s and
in the meeting there was a warming sense of intimacy.

But she was gone now. He would never see her again. He had handed
down her violin as she reached up from the tossing whale-boat to
receive it. He remembered her firm, boyish hand-clasp as she said
good-bye to him. Was there regret in her eyes at the separation, or
had he imagined it?

Gregg leaned wearily against the cabin looking toward the shore.
Everything seemed to have gone wrong for him today. He had intended
going in with the last load for an hour's stay on the Island, but
Silvertip, fearing that the wind might grow stronger, had insisted on
his remaining behind to watch the schooner.

Through the glasses he could see Loll and Kobuk racing up and down the
beach now. Jean and her sister sat, somewhat forlornly, he thought, on
part of the outfit piled up on the sand. The men had gathered about
the whale-boat which was to be left on the Island, and were drawing it
up higher on the shingle.

It would be an hour or more before the Swedes returned to the _Hoonah_.
Gregg looked out across the rolling, endless ocean. Although the sun
was yet shining brightly there was a feeling of evening coming on. The
cries of the gulls seemed to have taken on a tone of infinite sadness.
All at once, for some inexplicable reason, he was overwhelmed by a
sense of the futility of life--of living. No quest seemed worth
pursuing. No dream worth dreaming. He had often felt this way during
the past three months, and when he did--he drank. He longed, with
sudden intensity, for a bottle of Kayak's clear, white brew. Alcohol
was the magic brush that transformed the monotone of life into shades
of wondrous hue.

His dejection was deepened by the fact that ever since leaving Katleean
he had been trying vainly to recall that thing he should remember.
While he strained and sweated over the loading of the outfit, his mind
had been busy seeking, searching, trying to pierce the curtain of
oblivion that separated him from that subliminal self who knew the
thing he wanted. He felt as though he were being tantalized. It was
almost the same feeling he remembered having in boyish dreams that came
during examination time, when the answers to dream questions flashed in
his mind for a moment then diabolically faded before he got them down
on paper.

After a while his unseeing eyes left the water. He gingerly felt the
blisters on his hands and shook his head with a half-conte