was not an attractive
personality, and Mrs. Burke derived little comfort from her presence.

Willard was away a great deal teaming, working desperately to get
something laid up for the winter. The summer excursion, with its
laughter, its careless irresponsibility, had become a deadly grapple
with the implacable forces of winter. The land of the straddle-bug had
become a menacing desert, hard as iron, pitiless as ice.

Now the wind had dominion over the lonely women, wearing out their
souls with its melancholy moanings and its vast and wordless sighs. Its
voices seemed to enter Blanche Burke's soul, filling it with hunger
never felt before. Day after day it moaned in her ears and wailed about
the little cabin, rousing within her formless desires and bitter
despairs. Obscure emotions, unused powers of reason and recollection
came to her. She developed swiftly in sombre womanhood.

Sometimes Mrs. Bussy came across the prairie, sometimes a load of
land-seekers asked for dinner, but mainly she was alone all the long,
long days. She spent hours by the window watching, waiting, gazing at
the moveless sod, listening to the wind-voices, companioned only by her
memories. She began to perceive that their emigration had been a bitter
mistake, but her husband had not yet acknowledged it, and she honestly
tried not to reproach him for it. Nevertheless, she had moments of
bitterness when she raged fiercely against him.

Little things gave her opportunity. He came home late one day. She
greeted him sullenly. He began to apologize:

"I didn't intend to stay to supper, but Mrs. Bradley--"

"Mrs. Bradley! Yes, you can go and have a good time with Mrs. Bradley,
and leave me here all alone to rot. It'd serve you right if I left you
to enjoy this fine home alone."

He trembled with agony and weakness.

"Oh, you don't mean that, Blanche--"

"For Heaven's sake, don't call me pet names. I'm not a child. If I'd had
any sense I'd never have come out here. There's nothing left for us but
just freeze or starve. What did we ever leave Illinois for, anyway?"

He sank back into a corner in gentle, sorrowful patience, waiting for
her anger to wear itself out.

While they sat there in silence they heard the sound of hoofs on the
frozen ground, and a moment later Bailey's pleasant voice arose: "Hullo,
the house!" Burke went to the door, and Blanche rose to meet the visitor
with a smile, the knot in her forehead smoothed out. There was no all