Beatrice smiled at him.
"I'm afraid your feelings must get many a rude jar in these degenerate times. Still, you know things are changing."
"That's true," said Mowbray. "I've had cause to realize it of late. For example, your brother Lance goes off to Winnipeg on some mysterious business without consulting me, and only tells me in a casual manner that he may have to go again. Respect for parents is not a characteristic of your generation. But I want to speak about Harding."
He talked very kindly and shrewdly, and when Beatrice left him she sought her favorite place in the shadow of a nearby bluff to think over what he had said.
There was less wind for the next two days, and driving sand no longer raked the grain. From early morning dingy clouds rolled up slowly from the west, and though not a drop of rain fell the distance grew blurred. The horses on the range were restless and galloped furiously now and then; the gophers scurried up and down the trails; men at work grew impatient over trifling obstacles, and often stopped to watch the clouds. These rolled on and vanished in the east, while many an anxious farmer wondered when the last would rise from the horizon and leave the pitiless sky uncovered again. Thirsty wild creatures stirred in the shadow of the bluffs and rustled through the withered grass beside the dried-up creeks. Leaves fluttered and hung still again with a strange limpness, their under sides exposed. It was as if the sun-scorched waste and all that lived on it were panting for the rain. And still the clouds that never broke rolled slowly on.
At dusk on the second evening, Beatrice and Harding walked across the prairie, speaking in low voices, anxious and yet serene.
"What are you thinking of, Craig?" Beatrice asked presently.
"Of the weather," Harding answered. "Wondering if these clouds will break or clear away again. It looks as if our future hung upon the chance of a storm. If it doesn't come, there's a long uphill fight before us; and I hate to think of what you may have to bear."
"I'm not afraid," said Beatrice. "If I stayed at Allenwood, I should not escape. Perhaps I have missed something by getting through life too easily. I really don't think I'm much weaker, or less capable, than Effie Broadwood, and she's not cast down."
Harding kissed the hand he held.