The Purple Springs district was going through a period of intense excitement. Housework languished, dough ran over, dish-water cooled. The news which paralyzed household operations came shortly after one o'clock, when Mrs. Cowan phoned to Mrs. Brownless that the teacher had just been in, and said she was going to board with the woman who lived alone. The teacher had said it, according to Mrs. Cowan, in the "most off-hand manner, just as if she said she had found her jackknife or her other rubber—just as easy as that, she said she had found a boarding house. Mrs. Howser could not take her, but Mrs. Gray could, and she was moving over right away."

Mrs. Cowan, according to her own testimony, nearly dropped. She did not really drop, but any one could easily have knocked her down; she could have been knocked down with a pin feather. She could not speak—she just stared. She went all "through other," and felt queer.

"Do you know that woman has a child?" she managed to say at last, and the teacher said, "Sure—one of the nicest I've ever seen—a perfect beauty."

Mrs. Cowan admitted to Mrs. Brownlees, who sympathized with her, that she did not know what to say then.

At last she said, "But she has no right to have a child," and the teacher said:

"Why not if she wants to. She's good to him, dresses him well and trains him well. My mother had nine—and got away with it—and likes them all. Having a child is nothing against her." Now, wasn't that an awful way for her to talk?

Mrs. Brownlees said it certainly was fierce! and the other listeners on the phone, for the audience had been augmented as the conversation proceeded, politely said nothing, but hung up their receivers with haste, and acquainted the members of their household with the disquieting news.

Mrs. Switzer threw her apron over her head and ran out to the pump, where Bill was watering his three-horse team. Bill received the news in that exasperating silence which is so hard to bear. When urged for an opinion, he said crustily: "Well, what's the girl goin' to do? None of you women would take her—she can't starve—and she can't sleep in the school woodpile. Mrs. Gray won't bite—she's a fine lookin' woman, drives a binder like a man, pays her debts, minds her own business. I don't see why it wouldn't be a good boardin' place."

In telling about it afterwards to Mrs. Howser, Mrs. Switzer said, "You know what men are like; in some ways they are hardly human—they take things so easy."

Pearl was surprised at the storm that burst, but soon realized the futility of further speech. They would not listen—they were so intent on proving the woman's guilt, they would hear no defence. From what they said, Pearl gathered that they knew nothing about Mrs. Gray except what the sewing-machine agent had told them, and even he had not claimed that he had any definite knowledge. The worst count against her was that she would not tell anything about herself. That she would not tell anything about herself, could only have one explanation! There must be nothing good to tell!

On Sunday, at the little stone church in the valley of the river Pearl took her place among the worshippers. The attendance was unusually large. A new bond of interest was binding the neighborhood together, and they spoke of it as they congregated in the church-yard before the service. Pearl sat inside and watched them as they talked together excitedly. Snatches of their conversation came to her. "Well-behaved people should stay with well-behaved people, I say"—this was from Mrs. Switzer.

The men did not join in the conversation, but stood around, ill at ease in their stiff collars, and made an attempt to talk about summer fallowing and other harmless topics. Their attitude to the whole affair was one of aloofness. Let the women settle it among themselves.

From the window where she sat Pearl could see far down the valley. The river pursued its way, happily, unperturbed by the wrongs or sorrows of the people who lived beside it. Sometimes it had reached out and drowned a couple of them as it had done last year—but no one held it against the river at all.

The rejuvenation of nature was to be seen everywhere, in springing grass and leafing tree. Everything could begin life over again. Why were the people so hard on Annie Gray, even if all they believed about her were true? Pearl wondered about the religion of people like the group who were so busily talking just outside the window. Did it not teach them to be charitable? The Good Shepherd, in the picture above the altar, had gone out to find the wandering sheep, even leaving all the others, to bring back the lost one, sorry that it had been wayward, not angry—but only sorry—Pearl hoped that they would look at it when they came in. She hoped too, that they would look at the few scattered tombstones in the churchyard, over which the birds were darting and skimming, and be reminded of the shortness of life, and their own need of mercy—and she hoped that some of the dead, who lay there so peacefully now, might have been sinners who redeemed the past and died respected, and that they might plead now with these just persons who needed no repentance.

But when the service was over, and a brief sermon on Amos and his good deeds, the congregation separated, and Pearl went back to the brown house with a heavy heart, and the cry of her soul was that God would show her a way of making the people understand. "Plough a fire-guard, O Lord," she prayed, as she walked, "and let these deadly fires of gossip run their noses square into it and be smothered. Use me if you can—I am here—ready to help—but the big thing is to get it done."

Around the open grate-fire that night, after James had gone to bed, Pearl and Mrs. Gray sat long before the pleasant wood fire For the first time Annie Gray felt she had found some one to whom she could talk and tell what was in her heart, and the story of the last eleven years was revealed, from the time that pretty Annie Simmons, fresh from Scotland, arrived at the Hudson's Bay post at Fort Resolution, coming by dog-train the last two hundred miles to her cousin, the factor's wife—the thin-lipped daughter of the Covenanters—who kept the pretty young cousin closely at work in the kitchen with her pots and pans when the traders came in, for Mrs. McPherson had no intention of losing Annie and her capable help after bringing her all the way from the Isle of Skye.

After a year of hard work, and some lonesome times, too, in the long, dark winter, there came to the Post a young trapper and prospector, Jim Gray.

"When I saw him," said the woman, with the silver bands of gray encircling her shapely head, "I knew him for my own man. He was tall and dark, with a boyish laugh that I loved, and a way of suddenly becoming very serious in the middle of his fun—a sort of clouding over of his face as if the sun had gone under for a minute."

She spoke haltingly, but Pearl knew what was in her heart, and her quick imagination painted in the details of each picture. She could see the homesick Scotch girl, in the far Northern post, hungry for admiration and love, and trying to make herself as comely as she could. She could sense all the dreams and longings, the hopes and thrills.

"Tell me more about him," Pearl urged.

"He had the out-of-doors look," said Mrs. Gray, "big, gentle, fearless. I knew as soon as I looked in his eyes that I would go with him if he asked me—anywhere. I would dare anything, suffer anything for him. Nothing mattered; you will know it some time, Pearl, I hope. It brings sorrow, maybe, but it is the greatest thing in life. Even now, looking back down these black years, I would do the same—I would go with my man.

"My cousin and her husband, the factor, forbade him the house when they saw what was happening. They had nothing against him. Every trapper said Jim Gray was straight as a gun-barrel. It was just that they would not let me go—they wanted my work, but I had already worked out my passage money, and considered myself free. They locked me in my room at night, and treated me like a prisoner. They said abominable things.

"One night a tapping came at the little square window It was a heavy, dark night in July, with thunder rolling in great shaking billows. It was Jim, and he asked me if I would come with him. He had spoken to the missionary at the post, who would marry us. Would I come? I did not know whether he had a house, or even a blanket. I only knew I loved him.

"Under cover of the storm Jim took out the window-frame, lifted me out, and we were off through the rain and the storm. But when we got to the missionary's he would not marry us—the factor had forbidden him. Jim would have taken me back but I was afraid. The factor had said he would shoot him if he ever came for me. He was a high-tempered man and ruled the post and every one in it with his terrible rages. What would you have done, Pearl?"

"Was there no one else?" said Pearl, "no magistrate—no other missionary or priest?"

"There was a missionary at the next post, sixty miles away. We could reach him in two days. What would you have done, Pearl?"

Pearl was living with her every detail, every sensation, every thrill.

"What would I have done?" she said, trembling with the excitement of a great decision. "I would have gone!"

Annie Gray's hand tightened on hers.

"I went," she said, "and I was never sorry. Jim was a man of the big woods; he loved me. The rain, which fell in torrents, did not seem to wet us—we were so happy."

"At the missionary's house at Hay River we were married, and the wife of the missionary gave me her clothes until mine dried. We stayed there three days and then we went on. Jim had a cabin in a wonderful hot springs valley, and it was there we were going. It would take us a month, but the weather was at its best, hazy blue days, continuous daylight, only a little dimming of the sun's light when it disappeared behind the mountains. We had pack-dogs from the post—Jim had left them there—and lots of provisions. I dream of those campfires and the frying bacon, and the blue smoke lifting itself up to the tree-tops."

She sat a long time silent, in a happy maze of memory.

"I had as much happiness as most women, but mine came all at once—and left me all at once. We reached the valley in September. I was wild with the beauty of it! Set in the mountains, which arched around it, was this wonderful square of fertile land, about six miles one way and seven the other. The foliage is like the tropics, for the hot springs keep off frost. The creeks which run through it come out of the rocks boiling hot—but cool enough to bathe in as they run on through the meadows. Their waters have a peculiar purplish tinge, which passes away after it stands a while, and a delicate aroma like a fragrant toilet water. I called it the Valley of purple springs'."

"Our house was of logs, and built on a rock floor, which was always warm. There were skins on the floor worth fortunes, for the animals came to the valley in winter by the hundreds, black foxes and silver, martins and bear. They came in, stayed a few days and passed out again. The ferns in the valley stood seven feet high, and the stalks were delicious when boiled and salted.

"Jim had planted a garden before he left, and we had everything, cabbages, cauliflower, beets, mushrooms. Jim got the skins he wanted—he didn't kill many—and we tanned them in the Indian way.

"At first the Indians had been afraid to come. They called it 'The
Devil's Valley,' and though the young bucks might come in and spend a
night, just as a bit of bravado, they were frightened of it; but after
I came they took courage and came in.

"We found out that the water in the streams had healing power, and made one's skin feel soft as velvet, especially one stream which had the deepest color. One old squaw, whose eyes had been sore for years, was healed in three weeks and went back to her people with her wonderful tales of the valley. After that we had Indians with us all the time. They brought their sick children and their old people, and the results were marvelous. I never knew the stream to fail. Even the tubercular people soon began to grow rosy and well. The food seemed to have healing power, too, and some who came hollow-cheeked, feverish, choking with their cruel paroxysms of coughing, soon began to grow fat and healthy. At first the sick people just slept and slept on the warm rocks, and then came the desire to bathe in the stream, and after that they went searching for the herbs they needed.

"We lived there three years. At the end of the first year little Jim was born—my precious Jim, with his wonderful eyes, reflecting the beauty of the valley. The Indian women tanned the softest buckskin for his little things, and he had the most elaborately beaded garments. No little prince was ever more richly dressed. He grew lovlier every day."

Pearl could refrain no longer: "Why did you ever leave?" she asked breathlessly.

"Conscience," said Annie Gray, after a pause. "We couldn't keep it all to ourselves and be happy over it. We couldn't forget all the sick people to whom our purple springs would bring healing. Mind you, we tried to deaden our consciences; tried to make ourselves believe it was not our duty to give it to the world. We fought off these spells of conscience—we tried to forget that there was a world outside. But we couldn't—we owed a duty, which we had to pay.

"One day, with our winter catch of furs packed on the dogs, we came out. The Indians could not understand why we were leaving, and stood sorrowfully watching us as far as we could see them—there was a heaviness on our spirits that day, as if we knew what was coming.

"On the Judah Hill, at Peace River, came the accident. The train went over the bank. When I came to I was in the Irene Hospital there, with little Jim beside me quite unhurt. But I knew—I knew. I saw in the nurses' face—my Jim had been killed."

All the color had gone from her voice, and she spoke as mechanically as a deaf person.

"He was instantly killed—they did not let me see him.

"I went on. I knew what I should do. I would carry out as far as possible what Jim and I had started out to do. We had filed on the land, and I had the papers—I have them still. In Peace River we had sold the furs, and I had quite a lot of money, for furs were high that year.

"Jim had told me a lot about his father, a domineering but kindly old fellow, the local member of Parliament in a little Eastern town—a man who had had his own way all his life. Jim had not got along well with him, and had left home at eighteen.

"I remembered Jim had said that he wouldn't tell his father about the valley until he had talked it over with a lawyer and got everything settled, for the old man would run the whole thing. So when I went to his home I said little about our valley, except to tell them of the beauty of it.

"I was very unhappy. He raged about Jim and his wild ways. I could not bear it. He knew nothing of the real Jim that I knew, the tender, loving, sweet-souled Jim. I could see how he had raised the devil in the boy with his high-handed ways.

"He was passionately fond of the little Jim, and foolishly indulgent. He would give the child a dollar for a kiss, but if he did not come running to him the very moment he called he would be angry. Yet I could see that he adored the little fellow, and was very proud of his clever ways.

"One day he told me he was going to send Jim to a boy's school in England as soon as he was nine. I told him it could not be. Jim had said to me that we would bring up our boy in the wild, new country, where men are honorable and life is simple. I would follow Jim's wishes—our boy would not go to England. I defied him. I saw his temper then. He told me I had nothing to say about it, he was his grandson's guardian. Jim had made a will before he left home, making his father executor of his estate. He told me the father was the only parent the child had in the eyes of the law, and I had no claim on my boy.

"I had no one to turn to. Jim's mother was one of those sweet, yielding women, who said 'Yes, dear,' to everything he said. She followed him around, picking up the things he scattered and the chairs he kicked over in his fits of temper. Sometimes when he swore she dabbed her eyes with a daintily trimmed handkerchief. That was her only protest. She advised me to say nothing, but just do whatever 'father' told me, and I said I would see him in hell first, and at that she ran out with her fingers in her ears.

"Then a strange thing happened. McPherson, my cousin's husband, the factor from Fort Resolution, met Jim's father at a lodge meeting, and told him Jim and I had gone away without being married—the missionary had refused to marry us—and we had gone away. I think he knew better, for in the north country every one knows everyone else, and it was well known that Jim and I were married at Hay River. He came home raging and called me names. I'll never forget how they went crashing through my brain. He was a proud man, and this 'disgrace' of Jim's, as he said, was the finishing touch. But when he began to abuse Jim I raged too. I said things to him which perhaps had better been left unsaid. I was sorry afterwards, for Jim was fond of his father for all his blustering ways. I did not tell him that Jim and I were legally married, for the fear was on me that he could take little Jim from me, and it did not matter to me what they thought of me. I had one thought—and that was to keep my boy and bring him up myself—bring him up to be a man like his father.

"That night I left. I was proud, too, and I left money to pay for the time I had been with them. I had a few hundred dollars left, not enough to take me back to Purple Springs. My first plan was to get a housekeeper's position, but I soon found I could not do that—the work was hard, and Jim was not wanted. I worked as waitress in a restaurant, and as saleslady in a country store, but Jim was not getting the care he should have.

"One day I saw an advertisement in a paper. A prospector, crippled with rheumatism, wanted a housekeeper. It said 'a woman with sense and understanding,' and I liked the tone of it. It was blunt and honest.

"When I went to see him I found a grizzled old fellow of about sixty, who had been most of his life in the north, and when I found he had known Jim, and had trapped with him on the Liard River, and knew what a splendid fellow he was, I just begged him to let us stay. He was as glad to get me, as I was to find a home.

"I cared for him until he died. He was a good man, a man of the big woods, whose life was simple, honest and kindly.

"In the little town where we lived the people gossiped when I came to him. They wanted to know where I had come from, and all about me. I told them nothing. I was afraid. I had changed my name, but still I was afraid Jim's father might find me. Mr. Bowen thought it would be better if we were married, just to stop their tongues, but I couldn't marry him. Jim has always been just as real to me as when he was with me. Mr. Bowen was kind and gentlemanly always, and many a happy hour we spent talking of the big country with its untold riches. If I could have taken him to Purple Springs he could have been cured, but we knew he could not stand the journey, for his heart was weak.

"I went to night school while I was with him, and learned all I could for Jim's sake. But he died at last, and left me very lonely, for I had grown fond of him.

"By his will he left me all he had, and the deed of this farm was part of his estate. So, after his death, Jim and I came here. Mr. Bowen had advised me to stay on this farm—he had taken it because there were indications of oil, and he believed there would be a big strike here some day. He also left me four thousand dollars, and I have added to it every year. Sometimes I've been tempted to sell out and get back north, but Jim is too young yet, I think, I should go somewhere and let him go to school. I thought when I came he could go here. I have only one thought, one care, one ambition—I've lived my life—I've had my one good, glorious day, and now I want to see that Jim gets his.

"It's a queer story, isn't it, Pearl? I ran away and got married, and then I ran away from marriage to keep my boy. I could prove in a moment that my marriage was legal, of course, the certificate is here, and the marriage was registered by the missionary, who has come back now and lives in the city. But I dare not tell who I am—Jim does not know who his grandfather is."

"He surely couldn't take your boy," cried Pearl. "There is no justice in that."

"Only the unmarried mother has the absolute right to her child," said Annie Gray, as one who quotes from a legal document. "I talked to a lawyer whom Mr. Bowen sent for. He showed it to me in the law."

"Peter Neelands was right," said Pearl after a while, "it is exactly the sort of a law he said the other one was."

The two women sat by the fire, which by this time was reduced to one tiny red coal. There was not a sound in the house except the regular breathing of little Jim from the adjoining room. A night wind stirred the big tree in front of the house, and its branches touched the shingles softly, like a kind hand.

"I'll tell you the rest of it, Pearl, and why I am so frightened. Perhaps I grow fearful, living here alone, and my mind conjures up dreadful things. Jim's grandfather has moved to this Province from the East. I read about him in the papers. He is a powerful man—who gets his own way. He might be able to get doctors to pronounce me insane—we read such things. He has such influence."

"Who is he?" asked Pearl wonderingly.

"He is the Premier of this Province," said Annie Gray. "Now do you wonder at my fear?"

Pearl sat a long time silent. "A way will be found," she said.