turned to the girl. "I'd like to go ashore with you, and as far as the
store, but you see how busy we are. Good-by, and a lucky trip to you.
I'll tell off a couple of men at once and break out your baggage. Have
it up at the store to-morrow morning, sharp."

She took his hand lightly and stepped aboard. Her weight gave the
leaky boat a sudden lurch, and the water hurtled across the bottom
boards to her shoe-tops: but she took it coolly enough, settling
herself in the stern-sheets and tucking her feet under her.

"Hold on!" the officer cried. "This will never do, Miss Welse. Come
on back, and I'll get one of our boats over as soon as I can."

"I'll see you in--in heaven first," retorted the boatman, shoving off.
"Let go!" he threatened.

Mr. Thurston gripped tight hold of the gunwale, and as reward for his
chivalry had his knuckles rapped sharply by the oar-blade. Then he
forgot himself, and Miss Welse also, and swore, and swore fervently.

"I dare say our farewell might have been more dignified," she called
back to him, her laughter rippling across the water.

"Jove!" he muttered, doffing his cap gallantly. "There is a _woman_!"
And a sudden hunger seized him, and a yearning to see himself mirrored
always in the gray eyes of Frona Welse. He was not analytical; he did
not know why; but he knew that with her he could travel to the end of
the earth. He felt a distaste for his profession, and a temptation to
throw it all over and strike out for the Klondike whither she was
going; then he glanced up the beetling side of the ship, saw the red