I shook my head.
“He is in the service of the Hudson’s Bay Company, chief at one of their stations in British Columbia.”
“British Columbia!” I exclaimed.
“Yes. What do you know of the country?”
“Nothing, sir, only that one of Mr Dempster’s men has a brother there. But it is a rough place, wild, and there are forests. Mrs John could not go there.”
“No place could be rough or wild to me, Mayne,” she said, smiling, “if I could find health and strength.”
“And you will there, dear,” cried Mr John excitedly. “Your brother says the country is lovely, and that the slow waggon journey across, though rough, will be invigorating. It will take many months, Mayne,” he continued, speaking as eagerly and joyfully as a boy preparing for a holiday, “but my brother-in-law has sent us ample for our expenses, and he tells us to take our time, and once there I shall easily be able to repay him, either by assisting him, or by means of a farm. Alexes, my darling, I feel now that nature meant me for a farmer, and at last I am going to succeed.”
“Nature meant you, John,” she replied, with a look of pride at him, “for what you are, what you always have been, and will be.”
“A poor dreamer?”
“No, my dear husband—a gentleman.”