ered strips of fabric. "This," he said, "is evidently in
preparation for that ridiculous pulp-mill ball. In view of the
primitive manners of the people we shall be compelled to mix with, I
really think I am exercising a good deal of self-denial in consenting
to go at all. Why you should wish to do so is, I confess, altogether
beyond me."

"I understood that you considered it advisable to keep on good terms
with the manager," said Laura, with a trace of impatience. "He has
bought a good deal of produce from you to feed his workmen with."

Her father made a gesture of resignation. "One has certainly to put up
with a good deal that is unpleasant in this barbarous land--in fact,
almost everything in it jars upon one," he complained. "You, however,
I have sometimes wondered to notice, appear almost content here."

Laura looked up with a smile, but said nothing. She, at least, had the
sense and the courage to make the most of what could not be changed.
It was a relief to her when, a minute or two later, the hired man
opened the door.

"If you've got the embrocation, I guess I'll give that ox's leg a
rub," he said.

Waynefleet rose and turned to the girl. "I'll put on my rubber
overshoes," he announced. "As I mentioned that I might have to go out,
it's a pity you didn't think of laying out my coat to warm."

Laura brought the overshoes, and he permitted her to fasten them for
him and to hold his coat while he put it on, after which he went out
grumbling, and she sat down again to her sewing with a strained
expression in her eyes, for there were times when her father tried her
patience severely. She sighed as she contemplated the partly rigged-up
dress stretched out on the table, for she could not help remembering
how she had last worn it at a brilliant English function. Then she had
been flattered and courted, and now she was merely an unpaid toiler on
the lonely ranch. Money was, as a rule, signally scarce there, but
even when there were a few dollars in Waynefleet's possession, it
seldom occurred to him to offer any of them to his daughter. It is
also certain that nobody could have convinced him that it was only
through her efforts he was able to keep the ranch going at all. She
never suggested anything of the kind to him, but she felt now and then
that her burden was almost beyond her strength.

She quietly went on with her sewing. There was to be a dance at the
new pulp-mill, which had just been roofed, and, after