“It’s bitter work, opening up a new country, I realize that,” Nora went on, her eyes dark with earnestness.

Unknown to herself, she had a larger audience, for Hornby and Frank stood silently in the open door.  Marsh saw them, and shook his head slightly.  He wanted Nora to finish.

“What if it is the others who reap the harvest?  Don’t you really believe that those who break the ground are rewarded in a way that the later comers never dream of?  I do.”

“She’s right there,” broke in Marsh.  “I shall never forget, Mrs. Sharp, what I felt when I saw my first crop spring up—­the thought that never since the world began had wheat grown on that little bit of ground before.  Oh, it was wonderful!  I wouldn’t go back to England now, to live, for anything in the world.  I couldn’t breathe.”

“You’re a man.  You have the best of it, and all the credit.”

“Not with everyone,” said Nora.  She fell on her knees beside the elder woman’s chair and stroked her work-roughened old hand.

“The outsiders don’t know.  You mustn’t blame them, how could they?  It’s only those who’ve lived on the prairie who could know that the chief burden of the hardships of opening up a new country falls upon the women.  But the men who are the husbands, they know, and in their hearts they give us all credit.”

“I guess they do, Mrs. Sharp,” said Marsh earnestly.

Mrs. Sharp smiled gratefully on Nora through her tears.

“Thank you for speaking so kindly to me, my dear.  I know that you are right in every blessed thing you’ve said.  You must excuse me for being a bit downhearted for the moment.  The fact is, I’m that nervous that I hardly know what I’m saying.  But you’ve done me no end of good.”

“That’s right.”  Nora got slowly to her feet.  “Sid and Frank will be here in a minute or two, I am sure.”

“And you’re perfectly right, both of you,” Mrs. Sharp repeated.  “I couldn’t go back and live in England again.  If we lose our crop, well, we must hang on some way till next year.  We shan’t starve, exactly.  A person’s got to take the rough with the smooth; and take it by and large, it’s a good country.”

“Ah, now you’re talking more like yourself, the self that used to cheer me up when——­”

Turning, she saw her husband standing in the doorway.

“Frank!”

He was looking at her with quite a new expression.  How long had he been there?  Had he heard all she had been saying to Mrs. Sharp, carried away by the emotion aroused by the secret conflict within her own heart?  She both hoped and feared that he had.

“Where’s Sid?” said Mrs. Sharp, starting to her feet.

“Why, he’s up at your place.  Hulloa, Ed. Saw you coming along in the rig earlier in the morning.  But I was surprised to find Reg here.  Didn’t recognize him so far away in his store clothes.”

“Must have been a pleasant surprise for you,” said Hornby with conviction.