e hunch
and the big strike he believed was coming, and he knew that the spur
had been his desire to sit in for a hand at that big game. And again
why? What if he made his million? He would die, just the same as
those that never won more than grub-stakes. Then again why? But the
blank stretches in his thinking process began to come more frequently,
and he surrendered to the delightful lassitude that was creeping over
him.

He roused with a start. Something had whispered in him that he must
awake. Abruptly he saw Sixty Mile, not a hundred feet away.

The current had brought him to the very door. But the same current was
now sweeping him past and on into the down-river wilderness. No one
was in sight. The place might have been deserted, save for the smoke
he saw rising from the kitchen chimney. He tried to call, but found he
had no voice left. An unearthly guttural hiss alternately rattled and
wheezed in his throat. He fumbled for the rifle, got it to his
shoulder, and pulled the trigger. The recoil of the discharge tore
through his frame, racking it with a thousand agonies. The rifle had
fallen across his knees, and an attempt to lift it to his shoulder
failed. He knew he must be quick, and felt that he was fainting, so he
pulled the trigger of the gun where it lay. This time it kicked off
and overboard. But just before darkness rushed over him, he saw the
kitchen door open, and a woman look out of the big log house that was
dancing a monstrous jig among the trees.

CHAPTER IX

Ten days later, Harper and Joe Ladue arrived at Sixty Mile, and
Daylight, still a trifle weak, but strong enough to obey the hunch that
had come to him, traded a third interest in his Stewart town site for a
third interest in theirs on the Klondike.

They had faith in the Upper Country, and Harper left down-stream, with
a raft-load of supplies, to start a small post at the mouth of the
Klondike.

"Why don't you tackle Indian River, Daylight?" Harper advised, at
parting. "There's whole slathers of creeks and draws draining in up
there, and somewhere gold just crying to be found. That's my hunch.
There's a big strike coming, and Indian River ain't going to be a
million miles away."

"And the place is swarming with moose," Joe Ladue added. "Bob
Henderson's up there somewhere, been there three years now, swearing
something big is going to happen, living off'n straight moose and
prospecting around like a crazy man."