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more and more from my mind. I told myself that all this struggle was for her. In the thought that she was safe I calmed all anxious fear. Sometimes by not thinking so much of dear ones, one can be more thoughtful of them. So it was with me. I knew that all my concentration of effort was for her
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sake, and would bring her nearer to me. Yet at Locasto's words all my old longing and heartache vehemently resurged. In spite of myself, I was the prey of a growing uneasiness. Things seemed vastly different, now success had come to me. I could not bear to think of her working in that ambiguous restaurant, rubbing shoulders with its unspeakable
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habitus. I wondered how I had ever deceived myself into thinking it was all right. I began to worry, so that I knew only a trip into Dawson would satisfy me. Accordingly, I hired a big Swede to take my place at the shovel, and set out once more on the hillside trail for town. I found the town more
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animated than ever, the streets more populous, the gaiety more unrestrained. Everywhere were flaunting signs of a plethoric wealth. The anxious Cheechako had vanished from the scene, and the victorious miner masqueraded in his place. He swaggered along in the glow of the Spring sunshine, a picture of perfect manhood, bronzed and lean and muscular. He was brimming over with
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the exuberance of health. He had come into town to "live" things, to transmute this yellow dust into happiness, to taste the wine of life, to know the lips of flame. It was the day of the Man with the Poke. He was King. The sheer animalism of him overflowed in midnight roysterings, in bacchanalian revels, in debauches among the
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human dbris of the tenderloin. Every one was waiting for him, to fleece him, rob him, strip him. It was also the day of the man behind the bar, of the gambler, of the harpy. My strange, formless fears for Berna were soon set at rest. She was awaiting me. She looked better than I had ever seen her, and
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she welcomed me with an eager delight that kindled me to rapture. "Just think of it," she said, "only two weeks, and we'll be together for always. It seems too good to be true. Oh, my dear, how can I ever love you enough? How happy we are going to be, aren't we?" "We're going to be happier than any
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two people ever were before," I assured her. We crossed the Yukon to the green glades of North Dawson, and there, on a little rise, we sat down, side by side. How I wish I could put into words the joy that filled my heart! Never was lad so happy as I. I spoke but little, for love's silences are
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sweeter than all words. Well, well I mind me how she looked: just like a picture, her hands clasped on her lap, her eyes star-bright, angel-sweet, mother-tender. From time to time she would give me a glance so full of trust and love that my heart would leap to her, and wave on wave of passionate tenderness come sweeping over
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me. It may be there was something humble in my stintless adoration; it may be I was like a child for the pleasure of her nearness; it may be my eyes told all too well of the fire that burned within me, but O, the girl was kind, gentler than forgiveness, sweeter than all heaven. Caressingly she touched my hair.
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I kissed her fingers, kissed them again and again; and then she lifted my hand to her lips, and I felt her kiss fall upon it. How wondrously I tingled at the touch. My hand seemed mine no longer--a consecrated thing. Proud, happy me! "Yes," she went on, "doesn't it seem as if we were dreaming? You know, I always
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thought it was a dream, and now it's coming true. You'll take me away from this place, won't you, boy?--far, far away. I'll tell you now, dear, I've borne it all for your sake, but I don't think I could bear it any longer. I would rather die than sink in the mire, and yet you can't imagine how this
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life affects one. It's sad, sad, but I don't get shocked at things in the way I used to. You know, I sometimes think a girl, no matter how good, sweet, modest to begin with, placed in such surroundings could fall gradually." I agreed with her. Too well I knew I was becoming calloused to the evils around me. Such
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was the insidious corruption of the gold-camp, I now regarded with indifference things that a year ago I would have shrunk from with disgust. "Well, it will be all over very soon, won't it, dear? I don't know what I'd have done if it hadn't been for the rough miners. They've been so kind to me. When they saw I
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was straight and honest they couldn't be good enough. They shielded me in every way, and kept back the other kind of men. Even the women have been my friends and helped me." She looked at me archly. "And, you know, I've had ever so many offers of marriage, too, from honest, rough, kindly men--and I've refused them ever so
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gracefully." "Has Locasto ever made any more overtures?" Her face grew grave. "Yes, about a month ago he besieged me, gave me no rest, made all kinds of proposals and promises. He wanted to divorce his 'outside' wife and marry me. He wanted to settle a hundred thousand dollars on me. He tried everything in his power to force me
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to his will. Then, when he saw it was no use, he turned round and begged me to let him be my friend. He spoke so nicely of you. He said he would help us in any way he could. He's everything that's kind to me now. He can't do enough for me. Yet, somehow, I don't trust him." "Well,
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my precious," I assured her, "all danger, doubt, despair, will soon be over. Locasto and the rest of them will be as shadows, never to haunt my little girl again. The Great, Black North will fade away, will dissolve into the land of sunshine and flowers and song. You will forget it." "The Great Black North.--I will never forget it,
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and I will always bless it. It has given me my love, the best love in all the world." "O my darling, my Life, I'll take you away from it all soon, soon. We'll go to my home, to Garry, to Mother. They will love you as I love you." "I'm sure I will love them. What you have told
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me of them makes them seem very real to me. Will you not be ashamed of me?" "I will be proud, proud of you, my girl." Ah, would I not! I looked at that flower-like face the sunshine glorified so, the pretty, bright hair falling away from her low brow in little waves, the lily throat, the delicately patrician features,
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the proud poise of her head. Who would not have been proud of her? She awoke all that was divine in me. I looked as one might look on a vision, scarce able to believe it real. Suddenly she pointed excitedly. "Look, dear, look at the rainbow. Isn't it wonderful? Isn't it beautiful?" I gazed in rapt admiration. Across the
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river a shower had fallen, and the clouds, clearing away abruptly, had left there a twin rainbow of matchless perfection. Its double arch was poised as accurately over the town as if it had been painted there. Each hoop was flawless in form, lovely in hue, tenderly luminous, exquisite in purity. Never had I seen the double iris so immaculate
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in colouring, and, with its bases resting on the river, it curved over the gold-born city like a frame of ethereal beauty. "Does it not seem, dear, like an answer to our prayer, an omen of good hope, a promise for the future?" "Yes, beloved, our future, yours and mine. The clouds are rolling away. All is bright with sunshine
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once again, and God sends His rainbow to cheer and comfort us. It will not be long now. On the first day of June, beloved, I will come to you, and we will be made man and wife. You will be waiting for me, will you not?" "Yes, yes, waiting ever so eagerly, my lover, counting every hour, every minute."
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I kissed her passionately, and we held each other tightly for a moment. I saw come into her eyes that look which comes but once into the eyes of a maid, that look of ineffable self-surrender, of passionate abandonment. Life is niggard of such moments, yet can our lives be summed up in them. She rested her head on my
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shoulder; her lips lay on mine, and they moved faintly. "Yes, lover, yes, the first of June. Don't fail me, honey, don't fail me." We parted, buoyant with hope, in an ecstasy of joy. She was for me, this beautiful, tender girl, for me. And the time was nigh when she should be mine, mine to adore until the end.
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Always would she be by my side; daily could I plot and plan to give her pleasure; every hour by word and look and act could I lavish on her the exhaustless measure of my love. Ah! life would be too short for me. Could aught in this petty purblind existence of ours redeem it and exalt it so: her
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love, this pure sweet girl's, and mine. Let nations grapple, let Mammon triumph, let pestilence o'erwhelm; what matter, we love, we love. O proud, happy me! * * * * * I got back to the claim. Everything was going merrily, but I felt little desire to resume my toil. I was strangely wearied, worn out somehow. Yet I took
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up my shovel again with a body that rebelled in every tissue. Never had I felt like this before. Something was wrong with me. I was weak. At night I sweated greatly. I cared not to eat. * * * * * "Well," said the Prodigal, "it's all over but the shouting. From my calculations we've cleaned up two hundred
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and six thousand dollars. That's a hundred and three between us four. It's cost us about three to get out the stuff; so there will be, roughly speaking, about twenty-five thousand for each of us." How jubilant every one was looking--every one but me. Somehow I felt as if money didn't matter just then, for I was sick, sick. "Why,
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what's the matter?" said the Prodigal, staring at me curiously. "You look like a ghost." "I feel like one, too," I answered. "I'm afraid I'm in for a bad spell. I want to lie down awhile, boys ... I'm tired.... The first of June, I've got a date on the first of June. I must keep it, I must.... Don't
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let me sleep too long, boys. I mustn't fail. It's a matter of life and death. The first of June...." Alas, on the first of June I lay in the hospital, raving and tossing in the clutches of typhoid fever. I was lying in bed, and a heavy weight was pressing on me, so that, in spite of my struggles,
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I could not move. I was hot, insufferably hot. The blood ran boiling through my veins. My flesh was burning up. My brain would not work. It was all cobwebs, murky and stale as a charnel-house. Yet at times were strange illuminations, full of terror and despair. Blood-red lights and purple shadows alternated in my vision. Then came the dreams.
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* * * * * There was always Berna. Through a mass of grimacing, greed-contorted faces gradually there formed and lingered her sweet and pensive one. We were in a strange costume, she and I. It seemed like that of the early Georges. We were running away, fleeing from some one. For her sake a great fear and anxiety possessed
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me. We were eloping, I fancied. There was a marsh to cross, a hideous quagmire, and our pursuers were close. We started over the quaking ground, then, suddenly, I saw her sink. I rushed to aid her, and I, too, sank. We were to our necks in the soft ooze, and there on the bank, watching us, was the foremost
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of our hunters. He laughed at our struggles; he mocked us; he rejoiced to see us drown. And in my dream the face of the man seemed strangely like Locasto. * * * * * We were in a bower of roses, she and I. It was still further back in history. We seemed to be in the garden of
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a palace. I was in doublet and hose, and she wore a long, flowing kirtle. The air was full of fragrance and sunshine. Birds were singing. A fountain scattered a shower of glittering diamonds on the breeze. She was sitting on the grass, while I reclined by her side, my head lying on her lap. Above me I could see
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her face like a lily bending over me. With dainty fingers she crumpled a rose and let the petals snow down on me. Then, suddenly, I was seized, torn away from her by men in black, who roughly choked her screams. I was dragged off, thrown into a foul cell, left many days. Then, one night, I was dragged forth
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and brought before a grim tribunal in a hall of gloom and horror. They pronounced my doom--Death. The chief Inquisitor raised his mask, and in those gloating features I recognised--Locasto. * * * * * Again it seemed as if I were still further back in history, in some city under the Roman rule. I was returning from the Temple
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with my bride. How fair and fresh and beautiful she was, garlanded with flowers and radiantly happy. Again it was Berna. Suddenly there are shouts, the beating of drums, the clash of cymbals. The great Governor of the Province is coming. He passes with his retinue. Suddenly he catches sight of her whom I have but newly wed. He stops.
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He asks who is the maid. They tell him. He looks at me with haughty contempt. He gives a sign. His servants seize her and drag her screaming away. I try to follow, to kill him. I, too, am seized, overpowered. They bind me, put out my eyes. The Roman sees them do it. He laughs as the red-hot iron
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kisses my eye-balls. He mocks me, telling me what a dainty feast awaits him in my bride. Again I see Locasto. * * * * * Then came another phase of my delirium, in which I struggled to get to her. She was waiting for me, wanting me, breaking her heart at my delay. O, Berna, my soul, my life,
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since the beginning of things we were fated. 'Tis no flesh love, but something deeper, something that has its source at the very core of being. It is not for your sweet face, your gentle spirit, my own, that you are dearer to me than all else: it is because--you are you. If all the world were to turn against
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you, flout you, stone you, then would I rush to your side, shield you, die with you. If you were attainted with leprosy, I would enter the lazar-house for your sake. "O Berna, I must see you, I must, I must. Let me go to her ... now ... dear! She's calling me. She's in trouble. Oh, for the love
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of God, let me go ... let me go, I say.... Curse you, I will. She's in trouble. You can't hold me. I'm stronger than you all when she calls.... Let me ... let me.... Oh, oh, oh ... you're hurting me so. I'm weak, yes, weak as a baby.... Berna, my child, my poor little girl, I can do
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nothing. There's a mountain weighing me down. There's a slab of gold on my chest. They're burning me up. My veins are on fire. I can't come.... I can't, dear.... I'm tired...." Then the fever, the ravings, the wild threshing of my pillow, all passed away, and I was left limp, weak, helpless, resigned to my fate. I was on
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the sunny slope of convalescence. The Prodigal had remained with me as long as I was in danger, but now that I had turned the corner, he had gone back to the creeks, so that I was left with only my thoughts for company. As I turned and twisted on my narrow cot it seemed as if the time would
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never pass. All I wanted was to get better fast, and to get out again. Then, I thought, I would marry Berna and go "outside." I was sick of the country, of everything. I was lying thinking over these things, when I became aware that the man in the cot to the right was trying to attract my attention. He
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had been brought in that very morning, said to have been kicked by a horse. One of his ribs was broken, and his face badly smashed. He was in great pain, but quite conscious, and he was making stealthy motions to me. "Say, mate," he said, "I piped you off soon's I set me lamps on you. Don't youse know
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me?" I looked at the bandaged face wonderingly. "Don't you spot de man dat near let youse down de shaft?" Then, with a great start, I saw it was the Worm. "'Taint no horse done me up," he said in a hoarse whisper; "'twas a man. You know de man, de worst devil in all Alaska, Black Jack. Bad luck
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to him! He knocked me down and give me de leather. But I'm goin' to get even some day. I'm just laying for him. I wouldn't be in his shoes for de richest claim in de Klondike." The man's eyes glittered vengefully between the white bandages. "'Twas all on account of de little girl he done it. You know de
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girl I mean. Black Jack's dead stuck on her, an' de furder she stands him off de more set he is to get her. Youse don't know dat man. He's never had de cold mit yet." "Tell me what's the matter, for Heaven's sake." "Well, when youse didn't come, de little girl she got worried. I used to be doin'
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chores round de restaurant, an' she asks me to take a note up to you. So I said I would. But I got on a drunk dat day, an' for a week after I didn't draw a sober breath. When I gets around again I told her I'd seen you an' given you de note an' you was comin' in
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right away." "Heaven forgive you for that." [Illustration: Then, as I hung half in, half out of the window, he clutched me by the throat] "Yep, dat's what I say now. But it's all too late. Well, a week went on an' you never showed up, an' meantime Locasto was pesterin' her cruel. She got mighty peaked like, pale as
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a ghost, an' I could see she cried most all her nights. Den she gives me anudder note. She gives me a hundred dollars to take dat note to you. I said she could lay on me dis time. I was de hurry-up kid, an' I starts off. But Black Jack must have cottoned on, for he meets me back
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of de town an' taxes me wid takin' a message. Den he sets on me like a wild beast an' does me up good and proper. But I'll fix him yet." "Where are the notes?" I cried. "In de pocket of me coat. Tell de nurse to fetch in me clothes, an' I'll give dem to youse." The nurse brought
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the clothes, but the little man was too sore to move. "Feel in de inside pocket." There were the notes, folded very small, and written in pencil. There was a strange faintness at my heart, and my fingers trembled as I opened them. Fear, fear was clutching me, compressing me in an agonising grip. Here was the first. "My Darling
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Boy: Why didn't you come? I was all ready for you. O, it was such a terrible disappointment. I've cried myself to sleep every night since. Has anything happened to you, dear? For Heaven's sake write or send a message. I can't bear the suspense. "Your loving "Berna." Blankly, dully, almost mechanically, I read the second. "O, come, my dear,
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at once. I'm in serious danger. He's grown desperate. Swears if he can't get me by fair means he'll have me by foul. I'm terribly afraid. Why ar'n't you here to protect me? Why have you failed me? O, my darling, have pity on your poor little girl. Come quickly before it is too late." It was unsigned. Heavens! I
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must go to her at once. I was well enough. I was all right again. Why would they not let me go to her? I would crawl on my hands and knees if need be. I was strong, so strong now. Ha! there were the Worm's clothes. It was after midnight. The nurse had just finished her rounds. All was
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quiet in the ward. Dizzily I rose and slipped into the frayed and greasy garments. There were the hospital slippers. I must wear them. Never mind a hat. I was out in the street. I shuffled along, and people stared at me, but no one delayed me. I was at the restaurant now. She wasn't there. Ah! the cabin on
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the hill. I was weaker than I had thought. Once or twice in a half-fainting condition I stopped and steadied myself by holding a sapling tree. Then the awful intuition of her danger possessed me, and gave me fresh strength. Many times I stumbled, cutting myself on the sharp boulders. Once I lay for a long time, half-unconscious, wondering if
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I would ever be able to rise. I reeled like a drunken man. The way seemed endless, yet stumbling, staggering on, there was the cabin at last. A light was burning in the front room. Some one was at home at all events. Only a few steps more, yet once again I fell. I remember striking my face against a
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sharp rock. Then, on my hands and knees, I crawled to the door. I raised myself and hammered with clenched fists. There was silence within, then an agitated movement. I knocked again. Was the door ever going to be opened? At last it swung inward, with a suddenness that precipitated me inside the room. The Madam was standing over me
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where I had fallen. At sight of me she screamed. Surprise, fear, rage, struggled for mastery on her face. "It's him," she cried, "_him_." Peering over her shoulder, with ashy, horrified face, I saw her trembling husband. "Berna," I gasped hoarsely. "Where is she? I want Berna. What are you doing to her, you devils? Give her to me. She's
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mine, my promised bride. Let me go to her, I say." The woman barred the way. All at once I realised that the air was heavy with a strange odour, the odour of _chloroform_. Frenzied with fear, I rushed forward. Then the Amazon roused herself. With a cry of rage she struck me. Savagely both of them came for me.
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I struggled, I fought; but, weak as I was, they carried me before them and threw me from the door. I heard the lock shoot; I was outside; I was impotent. Yet behind those log walls.... Oh, it was horrible! horrible! Could such things be in God's world? And I could do nothing. I was strong once more. I ran
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round to the back of the cabin. She was in there, I knew. I rushed at the window and threw myself against it. The storm frame had not been taken off. Crash! I burst through both sheets of glass. I was cruelly cut, bleeding in a dozen places, yet I was half into the room. There, in the dirty, drab
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light, I saw a face, the fiendish, rage-distorted face of my dream. It was Locasto. He turned at the crash. With a curse he came at me. Then, as I hung half in, half out of the window, he clutched me by the throat. Using all his strength, he raised me further into the room, then he hurled me ruthlessly
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out onto the rocks outside. I rose, reeling, covered with blood, blind, sick, speechless. Weakly I staggered to the window. My strength was leaving me. "O God, sustain me! Help me to save her." Then I felt the world go blank. I swayed; I clutched at the walls; I fell. There I lay in a ghastly, unconscious heap. I had
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lost! THE VORTEX He burned a hole in the frozen muck; He scratched the icy mould; And there in six-foot dirt he struck A sack or so of gold. He burned a hole in the Decalogue, And then it came about-- For Fortune's only a lousy rogue-- His "pocket" petered out. And lo! it was but a year all told,
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When there in the shadow grim, But six feet deep in the icy mould, They burned a hole for him. --"The Yukoner." "No, no, I'm all right. Really I am. Please leave me alone. You want me to laugh? Ha! Ha! There! Is that all right now?" "No, it isn't all right. It's very far from all right, my boy;
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and this is where you and your little uncle here are going to have a real heart to heart talk." It was in the big cabin on Gold Hill, and the Prodigal was addressing me. He went on: "Now, look here, kid, when it comes to expressing my feelings I'm in the kindergarten class; when it comes to handing out
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the high-toned dope I drop my cue every time; but when I'm needed to do the solid pardner stunt then you don't need to holler for me--I'm there. Well, I'm giving you a straight line of talk. Ever since the start I've taken a strong notion to you. You've always been ace-high with me, and there never will come the
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day when you can't eat on my meal-ticket. We tackled the Trail of Trouble together. You were always wanting to lift the heavy end of the log, and when the God of Cussedness was doing his best to rasp a man down to his yellow streak, you showed up white all through. Say, kid, we've been in tight places together;
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we've been stacked up against hard times together: and now I'll be gol-darned if I'm going to stand by and see you go downhill, while the devil oils the bearings." "Oh, I'm all right," I protested. "Yes, you're all right," he echoed grimly. "In an impersonation of an 'all-right' man it's the hook for yours. I've seen 'all-right' men like
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you hitting the hurry trail for the boneyard before now. You're 'all right'! Why, for the last two hours you've been sitting with that 'just-break-the-news-to mother' expression of yours, and paying no more heed to my cheerful brand of conversation than if I had been a measly four-flusher. You don't eat more than a sick sparrow, and often you don't
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bat an eye all night. You're looking worse than the devil in a gale of wind. You've lost your grip, my boy. You don't care whether school keeps or not. In fact, if it wasn't for your folks, you'd as lief take a short cut across the Great Divide." "You're going it a little strong, old man." "Oh no, I'm
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not. You know you're sick of everything. Feel as if life's a sort of penitentiary, and you've just got to do time. You don't expect to get any more fun out of it. Look at me. Every day's my sunshine day. If the sky's blue I like it; if it's grey I like it just as well. I never worry.
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What's the use? Yesterday's a dead one; to-morrow's always to-morrow. All we've got's the 'now,' and it's up to us to live it for all we're worth. You can use up more human steam to the square inch in worrying than you can to the square yard in hard work. Eliminate worry and you've got the only system." "It's all
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very well for you to preach," I said, "you forget I've been a pretty sick man." "That's no nursemaid's dream. You almost cashed in. Typhoid's a serious proposition at the best; but when you take a crazy streak on top of it, make a midnight getaway from the sick-ward and land up on the Slide looking as if you'd been
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run through a threshing machine, well, you're sure letting death get a short option on you. And you gave up. You didn't want to fight. You shirked, but your youth and constitution fought for you. They healed your wounds, they soothed your ravings, they cooled your fever. They were a great team, and they pulled you through. Seems as if
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they'd pulled you through a knot-hole, but they were on to their job. And you weren't one bit grateful--seemed to think they had no business to butt in." "My hurts are more than physical." "Yes, I know; there was that girl. You seemed to have a notion that that was the only girl on God's green brush-pile. As I camped
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there by your bedside listening to your ravings, and getting a strangle-hold on you when you took it into your head to get funny, you blabbed out the whole yarn. Oh, sonny, why didn't you tell your uncle? Why didn't you put me wise? I could have given you the right steer. Have you ever known me handle a job
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I couldn't make good at? I'm a whole matrimonial bureau rolled into one. I'd have had you prancing to the tune of the wedding march before now. But you kept mum as a mummy. Wouldn't even tell your old pard. Now you've lost her." "Yes, I've lost her." "Did you ever see her after you came out of the hospital?"
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"Once, once only. It was the first day. I was as thin as a rail, as white as the pillow from which I had just raised my head. Death's reprieve was written all over me. I dragged along wearily, leaning on a stick. I was thinking of her, thinking, thinking always. As I scanned the faces of the crowds that
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thronged the streets, I thought only of her face. Then suddenly she was before me. She looked like a ghost, poor little thing; and for a fluttering moment we stared at each other, she and I, two wan, weariful ghosts." "Yes, what did she say?" "Say! she said nothing. She just looked at me. Her face was cold as ice.
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She looked at me as if she wanted to _pity_ me. Then into her eyes there came a shadow of bitterness, of bitterness and despair such as might gloom the eyes of a lost soul. It unnerved me. It seemed as if she was regarding me almost with horror, as if I were a sort of a leper. As I
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stood there, I thought she was going to faint. She seemed to sway a moment. Then she drew a great, gasping breath, and turning on her heel she was gone." "She cut you?" "Yes, cut me dead, old fellow. And my only thought was of love for her, eternal love. But I'll never forget the look on her face as
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she turned away. It was as if I had lashed her with a whip. My God!" "And you've never seen her since?" "No, never. That was enough, wasn't it? She didn't want to speak to me any more, never wanted to set eyes on me any more. I went back to the ward; then, in a little, I came on
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here. My body was living, but my heart was dead. It will never live again." "Oh, rot! You mustn't let the thing down you like that. It's going to kill you in the end. Buck up! Be a man! If you don't care to live for yourself, live for others. Anyway, it's likely all for the best. Maybe love had
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you locoed. Maybe she wasn't really good. See now how she lives openly with Locasto. They call her the Madonna; they say she looks more like a virgin-martyr than the mistress of a dissolute man." I rose and looked at him, conscious that my face was all twisted with the pain of the thought. "Look here," I said, "never did
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God put the breath of life into a better girl. There's been foul play. I know that girl better than any one in the world, and if every living being were to tell me she wasn't good I would tell them they lied, they lied. I would burn at the stake upholding that girl." "Then why did she turn you
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down so cruelly?" "I don't know; I can't understand it. I know so little about women. I have not wavered a moment. To-day in my loneliness and heartbreak I care and hunger for her more than ever. She's always here, right here in my head, and no power can drive her out. Let them say of her what they will,
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I would marry her to-morrow. It's killing me. I've aged ten years in the last few months. Oh, if I only could forget." He looked at me thoughtfully. "I say, old man, do you ever hear from your old lady?" "Every mail." "You've often told me of your home. Say! just give us a mental frame-up of it." "Glengyle? Yes.
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I can see the old place now, as plainly as a picture: the green, dimpling hills all speckled with sheep; the grey house nestling snugly in a grove of birch; the wild water of the burn leaping from black pool to pool, just mad with the joy of life; the midges dancing over the water in the still sunshine, and
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the trout jumping for them--oh, it's the bonny, bonny place. You would think so too. You would like it, tramping knee-deep in the heather, to see the moorcock rise whirring at your feet; you would like to set sail with the fisher folk after the silver herring. It would make you feel good to see the calm faces of the
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shepherds, the peace in the eyes of the women. Ay, that was the best of it all, the Rest of it, the calm of it. I was pretty happy in those days." "You were happy--then why not go back? That's your proper play; go back to your Mother. She wants you. You're pretty well heeled now. A little money goes
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a long way over there. You can count on thirty thousand. You'll be comfortable; you'll devote yourself to the old lady; you'll be happy again. Time's a regular steam-roller when it comes to smoothing out the rough spots in the past. You'll forget it all, this place, this girl. It'll all seem like the after effects of a midnight Welsh
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rabbit. You've got mental indigestion. I hate to see you go. I'm really sorry to lose you; but it's your only salvation, so go, go!" Never had I thought of it before. Home! how sweet the word seemed. Mother! yes, Mother would comfort me as no one else could. She would understand. Mother and Garry! A sudden craving came over
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