It seemed the last had come. Up, up we went. We seemed to hover uncertainly, tilted, hair-poised over a yawning gulf. Were we going to upset? Mental agony screamed in me. But, no! We righted. Dizzily we dipped over; steeply we plunged down. Oh! it was terrible! We were in a hornets' nest of angry waters and they were stinging us to death; we were in a hollow cavern roofed over with slabs of seething foam; the fiery horses were trampling us under their myriad hoofs. I gave up all hope. I felt the girl faint in my arms. How long it seemed! I wished for the end. The flying hammers of hell were pounding us, pounding us—Oh, God! Oh, God!...
Then, swamped from bow to stern, half turned over, wrecked and broken, we swept into the peaceful basin of the river below.
CHAPTER XIV
On the flats around the Whitehorse Rapids was a great largess of wild flowers. The shooting stars gladdened the glade with gold; the bluebells brimmed the woodland hollow with amethyst; the fire-weed splashed the hills with the pink of coral. Daintily swinging, like clustered pearls, were the petals of the orchid. In glorious profusion were begonias, violets, and Iceland poppies, and all was in a setting of the keenest emerald. But over the others dominated the wild rose, dancing everywhere and flinging its perfume to the joyful breeze.
Boats and scows were lined up for miles along the river shore. On the banks water-soaked outfits lay drying in the sun. We, too, had shipped much water in our passage, and a few days would be needed to dry out again. So it was that I found some hours of idleness and was able to see a good deal of Berna.
Madam Winklestein I found surprisingly gracious. She smiled on me, and in her teeth, like white quartz, the creviced gold gleamed. She had a smooth, flattering way with her that disarmed enmity. Winklestein, too, had conveniently forgotten our last interview, and extended to me the paw of spurious friendship. I was free to see Berna as much as I chose.
Thus it came about that we rambled among the woods and hills, picking wild flowers and glad almost with the joy of children. In these few days I noted a vast change in the girl. Her cheeks, pale as the petals of the wild orchid, seemed to steal the tints of the briar-rose, and her eyes beaconed with the radiance of sun-waked skies. It was as if in the poor child a long stifled capacity for joy was glowing into being.
One golden day, with her cheeks softly flushed, her eyes shining, she turned to me.
"Oh, I could be so happy if I only had a chance, if I only had the chance other girls have. It would take so little to make me the happiest girl in the world—just to have a home, a plain, simple home where all was sunshine and peace; just to have the commonest comforts, to be care-free, to love and be loved. That would be enough." She sighed and went on: