some time after leaving jepson’s curtis was joined by two police troopers, despatched by the sergeant who had telegraphed to him. he handed over his prisoner and the wagon to them, though he asked permission to keep the wad of bills. then stanton unhitched the jaded horses from the back of the vehicle, and while the others drove back to the west he and curtis rode on to the post. reaching it, half frozen, in the morning, they filled up the stove and went to sleep until supper time. when the meal was over they sat down to smoke and talk.
stanton felt lazily good-humored. a sound sleep had refreshed him, and though his limbs still ached, he was enjoying the pleasant, physical reaction which usually succeeds fatigue and exposure to the arctic frost. what was better, he had assisted in the successful completion of an arduous piece of work. curtis lay back in a chair opposite him, pipe in mouth, his expression suggesting quiet satisfaction.
“toes feeling pretty good?” he inquired by and by.
“i’m glad to say they are, though i thought i was in for trouble,” stanton said with a deprecatory smile. “i allow that frost-bite’s a thing i’m easy scared about, after the patrol i made with stafford through the northern bush last winter. got his foot wet with mushy snow crossing a rapid where the ice was working, and it froze bad; had to pack him the last two hundred miles on the 262 sled, with the dogs getting used up, and the grub running out. they paid him off at regina and sent him home; but stafford will never put on an ordinary boot again.”
“a frozen foot’s bad enough, if you have to walk until it galls,” curtis admitted. “a hand’s easier looked after, though i’ve three fingers i’m never quite sure of. that’s one reason it took so much shooting before i plugged glover’s horse.”
“you were pretty cute about his jacket,” stanton remarked.
“that was easy enough. the thing was too big for him and newer than his trousers. soon as i noticed it, i knew i’d dropped on to something worth following up.”
“i can’t see what you made of it, and you haven’t told me yet.”
“i was too dog-goned cold and tired to talk; wanted to make the post and get to sleep. however, though i gave crane’s boys no hint, i’ll show you what i’ve been figuring on. consider yourself a jury and tell me how it strikes you. you have as much intelligence as the general run of them.”
“if i hadn’t any more than the kind of jurymen we’re usually up against, i’d quit the service,” stanton declared.
the corporal’s eyes twinkled.
“if you’ll learn to think and not hustle, you’ll make a useful man some day. anyhow, the first thing i caught on to was that glover had taken off his jacket because there was something in it he didn’t want us to find. next, that it was money or valuables, because he could have put any small thing into the stove or hid it in the snow before he lit out. now, glover knew it was kind of 263 dangerous to leave his jacket with jepson, who might find the bills, and as he couldn’t tell you were in the ravine he must have thought he had a good chance of getting clear away; but, for all that, he wouldn’t risk taking the wad along. guess there’s only one explanation—he’d a reason for being mighty afraid of those bills falling into our hands. that was plain enough when i asked him about his jacket.”
“yes,” stanton said thoughtfully; “i guess you have got it right. but what was his reason? he knows crane can have him sent up for horse-stealing.”
curtis, opening a drawer, took out a slip of paper with some numbers on it, and then laid the wad of bills on the table.
“twenty dollars each, merchants’ bank, and quite clean,” he said.
“it was a five-dollar bill on the same bank we found at the muskeg!” cried stanton, starting.
“it was.” curtis took up the list. “now here are the numbers of the twenty-dollar bills morant at sebastian got from the bank a day or two before he made the deal with jernyngham; it was with those bills he paid him the night he disappeared.” he paused and added significantly, “i guess we have got some of them here.”
this proved to be correct when they had compared them with the list. then curtis leaned back in his chair and filled his pipe.
“it’s a mighty curious case,” he remarked.
“sure,” replied stanton. “you get no farther with it. you have points against three different men, and it’s pretty clear that they haven’t been working together. they can’t all have killed the man.”
“that’s true. well, i’ve made a report for regina, 264 and they’ll keep glover safe until we want him. i can’t tell what our chiefs will do; but as glover’s not likely to tell them anything, i guess they’ll hold this matter over until we find out more.” he locked up the money. “now we’ll quit talking about it. i want to give my mind a rest.”
curtis had few of the qualities needed for the making of a great detective; he was merely a painstaking, determined man, with a capacity for earnest work, which is perhaps more useful than genius in the ranks of the northwest police. he could tirelessly follow the dog-sleds, sometimes on the scantiest rations, for hundreds of miles over the snow, sleeping in the open in the arctic frost. he had made long forced marches to succor improvident settlers starving far out in the wilds; in the fierce heat of summer he made his patrols, watching the progress of the grass-fires, sternly exacting from the ranchers the plowing of the needed guards; and cattle-thieves prudently avoided the district that he ruled with firm benevolence. the man was a worthy type of his people, the new nation that is rising in the west: forceful, steadfast, direct, and, as a rule, devoid of mental subtleties. he admitted that the jernyngham mystery, every clue to which broke off as he began to follow it, was harassing him.
while he spent the evening, lounging in well-earned leisure beside the stove, mrs. colston was talking seriously to her sister in a room of the leslie homestead. owing to the number of its inmates, she had found it difficult to get a word with the girl alone, and now that an opportunity had come, she felt that she must make the most of it.
“muriel,” she said, “do you think it’s judicious to 265 speak so strongly in prescott’s favor as you have done of late? you were rude to gertrude last night.”
the girl colored. she had, as a matter of fact, lost her temper, which was generally quick.
“i hate injustice!” she broke out. “gertrude and her father make such an unfair use of everything they can find against him, and i think gertrude’s the worse of the two.” she looked hard at her sister. “she shows a rancor against the man which even the disappearance of her brother doesn’t account for.”
the same idea had occurred to mrs. colston, but it was a side issue and she was not to be drawn away from the point.
“you stick to the word disappearance,” she said.
“yes,” muriel answered steadily. “cyril jernyngham isn’t dead!”
“you have only prescott’s word for that.”
muriel made no answer for a few moments; then she looked up with a resolute expression.
“i’m satisfied with it!”
her sister understood this as a challenge. she had indulged in hints and indirect warnings, and they had been disregarded. the situation now needed more drastic treatment.
“that,” she said, “is a significant admission; i can’t let it pass. your prejudice in favor of the man has, of course, been noticeable; you have even let him see it. don’t you realize what damaging conclusions one might draw from it?”
“damaging?” muriel’s eyes were fixed on her sister, though her face was hot. “as you have been thinking of all this for some time, perhaps you had better explain and get it over.” 266
mrs. colston leaned forward with a severe expression.
“i feel that some candor is necessary. you have taken the man’s side openly; you have sympathized with him; i might even say that you have led him on.”
muriel’s wayward temperament drove her to the verge of an outbreak, but with an effort at self-control, she sat still, and her sister resumed:
“besides his lying under suspicion, the man is a mere working farmer, imperfectly educated, forced to live in a most primitive manner, thinking of nothing but his crops and horses.”
“he is not imperfectly educated! as a matter of fact, he knows more about most things than we do; but that’s not important. mind, i’m admitting nothing of all that you suggest, but you might have said that i’m a penniless girl, living on your husband’s charity. i must confess that he gives it very willingly.”
“that is precisely why i’m anxious about your future.” mrs. colston’s voice softened to a tone of genuine solicitude. “of course, we are glad to have you—harry has always been fond of you—but, for your sake, i could wish you a completer life in a home of your own. but so much depends on the choice you make.”
“yes; a very great deal depends on that. i’m expected, of course, to make a brilliant match!”
“not necessarily brilliant, but there are things we have always enjoyed which must be looked for—a good name, position, the right to meet people brought up as we have been, on an equal footing.”
muriel broke in upon her with a strained laugh.
“once, for a little while, it looked as if we should have to do without them, and somehow i wasn’t very much 267 alarmed. but your list’s rather short and incomplete. there are one or two quite as important things you might have added to it; though perhaps i’m exacting.”
there was silence for a few moments, and a faint flicker of color crept into mrs. colston’s face while the girl mused. her sister had got all she asked for, but muriel suspected that she was not content; now and then, indeed, she had seen a hint of weariness in her expression. harry colston made a model husband in some respects, but he had his limitations. his virtues were commonplace and sometimes tedious; his intelligence was less than his wife’s. muriel was fond of him, but his unwavering good-nature and placidity irritated her. she was inclined to be sorry for her sister in some ways.
“muriel,” mrs. colston resumed gently, “your happiness means a good deal to me. a mistake might cost you dear, and, after all, one cannot have everything.”
“that is obviously true. i suppose it’s a question of what one values most, or perhaps what most strongly appeals to one’s fancy. it would be difficult to fix an accurate standard for judging suitors by, wouldn’t it?” then her tone grew scornful. “besides, as those who are eligible aren’t numerous, a girl’s expected to wait with an encouraging smile and thankfully take what comes.”
mrs. colston looked at her reproachfully.
“you’re hardly just, my dear; i only urge you to be prudent now.”
“prudence is such a cold-blooded thing! i’m afraid i never had it. after all, what seems wise to me might appear to be folly to you. i think if ever what looks like a chance of happiness is offered me, i shall take all risks and clutch at it.” 268
she picked up a book, as if to intimate that she had no more to say, and mrs. colston wondered whether her worst fears were justified or whether muriel had been behaving with unusual perverseness. in either case, she might make things worse by laboring the subject. she hesitated a moment and then went out in search of her husband.
“harry,” she said, “we have been away a long while. don’t you think it is time to go home?”
“no,” he answered; “i haven’t thought so. what suggested the idea?”
it was obvious that he had no suspicion of her motive, and she was not prepared to explain that she wished to place muriel beyond prescott’s reach.
“well,” she said lamely, “aren’t you rather neglecting your duties?”
“no,” colston replied with a smile; “as they’re to a large extent merely formal ones, i believe they can wait a little longer without much harm being done.”
mrs. colston was surprised. she had not expected such an admission from her husband, though she agreed with him. harry was not, as a rule, susceptible to new impressions, but there was a subtle influence in the simple life on the prairies which altered one’s point of view and led to one’s forming a new estimate of values. she had felt this. things which had seemed essential in england somehow lost their importance in canada.
“besides,” he resumed, “you will remember that i made arrangements to be away a year, if necessary, and perhaps if i make the most of my opportunities in this country, i may have something worth while to say when we go home again.”
this was more in his usual vein; but his wife did not 269 encourage him. harry was apt to grow tiresome in his improving mood.
“but you don’t think of staying the full year?” she asked in alarm.
“oh, no; we might wait another week or two, or even a month more. it wouldn’t be the thing to desert jernyngham; and, as we’re mixed up in it, i feel it would be better to see the matter through.” he smiled at his wife with cumbrous gallantry. “then, though you always look charming, you’re now unusually fresh and fit; there’s no doubt that the place agrees with you.”
mrs. colston could not deny it. she yielded for the present, deciding to wait until some turn of events rendered him more amenable. in spite of his good humor, harry was obstinate and often hard to move.
she went to join gertrude, while muriel, sitting alone where she had been left, laid down her book, and let her eyes range slowly round the room, trying to analyze the impression it made on her. there was no carpet on the floor; the walls were made of mill-dressed boards which had cracked with the dryness and smelt of turpentine. the furniture consisted of a few bent-hardwood chairs and a rickety table covered with a gaudy cloth. the nickeled lamp, which diffused an unpleasant odor, was of florid but very inartistic design; the plain stove stood in an ugly iron tray, and its galvanized pipe ran up, unconcealed, to the ceiling. a black distillate had trickled down from a bend in it, and stained the floor.
muriel realized that had she been expected to live in such a place in england it would have struck her as comfortless, and almost squalid; but now, perhaps by contrast with the frozen desolation without, it looked cheerful, and had a homelike air. this, she thought, was significant, 270 and she followed up the train of ideas to which it led. she had a practical, independent bent; she liked to handle and investigate things for herself, to get into close and intimate touch with life. at home, this had not often been possible; she was too sheltered and, in a sense, too secluded. the people she met were conventional, acting in accordance with a recognized code, concealing their feelings. if she rode or drove, somebody got ready the horse for her; it was the same with the car. when she strolled through an english garden, she might pluck a flower or take pleasure in the smoothness of the lawn, but it was always with the feeling that others had planted and mown. she could take no active part in things; there was little that she could really do.
it was different on the western prairie. here men and women showed anger or sorrow or gladness more or less openly. one could realize their emotions, and this, instead of deterring, attracted her; one came to close grips with the primitive influences of human nature. then they were strenuous people, toiling stubbornly, rejoicing in tangible results that their hands and brains had produced. woman was man’s real helpmate, not a companion for his idle hours. she kept his house, and in time of pressure drove his horses; she had her say in determining the count of the cattle and the bushels of seed, and it was sometimes conceded that her judgment was the better.
but this was only one aspect of the subject that filled the girl’s thoughts. she knew that prescott loved her and she was glad of it; but here she stopped. she was sanguine, impulsive, courageous, but, with all that could be said for it, the change she must face if he claimed her was a startling one. besides, he must clear himself of 271 suspicion, and because the part of a mere looker-on was uncongenial, there was a course which she would urge on him. she must see him and convince him of the necessity for it. soon after she had made up her mind on this point, jernyngham and colston came in, and she had to talk to them.
