"And she has them in the house as if they were flowers!" exclaimed Mrs. Sharp, addressing the ceiling.
"Eddie, I insist that you tell me what you two are talking about," demanded Nora hotly.
"My dear," said her brother, "these pretty little flowers which you've picked to make your shack look bright and—and homelike, may mean ruin."
"Eddie!"
"You must have heard—why, I remember telling you about it myself—about this mustard, this weed. We farmers in Canada have three enemies to fight: frost, hail and weed."
Mrs. Sharp confirmed his words with a despairing nod of her head.
"We was hailed out last year," she said. "Lost our whole crop. Never got a dollar for it. And now! If we lose it this year, too—why, we might just as well quit and be done with it."
"When it gets into your crop," Marsh explain for Nora's benefit, "you've got to report it. If you don't, one of the neighbors is sure to. And then they send an inspector along, and if he condemns it, why you just have to destroy the whole crop, and all your year's work goes for nothing. You're lucky, in that case, if you've got a bit of money laid by in the bank and can go on till next year when the next crop comes along."
"We've only got a quarter-section and we've got five children. It's not much money you can save then."
"But——" began Nora.