THE SHORES OF THE INFINITE
The summer was a season of great activity and development. Harris did not sow any crop after the 1st of June, but applied himself then to the construction of his stable, which was built after the same fashion as the house. The shelter of its cool walls and roof was gratefully sought by the cows in the heat of the day, and its comparative freedom from mosquitoes was a haven to the horses in the evenings. Then there was more land to plough, and Harris's soul never dulled to the delight of driving the ploughshare through the virgin sod. There was something almost sacred in the bringing of his will to bear upon soil which had come down to him through all the ages fresh from the hand of the Creator. The blackbirds that followed at his heel in long, respectful rows, solemnly seeking the trophies of their chase, might have been incarnations from the unrecorded ages that had known these broad fields for chase and slaughter, but never for growth and production. The era of the near vision, demanding its immediate reward, had passed away, and in its place was the day of faith, for without faith there can be neither seed-time nor harvest.
But it was not only on Harris's homestead that development was taking place. As McCrae had predicted, there was a considerable movement of settlers into the district, and at several points their tents or rude houses now broke the vast sweep of the horizon. Tom Morrison had found land to the satisfaction of his heart within three miles of the Harris homestead, and his big log-house, eighteen by twenty-four, assumed the proportions of a castle by comparison with the smaller homes springing up around. Some miles to the east Dick Matheson, straight from the lumber camps of the Madawaski, had pitched his tent, and a few miles farther on was his friend of the shanties, John Burton. To the west were the Grants, and to the north Hiram Riles and his wife, Eliza. A mixed community they were, drawn from many corners, and all of them more or less under the heel of poverty; but they were filled with enthusiasm, with resourcefulness, and an indomitable determination to face and overcome all obstacles. A missionary had in some way spied out the field, and held monthly Sunday services at Morrison's house; and Dr. Blain, when not in one of his unfortunate debauches, had his headquarters at the new town of Plainville, which consisted of Sempter's general store and a "stopping-place," and which had sprung up near the junction of two streams in anticipation of the railway.
None of these pioneers was possessed of a complete farming equipment, but each had something which his neighbour lacked, and they made common cause together in their struggle with Nature. Thus Harris had no mower, but when haying season came he was able to borrow Morrison's, at the same time lending his plough to Riles, who simultaneously accommodated Morrison with his hayrack. Among the women exchanging became something of an exact science. Mrs. Grant was the proud possessor of a very modern labour-saver in the shape of a clothes-wringer, as a consequence of which wash-day was rotated throughout the community, and it was well known that Mrs. Riles and Mrs. Harris had to do their churning alternately. But it was Mrs. Morrison's sewing-machine that was the great boon to the community, and to it, perhaps, as much as the open-hearted hospitality of honest Tom and his wife, was due the fact that their house became the social centre of the district.
Nor was the settlement deprived of its share of sport and amusement. On one of his periodical visits McCrae donated a baseball, and Harris quickly shaped a bat from the trunk of a stout willow he found by the river-bed. They had all outdoors to play in, and it was a simple matter to mow the grass from a stretch of level prairie and turn over the sod at points to mark the bases. Unfortunately, there were not enough men in the community to make two baseball teams, but a species of game was devised in which the players batted in turn, and when not batting or base-running were always on the "out" side. Harris developed considerable ability as a pitcher, throwing the powerful straight ball which in those days was a greater menace to the bare hands of the catcher than to the batter at the plate. On the occasion of his monthly visits the missionary, who was an ardent ball-player, generally contrived to reach Morrison's by Saturday afternoon, and so was able to take part in the Saturday night game. And although he never took advantage of his association with the young men to "preach" to them, except on Sundays, a sense of comradeship sprang up, and a standard of sport was established which bore fruit in the community many years later.
And so the first summer wore away and the first harvest was at hand. Any disappointment which had been occasioned by backward conditions earlier in the season was effaced by the wonderful crop which now crowned the efforts of the pioneers. On their finest Eastern farms they had seen nothing to equal the great stand of wheat and oats which now enveloped them, neck-high, whenever they invaded it. The great problem before the settlers was the harvesting of this crop. It was a mighty task to attempt with their scythes, but there was no self-binder, or even reaper, within many miles.
Finally Morrison solved the problem for the whole community by placing an order, at a fabulous figure, for a self-binder from the United States. It was a cumbrous, wooden-frame contrivance, guiltless of the roller bearings, floating aprons, open elevators, amid sheaf carriers of a later day, but it served the purpose, and with its aid the harvest of the little settlement was safely placed in sheaf. The farmers then stacked their grain in the fields, taking care to plough double fire-guards, with a burnt space between, as a precaution, against the terrifying fires which broke over the prairie as soon as the September frosts had dried the grass. A community some twenty miles to the eastward boasted a threshing mill, and arrangements were made for its use after it had discharged the duties of its own locality. The machine was driven by horse-power, and in the dawn of the crisp November mornings the crescendo of its metallic groan could be heard for miles across the brown prairie. It, too, with its hand feed, its open straw-carriers, its low-down delivery, which necessitated digging a hole in the frozen earth to accommodate the bags, and its possible capacity of six hundred bushels a day, bears mean comparison with its modern successor; but it threshed grain at a lower cost per bushel, and threw less into the straw than has ever been accomplished by the mighty steam and gasoline inventions which have displaced it.
When Harris's threshing was done he found he had six hundred bushels of wheat and seven hundred bushels of oats in cone-shaped piles on his fields. The roads were fine and hard, and no snow had yet fallen, so he determined to begin at once with the marketing of his wheat. His last cent had been spent months before; indeed, it had been only through the courtesy of the storekeeper at Plainville, who was also postmaster, and who had stretched the law to the point of accepting hen eggs as legal tender in exchange for postage stamps, that Mary Harris had been able to keep up the brave, optimistic series of letters written "home." So Harris decided that he would at once market some of his wheat. Most of the oats would be needed for his horses and for seed, and what remained would command good prices from new settlers the following spring, but some of the wheat must be turned into money at once. During the latter part of the summer they had lived exclusively on the produce of their farm; on vegetables from the garden, fish and ducks from the stream, prairie chickens, and an occasional rabbit from the fields. The wild geese had deserted them early in the spring, and returned only after harvest. But now they should have a change on their table. Mary had accepted the pioneer fare of the summer without complaint, but of late Harris had discovered a strange longing in her ryes, and more than once she had arrested herself in the words "I wish we had—" Then two penitent little tears would steal softly clown her cheeks, and she would bury her head in his arms as he soothed her with loving words and promised that "after threshing things would be different."
So now he set out for Emerson with the best load his horses could draw. The first few miles he drove in silence, for there was a heavy weight at his heart as he thought of the little wife alone with the responsibilities of the farm…That she would be faithful to every responsibility he knew beyond question…But he was not quite satisfied. A strange moodiness had come over her, and even with him at home she had at times given way to fits of downheartedness which seemed altogether alien to her nature.
But this morning as he drove the well-worn trail, a burnished sun mounted higher and higher ahead of him, and with it his own spirits rose until he found himself whistling and boyishly building castles in the air. But his castles, as he told himself, had solid foundations; indeed, they were not even speculations, but already might be accepted as assured accomplishments. Some things he certainly must do for Mary. First of these was the purchase of a glass window for the house, and next to that he promised enough boards for a door, and perhaps enough to floor part of their little room. Then there should be sugar, and tea, and flour, and warm boots, and some much-needed kitchen utensils. True, he needed some things himself, but his needs could wait. And then there were other things. Oh, he knew what to get. He hadn't been having little conferences with Mrs. Morrison for nothing…A tender smile gently suffused his face, and his cheery whistle soared above the rumble of the wagon-wheels on the hard lumps of the trail.
Ten days later he retraced his course in the teeth of a blinding blizzard. A dozen times he had been lost in the last forty-eight hours, but he had developed the prairie-dweller's sense of direction, and had always been able again to locate the trail. The Arthurs would have detained him, almost by force, but the thought of a pale, patient face, wrung with an agony of anxiety not for itself, made him adamant in his resolve to go home at whatever cost. The roads were almost impassable; he left his lumber at Arthurs', but carried with him his window, a few boards for a door, and a little bundle of drygoods. Everything else had gone by the way, surrendered in exchange for food and shelter for himself and horses.
It was not dreadfully cold, but the sky seemed only a vast turmoil of snow. The north-west wind pelted the flakes in his face, where they melted with the warmth of his skin and again drooped in tenacious icicles from his eyebrows and moustache. The horses, too, were half blinded with the storm, and the empty wagon dragged laboriously through the deep drifts. Darkness came down very early, but at last Harris began to recognize familiar landmarks close by the trail, and just as night was settling in he drew into the partial shelter of the bench on the bank of the coulee. The horses pulled on their reins persistently for the stable, but Harris forced them up to the house. His loud shout was whipped away by the wind and strangled in a moment, so he climbed stiffly from the wagon and pulled with numbed hands at the double thickness of carpet that did service for a door. He fancied he heard a sound, but could be sure of nothing; he called her name again and again, but could distinguish no answer. But at last the fastenings which held the carpet gave way, and he half walked, half fell, into the house.
The lantern burned dimly, but it was not at the lantern he looked. In the farthest corner, scarcely visible in the feeble light, stood his wife, and at her shoulder was the gun, trained steadily upon him.
"Mary, Mary, don't you know me?" he cried.
She dropped her weapon to the floor, where it went off, harmlessly burying its charge in the sod wall.
"Thank God, oh, thank God!" she exclaimed.
He threw off his wet overcoat and rushed to her side. But she sat silent on the bed, staring absently at the light flickering uncertainly in the wind from the open door.
He hastily rearranged the carpet, then, returning to her, he took her hands in his and rubbed them briskly. But she still stared vaguely at the light.
Suddenly a thought came to him. He rushed outside, to find that the horses, of their own accord, had taken shelter beside the stable. Here from the wagon he drew a little bundle and hurried back to the house.
She was sitting where he left her, shivering slightly and watching the play of the light as it flickered up and down the wall. He tore the package open and spread its contents before her.
At first she took no notice, but gradually her eyes found the outline of soft cloth and dainty feminine devices. With a great joy he watched the colour returning as her set face relaxed in a smile of ineffable tenderness. She raised her face to his and slipped her arms about his neck, and he knew that for the moment he had snatched her out of the valley of the shadow.
Harris made no more attempts to market his wheat that winter. His wife's health now became his first consideration, but, even had there been no such problem, experience had shown that nothing was to be gained by making the long and expensive trip to Emerson. The cost of subsistence of man and team on the way devoured all the proceeds of the wheat; indeed, there were instances on record in the settlement where men who attempted such trips during the winter actually came back poorer than they left, while those who could show a gain of a bag of sugar, a sack of flour, or a box of groceries were considered fortunate indeed.
"What shall we eat?" said Harris to his wife, when, after a full discussion, it was decided that no more grain could be marketed until spring.
"Oh, we shall not suffer," was her calm reply. "We have over five hundred bushels of wheat."
"But we can't eat wheat!"
"I'm not so sure of that. I heard Mr. McCrae say that lots of families had wintered on wheat. Indeed, boiled wheat is something of a delicacy. Even the best city families rarely have it, although it is more nutritious than flour and much easier to prepare."
Harris thrilled with joy over his wife's vivacity. The strange gloom that oppressed her so much of late had cost him many anxious hours.
"Besides," she continued, "we are well off to what some of them are. We have a good supply of vegetables, and one of the cows will milk most of the winter, and we have half a dozen laying hens. Then you will be able to shoot a rabbit now and again."
"Yes, we'll be all right," he agreed. "Perhaps I will get a day or two out at the lake. They say there is fine fishing all winter where some of the springs keep the ice open. And then, there's always a chance to pick off a deer."
So, in high spirits, they planned for their winter. There were long hours, and little diversion, and the desolation of bleak, snowbound prairies on every side, but through it all they kept up their courage and their hopefulness. Mary spent much time with her needle, from which John, when he felt she was applying herself too closely, beguiled her to a game of checkers or an hour with one of their few but valued books. To supplement their reading matter Mrs. Morrison sent over her little library, which consisted of "The Life of David Livingstone" and a bound number of "The Gospel Tribune." And there were frequent visits and long evenings spent about a cosy fire, when the Morrisons, or the Grants, or the Rileses, dropped in to while away the time. The little sod house was warm and snug, and as the men played checkers while the women sewed, what cared the pioneers for the snow and the cold and the wind whistling across the plains?
***
At last came the crisis. At four in the afternoon Harris kissed his wife an affectionate farewell, hitched his horses to the sleigh, and started out posthaste for Plainville. The sun, hanging low to the western horizon, was banded by a great ring of yellow and gold, bulging into two dull reflected glows at either side. A ground-drift of snow whipped keenly across the hard crust, and the north-west wind had a rip to it, but overhead the sky was clear and the blue amazingly deep. Harris drove by way of the Morrisons, where a few low words sent Tom to the stable at a trot to hitch his own team, while the good wife bustled about in the "room," almost overwhelmed with the importance of her mission.
"I will go for the doctor, Jack, and you go back and take the wife with you," was Morrison's kindly offer, but Harris would not agree. It was dark by this time, and he felt that he could trust no one else to make the journey to Plainville. Besides, there was more than a chance that Dr. Blain might be incapable, and in that case it meant a drive of thirty miles farther.
"It's good of you, Morrison," he said, "but you are more used to your wife's'bidding than I am, and you can be of good service there, if you will." And without waiting to argue he sprang into his sleigh again and was whipping his team into the darkness.
Dr. Blain, when at home, was to be found at the stopping-place. Harris tied his team at the door and went in, shaking the snow and frost from his great-coat. The air inside was close and stifling with tobacco, not unmixed with stronger fumes. A much-smoked oil lamp, hung by a wall-bracket, shed a certain sickly light through the thick air, and was supplemented in its illumination by rays from the door of a capacious wood stove which stood in the centre of the room, and about which half a dozen men were sitting.
"Night, Harris," said the landlord, who had a speaking acquaintance with every settler within twenty miles. "Ye're drivin' late. Ye'll have a bite supper, an' stable the team?"
"No, Hank, not to-night, thanking you the same. But I'm after Dr. Blain, and I'm in a hurry. Is he here, and—is he fit?" There was an anxiety in the last words that did not escape the host.
"Nothin' ser'ous, I hope? Frost, or somethin'?" Then, without waiting for reply, he continued: "Yes, doctor's here. Upstairs, bed to the right as ye go up. Just got in a little back. As for fit—dig 'im out an' judge for yourself."
Harris lost no time in scaling the ladder which led to the upper half-storey of the building. It was a garret—nothing better—where the cold stars looked through knot-holes in the poplar shingles, and the ends of the shingle-nails were tipped with frost. Another wall-lamp burned uncertainly here, flickering in the wind that whistled through the cracks in the gables, and by its light Harris found "the bed to the right." The form of a man lay diagonally across it, face downward, with arms extended above the head, and so still that Harris paused for a moment in a strange alarm. Then he slipped his hand on the doctor's neck and found it warm.
"Come, Doctor," he said, "I want you with me." But the sleeping man answered with not so much as a groan.
"Come, Dr. Blain," Harris repeated, shaking him soundly. "I want you to go home with me." He might have been speaking to the dead.
In sudden exasperation he seized the doctor by the shoulders, and with one heave of his mighty arms set him upright on the floor and shook him vigorously.
Dr. Blain opened his eyes and blinked uncertainly at the light.
"Whatche doing, Harris?" he said at length, and the recognition
brought a thrill of hope. "'S no use…Gotta sleep it off. 'S no use,
Harris. 'S no use." And he crumpled up in the bed.
But Harris was desperate. "Now I'm not going to fool with you," he said. "You get up and come with me or I'll take you. Which is it?"
But the doctor only mumbled "'S no use," and fell heavily to sleep.
Throwing open his coat to get free motion for his arms, Harris in a moment wrapped the sleeping man in a couple of blankets from the bed, threw him over his shoulder, carried him down the rickety ladder, and deposited him, none too gently, in the sleigh. There was a mild cheer from the men about the stove over these heroic measures, and one of them thoughtfully threw the doctor's satchel into the sleigh. The next moment all were lost in the darkness.
Harris drove for an hour, watching the trail keenly in the whitish mist of the winter's night, and urging the horses to the limit of their exertions. He had almost forgotten his passenger when he felt a stir in the bottom of the sleigh. Looking down closely he found the doctor trying to extricate a flask from one of his pockets. With a quick wrench he took it from him, and would have thrown it into the snow, but the thought struck him that it might be needed, and he put it into his own pocket.
The doctor struggled to his feet. "Say, Harris, you're friend o' mine, but don't take too many liberties, see? 'S no use tryin' without it. Jush give me that bottle now, or I'll get out an' go home."
Harris was so pleased at the signs of returning coherence that he could have hugged the doctor, but he only said, "You've had enough for to-night. And you won't get out, because if you try to I'll knock you senseless in the bottom of the sleigh."
Then the doctor changed his tactics. He threw his arms about Harris's neck, and genuine tears coursed down his cheeks.
"Say, Harris, you don' know anything about it. You don' know what I'm up agains'. Jush got in from Wakopa to-day, and I haven't had my closh off for week. 'S right! I tell you, Harris, you don' know…Oh, I know I'm a fool—yes, don' tell me. But th' engineer knows it too when he ties down th' shafety valve t' make th' grade. Dosh it jush th' same. Thash jus' like me. Come on, Harris, hand it over. I got t' have it, or I can't make the grade."
"Well, you'll make the grade first to-night," said Harris.
After that the doctor remained silent for some time. Then suddenly he demanded: "Shay, Harris, where you takin' me to, anyway?"
"I'm taking you home."
"Home? What home? I got no home, jus'a—"
"I'm taking you to my home."
"Wha' for? You're all right, I guess…" Suddenly the doctor stood erect. "Harris, is your wife sick?"
"That's why I came for you."
"Well, why the devil didn't you say so? Here, give me that whip.
Harris, Harris, what did you waste time arguing for?"
"I didn't waste much. The argument was mostly on your side."
"Harris," said the doctor, after a long silence, "you think I'm a fool. You're right. It isn't as though I didn't know. I know the road I'm going, and the end thereof… And yet, in a pinch, I can pull myself together. I'm all right now. But it'll get me again as soon as this is over… Any good I am, any good I do, is just a bit of salvage out of the wreck. The wreck—yes, it's a good word that—wreck."
***
Just as the dawn was breaking he knelt beside her. Her eyes were very large and quiet, and her face was white and still. But she raised one pale hand, and the thin fingers fondled in his hair. She drew his face very gently down, and big silent tears stood in his eyes.
"We will call him Allan," he said.