"To who it may concern:
"Know all men by these presents that I, James McGinty, now of Minóok (or Rampart City), Alaska, do hereby give notice of my intention to hold and claim a lien by virtue of the statue in such case——"
He had read so far when Maudie, having jumped down off the bar with her fists full of nuggets, and dodging her admirers, wormed her way to the Colonel. She thrust her small person in between the notice and the reader, and scrutinised the tanned face, on which the Rochester burners shed a flood of light. "You lookin' mighty serious," she said.
"Am I?"
"M-hm! Thinkin' 'bout home sweet home?"
"N-no—not just then."
"Say, I told you 'bout—a—'bout me. You ain't never told me nothin'."
He seemed not to know the answer to that, and pulled at his ragged beard. She leaned back against McGinty's notice, and blurred still more the smudged intention "by virtue of the statue."
"Married, o' course," she said.
"No."