Marjorie L. C. Pickthall

“ The weary weeks of cold passed slowly. At the end of March the change came, and the prairies suddenly leapt into life. The skies were softer, and full of great white clouds which sailed grandly before the wind. The long, low earthen billows were covered with grass and all the radiant flowers of spring. Every depression of the soil was a slough full of green water, covered with battalions of mallards and other wild-fowl. The poplars put forth shiny leaves which glittered restlessly in the sunshine, and the meadow-larks filled the whole world with music.
Then Dick spoke to Peter Many-Names. ”

“ Stephanie never forgot that journey. Trees, trees, nothing but trees before them behind them, on either side—except where the trail wound onwards, and even that, the low branches and the long-armed bushes were striving to reclaim. And between these trees the carpet of white lay as yet unbroken, though somewhat shrunken here and there. Winter seemed to be still present; but as the day advanced, Stephanie noticed that the woods were disturbed by an occasional whirr and flutter of birds, while in the sunnier spots could be heard the soft insistent music of melting snow. ”

“ The little owls, the great wood-peckers, the tiny songsters of the reeds and bushes, he looked upon as his brethren. He felt no return of the desolate ache at his heart he had experienced on the night of Peter's struggle with the lynx. His was that joyous fellowship with nature that knows no weariness, and he troubled himself as little as possible about Stephanie. Not yet had his awakening come.
Straight northwest they went, through all the brief splendour of the northern summer; and the weeks passed in golden dreams of freedom and of beauty. ”

“ Roger's a good fellow, and I should be a selfish brute if I let my moping ways sadden her, God bless her!" Even this little thought showed how great a change had taken place in Dick's character.
His thoughts turned to the limitless prairies of richest soil, to the untouched forests, to the wide beauty of lake and river, to all those fair pictures of the wilderness graven upon his heart. He thought of the clear skies, of the stinging cold, of the splendour of summer, of the fulfilment of the fall. ”

“ But Dick only saw the choke-cherry's white tassels trailing in the water, the white drifts clearing from the hollows and showing all the tender tangled green beneath, the delicate green mist that showed upon the birch-boughs, and the young leaves that reddened the twigs of oak and maple. He only heard the robins whistling from dawn to dusk, the rush and patter of the sudden sparkling showers, the rustlings and murmurs that showed the woods were full of life about them. He ate what was offered him and slept where Peter wished, dazed and enraptured. ”

“ For a moment, watching the gloom surrounding them—black, silent, yet giving the listener an impression of teeming, hungry multitudes within it—Dick's heart sank with a sense of isolation. On every side, for leagues, these forests lay. He felt a benumbing realisation of his own loneliness, and of the smallness of man's aims and hopes when confronted with the impassive greatness of nature. What part had he in this solemn wilderness, full of the things of the woods seeking their meat from God? ”

“ It recalled to his memory all those days of cold and hardship, all the roughness, the poverty, the privation of their lives in the dreaded winter-time. But it recalled also his past freedom, his wood-running, his neglected skill in shot and snare. The very note of the howl suggested the idea of untiring, relentless speed; and he suddenly remembered all the old delight of those long snow-shoe runs he had been wont to take whenever it so pleased him—over the crackling snow, beneath the black pine branches and the dazzling winter stars. ”

“ For the first time he had dimly realised that no human being can live to himself alone—realised that, even if a man is responsible to no earthly duties of kinship and labour, he is responsible to his Maker. And such realisation could not fail to bear fruit in deeds.
But presently the insidious hand of the frost fell heavily upon them again. Peter's long, savage step became shorter and less sure, and he fell to crooning little snatches of some wild chant under his breath—a brave's death-song, if Dick had known. The pony lagged more and more, and Dick noticed nothing, felt nothing any longer. ”

“ He was content to see the vast arch of the pale autumn skies above his head, to feel the keen air in his face, to travel over those limitless earthen billows, interrupted only by some bluff of aspens or other soft-wood trees, or by the forest-growth which fringed the courses of the larger rivers. To him, life offered nothing better.
Two days after they had definitely left the last of the wooded country behind them, Dick camped in the shelter of a poplar bluff, while Peter Many-Names went off a day's journey to the east with the intention of procuring a couple of ponies. ”

“ And the log-cabin and its clearing were picturesque enough to the eye of an artist, though speaking of all lack of skill and thrift and industry to the eye of a farmer. Even the garden in front of the cabin was being slowly and surely swallowed up into the wilderness again. The sunflowers flourished and bloomed and seeded, forming food-stores for multitudes of birds; and the squirrels would flicker down the tree-trunks and feast upon the seeds which the birds dropped, spitting the hard shells deftly to right and left through their whiskers. ”

“ Beyond the stump fence, on the gradually rising ground, stood Stephanie. Her eyes and mouth had a wistful look, but she did not seem unhappy. She was standing a little turned away from the ravine, watching the distant forests beyond the farm-buildings—watching them dreamily, and a little sadly. She had neither heard nor seen Dick. And he knelt in the deep leaves, and looked at her, and looked. All his shame and repentance surged upon him overwhelmingly, and kept him dumb and helpless, unable to move. ”

“ Through all the splendour of wild forest and deep ravine, Peter led the way, straight north-west, stopping for nothing. And so great was his ascendancy over Dick, that the English boy never questioned his leadership, or even asked definitely where they were going. In the wilds the Indian was supreme, and his speed, endurance, and skill were dominant. Dick relied upon him almost blindly, and was content to follow where he led.
The life at the homestead seemed a thing of the past, part of some other state of existence, so intense a hold had the wilderness upon Dick's mind. ”

“ But to Peter Many-Names the prairies were as home-like and familiar as a meadow.
Here, where Dick would see the far skyline broken by the irregular black mass of a herd of bison, the wheat waves now, mile after mile, about the countless farms and homesteads. These fertile lands, known then to few but the Indian and the hunter, have been claimed by civilisation, and their produce goes to the feeding of the nations. Agriculture has taken the prairies, and their nomad life is surely slipping into the past. ”

“ Three years have passed, shifting from bud to blossom, from sun to snow, from promise to fulfilment, bringing with them all their store of light, and shadows only deep enough to make the brightness clearer. Three times the snow has cleared from the good brown soil, three times the tender green of wheat has gladdened the eye, three times the fruitful fields have grown golden to the harvest, since Dick came home. And how have these changing seasons affected Dick and Stephanie, and all the people at the Collinson homestead? ”

“ Next morning the year had grown perceptibly older; or so it seemed to Stephanie, as she stood in the doorway of the log-cabin, looking across the misty clearing to the golden forests that encircled it. The fallen leaves looked browner, each furred at the edge with a delicate fringe of hoar-frost; and the newly risen sun strove as yet in vain to send some heat through the faint, cold haze. ”

“ The days passed, and the prairies lay a vast field of white beneath the radiant blue of the skies. Then the snow blew off the higher mounds and ridges, and only the hollows and sloughs were white. So the season advanced, through all its changes of cold, through all its shifting winds, and brilliant sun and sudden tempest. And still the old squaw tended Dick, filling him with fearful herb-drinks, feeding him nobly, wrapping him close in soft skins. It was a fancy of hers that Death should not have the white boy ”

“ A goodly heritage indeed, O Dick, as we of later generation know. Though you knew it not, the unloved toil you faced so well went to the building of a nation. In a fair ground the lot had fallen unto you, and, standing there in the darkness, you realised the possibilities of that lot for the first time. You realised that the beauty of the wilderness must give way, and rightfully, before the wants of man; that the splendour of freedom is less than the splendour of toil ”

“ In the plains and the forests man sees the foot-marks of the Great Spirit, hears His speech in the heart, and beholds His presence in all things. And you shall know them no more."
Dick nodded. "I shall know them no more," he answered, a little sadly, "but I think the Great Spirit can be heard and known as well in my life as in yours, Peter."
The next day Dick went on alone. He had no very distinct plan in his mind, but he was too much ashamed of himself to go directly to the homestead, and face the grave, displeased looks which he felt sure would be his portion, and deservedly so. ”

“ The whole clearing was crying out for some skilled hand to tend and reclaim it once more from the encroaching wilderness; but this sturdy lad lay there with all the busy idleness of a savage, very deftly making a tiny canoe of birch-bark. He seemed a fit occupant for the tangled garden and the half-cultivated fields.
Five years before, a certain Captain Underwood, flying from financial disaster in England, had come to Canada with his wife and his two children, Dick and Stephanie. ”

“ Peter was enjoying himself thoroughly. The lean and haughty young braves, who looked down upon the white boy, were glad of his silent company; and the elders considered him a promising youth. While poor Dick lay weak and restive in the old squaw's wigwam, Peter was ruffling about the camp with a dozen arrogant young rascals at his tail. He was pre-eminently skilful as a hunter, and he added many ponies to the wealth of his host—ponies which were certainly never taken in trade for other articles, excepting probably an occasional bullet, or no less deadly arrows. ”

“ But it was days before the grip of the frost loosened from Dick's brain. An old woman had taken a queer fancy to the white boy, and she nursed him patiently and fed him well long after the great storm had passed, and long after Peter had begun to do his share of the hunting and other tasks which fell to the men. Day after day passed, and still Dick lay helpless on the pile of skins in the dusky tepee, waited on by the grim, silent old squaw, and knowing nothing of his surroundings. He fancied the Indian woman was Stephanie, and kept calling out to her and begging her to forgive him. ”

“ Dick looked up, almost startled that the Indian should show so perfect a knowledge of his feelings. "Yes, I go on alone," he answered quietly, "I go on alone—to see my sister."
The Indian leant forward, his eyes shining greenly in the flicker of the firelight. "Yes, you go on alone, my brother," he replied in his own speech, "you go on alone, to the life of the white man. In dark houses shall you live, in hard labour shall you grow old. ”

“ Collinson had offered Stephanie a home when Mrs. Underwood died, but the girl had chosen to stay with her father and Dick, and be the one influence which restrained that little household in the woods from lapsing into the happy-go-lucky sort of savagery to which even the most cultivated are liable in a new land.
I do not think that we of this generation can quite realise the life which was led in Upper Canada eighty years ago, when forest and swamp and bush foretold nothing of the great farms and cities and thriving towns which now replace them to such a great extent. ”

“ A prairie is not as bare of all landmarks as a lawn, but one buffalo-wallow is much like another, one poplar-bluff is not distinguishable from the next, and most sloughs have a family likeness to each other, especially when one's circle of vision is limited to a couple of yards' radius, and everything beyond is blotted out with pitiless, hurrying, scurrying clouds of white flakes. Dick was utterly lost. "Where are we? Where are we?" he kept saying. "Is the whole world turning to snow?" And sometimes, angrily, "I know you are going the wrong way, Peter. ”

“ In all those weeks they had seen and spoken with no one but the solitary trapper to whom Dick had consigned the letter, and the absolute loneliness had become as natural to Dick as the splendid clearness of air was natural. So when one morning in September he came upon the ashes of a fire that were still warm, it gave him a curious feeling of wistful excitement. "Look, Peter," he said, "feel here. The ground is not cold yet under the ashes. ”

“ Dick loves you too well to stay away for good, and you know it at the bottom of your heart, child. There 's no weariness like the weariness of waiting, I know. But many lives seem to be made up of waiting and prayings of which we don't see the end—more hopeless waiting and praying than yours. For, after all, such things are in higher hands than ours. And if we watch and pray patiently and trustfully, we are maybe doing more than we think, Stephanie. ”

“ For three days, the snow, and the wind, and the great cold had scourged the prairies, and the storm was almost an early blizzard in its wild fury, in the confusion of air-currents and always-falling, never-resting white flakes, tipped with ice, and stinging like fire. And for these three days Dick and Peter Many-Names had gone blindly on their painful way, trusting to the Indian's sense of direction, yet not knowing where they were going. An Indian's bump of locality is a marvellously developed organ ”

“ It was sheltered on all sides by the three-foot banks, crested with little straggling bushes, against which the snow had drifted. So cosy did this desolate little valley seem after the roaring tempest without, that Dick grew quite comfortable and drowsy, and would have gone to sleep where he fell. But this Peter would by no means allow. "You wake up," he commanded; "even little child know better than go sleep in snow an' cold. You wake up." ”