"I scarcely fancy you are well enough, but if you must go, I wonder whether you would do a good turn to Alfreton?" she said. "The lad has been speculating--and he seems anxious lately."
"It is natural that they should all bring their troubles to you."
Maud Barrington laughed. "I, however, generally pass them on to you."
A trace of color crept into the man's face, and his voice was a trifle hoarse as he said, "Do you know that I would ask nothing better than to take every care you had, and bear it for you?"
"Still," said the girl, with a little smile, "that is very evidently out of the question."
Winston rose, and she saw that one hand was closed as he looked down upon her. Then he turned and stared out at the prairie, but there was something very significant in the rigidity of his attitude, and his face seemed to have grown suddenly careworn when he glanced back at her.
"Of course," he said quietly. "You see, I have been ill, and a little off my balance lately. That accounts for erratic speeches, though I meant it all. Colonel Barrington is still in Winnipeg?"
"Yes," said the girl, who was not convinced by the explanation, very quietly. "I am a little anxious about him, too. He sold wheat forward, and I gather from his last letter has not bought it yet. Now, as Alfreton is driving in to-morrow, he could take you."
Winston was grateful to her, and still more to Miss Barrington, who came in just then, while he did not see the girl again before he departed with Alfreton on the morrow. When they had left Silverdale a league behind, the trail dipped steeply amid straggling birches to a bridge which spanned the creek in a hollow, and Winston glanced up at the winding ascent thoughtfully.
"It has struck me that going round by this place puts another six miles on to your journey to the railroad, and a double team could not pull a big load up," he said.