SERGEANT STIMSON CONFIRMS HIS SUSPICIONS It was late in the afternoon when Colonel Barrington drove up to Winston's homestead.

He had his niece and sister with him, and when he pulled up his team, all three were glad of the little breeze that came down from the blueness of the north and rippled the whitened grass.

It had blown over leagues of sun-bleached prairie, and the great desolation beyond the pines of the Saskatchewan, but had not wholly lost the faint, wholesome chill it brought from the Pole.
There was no cloud in the vault of ether, and slanting sun-rays beat fiercely down upon the prairie, until the fibrous dust grew fiery and the eyes ached from the glare of the vast stretch of silvery gray.

The latter was, however, relieved by stronger color in front of the party, for blazing gold on the dazzling stubble, the oat sheaves rolled away in long rows that diminished and melted into each other, until they cut the blue of the sky in a delicate filigree.

Oats had moved up in value in sympathy with wheat, and the good soil had most abundantly redeemed its promise that year.