?”
“Got mauled pretty badly; must have been having a turn with a wolf, I
should say, only it’s early for wolves to be getting troublesome. So
p’r’aps he’s been fighting a wild dog.”
“There ain’t no wild dogs round here,” objected Nell, with a shake of
her head.
“I’m not so sure of that. Last time I was over to Button End, Job Lipton
said he’d seen a buff-coloured beast hunting rabbits on the ridges, and
that there’d been a talk of sheep being killed out Lewisville way,” the
old man said, as he turned from the door. Nell followed him to inspect
the dog, which lay helpless on the edge of the forest.
The house, a wooden one, old and weather-beaten, was perched on a high
woody ridge in the great forests stretching along the American side of
the Canadian frontier. A mighty Valparaiso oak grew on one side of the
house, giving shade in summer and shelter in winter, but the forest had
been pushed back on either side, to make room for a small orchard of
wind-twisted apple-trees.
It was a lovely day in late September, but the fall of the summer could
be seen in the changing hues of the maples, which flamed into crimson
and gold, lighting up the sombre green of the other trees.
Pip was a big deerhound, fierce of aspect, and the creature lay at the
edge of the clearing, where it had fallen, exhausted in its effort to
get home after the fray, in which it had plainly come off second best.
It was covered with blood and wounds, one ear being torn in a ghastly
fashion.
“Oh, you poor dear thing! Good old Pip, you have been having a rough
time!” exclaimed Nell, dropping on her knees beside the dog, and
touching it gently here and there.
The creature wagged its tail feebly, as if it understood and appreciated
her sympathy; then uttered a whining cry.
“Thirsty, are you? I’ll get you drink, and rig up a little curtain to
keep the flies from bothering,” she said in the soothing tone one would
use towards a child that had been injured.
“Couldn’t you help me to carry Pip indoors, granfer? I could look after
it so much better there,” she said, when she had brought the water,
which the creature feebly lapped.
“The dog will be cooler out here, and we can bring it in at nightfall.
I’ve got some work to do down beyond now, and can’t be bothered.”
It was characteristic of Doss Umpey that he had always work to do down
beyond whenever Nell wanted any assistance from him, so she made up her
mind that when he was safely out of the way she would manage somehow to
get poor Pip into more comfortable quarters.
Despite the work he had spoken of, the old man seemed in no hurry to go,
but stood leaning at ease against the bole of a great redwood tree,
talking in the dreamy fashion which always seemed to suit him much
better than hard work.
He was not a really old man, being only about sixty-five, strong and
hearty, but with a constitutional aversion to sustained effort of any
sort.
“There’s no mistake but you are right-down handy at tending critters
that are ill. A first-class nurse you’d make, Nell, if only you’d got
the chance,” he said, watching her active ministrations to the dog with
lazy admiration.
“Why don’t you give me the chance, then?” she retorted quickly. “I’d
love to be a nurse, or to be anything that would help me to get on. Just
look at me, granfer. I’m seventeen to-day, and I’m just good for
nothing. I can’t even keep house properly, because I ain’t got the
things to do it with.”
“I’m a poor man, or maybe I’d have done a better part by you; though, as
folks are always telling me, it isn’t every lone man like me that would
have been bothered with bringing up a child as didn’t really belong to
him,” Doss Umpey said, puffing out his chest with an air of
satisfaction. He always prided himself a great deal on this, the one
charitable act of his life, but it is open to doubt whether Nell would
not have been better off if she had been left to the tender mercies of
some orphan asylum when her father died, than she was in the care of a
grandfather who troubled himself so little about her interests.
“If only I’d crossed the border and settled in Canada when I was a young
man, it would have been a deal better for me all round,” he said,
leaning his head back against the redwood and gazing pensively up into
the sky.
“Why didn’t you?” demanded Nell, as she gently bathed Pip’s torn ear in
cool water.
“Circumstances were against me. Most things have been against me
somehow,” he said, with a reflective sigh.
“Look here, granfer, couldn’t we go now?” she asked eagerly. “We
couldn’t be poorer than we are here, and if we lived where there were
more people, I could get work to do at helping, that would bring in
money.”
“We’ll see about it, girl, in a few weeks, maybe, but it would be an
undertaking, I can tell you, to go such a long way.”
“How far is it to the frontier, granfer?” asked Nell, who as ever was
athirst for information.
“Oh, a good few miles. Why, you can walk for thirty miles on this trail,
without coming to anything bigger than a woodcutter’s hut, and when
you’ve done the thirty miles you are still a goodish distance from the
border. But if anything ever happens to me, you’d best make tracks over
the border as fast as you can go.”
“Why?” she asked, throwing back her head to get a better look at him,
then blinking like an owl, because the sun came into her eyes.
“For ever so many reasons. Canada is a land of promise for young people.
Then, English law, by which, of course, I mean Canadian law, is kinder
to lone women and girls than American. But I must be stirring, or that
bit o’ work down beyond won’t get done by sundown.” And the old man
prepared to shuffle off at a slow, comfortable crawl, which was his
usual rate of travel.
But there was a request Nell had to prefer before he went, and she rose
up hurriedly to intercept his going.
“Granfer, I’m seventeen to-day; mayn’t I have the box of mother’s things
that father left for you to take care of? He said I was to have them
when I was seventeen.”
“So he did, only I’d forgotten all about it, and, now I come to think of
it, I lost the key a good few years back, so you’ll just have to wait
till I come home again, then I’ll get out my tools and prise the lid
open.”
Doss Umpey quickened his pace then, as if anxious not to be recalled,
and was soon out of sight, hidden from view by the trees.
Nell heaved an impatient sigh, but busied herself with the dog; then,
when she had made the poor creature as comfortable as she could, she
went back to her secret avocations in the loft.
This loft was her refuge, the one place where she was secure from
interruption. The roof was open to the shingles, so above, below, and at
the sides it was all bare brown wood, without any attempt at adornment
of any kind. Window proper there was none, but a hinged shutter in the
western gable let in sunshine and fresh air, and, weather permitting,
this stood open night and day.
There were no small prettinesses such as may be found in many a chamber
belonging to girls who are poor. But, all the same, it did not lack
individuality. It was scrupulously clean and well kept, while on a
packing-case, standing near the open shutter, were arranged a small pile
of books, a bigger heap of newspapers, a bottle of ink, a pen, and a few
stumps of pencils.
Here every day Nell did her best to carry on her education, reading
everything she could get hold of, and writing extracts from her scanty
library on the margins of the newspapers, because she had no
writing-paper or exercise books.
She had been hard at work here when her grandfather called her down to
attend to the dog, and she went back to her occupation when he had gone
away, and she had left Pip as comfortable as circumstances permitted.
But now her attention wandered; the talk about Canada had excited her,
while the disappointment about the box was depressing.
Presently she pushed her work aside, and went down the ladder to the
lower room. The box containing the things which had belonged to her dead
mother stood there. It was only a small box, but strongly made and
clamped with iron. Nell had not seen inside it since her father died,
but she knew what it contained. There were frocks and coats belonging to
her mother, a gold watch and chain, a gold bracelet, and some brooches.
The jewelry was of no great value from a monetary point of view, but it
was precious beyond price to the girl, whose memory of her mother grew
every day more faint and indistinct.
“Just to think that granfer should lose the key, when I wanted it so
badly!” she murmured to herself, as she leaned over the box, touching it
with caressing fingers.
At that moment the sound of a deep-drawn sigh caught her ear, and
lifting her head she saw a strange man standing on the threshold and
clinging to the door-frame.