The Alaskan | Page 9

rides steerage when you go north. You can
always find a millionaire or two on the lower deck. When they get sleepy, most of the
men you see in there will unroll blankets and sleep on the floor. Did you ever see an
earl?"
He felt it his duty to make explanations now that he had brought her in, and directed her
attention to the third table on their left. Three men were seated at this table.
"The man facing us, the one with a flabby face and pale mustache, is an earl--I forget his
name," he said. "He doesn't look it, but he is a real sport. He is going up to shoot Kadiak
bears, and sleeps on the floor. The group beyond them, at the fifth table, are Treadwell
mining men, and that fellow you see slouched against the wall, half asleep, with whiskers
nearly to his waist, is Stampede Smith, an old-time partner of George Carmack, who
discovered gold on Bonanza Creek in Ninety-six. The thud of Carmack's spade, as it hit
first pay, was the 'sound heard round the world,' Miss Standish. And the gentleman with
crumpled whiskers was the second-best man at Bonanza, excepting Skookum Jim and
Taglish Charlie, two Siwah Indians who were with Carmack when the strike was made.
Also, if you care for the romantic, he was in love with Belinda Mulrooney, the most

courageous woman who ever came into the north."
"Why was she courageous?"
"Because she came alone into a man's land, without a soul to fight for her, determined to
make a fortune along with the others. And she did. As long as there is a Dawson
sour-dough alive, he will remember Belinda Mulrooney."
"She proved what a woman could do, Mr. Holt."
"Yes, and a little later she proved how foolish a woman can be, Miss Standish. She
became the richest woman in Dawson. Then came a man who posed as a count, Belinda
married him, and they went to Paris. Finis, I think. Now, if she had married Stampede
Smith over there, with his big whiskers--"
He did not finish. Half a dozen paces from them a man had risen from a table and was
facing them. There was nothing unusual about him, except his boldness as he looked at
Mary Standish. It was as if he knew her and was deliberately insulting her in a stare that
was more than impudent in its directness. Then a sudden twist came to his lips; he
shrugged his shoulders slightly and turned away.
Alan glanced swiftly at his companion. Her lips were compressed, and her cheeks were
flaming hotly. Even then, as his own blood boiled, he could not but observe how
beautiful anger made her.
"If you will pardon me a moment," he said quietly, "I shall demand an explanation."
Her hand linked itself quickly through his arm.
"Please don't," she entreated. "It is kind of you, and you are just the sort of man I should
expect to resent a thing like that. But it would be absurd to notice it. Don't you think so?"
In spite of her effort to speak calmly, there was a tremble in her voice, and Alan was
puzzled at the quickness with which the color went from her face, leaving it strangely
white.
"I am at your service," he replied with a rather cold inclination of his head. "But if you
were my sister, Miss Standish, I would not allow anything like that to go unchallenged."
He watched the stranger until he disappeared through a door out upon the deck.
"One of John Graham's men," he said. "A fellow named Rossland, going up to get a final
grip on the salmon fishing, I understand. They'll choke the life out of it in another two
years. Funny what this filthy stuff we call money can do, isn't it? Two winters ago I saw
whole Indian villages starving, and women and little children dying by the score because
of this John Graham's money. Over-fishing did it, you understand. If you could have seen
some of those poor little devils, just skin and bones, crying for a rag to eat--"

Her hand clutched at his arm. "How could John Graham--do that?" she whispered.
He laughed unpleasantly. "When you have been a year in Alaska you won't ask that
question, Miss Standish. How? Why, simply by glutting his canneries and taking from the
streams the food supply which the natives have depended upon for generations. In other
words, the money he handles represents the fish trust--and many other things. Please
don't misunderstand me. Alaska needs capital for its development. Without it we will not
only cease to progress; we will die. No territory on the face of the earth offers greater
opportunities for capital than Alaska does