“I am sorry. But they were stupid and difficult
to pass.”
“Only by chance did I happen to see it all,
my child. Otherwise the ship’s regulations
would have compelled me to send you ashore. You
were frightened. You can not deny that.
You were running away from something!”
He was amazed at the childish simplicity with which
she answered him.
“Yes, I was running away—from something.”
Her eyes were beautifully clear and unafraid, and
yet again he sensed the thrill of the fight she was
making.
“And you will not tell me why—or
from what you were escaping?”
“I can not—tonight. I may do
so before we reach Nome. But—it is
possible—”
“What?”
“That I shall never reach Nome.”
Suddenly she caught one of his hands in both her own.
Her fingers clung to him, and with a little note of
fierceness in her voice she hugged the hand to her
breast. “I know just how good you have been
to me,” she cried. “I should like
to tell you why I came aboard—like that.
But I can not. Look! Look at those wonderful
mountains!” With one free hand she pointed.
“Behind them and beyond them lie the romance
and adventure and mystery of centuries, and for nearly
thirty years you have been very near those things,
Captain Rifle. No man will ever see again what
you have seen or feel what you have felt, or forget
what you have had to forget. I know it.
And after all that, can’t you—won’t
you—forget the strange manner in which
I came aboard this ship? It is such a simple,
little thing to put out of your mind, so trivial,
so unimportant when you look back—and think.
Please Captain Rifle—please!”
So quickly that he scarcely sensed the happening of
it she pressed his hand to her lips. Their warm
thrill came and went in an instant, leaving him speechless,
his resolution gone.
“I love you because you have been so good to
me,” she whispered, and as suddenly as she had
kissed his hand, she was gone, leaving him alone at
the rail.
Alan Holt saw the slim figure of the girl silhouetted
against the vivid light of the open doorway of the
upper-deck salon. He was not watching her, nor
did he look closely at the exceedingly attractive picture
which she made as she paused there for an instant
after leaving Captain Rifle. To him she was only
one of the five hundred human atoms that went to make
up the tremendously interesting life of one of the
first ships of the season going north. Fate,
through the suave agency of the purser, had brought
him into a bit closer proximity to her than the others;
that was all. For two days her seat in the dining-salon
had been at the same table, not quite opposite him.
As she had missed both breakfast hours, and he had
skipped two luncheons, the requirements of neighborliness
and of courtesy had not imposed more than a dozen
words of speech upon them. This was very satisfactory
to Alan. He was not talkative or communicative
of his own free will. There was a certain cynicism
back of his love of silence. He was a good listener
and a first-rate analyst. Some people, he knew,
were born to talk; and others, to trim the balance,
were burdened with the necessity of holding their tongues.
For him silence was not a burden.
