"Berna!" angry and aghast, I had stopped her. "Never let me hear you utter that word. Even to say it seems pollution."

She laughed harshly, bitterly.

"What's this whole life but pollution?... Well, anyway, he wants me."

"But you wouldn't, surely you wouldn't?"

She turned on me fiercely.

"What do you take me for? Surely you know me better than that. Oh, you almost make me hate you."

Suddenly she pressed the little handkerchief to her eyes. She fell to sobbing convulsively. Vainly I tried to soothe her, whispering:

"Oh, my dear, tell me all about it. I'm sorry, girl, I'm sorry."

She ceased crying. She went on in her fierce, excited way.

"He came to the restaurant in Bennett. He used to watch me a lot. His eyes were always following me. I was afraid. I trembled when I served him. He liked to see me tremble, it gave him a feeling of power. Then he took to giving me presents, a diamond ring, a heart-shaped locket, costly gifts. I wanted to return them, but she wouldn't let me, took them from me, put them away. Then he and she had long talks. I know it was all about me. That was why I came to you that night and begged you to marry me--to save me from him. Now it's gone from bad to worse. The net's closing round me in spite of my flutterings."

"But he can't get you against your will," I cried.

"No! no! but he'll never give up. He'll try so long as I resist him. I'm nice to him just to humour him and gain time. I can't tell you how much I fear him. They say he always gets his way with women. He's masterly and relentless. There's a cold, sneering command in his smile. You hate him but you obey him."

"He's an immoral monster, Berna. He spares neither time nor money to gratify his whims where a woman is concerned. And he has no pity."

"I know, I know."

"He's intensely masculine, handsome in a vivid, gipsy sort of way; big, strong and compelling, but a callous libertine."

"Yes, he's all that. And can you wonder then my heart is full of fear, that I am distracted, that I asked you what I did? He is relentless and of all women he wants me. He would break me on the wheel of dishonour.

Oh, God!"

Her face grew almost tragic in its despair.

"And everything's against me; they're all helping him. I haven't a single friend, not one to stand by me, to aid me. Once I thought of you, and you failed me. Can you wonder I'm nearly crazy with the terror of it? Can you wonder I was desperate enough to ask you to save me? I'm all alone, friendless, a poor, weak girl. No, I'm wrong. I've one friend--death; and I'll die, I'll die, I swear it, before I let him get me."

Her words came forth in a torrent, half choked by sobs. It was hard to get her calmed. Never had I thought her capable of such force, such passion. I was terribly distressed and at a loss how to comfort her.

"Hush, Berna," I pleaded, "please don't say such things. Remember you have a friend in me, one that would do anything in his power to help you."

She looked at me a moment.

"How can you help me?"

I held both of her hands firmly, looking into her eyes.

"By marrying you. Will you marry me, dear? Will you be my wife?"

"No!"

I started. "Berna!"

"No! I wouldn't marry you if you were the last man left in the world,"

she cried vehemently.

"Why?" I tried to be calm.

"Why! why, you don't love me; you don't care for me."

"Yes, I do, Berna. I do indeed, girl. Care for you! Well, I care so much that--I beg you to marry me."

"Yes, yes, but you don't love me right, not in your great, grand way.

Not in the way you told me of. Oh, I know; it's part pity, part friendship. It would be different if I cared in the same way, if--if I didn't care so very much more."

"You do, Berna; you love me like that?"

"How do I know? How can I tell? How can any of us tell?"

"No, dear," I said, "love has no limits, no bounds, it is always holding something in reserve. There are yet heights beyond the heights, that mock our climbing, never perfection; no great love but might have been eclipsed by a greater. There's a master key to every heart, and we poor fools delude ourselves with the idea we are opening all the doors. We are on sufferance, we are only understudies in the love drama, but fortunately the star seldom appears on the scene. However, this I know----"

I rose to my feet.

"Since the moment I set eyes on you, I loved you. Long before I ever met you, I loved you. I was just waiting for you, waiting. At first I could not understand, I did not know what it meant, but now I do, beyond the peradventure of a doubt; there never was any but you, never will be any but you. Since the beginning of time it was all planned that I should love you. And you, how do you care?"

She stood up to hear my words. She would not let me touch her, but there was a great light in her eyes. Then she spoke and her voice was vibrant with passion, all indifference gone from it.

"Oh, you blind! you coward! Couldn't you see? Couldn't you feel? That day on the scow it came to me--Love. It was such as I had never dreamed of, rapture, ecstasy, anguish. Do you know what I wished as we went through the rapids? I wished that it might be the end, that in such a supreme moment we might go down clinging together, and that in death I might hold you in my arms. Oh, if you'd only been like that afterwards, met love open-armed with love. But, no! you slipped back to friendship.

I feel as if there were a barrier of ice between us now. I will try never to care for you any more. Now leave me, leave me, for I never want to see you again."

"Yes, you will, you must, you must, Berna. I'd sell my immortal soul to win that love from you, my dearest, my dearest; I'd crawl around the world to kiss your shadow. If you called to me I would come from the ends of the earth, through storm and darkness, to your side. I love you so, I love you so."

I crushed her to me, I kissed her madly, yet she was cold.

"Have you nothing more to say than fine words?" she asked.

"Marry me, marry me," I repeated.

"Now?"

Now! I hesitated again. The suddenness of it was like a cold douche. God knows, I burned for the girl, yet somehow convention clamped me.

"Now if you wish," I faltered; "but better when we get to Dawson. Better when I've made good up there. Give me one year, Berna, one year and then----"

"One year!"

The sudden gleam of hope vanished from her eyes. For the third time I was failing her, yet my cursed prudence overrode me.

"Oh, it will pass swiftly, dear. You will be quite safe. I will be near you and watch over you."