Hawtrey bought a pair, and the storekeeper took a fur cap out of another box.

"Now," he said, "this is just the thing she'd like to go with the mittens. There's style about that cap; feel the gloss of it."

Hawtrey bought the cap, and smiled as he swung himself up into his waggon. Gloves are not much use in the prairie frost, and mittens, which are not divided into finger-stalls, will within limits fit almost anybody. This, he felt, was fortunate, for he was not quite sure that he meant to give them to Agatha.

It was bitterly cold, and the pace the team made was slow, for the snow was loose and too thin for a sled of any kind, which, after all, is not very generally used upon the prairie. As the result of this, night had closed down and Hawtrey was frozen almost stiff when at last a birch bluff rose out of the waste in front of him. It cut black against the cold blueness of the sky and the spectral gleam of snow, but when he had driven a little further a stream of ruddy orange light appeared in the midst of it. A few minutes later he pulled his team up in front of a little log-built house, and getting down with difficulty saw the door open as he approached it. Sally stood in the entrance silhouetted against a blaze of cheerful light.

"Oh!" she said. "Gregory!"

Hawtrey recognised the thrill in her voice, and took both her hands, as he had once been in the habit of doing.

"Will you let me in?" he asked.

The girl laughed in a rather strained fashion. She had been a little startled, and was not quite sure yet as to how she should receive him; but in the meanwhile Hawtrey drew her in.

"The old folks are out," she said. "They've gone over to Elliot's for supper. He's bringing us a package."

Hawtrey, who explained that he had got it, let her hands go, and sat down somewhat limply. He had come suddenly out of the bitter frost into the little, brightly-lighted, stove-warmed room. In another few moments, however, the comfort and cheeriness of it appealed to him.

"This looks very cosy after my desolate room at the Range," he said.

"Then if you'll stay I'll make you supper. I suppose there's nothing to take you home?"

"No," said Hawtrey, with a significant glance at her, "there certainly isn't, Sally. As a matter of fact, I often wish there was."

He saw her sudden uncertainty, which was, however, not tinged with embarra.s.sment, and feeling that he had gone far enough in the meanwhile he went out to put up his team. When he came back there was a cloth on the table, and Sally was busy about the stove. He sat down and watched her attentively. In some respects, he thought, she compared favourably with Agatha. She had a nicely moulded figure, and a curious lithe gracefulness of carriage which was suggestive of a strong vitality, while Agatha's bearing was usually characterised by a certain rather frigid repose. This and the latter's general manner had a somewhat inciting effect on him when he was in her presence, but he now and then remembered it afterwards with resentment. Then Sally's face was at least as comely in a different way, and there was no reserve in it.

She was what he thought of as human, frankly flesh and blood. Her quick smile was, as a rule, provocative, and never chilled one as Agatha's quiet glances sometimes did.

"Sally," he said, "you've grown prettier than ever."

The girl turned partly round towards him with a slow, sinuous movement that he found seductively graceful.

"Now," she said, "you oughtn't to say those things to me."

Hawtrey laughed; he was usually sure of his ground with Sally.

"Why shouldn't I, when it's just what you are?"

"For one thing, Miss Ismay wouldn't like it."

The man's face hardened. "I'm not sure she'd mind. Anyway, Miss Ismay doesn't like a good many things I'm in the habit of doing."

Sally, who had watched him closely, turned away again, but a little thrill of exultation ran through her. It had been with dismay she had first heard him speak of his marriage, which was, perhaps, not altogether astonishing, and she had fled home in an agony of anger and humiliation. That state of mind had, however, not lasted long, and when it became evident that the wedding was, at least, postponed indefinitely, she commenced to wonder whether it was quite impossible that Hawtrey should come back to her. She felt that he belonged to her although he had never given her any very definite claim in him. She was a trifle primitive and pa.s.sionate, but she was determined, and now he had done what she had almost expected him to do, she meant to keep him.

"You have fallen out?" she said, and contrived to keep the anxiety she was conscious of out of her voice.

The question, and more particularly the form of it, rather jarred upon Hawtrey, but he answered it.

"Oh no," he said. "As a matter of fact, Sally, you can't fall out nicely with everybody. Now when we fell out you got delightfully angry--I don't know if you were more delightful then or when you graciously agreed to make it up again." He laughed. "I almost wish I could make you a little angry now."

Sally had moved a little nearer to take a kettle off the stove, and she looked down on him with her eyes shining in the lamplight. She realised that she would have to fight Miss Ismay for this man; but there was this in her favour, that she appealed directly to one side of his nature, as Agatha, even if she had loved him, would not have done.

"Would you?" she said. "Dare you try?"

"I might if I was tempted sufficiently."

She leaned upon the table still looking at him mockingly, and she was probably aware that her pose and expression were wholly provocative.

Indeed, she could not have failed to recognise the meaning of the sudden tightening of his lips, though she did not in the least shrink from it. She had not the faintest doubt of her ability to keep him at a due distance if it appeared necessary.

"Oh," she said, "you only say things."

Hawtrey laughed, and stooping down picked up a package he had brought from the store.

"Well," he said, "after all, I think I'd rather try if I can please you." He opened the package. "Are these things very much too big for you, Sally?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'Are these things very much too big for you, Sally?'"]

The girl's eyes glistened at the sight of the mittens he held out.

They were very different from the kind she had hitherto been in the habit of wearing, and when he carelessly took out the fur cap she broke into a little cry of delight. In the meanwhile Hawtrey watched her with a rather curious expression. He was not quite sure he had meant Sally to have the things when he had purchased them, but he was quite contented now. The one gift he had somewhat diffidently offered Agatha since her arrival in Canada had been almost coldly laid aside.

In another few minutes Sally laid out supper, and as she waited upon him daintily or filled his cup Hawtrey thrust the misgivings he had felt further behind him. Sally, he thought with a little dry smile, could certainly cook. When the meal was over he sat talking about nothing in particular for almost an hour, and then stood up. It occurred to him that Sally's mother would be back before very long, and she was a person he had no great liking for.

"Well," he said, "I must be getting home. Won't you let me see you with that cap on?"

Sally, who betrayed no diffidence, put on the cap, and stood before a little dingy mirror with both hands raised while she pressed it down upon her gleaming hair. Then she flashed a smiling glance at him. It was quite sufficient, and as she turned again Hawtrey slipped forward as softly as he could. She swung round, however, with a flush in her face and a forceful, restraining gesture.

"Don't spoil it all, Gregory," she said sharply.

Hawtrey, who saw that she meant it--which was a cause of some astonishment to him--dropped his hand.

"Oh," he said, "if you look at it in that way I'm sorry. Good-night, Sally!"

She let him go, but she smiled when he drove away; and half an hour later she showed the cap and mittens to her mother with significant candour. Mrs. Creighton, who was a severely practical person, nodded.

"Well," she said, "he only wants a little managing if he bought you these, and n.o.body could say you ran after him. I wouldn't, anyway; some of them don't like it."

CHAPTER XX.

THE FIRST STAKE.

A fortnight had slipped by since the evening Hawtrey had spent with Sally, when Winifred and Sproatly once more arrived at the Hastings homestead. The girl was looking a trifle jaded, and it appeared that the manager of the elevator, who had all along treated her with a good deal of consideration, had insisted upon her going away for a few days now the pressure of business which had followed the harvest had slackened. Sproatly, as usual, had driven her in from the settlement.

When the evening meal was over they drew their chairs close up about the stove, and Hastings thrust fresh birch billets into it, for there was a bitter frost. Mrs. Hastings installed Winifred in a canvas lounge and wrapped a shawl about her.

"You haven't got warm yet, and you're looking quite worn out," she said. "I suppose Hamilton has still been keeping you at work until late at night?"