woman's
attraction lay in that to the eye she was a handsome animal; perhaps she
fascinated him with her old-world talk of palaces and princes; leastwise
she dazzled him whose life had been worked out in uncultured roughness,
and he at last agreed to her suggestion of a run down the river and a
marriage at Forty Mile. In token of his intention he bought dogs from
Sitka Charley,--more than one sled is necessary when a woman like Loraine
Lisznayi takes to the trail, and then went up the creek to give orders
for the superintendence of his Bonanza mines during his absence.

He had given it out, rather vaguely, that he needed the animals for
sledding lumber from the mill to his sluices, and right here is where
Sitka Charley demonstrated his fitness. He agreed to furnish dogs on a
given date, but no sooner had Floyd Vanderlip turned his toes up-creek,
than Charley hied himself away in perturbation to Loraine Lisznayi. Did
she know where Mr. Vanderlip had gone? He had agreed to supply that
gentleman with a big string of dogs by a certain time; but that shameless
one, the German trader Meyers, had been buying up the brutes and skimped
the market. It was very necessary he should see Mr. Vanderlip, because
of the shameless one he would be all of a week behindhand in filling the
contract. She did know where he had gone? Up-creek? Good! He would
strike out after him at once and inform him of the unhappy delay. Did he
understand her to say that Mr. Vanderlip needed the dogs on Friday night?
that he must have them by that time? It was too bad, but it was the
fault of the shameless one who had bid up the prices. They had jumped
fifty dollars per head, and should he buy on the rising market he would
lose by the contract. He wondered if Mr. Vanderlip would be willing to
meet the advance. She knew he would? Being Mr. Vanderlip's friend, she
would even meet the difference herself? And he was to say nothing about
it? She was kind to so look to his interests. Friday night, did she
say? Good! The dogs would be on hand.

An hour later, Freda knew the elopement was to be pulled off on Friday
night; also, that Floyd Vanderlip had gone up-creek, and her hands were
tied. On Friday morning, Devereaux, the official courier, bearing
despatches from the Governor, arrived over the ice. Besides the
despatches, he brought news of Flossie. He had passed her camp at Sixty
Mile; humans and dogs were in good condition; and she would d