The Impostor

It was a bitter night, for although there was no snow as yet, the frost had bound the prairie in its iron grip, when Rancher Witham stood shivering in a little Canadian settleme...

It was late when Witham reached his log-built house, but he set out once more with his remaining horse before the lingering daylight crept out of the east, to haul the wagon hom...

There was bitter frost in the darkness outside when two young men stood talking in the stables of a little outpost lying a long ride back from the settlement in the lonely prair...

It was very dark amidst the birches where Trooper Shannon sat motionless in his saddle, gazing down into the denser blackness of the river hollow. The stream ran deep below the...

The long train was slackening speed and two whistles rang shrilly through the roar of wheels when Miss Barrington laid down the book with which she had beguiled her journey of f...

It was late at night, and outside the prairie lay white and utterly silent under the Arctic cold, when Maud Barrington, who glanced at it through the double windows, flung back...

Farmer Witham crossed the frontier without molestation and spent one night in a little wooden town, where several people he did not speak to apparently recognized him. Then he p...

There were warmth and brightness in the cedar-boarded general room of Silverdale Grange, and most of the company gathered there basked in it contentedly after their drive throug...

The dismal afternoon was drawing in when Witham, driving home from the railroad, came into sight of a lonely farm. It lifted itself out of the prairie, a blur of huddled buildin...

Daylight had not broken across the prairie, when, floundering through a foot of dusty snow, Witham reached the Grange. He was aching from fatigue and cold, and the deerskin jack...

Winter had fled back beyond the barrens to the lonely North at last, and though here and there a little slushy snow still lay soaking the black loam in a hollow, a warm wind swe...

There was, considering the latest price of wheat, a somewhat astonishing attendance in the long room of the hotel at the railroad settlement one Saturday evening. A big stove in...

Thanks to the fashion in which the hotel-keeper managed the affair, the gambler left the settlement without personal injury, but very little richer than when he entered it. The...

The sun beat down on the prairie, which was already losing its flush of green, but it was cool where Maud Barrington and her aunt stood in the shadow of the bluff by Silverdale...

Courthorne rode away next morning, and some weeks had passed when Maud Barrington came upon Witham sitting beside his mower in a sloo. He did not at first see her, for the rattl...

Dane overtook the wagon close by the birch bluff at Silverdale Grange. It was late then, but there were lights in the windows that blinked beyond the trees, and, when the wagon...

It was Witham's last afternoon at the Grange, and almost unpleasantly hot, while the man whose vigour had not as yet returned to him was content to lounge in the big window-seat...

The prairie lay dim and shadowy in the creeping dusk when Witham sat on a redwood stringer near the head of his partly-finished bridge. There was no sound from the hollow behind...

Lance Courthorne had lightly taken a good many risks in his time, for he usually found a spice of danger stimulating, and there was in him an irresponsible daring that not infre...

It was a hot morning when Sergeant Stimson and Corporal Payne rode towards the railroad across the prairie. The grassy levels rolled away before them, white and parched, into th...

It was not until early morning that Courthorne awakened from the stupor he sank into, soon after Witham conveyed him into his homestead. First, however, he asked for a little fo...

It was late in the afternoon when Colonel Barrington drove up to Witham's homestead. He had his niece and sister with him, and when he pulled up his team, all three were glad of...

It was with a wry smile he watched the man ride off towards the settlement with it. "I shall not be sorry when the climax comes," he said. "The strain is telling."

Witham's harvesting prospered as his sowing had done, for day by day the bright sunshine shone down on standing wheat and lengthening rows of sheaves. It was in the bracing cold...

"What has happened has been a blow to me, and I am afraid I am scarcely equal to entertaining you to-night," he said. "I should, however, like Dane and Macdonald, and one or two...

The first of the snow was driving across the prairie before a bitter wind when Maud Barrington stood by a window of the Grange looking out into the night. The double casements r...

A year of tireless effort and some anxiety had passed since Witham had seen the first load of flour sent to the east, when he and Graham sat talking in their Winnipeg office. Th...