there in the distance one could see an outlying farm. A row
of houses followed the crest of the ravine, the side of which formed a
dumping ground for domestic refuse. Some were built of small logs, and
some of shiplap lumber which had cracked with exposure to the sun, but
all had a neglected and poverty-stricken air. The land was poor and
the settlement located too far from a market. With leaden
thunderclouds hanging over it, the place looked as desolate as the
sad-coloured waste.

Following the deeply-rutted street, which had a narrow, plank sidewalk,
they reached the Imperial hotel; a somewhat pretentious,
double-storeyed building of unpainted wood, with a verandah in front of
it. Here Gardner took the pony from them and gave them a room which
had no furniture except a chair and two rickety iron beds. Before he
went out he indicated a printed list of the things they were not
allowed to do. Harding studied it with a sardonic smile.

"I don't see much use in prohibiting folks from washing their clothes
in the bedrooms when they don't give you any water," he remarked.
"This place must be about the limit in the way of cheap hotels."

"It isn't cheap," said Blake; "I've seen the tariff, but on the whole I
like the fellow who keeps it."

They found their supper better than they had reason to expect, and
afterwards sat out on the verandah with the proprietor and one or two
of the settlers who boarded at the hotel. The sun had set and now and
then a heavy shower beat upon the shingled roof, but the western sky
was clear and flushed with vivid crimson, towards which the prairie
rolled away in varying tones of blue. Lights shone in the windows
behind the verandah, and from one which stood open a hoarse voice
drifted out, singing in a maudlin fashion snatches of an old music-hall
ditty.

"It's that fool Benson--Clarke's Englishman," Gardner explained.
"Found he'd got into my bed with his boots on after falling down in a
muskeg. It's not the first time he's played that trick; when he gets
worse than usual he makes straight for my room."

"Why do you give him the liquor?" Harding inquired.

"I don't," said Gardner drily. "He's a pretty regular customer, but he
never gets too much at this hotel."

"And there isn't another."

"That's so," Gardner agreed, but he offered no explanation and Blake
changed the subject.

"Unless you're fond of farming, life in these remote districts is
trying," he remarked. "The