It was hard, but keep him down we did; though his cries of anguish deafened us through that awful night, and our muscles knotted as we gripped. Hour after hour we held him, plunging now a hand, now a foot in the ice-water, and holding it there. How long he fought! How strong he was! But the time came when he could fight no more. He was like a child in our hands.

There, at last it was done. We wrapped the tender flesh in pieces of blanket. We laid him moaning on the bed. Then, tired out with our long struggle, we threw ourselves down and slept like logs.

Next morning he was still unconscious. He suffered intense pain, so that Jim or the Halfbreed had to be ever by him. I, for my part, refused to go near. Indeed, I watched with a growing hatred his slow recovery. I was sorry, sorry. I wished he had died.

At last he opened his eyes, and feebly he asked where he was. After the Halfbreed had told him, he lay silent awhile.

"I've had a close call," he groaned. Then he went on triumphantly: "I guess the Wild hasn't got the bulge on me yet. I can give it another round."

He began to pick up rapidly, and there in that narrow cabin I sat within a few feet of him, and beheld him grow strong again. I suppose my face must have showed my bitter hate, for often I saw him watching me through half-closed eyes, as if he realised my feelings. Then a sneering smile would curve his lips, a smile of satanic mockery. Again and again I thought of Berna. Fear and loathing convulsed me, and at times a great rage burned in me so that I was like to kill him.

"Seems to me everything's healing up but that hand," said the Halfbreed. "I guess it's too far gone. Gangrene's setting in. Say, Locasto, looks like you'll have to lose it."

Locasto had been favouring me with a particularly sardonic look, but at these words the sneer was wiped out, and horror crowded into his eyes.

"Lose my hand—don't tell me that! Kill me at once! I don't want to be maimed. Lose my hand! Oh, that's terrible! terrible!"

He gazed at the discoloured flesh. Already the stench of him was making us sick, but this hand with its putrid tissues was disgusting to a degree.

"Yes," said the Halfbreed, "there's the line of the gangrene, and it's spreading. Soon mortification will extend all up your arm, then you'll die of blood poison. Locasto, better let me take off that hand. I've done jobs like that before. I'm a handy man, I am. Come, let me take it off."

"Heavens! you're a cold-blooded butcher. You're going to kill me, between you all. You're in a plot leagued against me, and that long-faced fool over there's at the bottom of it. Damn you, then, go on and do what you want."

"You're not very grateful," said the Halfbreed. "All right, lie there and rot."

At his words Locasto changed his tune. He became alarmed to the point of terror. He knew the hand was doomed. He lay staring at it, staring, staring. Then he sighed, and thrust its loathsomeness into our faces.

"Come on," he growled. "Do something for me, you devils, or I'll do it myself."

* * * * *

The hour of the operation was at hand. The Halfbreed got his jack-knife ready. He had filed the edge till it was like a rough saw. He cut the skin of the wrist just above the gangrene line, and raised it up an inch or so. It was here Locasto showed wonderful nerve. He took a large bite of tobacco and chewed steadily, while his keen black eyes watched every move of the knife.

"Hurry up and get the cursed thing off," he snarled.

The Halfbreed nicked the flesh down to the bone, then with the ragged jack-knife he began to saw. I could not bear to look. It made me deathly sick. I heard the grit, grit of the jagged blade. I will remember the sound to my dying day. How long it seemed to take! No man could stand such torture. A groan burst from Locasto's lips. He fell back on the bed. His jaws no longer worked, and a thin stream of brown saliva trickled down his chin. He had fainted.

Quickly the Halfbreed finished his work. The hand dropped on the floor. He pulled down the flaps of skin and sewed them together.

"How's that for home-made surgery?" he chuckled. He was vastly proud of his achievement. He took the severed hand upon a shovel and, going to the door, he threw it far out into the darkness.



CHAPTER XIII

"WHY don't you go outside?" I asked of the Jam-wagon.

I had rescued him from one of his periodical plunges into the cesspool of debauch, and he was peaked, pallid, penitent. Listlessly he stared at me a long moment, the dull, hollow-eyed stare of the recently regenerate.

"Well," he said at last, "I think I stay for the same reason many another man stays—pride. I feel that the Yukon owes me one of two things, a stake or a grave—and she's going to pay."

"Seems to me, the way you're shaping you're more liable to get the latter."

"Yes—well, that'll be all right."

"Look here," I remonstrated, "don't be a rotter. You're a man, a splendid one. You might do anything, be anything. For Heaven's sake stop slipping cogs, and get into the game."

His thin, handsome face hardened bitterly.

"I don't know. Sometimes I think I'm not fit to play the game; sometimes I wonder if it's all worth while; sometimes I'm half inclined to end it."

"Oh, don't talk nonsense."

"I'm not; I mean it, every word. I don't often speak of myself. It doesn't matter who I am, or what I've been. I've gone through a lot—more than most men. For years I've been a sort of a human derelict, drifting from port to port of the seven seas. I've sprawled in their mire; I've eaten of their filth; I've wallowed in their moist, barbaric slime. Time and time again I've gone to the mat, but somehow I would never take the count. Something's always saved me at the last."

"Your guardian angel."

"Maybe. Somehow I wouldn't be utterly downed. I'm a bit of a fighter, and every day's been a battle with me. Oh, you don't know, you can't believe how I suffer! Often I pray, and my prayer always is: 'O dear God, don't allow me to think. Lash me with Thy wrath; heap burdens on me, but don't let me think.' They say there's a hell hereafter. They lie: it's here, now."

I was astonished at his vehemence. His face was wrenched with pain, and his eyes full of remorseful misery.

"What about your friends?"

"Oh, them—I died long ago, died in the early '80's. In a little French graveyard there's a tombstone that bears my name, my real name, the name of the 'me' that was. Heart, soul and body, I died. My sisters mourned me, my friends muttered, 'Poor devil.' A few women cried, and a girl—well, I mustn't speak of that. It's all over long ago; but I must eternally do something, fight, drink, work like the devil—anything but think. I mustn't think."

"What about your guardian angel?"

"Yes, sometimes I think he's going to give me another chance. This is no life for a man like me, slaving in the drift, burning myself up in the dissipation of the town. A great, glad fight with a good sweet woman to fight for—that would save me. Oh, to get away from it all, get a clean start!"

"Well, I believe in you. I'm sure you'll be all right. Let me lend you the money."

"Thank you, a thousand thanks; but I cannot take it. There it is again—my pride. Maybe I'm all wrong. Maybe I'm a lost soul, and my goal's the potter's field. No; thanks! In a day or two I'll be fighting-fit again. I wouldn't have bored you with this talk, but I'm weak, and my nerve's gone."

"How much money have you got?" I asked.

He pulled a poor piece of silver from his pocket.

"Enough to do me till I join the pick-and-shovel gang."

"What are those tickets in your hand?"

He laughed carelessly.

"Chances in the ice pools. Funny thing, I don't remember buying them. Must have been drunk."

"Yes, and you seem to have had a 'hunch.' You've got the same time on all three: seven seconds, seven minutes past one, on the ninth—that's to-day. It's noon now. That old ice will have to hurry up if you're going to win. Fancy, if you did! You'd clean up over three thousand dollars. There would be your new start."

"Yes, fancy," he echoed mockingly. "Over five thousand betting, and the guesses as close as peas in a pod."

"Well, the ice may go out any moment. It's awful rotten."

With a curious fascination, we gazed down at the mighty river. Around us was a glow of spring sunshine, above us the renaissance of blue skies. Rags of snow still glimmered on the hills, and the brown earth, as if ashamed of its nakedness, was bursting greenly forth. On the slope overlooking the Klondike, girls in white dresses were gathering the wild crocus. All was warmth, colour, awakening life.

Surely the river ice could not hold much longer. It was patchy, netted with cracks, heaved up in ridges, mottled with slushy pools, corroded to the bottom. Decidedly it was rotten, rotten. Still it held stubbornly. The Klondike hammered it with mighty bergs, black and heavy as a house. Down the swift current they sped, crashing, grinding, roaring, to batter into the unbroken armour of the Yukon. And along its banks, watching even as we watched, were thousands of others. On every lip was the question—"The ice—when will it go out?" For to these exiles of the North, after eight months of isolation, the sight of open water would be like Heaven. It would mean boats, freedom, friendly faces, and a step nearer to that "outside" of their dreams.

Towards the centre of the vast mass of ice that belted in the city was a post, and on this lonely post thousands of eyes were constantly turning. For an electric wire connected it with the town, so that when it moved down a certain distance a clock would register the exact moment. Thus, thousands gazing at that solitary post thought of the bets they had made, and wondered if this year they would be the lucky ones. It is a unique incident in Dawson life, this gambling on the ice. There are dozens of pools, large and small, and both men and women take part in the betting, with an eagerness and excitement that is almost childish.

I sat on a bench on the N. C. trail overlooking the town, and watched the Jam-wagon crawl down the hill to his cabin. Poor fellow! How drawn and white was his face, and his long, clean frame—how gaunt and weary! I felt sorry for him. What would become of him? He was a splendid "misfit." If he only had another chance! Somehow I believed in him, and fervently I hoped he would have that good clean start again.

Up in the cold remoteness of the North are many of his kind—the black sheep, the undesirables, the discards of the pack. Their lips are sealed; their eyes are cold as glaciers, and often they drink deep. Oh, they are a mighty company, the men you don't enquire about; but it is the code of the North to take them as you find them, so they go their way unregarded.

How clear the air was! It was like looking through a crystal lens—every leaf seemed to stand out vividly. Sounds came up to me with marvellous distinctness. Summer was coming, and with it the assurance of a new peace. Down there I could see our home, and on its veranda, hammock-swung, the white figure of Berna. How precious she was to me! How anxiously I watched over her! A look, a word meant more to me than volumes. If she was happy I was full of joy; if she was sad the sunshine paled, the flowers drooped, there was no gladness in the day. Often as she slept I watched her, marvelling at the fine perfection of her face. Always was she an object of wonder to me—something to be adored, to demand all that was fine and high in me.

Yet sometimes it was the very intensity of my love that made me fear; so that in the ecstasy of a moment I would catch my breath and wonder if it all could last. And always the memory of Locasto was a sinister shadow. He had gone "outside," terribly broken in health, gone cursing me hoarsely and vowing he would return. Would he?

Who that knows the North can ever deny its lure? Wherever you be, it will call and call to you. In the sluggish South you will hear it, will long for the keen tingle of its silver days, the vaster glory of its star-strewn nights. In the city's heart it will come to you till you hunger for its big, clean spaces, its racing rivers, its purple tundras. In the homes of the rich its voice will seek you out, and you will ache for your lonely camp-fire, a sunset splendouring to golden death, the night where the silence clutches and the heavens vomit forth white fire. Yes, you will hear it, and hear it, till a madness comes over you, till you leave the crawling men of the sticky pavements to seek it out once more, the sapphire of its lustrous lakes, the white yearning of its peaks to the myriad stars. Then, as a child comes home, will you come home. And I knew that some day to the land wherein he had reigned a conqueror, Locasto, too, would return.

As I looked down on the grey town, the wonder of its growth came over me. How changed from the muddle of tents and cabins, the boat-lined river, the swarming hordes of the Argonauts! Where was the niggerhead swamp, the mud, the unrest, the mad fever of '98? I looked for these things and saw in their stead fine residences, trim gardens, well-kept streets. I almost rubbed my eyes as I realised the magic of the transformation.

And great as was the city's outward change, its change of spirit was still greater. The day of dance-hall domination was over. Vice walked very circumspectly. No longer was it possible on the street to speak to a lady of easy virtue without causing comment.

The demireps of the deadline had been banished over the Klondike, where, in a colony reached by a crazy rope bridge, their red lights gleamed like semaphores of sin. The dance-halls were still running, but the picturesque impunity of the old muckluck days was gone forever. You looked in vain for the crude scenes where the wilder passions were unleashed, and human nature revealed itself in primal nakedness. Heroism, brutality, splendid achievement, unbridled license, the North seems to bring out all that is best and worst in a man. It breeds an exuberant vitality, a madness for action, whether it be for good or evil.

In the town, too, life was becoming a thing of more sober hues. Sick of slipshod morality, men were sending for their wives and children. The old ideals of home and love and social purity were triumphing. With the advent of the good woman, the dance-hall girl was doomed. The city was finding itself. Society divided into sets. The more pretentious were called Ping-pongs, while a majority rejoiced in the name of Rough-necks. The post-office abuses were remedied, the grafters ousted from the government offices. Rapidly the gold-camp was becoming modernised.

Yes, its spectacular days were over. No more would the "live one" disport himself in his wild and woolly glory. The delirium of '98 was fast becoming a memory. The leading actors in that fateful drama—where were they? Dead: some by their own hands; down and out many, drivelling sottishly of by-gone days; poor prospectors a few, dreaming of a new gold strike.

And, as I think of it, it comes over me that the thing is vastly tragic. Where are they now, these Klondike Kings, these givers of champagne baths, these plungers of the gold-camp? How many of those that stood out in the limelight of '98 can tell the tale to-day? Ladue is dead, leaving little behind. Big Alec MacDonald, after lavishing a dozen fortunes on his friends, dies at last, almost friendless and alone. Nigger Jim and Stillwater Willie—in what back slough of vicissitude do they languish to-day? Dick Low lies in a drunkard's grave. Skookum Jim would fain qualify for one. Dawson Charlie, reeling home from a debauch, drowns in the river. In impecunious despair, Harry Waugh hangs himself. Charlie Anderson, after squandering a fortune on a thankless wife, works for a labourer's hire.

So I might go on and on. Their stories would fill volumes. And as I sat on the quiet hillside, listening to the drowsy hum of the bees, the inner meaning of it all came home to me. Once again the great lone land was sifting out and choosing its own. Far-reaching was its vengeance, and it worked in divers ways. It fell on them, even as it had fallen on their brethren of the trail. In the guise of fortune it dealt their ruin. From the austere silence of its snows it was mocking them, beguiling them to their doom. Again it was the Land of the Strong. Before all it demanded strength, moral and physical strength. I was minded of the words of old Jim, "Where one wins ninety and nine will fail"; and time had proved him true. The great, grim land was weeding out the unfit, was rewarding those who could understand it, the faithful brotherhood of the high North.

Full of such thoughts as these, I raised my eyes and looked down the river towards the Moosehide Bluffs. Hullo! There, just below the town, was a great sheet of water, and even as I watched I saw it spread and spread. People were shouting, running from their houses, speeding to the beach. I was conscious of a thrill of excitement. Ever widening was the water, and now it stretched from bank to bank. It crept forward to the solitary post. Now it was almost there. Suddenly the post started to move. The vast ice-field was sliding forward. Slowly, serenely it went, on, on.

Then, all at once, the steam-whistles shrilled out, the bells pealed, and from the black mob of people that lined the banks there went up an exultant cheer. "The ice is going out—the ice is going out!"

I looked at my watch. Could I believe my eyes? Seven seconds, seven minutes past one—his "hunch" was right; his guardian angel had intervened; the Jam-wagon had been given his chance to make a new start.



CHAPTER XIV

The waters were wild with joy. From the mountain snows the sun had set them free. Down hill and dale they sparkled, trickling from boulders, dripping from mossy crannies, rioting in narrow runlets. Then, leaping and laughing in a mad ecstasy of freedom, they dashed into the dam.

Here was something they did not understand, some contrivance of the tyrant Man to curb them, to harness them, to make them his slaves. The waters were angry. They gloomed fearsomely. As they swelled higher in the broad basin their wrath grew apace. They chafed against their prison walls, they licked and lapped at the stolid bank. Higher and higher they mounted, growing stronger with every leap. More and more bitterly they fretted at their durance. Behind them other waters were pressing, just as eager to escape as they. They lashed and writhed in savage spite. Not much longer could these patient walls withstand their anger. Something must happen.

The "something" was a man. He raised the floodgate, and there at last was a way of escape. How joyously the eager waters rushed at it! They tumbled and tossed in their mad hurry to get out. They surged and swept and roared about the narrow opening.

But what was this? They had come on a wooden box that streaked down the slope as straight as an arrow from the bow. It was some other scheme of the tyrant Man. Nevertheless, they jostled and jammed to get into it. On its brink they poised a moment, then down, down they dashed.

Like a cataract they rushed, ever and ever growing faster. Ho! this was motion now, this was action, strength, power. As they shot down that steep hill they shrieked for very joy. Freedom, freedom at last! No more trickling feebly from snowbanks; no more boring devious channels in oozy clay, no more stagnating in sullen dams. They were alive, alive, swift, intense, terrific. They gloried in their might. They roared the raucous song of freedom, and faster and faster they charged. Like a stampede of maddened horses they thundered on. What power on earth could stop them? "We must be free! We must be free!" they cried.

Suddenly they saw ahead the black hole of a great pipe, a hollow shard of steel. Prison-like it looked, again some contrivance of the tyrant Man. They would fain have overleapt it, but it was too late. Countless other waters were behind them, forcing them forward with irresistible power. And, faster and faster still, they crashed into the shard of steel.

They were trapped, atrociously trapped, cabined, confined, rammed forward by a vast and remorseless pressure. Yet there was escape just ahead. It was a tiny point of light, an outlet. They must squeeze through it. They were crushed and pinioned in that prison of steel, and mightily they tried to burst it. No! there was only that orifice; they must pass through it. Then with that great force behind them, tortured, maddened, desperate, the waters crashed through the shard of steel, to serve the will of Man.

The man stood by his water-gun and from its nozzle, the gleaming terror leapt. At first it was only a slim volley of light, compact and solid as a shaft of steel. To pierce it would have splintered to pieces the sharpest sword. It was a core of water, round, glistening and smooth, yet in its mighty power it was a monster of destruction.

The man was directing it here and there on the face of the hill. It flew like an arrow from the bow, and wherever he aimed it the hillside seemed to reel and shudder at the shock. Great cataracts of gravel shot out, avalanches of clay toppled over; vast boulders were hurled into the air like heaps of fleecy wool.

Yes, the waters were mad. They were like an angry bull that gored the hillside. It seemed to melt and dissolve before them. Nothing could withstand that assault. In a few minutes they would reduce the stoutest stronghold to a heap of pitiful ruins.

There, where the waters shot forth in their fury, stood their conqueror. He was one man, yet he was doing the work of a hundred. As he battered at that bank of clay he exulted in his power. A little turn of the wrist and a huge mass of gravel crumbled into nothingness. He bored deep holes in the frozen muck, he hammered his way down to bed rock, he swept it clean as a floor. There, with the solid force of a battering-ram, he pounded at the heart of the hill.

The roar deafened him. He heard the crash of falling rock, but he was so intent on his work he did not hear another man approach. Suddenly he looked up and saw.

He gave a mighty start, then at once he was calm again. This was the meeting he had dreaded, longed for, fought against, desired. Primordial emotions surged within him, but outwardly he gave no sign. Almost savagely, and with a curious blaze in his eyes he redirected the little giant.

He waved his hand to the other man.

"Go away!" he shouted.

Mosher refused to budge. The generous living of Dawson had made him pursy, almost porcine. His pig eyes glittered, and he took off his hat to wipe some beads of sweat from the monumental baldness of his forehead. He caressed his coal-black beard with a podgy hand on which a large diamond sparkled. His manner was arrogance personified. He seemed to say, "I'll make this man dance to my music."

His rich, penetrating voice pierced through the roar of the "giant."

"Here, turn off your water. I want to speak to you. Got a business proposition to make."

Still Jim was dumb.

Mosher came close to him and shouted into his ear. The two men were very calm.

"Say, your wife's in town. Been there for the last year. Didn't you know it?"

Jim shook his head. He was particularly interested in his work just then. There was a great saddle of clay, and he scooped it up magically.

"Yes, she's in town—living respectable."

Jim redirected his giant with a savage swish.

"Say, I'm a sort of a philant'ropic guy," went on Mosher, "an' there's nothing I like better than doing the erring wife restitootion act. I think I could induce that little woman of yours to come back to you."

Jim gave him a swift glance, but the man went on.

"To tell the truth, she's a bit stuck on me. Not my fault, of course. Can't help it if a girl gets daffy on me. But say, I think I could get her switched on to you if you made it worth my while. It's a business proposition."

He was sneering now, frankly villainous. Jim gave no sign.

"What d'ye say? This is a likely bit of ground—give me a half-share in this ground, an' I'll guarantee to deliver that little piece of goods to you. There's an offer."

Again that smug look of generosity beamed on the man's face. Once more Jim motioned him to go, but Mosher did not heed. He thought the gesture was a refusal. His face grew threatening. "All right, if you won't," he snarled, "look out! I know you love her still. Let me tell you, I own that woman, body and soul, and I'll make life hell for her. I'll torture you through her. Yes, I've got a cinch. You'd better change your mind."

He had stepped back as if to go. Then, whether it was an accident or not no one will ever know—but the little giant swung round till it bore on him.

It lifted him up in the air. It shot him forward like a stone from a catapult. It landed him on the bank fifty feet away with a sickening crash. Then, as he lay, it pounded and battered him out of all semblance of a man.

The waters were having their revenge.



CHAPTER XV

"There's something the matter with Jim," the Prodigal 'phoned to me from the Forks; "he's gone off and left the cabin on Ophir, taken to the hills. Some prospectors have just come in and say they met him heading for the White Snake Valley. Seemed kind of queer, they say. Wouldn't talk much. They thought he was in a fair way to go crazy."

"He's never been right since the accident," I answered; "we'll have to go after him."

"All right. Come up at once. I'll get McCrimmon. He's a good man in the woods. We'll be ready to start as soon as you arrive."

So the following day found the three of us on the trail to Ophir. We travelled lightly, carrying very little food, for we thought to find game in the woods. On the evening of the following day we reached the cabin.

Jim must have gone very suddenly. There were the remains of a meal on the table, and his Bible was gone from its place. There was nothing for it but to follow and find him.

"By going to the headwaters of Ophir Creek," said the Halfbreed, "we can cross a divide into the valley of the White Snake, and there we'll corral him, I guess."

So we left the trail and plunged into the virgin Wild. Oh, but it was hard travelling! Often we would keep straight up the creek-bed, plunging through pools that were knee-deep, and walking over shingly bars. Then, to avoid a big bend of the stream, we would strike off through the bush. Every yard seemed to have its obstacle. There were windfalls and tangled growths of bush that defied our uttermost efforts to penetrate them. There were viscid sloughs, from whose black depths bubbles arose wearily, with grey tree-roots like the legs of spiders clutching the slimy mud of their banks. There were oozy bottoms, rankly speared with rush-grass. There were leprous marshes spotted with unsightly niggerheads. Dripping with sweat, we fought our way under the hot sun. Thorny boughs tore at us detainingly. Fallen trees delighted to bar our way. Without let or cease we toiled, yet at the day's end our progress was but a meagre one.

Our greatest bane was the mosquitoes. Night and day they never ceased to nag us. We wore veils and had gloves on our hands, so that under our armour we were able to grin defiance at them. But on the other side of that netting they buzzed in an angry grey cloud. To raise our veils and take a drink was to be assaulted ferociously. As we walked we could feel them resisting our progress, and it seemed as if we were forcing our way through solid banks of them. If we rested, they alighted in such myriads that soon we appeared literally sheathed in tiny atoms of insect life, vainly trying to pierce the mesh of our clothing. To bare a hand was to have it covered with blood in a moment, and the thought of being at their mercy was an exquisitely horrible one. Night and day their voices blended in a vast drone, so that we ate, drank and slept under our veils.

In that rankly growing wilderness we saw no sign of life, not even a rabbit. It was all desolate and God-forsaken. By nightfall our packs seemed very heavy, our limbs very tired. Three days, four days, five days passed. The creek was attenuated and hesitating, so we left it and struck off over the mountains. Soon we climbed to where the timber growth was less obstructive. The hillside was steep, almost vertical in places, and was covered with a strange, deep growth of moss. Down in it we sank, in places to our knees, and beneath it we could feel the points of sharp boulders. As we climbed we plunged our hands deep into the cool cushion of the moss, and half dragged ourselves upward. It was like an Oriental rug covering the stony ribs of the hill, a rug of bizarre colouring, strangely patterned in crimson and amber, in emerald and ivory. Birch-trees of slim, silvery beauty arose in it, and aided us as we climbed.

So we came at last, after a weary journey, to a bleak, boulder-studded plateau. It was above timber-line, and carpeted with moss of great depth and gaudy hue. Suddenly we saw two vast pillars of stone upstanding on the aching barren. I think they must have been two hundred feet high, and, like monstrous sentinels in their lonely isolation, they overlooked that vast tundra. They startled us. We wondered by what strange freak of nature they were stationed there.

Then we dropped down into a vast, hush-filled valley, a valley that looked as if it had been undisturbed since the beginning of time. Like a spirit-haunted place it was, so strange and still. It was loneliness made visible. It was stillness written in wood and stone. I would have been afraid to enter it alone, and even as we sank in its death-haunted dusk I shuddered with a horror of the place.

The Indians feared and shunned this valley. They said, of old, strange things had happened there; it had been full of noise and fire and steam; the earth had opened up, belching forth great dragons that destroyed the people. And indeed it was all like the vast crater of an extinct volcano, for hot springs bubbled forth and a grey ash cropped up through the shallow soil.

There was no game in the valley. In its centre was a solitary lake, black and bottomless, and haunted by a giant white water-snake, sluggish, blind and very old. Stray prospectors swore they had seen it, just at dusk, and its sightless, staring eyes were too terrible ever to forget.

And into this still, cobweb-hued hollow we dropped—dropped almost straight down over the flanks of those lean, lank mountains that fringed it so forlornly. Here, ringed all around by desolate heights, we were as remote from the world as if we were in some sallow solitude of the moon. Sometimes the valley was like a gaping mouth, and the lips of it were livid grey. Sometimes it was like a cup into which the sunset poured a golden wine and filled it quivering to the brim. Sometimes it was like a grey grave full of silence. And here in this place of shadows, where the lichen strangled the trees, and under-foot the moss hushed the tread, where we spoke in whispers, and mirth seemed a mockery, where every stick and stone seemed eloquent of disenchantment and despair, here in this valley of Dead Things we found Jim.

He was sitting by a dying camp-fire, all huddled up, his arms embracing his knees, his eyes on the fading embers. As we drew near he did not move, did not show any surprise, did not even raise his head. His face was very pale and drawn into a pucker of pain. It was the queerest look I ever saw on a man's face. It made me creep.

His eyes followed us furtively. Silently we squatted in a ring round his camp-fire. For a while we said no word, then at last the Prodigal spoke:

"Jim, you're coming back with us, aren't you?"

Jim looked at him.

"Hush!" says he, "don't speak so loud. You'll waken all them dead fellows."

"What d'ye mean?"

"Them dead fellows. The woods is full of them, them that can't rest. They're all around, ghosts. At night, when I'm a-sittin' over the fire, they crawl out of the darkness, an' they get close to me, closer, closer, an' they whisper things. Then I get scared an' I shoo them away."

"What do they whisper, Jim?"

"Oh say! they tell me all kinds of things, them fellows in the woods. They tell me of the times they used to have here in the valley; an' how they was a great people, an' had women an' slaves; how they fought an' sang an' got drunk, an' how their kingdom was here, right here where it's all death an' desolation. An' how they conquered all the other folks around an' killed the men an' captured the women. Oh, it was long, long ago, long before the flood!"

"Well, Jim, never mind them. Get your pack ready. We're going home right now."

"Goin' home?—I've no home any more. I'm a fugitive an' a vagabond in the earth. The blood of my brother crieth unto me from the ground. From the face of the Lord shall I be hid an' every one that findeth me shall slay me. I have no home but the wilderness. Unto it I go with prayer an' fastin'. I have killed, I have killed!"

"Nonsense, Jim; it was an accident."

"Was it? Was it? God only knows; I don't. Only I know the thought of murder was black in my heart. It was there for ever an' ever so long. How I fought against it! Then, just at that moment, everything seemed to come to a head. I don't know that I meant what I did, but I thought it."

"Come home, Jim, and forget it."

"When the rivers start to run up them mountain peaks I'll forget it. No, they won't let me forget it, them ghosts. They whisper to me all the time. Hist! don't you hear them? They're whispering to me now. 'You're a murderer, Jim, a murderer,' they say. 'The brand of Cain is on you, Jim, the brand of Cain.' Then the little leaves of the trees take up the whisper, an' the waters murmur it, an' the very stones cry out ag'in me, an' I can't shut out the sound. I can't, I can't."

"Hush, Jim!"

"No, no, the devil's a-hoein' out a place in the embers for me. I can't turn no more to the Lord. He's cast me out, an' the light of His countenance is darkened to me. Never again; oh, never again!"

"Oh come, Jim, for the sake of your old partners, come home."

"Well, boys, I'll come. But it's no good. I'm down an' out."

Wearily we gathered together his few belongings. He had been living on bread, and but little remained. Had we not reached him, he would have starved. He came like a child, but seemed a prey to acute melancholy.

It was indeed a sad party that trailed down that sad, dead valley. The trees were hung with a dreary drapery of grey, and the ashen moss muffled our footfalls. I think it was the deadest place I ever saw. The very air seemed dead and stale, as if it were eternally still, unstirred by any wind. Spiders and strange creeping things possessed the trees, and at every step, like white gauze, a mist of mosquitoes was thrown up. And the way seemed endless.

A great weariness weighed upon our spirits. Our feet flagged and our shoulders were bowed. As we looked into each other's faces we saw there a strange lassitude, a chill, grey despair. Our voices sounded hollow and queer, and we seldom spoke. It was as if the place was a vampire that was sucking the life and health from our veins.

"I'm afraid the old man's going to play out on us," whispered the Prodigal.

Jim lagged forlornly behind, and it was very anxiously we watched him. He seemed to know that he was keeping us back. His efforts to keep up were pitiful. We feigned an equal weariness, not to distress him, and our progress was slow, slow.

"Looks as if we'll have to go on half-rations," said the Halfbreed. "It's taking longer to get out of this valley than I figured on."

And indeed it was like a vast prison, and those peaks that brindled in the sunset glow were like bars to hold us in. Every day the old man's step was growing slower, so that at last we were barely crawling along. We were ascending the western slope of the valley, climbing a few miles a day, and every step we rose from that sump-hole of the gods was like the lifting of a weight. We were tired, tired, and in the wan light that filtered through the leaden clouds our faces were white and strained.

"I guess we'll have to go on quarter-rations from now," said the Halfbreed, a few days later. He ranged far and wide, looking for game, but never a sign did he see. Once, indeed, we heard a shot. Eagerly we waited his return, but all he had got was a great, grey owl, which we cooked and ate ravenously.



CHAPTER XVI

At last, at last we had climbed over the divide, and left behind us forever the vampire valley. Oh, we were glad! But other troubles were coming. Soon the day came when the last of our grub ran out. I remember how solemnly we ate it. We were already more than three-parts starved, and that meal was but a mouthful.

"Well," said the Halfbreed, "we can't be far from the Yukon now. It must be the valley beyond this one. Then, in a few days, we can make a raft and float down to Dawson."

This heartened us, so once more we took up our packs and started. Jim did not move.

"Come on, Jim."

Still no movement.

"What's the matter, Jim? Come on."

He turned to us a face that was grey and deathlike.

"Go on, boys. Don't mind me. My time's up. I'm an old man. I'm only keeping you back. Without me you've got a chance; with me you've got none. Leave me here with a gun. I can shoot an' rustle grub. You boys can come back for me. You'll find old Jim spry an' chipper, awaitin' you with a smile on his face. Now go, boys. You'll go, won't you?"

"Go be darned!" said the Prodigal. "You know we'll never leave you, Jim. You know the code of the trail. What d'ye take us for—skunks? Come on, we'll carry you if you can't walk."

He shook his head pitifully, but once more he crawled after us. We ourselves were making no great speed. Lack of food was beginning to tell on us. Our stomachs were painfully empty and dead.

"How d'ye feel?" asked the Prodigal. His face had an arrestively hollow look, but that frozen smile was set on it.

"All right," I said, "only terribly weak. My head aches at times, but I've got no pain."

"Neither have I. This starving racket's a cinch. It's dead easy. What rot they talk about the gnawing pains of hunger, an' ravenous men chewing up their boot-tops. It's easy. There's no pain. I don't even feel hungry any more."

None of us did. It was as if our stomachs, in despair at not receiving any food, had sunk into apathy. Yet there was no doubt we were terribly weak. We only made a few miles a day now, and even that was an effort. The distance seemed to be elastic, to stretch out under our feet. Every few yards we had to help Jim over a bad place. His body was emaciated and he was getting very feeble. A hollow fire burned in his eyes. The Halfbreed persisted that beyond those despotic mountains lay the Yukon Valley, and at night he would rouse us up:

"Say, boys, I hear the 'toot' of a steamer. Just a few more days and we'll get there."

Running through the valley, we found a little river. It was muddy in colour and appeared to contain no fish. We ranged along it eagerly, hoping to find a few minnows, but without success. It seemed to me, as I foraged here and there for food, it was not hunger that impelled me so much as the instinct of self-preservation. I knew that if I did not get something into my stomach I would surely die.

Down the river we trailed forlornly. For a week we had eaten nothing. Jim had held on bravely, but now he gave up.

"For God's sake, leave me, boys! Don't make me feel guilty of your death. Haven't I got enough on my soul already? For God's pity, lads, save yourselves! Leave me here to die."

He pleaded brokenly. His legs seemed to have become paralysed. Every time we stopped he would pitch forward on his face, or while walking he would fall asleep and drop. The Prodigal and I supported him, but it was truly hard to support ourselves, and sometimes we collapsed, coming down all three together in a confused and helpless heap. The Prodigal still wore that set grin. His face was nigh fleshless, and, through the straggling beard, it sometimes minded me of a grinning skull. Always Jim moaned and pleaded:

"Leave me, dear boys, leave me!"

He was like a drunken man, and his every step was agony.

We threw away our packs. We no longer had the strength to bear them. The last thing to go was the Halfbreed's rifle. Several times it dropped out of his hand. He picked it up in a dazed way. Again and again it dropped, but at last the time came when he no longer picked it up. He looked at it for a stupid while, then staggered on without it.

At night we would rest long hours round the camp-fire. Often far into the day would we rest. Jim lay like a dead man, moaning continually, while we, staring into each other's ghastly faces, talked in jerks. It was an effort to hunt food. It was an effort to goad ourselves to continue the journey.

"Sure the river empties into the Yukon, boys," said the Halfbreed. "'Tain't so far, either. If we can just make a few miles more we'll be all right."

At night, in my sleep, I was a prey to the strangest hallucinations. People I had known came and talked to me. They were so real that, when I awoke, I could scarce believe I had been dreaming. Berna came to me often. She came quite close, with great eyes of pity that looked into mine. Her lips moved.

"Be brave, my boy. Don't despair," she pleaded. Always in my dreams she pleaded like that, and I think that but for her I would have given up.

The Halfbreed was the most resolute of the party. He never lost his head. At times we others raved a little, or laughed a little, or cried a little, but the Halfbreed remained cool and grim. Ceaselessly he foraged for food. Once he found a nest of grouse eggs, and, breaking them open, discovered they contained half-formed birds. We ate them just as they were, crunched them between our swollen gums. Snails, too, we ate sometimes, and grass roots and moss which we scraped from the trees. But our greatest luck was the decayed grouse eggs.

Early one afternoon we were all resting by a camp-fire on which was boiling some moss, when suddenly the Halfbreed pointed. There, in a glade down by the river's edge, were a cow moose and calf. They were drinking. Stupidly we gazed. I saw the Halfbreed's hand go out as if to clutch the rifle. Alas! his fingers closed on the empty air. So near they were we could have struck them with a stone. Taking his sheath knife in his mouth, the Halfbreed started to crawl on his belly towards them. He had gone but a few yards when they winded him. One look they gave, and in a few moments they were miles away. That was the only time I saw the Halfbreed put out. He fell on his face and lay there for a long time.

Often we came to sloughs that we could not cross, and we had to go round them. We tried to build rafts, but we were too weak to navigate them. We were afraid we would roll off into the deep black water and drown feebly. So we went round, which in one case meant ten miles. Once, over a slough a few yards wide, the Halfbreed built a bridge of willows, and we crawled on hands and knees to the other side.

From a certain point our trip seems like a nightmare to me. I can only remember parts of it here and there. We reeled like drunken men. We sobbed sometimes, and sometimes we prayed. There was no word from Jim now, not even a whimper, as we half dragged, half carried him on. Our eyes were large with fever, our hands were like claws. Long sickly beards grew on our faces. Our clothes were rags, and vermin overran us. We had lost all track of time. Latterly we had been travelling about half a mile a day, and we must have been twenty days without proper food.

The Halfbreed had crawled ahead a mile or so, and he came back to where we lay. In a voice hoarse almost to a whisper he told us a bigger river joined ours down there, and on the bar was an old Indian camp. Perhaps in that place some one might find us. It seemed on the route of travel. So we made a last despairing effort and reached it. Indians had visited it quite recently. We foraged around and found some putrid fish bones, with which we made soup.

There was a grave set high on stilts, and within it a body covered with canvas. The Halfbreed wrenched the canvas from the body, and with it he made a boat eight feet in length by six in breadth. It was too rotten to hold him up, and he nearly drowned trying to float it, so he left it lying on the edge of the bar. I remember this was a terrible disappointment to us, and we wept bitterly. I think that about this time we were all half-crazy. We lay on that bar like men already dead, with no longer hope of deliverance.

* * * * *

Then Jim passed in his checks. In the night he called me.

"Boy," he whispered, "you an' I'se been good pals, ain't we?"

"Yes, old man."

"Boy, I'm in agony. I'm suffering untold pain. Get the gun, for God's sake, an' put me out of my misery."

"There's no gun, Jim; we left it back on the trail."

"Then take your knife."

"No, no."

"Give me your knife."

"Jim, you're crazy. Where's your faith in God?"

"Gone, gone; I've no longer any right to look to Him. I've killed. I've taken life He gave. 'Vengeance is mine,' He said, an' I've taken it out of His hands. God's curse is on me now. Oh, let me die, let me die!"

I sat by him all night. He moaned in agony, and his passing was hard. It was about three in the morning when he spoke again:

"Say, boy, I'm going. I'm a useless old man. I've lived in sin, an' I've repented, an' I've backslid. The Lord don't want old Jim any more. Say, kid, see that little girl of mine down in Dawson gets what money's comin' to me. Tell her to keep straight, an' tell her I loved her. Tell her I never let up on lovin' her all these years. You'll remember that, boy, won't you?"

"I'll remember, Jim."

"Oh, it's all a hoodoo, this Northern gold," he moaned. "See what it's done for all of us. We came to loot the land an' it's a-takin' its revenge on us. It's accursed. It's got me at last, but maybe I can help you boys to beat it yet. Call the others."

I called them.

"Boys," said Jim, "I'm a-goin'. I've been a long time about it. I've been dying by inches, but I guess I'll finish the job pretty slick this time. Well, boys, I'm in possession of all my faculties. I want you to know that. I was crazy when I started off, but that's passed away. My mind's clear. Now, pardners, I've got you into this scrape. I'm responsible, an' it seems to me I'd die happier if you'd promise me one thing. Livin', I can't help you; dead, I can—you know how. Well, I want you to promise me you'll do it. It's a reasonable proposition. Don't hesitate. Don't let sentiment stop you. I wish it. It's my dying wish. You're starvin', an' I can help you, can give you strength. Will you promise, if it comes to the last pass, you'll do it?"

We were afraid to look each other in the face.

"Oh, promise, boys, promise!"

"Promise him anyway," said the Halfbreed. "He'll die easier."

So we nodded our heads as we bent over him, and he turned away his face, content.

'Twas but a little after he called me again.

"Boy, give me your hand. Say a prayer for me, won't you? Maybe it'll help some, a prayer for a poor old sinner that's backslid. I can never pray again."

"Yes, try to pray, Jim, try. Come on; say it after me: 'Our Father—'"

"'Our Father—'"

"'Which art in Heaven—'"

"'Which art in—'"

His head fell forward. "Bless you, my boy. Father, forgive, forgive—"

He sank back very quietly.

He was dead.

* * * * *

Next morning the Halfbreed caught a minnow. We divided it into three and ate it raw. Later on he found some water-lice under a stone. We tried to cook them, but they did not help us much. Then, as night fell once more, a thought came into our minds and stuck there. It was a hidden thought, and yet it grew and grew. As we sat round in a circle we looked into each other's faces, and there we read the same revolting thought. Yet did it not seem so revolting after all. It was as if the spirit of the dead man was urging us to this thing, so insistent did the thought become. It was our only hope of life. It meant strength again, strength and energy to make a raft and float us down the river. Oh, if only—but, no! We could not do it. Better, a hundred times better, die.

Yet life was sweet, and for twenty-three days we had starved. Here was a chance to live, with the dead man whispering in our ears to do it. You who have never starved a day in your lives, would you blame us? Life is sweet to you, too. What would you have done? The dead man was urging us, and life was sweet.

But we struggled, God knows we struggled. We did not give in without agony. In our hopeless, staring eyes there was the anguish of the great temptation. We looked in each other's death's-head faces. We clasped skeleton hands round our rickety knees, and swayed as we tried to sit upright. Vermin crawled over us in our weakness. We were half-crazy, and muttered in our beards.

It was the Halfbreed who spoke, and his voice was just a whisper:

"It's our only chance, boys, and we've promised him. God forgive me, but I've a wife and children, and I'm a-goin' to do it."

He was too weak to rise, and with his knife in his mouth he crawled to the body.

* * * * *

It was ready, but we had not eaten. We waited and waited, hoping against hope. Then, as we waited, God was merciful to us. He saved us from this thing.

"Say, I guess I've got a pipe-dream, but I think I see two men coming downstream on a raft."

"No, it's no dream," I said; "two men."

"Shout to them; I can't," said the Prodigal.

I tried to shout, but my voice came as a whisper. The Halfbreed, too, tried to shout. There was scarcely any sound to it. The men did not see us as we lay on that shingly bar. Faster and faster they came. In hopeless, helpless woe we watched them. We could do nothing. In a few moments they would be past. With eyes of terror we followed them, tried to make signals to them. O God, help us!

Suddenly they caught sight of that crazy boat of ours made of canvas and willows. They poled the raft in close, then one of them saw those three strange things writhing impotently on the sand. They were skeletons, they were in rags, they were covered with vermin.— * * *

We were saved; thank God, we were saved!



CHAPTER XVII

"Berna, we must get married."

"Yes, dearest, whenever you wish."

"Well, to-morrow."

She smiled radiantly; then her face grew very serious.

"What will I wear?" she asked plaintively.

"Wear? Oh, anything. That white dress you've got on—I never saw you looking so sweet. You mind me of a picture I know of Saint Cecilia, the same delicacy of feature, the same pure colouring, the same grace of expression."

"Foolish one!" she chided; but her voice was deliciously tender, and her eyes were love-lit. And indeed, as she stood by the window holding her embroidery to the failing light, you scarce could have imagined a girl more gracefully sweet. In a fine mood of idealising, my eyes rested on her.

"Yes, fairy girl, that briar rose you are doing in the centre of your little canvas hoop is not more delicate in the tinting than are your cheeks; your hands that ply the needle so daintily are whiter than the May blossoms on its border; those coils of shining hair that crown your head would shame the silk you use for softness."

"Don't," she sighed; "you spoil me."

"Oh no, it's true, true. Sometimes I wish you were not so lovely. It makes me care so much for you that—it hurts. Sometimes I wish you were plain, then I would feel more sure of you. Sometimes I fear, fear some one will steal you away from me."

"No, no," she cried; "no one ever will. There will never be any one but you."

She came over to me, and knelt by my chair, putting her arms around me prettily. The pure, sweet face looked up into mine.

"We have been happy here, haven't we, boy?" she asked.

"Exquisitely happy. Yet I have always been afraid."

"Of what, dearest?"

"I don't know. Somehow it seems too good to last."

"Well, to-morrow we'll be married."

"Yes, we should have done that a year ago. It's all been a mistake. It didn't matter at first; nobody noticed, nobody cared. But now it's different. I can see it by the way the wives of the men look at us. I wonder do women resent the fact that virtue is only its own reward—they are so down on those who stray. Well, we don't care anyway. We'll marry and live our lives. But there are other reasons."

"Yes?"

"Yes. Garry talks of coming out. You wouldn't like him to find us living like this—without benefit of the clergy?"

"Not for the world!" she cried, in alarm.

"Well, he won't. Garry's old-fashioned and terribly conventional, but you'll take to him at once. There's a wonderful charm about him. He's so good-looking, yet so clever. I think he could win any woman if he tried, only he's too upright and sincere."

"What will he think of me, I wonder, poor, ignorant me? I believe I'm afraid of him. I wish he'd stay away and leave us alone. Yet for your sake, dear, I do wish him to think well of me."

"Don't fear, Berna. He'll be proud of you. But there's a second reason."

"What?"

I drew her up beside me on the great Morris-chair.

"Oh, my beloved! perhaps we'll not always be alone as we are now. Perhaps, perhaps some day there will be others—little ones—for their sakes."

She did not speak. I could feel her nestle closer to me. Her cheek was pressed to mine; her hair brushed my brow and her lips were like rose-petals on my own. So we sat there in the big, deep chair, in the glow of the open fire, silent, dreaming, and I saw on her lashes the glimmer of a glorious tear.

"Why do you cry, beloved?"

"Because I'm so happy. I never thought I could be so happy. I want it to last forever, I never want to leave this little cabin of ours. It will always be home to me. I love it; oh, how I love it!—every stick and stone of it! This dear little room—there will never be another like it in the world. Some day we may have a fine home, but I think I'll always leave some of my heart here in the little cabin."

I kissed away her tears. Foolish tears! I blessed her for them. I held her closer to me. I was wondrous happy. No longer did the shadow of the past hang over us. Even as children forget, were we forgetting. Outside the winter's day was waning fast. The ruddy firelight danced around us. It flickered on the walls, the open piano, the glass front of the bookcase. It lit up the Indian corner, the lounge with its cushions and brass reading-lamp, the rack of music, the pictures, the lace curtains, the gleaming little bit of embroidery. Yes, to me, too, these things were wistfully precious, for it seemed as if part of her had passed into them. It would have been like tearing out my heart-strings to part with the smallest of them.

"Husband, I'm so happy," she sighed.

"Wife, dear, dear wife, I too."

There was no need for words. Our lips met in passionate kisses, but the next moment we started apart. Some one was coming up the garden path—a tall figure of a man. I started as if I had seen a ghost. Could it be?—then I rushed to the door.

There on the porch stood Garry.



CHAPTER XVIII

As he stood before me once again it seemed as if the years had rolled away, and we were boys together. A spate of tender memories came over me, memories of the days of dreams and high resolves, when life rang true, when men were brave and women pure. Once more I stood upon that rock-envisaged coast, while below me the yeasty sea charged with a roar the echoing caves. The gulls were glinting in the sunshine, and by their little brown-thatched homes the fishermen were spreading out their nets. High on the hillside in her garden I could see my mother idling among her flowers. It all came back to me, that sunny shore, the whitewashed cottages, the old grey house among the birches, the lift of sheep-starred pasture, and above it the glooming dark of the heather hills.

And it was but three years ago. How life had changed! A thousand things had happened. Fortune had come to me, love had come to me. I had lived, I had learned. I was no longer a callow, uncouth lad. Yet, alas! I no longer looked futurewards with joy; the savour of life was no more sweet. It was another "me" I saw in my mirror that day, a "me" with a face sorely lined, with hair grey-flecked, with eyes sad and bitter. Little wonder Garry, as he stood there, stared at me so sorrowfully.

"How you've changed, lad!" said he at last.

"Have I, Garry? You're just about the same."

But indeed he, too, had changed, had grown finer than my fondest thoughts of him. He seemed to bring into the room the clean, sweet breath of Glengyle, and I looked at him with admiration in my eyes. Coming out of the cold, his colour was dazzling as that of a woman; his deep blue eyes sparkled; his fair silky hair, from the pressure of his cap, was moulded to the shape of his fine head. Oh, he was handsome, this brother of mine, and I was proud, proud of him!

"By all that's wonderful, what brought you here?"

His teeth flashed in that clever, confident smile.

"The stage. I just arrived a few minutes ago, and hurried here at once. Aren't you glad to see me?"

"Glad? Yes, indeed! I can't tell you how glad. But it's a shock to me your coming so suddenly. You might have let me know."

"Yes, it was a sudden resolve; I should have wired you. However, I thought I would give you a surprise. How are you, old man?"

"Me—oh, I'm all right, thanks."

"Why, what's the matter with you, lad? You look ten years older. You look older than your big brother now."

"Yes, I daresay. It's the life, it's the land. A hard life and a hard land."

"Why don't you go out?"

"I don't know, I don't know. I keep on planning to go out and then something turns up, and I put it off a little longer. I suppose I ought to go, but I'm tied up with mining interests. My partner is away in the East, and I promised to stay in and look after things. I'm making money, you see."

"Not sacrificing your youth and health for that, are you?"

"I don't know, I don't know."

There was a puzzled look in his frank face, and for my part I was strangely ill at ease. With all my joy at his coming, there was a sense of anxiety, even of fear. I had not wanted him to come just then, to see me there. I was not ready for him. I had planned otherwise.

He was fixing me with a clear, penetrating look. For a moment his eyes seemed to bore into me, then like a flash the charm came back into his face. He laughed that ringing laugh of his.

"Well, I was tired of roaming round the old place. Things are in good order now. I've saved a little money and I thought I could afford to travel a little, so I came up to see my wandering brother, and his wonderful North."

His gaze roved round the room. Suddenly it fell on the piece of embroidery. He started slightly and I saw his eyes narrow, his mouth set. His glance shifted to the piano with its litter of music. He looked at me again, in an odd, bewildered way. He went on speaking, but there was a queer constraint in his manner.

"I'm going to stay here for a month, and then I want you to come back with me. Come back home and get some of the old colour into your cheeks. The country doesn't agree with you, but we'll have you all right pretty soon. We'll have you flogging the trout pools and tramping over the heather with a gun. You remember how—whir-r-r—the black-cock used to rise up right at one's very feet. They've been very plentiful the last two years. Oh, we'll have the good old times over again! You'll see, we'll soon put you right."

"It's good of you, Garry, to think so much of me; but I'm afraid, I'm afraid I can't come just yet. I've got so much to do. I've got thirty men working for me. I've just got to stay."

He sighed.

"Well, if you stay I'll stay, too. I don't like the way you're looking. You're working too hard. Perhaps I can help you."

"All right; I'm afraid you'll find it rather awful, though. No one lives up here in winter if they possibly can avoid it. But for a time it will interest you."

"I think it will." And again his eyes stared fixedly at that piece of embroidery on its little hoop.

"I'm terribly, glad to see you anyway, Garry. There's no use talking, words can't express things like that between us two. You know what I mean. I'm glad to see you, and I'll do my best to make your visit a happy one."

Between the curtains that hung over the bedroom door I could see Berna standing motionless. I wondered if he could see her too. His eyes followed mine. They rested on the curtains and the strong, stern look came into his face. Yet again he banished it with a sunny smile.

"Mother's one regret was that you were not with her when she died. Do you know, old man, I think she was always fonder of you than of me? You were the sentimental one of the family, and Mother was always a gentle dreamer. I took more after Dad; dry and practical, you know. Well, Mother used to worry a good deal about you. She missed you dreadfully, and before she died she made me promise I'd always stand by you, and look after you if anything happened."

"There's not much need of that, Garry. But thanks all the same, old man. I've seen a lot in the past few years. I know something of the world now. I've changed. I'm sort of disillusioned. I seem to have lost my zest for things—but I know how to handle men, how to fight and how to win."

"It's not that, lad. You know that to win is often to lose. You were never made for the fight, my brother. It's all been a mistake. You're too sensitive, too high-strung for a fighting-man. You have too much sentiment in you. Your spirit urged you to fields of conquest and romance, yet by nature you were designed for the gentler life. If you could have curbed your impulse and only dreamed your adventures, you would have been the happier. Imagination's been a curse to you, boy. You've tortured yourself all these years, and now you're paying the penalty."

"What penalty?"

"You've lost your splendid capacity for happiness; your health's undermined; your faith in mankind is destroyed. Is it worth while? You've plunged into the fight and you've won. What does your victory mean? Can it compare with what you've lost? Here, I haven't a third of what you have, and yet I'm magnificently happy. I don't envy you. I am going to enjoy every moment of my life. Oh, my brother, you've been making a sad mistake, but it's not too late! You're young, young. It's not too late."

Then I saw that his words were true. I saw that I had never been meant for the fierce battle of existence. Like those high-strung horses that were the first to break their hearts on the trail, I was unsuited for it all. Far better would I have been living the sweet, simple life of my forefathers. My spirit had upheld me, but now I knew there was a poison in my veins, that I was a sick man, that I had played the game and won—at too great a cost. I was like a sprinter that breasts the tape, only to be carried fainting from the field. Alas! I had gained success only to find it was another name for failure.

"Now," said Garry, "you must come home. Back there on the countryside we can find you a sweet girl to marry. You will love her, have children and forget all this. Come."

I rose. I could no longer put it off.

"Excuse me one moment," I said. I parted the curtains and entered the bedroom.

She was standing there, white to the lips and trembling. She looked at me piteously.

"I'm afraid," she faltered.

"Be brave, little girl," I whispered, leading her forward. Then I threw aside the curtain.

"Garry," I said, "this is—this is Berna."



CHAPTER XIX

Garry, Berna—there they stood, face to face at last. Long ago I had visioned this meeting, planned for, yet dreaded it, and now with utter suddenness it had come.

The girl had recovered her calm, and I must say she bore herself well. In her clinging dress of simple white her figure was as slimly graceful as that of a wood-nymph, her head poised as sweetly as a lily on its stem. The fair hair rippled away in graceful lines from the fine brow, and as she gazed at my brother there was a proud, high look in her eyes.

And Garry—his smile had vanished. His face was cold and stern. There was a stormy antagonism in his bearing. No doubt he saw in her a creature who was preying on me, an influence for evil, an overwhelming indictment against me of sin and guilt. All this I read in his eyes; then Berna advanced to him with outstretched hand.

"How do you do? I've heard so much about you I feel as if I'd known you long ago."

She was so winning, I could see he was quite taken aback. He took the little white hand and looked down from his splendid height to the sweet eyes that gazed into his. He bowed with icy politeness.

"I feel flattered, I assure you, that my brother should have mentioned me to you."

Here he shot a dark look at me.

"Sit down again, Garry," I said. "Berna and I want to talk to you."

He complied, but with an ill grace. We all three sat down and a grave constraint was upon us. Berna broke the silence.

"What sort of a trip have you had?"

He looked at her keenly. He saw a simple girl, shy and sweet, gazing at him with a flattering interest.

"Oh, not so bad. Travelling sixty miles a day on a jolting stage gets monotonous, though. The road-houses were pretty decent as a rule, but some were vile. However, it's all new and interesting to me."

"You will stay with us for a time, won't you?"

He favoured me with another grim look.

"Well, that all depends—I haven't quite decided yet. I want to take Athol here home with me."

"Home——" There was a pathetic catch in her voice. Her eyes went round the little room that meant "home" to her.

"Yes, that will be nice," she faltered. Then, with a brave effort, she broke into a lively conversation about the North. As she talked an inspiration seemed to come to her. A light beaconed in her eyes. Her face, fine as a cameo, became eager, rapt. She was telling him of the magical summers, of the midnight sunsets, of the glorious largess of the flowers, of the things that meant so much to her. She was wonderfully animated. As I watched her I thought what a perfect little lady she was; and I felt proud of her.

He was listening carefully, with evident interest. Gradually his look of stern antagonism had given way to one of attention. Yet I could see he was not listening so much to her as he was studying her. His intent gaze never moved from her face.

Then I talked a while. The darkness had descended upon us, but the embers in the open fireplace lighted the room with a rosy glow. I could not see his eyes now, but I knew he was still watching us keenly. He merely answered "yes" and "no" to our questions, and his voice was very grave. Then, after a little, he rose to go.

"I'll return to the hotel with you," I said.

Berna gave us a pathetically anxious little look. There was a red spot on each cheek and her eyes were bright. I could see she wanted to cry.

"I'll be back in half an hour, dear," I said, while Garry gravely shook hands with her.

We did not speak on the way to his room. When we reached it he switched on the light and turned to me.

"Brother, who's this girl?"

"She's—she's my housekeeper. That's all I can say at present, Garry."

"Married?"

"No."

"Good God!"

Stormily he paced the floor, while I watched him with a great calm. At last he spoke.

"Tell me about her."

"Sit down, Garry; light a cigar. We may as well talk this thing over quietly."

"All right. Who is she?"

"Berna," I said, lighting my cigar, "is a Jewess. She was born of an unwed mother, and reared in the midst of misery and corruption."

He stared at me. His mouth hardened; his brow contracted.

"But," I went on, "I want to say this. You remember, Garry, Mother used to tell us of our sister who died when she was a baby. I often used to dream of my dead sister, and in my old, imaginative days I used to think she had never died at all, but she had grown up and was with us. How we would have loved her, would we not, Garry? Well, I tell you this—if our sister had grown up she could have been no sweeter, purer, gentler than this girl of mine, this Berna."

He smiled ironically.

"Then," he said, "if she is so wonderful, why, in the name of Heaven, haven't you married her?"

His manner towards her in the early part of the interview had hurt me, had roused in me a certain perversity. I determined to stand by my guns.



"Marriage," said I, "isn't everything; often isn't anything. Love is, and always will be, the great reality. It existed long before marriage was ever thought of. Marriage is a good thing. It protects the wife and the children. As a rule, it enforces constancy. But there's a higher ideal of human companionship that is based on love alone, love so perfect, so absolute that legal bondage insults it; love that is its own justification. Such a love is ours."

The ironical look deepened to a sneer.

"And look you here, Garry," I went on; "I am living in Dawson in what you would call 'shame.' Well, let me tell you, there's not ninety-nine in a hundred legally married couples that have formed such a sweet, love-sanctified union as we have. That girl is purest gold, a pearl of untold price. There has never been a jar in the harmony of our lives. We love each other absolutely. We trust and believe in each other. We would make any sacrifice for each other. And, I say it again, our marriage is tenfold holier than ninety-nine out of a hundred of those performed with all the pomp of surplice and sacristy."

"Oh, man! man!" he said crushingly, "what's got into you? What nonsense, what clap-trap is this? I tell you that the old way, the way that has stood for generations, is the best, and it's a sorry day I find a brother of mine talking such nonsense. I'm almost glad Mother's dead. It would surely have broken her heart to know that her son was living in sin and shame, living with a——"

"Easy now, Garry," I cautioned him. We faced each other with the table between us.

"I'm going to have my say out. I've come all this way to say it, and you've got to hear me. You're my brother. God knows I love you. I promised I'd look after you, and now I'm going to save you if I can."

"Garry," I broke in, "I'm younger than you, and I respect you; but in the last few years I've grown to see things different from the way we were taught; broader, clearer, saner, somehow. We can't always follow in the narrow path of our forefathers. We must think and act for ourselves in these days. I see no sin and shame in what I'm doing. We love each other—that is our vindication. It's a pure, white light that dims all else. If you had seen and striven and suffered as I have done, you might think as I do. But you've got your smug old-fashioned notions. You gaze at the trees so hard you can't see the forest. Yours is an ideal, too; but mine is a purer, more exalted one."

"Balderdash!" he cried. "Oh, you anger me! Look here, Athol, I came all this way to see you about this matter. It's a long way to come, but I knew my brother was needing me and I'd have gone round the world for you. You never told me anything of this girl in your letters. You were ashamed."

"I knew I could never make you understand."

"You might have tried. I'm not so dense in the understanding. No, you would not tell me, and I've had letters, warning letters. It was left to other people to tell me how you drank and gambled and squandered your money; how you were like to a madman. They told me you had settled down to live with one of the creatures, a woman who had made her living in the dance-halls, and every one knows no woman ever did that and remained straight. They warned me of the character of this girl, of your infatuation, of your callousness to public opinion. They told me how barefaced, how shameless you were. They begged me to try and save you. I would not believe it, but now I've come to see for myself, and it's all true, it's all true."

He bowed his head in emotion.

"Oh, she's good!" I cried. "If you knew her you would think so, too. You, too, would love her."

"Heaven forbid! Boy, I must save you. I must, for the honour of the old name that's never been tarnished. I must make you come home with me."

He put both hands on my shoulders, looking commandingly into my face.

"No, no," I said, "I'll never leave her."

"It will be all right. We can pay her. It can be arranged. Think of the honour of the old name, lad."

I shook him off. "Pay!"—I laughed ironically. "Pay" in connection with the name of Berna—again I laughed.

"She's good," I said once again. "Wait a little till you know her. Don't judge her yet. Wait a little."

He saw it was of no use to waste further words on me. He sighed.

"Well, well," he said, "have it your own way. I think she's ruining you. She's dragging you down, sapping your moral principles, lowering your standard of pure living. She must be bad, bad, or she wouldn't live with you like that. But have it your own way, boy; I'll wait and see."



CHAPTER XX

In the crystalline days that followed I did much to bring about a friendship between Garry and Berna. At first I had difficulty in dragging him to the house, but in a little while he came quite willingly. The girl, too, aided me greatly. In her sweet, shy way she did her best to win his regard, so that as the winter advanced a great change came over him. He threw off that stern manner of his as an actor throws off a part, and once again he was the dear old Garry I knew and loved.

His sunny charm returned, and with it his brilliant smile, his warm, endearing frankness. He was now twenty-eight, and if there was a handsomer man in the Northland I had yet to see him. I often envied him for his fine figure and his clean, vivid colour. It was a wonderfully expressive face that looked at you, firm and manly, and, above all, clever. You found a pleasure in the resonant sweetness of his voice. You were drawn irresistibly to the man, even as you would have been drawn to a beautiful woman. He was winning, lovable, yet back of all his charm there was that great quality of strength, of austere purpose.

He made a hit with every one, and I verily believe that half the women in the town were in love with him. However, he was quite unconscious of it, and he stalked through the streets with the gait of a young god. I knew there were some who for a smile would have followed him to the ends of the earth, but Garry was always a man's man. Never do I remember the time when he took an interest in a woman. I often thought, if women could have the man of their choice, a few handsome ones like Garry would monopolise them, while we common mortals would go wifeless. Sometimes it has seemed to me that love is but a second-hand article, and that our matings are at best only makeshifts.

I must say I tried very hard to reconcile those two. I threw them together on every opportunity, for I wanted him to understand and to love her. I felt he had but to know her to appreciate her at her true value, and, although he spoke no word to me, I was soon conscious of a vast change in him. Short of brotherly regard, he was everything that could be desired to her—cordial, friendly, charming. Once I asked Berna what she thought of him.

"I think he's splendid," she said quietly. "He's the handsomest man I've ever seen, and he's as nice as he's good-looking. In many ways you remind me of him—and yet there's a difference."

"I remind you of him—no, girl. I'm not worthy to be his valet. He's as much above me as I am above—say a siwash. He has all the virtues; I, all the faults. Sometimes I look at him and I see in him my ideal self. He is all strength, all nobility, while I am but a commonplace mortal, full of human weaknesses. He is the self I should have been if the worst had been the best."

"Hush! you are my sweetheart," she assured me with a caress, "and the dearest in the world."

"By the way, Berna," I said, "you remember something we talked about before he came? Don't you think that now——?"

"Now——?"

"Yes."

"All right." She flashed a glad, tender look at me and left the room. That night she was strangely elated.

Every evening Garry would drop in and talk to us. Berna would look at him as he talked and her eyes would brighten and her cheeks flush. On both of us he had a strangely buoyant effect. How happy we could be, just we three. It was splendid having near me the two I loved best on earth.

That was a memorable winter, mild and bright and buoyant. At last Spring came with gracious days of sunshine. The sleighing was glorious, but I was busy, very busy, so that I was glad to send Garry and Berna off together in a smart cutter, and see them come home with their cheeks like roses, their eyes sparkling and laughter in their voices. I never saw Berna looking so well and happy.

I was head over ears in work. In a mail just arrived I had a letter from the Prodigal, and a certain paragraph in it set me pondering. Here it was:

"You must look out for Locasto. He was in New York a week ago. He's down and out. Blood-poisoning set in in his foot after he got outside, and eventually he had to have it taken off. He's got a false mit for the one Mac sawed off. But you should see him. He's all shot to pieces with the 'hooch.' It's a fright the pace he's gone. I had an interview with him, and he raved and blasphemed horribly. Seemed to have a terrible pick at you. Seems you have copped out his best girl, the only one he ever cared a red cent for. Said he would get even with you if he swung for it. I think he's dangerous, even a madman. He is leaving for the North now, so be on your guard."

Locasto coming! I had almost forgotten his existence. Well, I no longer cared for him. I could afford to despise him. Surely he would never dare to molest us. If he did—he was a broken, discredited blackguard. I could crush him.

Coming here! He must even now be on the way. I had a vision of him speeding along that desolate trail, sitting in the sleigh wrapped in furs, and brooding, brooding. As day after day the spell of the great and gloomy land grew on his spirit, I could see the sombre eyes darken and deepen. I could see him in the road-house at night, gaunt and haggard, drinking at the bar, a desperate, degraded cripple. I could see him growing more reckless every day, every hour. He was coming back to the scene of his ruined fortunes, and God knows with what wild schemes of vengeance his heart was full. Decidedly I must beware.

As I sat there dreaming, a ring came to the 'phone. It was the foreman at Gold Hill.

"The hoisting machine has broken down," he told me. "Can you come out and see what is required?"

"All right," I replied. "I'll leave at once."

"Berna," I said, "I'll have to go out to the Forks to-night. I'll be back early to-morrow. Get me a bite to eat, dear, while I go round and order the horse."

On my way I met Garry and told him I would be gone over night. "Won't you come?" I asked.

"No, thanks, old man, I don't feel like a night drive."

"All right. Good-bye."

So I hurried off, and soon after, with a jingle of bells, I drove up to my door. Berna had made supper. She seemed excited. Her eyes were starry bright, her cheeks burned.

"Aren't you well, sweetheart?" I asked. "You look feverish."

"Yes, dear, I'm well. But I don't want you to go to-night. Something tells me you shouldn't. Please don't go, dear. Please, for my sake."

"Oh, nonsense, Berna! You know I've been away before. Get one of the neighbour's wives to sleep with you. Get in Mrs. Brooks."

"Oh, don't go, don't go, I beg you, dear. I don't want you to. I'm afraid, I'm afraid. Won't some one else do?"

"Nonsense, girl. You mustn't be so foolish. It's only for a few hours. Here, I'll ring up Mrs. Brooks and you can ask her."

She sighed. "No, never mind. I'll ring her up after you've gone."

She clung to me tightly, so that I wondered what had got into the girl. Then gently I kissed her, disengaged her hands, and bade her good-night.

As I was rattling off through the darkness, a boy handed me a note. I put it in my pocket, thinking I would read it when I reached Ogilvie Bridge. Then I whipped up the horse.

The night was crisp and exhilarating. I had one of the best trotters in the country, and the sleighing was superb. As I sped along, with a jingle of bells, my spirits rose. Things were looking splendid. The mine was turning out far better than we had expected. Surely we could sell out soon, and I would have all the money I wanted. Even then the Prodigal was putting through a deal in New York that would realise our fortunes. My life-struggle was nearly over.

Then again, I had reconciled Garry to Berna. When I told him of a certain secret I was hugging to my breast he would capitulate entirely. How happy we would all be! I would buy a small estate near home, and we would settle down. But first we would spend a few years in travel. We would see the whole world. What good times we would have, Berna and I! Bless her! It had all worked out beautifully.

Why was she so frightened, so loath to let me go? I wondered vaguely and flicked up the horse so that it plunged sharply forward. The vast blue-black sky was like an inverted gold-pan and the stars were flake colours adhering to it. The cold snapped at me till my cheeks tingled, and my eyes felt as if they could spark. Oh, life was sweet!

Bother! In my elation I had forgotten to get off at the Old Inn and read my note. Never mind, I would keep it till I reached the Forks.

As I spun along, I thought of how changed it all was from the Bonanza I first knew. How I remembered tramping along that hillside slope, packing a sack of flour over a muddy trail, a poor miner in muddy overalls! Now I was driving a smart horse on a fine road. I was an operator of a first-class mine. I was a man of business, of experience. Higher and higher my spirits rose.

How fast the horse flew! I would be at the Forks in no time. I flashed past cabin windows. I saw the solitary oil-lamp and the miner reading his book or filling his pipe. Never was there a finer, more intelligent man; but his day was passing. The whole country was falling into the hands of companies. Soon, thought I, one or two big combines would control the whole wealth of that land. Already they had their eyes on it. The gold-ships would float and roar where the old-time miner toiled with pick and pan. Change! Change!

I almost fancied I could see the monster dredges ploughing up the valley, where now men panted at the windlass. I could see vast heaps of tailings filling the creek-bed; I could hear the crash of the steel grizzlies; I could see the buckets scooping up the pay-dirt. I felt strangely prophetic. My imagination ran riot in all kinds of wonders, great power plants, quartz discoveries. Change! Change!

Yes, the stamp-mill would add its thunder to the other voices; the country would be netted with wires, and clamorous for far and wide. Man had sought out this land where Silence had reigned so long. He had awakened the echoes with the shot of his rifle and the ring of his axe. Silence had raised a startled head and poised there, listening. Then, with crack of pick and boom of blast, man had hurled her back. Further and further had he driven her. With his advancing horde, mad in their lust for the loot of the valley, he had banished her. His engines had frightened her with their canorous roar. His crashing giants had driven her cowering to the inviolate fastnesses of her hills. And there she broods and waits.

But Silence will return. To her was given the land that she might rule and have dominion over it forever. And in a few years the clamour will cease, the din will die away. In a few years the treasure will be exhausted, and the looters will depart. The engines will lie in rust and ruin; the wind will sweep through the empty homes; the tailing-piles lie pallid in the moon. Then the last man will strike the last blow, and Silence will come again into her own.

Yea, Silence will come home once more. Again will she rule despotic over peak and plain. She is only waiting, brooding in the impregnable desolation of her hills. To her has been given empery of the land, and hand in hand with Darkness will she return.



CHAPTER XXI

Ha! here I had reached the Forks at last. As I drew up at the hotel, the clerk came out to meet me.

"Gent wants to speak to you at the 'phone, sir."

It was Murray of Dawson, an old-timer, and rather a friend of mine.

"Hello!"

"Hello! Say, Meldrum, this is Murray speaking. Say, just wanted to let you know there's a stage due some time before morning. Locasto's on board, and they say he's heeled for you. Thought I'd better tell you so's you can get fixed up for him."

"All right," I answered. "Thank you. I'll turn and come right back."

So I switched round the horse, and once more I drove over the glistening road. No longer did I plan and exult. Indeed a grim fear was gripping me. Of a sudden the shadow of Locasto loomed up sinister and menacing. Even now he was speeding Dawsonward with a great hatred of me in his heart. Well, I would get back and prepare for him.

There came to my mind a comic perception of the awkwardness of returning to one's own home unexpectedly, in the dead of night. At first I decided I would go to a hotel, then on second thoughts I determined to try the house, for I had a desire to be near Berna.

I knocked gently, then a little louder, then at last quite loudly. Within all was still, dark as a sepulchre. Curious! she was such a light sleeper, too. Why did she not hear me?

Once more I decided to go to the hotel; once more that vague, indefinite fear assailed me and again I knocked. And now my fear was becoming a panic. I had my latch-key in my pocket, so very quietly I opened the door.

I was in the front room, and it was dark, very dark and quiet. I could not even hear her breathe.

"Berna," I whispered.

No reply.

That dim, nameless dread was clutching at my heart, and I groped overhead in the darkness for the drop-light. How hard it was to find! A dozen times my hand circled in the air before I knocked my knuckles against it. I switched it on.

Instantly the cabin was flooded with light. In the dining-room I could see the remains of our supper lying untidily. That was not like her. She had a horror of dirty dishes. I passed into the bedroom—Ah! the bed had never been slept on.

What a fool I was! It flashed on me she had gone over to Mrs. Brooks' to sleep. She was afraid of being alone. Poor little girl! How surprised she would be to see me in the morning!

Well, I would go to bed. As I was pulling off my coat, I found the note that had been given to me. Blaming myself for my carelessness, I pulled it out of my pocket and opened it. As I unfolded the sheet, I noticed it was written in what looked like a disguised hand. Strange! I thought. The writing was small and faint. I rubbed my eyes and held it up to the light.

Merciful God! What was this? Oh no, it could not be! My eyes were deceiving me. It was some illusion. Feverishly I read again. Yes, they were the same words. What could they mean? Surely, surely—Oh, horror on horrors! They could not mean THAT. Again I read them. Yes, there they were:

"If you are fool enough to believe that Berna is faithful to you visit your brother's room to-night.

"A wellwisher."

Berna! Garry!—the two I loved. Oh, it could not be! It was monstrous! It was too horrible! I would not believe it; I would not. Curse the vile wretch that wrote such words! I would kill him. Berna! my Berna! she was as good as gold, as true as steel. Garry! I would lay my life on his honour. Oh, vile calumny! what devil had put so foul a thing in words? God! it hurt me so, it hurt me so!

Dazedly I sat down. A sudden rush of heat was followed by a sweat that pricked out of me and left me cold. I trembled. I saw a ghastly vision of myself in a mirror. I felt sick, sick. Going to the decanter on the bureau, I poured myself a stiff jolt of whisky.

Again I sat down. The paper lay on the hearthrug, and I stared at it hatefully. It was unspeakably loathsome, yet I was fascinated by it. I longed to take it up, to read it again. Somehow I did not dare. I was becoming a coward.

Well, it was a lie, a black devil's lie. She was with one of the neighbours. I trusted her. I would trust her with my life. I would go to bed. In the morning she would return, and then I would unearth the wretch who had dared to write such things. I began to undress.

Slowly I unfastened my collar—that cursed paper; there it lay. Again it fascinated me. I stood glaring at it. Oh, fool! fool! go to bed.

Wearily I took off my clothes—Oh, that devilish note! It was burning into my brain—it would drive me mad. In a frenzy of rage, I took it up as if it were some leprous thing, and dropped it in the fire.

There I lay in bed with the darkness enfolding me, and I closed my eyes to make a double darkness. Ha! right in the centre of my eyes, burned the fatal paper with its atrocious suggestion. I sprang up. It was of no use. I must settle this thing once and for all. I turned on the light and deliberately dressed again.

I was going to the hotel where Garry had his room. I would tell him I had come back unexpectedly and ask to share his room. I was not acting on the note! I did not suspect her. Heaven forbid! But the thing had unnerved me. I could not stay in this place.

The hotel was quiet. A sleepy night-clerk stared at me, and I pushed past him. Garry's rooms were on the third floor. As I climbed the long stairway, my heart was beating painfully, and when I reached his door I was sadly out of breath. Through the transom I could see his light was burning.

I knocked faintly.

There was a sudden stir.

Again I knocked.

Did my ears deceive me or did I hear a woman's startled cry? There was something familiar about it—Oh, my God!

I reeled. I almost fell. I clutched at the doorframe. I leaned sickly against the door for support. Heaven help me!

"I'm coming," I heard him say.

The door was unlocked, and there he stood. He was fully dressed. He looked at me with an expression on his face I could not define, but he was very calm.

"Come in," he said.

I went into his sitting-room. Everything was in order. I would have sworn I heard a woman scream, and yet no one was in sight. The bedroom door was slightly ajar. I eyed it in a fascinated way.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, Garry," I said, and I was conscious how strained and queer my voice sounded. "I got back suddenly, and there's no one at home. I want to stay here with you, if you don't mind."

"Certainly, old man; only too glad to have you."

His voice was steady. I sat down on the edge of a chair. My eyes were riveted on that bedroom door.

"Had a good drive?" he went on genially. "You must be cold. Let me give you some whisky."

My teeth were chattering. I clutched the chair. Oh, that door! My eyes were fastened on it. I was convinced I heard some one in there. He rose to get the whisky.

"Say when?"

I held the glass with a shaking hand:

"When."

"What's the matter, old man? You're ill."

I clutched him by the arm.

"Garry, there's some one in that room."

"Nonsense! there's no one there."

"There is, I tell you. Listen! Don't you hear them breathing?"

He was quiet. Distinctly I could hear the panting of human breath. I was going mad, mad. I could stand it no longer.

"Garry," I gasped, "I'm going to see, I'm going to see."

"Don't——"

"Yes, I must, I say. Let me go. I'll drag them out."

"Hold on——"

"Leave go, man! I'm going, I say. You won't hold me. Let go, I tell you, let go—Now come out, come out, whoever you are—Ah!"

It was a woman.

"Ha!" I cried, "I told you so, brother; a woman. I think I know her, too. Here, let me see—I thought so."

I had clutched her, pulled her to the light. It was Berna.

Her face was white as chalk, her eyes dilated with terror. She trembled. She seemed near fainting.

"I thought so."

Now that it seemed the worst was betrayed to me, I was strangely calm.

"Berna, you're faint. Let me lead you to a chair."

I made her sit down. She said no word, but looked at me with a wild pleading in her eyes. No one spoke.

There we were, the three of us: Berna faint with fear, ghastly, pitiful; I calm, yet calm with a strange, unnatural calmness, and Garry—he surprised me. He had seated himself, and with the greatest sang-froid he was lighting a cigarette.

A long tense silence. At last I broke it.

"What have you got to say for yourself, Garry?" I asked.

It was wonderful how calm he was.

"Looks pretty bad, doesn't it, brother?" he said gravely.

"Yes, it couldn't look worse."

"Looks as if I was a pretty base, despicable specimen of a man, doesn't it?"

"Yes, about as base as a man could be."

"That's so." He rose and turned up the light of a large reading-lamp, then coming to me he looked me square in the face. Abruptly his casual manner dropped. He grew sharp, forceful; his voice rang clear.

"Listen to me."

"I'm listening."

"I came out here to save you, and I'm going to save you. You wanted me to believe that this girl was good. You believed it. You were bewitched, befooled, blinded. I could see it, but I had to make you see it. I had to make you realise how worthless she was, how her love for you was a sham, a pretence to prey on you. How could I prove it? You would not listen to reason: I had to take other means. Now, hear me."

"I hear."

"I laid my plans. For three months I've tried to conquer her, to win her love, to take her from you. She was truer to you than I had bargained for; I must give her credit for that. She made a good fight, but I think I have triumphed. To-night she came to my room at my invitation."

"Well?"

"Well. You got a note. Now, I wrote that note. I planned this scene, this discovery. I planned it so that your eyes would be opened, so that you would see what she was, so that you would cast her from you—unfaithful, a wanton, a——"

"Hold on there," I broke in; "brother of mine or no, I won't hear you call her those names; no, not if she were ten times as unfaithful. You won't, I say. I'll choke the words in your throat. I'll kill you, if you utter a word against her. Oh, what have you done?"

"What have I done! Try to be calm, man. What have I done? Well, this is what I've done, and it's the lucky day for you I've done it. I've saved you from shame; I've freed you from sin; I've shown you the baseness of this girl."

He rose to his feet.

"Oh, my brother, I've stolen from you your mistress; that's what I've done."

"Oh, no, you haven't," I groaned. "God forgive you, Garry; God forgive you! She's not my—not what you think. She's my wife!"



CHAPTER XXII

I thought that he would faint. His face went white as paper and he shrank back. He gazed at me with wild, straining eyes.

"God forgive me! Oh, why didn't you tell me, boy? Why didn't you tell me?"

In his voice there was a note more poignant than a sob.

"You should have trusted me," he went on. "You should have told me. When were you married?"

"Just a month ago. I was keeping it as a surprise for you. I was waiting till you said you liked and thought well of her. Oh, I thought you would be pleased and glad, and I was treasuring it up to tell you."

"This is terrible, terrible!"

His voice was choked with agony. On her chair, Berna drooped wearily. Her wide, staring eyes were fixed on the floor in pitiful perplexity.

"Yes, it's terrible enough. We were so happy. We lived so joyously together. Everything was perfect, a heaven for us both. And then you came, you with your charm that would lure an angel from high heaven. You tried your power on my poor little girl, the girl that never loved but me. And I trusted you, I tried to make you and her friends. I left you together. In my blind innocence I aided you in every way—a simple, loving fool. Oh, now I see!"