THE PICNIC

The picnic at Long Lake was an annual function, held as soon as the weather got warm enough, to celebrate the return of spring.  Winter is long and tedious on the high Western plains, where the frost is often Arctic and little work can be done, and after sitting by the red-hot stove through the dark, cold months, the inhabitants of the scattered homesteads come out with joyful hearts to greet the sunshine.  There is, however, no slow transition.  Rushing winds from the North-west sweep the sky, the snow vanishes, and after a week or two, during which the prairie trails are impassable, the bleached grass dries and green blades and flowers spring from the steaming sod.

Moreover, the country round Long Lake has some beauty.  To the east, it runs back, bare and level, with scarcely a tree to break the vast expanse; but to the west low undulations rise to the edge of the next tableland.  Sandhills mark the summits, but the slopes are checkered with birches and poplars, and creeks of clear water flow through the hollows in the shadow of thick bluffs.  There are many ponds, and here and there a shallow lake shines amidst the sweep of grass.  The clear air and the distance the view commands give the landscape a distinctive charm.  One has a sense of space and freedom; all the eye rests upon is clean-cut.

It was a bright morning when Charnock drove up to the door of Keller’s hotel.  The street was one-sided, and for the most part of its length, small, ship-lap-board houses boldly fronted the prairie.  A few had shallow verandas that relieved their bareness, but the rest were frankly ugly, and in some the front was carried up level with the roof-ridge, giving them a harsh squareness of outline.  A plank sidewalk, raised a foot or two above the ground, ran along the street, where the black soil was torn by wagon wheels.

There was nothing attractive about the settlement, and Charnock had once been repelled by its dreariness.  He, however, liked society, and as the settlement was the only center of human intercourse, had acquired the habit of spending time there that ought to have been devoted to his farm.  He enjoyed a game of pool, and to sit on the hotel veranda, bantering the loungers, was a pleasant change from driving the plow or plodding through the dust that rolled about the harrows.  For all that, he knitted his brows as his light wagon lurched past the Chinese laundry and the poolroom in the next block.  The place looked mean and shabby in the strong sunlight, and, with feelings he had thought dead re-awaking, he was conscious of a sharp distaste.  There was a choice he must shortly make, and he knew what it would cost to take the line that might be forced on him.

It was with a certain shrinking he stopped his team in front of the hotel.  The bare windows were open and the door was hooked back, so that one could see into the hall, where a row of tin wash-basins stood on a shelf.  Dirty towels were scattered about, and the boarded floor was splashed.  The veranda, on to which the hall opened, was strewn with cigar-ends and burnt matches, and occupied by a row of cheap wooden chairs.  Above the door was painted The Keller House.  The grocery in the next block, and the poolroom, bore the same owner’s name.