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.