The minister's cutter, in front of the shed, called to his remembrance the fact that this was the hour for service, which no doubt was going on now. "It's a wonder they still keep it up," he thought, rather contemptuously.

It seemed the most natural thing in the world for him to go into the porch—he, would hear what was going on, anyway, and perhaps he could see if Mrs. Cavers were there. Suddenly some one began to sing—the voice was strange, and yet familiar, like something had heard long, long, ago. When he realized that it was Mrs. Cavers he was listening to, a sudden impulse seized him to rush in. Libby Anne must be there beside her mother—she was always beside her.

"was it for crimes that I have done, He groaned upon the tree?"

Mrs. Cavers was singing alone, it seemed, in her sweet thin voice.

"Oh, no," Bud said to himself, "I guess it was not for any crimes she ever did."

The day had grown darker and colder, biting wind began to whirl hard little around the porch. Mrs. Cavers sang on:

"Well may the sun in darkness hide, And shut his glories in. When Christ, the mightly Saviour died For man, the creatures sin."

Then he heard Mr. Burrell say, quite distinctly: "Ye that do truly and earnestly repent of your sins and are in love and charity with your neighbours, and intend to lead a new life ... draw near with faith and take this holy sacrament to your comfort ... meekly kneeling upon your knees."

Bud heard a few moving forward—he knew who they were, just the same few—he had gone with them once, more fool he was—what was the use of that man talking about love and charity when the very first chance he got he would turn a fellow down?

"... Who in the same night that he was betrayed took bread and brake it, saying: 'Take, eat; this is my body which was broken for you this is my blood of the New Testament, which was shed for you ....'"

This one sentence came out to him clearly, fastening itself on his mind, and though in a vague way he heard the service through, his mind was busy with the thought that the Saviour of men had been betrayed by a friend, betrayed to his death, and had died blessing and forgiving his enemies.

" ... the same night that he was betrayed."

The solemnity of it all fell on the boy's heart. He had knelt there once, and heard those words and taken these tokens of the Lord's death, with his heart swelling with love for Him who had not even refused to die. It had been a glorious day of June sunshine, when through the open windows came the robin's song and the prairie breeze laden with the perfume of wolf-willow blossoms and sweet-grass. He remembered how the tears had risen unbidden to his eyes—happy tears of love and loyalty—and he had felt that nothing could ever separate him from the Master whom he loved. But now he stood on the outside of the door—he was an outsider—he had no part in this. He made a step backward—he would go away—he would hear no more—he had come back for the pacing colt—he was done with this neighbourhood and home—he was done with religion!

"Drink ye this in remembrance that Christ's blood was shed for you."

The voice sounded at Bud's elbow, as if calling him to stay. He hesitated—they were not nearly done yet—there was no danger of anyone coming out—everyone stayed for the whole service, he knew, even if they didn't take part.

"Our Father, who art in heaven," he heard them all repeat, and quite unconsciously he began to follow the words with them. It was like an old friend coming out to meet him.

"Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them who trespass against us."

Bud stopped abruptly, he couldn't say that—he would not forgive—he had been bitterly wronged, and he would never forgive—he had done what was right, and what had he got for it? He tried to summon back to him the anger that had kept alive his resolve to stay away from home. Instead of anger and bitterness he found his, heart swelling with the old love for the One who, the same night that he was betrayed, took bread and broke it, saying: "Take, eat; this is my body, which was broken for you."

Some one was praying—it was Mr. Burrell—every word came to Bud clearly.

"Dear Lord," the minister prayed, "be one with us to-day, and grant that the great appeal which Thou dost make in the broken body and the shed blood may find an answer in every heart that hears. Compel us with it to consecrate our lives to Thee. If there is any root of bitterness in our lives, let us bring it to where the shadow of the Cross may fall upon it. Oh, dear Lord, bless all those who have wandered from Thee. Bless the dear boy of our prayers who may have wandered far, but who, we believe, will never be deaf to the call of the Spirit. We praise Thee for prayers answered—for sick ones healed—for lives redeemed—and we humbly crave Thy mercy for us all. Amen."

What strange power was in these words to make Bud Perkins suddenly realize that only one thing mattered? He opened the door and walked in. The people heard the door open and some one come quickly toward the front. They saw the minister step down from the platform and into the aisle, where he clasped a black-bearded youth in his arms. For a full minute no one spoke; then Roderick Ray, the Scottish Covenanter, broke into singing:

"O dying Lamb, Thy precious blood Shall never lose its power Till all the ransomed church of God Be saved to sin no more."

What a scene of rejoicing was in the schoolhouse that dark March day! Roderick Ray slapped Bud on the back again and again, crying: "Wonderful! Wonderful!" Mr. Perkins hung on to Bud's arm as if he were afraid he might lose him again, and told him over and over again what a time he had been having with hired help. "There's nothing like your own you bet." Even George Steadman shook hands with Bud, and told him he was glad to see him back again.

While Mrs. Cavers, in answer to his eager inquiry, was telling Bud all about Libby Anne's illness, and the great kindness of his father and mother and Martha Pearl Watson whispered to Mr. Perkins: "Now's the time to clear up Bud's name about that wheat plugging. Tell them who did it." In the excitement of the moment there did not seem anything odd in the suggestion. Pearl was shrewd enough to know that the psychological moment had come.

Mr. Burrell was still standing with his hand on Bud's shoulder, as if he could never let go of him. Pearl whispered to the minister to ask the people to sit down for a few minutes, for Mr. Perkins had something to say to them. Mr. Burrell did as Pearl had asked him. Then Mr. Perkins addressed a few words to the congregation which were probably as strange a closing as any sacramental service has ever had.

"Well, friends," he said, "I believe I have a few words to say. I should have said them before, I guess. In fact, I should have said them when the thing happened, but I'm a terrible man to put off things that I don't like to do. But I'm so glad to get Buddie home that I don't mind tellin' ye that he didn't have nothin' to do with that wheat pluggin'—that was my idea entirely—in fact, Bud raised Cain about us ever pluggin' grain, and said he'd not stand for it any more. I ain't much used to speakin' in church, as you know. I've always kept my religion in my wife's name, and I may not be talking in a suitable way at all. I'm a good deal like old Jimmie Miller was at a funeral one time. Jimmie had took a glass or two too much, and just when the minister asked them to walk around and view the remains, old Jimmie jumped up and proposed the health of the bride and groom. Well, of course, someone grabbed him and pulled him down, and says: 'Sit down, man, this is a funeral!' 'Well,' says Jimmie, speakin' pretty thick, 'I don't care what it is, but it's a very successful event any way.' That's the way I feel—it's the happiest day I've known for quite a while." Thomas Perkins suddenly stopped speaking and blew his nose noisily on a red handkerchief. The neighbours, looking at him in surprise, realized that there was strong emotion behind his lightly spoken words.

It seemed to be quite a natural thing for them to sing "Praise God, from whom all blessings flow," and for the hand-shaking to begin all over again. They were only a handful of very ordinary people in a desolate-looking, unpainted schoolhouse that dark Sunday afternoon, but a new spirit seemed suddenly to have come over them, a new spirit that made them forget their worries and cares, their sordid jealousies and little meannesses, the spirit of love and neighbourly kindness, and there were some there who remembered that old promise about the other One who will come wherever "two or three are gathered together," and thought they felt the Unseen Presence.

A few hours later Bud was sitting in the cushioned rocking-chair of the tent before a cheerful fire that blazed in the Klondike heater. On the lounge sat his father, mother and Mrs. Cavers.

Libby Anne, in a pale blue kimono, and wrapped in a warm shawl, was on Bud's knee, holding in her hands a gold locket and a chain, and saying over and over to herself in an ecstasy: "Bud did come back and I'm Bud's girl."

Mr. Perkins was in radiant good-humour. "By George, it's great to have Buddie home!" he said, "and our kid here gettin' better. Let me tell you, Buddie, we've had a pretty dull, damp time around here; things have been pretty blue, and with no one to help me with the stock since Ted left. I was tellin' ye about Ted, wasn't I? Well, sir, we've been up against it all right, but now I'm feelin' so good I could whoop and yell, and still, I kinda feel I shouldn't. I'm a good deal like old Bill Mills, down at the Portage, the time the boys 'shivaried' him. You see, just the day after the first woman was buried old Bill started in to paint up his buckboard, and as soon as the paint was dry he was off huntin' up another woman; and he got her, too, a strappin' fine big Crofter girl—by George! you should see her milkin' a cow—I passed there one day when she was milkin', and I can tell you she had a big black-and-white Holstein cow shakin' to the horns! Well, anyway, when Bill and the girl got married, the boys came to 'shivaree' them. The old woman was just dead two months, and when the noise started Bill came out, mad as hops, and told them they should be ashamed of themselves making such a racket at a house where there had so lately been a funeral! That's how it is with us, eh, what? By George, it's great altogether to have Buddie home."



CHAPTER XXXIV

THE CONTRITE HEART

Who knows whither the clouds have fled? In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake. And the eyes forget the tears they have shed, And the heart forgets its sorrow and ache.

——James Russell Lowell.

DURING Libby Anne's illness Mrs. Cavers had been so anxious about her that she had hardly given a thought to anything else; but when the little girl's perfect recovery seemed assured, she was confronted again by the problem of their future. Libby Anne's illness, in spite of the neighbours' and the doctor's kindness, had made a hole in the two hundred dollars the Watsons had given her. She still had some money left from her share of the crop, but she would need that for new clothes for herself and Libby Anne; there would be the price of their tickets, and the other expenses of the journey, and she must save enough to buy her ticket back to Manitoba.

Of course, there were still the two cows and the hens, which the neighbours had kindly taken care of for her, and there was some old machinery, but she did not expect that she would get much from the sale of it.

The first day that Libby Anne was able to walk, Dr. Clay came out to see her, and brought to Mrs. Cavers a letter from the new tenant who had rented the Steadman farm. The letter stated that the writer was anxious to buy all her furniture, machinery and stock, and wanted to make her an offer of three hundred dollars cash for them.

Mrs. Cavers read the letter with astonishment. She had never hoped for such a price. "Now, doctor," she said, "you've been to me one of the best friends any one ever had. Tell me one thing—is Sandy Braden paying part of this?"

Dr. Clay was prepared for the question and answered evasively. "I'll bring the man here to see you—he's an old Indiana farmer with lots of money, and you know your implements are in very good shape. I went out with him to the farm, and together we figured out what the stuff was worth. Here is the list; he is perfectly satisfied if you are."

Mrs. Cavers shook her head doubtfully. "I know that the stuff is not worth more than half that amount, and I know very well that either you or Mr. Braden has fixed this up for me to let me still feel independent and have my trip back home. I know that, but I'm going to take it, doctor, without a word. I am not even going to try to thank you. I haven't seen my mother or any of my own people for twelve years. It has been my sweetest dream that some day I would go back home, and now it looks as if the dream were coming true. I am like a little hungry boy who has been looking at a peach in a shop window for days and days and days, desiring without hope, when suddenly someone comes out and puts it in his hand—he will quite likely run away with it without so much as thanking his kind friend, but he's grateful just the same. That's the way it is with me, doctor; I am grateful, too, so grateful that I can't talk about it."

A month later Mrs. Cavers and Libby Anne arrived safely home, and Libby Anne's enraptured eyes beheld the tall maple trees, the bed of red and yellow tulips, and the budding horse-chestnuts of her dreams. The grandmother, a gentle, white-haired old lady, looked anxiously and often at her widowed daughter's face, so worn and tired, so cruelly marked by the twelve hard years; and although Mrs. Cavers told them but little of her past life that was gloomy and sad, yet the mother's keen eyes of love read the story in her daughter's work-worn hands, her gray hair, and the furrows that care and sorrow had left in her face. She followed her about with tenderest solicitude, always planning for her comfort and pleasure. She often sat beside Mrs. Cavers when, in the quiet afternoon, she lay in the hammock on the veranda. Always as they talked the mother was thinking of the evil days that the world had held for her poor girl, and planning in every way her loving heart could devise to make it up to her, after the fashion of mothers the wide world over.

To Mrs. Cavers, the spring and summer days were full of peace and happiness. The quiet restfulness of her mother's home—the well-appointed rooms, the old-fashioned piano, with its yellow keys, in the back parlour, the dear familiar pictures on the walls—all these seemed to soothe her tired heart. The garden, with its patch of ribbongrass, its sumach trees and scarlet runners, was full of pleasant associations, and when she sat in the little vine-covered summer-house and listened to the birds nesting in the trees above, the long twelve years she had lived seemed like a bad dream, hazy and unreal—the real things were the birds and the vines, and her mother's love.

July came in warm and sultry, but behind the morning-glory vines that closed in the small veranda it was always cool and pleasant. One day Mrs. Cavers, lying in the hammock, was looking at the sweet face of her mother, who sat knitting beside her. All afternoon, as she lay there, she had been thinking of the hot, busy days on the farm which she must soon face—the busy, busy farm, where the work has to be done, for the men must be fed. Each day she seemed to dread it more—the early rising, the long, long hours, the constant hurry and rush, the interminable washing of heavy, white dishes in a hot little kitchen, reeking with tobacco smoke. She had gone through it many times, cheerfully, bravely, for there had always been in her heart the hope of something better—good days would surely come, when her husband would do better, and they would be happy yet. This thought had sustained her many times, but the good, days had never come, and now—how could she go back to it with no hope. There was nothing ahead of her but endless toil, just working every day to earn a living. Oh, was life really such a priceless boon that people should crave it so!

"Must you really go back to the West, Ellie dear?" her mother asked, as if she read her daughter's bitter thoughts.

Mrs. Cavers sat up and smiled bravely. "Oh, yes, mother, it's the West for me; but some day we'll come back again for another one of these dear, lovely visits. I always felt I would never really be rested until I got back here and had you to sit beside me. But, of course, I must go back for the harvest—it is really a beautiful country, and especially so in the fall of the year, and I have some business there which I must go and attend to." She did not tell the nature of the business.

"Ellie, I would like to have you always with me, and your dear little girl—there's only the four of us, and we are so happy here. Why can't you stay with us?"

Mrs. Cavers knew why, but she could not tell her mother that she had very little in the world beyond the price of a ticket back to Manitoba.

"I've been praying every day since you came, Ellie, that we would never need to part again," her mother said wistfully. "I can't let you go, it seems."

Just then the gate clicked and a heavy step came rapidly up the walk. Mrs. Cavers, starting to her feet, found herself face to face with Sandy Braden as he came up the steps.

For a few seconds neither of them spoke. Then Mrs. Cavers held out her hand. "Mr. Braden," she said. Words failed her.

"I want to speak to you for a few minutes," he said.

She opened the door and led him into the little parlour.

"Mrs. Cavers, I know that my presence is full of bitter memories for you," he began. "You have no reason to think kindly of me, I well know; but no one else could do this for me, or I would not force myself on you this way——"

She interrupted him. "You were kind to me and my little girl once; you did for us what few would have done. I have never thanked you, but I have always been and always will be grateful; and when I think of you—that is what I remember."

There was a silence between them for a few seconds. Then he spoke.

"I don't know how to begin to say what I want to say. I did you a great wrong—you, and others, too; not willfully, but I did it just the same. I can never make amends. Oh, forgive me for talking about making amends—but you're not the only one who has suffered; it's with me night and day. I can see Bill's face that day—on the river-bank! I liked Bill, too. As you know, I closed the bar that day forever, but it was too late—to help Bill."

Mrs. Cavers was holding the back of a chair, her face colourless and drawn.

"I heard a few days ago that you were coming back to Manitoba to work, to earn your living and the little girl's. I can't stand that—I had to come—Oh, don't scorn me like that—let me help you. If it had not been for my bar you would have had plenty. I want you to take this; it's the deed of a half-section of land near Brandon—it will keep you in plenty. I'm a blundering fellow—I've put it roughly, but God knows I mean it all right."

He stopped and wiped the perspiration from his face.

"I can't take it," Mrs. Cavers said, without moving.

"You must!" he cried, moving nearer to her. "Don't refuse! Oh, Mrs. Cavers, you were merciful to me once—do you mind how you held out your hand to me that day? God bless you, it was like a drop of water to a man in hell. Have mercy now; take a little of the burden from a guilty man's heart."

"I do forgive you freely, and I wish you well, but—I—I—can't take your money," she whispered hoarsely.

He walked up and down the room for a few moments, then turned to her again.

"Mrs. Cavers, I've been a guilty man, careless and hard, but that day—on the river-bank—I saw things as I never saw them before, and I'm trying to be square. My mother"—his voice broke and his eyes glistened—"my mother has been in heaven twenty years. She always told me about God's mercy to—the very worst—that He turned no one down that came to Him. My mother was that kind herself, and knowing her—has made it easier for me to believe that—God is always merciful—and always willing—to give a fellow a—a second chance. I can't look for it or ask it until—you take this. Now, Mrs. Cavers, I know you don't like me—why should you?—but won't you take it?"

She hesitated, and was about to refuse again, when he suddenly seized her arm and compelled her to meet his gaze.

"For God's sake!" he cried.

Mrs. Cavers took the document in her trembling hands.

Sandy Braden turned to leave the room, but she detained him.

"Mr. Braden," she almost whispered, her voice was so low, "I have a mother like yours, one who makes it easy to believe that God is always loving and kind—I want her to thank you for me. Tell her all about it—she'll understand, just like your own mother would—these dear old mothers are all the same."

Mrs. Cavers went back to the veranda and brought her mother into the parlour; then she went out, leaving them alone.

What passed between them no one ever knew, but an hour later Sandy Braden went out from the little white cottage with a new light shining in his face, and the peace of God, which passes all understanding, in his heart. He went back into the world that day destined to do a strong man's part in the years to come.



CHAPTER XXXV

THE LURE OF LOVE AND THE WEST

If you've heard the wild goose honking, if you've seen the sunlit plain, If you've breathed the smell of ripe grain, dewy, wet, You may go away and leave it, say you will not come again, But it's in your blood, you never can forget.

THERE is a belief, to which many sentimental people still hold, in spite of all contradictory evidence, that marriages are arranged in heaven, and that no amount of earthly wire-pulling can alter the decrees of the Supreme Court. Many beautiful sentiments have been expressed, bearing on this alluring theme, but none more comprehensive than Aunt Kate Shenstone's brief summary: "You'll get whoever is for ye, and that's all there is to it."

Theoretically, Mrs. Burrell was a believer in this doctrine of non-resistance, modified, however, by the fact that she also believed in the existence of earthly representatives of the heavenly matrimonial bureau, to whom is entrusted the pleasing duty of selecting and pairing. Of this glorious company, Mrs. Burrell believed herself a member in good standing, and one who stood high upon the honour roll. Therefore, having decided that Arthur should marry Martha Perkins she proceeded to arrange the match with a boldness that must have made the angels tremble.

She planned an evening party, and wrote to Arthur asking him to bring Martha, but forgot to send Martha an invitation, which rather upset her plans, for Martha declined to go. Mrs. Burrell, however, not to be outdone, took Arthur aside and talked to him very seriously about his matrimonial prospects; but Arthur brought the conversation to an abrupt close by telling her he had not the slightest intention of marrying, and had quite made up his mind to go back to England as soon as the harvest was over.

When Mrs. Burrell was telling her husband about it she was almost in tears.

"If he goes to England, John, we'll never see him again; he'll marry an English girl—I know it. They're so thick over there he can't help it, when he sees so many dangling after him! He'll just have to marry one of them."

"To thin them out, I suppose you mean," her husband said, smiling. "Don't worry, anyway, and above all things, don't interfere. Leave something for Providence to do."

After Mrs. Cavers and Libby Anne had gone, life in the Perkins's home settled down to its old pleasing monotony. The schoolmaster found Martha a willing and apt pupil, and came to look forward with pleasure to the evenings he spent helping her to understand the world in which she was living. Dr. Emory paid his regular visits, seeking with the magic arts of music to draw Arthur's thoughts down the pleasant lanes of love. Pearl Watson, like a true general, kept a strict oversight of everything, but apparently took no active part herself; only on Saturday afternoons, which she usually spent with Martha, she had Martha tell her the stories she had read during the week. At first the telling was haltingly done, for Martha was not gifted with fluent speech, but under the spell of Pearl's sympathetic listening, her story-telling powers developed amazingly.

When the summer days came, with their wealth of flowers and singing birds, to Martha the whole face of Nature seemed changed; she heard new music in the meadowlark's ringing note, and the plaintive piping of the whippoorwill. The wild roses' fragrant beauty, the gorgeous colouring of the tiger-lilies and moccasin flowers, the changing hues of the grainfields at noon-day as the drifting clouds threw racing shadows over them, were all possessed of a new charm, a new power to thrill her heart, for the old miracle of love and hope had come to Martha, the old witchery that has made "blue skies bluer and green things greener," for us all. There was the early rising in the dewy mornings when the river-valley was filled with silvery mist, through which the trees loomed gray and ghostly; there was the quivering heat of noonday, that played strange tricks on the southern horizon, when even the staid old Tiger Hills seemed to pulsate with the joy of summer; and, then the evenings, when the day's work was done, and the western sky was all aglow with crimson and gold.

One quiet Sunday evening in harvest time, Martha and Arthur stood beside the lilac hedge and watched the sun going down behind the Brandon Hills. Before them stretched the long field of ripening grain. There was hardly a leaf stirring on the trees over their heads, but the tall grain rustled and whispered of the abundance of harvest.

As they listened to the rustling of the wheat Martha said: "I have been trying to think what it sounds like, but can think of nothing better than the bursting of soap-bubbles on a tub of water, and that's a very unpoetical comparison."

"I think it's a very good one, though," Arthur said, absently.

"And it seems to whisper: 'Plenty, plenty, plenty,' as if it would tell us we need not rush and worry so," she went on. "I love to listen to it. It has such a contented sound."

Arthur sighed wearily, and looking up, Martha saw his face was sad with bitter memories.

"What is it, Arthur?" she said, drawing nearer in quick sympathy.

"I'm all right," he answered quickly, but, with an effort; "just a little bit blue, perhaps."

"How can anyone be blue to-night with everything so beautiful and full of promise?" Martha cried.

"There are other things—beside these," he said gloomily.

Martha shrank back at his words, for she knew of whom he was thinking. Then a sudden rage seized her, and she turned and faced him with a new light burning in her eyes.

"You must forget her!" she cried. "You must! She cares nothing for you. She, never loved you, or she would not have treated you so badly. She soon let you go when she got what she thought, was a better chance. Why do you go on loving her?" She seized his arm and shook him. "It's foolish, it's weak—why do you do it? I wouldn't waste a thought on any one who cares nothing for me—it isn't—it isn't——" she stopped abruptly, and the colour surged into her pale face.

"Oh, Arthur, forgive me for speaking so." All the anger had gone from her voice. "I cannot bear to see you so unhappy. Try to forget her. The world is wide and beautiful."

In the western sky a band of crimson circled the horizon.

"Martha," Arthur said gently, "you are one of the truest friends a fellow ever had, and I know you think I am foolish and sentimental, but I am just a little bit upset to-day. I saw her last night—she and—her husband were on the train going to Winnipeg, and I saw them at the station. She's lovelier than ever. This sounds foolish to you, I know, Martha, but that's because you don't know. I hope you will never know."

Martha turned away hastily.

"All this," he continued, waving his hand toward the evening sky and the quiet landscape, "all this reminds me of her. You know, Martha, when you look at the sun for a while you can see suns everywhere you look; that's the way it is with me."

The colour was fading from the sky; only the faintest trace of rose-pink tinged the gray clouds.

"I think I shall go home to England," Arthur said, after a long silence. "I shall go home for a while, and then, perhaps—pshaw! I don't know what I shall do." In the failing light he could not see the pallor of Martha's face, neither did he notice that she shivered as if with cold.

The sunset glory had all gone from the clouds; there was nothing left now but the ashes.

"I am sorry you are going," Martha said steadily. "We will miss you."

The schoolmaster, who was sitting by the kitchen window, noticed Martha's white face when she came into the house and guessed the cause. Looking after Arthur as he walked rapidly down the road to his own house, Mr. Donald shook his head sadly, murmuring to himself: "Lord, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"

When Martha went up to her own room she sat before the mirror as she had done that at other night two years before, and looked sadly at her face reflected there. She recalled his words: "She is lovelier than ever"—this was what had won and held his love. Oh, this cruel, unjust world, where the woman without beauty has to go lonely, hungry, unmated—it was not fair; she stretched out her arms in an agony of longing.

"Thursa cares nothing for him, and I would gladly die to save him pain!" she whispered hoarsely.

She tore off her collar roughly and threw it from her; she took down her hair and brushed it almost savagely; then she went to the open window, and, leaning on the casement, listened to the rustling of the wheat. It no longer sang to her of peace and plenty, but inexorable, merciless as the grave itself, it spoke to her of heart-break and hopes that never come true.

* * *

In September Arthur went to England. After he had gone, Martha went about her work with the same quiet cheerfulness. She had always been a kind-hearted neighbour, but now she seemed to delight in deeds of mercy. She still studied with the school-master, who daily admired the bravery with which she hid her heartache. Martha was making a fight, a brave fight, with an unjust world. She would study—she would fit herself yet for some position in life when her parents no longer needed her. Surely, there was some place where a woman would not be disqualified because she was not beautiful.

Arthur had written regularly to her. Looking ahead, she dreaded the time when he would cease to write, though she tried to prepare for it by telling herself over and over again that it must surely come.

Arthur's last letter came in November, and now with Christmas coming nearer, Martha was lonelier than ever for a word from him. The week before Christmas she looked for his letter every day. Christmas eve came, a beautiful moonlight, sparkling night, with the merry jingle of sleighbells, in the air, but no letter had yet come.

Mr. and Mrs. Perkins and Bud had driven in to Millford to attend the concert given by the Sunday-school, but Martha stayed at home. When they were gone, and she sat alone in the quiet house, a great restlessness seized her. She tried to read and then to sew, but her mind, in spite of her, would go back to happier days. It was not often that Martha allowed herself to indulge in self-pity; but to-night, as she looked squarely into the future and saw it stretching away before her, barren and gray, it seemed hard to keep back the tears. It was not like Martha to give way to her emotions; perhaps it was the Christmas feel in the air that gripped her heart with new tenderness.

She finished making the pudding for the Christmas dinner, and put the last coat of icing on the Christmas cake, and then forced herself to dress another doll for one of the neighbour's children. Sometimes the tears dimmed her eyes, but she wiped them away bravely.

Suddenly a loud knock sounded on the door. Martha sprang up in some confusion, and hastily tried to hide the traces of her tears, but before she was ready to open the door it opened from without and Arthur stood smiling before her.

"Oh, Arthur!" she cried, her face glowing with the love she could not hide. "I was just thinking that you had stopped writing to me."

"Well, I have, too," he laughed; "letters are not much good anyway. I knew you were here, for I met the others on the road," he continued, as he hung his overcoat on its old nail behind the door, "and so I hurried along, for I have a great many things to tell you. No," in answer to her question, "I have not had supper—I couldn't wait. I wanted to see you. I've made, a big discovery."

Martha had put the tea-kettle on and was stirring the fire.

"Don't bother getting any supper for me until I tell you what I found out."

She turned around and faced him, her heart beating faster at the eagerness in his voice.

"Martha, dear," he said, "I cannot do without you—that's the discovery I made. I have been lonely—lonely for this broad prairie and you. The Old Country seemed to stifle me; everything is so little and crowded and bunched up, and so dark and foggy—it seemed to smother me. I longed to hear the whirr of prairie chickens and see the wild ducks dipping in the river; I longed to hear the sleighs creaking over the frosty roads; and so I've come home to all this—and you, Martha," He came nearer and held out his arms. "You're the girl for me."

Martha drew away from him. "Arthur, are you sure?" she cried. "Perhaps it's just the country you're in love with. Are you sure it isn't just the joy of getting back to it all. It can't be me—I am only a plain country girl, not pretty, not educated, not clever, not——"

He interrupted her in a way that made further speech not only impossible but quite unnecessary.

"Martha, I tell you it is you that makes me love this country. When I thought of the sunlit prairie it was your dear eyes that made it glorious. Your voice is sweeter than the meadowlark's song at sunrise. You are the soul of this country for me—you stand for it all. You are the sunshine, the birdsong, the bracing air, the broad outlook, the miles of golden wheat. Now, tell me, dear, for you haven't told me yet, are you glad to see me back?"

"But what would your mother say?" Martha asked, evading his question. "Arthur, think of the people at home."

He opened his pocket-book and took out a leather case. Springing the lid, he handed it to her, saying: "My mother knows all about you, and she sends you this."

Martha took out the beautiful necklace of pearls and read the tender little note, inside the case. Her eyes filled with happy tears, and looking up into Arthur's smiling face, her last doubt vanished.

A few hours later, when the old clock on the wall, slowly struck the midnight hour, telling them that another Christmas morning had come, they listened to it, hand in hand without a spoken word, but in their hearts was the echo of all the Christmas bells that were ringing around the world.

THE END