Free Fruits of the Earth by Frederick Philip Grove Page A

’bout him?”
    â€œI don’t think so. He keeps only four horses.”
    â€œHm….”
    â€œWell,” Abe said, none too favourably impressed with the stranger, “if there is nothing else I can give you information on–”
    The man eyed him in a curious way. Then, “Don’t think so. However, seeing as I’m going to move in here, I guess I’ll meet you again.”
    Abe nodded and moved on.
    During the next few weeks he often saw a one-horse team drawing a little spring wagon along the road from Morley. On top of a load of old boards and joists, among boxes and packing crates, perched that grotesque figure of a man who had spoken to him.
    On these drives Abe found that there was, nearer the highway, between his trail and the Somerville Line, at least one other settlement, and a rather compact and considerable one. He could count a dozen farmsteads, while from the Somerville Line only two or three could be seen. He began to be interested in municipal affairs; and the councillor representing Ward Six–the ward in which Abe lived–a man called Davis, had his domicile in that district which went by the name of Britannia.
    On one occasion Abe turned farther north. A cluster of grain elevators came into view in line with Morley. That was the town of Arkwright, twelve miles west of St. Cecile where a railway branched off from the main line, running via Arkwright and other towns to Torquay, to describe a loop there and to return via Ferney, Morley, and Somerville; from Morley one could go to the city by starting either east or west. Why was there no settlement south of the Arkwright Line? Some three miles north of Nicoll’s Corner the slope of the land began to change, towards a tributary of the river which bounded the prairie in the east. Large stretches of country, there, consisted of an impenetrable swamp which could be crossed in winter only. Thus, by the mere chance of his having gone east for a thresherman instead of south, Abe’s horizon was suddenly widened.
    He was beginning to worry about the slowness with which settlers moved into the district, for his children were approaching school age. Already he had been amazed to hearof the frequent changes of teachers at Morley. These teachers were invariably young girls; and he doubted their ability to handle a school. That was why, when one day he was taking his dinner at the hotel at St. Cecile, he was much interested to find that a bearded old man who sat down at his table proved to be a teacher who, for many years, had been a schoolmaster in various districts near Arkwright. His name was Blaine. Abe was so much interested that he gave the man his exact location and asked him to call.
    â€œI see you ride a bicycle,” he said when the other man rose. For his trousers were held by steel clamps around his ankles.
    â€œI do,” said Mr. Blaine. “But you can’t cross from Arkwright except in winter, when the bicycle is useless.”
    â€œWell,” Abe added and rose to shake hands, “the snow may hold off.”
    Mr. Blaine was small and slender, with a head disproportionately large for his body, and a sandy beard streaked with grey disproportionately large for his head. When he turned, one was oddly reminded of a lion turning in a cage. He wore a dark suit of heavy cloth, his trousers hanging about his legs like curtains.
    Abe heard more of him. He was seventy years old and had come from Ontario; he had been a high-school teacher and had married a pupil of his. For her he had built a small house at Arkwright where he had been teaching at the time; but his married life had been short, his young wife dying in childbirth and taking her baby with her into the grave. He had returned to rural life and now had the distinction of being the teacher with the longest record in the Canadian west.
    One day Abe met the local school inspector at his sister’s house where he had had dinner; for Morley