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Updated: June 4, 2025
Sadie misled me about that; she used to hint that I had only to apply my talents and pick up the cash; but since she's a business woman, she ought to have known better. The virtuous path is about as rocky as luck can make it; but perhaps you take something for granted if you allow that making money is virtuous." Festing frowned impatiently. "One ought to pay one's debts."
"A rabbit, choking, in a snare," she answered with a look of horror. Festing leaped across a ditch and plunged into the briars. Helen heard the rotten fence-rails smash and he vanished behind the thorny branches that closed across the gap. She was glad he had gone so quickly; partly because it was her wish, and partly because she saw the cry of pain had moved him.
There was not much rain, but thick mist rolled across the top of the hill they were now level with, and everything below was blotted out. Leaving the stones, they crossed a belt of boggy grass where their feet sank, but Festing felt it a relief to have done with the rocks. The narrow tableland they were crossing was comfortingly flat, and he looked forward to descending a long grassy slope.
For a few minutes they struggled against the gale, and then the roar Festing had heard behind the scream drowned the rumbling thunder. He threw up his arm to guard his face as the terrible hail of the plains drove down the blast. It fell in oblique lines of ragged lumps of ice, hammering upon the wagon and bringing the horses to a stop.
Tents, iron huts, and rude log shacks slipped past; men in muddy slickers drew back against the bank, and then the train stopped. Festing got down into the water that flowed among the ties, and Kerr came forward in dripping slickers. "If you want help to get the teams out, I'll send some of the boys," he said. "If not, you had better come along and I'll show you your shack.
Festing remembered his keenness and careless good-humor when he began to farm, but disappointment had blunted the first, though his carelessness remained. He had been fastidious, but one now got a hint of a coarse streak and there was something about his face that indicated dissipation. Yet Festing admitted that he had charm. "You don't look happy," he remarked.
Putting the lid on the stove, he took the lamp from Charnock's unsteady hand, and, when he had lighted it, found a brush and set to work. Presently Charnock made a vague sign of relief as he looked at the swept floor. "All gone!" he remarked. "There was something I couldn't find. Suppose I burned it, though I don't remember." "There's nothing left," said Festing, who felt guilty.
She looked fresh and vigorous, although the summer had been hot and she worked hard; the numerous petty difficulties she had to contend with had left no mark. Her courage had always been evident, but she had shown a resolution that Festing had not quite expected. He admired it, in a way, but it was sometimes awkward when they took a different point of view.
The engineers can hardly have had time to make a proper test." "I have some grounds for being anxious. If the fellows aren't satisfied, we won't get paid." Helen smiled. "You're really afraid that Bob may have been careless and neglected something!" "Bob's a very good partner; I've confessed that I misjudged him," Festing answered with a touch of embarrassment.
Helen did so and waited until Festing resumed: "To begin with, I've been a short-sighted, censorious fool about Bob. I'm ashamed to remember that I said he was a shiftless wastrel. The worst is I can't apologize; it wouldn't make things better to tell him what I thought." "That's obvious," said Helen, with a smile. "Still, in a way perhaps, you were not so very wrong.
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