leprous and mottled in the deep twilight that midnight brought in
this latitude. They had threaded into the ice-field as long as the
light lasted, following the lanes of blue water till they closed,
then drifting idly till others appeared; worming out into leagues
of open sea, again creeping into the shifting labyrinth till
darkness rendered progress perilous.

Occasionally they had passed herds of walrus huddled sociably upon
ice-pans, their wet hides glistening in the sunlight. The air had
been clear and pleasant, while away on all quarters they had seen
the smoke of other ships toiling through the barrier. The spring
fleet was knocking at the door of the Golden North.

Chafing at her imprisonment, the girl had asked the old man to
take her out on deck under the shelter of darkness; then she had
led him to speak of his own past experiences, and of Glenister's;
which he had done freely. She was frankly curious about them, and
she wondered at their apparent lack of interest in her own
identity and her secret mission. She even construed their silence
as indifference, not realizing that these Northmen were offering
her the truest evidence of camaraderie.

The frontier is capable of no finer compliment than this utter
disregard of one's folded pages. It betokens that highest faith in
one's fellow-man, the belief that he should be measured by his
present deeds, not by his past. It says, translated: "This is
God's free country where a man is a man, nothing more. Our land is
new and pure, our faces are to the front. If you have been square,
so much the better; if not, leave behind the taints of artificial
things and start again on the level--that's all."