"There's not another set like them on the prairie, and I expect there are very few folks in Montreal have anything quite as smart," she said. "They must have cost a pile of money." A little flush crept into Carrie's face, but she answered languidly. "I suppose they did," she said. "Mr. Leland had them made for me." "Well," said the woman, who gazed at her with an air of deprecation, "you have got a good man, my dear. There's not a straighter or a better-hearted one between Winnipeg and the Rockies--but it would be worth while to humour him a little. He has just a hard spot or two in him, and he generally gets his way." Carrie smiled, a trifle coldly. "And so do I." She went out with Gallwey, but the hard-handed woman stood still a moment with a shadow of anxiety in her eyes, and then sighed a little as she went on with her work again. She would have done a good deal to save Charley Leland trouble, and she foresaw difficulties. In the meanwhile, the girl found the cold unlike anything she had felt in England, but, after the first few minutes, more endurable than she had expected. There was no trace of moisture in that crystalline atmosphere, the sun that had no heat in it shone dazzlingly, and the snow that flung the sun's rays back fell from her feet dusty and dry as flour. No cloud flecked the clear blueness overhead, and fainter washes of the same cold colour marked the beaten trails and prints of horse-hoofs that alone broke the gleaming surface of the white expanse below. On the far horizon she could see grey blurs, which were presumably trees. Gallwey, who was wrapped in an old fur coat from cheeks to ankles, proved an agreeable companion. He led her first a little way back among the slender birches, where she could see the house. It was, she decided, by no means picturesque, a rambling, frame structure roofed with cedar shingles, built round what was evidently the original hut of small birch logs; but it had a little verandah with rude pillars and trellis work on one side of it, and Gallwey assured her there were not many houses in that country to equal it. Then he showed her the barns and stables, built in part of birch logs and for the rest of sods, stretching back into the shelter of the bluff. They were primitive and almost shapeless structures, with roofs that apparently consisted of straw and soil and snow, but she fancied their thickness would keep out even the frost of the Northwest. There were, however, only a horse or two and a few brawny oxen standing in them. Last of all, he led her into one of the most curious edifices she had ever seen. Sitting down on one of the wheat bags inside it, she looked about her.