"It serves me right," she told herself, furiously. "I deserve the pink ticket for making a fool of myself. Yes, a FOOL! What has Pierce ever done for me? Nothing. And I--?" Before her mind's eye came a vision of the opportunities she had let slip, the chances she had ignored. She knew full well that she could have had the pick of many men--the new-made millionaires of Dawson--but instead she had chosen him. And why? Merely because he had a way, a smile, a warm and pleasing personality--some magnetic appeal too intangible to identify. It was like her to make the wrong choice--she always did. She had come North with but one desire, one determination--namely, to make money, to reap to the full her share of this free harvest. She had given up the life she liked, the people she knew, the comforts she craved, for that and for nothing else, and what a mess she had made of the venture! Other girls not half so smart, not half so pretty as she, had feathered their nests right here before her eyes, while she was wasting her time. They had kept their heads, and they would go out in the spring, first class, with good clothes and a bank-roll in the purser's safe. Some of them were married and respectable. "Never again!" she whispered to herself. "The next one will pay." Chagrin at the treatment she had suffered filled her with a poisonous hatred of all mankind, and soundlessly she cursed Phillips as the cause of her present plight. Such thoughts as these ran tumbling through the girl's mind; her rage and her resentment were real enough; nevertheless, through this overtone there ran another note; a small voice was speaking in the midst of all her tumult--a small voice which she refused to listen to. "What I ever saw in him I don't know," she sneered, goading herself to further bitterness and stiffening her courage. "I never really cared for him; I'm too wise for that. I don't care for him now. I detest the poor, simple-minded fool. I--HATE him." So she fought with herself, drowning the persistent piping of that other voice. Then her eyes dropped to that fatal paper in her lap and suddenly venom fled from her. She wondered if Cavendish would tell Pierce that he had given her the pink ticket. Probably not. The Mounted Police were usually close-mouthed about such things, and yet--Laure crushed the paper into a crumpled ball and furtively hid it in the pocket of her coat; then she raised wild, apprehensive eyes to the door. If only she dared slip out now, before Pierce reappeared, before he had a chance to see her. It seemed as if she could not bear to have him know, but--Cavendish had ordered her to wait. "My God!" the girl whispered. "I'll die, if he knows! I'll die!" She began to tremble wretchedly and to wring her hands; she could not remove her gaze from the door.