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Updated: May 12, 2025
Now and then a clump of willows or a birch bluff flitted out of the dimness, grew a trifle blacker, and was left behind, but there was still no sign of habitation, and Alfreton, too chilled at last to speak, passed the reins to Winston, and beat his mittened hands. Winston could scarcely grasp them, for he had lived of late in the cities, and the cold he had been sheltered from was numbing.
Half an hour later Alfreton pulled the wagon up amid the birches on the edge of the ravine, which just there sloped steep as a railway cutting, and not very much broader, to the creek. Winston gazed at it, and then handed the twine to the hired man. "Take that with you, Charley, and get down," he said. "If you strip your boots off you can wade through the creek."
They came out upon the high road to Alfreton, which ran white between the darkening fields. There Paul hesitated. It was two miles home for him, one mile forward for Miriam. They both looked up the road that ran in shadow right under the glow of the north-west sky.
Now, as Alfreton is driving in to-morrow, he could take you." Winston was grateful to her, and still more to Miss Barrington, who came in just then, while he did not see the girl again before he departed with Alfreton on the morrow.
It is even claimed for Mr. Young's little factory at Alfreton that it was the parent, not only of the Scotch mineral oil trade, but also of that of America; for oil had never been distilled to produce an article of commerce until he commenced to work his patent there.
Finally Alfreton, who was a trifle too quick for the others, got him into his sleigh, and they swept out behind a splendid team into the frozen stillness of the prairie. The white leagues rolled behind them, the cold grew intense, but while Winston was for the most part silent, and apparently preoccupied, Alfreton talked almost incessantly, and only once looked grave.
Alfreton, who seemed to quiver, turned to his companion, and then forgot what he had to tell him. Winston had straightened himself, and his eyes were shining, while the lad was puzzled by his face. Still, save for the little tremor in it his voice was very quiet. "It has come at last," he said. "Two farms would not have covered your losses, Alfreton, if you had waited until to-morrow.
Dane dare urge nothing further, and spent the rest of that day wandering up and down the city, in a state of blissful content, with Alfreton and Winston. One of them had turned his losses into a small profit, and the other two, who had, hoping almost against hope, sown when others had feared to plow, saw that the harvest would repay them beyond their wildest expectations.
That happened when Winston asked about Colonel Barrington. The lad shook his head. "I scarcely think he will ever take hold again," he said. "You will understand me better when you see him." They stopped a while at mid-day at an outlying farm, but Winston glanced inquiringly at Alfreton when one of the sleighs went on. The lad smiled at him. "Yes," he said.
The corridor rang with footsteps, the murmur of voices seemed to vibrate through the great building, while it seemed to Alfreton there was a suggestion of strain and expectancy in all he heard and saw.
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