rl. Be good and
sweet and true and every one will love and help you. Ah, you must go.
Well, well--God bless you, Berna."

"And I wish you happiness and success, dear friend of mine."

Her voice trembled. Something seemed to choke her. She stood a moment as
if reluctant to go.

Suddenly a great impulse of tenderness and pity came over me, and before
I knew it, my arms were around her. She struggled faintly, but her face
was uplifted, her eyes starlike. Then, for a moment of bewildering
ecstasy, her lips lay on mine, and I felt them faintly answer.

Poor yielding lips! They were cold as ice.

CHAPTER V

Never shall I forget the last I saw of her, a forlorn, pathetic figure
in black, waving a farewell to me as I stood on the wharf. She wore, I
remember, a low collar, and well do I mind the way it showed off the
slim whiteness of her throat; well do I mind the high poise of her head,
and the silken gloss of her hair. The grey eyes were clear and steady as
she bade good-bye to me, and from where we stood apart, her face had all
the pathetic sweetness of a Madonna.

Well, she was going, and sad enough her going seemed to me. They were
all for Dyea, and the grim old Chilcoot, with its blizzard-beaten
steeps, while we had chosen the less precipitous, but more drawn-out,
Skagway trail. Among them I saw the inseparable twins; the grim Hewson,
the silent Mervin, each quiet and watchful, as if storing up power for a
tremendous effort. There was the large unwholesomeness of Madam
Winklestein, all jewellery, smiles and coarse badinage, and near her,
her perfumed husband, squinting and smirking abominably. There was the
old man, with his face of a Hebrew Seer, his visionary eye now aglow
with fanatical enthusiasm, his lips ever muttering: "Klondike,
Klondike"; and lastly, by his side, with a little wry smile on her lips,
there was the white-faced girl.

How my heart ached for her! But the time for sentiment was at an end.
The clarion call to action rang out. Inflexibly the trail was mustering
us. The hour was come for every one to give of the best that was in him,
even as he had never given it before. The reign of peace was over; the
fight was on.

On all sides were indescribable bustle, confusion and excitement; men
shouting, swearing, rushing hither, thither; wrangling, anxious-eyed and
distracted over their outfits. A mood of unsparing energy dominated
them. Their only thought was to get away on the gold-trail. A