Winston of the Prairie

by Harold Bindloss

"There's one more point," said Winston. "I must make those thirty thousand dollars soon or they'll be no great use to me, and when I have them I may want to leave you."

"That's all right," said Graham. "By the time you've done it, you'll have made sixty for me. We'll go out and have some lunch to clinch the deal if you're ready."

It might have appeared unusual in England, but it was much less so in a country where the specialization of professions is still almost unknown, and the man who can adapt himself attains ascendency, and on the morrow Winston arrived at a big wooden building beside a pine-shrouded river. It appeared falling to pieces, and the engineer looked disdainfully at some of the machinery, but, somewhat against his wishes, he sat up with his companion most of the night in a little log hotel, and orders that occasioned one of Graham's associates consternation were mailed to the city next morning. Then machines came out by the carload, and men with tools in droves. Some of them murmured mutinously when they found they were expected to do as much as their leader, who was not a tradesman, but these were forth-with sent back again, and the rest were willing to stay and earn the premium he promised them for rapid work.

Before the frost grew arctic, the building stood firm, and the hammers rang inside it night and day until, when the ice had bound the dam and lead, the fires were lighted and the trials under steam began. It cost more than water, but buyers with orders from the East were clamoring for flour just then. For a fortnight Winston snatched his food in mouthfuls, and scarcely closed his eyes, while Graham found him pale and almost haggard when he came down with several men from the cities in response to a telegram. For an hour they moved up and down, watching whirring belt and humming roller, and then, whitened with the dust, stood very intent and quiet while one of them dipped up a little flour from the delivery hopper. His opinions on, and dealings in, that product were famous in the land. He said nothing for several minutes, and then brushing the white dust from his hands turned with a little smile to Graham.

"We'll have some baked, but I don't know that there's much use for it. This will grade a very good first," he said. "You can book me the thousand two eighties for a beginning now."

Winston's fingers trembled, but there was a twinkle in Graham's eyes as he brought his hand down on his shoulder.

"Gentlemen," he said, "I was figuring right on this when I brought the champagne along. It was all I could do, but Imperial Tokay wouldn't be good enough to rinse this dust down with, when every speck of it that's on you means dollars by the handful rolling in."

It was a very contented and slightly hilarious party that went back to the city, but Winston sat down before a shaded lamp with a wet rag round his head when they left him, and bent over a sheaf of drawings until his eyes grew dim. Then he once more took up a little strip of paper that Graham had given him, and leaned forward with his arms upon the table. The mill was very silent at last, for of all who had toiled in it that day one weary man alone sat awake, staring, with aching eyes, in front of him. There was, however, a little smile in them, for roseate visions floated before them. If the promise that strip of paper held out was redeemed, they might materialize, for those who had toiled and wasted their substance that the eastern peoples might be fed would that year, at least, not go without their reward. Then he stretched out his arms wearily above his head.

"It almost seems that what I have hoped for may be mine," he said. "Still, there is a good deal to be done first, and not two hours left before I begin it to-morrow."