"Back you—lie down!" King cried, and Sal retreated from the edge of the slough and came towards King wriggling and twisting her shaggy body in an effort to appear apologetic.
It was a great day, and now that the afternoon was wearing on, King was strongly tempted to be lazy. He had worked hard during the past weeks. The land he had prepared for crop had been sown broadcast by hand. He had cut his hay with a scythe and would have to rake it by hand—though Cherry was longing for the hay to cure so that she could get into the field with King and rake the long windrows into coils.
Oh, yes—Cherry was King's helper now. One day in spring, just before the men had gone out to begin work on the railway construction again, there had been a final gathering from the whole valley. Cherry and King might have left it until midsummer. King wanted to get his land into shape and his first crop in—and Cherry wanted to see her father started once again on his right-of-way contracts. At least, so they said. The fact of the matter was that Old Silent wanted to keep his daughter by him for just a few weeks more, and King and Cherry had both agreed, to humor him a little until the work was well under way.
But the men had settled it. McCartney and his crowd—or such of them as felt themselves unable to face Keith McBain again—had withdrawn before the snow was on the ground. The season in the camps had been highly successful in every sense, a fact, by the way, that reflected much credit upon King Howden, who had handled the men and had taken the responsibility of conducting the camp during the winter. The work on the grade was waiting, and when the men went out to the right-of-way and the young settlers went to their land, The Town would be no more. There had not been a wedding in the place since the first hut had been built. The men—through a committee duly chosen and given full powers—made known to Keith McBain their feelings on the matter. For once the old contractor allowed himself to be persuaded against his will. He made only one condition, namely, that he himself should announce to King and Cherry the decision that The Town had come to. The men agreed, and withdrew from the presence of Old Silent to begin preparations for the great day.
And it had been a day for all to remember. King thought of it now as he walked back to where his scythe lay, and picking it up stood it on its haft while he applied his whet-stone to the blade, and sent the rhythmic tune of the hay-maker ringing across the meadow.
The Town was gone. There were a few old unfilled wells and the tumbled foundations of cabins, and a winding street grown over with grass and weeds—but that was all. Farther up the valley its ambitious successor was already thriving beside the right-of-way, waiting for the coming of the steel. Soon it would be linked up with the outside world, it would be given a name and placed on the map by someone who probably had never seen it—and the world's outer edge would have been pushed a little farther westward, and a little farther northward.
King tossed his stone aside upon the coat that lay on the hay near him, and taking his scythe in his hands, stepped forward and swung it through the grass.
From behind him came a clear call, and pausing at the end of his stroke he turned with a smile and waved his hand to Cherry, who was tripping along down the meadow towards him. King dropped his scythe and went to meet her. When they met he caught her by the arms, and lifting her from the ground, kissed her on the lips.
"Leave the hay, King," she said, as soon as he had set her upon her feet again, "and let's go to the camp for supper. It's not four o'clock yet—we have more than two hours."
King glanced at the hay waiting to be put into coils and then at Cherry, whose face was full of fresh girlish expectancy. Her eyes were as roguish as they had been in those first days of their meeting, nearly a year ago.