"
Left to himself Thompson would probably have gravitated first to a man
of his own blood, even though he had been warned to approach Carr with
diplomacy. But there was no sign of life about the Carr place, and his
men were headed straight for their objective, walking hurriedly to get
away from the hungry swarms of mosquitoes that rose out of the grass.
Thompson followed them. Two weeks in their company, with a steadily
growing consciousness of his dependence upon them, had inclined him to
follow their lead.
They found Lachlan at home, a middle-aged Scotch half-breed with a house
full of sons and daughters ranging from the age of four to twenty. How
could they all be housed in three small rooms was almost the first
dubious query which presented itself to Thompson. His mind, to his great
perplexity, seemed to turn more upon incongruities than upon his real
mission there. That is, to Thompson they seemed incongruities. The
little things that go to make up a whole were each impinging upon him
with a force he could not understand. He could not, for instance, tell
why he thought only with difficulty, with extreme haziness, of the
great good he desired to accomplish at Lone Moose, and found his
attention focussing sharply upon the people, their manner of speech,
their surroundings, even upon so minor a detail as a smudge of flour
upon the hand that Mrs.
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