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"Fifty dollars from San Francisco to Dyea, two hundred from Dyea to Linderman, passengers pay for the boat two hundred and fifty all told," she summed up swiftly. "And a hundred for my clothes and personal outfit," he went on happily; "that leaves a margin of five hundred for emergencies. And what possible emergencies can arise?" Alma shrugged her shoulders and elevated her brows.
Why, have you seen the trail? Take a look; it's a man-killer, and the rate is forty cents a pound to Linderman. It'll go to fifty now maybe a dollar- -and there aren't enough packers to handle half the stuff." "Things are worse at Skagway," another man volunteered. "I came up yesterday, and they're losing a hundred head of horses a day bogging 'em down and breaking their legs.
Very quietly she said: "I'll tell you whether I am if you'll tell me who got his thousand dollars. Was it your brother?" Jim McCaskey recoiled; his face whitened. "Who hit you over the head?" the woman persisted. "Did he?" "That's none of your business," Jim shouted. "I want to know what you're doing in this case. You say the kid was in Linderman last night.
At the far end of the portage he bought an old set of pack-straps for a dollar, and in them he swung the grip. Also, he chartered a launch to run him the six miles to the upper end of Lake Linderman, where he arrived at four in the afternoon. The Athenian was to sail from Dyea next morning at seven. Dyea was twenty-eight miles away, and between towered Chilcoot.
But Rasmunsen was clean grit, and at fifty cents found takers, who, two days later, set his eggs down intact at Linderman. But fifty cents a pound is a thousand dollars a ton, and his fifteen hundred pounds had exhausted his emergency fund and left him stranded at the Tantalus point where each day he saw the fresh-whipsawed boats departing for Dawson.
He had had enough of traveling with what he considered a madman. But Daylight persuaded him in grim ways to stay by the outfit, and they pulled on across Deep Lake and Long Lake and dropped down to the level-going of Lake Linderman. It was the same killing pace going in as coming out, and the Indian did not stand it as well as Kama. He, too, never complained. Nor did he try again to desert.
But behind his employer's back Kit caught the approving grin of Shorty, who had already caught the whim of his metaphor. Kit steered the length of Linderman, displaying an aptitude that caused both young men of money and disinclination for work to name him boat-steerer. Shorty was no less pleased, and volunteered to continue cooking and leave the boat work to the other.
Inasmuch as the rice had been stolen during the previous night, he argued that he could have had no hand in the theft, for he had spent the night in Linderman, which fact he offered to prove by two witnesses. "Produce them," ordered the chairman. "One of them is still at Linderman, the other was here in Sheep Camp an hour ago. She has probably started for Dyea by this time." "A woman?" "Yes, sir.
His employer favoured him with a hard look, and sulked several minutes longer. Then he surrendered. "Get out my bag, Smoke," he ordered, "and lend a hand with that fire. We won't get off till morning now." Next day the gale still blew. Lake Linderman was no more than a narrow mountain gorge filled with water.
She flashed a smile at Pierce Phillips, then said, so that all could hear: "I understand you accuse this young man of stealing something last night. Well, he was in Linderman. He brought me over to-day." "We don't care so much about the rice; this stealing has been going on for a long time," a bystander explained. "True. But the rice was stolen last night, wasn't it?
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