CHAPTER IX
PRESCOTT MAKES A PROMISE
The fortnight that followed Gertrude’s drive to Sebastian passed uneventfully, though the minds of three of the occupants of the homestead were filled with disturbing thoughts. Prescott spent the time working hard at his harvest, but he wished that something might relieve him of his guests, whose presence he found embarrassing, since it forced him to be continually on his guard. In spite of this, he was conscious of strong sympathy for them and did what he could to ensure their comfort. He was getting uneasy, for he saw that Cyril Jernyngham had involved him in a maze of complications from which there seemed to be no escape. It was obvious that appearances were against him; the evidence that Curtis had obtained pointed to his being implicated in the death of his friend, and the painstaking corporal might discover something more damaging. Prescott fancied that one or two of his acquaintances who now and then rode across his farm on different errands returned his greeting with a new and significant coldness.
Jernyngham spent much of his time at the muskeg, encouraging the men who searched it and often assisting in the work. The whole morass was being systematically turned over with the spade, but no further discoveries had been made. In addition to this, Jernyngham rode to and fro about the prairie, talking to the farmers whom he met on the trail or found at work in the fields. They were all sorry for him, but there was something deterrent in his sternness and his formal English manner, and they were less communicative than they might have been. This was why he failed to learn that the Colstons had stayed at Prescott’s homestead, though, for that matter, the fact was not generally known. The man could not rest; tormented by regrets for his past harshness, he was bent on making the only amend he could by hunting down the slayer of his son. His whole mind was fixed on the task, and he brooded over it in a manner that aroused his daughter’s concern. She dreaded the effect a continuance of the strain might have.
Gertrude, however, was relieved of a more pressing anxiety. Though her father steadfastly refused to entertain it, she shared Prescott’s belief that her brother was not dead. For one thing, Cyril was not the man to come badly to grief; he had done many reckless things and somehow escaped the worst results. Illogical as the idea was, she felt that his luck was good. It was a comforting reflection and she was sensible of a growing confidence in the farmer, who encouraged her to cling to it.
One afternoon she left the house and strolled across the harvest fields, which had greatly changed in appearance since she had first seen them. The oats were all stooked and stood in silvery sheaves, ready for the thrasher; the great stretch of wheat had melted down to a narrow oblong, round which the binders were working. Gertrude stopped to watch them. The plodding horses, the bent figures of the men, the play of light on falling grain, and the revolving arms of the machines fixed her eyes; the rustle of sheaves, the crackle of stubble, and the musical tinkle of metal, fell pleasantly on her ears. The mornings and evenings were cold now, but the days were hot and bright, and the scene was steeped in vivid hues: ocher, lemon, and coppery red below, dazzling blue above.
Prescott drove the leading binder and when it drew nearer she followed his movements with careful scrutiny. She admitted that the man aroused her interest. He was wonderfully virile, sanguine, and hopeful, with a trace of what she thought of as the primitive strain; which tended toward physical perfection; his vigor and muscular symmetry had their effect on her. Though her father was a man of means and influence, her circle of acquaintances had been restricted by the narrowness of his views; and the men with whom she had been brought into contact were, for the most part, distinguished rather by unexceptional morals and sound opinions than by bodily grace and original thought.
By disposition as well as training Gertrude was a formalist and a prude, but she was human and she unconsciously obeyed a law of nature which ordains the union of the dissimilar. This was why, having met only men of her own kind hitherto, she had escaped the touch of passion and now felt drawn toward one who greatly differed from her.