Free A Place Called Bliss by Ruth Glover

four-button cut-away, tailored to fit without a wrinkle to be seen, was snug and uncomfortable. Sophia, he was certain, was breathing with difficulty in the prized new corset with its Coraline stays.
    Sunday stretched before the Galloways, an attractive alternative with the quiet peace and comfort of a home they enjoyed and a rather rare opportunity to be together.
    “I noticed you were having quite a conversation with that scarlet-coated individual across the table from you,” Sophia prompted.
    “North West Mounted Police uniform; quite attractive, I’d say, certainly eye-catching. Their motto, by the way, is ‘Maintain the Right.’ Seems fitting.”
    “I do trust they are in evidence where Angus and Mary have gone.”
    “Well,” Hugh said, half humorously, “mounted means horseback, and police means enforcer of the law, so I assume North West refers to the Alberta and Saskatchewan territories.”
    “I suppose so,” Sophia said dubiously. “We’ll just have to wait and hear what news comes from this . . . Bliss, is it? At any rate, this enforcer seemed to keep everyone at that end of the table spellbound.”
    “Fascinating, the account of their activities, like nothing we’ve ever heard of, that’s certain. The force was formed in the first place to eliminate the whiskey forts in the territories. Indians, of course, can’t abide whiskey but crave it. Unscrupulous men made and traded it to them at these forts through smallopenings or wickets. An Indian would hand over his buffalo robe and receive in return a cup of whiskey. A full quart would cost him his pony.”
    “Gracious!”
    “Listen to the recipe for this firewater; if I remember what this man Dillard said, a bottle of Jamaica ginger, a quart of molasses, and a handful of red pepper were added to a quart of whiskey. When this was heated, it lived up to its name.”
    “Gracious!”
    This interesting exchange of conversation was interrupted by the timid voice of Tessie, helper in the nursery.
    “Mrs. Hugh—”
    “Yes, what is it, Tessie?”
    “It’s the baby, Mum. Miss Margaret. She’s—”
    “What, Tessie? She’s what?” Alarm had crept into Sophia’s voice. Instinctively she stood to her feet. Hugh peered over the top of his paper.
    “She’s sick, Mum.”
    Something like panic rose in Sophia’s motherly bosom. About to run unceremoniously from the room and her husband’s presence, she caught Hugh’s level look.
    “Excuse me, Hugh,” she said, pausing in flight.
    “Of course, my dear,” he said pleasantly.

 
    Prince Albert
     
    I t’s beautiful!” Mary breathed, while Cameron and Molly frolicked in the abundant grass at her feet, happy to be released from the confines of the buggy and the cart. They had made a rush for the river flowing just a few feet away, but Mary had drawn them back from the tantalizing water.
    She could understand the impression of the Rev. James Nisbet when he had stood in almost precisely the same place not too many years before and said, “I am satisfied with the excellence of the locality for a settlement.”
    Nisbet, too, had just completed the trek of five hundred miles in Red River carts drawn by oxen. He, too, had forded streams, battled mosquitoes, crossed flooded valleys on improvised scows. Here he had stood with his wife and daughter and recognized the promised land. “I have not seen any place with equal advantages,” he had said.
    Not far away stood the Mission House he had erected, and behind Mary were the scattered buildings of the town Nisbet had named Prince Albert in honor of the Queen’s late consort.
    The same things that had attracted Nisbet drew men today in increasing numbers—the fertility of the soil, the abundance of hay land, the clear, flowing waters, the myriad sloughs with their ducks and geese. The free land!
    The trouble was—and Mary shut her eyes and shuddered, just thinking of it—the difficulty in getting here. One trail had to be abandoned because of the many