CHAPTER XL

THE HAPPY ENDING

When, the next day, Alice accompanied John and George Bruce in a first visit to their claims on Chechacho Hill, they saw that the signal thrown out by the first red tints of the maples and the willows--which told of summer ending and the dreary months of winter beginning--was shown. The sun was shining brightly, but already it seemed robbed of some of its heat.

Alice had often pictured life at the diggings. She had read numbers of mining-camp stories, with scenes laid in America and Australia, yet had gained little insight to the realities. She gloried in the experience, and was eager to urge them on. "Hurry! hurry!" but John exhorted her to stay her speed, for the distance they had to go was twenty-four miles, and the trail--though many of the mud-holes had dried--was rough.

She looked at the men she met, hunting for the type of her fancy, the type engendered by novel and tale. No one seemed armed, save occasionally with a rifle or a shot-gun; but the wild man with the brace of pistols, bandolier, huge moustache and homicidal aspect did not present himself!

They crossed the Klondike by Poo-Bah's ferry. Once in Bonanza Valley Alice felt she had left the civilized world behind her, and was entering the enchanted regions of Nature. To her, in her happy illusions, it was fairy-land.

Few women had preceded her over the Bonanza trail, so that men, "mushing," who pa.s.sed their fellows with lowered head, openly stared at her; and many of these lonely wayfarers would have been glad of a word from her, to hear again the sweet soft accents of the better world outside. For to the men of the frontier the idea of home is very refined and dear, and women ever virtuous and tender, so that the appearance of Alice Peel, on the Bonanza trail upon that glorious day, was to them as a beautiful picture and an uplifting influence.

One grizzled miner hurried out, holding a gold-pan full of nuggets, dust, and black sand.

"Put your hand into it, lady, and see what it feels like."

Alice did so, and thought it felt like any other sand, only heavier. He then selected a nugget--worth quite a sovereign--from the pan and gave it to her.

"Why did you give me this?"

"Because you are a lady."

Alice looked perplexed.

"Keep it as a souvenir," said John, so she thanked the man and slipped the nugget inside her glove. But that was not to be the limit of their host's hospitality, for, as they turned to go, he said,

"It's just about noon, and if you've walked from Dawson the lady must be near petered. Better stay and have dinner."

"We thought of dining at the road-house at Discovery," said George. "We have some ground on Chechacho Hill."

"I can give you a better feed here: moose-meat, either steak or nose, whichever you fancy. You see, lady, in the old days this was a sort of a pet locality for moose, so they stray in once in a while yet, and sometimes they don't get a chance to get away again."

The sound of a horn came from a tent close by.

The signal was answered by a general throwing down of tools, and the half-dozen men at work made their way towards the tent. They all washed in a couple of tin basins, and dried themselves on a filthy towel.

Alice and her companions were ushered into the dining-tent, where, John's quick eyes noticed, extra places had been set. Alice was asked to sit at the head of the table, in the owner's place: John and George were seated at her right, and the owner--Wild Horse Bill--on the left.

The men were already hard at work, consuming their food--moose-steak, pork and beans, and great pieces of bread.

As they sat down the cook placed on the table a large tin platter, in which was a piece of meat of indescribable colour and shape.

"This is moose nose, lady, the best part of the animal, and along with the beaver tail and wild-cat makes the finest eating in the Northland."

"Wild-cat!" Alice exclaimed. She had indeed read of the tail of Canada's mascot being a frontier dainty, but moose nose, and especially wild-cat, were new, and did not sound altogether attractive articles of diet.

"Yes, lady, the lynx, or wild-cat, is the best eating the trapper knows in the Northland. You would think you were eating chicken. As for moose nose and beaver tail, one is much like the other."

The owner pushed the platter containing the strange dainty towards Alice, with the words, "Help yourself, lady."

Alice was game; and, without showing her disinclination, she took up the knife and fork and cut off a piece of the blubberous meat, and put it on her plate.

After they had walked about a mile and a half beyond the claim where they had lunched they stood beneath Chechacho Hill at the north-east, a quarter of a mile down-stream from where Carmack had made his discovery; and John pointed to where their claims were situate. Men were at work, "rocking" gold on the next claim to John's.

When they reached their claims Alice looked across the valley, noting the great stretches of poplar and birch, golden-yellow in their autumn tints, and smiled at the beauty of it--till out of the chilled atmosphere somewhere came the whisper, "Make haste and provide."

"I should like to live here always," whispered Alice to John, while Bruce went to talk with the men working on the claim alongside.

"Always is a long time, and every day will not be as beautiful as this; but for a year or two----"

"Yes, for a year or two."

And so it was decided.

They were married in the little church by the side of the slough in Dawson.