"
"But beautiful, Madame,--oh! it is beautiful, is it not?"
"Fair,--wid high hills an' a great blue lake an' woildness!--Ah!"
But the tall leader was calling and camp was breaking for another
stretch.
And under the travelling stars of that night there awoke in the heart
of the maid of the trail something of the old love, the old longing for
that goal of her life's ambition.
She had turned aside from it, only to be taught a lesson whose scars
would stay deep in her soul so long as life lasted.
At last came an hour when the party under O'Halloran must turn to the
east, where the bottle-neck of Winnipeg split in two, going down that
well-worn way which led to Lake of the Woods, Rainy River, and at last
to the wide lakes, whose sparkling waves would waft them on to the
great outside world.
There was a scene at parting, when the warmhearted Irishwoman clung to
Maren and wept against her bosom, calling her all the hundred words for
"darling" in the Celtic and vowing to remember her always.
The fair woman, wife of a Scotchman who acted as some sort of secretary
to O'Halloran, sat apart in cold silence.
"M'sieu," said Maren, at the last, "I have no words to thank you for
this that you have done.
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