"Then don't go near the Skagit to-night," said Soapy impressively. "There's a storm rising, and I shouldn't wonder if the old barge bursts her moorings before morning."
He was gone in an instant, and Mac and I gazed at each other in dismay. "What can he mean?" I said.
"Heaven knows," growled Mac; "but we'll likely find out before very long. He's a gey slippery customer, is Soapy, an' no' easily understood, I'm thinkin'."
We continued on our course meditating deeply, but, no solution of the mysterious warning presenting itself, it escaped our minds utterly in the noisy excitement that prevailed on our return to the Skagit. O'Connor, the proprietor, was all agog with the importance of his position as master of ceremonies; he was busily superintending the placing of a rickety old piano when we made our appearance, and he immediately seized on Mac for a song during the evening, a favour which was most promptly refused.
"Miss Caprice an' me wouldna suit on the same programme," was the worthy diplomatist's excuse. "Get Black Harry an' Soapy Sam—"
"Soapy Sam is barred this circus," sternly interrupted O'Connor. "I'm running a concert to-night, not a funeral undertaking establishment." Assuredly Soapy Sam's prowess was no mean factor to be considered.
At 7 p.m. prompt—as advertised—the entertainment began. The room was crowded with truly all sorts and conditions of men, and the air reeked with tobacco smoke. The piano manipulator—a bewhiskered and groggy-looking personage in top-boots—took his place with stately grace as befitted the dignity of his office. He ran his fingers clumsily over the keys as if seeking for some lost chord or combination, which, however, he did not find, and then he rattled out an ear-shattering melody in which the audience, after a moment's pause, joined lustily. In the midst of the uproar thus let loose a gaudily-bedecked creature of the female persuasion, wearing a grin that almost obliterated her features, appeared on the raised stage at the end of the saloon, and joined in the pandemonium, her shrill voice screaming out the touching information that there would be "a hot time in the old town to-night," which coincided with the item on the programme.
This was Miss Caprice—a type of the "noble and enduring" women whom recent "Klondike" novelists have portrayed so tenderly in their "realistic" romances. Heaven forbid that the respectable British public should be thus deceived. There was no woman with any claim to the name on the long trail in these days.
It would be impossible to describe the course of that memorable "concert." It continued in spasms—or turns, which I believe is the correct term to use—far into the night, with occasional interruptions in the shape of fights and wordy altercations among the poker players, diversions which lent pleasurable variety to the entertainment, though now and again it seemed as if a funeral or two would surely result therefrom. But all smoothed off harmoniously under the influence of Miss Caprice's moving melodies, which always were turned on at opportune moments. Mac said that her voice was like unto the buzzing of a steam saw in cross-grained wood, but perhaps he was prejudiced, or his artistic senses a trifle too fine. Anyhow, she pleased the multitude mightily, and they roared out their appreciation boisterously at the conclusion of each of her vocal exercises, and implored her to continue her soothing ditties unendingly. The too free use of the flowing bowl was probably accountable for the warmth of their approval; but Miss Caprice, having indulged in equal degree with her admirers, was getting less and less able to trill forth sweet sounds for their edification, and matters were fast beginning to assume a by no means inviting aspect.