ady, old-fashioned in
her dress and views, this Westerner had what was, perhaps, a clearer
vision. He could imagine the Major standing fast at any cost upon some
minute point of honour, and it seemed to him that his lady might have
stepped down from some old picture with all the graces of an earlier
age and the smell of the English lavender upon her garments. Then he
remembered that, after all, Englishwomen lived somewhat coarsely in the
Georgian days, and that he had met hard-handed men grimed with dust and
sweat who could also stand fast by a point of honour in Western Canada.
Though the latter fact did not occur to him, he had, for that matter,
done it more than once himself.

Then he recalled his wandering thoughts as his hostess smiled at him.

"You are interested in all you see?" she asked frankly.

"Yes, madam," said Wyllard--and the word rose instinctively to his
lips, for it seemed to him the only fitting way to address her. "In
fact, I'd like to spend some hours here and look at everything. I'd
begin at the pictures and work right round."

His companion's smile suggested that she was not displeased.

"But you have been in London?"

"I have," said Wyllard. "I had one or two letters to folks there from
big flour shippers, and they did all they could to entertain me.
Still, their places were different; they hadn't the--charm--of yours.
It's something which I think could only exist in these still valleys
and in cathedral closes. It strikes me more because it is something
I've never been accustomed to."

The lady was interested, and fancied that she partly understood his
attitude.

"Your life is necessarily different from ours," she suggested.

Wyllard smiled. "It's so different that you couldn't realise it. It's
all strain and effort from early sunrise until after dusk at night.
Bodily strain of aching muscles, and mental stress in adverse seasons.
We scarcely think of comfort, and never dream of artistic luxury. The
dollars we raise are sunk again in seed and extra teams and ploughs."

"After all, a good many people are driven rather hard by the love of
money here."

"No," said Wyllard gravely, "that's not it exactly. At least, not with
most of us. It's rather the pride of wresting another quarter-section
from the prairie, taking--our own--by labour, breaking the wilderness.
You"--and he added this as though to explain that he could hardly
expect her to quite grasp his views--"have never b