Chapter 3

CHAPTER VII.Where the heavy trail from Sixty Mile forged toward Indian River, Rex Britton halted his dog-train and eyed with an odd glance, half relief, half reproach, the dog-sled which was now rapidly approaching from the rear."Humph!" he growled through his fur hood, "the gentleman of the rear-guard has a conscience after all. He apparently knows the unwritten law of the Yukon that travellers take turns in breaking the trail."A fresh fall of snow had buried the Dawson route, and, unlucky as usual, Britton had found it his task to pack the loose stuff all the way from the Big Salmon. The other dog-train that had mushed behind him since morning had not offered to do its duty till now. The four o'clock gray was showing in the sky. Night lurked in the river shadows. Britton breathed his dogs a little longer and waited.The sled behind was drawn by a five-dog team like his own, but the huskies appeared far fresher."Been nursing them while I've done the work!" was his exclamation–"mighty good driver, too. By George, it's a woman!"Britton's wide eyes strained to catch the detail of the figure. As the distance lessened, his supposition was proven true. He saw the novel sight of a five-dog team being urged at full speed over that lonely trail by a mere slip of a girl."Gaucho, you lean beggar!" he cried to his leader. With a jump the animal tautened the traces to the shrill menace of the lash. The runners coughed a little in the sagging snow, and Britton was off down the slope."You see it's a girl, you old wolf," he whimsically explained. "We can't let her break a trail. No–not if we were dropping!"Nevertheless his team travelled in a surly fashion. The skin on the backs of their necks crinkled at the shriek of his whip. They snarled and fought in their harness despite the punishment which followed. The rear sled gained steadily. Soon a voice like a clear silver bell hailed Britton."Wait!" she commanded. "I'll take my turn. Your dogs are weakening. I should have come to the front sooner, only I must travel all night and need to spare my team.""I'm all right," Britton shouted back. "Laurance's cabin is my stop. The huskies will last.""I insist," the girl cried, urging her animals so that they nosed the packs on Britton's sleigh."And I refuse," he called over his shoulder. "You shouldn't be on this trail anyway. It's not safe to travel alone. You're surely not mad enough to attempt a night trip?"The girl straightened her shoulders haughtily, and the face, framed in a white-furred hood, took on a dignity which would have been lost on the man had not the physical beauty of the countenance forced its impression."Let me pass!" she tersely commanded, pulling her dogs into the powdery snow at one side of Britton's packed trail."Pass me, then," he said, a little nettled, and forced his team to topmost speed.Invited into a race, the girl soon showed the mettle of herself and of her animals. Before Britton reached the river-arm, she drew abreast. The trail sloped downward, and the dogs had but little to stay their lope. The two teams raced side by side, the leaders snapping at each other.[image]"The two teams raced side by side, the leaders snapping at each other.""They'll fight in a minute and pile us both up," the girl cried excitedly.Britton, gazing on her face, was struck with an old, poignant pain. For a second, he thought it was Maud Morris. The features were there; the same teeth, the same rose-hued cheeks, the same sunny hair about the temples! The resemblance was remarkable, and, forgetting the swift descent, Britton stared.Gaucho, over-zealous to maim the rival leader, stumbled, and a spill seemed imminent, but Britton's skilful lash sorted him out, thereby increasing the momentum of the train till the teams rushed neck and neck again."It's a dead heat," he said grimly. "We had better slacken speed before we cross the ice or neither sleigh will go any farther.""Agreed," smiled the hooded beauty, reining in. Her color was heightened by the ride, and, as she pushed the furry fringes from her mouth to admit of freer breathing, Britton could have sworn it was the face of Maud Morris. Only, the eyes had a serene depth of expression which bespoke soul and purity. Therein lay the difference!"Say," he began, confusedly, "you're like–you're the perfect mould of someone I know. Her name is Morris. Ah! I have it now! Such likeness can't exist without sisterhood. You're a sister of Maud Morris!" His voice was intense in its eagerness."I am not!" came the decidedly staccato answer, tinged with contempt. "Be careful," she added warningly. "There's a jam on this arm." They were sweeping the frozen river-bed, bumping over the jutting ice-boulders piled chaotically in a bend of the stream.Britton took the lead, swinging briskly across the jam. The girl shouted a warning at his evident carelessness."Do be cautious," she begged. "The fresh snow masks the water-holes in treacherous bridges, and the current here is very swift."Britton loped on without heed. The girl screamed, a second later. Without warning one runner of the foremost sled cut across a snow-arched slush-hole. Britton pitched backwards, splashing through the sloppy mask as a stone drops through scummy ooze.The girl was at the place in three dog-leaps. A dull blotch of open water showed where the man had disappeared. She jerked her sled sidewise, as an anchor for her weight, grasped a runner with one hand, and lowered her body as far as possible, searching with despairing glances for a reappearing head. She gave a low cry of agony when nothing showed, and began probing wildly with her whip. Its butt-end fell across the taut ropes of Britten's sled, and, looking up, the girl saw the dogs in a heap, well-nigh strangled with the tension on the collars. There was something on the other end!She grasped the ropes and pulled with all the strength of one arm. After what seemed an age of straining, Britton's black gauntlet pierced the slush. The lines were twisted tightly round his wrist, and the girl frantically seized it. However, the effort was useless. By the passiveness of the limb she knew him to be either stunned or drowned, and past helping himself, while her strength could not stir him.Relaxing her grip, she pulled herself up the side of the hole, ran to Britton's team, and lashed it into activity in spite of the cramping collars. In terror the huskies responded with their supreme efforts, but they could not draw out their master.In hysterical sobbing now the girl brought her own dogs, hitched them ahead, and slashed the double team till the cruel whip flayed their hides. To her blows she added prayers breathed between terrified sobs.At last the string of tortured dogs broke out the sagging, anchoring thing, and Britton's senseless body rolled into view with startling suddenness. The animals, at the quick release, dragged it clear of the river before the girl could stop them.Laurance's cabin showed just around the bend. In a new lease of strength the feminine rescuer rolled the man's body on his sleigh. Calling to her own team to follow, she made a dash for the shelter of the cabin.The headland reeled away; the ice-gaps ran past till she drew up with a swirl in front of Laurance's. A group of suspicious huskies, guarding the door, howled dubiously and charged on the strange teams. The girl cracked skulls here and there in a frantic fashion. The fear that they might spring on the inert man possessed her, but in a second the clamor reached Laurance by his fire.The door clanged back. Several oaths, puncturing the icy air like pistol-cracks, were swallowed in a ridiculous gurgle when the old Klondiker recognized the strange form as that of a woman."He's drowned!" she screamed. "Help him, for God's sake!""Who?" bellowed Laurance, rushing out and kicking dogs right and left. "By me oath, it's Britton, Rex Britton! Where'd you come on him, eh?""He fell in the river-jam!" she cried in unsuppressed irritation. "Don't talk–don't question! Do something! It's time that counts. You're losing time, man!" Her voice filed off in an upper break which told of racked nerves.Laurance gripped Britton in his arms and made the house with some little difficulty. Rex was a heavy man, and a bulky fellow seems twice his own weight when the muscles are so lax."I don't think he's drowned near so much as stunned," Laurance observed, as he laid the body in a bunk behind the stove. "Something's hit him a hefty blow there." He touched Britton's forehead where a dark bruise showed."Nary a drown," he continued triumphantly, as he ran a hand under thick Arctic clothing to feel the breast. "His heart's a-beatin'. His ribs heave some, too. Nary a drown, I tell you. The crack on the coco done the job, miss. I'll bring him round all up-to-date in a minnit or two."The girl's convulsive sobbing made Laurance look up in surprise."Don't you go for to take on so," he begged. "You go quiet your nerves and make summat hot in the kitchen room, for the cook's away. I'll dry-fix Britton, and he'll drink pints of scaldin' tea when he wakes."The girl obeyed, eager to do anything that would help. She busied herself over the tea-making, and warmed some soup, made from moose shoulder, which she found in the rough cupboard. At intervals, however, her anxiety overcame her, and she called to Laurance in the next room with questions as to Britton's condition. Reassuring replies came back in the Klondiker's quaint vocabulary, replies that made her smile when she could take her mind off Britton's danger, since Laurance declared there was no need to fear.By the time she had the tea and soup ready, Laurance came into the kitchen."He's come to–sort of dazed, though," was his announcement. "Got them things hot?""Steaming!" she answered, turning from the stove. The action brought her face in close range of Laurance's eyes. The tears were dried, disfiguring sobs gone. The sparkle of the eye and the fire-tinged cheek made a rare sight. The old Klondiker gazed for a speechless minute, while the girl's color deepened."Say, now," he stammered at last, "if I'd never set eyes on the Rose of the Yukon, I'd take me oath as you was her. Blast me if you don't resemble her like a twin. Where're you from?""Dawson!–don't bother me," the girl replied quickly. "You are sure he will be perfectly safe? I wouldn't like to think–you see, I believe it was my fault. I tempted him to race. He will take no harm?""Nary a bit," said Laurance, promptly. "He'll be as right as a trivet when he gets outside a good hot meal.""Then give him these as soon as you like!" She indicated the tea and soup, and added: "I'll thank you to tell him I'm sorry I was the cause of his accident. Just tell him I'm sorry."Laurance caught up the boiling liquids in their respective vessels and darted into the next room. Rex Britton's senses were gradually steadying themselves. The hollow, rocky feeling was passing away. In a dry suit of Laurance's he half reclined on the Alaska bunk, while the Klondiker proceeded to administer to his needs by dipping out the necessary nourishment."Where's the girl?" asked Britton, awkwardly."Out in the kitchen! Say, isn't she a Jim-Cracker from Jim-Crackerville, eh? What's her name?""Don't know!" said Rex. "Why didn't you ask her?""Bless me,–I–forgot," admitted Laurance. "However, son, seein' as you're summat interested, I'll attend to this here enquiry–"A jingle of bells and the movement of a dog-train outside clattered an interruption."Hello!" exclaimed Laurance, jumping up. "Someone else blew in, eh? Must be me day at home." He crossed quickly to the door and flung it open."Who's arrived?" demanded Britton."H–l!" cried Laurance, in a non-committal fashion, and dashed into the yard.Vociferous shouting drifted in to Britton, and when the Klondiker reappeared, he asked with a shade of anxiety: "Anything wrong out there?""She's gone," spluttered Laurance. "She's hiked with that bloody fast team of hers."Britton leaped from the bunk to the doorway. Around the bend of the trail the girl's outfit was disappearing. Full of a strange thrill of disappointment and sense of indignity, he turned the blame on Laurance."You blasted fool!" he roared, angrily."'Tain't my fault," the Klondiker threw back. "How'd I know she was goin' to vamoose? Must ha' thought we wasn't respectable inhabitants.""She said she intended to travel by night," explained Britton. "I told her it wasn't safe, but she laughed. I'm going after her!"Jim Laurance put his back to the door with a certain grim determination."No, you ain't," he said, quietly. "Sift some sense into your cracked head. Them dogs are gee-whiners. Yours wouldn't catch 'em in a year. No, siree! That girl knows what she's a-doin'. She's been on trails afore this, and don't you forgit it."Britton sat down upon his bunk again, convinced of the futility of trying to overtake the splendid team of the unknown beauty. Laurance came back from the door and replenished the fire. His friend drank the rest of the soup and tea in an absent manner."How do you shape?" asked Jim."Better," Rex grunted."Feel like a square meal? It'll skeer off the cold better'n slops. They're all right to prick your blood up, but they don't last like a stomachful of bull moose. Heh?""Hardly," Britton agreed. "Bring out your solid grub."Laurance dived into the kitchen, returning with a big platter of moosemeat and a tremendous slab of pilot bread. He put on a fresh pot of tea, and they fell to, munching in silence while dark crept under the door and into the cabin corners.CHAPTER VIII.When the meal was finished, the cabin was wrapped in gloom. Laurance opened the stove door in order to save the expense of lighting a candle. In the Yukon smaller things than candles count for much. The firelight blocked out the two men's figures in a ruddy smudge of color. Britton's massive frame showed larger by a half than the wiry figure of Jim Laurance. But though not bulky, the latter's muscles were of steel. His grizzled face was surmounted by stubby, iron-gray hair which met the up-creep of a disreputable beard in front of his rat ears. The stolid monochrome of a countenance was relieved only by the flash of two piercing blue eyes and the cherry-red hue of a snub nose. His lips were seldom seen; they clung incessantly to his pipe-stem under cover of the ragged whisker-growth.Britton's face, on the other hand, was a finely moulded one; the harrying conditions and bitter routines of the North appeared to have only conserved and augmented its strength. A broad forehead, dark, fine hair above, regular features, with chin and cheeks clean-shaven, and white, even teeth showing when he smiled, made a pleasant picture in the flame reflection. His muscle-corded shoulders, sturdy neck, and square chin gave evidence of combined physical and mental strength.For a time the men smoked in silence, staring into the coals, each busy with his own thoughts. Presently Britton spoke."Perhaps she'll stay at Ainslie's camp for the night," he said, more to himself than to his companion."Got the girl on your brain yet?" chirped Laurance, mockingly. "Kind of heroine of a fair romance, ain't she? Sort of angelic saviour sent for your special benefit, heh? 'Spose you'd a-dropped into that hole if she hadn't been around? Own up, now–honest Injun!""Can't say," evaded Britton. "I was thinking only of her safety. We're all pretty rough characters up here, but there are some d–d rough ones on this trail. At Stewart River they told me that someone was robbing caches by night between there and Dawson.""The bloody cache-thief, or thieves," Laurance broke out–"they'll swing if we catch them! Anderson's cache, near Ainslie's camp, was sandpapered clean two nights ago–not a speck of anything left. It's jumping-off time for the man who did that–when they spot him!""Suppose now–well, I'd hate to think of the girl meeting one of that breed," Britton ventured."Don't you fear," laughed Laurance. "The man as puts hand on her will catch a whole-fledged, fire-spittin' Tartar. What did I see in her neat little belt when she loosed her coat in front of me fire? An ivory-heeled shootin'-iron, if you ast me. Don't worry, son. Wimmen as carries them things can use 'em. If you met her on the trail and was on evil bent she'd plug you quicker'n scat. You're d–d right. She can go through–if she wants to."Something like a sigh heaved from Britton's wide chest. Laurance thought there was relief in it."On course," he bantered, "you was thinkin' of her safety. You certain had nary a thought of them red cheeks, them eyes, them lips–whoo!""Drop that!" Britton curtly ordered. "You know women aren't in my line.""Where've you been these last weeks?" Laurance asked, suddenly changing the subject."Following a fool stampede up Forty Forks, beyond Lake Marsh.""Hard luck again?""The worst." Britton's disconsolate tone told more than his brief answer."What's your latest idea?" his friend asked after a doubtful pause."I've word of something on Samson Creek. I'll outfit at Dawson and try for it. The Government courier gave me the hint at Tagish Post. I pulled him out of a cold bath he was taking in Lake Bennett once. He didn't forget it.""Humph!" Laurance growled, reaching for more wood and stoking up after the old-timer's fashion."It's my last stampede," Britton continued in an odd, tense voice. "I'm nearly down and out, and I'm staking all. If I fail this time, it's back over this cursed trail to Dyea on beans and horsehide. I'll wash dishes in the scullery of a Puget Sound boat or do something of the like. If I fail, Laurance, I'll have seen the last of the Yukon.""What brought you here, son?" asked Laurance, kindly. He leaned forward and put a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "What brought you to this God-forsaken Yukon?" he repeated. "I've heard of you playin' a hard-luck game on four stampedes. You've took the bumps right along like a vet'ran, but summat's agin you. You wasn't bred to this here. Your hands is too fine-shaped. Your head's too keen. Your speech is high-flown. Rex Britton, you turned your back on a better place in England than you'll light on here. I'm certainly certain of that. Tell me why you come, son?"A new light gleamed in Britton's eyes. His stern countenance softened as under the influence of some far-away dream. He got up and paced the floor for a little. Finally, he flung himself back in the chair with an air of resignation."I've never told anyone here," he said, "but I'll tell you, Jim. Perhaps I don't need to say it; of course, it was a woman. The old, old story! I'm a strong man, Laurance, and I'd scorn to hold the feminine sex responsible for my vicissitudes. Still, as the philosophers have it, 'In the beginning it was a woman.' We'll go to the starting line. Listen!"My family was one of the best in the old land. It consisted of three members, parents and myself. Both parents are dead–as you know. After graduating from college, I commenced a tour of the Orient, for recreation mostly. The patrimony left me was small, but I was heir to my uncle, who owns Britton Hall, the Sussex estate, and a post in the foreign diplomatic service was waiting for me when I should come back."Getting quickly to the point, I rescued a wonderfully attractive woman on a sinking vessel in the harbor of Algiers. I believe I cracked some Berber skulls in the process, and got a knife-thrust through the shoulder muscles in return."She bound the wound, Laurance, and nursed it, lingering in Algiers for that purpose. Our meetings were hourly, you might say! I had my uncle's yacht at my disposal, and all the delights of the capital invited our participation, so you may judge that the days and nights passed very pleasantly."I had friends there whom I should have considered, but I neglected them in the other fascination; for it was fascination, Jim–the kind of beautiful web that the spider spins." Britton paused with a snappy intake of breath while Laurance, unwilling to interrupt, swung the stove door to and fro with a moccasined foot."You know the atmosphere of romance surrounding any such happening," Britton finally went on. "The lady was beautiful, marvellously so, in fact, and well versed in worldly artifice. I was still young enough to have the rainbow focus on life. The days went quickly in the picturesque port. The girl–she told me she was twenty-four and unmarried–remained in the place, recuperating from the shock of her accident. What's the use of elaborating, though! You know how a love dream grows, Jim Laurance. You must have had one somewhere in your own old, grizzled existence. Algiers is sunny. The flowers are fragrant there. Love feeds on sun and flowers, moon and mountains, starry nights, and all that. I was young, Laurance, and she was old in the craft. Could you blame me for being such a fool? Sometimes I hardly blame myself."For nearly a mouth things developed. We were engaged. That city by the Mediterranean became a Paradise for me. Then–then–" Britton's voice broke away in bitterness."Then what?" his friend prompted."Her husband came hunting for her!""H–l!" Laurance gritted. His feet fell to the floor with a bang. "She duped you!" he added, softly."Sheared the lamb," Britton, said, with severe, self-directed irony. "The whole affair came out. Her husband tried to shoot me. Instead, I laid him up for weeks. Then they came at me for damages, and the she-devil framed a charge of seduction. I was the sensation of courts and yellow journals for half a year. When I got clear at last, the attendant circumstances worked their effect. The thing smirched my name and killed my diplomatic chances. It ruined my life when it was brightest with promise. It caused my uncle to disinherit and wash his hands of me. That's why I cut the Isles, Laurance. That's why I'm here."Britton rose to his towering height, with clenched hands, as if he were beginning the fight with the North, as if he were storming the Yukon's iron fastness for the first time. Laurance could picture him thus, setting foot on bleak Dyea beach. The old Klondiker took his pipe out of his mouth and forgot to replace it. In lieu of that he reached a knotted fist to Britton's palm."Son, I'm sorry," he said. This from a hardened Alaskan was much, for in that country, as a rule, no one is sorry for any person but himself. There, in a running fight, it is every man for his own interests, and the devil take the laggards and the weak!"Do you love her?" Laurance ventured, a second later."I'm cured," Britton laughed, bitterly. "Hasn't the draught been strong enough?"The old man returned his pipe-stem to his lips. "Better a good burn-out," he mumbled, "the rubbish won't catch sparks agin. What was her name?""Maud Morris, wife of Christopher Morris," his friend answered. "I saw a man who knew them when I came through Winnipeg. He told me that Morris had gone all to pieces through drink and fast living. At that time they had come direct to Seattle. I don't know where they are now–and don't care to know!"Britton settled back in his seat and refilled his pipe. The recounting of his story had been in some measure a relief, although the old taste of rancid memory remained."You're well out of it, son," Laurance observed, after another vigorous stoking of the stove. "You're bloody well clear, though you've stumped through such a hard-luck siege. I hope your last deal pans out some better. I'd hate to see you fall down. You're too good a man.""Have you met Pierre Giraud lately?" Britton inquired. "I wonder if he'd join me. We've tramped many a trail together.""Pierre's due here to-night," Laurance said quickly. "He won't join you, though. He has a fine thing toting the goods of some Dawson big gun out to Thirty Mile River. His royal nibs is going out–bound for the States–and he has Giraud under contract to pack him along.""Too bad," Britton mused. "Pierre's worth three ordinary men en route. Many's the mile we've paddled, and many's the moose we've missed.Bon camaradeis Giraud, if there was ever one.""I saw him beat two blaggards on the stampede into Nome," Laurance began reminiscently. "The guys started in to argue the right of way with Pierre. Weighty beggars they was, too, but Giraud put 'em both out of action in ten seconds. Shiftiest man on the route, less it's yourself, Britton."Rex shook his head as disclaiming the honor. Outside a shrill howl broke the night silence and started a hundred echoes. Rex lifted his head sharply."What's the matter with the husky?" he asked. "The moon's not up.""Someone's coming," Laurance answered, listening intently to a musical sound.The faint tinkle of bells grew clearer. The rushing sound of a laden dog-train made the cabin walls vibrate."Arrêtes!" commanded a leonine voice in the yard, and the noise died suddenly."It's Pierre," cried Laurance, jumping to his feet.CHAPTER IX.The door was kicked open without ceremony, and Pierre's head popped in."Hello, you young cheechako!" yelled Britton, gaily."Holá! mon camarade, you tam ole stampeder!" cried Giraud, rushing in with outstretched hands. "By de gar, Ah nevaire t'ink Ah find you here. Ah s'pose you seex hondred mile back–saprie, yes." He pulled off his Arctic hood, disclosing a veritable voyageur's head, handsome, debonair, crowned with coal-black curls and lightened by the ever-changing play of his fine eyes, sombre-hued as his hair. Pierre's face was full of a certain reckless beauty, and riveted attention by his daring, wilderness-bred fascination. Camaraderie spilled out of his infectious laugh and his habitant speech.Thus the two friends remained, the one sitting, the other standing, raking each other with volleys of cross-questions. They talked like a pair of chattering jays, trying to gather in the threads of the more recent incidents that had befallen each, till Laurance interrupted them."Sit down and eat," he said to Pierre, "I'll unhitch your team."It was then the current of excitement, which Giraud appeared to have difficulty in suppressing, burst to the surface. He sprang to Laurance's side and caught his arm."Non, non!" he exclaimed. "Wait wan leetle w'ile. Ah breeng news. We want dat sled sure t'ing. De cache-thief–you hear of heem?"Laurance's keen blue eyes flashed. "Is he pinched?" he cried, eagerly. "Have you seen him?"Britton rose from his chair in vague alarm. He was thinking of the girl travelling alone over the trail. "Speak, Pierre," was his tart order, "you know something. Out with it!""You leesten den," Giraud began, excitedly. "Ah come by de cache on Silver Hollowaprèsde dark she fall. Wat t'ink Ah find? De cache broken open. De stuff all gone todiable. Dat thief not ver' far away–Ah know dat for sure t'ing by de tracks. Ah t'ink we get fresh dogs here an' catch heem–catch heem!" Pierre jumped about and flourished his brawny arms in emphasis."Anderson he geeve reward," he continued."How much?" Britton broke in, a new incentive gripping him."Wan t'ousand tollars to de mans w'at catch discanaille–""Come on," roared his friend, jumping into his travelling-gear. "Come on, Pierre; we'll pull down that thousand."He was at the door in a second, calling to his huskies. Giraud ran after, boiling with impatience."Hold on!" called Laurance. "Though I'd like to be in on this job, I can't leave my cabin–not with Mister Feather-Fingers dabbling about, and the cook's over at Stewart for grub.""Jove! I forgot that," said Britton, hooking up his team. "It's rather a shame, Jim. We'd like to have you come.""Can't," Laurance grunted, dismally. "Still, you can have my dogs. Snap 'em on ahead. If it comes to speedin', you'll catch a runaway easier." He ordered the big animals out, and Rex prepared to harness them ahead of his own."It's a long string," he said, dubiously. "They'll take some managing.""Wait," commanded Pierre. "Ah feex dat. Ah have de double yoke."He pulled a double pack outfit from his sled and selected the harness, tracing the dogs up in pairs. Three minutes more and they were gliding over the trail, leaving Laurance watching from the mellow blur of his firelit doorway."Did you meet a sled drawn by five dogs?" Britton asked, as they sped over the smooth plateau beyond Laurauce's."Oui," answered Pierre. "Ah meet wan an' pass heem on de Grand Reedge.""Stop?""Non. De mans nevaire speak. He hurry, mebbe.""It was a girl!" said Britton, abruptly."Ciel!" gasped Pierre, in surprise. "Wat tellmoi? She drive lakdiable.""Yes," Britton assented, "the dogs were very fast. She had mine beaten before we came to Laurance's. Of course, that was my stop."Giraud's elbow gave a warning prod to his companion's ribs as they slid down Silver Hollow to the place which the voyageur had mentioned.It was a cache built after the manner of the North for storing purposes or for preserving baggage for future freighting. Anderson had used it for years and had never before experienced any trouble with pillagers. Indeed, the inexorable law of Yukon miners was sufficient to make any of the light-handed gentry think twice before opening a cache. This was one of the crimes for which swift justice was meted.Britton and the voyageur examined the snow-bound hummock carefully, lighting a torch to scrutinize the tell-tale tracks in the wind-screened valley. The imprints were very fresh, and had evidently been made by one man with a dog-train.During the momentary investigation Britton's thoughts revolved swiftly. From the amount of goods stolen, he judged that the robber did not intend travelling far. Probably he had in view some secret cache where he could hide the plunder till an opportunity of getting rid of portions of it should be presented."Did you notice the little cache by the stream when you came over Grand Ridge?" Britton asked."Certainement!" Pierre answered. "She be not touched. Ah look for dat.""Then the fellow must be working on the in-trail. He never passed Laurance's. He never passed you. You're sure the fast five-dog team was the only one you met?""Tam sure," Pierre vigorously asserted. "Ah have de sharp eyes!""In that case he must have left the route somewhere between Laurance's and Grand Ridge. He wouldn't go far with such a bulk of stuff. We have to find his track where he left the main trail. The moon's just up. In ten minutes it will be as clear as day. This is our chance for five hundred apiece. We earn it between here and Grand Ridge. Whip up those dogs!"Britton's tone was exultant. To the spice of adventure in running down a contemptible thief was added the lure of the reward which Anderson had offered. He needed that five hundred! In fact, it would be like money from home just at the critical juncture of his last stampede. His funds were barely sufficient to provide a proper outfit for the arduous trip up Samson Creek. This wind-fall–if the breeze held his way–would remedy the deficit in the budget.Pierre, with all the craft of the old musher, had his dogs well in hand, and the long walrus-hide whip sang out with a final snap at the ears of the leaders that sent them loping like a whirlwind. The voyageur scanned one side of their route for any signs of a dog-train having turned off the beaten path. Britton watched the other side closely. The brilliance of the moon turned the whole frozen expanse of country into a white blanket, with here and there a soiled spot, which was the dark-green of scrubby thickets.The rush of frosty air bit the men's cheeks. Odd little cadences, torn out of fleeting space, whined shrilly in their ears. White smoke of dog-breath blew back in cloud patches to mingle with the hoar of their own lungs. The exhilarating, electrifying flight through the Arctic atmosphere made the blood rush with all its virility through their lusty veins."We must be nearing Grand Ridge," Britton said at last, in a low tone. "Nothing has left the trail on my side so far.""Non," muttered Giraud, "she be de same on dis side."Britton was lying out as far as possible, watching past the dogs as they swung down by the little cache near the Ridge. Suddenly he uttered a half-suppressed exclamation."The rascal's left the trail here," he confided to Pierre. "Hold on; we're past it. Rein in your dogs. There, off to the left! That's his track. It leads down to the little cache. I can see something moving. Maybe the beggar's looting it, too." He stood up, balancing himself deftly in order to see the better. Acting on a swift impulse, he threw his hands up to his mouth in trumpet-fashion and gave a loud hail."Hello!–the cache," he bawled. "Who's down there?"An oath came back in answer. There was a scuttering through the snow, the frantic cracking of a whip, whining of punished dogs, and the desperate rush of a loaded sled."Caught red-handed!" roared Britton. "Cut him off, Pierre. He's trying to make the beaten trail."Giraud whipped his dogs up, running at an angle to the fugitive dog-train. The plunderer had reckoned badly in trying this mode of escape. His one team and laden sleigh struck only a snail's pace compared with the speed of Pierre's double team and empty sled. The voyageur's mad driving caught him before he reached the main trail. Whooping aloud, Pierre drove his galloping animals right on top of the other's dogs, anchoring them there in the loose side-snow to snarl and battle in the traces.Britton and the voyageur leaped off and made for the piled-up packs on which the strange driver was seated. Realizing that he was thus suddenly brought to bay, the fellow rose to his feet and whirled the butt-end of his whip aloft. "Stay back, curse you!" he cried."Better give in," Britton warned him. "It's best for you." He jumped upon the rear bundles of the sled.A vicious blow of the whip was the answer, but Rex was watchful. He caught the descending wrist, back-tripped the ruffian with a swift leg movement, and choked resistance out of him."I think he'll be quiet now," he said to Pierre. "Strap his limbs. That will do. Let's have a look at him." The moonlight failed to reveal much of the man's appearance except that his face looked more like that of a beaten dog than anything else."Smells like a distillery," Rex commented, turning his nose away. "He's been well primed for this job.""Were we tak' heem?" asked Pierre, more material in thought.Britton considered the matter for a short moment."We'll have to take him back to Laurance's and watch him by turns," he finally said. "I can pack the rascal on to Ainslie's Camp to-morrow and collect my half of the reward from Charlie Anderson. He can pay you a like amount on your return trip from Thirty Mile. How does that suit?""Bon, for sure t'ing," Pierre returned. "Ah t'ink dat suit me bully. Mak' de five hondred ver' easy.""Anderson will think it's well worth it for the return of his goods with the gentleman on top," observed Britton. "Turn your outfit, and I'll load this Whiskey-John into the empty sleigh. Whoa! Easy–that's correct,bon camarade! Go ahead now. I'll follow with the contraband."There was no jingle of bells, nothing but the sober plunging of the sleds as the two dog-trains filed back to Laurance's cabin on Indian River.CHAPTER X."So you've captured the condemned parasite!" cried Jim Laurance, as the returning ones reached his yard."Certainement! tam sure t'ing," Pierre assured him, with a burst of good humor. "Wat Ah tell you?–we catch heem!Saprie, yes–on de leetle cachepar leGrand Reedge–n'est-ce-pas, Rex,mon camarade?""That's correct," laughed Britton, "we hit it just right! A little later and we should have had a stern chase. Make a jail, Laurance, to hold the rascal.""Roll him in by the stove," ordered Jim. "He won't give us any ha-ha. I'll bet me best mukluks on that." Presently, as the man was taken inside and the bonds loosed, he added: "Don't calculate for a minnit you can vamoose–for you truly can't. Me Winchester'll stop such tom-fool notions." Laurance pointed to the sinister-outlined rifle above the door.When the light fell upon the captive's features, the two men who had brought him in recoiled involuntarily."Le diable!" hissed Giraud, as if some hideously unpleasant truth were forcing its utterance in spite of him."The devil!" echoed Britton; "that's it, Pierre. No more fitting description could be given. Look at the high cheekbones, vulture-shaped features, and hellish eyes. Good Lord, Jim, did you ever see such an ugly man?"Rex backed to a seat and began to divest himself of his outer garments, all the while regarding the cache-thief with critical eyes in which a light of discovery was dawning."Looks like a cross 'tween a 'Frisco wharf-rat and a Nome claim-jumper," Laurance averred. "Say, mister, was you ever forty-second cook round a scullery?–'cause you smells it!"The captive vouchsafed no reply. He sat with his Satanic-shaped head buried between narrow shoulders. The firelight licked his face at intervals, strengthening its horrible grotesqueness."W'iskey mak' heem talk," Pierre declared. "Got de fire-wataire, M'sieu Laurance?""Yes," said Jim, "but it's too blasted dear to waste on that trash. I wouldn't give him Seattle sas'priller. Don't matter a crow-bait whether he talks or not. He'll get his own at Ainslie's to-morrer."Britton came to the stove and gazed earnestly at the huddled heap on the floor."Look up, man," he said roughly, but the bloodshot eyes refused to meet his own."It's no use," Rex continued, with a cynical laugh. "I know you–Morris!"The sudden revelation had its effect. The man sprang up with a snarl of rage. His eyes glittered malevolently–-straight into Britton's now. He appeared about to fly at his captor's throat.Pierre, ignorant of the cause of the thief's sudden activity, likened him to a gaunt wolf at bay before a big bull moose. So the pair seemed."I think he will talk," Britton said slowly. "He knows who I am now. Yes–I think he will talk.""D–d if I do," came from the thief. The first words he had spoken sounded like a husky's gurgle when the collar nearly chokes him."Don't be so fast with denial," urged Britton, smoothly. "When you have heard the option, perhaps your opinion will suddenly change." He looked at Laurance for an instant, debating with himself. The Klondiker was in a deep and apparently uninterested silence."It's Morris, Jim! Christopher Morris–the man I spoke of, you remember? His attitude just now is suspicious. I don't know how long he has been in the Yukon, or what he is doing here, but I cannot understand his present escapade. There's something behind it." Britton paused and allowed his keen, searching glance to wander back to the repulsive figure of Morris."I was about to give you an option," he resumed. "I think Laurance will second my guarantee of a lightening of the punishment the miners will hand out. My proposition, in brief, is this: Tell us what you know, what your game is, who is behind you, and what is their object–tell us this, I say, and you'll only be flogged instead of hanged."Britton's meaning came out clear and sharp to the victim of drink. He shivered a little and pulled himself to his knees. There was a hint of supplication in the position, but this his captor ignored.Laurance coughed apologetically, in expiation of his silence."You want to make sure of that?" he questioned."Yes," answered Rex. "I know Morris through and through. In my long battle in the courts I came to read the man like a book. I can sense his subtleties and under-purposes. I learned to do that, Jim, in the hardest school of the world–the law-courts. I am almost certain that he is in league, or worse–in bondage. Shall we guarantee him this?"Laurance consulted his pipe for a long minute. Then he flashed up his eyes in acquiescence."Go ahead!" he grunted. "I guess we can make it even with Anderson."Britton confronted Morris once more, and drove his words home with sledgehammer effect."Take your choice!" he said. "Keep silent and hang–you know they'll do it at Ainslie's–or speak and get off with a flogging. Which? And be quick! We want to sleep here. Half the night has already gone."Morris, the derelict, instinctively felt himself on the edge of things. His wits were not yet so liquor-dulled but that he could see the fate awaiting him at the camp. He knew the stern code of the North–rough but effective. Fortune had played him a miserable turn, and, if he did not catch at the proffered hope, she would sing his death-knell, rollicking heartlessly.He collapsed suddenly from his kneeling posture and half lay on the rough floor within the stove's circle of warmth."What do you want to know?" he asked doggedly."Are you prepared to speak plainly and truthfully? No lies, remember!""Yes, that is–""No parleying," roared Britton. "I want some sleep for the trail to-morrow. You have to tell all I want to know in five minutes or not at all. Ready?" His words dropped bullet-like."Go on," Morris cried, with an assumption of recklessness; "d–d if I care. And hell take the other fellow. It's a case of life or death. Open up, Britton!""When'd you come?""By boat last summer to Dyea and thence to Dawson.""Wife with you?" Britton's teeth ground over the sentence."Yes," was the sneering answer."For what did you come?""Gold!"Rex Britton laughed harshly. "To be picked up anywhere, anyhow!" was his comment. "By man and wife–mostly by the wife!"His tone, however, changed to a cold, metallic timbre when he asked:"Who planned this cache game?""Simpson.""Good heavens!–he's here, eh? Still," with another harsh laugh, "I might have known that when your wife was in the vicinity."Turning to Laurance, he explained: "Simpson is a lawyer–counsel for Morris in the case against me–and an especial friend of Mrs. Morris.""What does Simpson want?" was his next question to the tool."Money," said Morris."That's a lie," cried Britton, advancing fiercely. "He wanted the goods and supplies for a purpose. Money's procured by him in an easier way. But stampeders' supplies have no pecuniary equivalent in Dawson now. You see there hasn't been a steamer up-river for long enough. They tell me Dawson has been lately iron-bound. Now let us know what Simpson was going to do with the goods. You'll swing if you don't.""He's going to prospect.""Where?""On–on Samson Creek, where the rest are going.""Big outfit for one man, isn't it? The contents of three caches!" Britton's casual remark held a taunt and a hidden meaning."He's taking men with him–to stake other claims for him. That's why–""Ah! I see," Britton interrupted. "When does he leave?""Right away.""Funny act, that," put in Laurance, with a smile and wink."Yes," Rex agreed, the smile reflecting itself on his wholesome face. "Morris, you're only a fool in this country, and you can't see much significance in your statements. I take the liberty of telling you that there is a great significance in those few words. Old-timers have no difficulty in seeing far. Simpson, by the way, must have become more rapidly acclimatized–or else he has been at the game in other mining territories. Pierre, what motive has the man who organizes a toughs' stampede ahead of the spring rush to ground which is partially staked?""He t'ink he joomp de claims," asserted Pierre, promptly. "Dat tam sure t'ing!"Laurance laughed at the sudden start and guilty shrinking of Morris."Why, a kid could spot that," the old Klondiker assured him. "Simpson, this law-juggler as Britton speaks of, gets the nerve to jump likely claims on Samson Creek. It's just as well he's found out. If he had per-sum-veered he'd surely got jumped hisself–at the jumpin'-off station. I'm certainly certain of that! How-sum-do-ever, as me friend here goes vamoosin' into Dawson shortly, he'll put a handspike in Mr. Simpson's choo-choo gear."Britton got up and shook himself as a great, shaggy bear stretches its muscles."That's all for to-night," he yawned. "The saggy trail made me sleepy. But take my advice, Morris, and cut away from Simpson. You're not bound by ties unbreakable–yet you soon will be. And that's saying a good deal if you stop to analyze it. Let's roll up, Pierre!""Oui," cried Giraud, slinging out the blankets. "Ah dream w'at Ah get wit' dat five hondred." In the height of his buoyancy he broke forth in song, and, while Britton dropped to sleep, Pierre's voice rang up to the ceiling in the tune:"En roulant ma boule roulante,En roulant ma boule–Derrièr' chez-nous y-a-t-un 'ètangEn roulant ma boule!"

CHAPTER VII.

Where the heavy trail from Sixty Mile forged toward Indian River, Rex Britton halted his dog-train and eyed with an odd glance, half relief, half reproach, the dog-sled which was now rapidly approaching from the rear.

"Humph!" he growled through his fur hood, "the gentleman of the rear-guard has a conscience after all. He apparently knows the unwritten law of the Yukon that travellers take turns in breaking the trail."

A fresh fall of snow had buried the Dawson route, and, unlucky as usual, Britton had found it his task to pack the loose stuff all the way from the Big Salmon. The other dog-train that had mushed behind him since morning had not offered to do its duty till now. The four o'clock gray was showing in the sky. Night lurked in the river shadows. Britton breathed his dogs a little longer and waited.

The sled behind was drawn by a five-dog team like his own, but the huskies appeared far fresher.

"Been nursing them while I've done the work!" was his exclamation–"mighty good driver, too. By George, it's a woman!"

Britton's wide eyes strained to catch the detail of the figure. As the distance lessened, his supposition was proven true. He saw the novel sight of a five-dog team being urged at full speed over that lonely trail by a mere slip of a girl.

"Gaucho, you lean beggar!" he cried to his leader. With a jump the animal tautened the traces to the shrill menace of the lash. The runners coughed a little in the sagging snow, and Britton was off down the slope.

"You see it's a girl, you old wolf," he whimsically explained. "We can't let her break a trail. No–not if we were dropping!"

Nevertheless his team travelled in a surly fashion. The skin on the backs of their necks crinkled at the shriek of his whip. They snarled and fought in their harness despite the punishment which followed. The rear sled gained steadily. Soon a voice like a clear silver bell hailed Britton.

"Wait!" she commanded. "I'll take my turn. Your dogs are weakening. I should have come to the front sooner, only I must travel all night and need to spare my team."

"I'm all right," Britton shouted back. "Laurance's cabin is my stop. The huskies will last."

"I insist," the girl cried, urging her animals so that they nosed the packs on Britton's sleigh.

"And I refuse," he called over his shoulder. "You shouldn't be on this trail anyway. It's not safe to travel alone. You're surely not mad enough to attempt a night trip?"

The girl straightened her shoulders haughtily, and the face, framed in a white-furred hood, took on a dignity which would have been lost on the man had not the physical beauty of the countenance forced its impression.

"Let me pass!" she tersely commanded, pulling her dogs into the powdery snow at one side of Britton's packed trail.

"Pass me, then," he said, a little nettled, and forced his team to topmost speed.

Invited into a race, the girl soon showed the mettle of herself and of her animals. Before Britton reached the river-arm, she drew abreast. The trail sloped downward, and the dogs had but little to stay their lope. The two teams raced side by side, the leaders snapping at each other.

[image]"The two teams raced side by side, the leaders snapping at each other."

[image]

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"The two teams raced side by side, the leaders snapping at each other."

"They'll fight in a minute and pile us both up," the girl cried excitedly.

Britton, gazing on her face, was struck with an old, poignant pain. For a second, he thought it was Maud Morris. The features were there; the same teeth, the same rose-hued cheeks, the same sunny hair about the temples! The resemblance was remarkable, and, forgetting the swift descent, Britton stared.

Gaucho, over-zealous to maim the rival leader, stumbled, and a spill seemed imminent, but Britton's skilful lash sorted him out, thereby increasing the momentum of the train till the teams rushed neck and neck again.

"It's a dead heat," he said grimly. "We had better slacken speed before we cross the ice or neither sleigh will go any farther."

"Agreed," smiled the hooded beauty, reining in. Her color was heightened by the ride, and, as she pushed the furry fringes from her mouth to admit of freer breathing, Britton could have sworn it was the face of Maud Morris. Only, the eyes had a serene depth of expression which bespoke soul and purity. Therein lay the difference!

"Say," he began, confusedly, "you're like–you're the perfect mould of someone I know. Her name is Morris. Ah! I have it now! Such likeness can't exist without sisterhood. You're a sister of Maud Morris!" His voice was intense in its eagerness.

"I am not!" came the decidedly staccato answer, tinged with contempt. "Be careful," she added warningly. "There's a jam on this arm." They were sweeping the frozen river-bed, bumping over the jutting ice-boulders piled chaotically in a bend of the stream.

Britton took the lead, swinging briskly across the jam. The girl shouted a warning at his evident carelessness.

"Do be cautious," she begged. "The fresh snow masks the water-holes in treacherous bridges, and the current here is very swift."

Britton loped on without heed. The girl screamed, a second later. Without warning one runner of the foremost sled cut across a snow-arched slush-hole. Britton pitched backwards, splashing through the sloppy mask as a stone drops through scummy ooze.

The girl was at the place in three dog-leaps. A dull blotch of open water showed where the man had disappeared. She jerked her sled sidewise, as an anchor for her weight, grasped a runner with one hand, and lowered her body as far as possible, searching with despairing glances for a reappearing head. She gave a low cry of agony when nothing showed, and began probing wildly with her whip. Its butt-end fell across the taut ropes of Britten's sled, and, looking up, the girl saw the dogs in a heap, well-nigh strangled with the tension on the collars. There was something on the other end!

She grasped the ropes and pulled with all the strength of one arm. After what seemed an age of straining, Britton's black gauntlet pierced the slush. The lines were twisted tightly round his wrist, and the girl frantically seized it. However, the effort was useless. By the passiveness of the limb she knew him to be either stunned or drowned, and past helping himself, while her strength could not stir him.

Relaxing her grip, she pulled herself up the side of the hole, ran to Britton's team, and lashed it into activity in spite of the cramping collars. In terror the huskies responded with their supreme efforts, but they could not draw out their master.

In hysterical sobbing now the girl brought her own dogs, hitched them ahead, and slashed the double team till the cruel whip flayed their hides. To her blows she added prayers breathed between terrified sobs.

At last the string of tortured dogs broke out the sagging, anchoring thing, and Britton's senseless body rolled into view with startling suddenness. The animals, at the quick release, dragged it clear of the river before the girl could stop them.

Laurance's cabin showed just around the bend. In a new lease of strength the feminine rescuer rolled the man's body on his sleigh. Calling to her own team to follow, she made a dash for the shelter of the cabin.

The headland reeled away; the ice-gaps ran past till she drew up with a swirl in front of Laurance's. A group of suspicious huskies, guarding the door, howled dubiously and charged on the strange teams. The girl cracked skulls here and there in a frantic fashion. The fear that they might spring on the inert man possessed her, but in a second the clamor reached Laurance by his fire.

The door clanged back. Several oaths, puncturing the icy air like pistol-cracks, were swallowed in a ridiculous gurgle when the old Klondiker recognized the strange form as that of a woman.

"He's drowned!" she screamed. "Help him, for God's sake!"

"Who?" bellowed Laurance, rushing out and kicking dogs right and left. "By me oath, it's Britton, Rex Britton! Where'd you come on him, eh?"

"He fell in the river-jam!" she cried in unsuppressed irritation. "Don't talk–don't question! Do something! It's time that counts. You're losing time, man!" Her voice filed off in an upper break which told of racked nerves.

Laurance gripped Britton in his arms and made the house with some little difficulty. Rex was a heavy man, and a bulky fellow seems twice his own weight when the muscles are so lax.

"I don't think he's drowned near so much as stunned," Laurance observed, as he laid the body in a bunk behind the stove. "Something's hit him a hefty blow there." He touched Britton's forehead where a dark bruise showed.

"Nary a drown," he continued triumphantly, as he ran a hand under thick Arctic clothing to feel the breast. "His heart's a-beatin'. His ribs heave some, too. Nary a drown, I tell you. The crack on the coco done the job, miss. I'll bring him round all up-to-date in a minnit or two."

The girl's convulsive sobbing made Laurance look up in surprise.

"Don't you go for to take on so," he begged. "You go quiet your nerves and make summat hot in the kitchen room, for the cook's away. I'll dry-fix Britton, and he'll drink pints of scaldin' tea when he wakes."

The girl obeyed, eager to do anything that would help. She busied herself over the tea-making, and warmed some soup, made from moose shoulder, which she found in the rough cupboard. At intervals, however, her anxiety overcame her, and she called to Laurance in the next room with questions as to Britton's condition. Reassuring replies came back in the Klondiker's quaint vocabulary, replies that made her smile when she could take her mind off Britton's danger, since Laurance declared there was no need to fear.

By the time she had the tea and soup ready, Laurance came into the kitchen.

"He's come to–sort of dazed, though," was his announcement. "Got them things hot?"

"Steaming!" she answered, turning from the stove. The action brought her face in close range of Laurance's eyes. The tears were dried, disfiguring sobs gone. The sparkle of the eye and the fire-tinged cheek made a rare sight. The old Klondiker gazed for a speechless minute, while the girl's color deepened.

"Say, now," he stammered at last, "if I'd never set eyes on the Rose of the Yukon, I'd take me oath as you was her. Blast me if you don't resemble her like a twin. Where're you from?"

"Dawson!–don't bother me," the girl replied quickly. "You are sure he will be perfectly safe? I wouldn't like to think–you see, I believe it was my fault. I tempted him to race. He will take no harm?"

"Nary a bit," said Laurance, promptly. "He'll be as right as a trivet when he gets outside a good hot meal."

"Then give him these as soon as you like!" She indicated the tea and soup, and added: "I'll thank you to tell him I'm sorry I was the cause of his accident. Just tell him I'm sorry."

Laurance caught up the boiling liquids in their respective vessels and darted into the next room. Rex Britton's senses were gradually steadying themselves. The hollow, rocky feeling was passing away. In a dry suit of Laurance's he half reclined on the Alaska bunk, while the Klondiker proceeded to administer to his needs by dipping out the necessary nourishment.

"Where's the girl?" asked Britton, awkwardly.

"Out in the kitchen! Say, isn't she a Jim-Cracker from Jim-Crackerville, eh? What's her name?"

"Don't know!" said Rex. "Why didn't you ask her?"

"Bless me,–I–forgot," admitted Laurance. "However, son, seein' as you're summat interested, I'll attend to this here enquiry–"

A jingle of bells and the movement of a dog-train outside clattered an interruption.

"Hello!" exclaimed Laurance, jumping up. "Someone else blew in, eh? Must be me day at home." He crossed quickly to the door and flung it open.

"Who's arrived?" demanded Britton.

"H–l!" cried Laurance, in a non-committal fashion, and dashed into the yard.

Vociferous shouting drifted in to Britton, and when the Klondiker reappeared, he asked with a shade of anxiety: "Anything wrong out there?"

"She's gone," spluttered Laurance. "She's hiked with that bloody fast team of hers."

Britton leaped from the bunk to the doorway. Around the bend of the trail the girl's outfit was disappearing. Full of a strange thrill of disappointment and sense of indignity, he turned the blame on Laurance.

"You blasted fool!" he roared, angrily.

"'Tain't my fault," the Klondiker threw back. "How'd I know she was goin' to vamoose? Must ha' thought we wasn't respectable inhabitants."

"She said she intended to travel by night," explained Britton. "I told her it wasn't safe, but she laughed. I'm going after her!"

Jim Laurance put his back to the door with a certain grim determination.

"No, you ain't," he said, quietly. "Sift some sense into your cracked head. Them dogs are gee-whiners. Yours wouldn't catch 'em in a year. No, siree! That girl knows what she's a-doin'. She's been on trails afore this, and don't you forgit it."

Britton sat down upon his bunk again, convinced of the futility of trying to overtake the splendid team of the unknown beauty. Laurance came back from the door and replenished the fire. His friend drank the rest of the soup and tea in an absent manner.

"How do you shape?" asked Jim.

"Better," Rex grunted.

"Feel like a square meal? It'll skeer off the cold better'n slops. They're all right to prick your blood up, but they don't last like a stomachful of bull moose. Heh?"

"Hardly," Britton agreed. "Bring out your solid grub."

Laurance dived into the kitchen, returning with a big platter of moosemeat and a tremendous slab of pilot bread. He put on a fresh pot of tea, and they fell to, munching in silence while dark crept under the door and into the cabin corners.

CHAPTER VIII.

When the meal was finished, the cabin was wrapped in gloom. Laurance opened the stove door in order to save the expense of lighting a candle. In the Yukon smaller things than candles count for much. The firelight blocked out the two men's figures in a ruddy smudge of color. Britton's massive frame showed larger by a half than the wiry figure of Jim Laurance. But though not bulky, the latter's muscles were of steel. His grizzled face was surmounted by stubby, iron-gray hair which met the up-creep of a disreputable beard in front of his rat ears. The stolid monochrome of a countenance was relieved only by the flash of two piercing blue eyes and the cherry-red hue of a snub nose. His lips were seldom seen; they clung incessantly to his pipe-stem under cover of the ragged whisker-growth.

Britton's face, on the other hand, was a finely moulded one; the harrying conditions and bitter routines of the North appeared to have only conserved and augmented its strength. A broad forehead, dark, fine hair above, regular features, with chin and cheeks clean-shaven, and white, even teeth showing when he smiled, made a pleasant picture in the flame reflection. His muscle-corded shoulders, sturdy neck, and square chin gave evidence of combined physical and mental strength.

For a time the men smoked in silence, staring into the coals, each busy with his own thoughts. Presently Britton spoke.

"Perhaps she'll stay at Ainslie's camp for the night," he said, more to himself than to his companion.

"Got the girl on your brain yet?" chirped Laurance, mockingly. "Kind of heroine of a fair romance, ain't she? Sort of angelic saviour sent for your special benefit, heh? 'Spose you'd a-dropped into that hole if she hadn't been around? Own up, now–honest Injun!"

"Can't say," evaded Britton. "I was thinking only of her safety. We're all pretty rough characters up here, but there are some d–d rough ones on this trail. At Stewart River they told me that someone was robbing caches by night between there and Dawson."

"The bloody cache-thief, or thieves," Laurance broke out–"they'll swing if we catch them! Anderson's cache, near Ainslie's camp, was sandpapered clean two nights ago–not a speck of anything left. It's jumping-off time for the man who did that–when they spot him!"

"Suppose now–well, I'd hate to think of the girl meeting one of that breed," Britton ventured.

"Don't you fear," laughed Laurance. "The man as puts hand on her will catch a whole-fledged, fire-spittin' Tartar. What did I see in her neat little belt when she loosed her coat in front of me fire? An ivory-heeled shootin'-iron, if you ast me. Don't worry, son. Wimmen as carries them things can use 'em. If you met her on the trail and was on evil bent she'd plug you quicker'n scat. You're d–d right. She can go through–if she wants to."

Something like a sigh heaved from Britton's wide chest. Laurance thought there was relief in it.

"On course," he bantered, "you was thinkin' of her safety. You certain had nary a thought of them red cheeks, them eyes, them lips–whoo!"

"Drop that!" Britton curtly ordered. "You know women aren't in my line."

"Where've you been these last weeks?" Laurance asked, suddenly changing the subject.

"Following a fool stampede up Forty Forks, beyond Lake Marsh."

"Hard luck again?"

"The worst." Britton's disconsolate tone told more than his brief answer.

"What's your latest idea?" his friend asked after a doubtful pause.

"I've word of something on Samson Creek. I'll outfit at Dawson and try for it. The Government courier gave me the hint at Tagish Post. I pulled him out of a cold bath he was taking in Lake Bennett once. He didn't forget it."

"Humph!" Laurance growled, reaching for more wood and stoking up after the old-timer's fashion.

"It's my last stampede," Britton continued in an odd, tense voice. "I'm nearly down and out, and I'm staking all. If I fail this time, it's back over this cursed trail to Dyea on beans and horsehide. I'll wash dishes in the scullery of a Puget Sound boat or do something of the like. If I fail, Laurance, I'll have seen the last of the Yukon."

"What brought you here, son?" asked Laurance, kindly. He leaned forward and put a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "What brought you to this God-forsaken Yukon?" he repeated. "I've heard of you playin' a hard-luck game on four stampedes. You've took the bumps right along like a vet'ran, but summat's agin you. You wasn't bred to this here. Your hands is too fine-shaped. Your head's too keen. Your speech is high-flown. Rex Britton, you turned your back on a better place in England than you'll light on here. I'm certainly certain of that. Tell me why you come, son?"

A new light gleamed in Britton's eyes. His stern countenance softened as under the influence of some far-away dream. He got up and paced the floor for a little. Finally, he flung himself back in the chair with an air of resignation.

"I've never told anyone here," he said, "but I'll tell you, Jim. Perhaps I don't need to say it; of course, it was a woman. The old, old story! I'm a strong man, Laurance, and I'd scorn to hold the feminine sex responsible for my vicissitudes. Still, as the philosophers have it, 'In the beginning it was a woman.' We'll go to the starting line. Listen!

"My family was one of the best in the old land. It consisted of three members, parents and myself. Both parents are dead–as you know. After graduating from college, I commenced a tour of the Orient, for recreation mostly. The patrimony left me was small, but I was heir to my uncle, who owns Britton Hall, the Sussex estate, and a post in the foreign diplomatic service was waiting for me when I should come back.

"Getting quickly to the point, I rescued a wonderfully attractive woman on a sinking vessel in the harbor of Algiers. I believe I cracked some Berber skulls in the process, and got a knife-thrust through the shoulder muscles in return.

"She bound the wound, Laurance, and nursed it, lingering in Algiers for that purpose. Our meetings were hourly, you might say! I had my uncle's yacht at my disposal, and all the delights of the capital invited our participation, so you may judge that the days and nights passed very pleasantly.

"I had friends there whom I should have considered, but I neglected them in the other fascination; for it was fascination, Jim–the kind of beautiful web that the spider spins." Britton paused with a snappy intake of breath while Laurance, unwilling to interrupt, swung the stove door to and fro with a moccasined foot.

"You know the atmosphere of romance surrounding any such happening," Britton finally went on. "The lady was beautiful, marvellously so, in fact, and well versed in worldly artifice. I was still young enough to have the rainbow focus on life. The days went quickly in the picturesque port. The girl–she told me she was twenty-four and unmarried–remained in the place, recuperating from the shock of her accident. What's the use of elaborating, though! You know how a love dream grows, Jim Laurance. You must have had one somewhere in your own old, grizzled existence. Algiers is sunny. The flowers are fragrant there. Love feeds on sun and flowers, moon and mountains, starry nights, and all that. I was young, Laurance, and she was old in the craft. Could you blame me for being such a fool? Sometimes I hardly blame myself.

"For nearly a mouth things developed. We were engaged. That city by the Mediterranean became a Paradise for me. Then–then–" Britton's voice broke away in bitterness.

"Then what?" his friend prompted.

"Her husband came hunting for her!"

"H–l!" Laurance gritted. His feet fell to the floor with a bang. "She duped you!" he added, softly.

"Sheared the lamb," Britton, said, with severe, self-directed irony. "The whole affair came out. Her husband tried to shoot me. Instead, I laid him up for weeks. Then they came at me for damages, and the she-devil framed a charge of seduction. I was the sensation of courts and yellow journals for half a year. When I got clear at last, the attendant circumstances worked their effect. The thing smirched my name and killed my diplomatic chances. It ruined my life when it was brightest with promise. It caused my uncle to disinherit and wash his hands of me. That's why I cut the Isles, Laurance. That's why I'm here."

Britton rose to his towering height, with clenched hands, as if he were beginning the fight with the North, as if he were storming the Yukon's iron fastness for the first time. Laurance could picture him thus, setting foot on bleak Dyea beach. The old Klondiker took his pipe out of his mouth and forgot to replace it. In lieu of that he reached a knotted fist to Britton's palm.

"Son, I'm sorry," he said. This from a hardened Alaskan was much, for in that country, as a rule, no one is sorry for any person but himself. There, in a running fight, it is every man for his own interests, and the devil take the laggards and the weak!

"Do you love her?" Laurance ventured, a second later.

"I'm cured," Britton laughed, bitterly. "Hasn't the draught been strong enough?"

The old man returned his pipe-stem to his lips. "Better a good burn-out," he mumbled, "the rubbish won't catch sparks agin. What was her name?"

"Maud Morris, wife of Christopher Morris," his friend answered. "I saw a man who knew them when I came through Winnipeg. He told me that Morris had gone all to pieces through drink and fast living. At that time they had come direct to Seattle. I don't know where they are now–and don't care to know!"

Britton settled back in his seat and refilled his pipe. The recounting of his story had been in some measure a relief, although the old taste of rancid memory remained.

"You're well out of it, son," Laurance observed, after another vigorous stoking of the stove. "You're bloody well clear, though you've stumped through such a hard-luck siege. I hope your last deal pans out some better. I'd hate to see you fall down. You're too good a man."

"Have you met Pierre Giraud lately?" Britton inquired. "I wonder if he'd join me. We've tramped many a trail together."

"Pierre's due here to-night," Laurance said quickly. "He won't join you, though. He has a fine thing toting the goods of some Dawson big gun out to Thirty Mile River. His royal nibs is going out–bound for the States–and he has Giraud under contract to pack him along."

"Too bad," Britton mused. "Pierre's worth three ordinary men en route. Many's the mile we've paddled, and many's the moose we've missed.Bon camaradeis Giraud, if there was ever one."

"I saw him beat two blaggards on the stampede into Nome," Laurance began reminiscently. "The guys started in to argue the right of way with Pierre. Weighty beggars they was, too, but Giraud put 'em both out of action in ten seconds. Shiftiest man on the route, less it's yourself, Britton."

Rex shook his head as disclaiming the honor. Outside a shrill howl broke the night silence and started a hundred echoes. Rex lifted his head sharply.

"What's the matter with the husky?" he asked. "The moon's not up."

"Someone's coming," Laurance answered, listening intently to a musical sound.

The faint tinkle of bells grew clearer. The rushing sound of a laden dog-train made the cabin walls vibrate.

"Arrêtes!" commanded a leonine voice in the yard, and the noise died suddenly.

"It's Pierre," cried Laurance, jumping to his feet.

CHAPTER IX.

The door was kicked open without ceremony, and Pierre's head popped in.

"Hello, you young cheechako!" yelled Britton, gaily.

"Holá! mon camarade, you tam ole stampeder!" cried Giraud, rushing in with outstretched hands. "By de gar, Ah nevaire t'ink Ah find you here. Ah s'pose you seex hondred mile back–saprie, yes." He pulled off his Arctic hood, disclosing a veritable voyageur's head, handsome, debonair, crowned with coal-black curls and lightened by the ever-changing play of his fine eyes, sombre-hued as his hair. Pierre's face was full of a certain reckless beauty, and riveted attention by his daring, wilderness-bred fascination. Camaraderie spilled out of his infectious laugh and his habitant speech.

Thus the two friends remained, the one sitting, the other standing, raking each other with volleys of cross-questions. They talked like a pair of chattering jays, trying to gather in the threads of the more recent incidents that had befallen each, till Laurance interrupted them.

"Sit down and eat," he said to Pierre, "I'll unhitch your team."

It was then the current of excitement, which Giraud appeared to have difficulty in suppressing, burst to the surface. He sprang to Laurance's side and caught his arm.

"Non, non!" he exclaimed. "Wait wan leetle w'ile. Ah breeng news. We want dat sled sure t'ing. De cache-thief–you hear of heem?"

Laurance's keen blue eyes flashed. "Is he pinched?" he cried, eagerly. "Have you seen him?"

Britton rose from his chair in vague alarm. He was thinking of the girl travelling alone over the trail. "Speak, Pierre," was his tart order, "you know something. Out with it!"

"You leesten den," Giraud began, excitedly. "Ah come by de cache on Silver Hollowaprèsde dark she fall. Wat t'ink Ah find? De cache broken open. De stuff all gone todiable. Dat thief not ver' far away–Ah know dat for sure t'ing by de tracks. Ah t'ink we get fresh dogs here an' catch heem–catch heem!" Pierre jumped about and flourished his brawny arms in emphasis.

"Anderson he geeve reward," he continued.

"How much?" Britton broke in, a new incentive gripping him.

"Wan t'ousand tollars to de mans w'at catch discanaille–"

"Come on," roared his friend, jumping into his travelling-gear. "Come on, Pierre; we'll pull down that thousand."

He was at the door in a second, calling to his huskies. Giraud ran after, boiling with impatience.

"Hold on!" called Laurance. "Though I'd like to be in on this job, I can't leave my cabin–not with Mister Feather-Fingers dabbling about, and the cook's over at Stewart for grub."

"Jove! I forgot that," said Britton, hooking up his team. "It's rather a shame, Jim. We'd like to have you come."

"Can't," Laurance grunted, dismally. "Still, you can have my dogs. Snap 'em on ahead. If it comes to speedin', you'll catch a runaway easier." He ordered the big animals out, and Rex prepared to harness them ahead of his own.

"It's a long string," he said, dubiously. "They'll take some managing."

"Wait," commanded Pierre. "Ah feex dat. Ah have de double yoke."

He pulled a double pack outfit from his sled and selected the harness, tracing the dogs up in pairs. Three minutes more and they were gliding over the trail, leaving Laurance watching from the mellow blur of his firelit doorway.

"Did you meet a sled drawn by five dogs?" Britton asked, as they sped over the smooth plateau beyond Laurauce's.

"Oui," answered Pierre. "Ah meet wan an' pass heem on de Grand Reedge."

"Stop?"

"Non. De mans nevaire speak. He hurry, mebbe."

"It was a girl!" said Britton, abruptly.

"Ciel!" gasped Pierre, in surprise. "Wat tellmoi? She drive lakdiable."

"Yes," Britton assented, "the dogs were very fast. She had mine beaten before we came to Laurance's. Of course, that was my stop."

Giraud's elbow gave a warning prod to his companion's ribs as they slid down Silver Hollow to the place which the voyageur had mentioned.

It was a cache built after the manner of the North for storing purposes or for preserving baggage for future freighting. Anderson had used it for years and had never before experienced any trouble with pillagers. Indeed, the inexorable law of Yukon miners was sufficient to make any of the light-handed gentry think twice before opening a cache. This was one of the crimes for which swift justice was meted.

Britton and the voyageur examined the snow-bound hummock carefully, lighting a torch to scrutinize the tell-tale tracks in the wind-screened valley. The imprints were very fresh, and had evidently been made by one man with a dog-train.

During the momentary investigation Britton's thoughts revolved swiftly. From the amount of goods stolen, he judged that the robber did not intend travelling far. Probably he had in view some secret cache where he could hide the plunder till an opportunity of getting rid of portions of it should be presented.

"Did you notice the little cache by the stream when you came over Grand Ridge?" Britton asked.

"Certainement!" Pierre answered. "She be not touched. Ah look for dat."

"Then the fellow must be working on the in-trail. He never passed Laurance's. He never passed you. You're sure the fast five-dog team was the only one you met?"

"Tam sure," Pierre vigorously asserted. "Ah have de sharp eyes!"

"In that case he must have left the route somewhere between Laurance's and Grand Ridge. He wouldn't go far with such a bulk of stuff. We have to find his track where he left the main trail. The moon's just up. In ten minutes it will be as clear as day. This is our chance for five hundred apiece. We earn it between here and Grand Ridge. Whip up those dogs!"

Britton's tone was exultant. To the spice of adventure in running down a contemptible thief was added the lure of the reward which Anderson had offered. He needed that five hundred! In fact, it would be like money from home just at the critical juncture of his last stampede. His funds were barely sufficient to provide a proper outfit for the arduous trip up Samson Creek. This wind-fall–if the breeze held his way–would remedy the deficit in the budget.

Pierre, with all the craft of the old musher, had his dogs well in hand, and the long walrus-hide whip sang out with a final snap at the ears of the leaders that sent them loping like a whirlwind. The voyageur scanned one side of their route for any signs of a dog-train having turned off the beaten path. Britton watched the other side closely. The brilliance of the moon turned the whole frozen expanse of country into a white blanket, with here and there a soiled spot, which was the dark-green of scrubby thickets.

The rush of frosty air bit the men's cheeks. Odd little cadences, torn out of fleeting space, whined shrilly in their ears. White smoke of dog-breath blew back in cloud patches to mingle with the hoar of their own lungs. The exhilarating, electrifying flight through the Arctic atmosphere made the blood rush with all its virility through their lusty veins.

"We must be nearing Grand Ridge," Britton said at last, in a low tone. "Nothing has left the trail on my side so far."

"Non," muttered Giraud, "she be de same on dis side."

Britton was lying out as far as possible, watching past the dogs as they swung down by the little cache near the Ridge. Suddenly he uttered a half-suppressed exclamation.

"The rascal's left the trail here," he confided to Pierre. "Hold on; we're past it. Rein in your dogs. There, off to the left! That's his track. It leads down to the little cache. I can see something moving. Maybe the beggar's looting it, too." He stood up, balancing himself deftly in order to see the better. Acting on a swift impulse, he threw his hands up to his mouth in trumpet-fashion and gave a loud hail.

"Hello!–the cache," he bawled. "Who's down there?"

An oath came back in answer. There was a scuttering through the snow, the frantic cracking of a whip, whining of punished dogs, and the desperate rush of a loaded sled.

"Caught red-handed!" roared Britton. "Cut him off, Pierre. He's trying to make the beaten trail."

Giraud whipped his dogs up, running at an angle to the fugitive dog-train. The plunderer had reckoned badly in trying this mode of escape. His one team and laden sleigh struck only a snail's pace compared with the speed of Pierre's double team and empty sled. The voyageur's mad driving caught him before he reached the main trail. Whooping aloud, Pierre drove his galloping animals right on top of the other's dogs, anchoring them there in the loose side-snow to snarl and battle in the traces.

Britton and the voyageur leaped off and made for the piled-up packs on which the strange driver was seated. Realizing that he was thus suddenly brought to bay, the fellow rose to his feet and whirled the butt-end of his whip aloft. "Stay back, curse you!" he cried.

"Better give in," Britton warned him. "It's best for you." He jumped upon the rear bundles of the sled.

A vicious blow of the whip was the answer, but Rex was watchful. He caught the descending wrist, back-tripped the ruffian with a swift leg movement, and choked resistance out of him.

"I think he'll be quiet now," he said to Pierre. "Strap his limbs. That will do. Let's have a look at him." The moonlight failed to reveal much of the man's appearance except that his face looked more like that of a beaten dog than anything else.

"Smells like a distillery," Rex commented, turning his nose away. "He's been well primed for this job."

"Were we tak' heem?" asked Pierre, more material in thought.

Britton considered the matter for a short moment.

"We'll have to take him back to Laurance's and watch him by turns," he finally said. "I can pack the rascal on to Ainslie's Camp to-morrow and collect my half of the reward from Charlie Anderson. He can pay you a like amount on your return trip from Thirty Mile. How does that suit?"

"Bon, for sure t'ing," Pierre returned. "Ah t'ink dat suit me bully. Mak' de five hondred ver' easy."

"Anderson will think it's well worth it for the return of his goods with the gentleman on top," observed Britton. "Turn your outfit, and I'll load this Whiskey-John into the empty sleigh. Whoa! Easy–that's correct,bon camarade! Go ahead now. I'll follow with the contraband."

There was no jingle of bells, nothing but the sober plunging of the sleds as the two dog-trains filed back to Laurance's cabin on Indian River.

CHAPTER X.

"So you've captured the condemned parasite!" cried Jim Laurance, as the returning ones reached his yard.

"Certainement! tam sure t'ing," Pierre assured him, with a burst of good humor. "Wat Ah tell you?–we catch heem!Saprie, yes–on de leetle cachepar leGrand Reedge–n'est-ce-pas, Rex,mon camarade?"

"That's correct," laughed Britton, "we hit it just right! A little later and we should have had a stern chase. Make a jail, Laurance, to hold the rascal."

"Roll him in by the stove," ordered Jim. "He won't give us any ha-ha. I'll bet me best mukluks on that." Presently, as the man was taken inside and the bonds loosed, he added: "Don't calculate for a minnit you can vamoose–for you truly can't. Me Winchester'll stop such tom-fool notions." Laurance pointed to the sinister-outlined rifle above the door.

When the light fell upon the captive's features, the two men who had brought him in recoiled involuntarily.

"Le diable!" hissed Giraud, as if some hideously unpleasant truth were forcing its utterance in spite of him.

"The devil!" echoed Britton; "that's it, Pierre. No more fitting description could be given. Look at the high cheekbones, vulture-shaped features, and hellish eyes. Good Lord, Jim, did you ever see such an ugly man?"

Rex backed to a seat and began to divest himself of his outer garments, all the while regarding the cache-thief with critical eyes in which a light of discovery was dawning.

"Looks like a cross 'tween a 'Frisco wharf-rat and a Nome claim-jumper," Laurance averred. "Say, mister, was you ever forty-second cook round a scullery?–'cause you smells it!"

The captive vouchsafed no reply. He sat with his Satanic-shaped head buried between narrow shoulders. The firelight licked his face at intervals, strengthening its horrible grotesqueness.

"W'iskey mak' heem talk," Pierre declared. "Got de fire-wataire, M'sieu Laurance?"

"Yes," said Jim, "but it's too blasted dear to waste on that trash. I wouldn't give him Seattle sas'priller. Don't matter a crow-bait whether he talks or not. He'll get his own at Ainslie's to-morrer."

Britton came to the stove and gazed earnestly at the huddled heap on the floor.

"Look up, man," he said roughly, but the bloodshot eyes refused to meet his own.

"It's no use," Rex continued, with a cynical laugh. "I know you–Morris!"

The sudden revelation had its effect. The man sprang up with a snarl of rage. His eyes glittered malevolently–-straight into Britton's now. He appeared about to fly at his captor's throat.

Pierre, ignorant of the cause of the thief's sudden activity, likened him to a gaunt wolf at bay before a big bull moose. So the pair seemed.

"I think he will talk," Britton said slowly. "He knows who I am now. Yes–I think he will talk."

"D–d if I do," came from the thief. The first words he had spoken sounded like a husky's gurgle when the collar nearly chokes him.

"Don't be so fast with denial," urged Britton, smoothly. "When you have heard the option, perhaps your opinion will suddenly change." He looked at Laurance for an instant, debating with himself. The Klondiker was in a deep and apparently uninterested silence.

"It's Morris, Jim! Christopher Morris–the man I spoke of, you remember? His attitude just now is suspicious. I don't know how long he has been in the Yukon, or what he is doing here, but I cannot understand his present escapade. There's something behind it." Britton paused and allowed his keen, searching glance to wander back to the repulsive figure of Morris.

"I was about to give you an option," he resumed. "I think Laurance will second my guarantee of a lightening of the punishment the miners will hand out. My proposition, in brief, is this: Tell us what you know, what your game is, who is behind you, and what is their object–tell us this, I say, and you'll only be flogged instead of hanged."

Britton's meaning came out clear and sharp to the victim of drink. He shivered a little and pulled himself to his knees. There was a hint of supplication in the position, but this his captor ignored.

Laurance coughed apologetically, in expiation of his silence.

"You want to make sure of that?" he questioned.

"Yes," answered Rex. "I know Morris through and through. In my long battle in the courts I came to read the man like a book. I can sense his subtleties and under-purposes. I learned to do that, Jim, in the hardest school of the world–the law-courts. I am almost certain that he is in league, or worse–in bondage. Shall we guarantee him this?"

Laurance consulted his pipe for a long minute. Then he flashed up his eyes in acquiescence.

"Go ahead!" he grunted. "I guess we can make it even with Anderson."

Britton confronted Morris once more, and drove his words home with sledgehammer effect.

"Take your choice!" he said. "Keep silent and hang–you know they'll do it at Ainslie's–or speak and get off with a flogging. Which? And be quick! We want to sleep here. Half the night has already gone."

Morris, the derelict, instinctively felt himself on the edge of things. His wits were not yet so liquor-dulled but that he could see the fate awaiting him at the camp. He knew the stern code of the North–rough but effective. Fortune had played him a miserable turn, and, if he did not catch at the proffered hope, she would sing his death-knell, rollicking heartlessly.

He collapsed suddenly from his kneeling posture and half lay on the rough floor within the stove's circle of warmth.

"What do you want to know?" he asked doggedly.

"Are you prepared to speak plainly and truthfully? No lies, remember!"

"Yes, that is–"

"No parleying," roared Britton. "I want some sleep for the trail to-morrow. You have to tell all I want to know in five minutes or not at all. Ready?" His words dropped bullet-like.

"Go on," Morris cried, with an assumption of recklessness; "d–d if I care. And hell take the other fellow. It's a case of life or death. Open up, Britton!"

"When'd you come?"

"By boat last summer to Dyea and thence to Dawson."

"Wife with you?" Britton's teeth ground over the sentence.

"Yes," was the sneering answer.

"For what did you come?"

"Gold!"

Rex Britton laughed harshly. "To be picked up anywhere, anyhow!" was his comment. "By man and wife–mostly by the wife!"

His tone, however, changed to a cold, metallic timbre when he asked:

"Who planned this cache game?"

"Simpson."

"Good heavens!–he's here, eh? Still," with another harsh laugh, "I might have known that when your wife was in the vicinity."

Turning to Laurance, he explained: "Simpson is a lawyer–counsel for Morris in the case against me–and an especial friend of Mrs. Morris."

"What does Simpson want?" was his next question to the tool.

"Money," said Morris.

"That's a lie," cried Britton, advancing fiercely. "He wanted the goods and supplies for a purpose. Money's procured by him in an easier way. But stampeders' supplies have no pecuniary equivalent in Dawson now. You see there hasn't been a steamer up-river for long enough. They tell me Dawson has been lately iron-bound. Now let us know what Simpson was going to do with the goods. You'll swing if you don't."

"He's going to prospect."

"Where?"

"On–on Samson Creek, where the rest are going."

"Big outfit for one man, isn't it? The contents of three caches!" Britton's casual remark held a taunt and a hidden meaning.

"He's taking men with him–to stake other claims for him. That's why–"

"Ah! I see," Britton interrupted. "When does he leave?"

"Right away."

"Funny act, that," put in Laurance, with a smile and wink.

"Yes," Rex agreed, the smile reflecting itself on his wholesome face. "Morris, you're only a fool in this country, and you can't see much significance in your statements. I take the liberty of telling you that there is a great significance in those few words. Old-timers have no difficulty in seeing far. Simpson, by the way, must have become more rapidly acclimatized–or else he has been at the game in other mining territories. Pierre, what motive has the man who organizes a toughs' stampede ahead of the spring rush to ground which is partially staked?"

"He t'ink he joomp de claims," asserted Pierre, promptly. "Dat tam sure t'ing!"

Laurance laughed at the sudden start and guilty shrinking of Morris.

"Why, a kid could spot that," the old Klondiker assured him. "Simpson, this law-juggler as Britton speaks of, gets the nerve to jump likely claims on Samson Creek. It's just as well he's found out. If he had per-sum-veered he'd surely got jumped hisself–at the jumpin'-off station. I'm certainly certain of that! How-sum-do-ever, as me friend here goes vamoosin' into Dawson shortly, he'll put a handspike in Mr. Simpson's choo-choo gear."

Britton got up and shook himself as a great, shaggy bear stretches its muscles.

"That's all for to-night," he yawned. "The saggy trail made me sleepy. But take my advice, Morris, and cut away from Simpson. You're not bound by ties unbreakable–yet you soon will be. And that's saying a good deal if you stop to analyze it. Let's roll up, Pierre!"

"Oui," cried Giraud, slinging out the blankets. "Ah dream w'at Ah get wit' dat five hondred." In the height of his buoyancy he broke forth in song, and, while Britton dropped to sleep, Pierre's voice rang up to the ceiling in the tune:

"En roulant ma boule roulante,En roulant ma boule–Derrièr' chez-nous y-a-t-un 'ètangEn roulant ma boule!"

"En roulant ma boule roulante,En roulant ma boule–Derrièr' chez-nous y-a-t-un 'ètangEn roulant ma boule!"

"En roulant ma boule roulante,

En roulant ma boule–

Derrièr' chez-nous y-a-t-un 'ètang

En roulant ma boule!"

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