There was just one note that bothered me. It was sounded a day or two after we left Regina in some covert remark which Marjorie made about Jean's Mounted Policeman. It seemed that while Jack and I had been away land hunting the girls, too, had been doing a little prospecting. Regina was the headquarters of the Mounted Police, and the fine figures of these young riders of the plains with their scarlet tunics and trim gold ribboned riding trousers and clanking spurs have turned more heads than Jean's before and since. It seems the girls were walking along a business street when they saw a young policeman coming at a short distance, and they happened to stop to admire something in a window while he approached. He also stopped to admire, and Marjorie said something--which Jean would not have done--and a conversation started up, and the policeman seemed to prefer Jean, perhaps because she had not spoken first. At any rate he saw them safely home, and dallied over his responsibility and the gate post until they said they must go in. He called the next night and wanted to take them to a "show", but they would not go; at any rate, Jean would not go. "But you went walking with him," Marjorie challenged. "He asked you, too," said Jean, her pretty face colouring. "You started with us, and then went back." "I saw how the land lay, or the wind blew, or whatever it was. I had nothing to do at home, but I knew I would be busier there than out walking with you and your policeman." "Marjorie! How _can_ you----" "And he told her he would call on her after we were settled." "He did no such thing! He asked me where we were going to settle, and I told him I didn't know, and he said he hoped he would be patrolling there. He's going to be sent out from barracks soon, and he said it would be safer for me--for us--if someone were patrolling our district." "Not for you, dear," said Marjorie, meaningly, and there was a little sting in her words which brought me into action. "I believe you're jealous, Marjorie," I said, in tones intended to be severe. "And aren't you?" she retorted. "You ought to be." The truth is, I was. Jean had always belonged to me so absolutely that I had never thought of the possibility of a rival. Even now I did not think of such a thing seriously. It was true that there was no engagement between us, unless the word of a man of six and a woman of four can be taken as binding, but I looked on Jean as mine, nevertheless, and I resented the action of the Mounted Policeman in seeking her acquaintance. I resented, too, the fact that she had gone walking with him, and I told her so at the first opportunity. It came that afternoon. Jean said she was tired riding, and got down to walk, on my side of the wagon. We trudged along for some distance in silence, save for my occasional words of rebuke and exhortation to the oxen. "You're cross at me," she said at length.