Presently the conversation turned to agricultural topics, and we were more at ease.
"My plowing," Spoof explained, "has gone better since I discarded my compass. The bullocks never took kindly to the compass. No doubt it was a foolish notion of mine that a furrow should run either east and west or north and south, seeing that the whole farm has to be plowed anyway. I now let them veer and tack as they please, and we are making considerable headway."
"Any crop in?"
"Not this year. A chap in Regina advised me to plant a sack of rolled oats and raise my own porridge, but, thank Heaven, I'm not Scotch. No reflection on the Scotch," he added hurriedly, noting a warning flash in Marjorie's eyes. "They are a very wonderful people. They eat oatmeal, and thrive on it. A very wonderful people."
"No garden either?"
"Only a few sunflowers. They should be up presently."
"Sunflowers? Why sunflowers?"
"A chap in Regina—Jake, the land guide—you know Jake, don't you?—he told me to be sure and plant some sunflowers. They are invaluable in winter. They stand up through the snow, and the sunlight beating on their bright, yellow faces enables a settler to locate his shack when otherwise the country is all a white blanket of snow. Jake assured me that many a settler had been frozen to death through neglect of this simple precaution."
"It's simple, all right," Jack agreed. "Our friend Jake seems to be a good adviser. Did he give you any other hints?"
"Lots of them, but I'm afraid he's a bit of a spoofer. Told me to catch four gophers and tie them by the hind legs to the four corners of my farm, and their squealing would warn all the other gophers off. I tried it but it didn't make a bit of difference. In fact, gophers seem to be about all I'm raising this year—gophers and sunflowers. His wild duck trap was no success, either. Jake showed me how to make a trap for wild ducks, and told me to put some buffalo bones in it and I would catch all the ducks I could eat. Said the ducks had to have the bone material for shells for the eggs, and would go anywhere to get it. I set two traps, but so far I haven't caught a duck."