The wedding was to take place at the homestead, and a parson from the town had been arranged with to come over and "hitch-on" the couple.
The day was to be observed as a holiday for the hands, and all were to be invited to the wedding-feast.
Ralph and Jessie had to endure a deal of rough, but good-humoured, chaff during the intervening period.
Society in the Far West, at the time of which we write, was not that unsophisticated and half-civilised agglomeration of human beings which before the advent of the Pacific Railway was to be found in the isolated and sometimes sparsely-populated settlements dotted about the prairie, or away up in the backwoods, remote from the haunts of men. Facilities for improved transit had created growing towns and cities, and the influx of the stranger from many lands had given rise to wants which traders found it their interest to meet.
The ubiquitous representatives of the great emporiums in the "States," as of the large commercial houses of the foreigner from across the seas, were indefatigable in pushing the wares of the firms they were commissioned to represent; not only supplying, but contributing largely to sustain a demand their energy had done so much to create.
With the exception of some few of the labourers on the Ranch, the whole of Ranger's people might be described as belonging to the upper strata of the working classes.
Sinclair himself—before his fall—was not what would be generally defined as a working-man. The working-men would be the first to resent his inclusion in their ranks, whilst those resembling Ralph would not be over-eager to claim the doubtful privilege. Since his arrival at the Ranch he had found it necessary to step down, and don the appearance, as well as join in the tasks of, the working-man.
Humiliated, as he already felt himself to be, by his past career, this was no hardship, for he knew that if he had received the due reward of his deeds, he would probably now be working out a sentence of imprisonment, only to emerge, it might be, as a hardened ruffian, further to prey upon society; or else to take his place with the lowest dregs of a society which the honest working-class look down upon, sometimes with pity but too often with contempt.
On the day the contract for "Kinbrae" was to be settled, Ranger rode over with Sinclair and Russell to the neighbourhood of the Crescent Lake to complete the transaction.
Crowley was ready for them on their arrival. His luggage, and such things as he intended to take with him, had been packed, and carted to Bredenbury the previous day, for transmission by a branch of the Pacific Railway running from Yorkton, until it unites with the main line a short distance east of Winnipeg. The stock having been inspected, the business was soon completed, and wishing the homeward voyagers farewell, the three men were left in possession of "Kinbrae."