ngs will, it leaked out, and all Forty Mile,
which had hitherto speculated on Joy Molineau's choice between her two
latest lovers, now hazarded bets and guesses as to which would win in the
forthcoming race. The camp divided itself into two factions, and every
effort was put forth in order that their respective favorites might be
the first in at the finish. There was a scramble for the best dogs the
country could afford, for dogs, and good ones, were essential, above all,
to success. And it meant much to the victor. Besides the possession of
a wife, the like of which had yet to be created, it stood for a mine
worth a million at least.

That fall, when news came down of McCormack's discovery on Bonanza, all
the Lower Country, Circle City and Forty Mile included, had stampeded up
the Yukon,--at least all save those who, like Jack Harrington and Louis
Savoy, were away prospecting in the west. Moose pastures and creeks were
staked indiscriminately and promiscuously; and incidentally, one of the
unlikeliest of creeks, Eldorado. Olaf Nelson laid claim to five hundred
of its linear feet, duly posted his notice, and as duly disappeared. At
that time the nearest recording office was in the police barracks at Fort
Cudahy, just across the river from Forty Mile; but when it became bruited
abroad that Eldorado Creek was a treasure-house, it was quickly
discovered that Olaf Nelson had failed to make the down-Yukon trip to
file upon his property. Men cast hungry eyes upon the ownerless claim,
where they knew a thousand-thousand dollars waited but shovel and sluice-
box. Yet they dared not touch it; for there was a law which permitted
sixty days to lapse between the staking and the filing, during which time
a claim was immune. The whole country knew of Olaf Nelson's
disappearance, and scores of men made preparation for the jumping and for
the consequent race to Fort Cudahy.

But competition at Forty Mile was limited. With the camp devoting its
energies to the equipping either of Jack Harrington or Louis Savoy, no
man was unwise enough to enter the contest single-handed. It was a
stretch of a hundred miles to the Recorder's office, and it was planned
that the two favorites should have four relays of dogs stationed along
the trail. Naturally, the last relay was to be the crucial one, and for
these twenty-five miles their respective partisans strove to obtain the
strongest possible animals. So bitter did the factions wax, an