and balanced."

As I said this, my conscience was whispering fiercely: "Oh, fool!
Coward! Paltering, despicable coward! This girl throws herself on you,
on your honour, chivalry, manhood, and you screen yourself behind a
barrier of convention."

However, I went on.

"You might come to love me in time, but we must wait a while, little
girl. Surely that is reasonable? I care for you a great, great deal, but
I don't know if I love you in the great way people should love. Can't we
wait a little, Berna? I'll look after you, dear; won't that do?"

She disengaged herself from me, sighing woefully.

"Yes, I suppose that'll do. Oh, I'll never forgive myself for saying
that to you. I shouldn't, but I was so desperate. You don't know what it
meant to me. Please forget it, won't you?"

"No, Berna, I'll never forget it, and I'll always bless you for having
said it. Believe me, dear, it will all come right. Things aren't so bad.
You're just scared, little one. I'll watch no one harms you, and love
will come to both of us in good time, that love that means life and
death, hate and adoration, rapture and pain, the greatest thing in the
world. Oh, my dear, my dear, trust me! We have known each other such a
brief space. Let us wait a little longer, just a little longer."

"Yes, that's right, a little longer."

Her voice was faint and toneless. She disengaged herself.

"Now, good-night; they may have missed me."

Almost before I could realise it she had disappeared amid the tents,
leaving me there in the gloom with my heart full of doubt, self-reproach
and pain.

Oh, despicable, paltering coward!

CHAPTER XII

Spring in the Yukon! Majestic mountains crowned with immemorial snow!
The mad midnight melodies of birds! From the kindly stars to the leaves
of grass that glimmer in the wind, a world pregnant with joy, a land
jewel-bright and virgin-sweet!

After the obsession of the long, long night, Spring leaps into being
with a sudden sun-thrilled joy, a radiant uplift. The shy emerald
mantles the valleys and fledges the heights; the pussy-willows tremble
by lake and stream; the wild crocus brims the hollows with a haze of
violet; trailing his last ragged pennants of snow on the hills, winter
makes his sullen retreat.

Perhaps I am over-sensitive, but I have ecstasied moments when to me it
seems the grass is greener, the sky bluer than they are to most; I
surrender my heart to wonder and joy; I am in tune with the tr