TRANSCRIPT

The Country Dance
A short story from 'Pioneer Tales and Other Human Stories'
By H.B. Adshead

Part 6

The good lady of the house was a real character, and although she has now passed to the great beyond (tired out, found dead in bed), she deserves mention. Their farm was almost totally a wood lot, poplar and spruce. If doing hard work clearing timber and brush, milking cows and being able with equal celerity to swing an axe or a fist, and last, but not least, having a kind heart, constitutes an 'Empire builder,' then our hostess comes in that category. She was not to be trifled with, had a vocabulary that Dan O'Connell might envy. She was tall, gaunt and sinewy. She hadn't much use for lawyers. I once saw her in Calgary, called as a witness for the defense by our prominent lawyer, Mr. A. L. Smith. He gave her up as a bad job and turned her over to Mr. J. Short. He also was nonplused.