THE Bronsons stayed at Camp’s Gulch until the end of September. And, although Dick Bronson made many excursions in the neighbourhood, night invariably found him ready to sling his hammock under the big cedar tree growing at the side of the house.
Nell sent for Dr. Russell on the next morning after her adventurous walk, but when he reached Goat’s Gulch, guided by Joe and accompanied by Dick Bronson, it was to find Doss Umpey dead.
They buried him in the little graveyard at the Settlement, and although Nell shed tears at his grave, they were rather tears of pity than of affection. For although she might grieve as any good girl would over the misspent life going out in hardship and gloom, she could not pretend to a love which he had never taken the least trouble to inspire, while the buzzing and humming discomfort in her injured ear kept the remembrance of his brutality constantly before her in those days of weariness following her long walk to Goat’s Gulch and her adventurous return journey.
She had rather seriously overdone her strength that day, and was so unwell that Gertrude and Mrs. Bronson insisted on the doctor prescribing for her.
After Doss Umpey had been laid in his grave, the weeks of summer flowed on in a golden content, such as Nell had never known or dreamed of before.
She was busier than ever, it is true—business was brisk, and her larger household made great demands on her time; but work had always been a delight, and now it was varied by all sorts of pleasant things, such as had never come into her life previously.
Mrs. Bronson and her son were highly cultured people, who loved learning for learning’s sake, and with them Dr. Russell foregathered as a matter of course, since birds of a feather flock together, and the two girls, who invariably dropped into the position of silent and absorbed listeners while the other three talked, found that it was a liberal education to be with people who knew so much and wore their knowledge in such an interesting fashion.
Nell left off sighing in private for educational chances, realizing that here within her reach lay stores of information to be had for the asking. But it was not until the summer was almost at its end, and the Bronsons were on the point of departure for their home in Victoria, that she became aware of the strange new influence on her life which had tinged all those busy weeks of summer with a light of golden happiness.
Mrs. Bronson was taking Flossie to the city for the winter. Patsey was going too, as a pupil at Royal Mount College. With the influence of Mr. Bronson to help him, there was no need to wait for the possible chance of a scholarship, and Flossie would be happier to have her brother with her.
Mrs. Trip had been making new shirts for Patsey, and the day before the travellers started for the city Nell went over to the Settlement to pay the old woman for her work, and to carry some cakes for Joey, who had a childish fondness for all sweet things.
Dick Bronson had gone off for a final ramble through the hills, and had been absent all the morning, but he came down to the Settlement just as Nell was coming away from Mrs. Trip’s, and walked home with her.
“What are you going to do when Miss Lorimer gets married?” he asked abruptly, as they turned their backs on the last ugly houses of the Settlement, and took the winding road through the forest.
“Gertrude will not marry just yet,” she said.
“Dr. Russell told me yesterday that he thought it would be in the spring, and he also said that he thought of coming to live at Camp’s Gulch, because it was growing so much faster than Bratley,” Dick Bronson said, not looking at Nell, but watching a fragment of white fleecy cloud that sailed slowly across the blue sky over his head.
“I shall keep the children—at least, some of them. I know Gertrude wants Teddy and Abe to bring up with Sonny; but Flossie and Patsey are my property,” Nell said, with a rather nervous laugh.
“My mother wants Flossie. She says the child reminds her so much of my little sister Frances, who died when I was small,” Dick said slowly. Then he brought his gaze down from the clouds, and looked at his companion, but her face was turned away, and he could only see the soft, dark hair, and the tip of a very pink ear.
“Mrs. Bronson is very kind; but I don’t think Flossie would be happy to go away from us entirely,” Nell replied, in a constrained tone.
“I don’t think she would either,” he said cheerfully. “Then my mother would be sure to spoil her dreadfully, if there were no one at hand to keep a check on things; and that would be a pity, for she is such a nice little girl.”
Nell made no reply to this, and the two walked in silence for perhaps a quarter of a mile. She was fighting for self-control, trying to appear calm and collected, but failing signally in the attempt.
Presently Dick spoke again, and now it was his voice which was hard and constrained.
“There is but one way out of it that I can see.”
“Out of what?” she asked, turning her head to look at him, but as quickly turning it away again, and flushing hotly because of something she had seen in his eyes.
“This awkwardness of dividing the family. Gertrude wants half, and you want the other half. But of your half my mother wants Flossie; and Patsey for his own good must be in Victoria for the next six or seven years, which leaves you alone, unless you come too. Will you, Nell?”
Nell lifted up her feet, and put them down mechanically. Her thoughts were in such a wild tumult and confusion that she scarcely knew what she was doing.
Then a hand strong and firm took hers, and held it closely.
“I want you, Nell, more than anything else in the world; and if you won’t consent to adopt me, why, I shall just pine away.”
She laughed then, because pining away looked the most unlikely of all fates to overtake one in his vigorous health.
“You will come?” he persisted.
“I—I am not well-educated enough,” she faltered, thinking of the vast difference between his easy leisured life and her own hard-working existence and lack of advantages.
He threw up his head and laughed in a happy and triumphant fashion.
“Now, that is false modesty on your part, for did you not tell me at our very first meeting that you had read a whole dictionary through from beginning to end, and that you could spell every word there was in it?”
“It is too bad to laugh at me, really!” she said; but she was laughing herself as she spoke, and her eyes were shining with happiness, for this man had been her ideal of all that was good and noble, and even when from mistake he had been mixed up with that other Dick whose name had been so similar, she had still cared for him in spite of herself.
“I will laugh at you, and with you always if you will let me,” he said, only now his voice was grave and subdued. “And when we part to-morrow, Nell, it must be with the understanding that in the spring I shall come to fetch you. Will you be ready for me?”
“Yes, I will be ready,” she answered softly.
And so they were betrothed.
Punctuation and printer errors including missing periods and quotes have been fixed.
Inconsistencies in the use of hyphens and hyphenated words has been maintained, e.g. freight-car, freight car, freight-wagon, and freight wagon are prevalent throughout the book.
A cover was created for this ebook.
[The end of "Daughters of the Dominion: A Story of the Canadian Frontier," by Bessie Marchant]