We haven't all the money we need, and the fact worries me. Papa says he will hire Bill to some one if any one should need help. It might be that the colored man will hire him, maybe. They say he is going to hire a man. Papa intends to speak to him about it. The only thing that worries us is that we have to explain that weakness in Bill and George. George is impossible: too slow, talks too much, and would never earn his salt. But if one is patient with Bill until he catches on, he is an excellent worker, and faithful. I wish the colored man would give him the job. He owns the quarter that corners with us, which he expects to complete breaking out and putting into flax next summer, so we are told. If Bill could get that job it would be handy. Handy for Bill, for Mr. Baptiste, and for us.

We have not met many people as yet. Because it is so cold to get out, I haven't met any so to speak; but papa appears to be getting acquainted right along. We are going to town--to Gregory again Saturday. I am looking forward to it with pleasant anticipation. I sincerely trust it will be a beautiful day. In the meantime the clock has struck one, papa is turning over in bed and I can hear him. I'll hear his voice presently, so I will close this with hopes that Saturday will be a beautiful day and that I'll meet and become acquainted with some nice people.

CHAPTER VIII

AN ENTERPRISING YOUNG MAN

When Jean Baptiste had found the papers belonging to Barr, and had come to understand that it had been Barr's intention to destroy the same, natural curiosity had prompted him to read into and examine what was in his possession.

But after having read them, and realizing fully to return the same then, would be to have Barr know, at least feel, that he was in possession of such a grave secret, would make their, up to this time agreeable, relationship rather awkward, he was at a loss as to what to do. So in the end he laid the papers away, and waited. If Barr should make inquiries for them, he would try to find some convenient way to return the same. But on after thought, he knew that Barr would hardly start an inquiry about the matter--even if he did come to realize he had lost instead of destroyed the papers.

A few days later he saw Peter Kaden in the village, and this time observed him more closely than had been his wont theretofore. Always sad, he so remained, and down in Baptiste's heart he was sorry for the wretch. It was after he had returned home and lingered at the fire that he heard a light knock at the door. He called "Come in." The door was opened and Augustus M. Barr stood in the doorway.

Baptiste was for a time slightly nervous. He was glad then that it was dark within the room, otherwise Barr must have seen him give a quick start.

"Ah-ha," began Barr, cheerfully, coming forward and taking the chair Baptiste placed at his disposal. "Quite comfortable in the little sod house on the claim."

"Quite comfortable," returned Baptiste evenly, his mind upon the papers so near. He didn't trust himself to comment. He waited for whatever was to happen.

"Suppose you are thinking about the big crop you will seed in the springtime," ventured Barr.

"Yes," admitted Baptiste, for in truth, the same had been on his mind before Barr put in his appearance. "Suppose you will put out quite a crop yourself in the spring," he ventured in return.

"Well, I don't know," said Barr thoughtfully. "I fear I'm getting a little old to farm--and this baching!" Baptiste thought about Christine who was not so far away instead of in England.... He marveled at the man's calm nerve. It did not seem possible that a man of this one's broad education could be so low as to resort to fallacies.

"No," he heard Barr again. "I don't think that I shall farm next summer.

In fact I have about decided to make proof on my claim, and that is what I have called on you in regard to. I suppose I can count you as witness to the fact?" Baptiste was relieved. Barr still thought he had destroyed the papers. He was smiling when he replied:

"Indeed, I shall be glad to attest to the fact you refer to."

"Thanks," Said Barr, and rose to go.

"No hurry."

"I must go into town on a matter of business," said Barr from the doorway. "Well," he paused briefly and then said, "I am applying for a date, and when that is settled I shall let you know."

"Very well. Good day."

"Good day, my friend," and he went over the hill.

Baptiste was thoughtful when he was gone. He looked after him and thought about the papers. He marveled again at the man's calmness....

Then suddenly he arose as a thought struck him, and going to his trunk, lifted from the top the last issue of the Dallas _Enterprise_. He glanced quickly through the columns and then his eyes rested on a legal notice. He smiled.

"Old Peter is going to make proof.... So is Barr. The eternal triangle begins to take shape...." He got up and went to the door. Over the hill he saw Barr just entering the town.... "This is beginning to get interesting.... But I don't like the Kaden end of it.... I wish I could do something.... Something to help Kaden...."

Saturday was a beautiful day. To Gregory from miles around went almost everybody. So along with the rest went Jean Baptiste. He fostered certain hopes,--had ulterior purposes in view. Firstly, it was a nice day, the town he knew would be filled; and secondly, he was subtly interested in Kaden. He had seen by the paper that he was advertised to make proof that day on his homestead.... Another thing, whenever he thought of Kaden, he could not keep Barr, and Syfe, and lastly, Christine, out of his mind....

He found the little town filled almost to overflowing when he arrived.

Teams were tied seemingly to every available post. The narrow board walks were crowded, the saloons were full, red liquor was doing its bit; while the general stores were alive with girls, women and children. A jovial day was ahead and old friendships were revived and new ones made.

There is about a new country an air of hopefulness that is contagious.

Here in this land had come the best from everywhere: the best because they were for the most part hopeful and courageous; that great army of discontented persons that have been the forerunners of the new world.

Mingled in the crowd, Jean Baptiste regarded the unusual conglomeration of kinds. There were Germans, from Germany, and there were Swedes from Sweden, Danes from Denmark, Norwegians from Norway. There were Poles, and Finns and Lithuanians and Russians; there were French and a few English; but of his race he was the only one.

As a whole the greater portion were from the northern parts of the United States, and he was glad that they were. With them there was no "Negro problem," and he was glad there was not. The world was too busy to bother with such: he was glad to know he could work unhampered. He was looked at curiously by many. To the young, a man of his skin was something rare, something new. He smiled over it with equal amusement, and then in a store he walked right into Agnes, the first time he had seen her since the morning at the sod house. He was greatly surprised, and rather flustrated,--and was glad again his skin was dark. She could not see the blood that went to his face; while with her, it showed most furiously.

As the meeting was unexpected, all she had thought and felt in the weeks since, came suddenly to the surface in her expression. In spite of her effort at self control, her blushing face evidenced her confusion upon seeing him again. But with an effort, she managed to bow courteously, while he was just as dignified. They would have passed and gone their ways had it not been that in that instant another, a lady, a neighbor and friend of Baptiste's, came upon them. She had become acquainted with Agnes that day, and was very fond of Baptiste. Although her name was Reynolds, she was a red blooded German, sociable, kind and obliging. She had not observed that they had exchanged greetings--did not know, obviously, that the two were acquainted; wherefore, her neighborly instincts became assertive.

Coming forward volubly, anxiously, she caught Baptiste by the hand and shook it vigorously. "Mr. Baptiste, Mr. Baptiste!" she cried, punctuating the hand shaking with her voice full of joy, her red, healthy face beaming with smiles. "How very glad I am to see you! You have not been to see us for an age, and I have asked Tom where you were.

We feared you had gone off and done something serious," whereupon she winked mischievously. Baptiste understood and smiled.

"You are certainly looking well for an old bachelor," she commented, after releasing his hand and looking into his face seriously, albeit amusedly, mischievously. "We were at Dallas and got some of the coal you were brave enough to bring from Bonesteel that awful cold day. My, Jean, you certainly are possessed with great nerve! While that coal to everybody was a godsend, yet think of the risk you took! Why, supposing you had gotten lost in that terrific storm; lost as people have been in the West before! You must be careful," she admonished, kindly. "You are really too fine a young man to go out here and get frozen to death, indeed!" Baptiste started perceptibly. She regarded him questioningly.

Unconsciously his eyes wandered toward Agnes who stood near, absorbed in all Mrs. Reynolds had been saying. His eyes met hers briefly, and the events of the night at the sod house passed through the minds of both.

The next moment they looked away, and Mrs. Reynolds, not understanding, glanced toward Agnes. She was by disposition versatile. But she caught her breath now with sudden equanimity, as she turned to Agnes and cried:

"Oh, Miss Stewart, you!" she smiled with her usual delight and going toward Agnes caught her arm affectionately, and then, with face still beaming, she turned to where Baptiste stood.

"I want you, Miss Stewart," she said with much ostentation, "to meet one of our neighbors and friends; one of the most enterprising young men of the country, Mr. Jean Baptiste. Mr. Baptiste, Miss Agnes Stewart." She did it gracefully, and for a time was overcome by her own vanity. In the meantime the lips of both those before her parted to say that they had met, and then slowly, understandingly, they saw that this would mean to explain.... Their faces lighted with the logic of meeting formally, and greetings were exchanged to fit the occasion.

For the first time he was permitted to see her, to regard her as the real Agnes. There was no embarrassment in her face but composure as she extended her small ungloved hand this time and permitted it to rest lightly in his palm. She smiled easily as she accepted his ardent gaze and showed a row of even white teeth momentarily before turning coquetishly away.

He regarded her intimately in one sweep of his eyes. She accepted this also with apparent composure. She was now fully normal in her composition. That about her which others had understood, and were inspired to call beautiful now seemed to strangely affect him.

Was it because he was hungry for woman's love; because since he had looked upon this land of promise and out of the visions she had come to him in those long silent days; because of his lonely young life there in the sod house she had communed with him; was it that he had imagined her sweet radiance that now caused him to feel that she was beautiful?

She had looked away only briefly, as if to give him time to think, to consider her, and then she turned her eyes upon him again. She regarded him frankly then, albeit admiringly. She wanted to hear him say something. She was not herself aware of how anxious she was to hear him speak; for him to say anything, would please her. And as she stood before him in her sweet innocence, all the goodness she possessed, the heart and desire always to be kind, to do for others as she had always, was revealed to him. His dream girl she was, and in reality she had not disappointed him.

If visionary he had loved her, he now saw her and what was hers. Her wondrous hair, rolled into a frivolous knot at the back of her head made her face appear the least slender when it was really square; the chestnut glint of it seemed to contrast coquettishly with her white skin; and the life, the healthy, cheerful life that now gave vigor to her blood brought faint red roses to her cheeks; roses that seemed to come and go. Her red lips seemed to tempt him, he was captivated. He forgot in this intimate survey that she was of one race while he, Jean Baptiste, was of another.... And that between their two races, the invisible barrier, the barrier which, while invisible was so absolute, so strong, so impossible of melting that it was best for the moment that he forget it.

While all he saw passed in a moment, he regarded her slenderness as she stood buttoned in the long coat, and wondered how she, so slight and fragile, had been able to lift his heavy frame upon the bed where he had found himself. And still before words had passed between them, he saw her again, and that singularity in the eyes had come back; they were blue and then they were brown, but withal they were so baffling. He did not seem to understand her when they were like this, yet when so he felt strangely a greater right, the right to look into and feast in what he saw, regardless of _the custom of the country and its law_.... And still while he was not aware of it, Jean Baptiste came to feel that there was something between them. Though infinite, in the life that was to come, he now came strangely to feel sure that he was to know her, to become more intimately acquainted with her, and with this consciousness he relaxed. The spell that had come from meeting her again, from being near her, from holding her hand in his though formally, the exchange of words passed and he gradually became his usual self; the self that had always been his in this land where others than those of the race to which he belonged were the sole inhabitants. He was relieved when he heard Mrs.

Reynolds' voice:

"Miss Stewart and her folks have just moved out from Indiana, Jean, and are renting on the Watson place over east of you; the place that corners with the quarter you purchased last fall, you understand."

"Indeed!" Baptiste echoed with feigned ignorance, his eyebrows dilating.

"Yes," she went on with concern, "And you are neighbors."

"I'm glad--honored," Baptiste essayed.

"He is flattering," blushed Agnes, but she was pleased.

"And you'll find Mr. Baptiste the finest kind of neighbor, too," cried Mrs. Reynolds with equal delight.