“No fear of that, sir,” replied the other, in a tone of keen satisfaction.

When they got outside, Edgar looked at George with a smile.

“I’m glad you engaged the fellow,” he said; “but considering that you’ll have to teach him, were you not a little rash?”

“I’ll find out by and by.”  George paused, and continued gravely:  “It’s a big adventure these people make.  Think of it—­the raising of the passage money by some desperate economy, the woman left behind with hardly enough to keep her a month or two, the man’s fierce anxiety to find some work!  When I saw how he was watching me, I felt I had to hire him.”

“Just so,” responded Edgar.  “I suppose I ought to warn you that doing things of the kind may get you into trouble some day; but cold-blooded prudence never did appeal to me.”  He took one of the chairs in front of the building and filled his pipe before he continued:  “We’ll sit here a while, and then we might as well stroll across the plain.  The general-room doesn’t strike me as an attractive place to spend the evening in.”

An hour later they left the tall elevators and straggling town behind, and after brushing through a belt of crimson flowers, they followed the torn-up black trail that led into the waste.  After a mile or two it broke into several divergent rows of ruts, and they went on toward a winding line of bluff across the short grass.  Reaching that, they pushed through the thin wood of dwarf birch and poplar, skirting little pools from which mallard rose:  and then, crossing a long rise, they sat down to smoke on its farther side.  Sage Butte had disappeared, the sun had dipped, and the air was growing wonderfully fresh and cool.  Here and there a house or barn rose from the sweep of grass; but for the most part it ran back into the distance lonely and empty.  It was steeped in strong, cold coloring, but on its western rim there burned a vivid flush of rose and saffron.  Edgar was impressed by its vastness and silence.

“This,” he said thoughtfully, “makes up for a good deal.  Once you get clear of the railroad, it’s a captivating country.”

“Have you decided yet what you’re going to do in it?”

“It’s too soon,” Edgar rejoined.  “The family idea was that I should stay about twelve months, and then go back and enter some profession.  Ethel seems quite convinced that a little roughing it will prove beneficial.  I might, however, stop out and try farming, which is one reason why you can have my services for nothing for a time.  Considering what local wages are, don’t you think you’re lucky?”

“That,” laughed George, “remains to be seen.”

“Anyhow, there’s no doubt that Sylvia Marston scores in securing you on the same favorable terms.  It has struck me that she’s a woman who gets things easily.”

“She hasn’t always done so.  Can you imagine, for instance, what two years on a prairie farm must have been to a delicate, fastidious girl, brought up in luxury?”