"I guess we'll be ashamed of this afterwards, but I have got to talk," he said. "Anyway, we can't all get right in with the axe and shovel. My work's here, and I've just sense enough to stay with it. Besides, it's a sure thing that everybody who goes north won't rake out money. Now, you want the snow and the cañons? You can't have them; but I'll give you drift-ice, blinding fog, reefs and breaking surf instead. You want money? Well, we'll try to meet your views on that point, and by and by we'll double what you're getting."
Jimmy gazed at him in evident bewilderment, and his comrade waved his hand.
"You're going to take the first of the crowd to St. Michael's in the Shasta, and the man who can run a 250-ton boat there and back again will have all the excitement he has any use for. Half the reefs aren't charted, the tides run any way, and when the gale drops, the fog shuts down thicker than a blanket. You can't pound a rock-drill or swing the shovel, but you can hold a steamer's wheel. Get hold of that, and try to understand it. It's the whole point of the thing."
He stopped a moment as if for breath, and then went on again, hurling out his words incisively while his eyes snapped.
"It's St. Michaels now, but by and by they'll find a way in from the Pan-handle or over British soil. The C.P.R. will put big boats on, and they'll run everything that will float up from 'Frisco and Portland; but we'll be in first and take hold with the Shasta. The men you're going to carry would go in a canoe. She has built up the coast trade enough to make it easy for us to raise the money to buy another boat—I'm hanging right on to that trade too—and I know of a handy steamer. I'll get an option on her now. She'll be worth considerably more in a week or two. You stand by the Shasta Company, and do your part in the rush that's coming in the way you know, and you'll rake in more money than you ever would mining. We'll put a thousand-ton boat on before long if you play our hand well. I want your answer right off: are you hanging on to us?"
"Yes," said Jimmy quietly. "After all, your point of view is no doubt the right one. If the boat were only fifty tons I'd start as soon as she was ready."
Jordan rose and grabbed his hat before he flung a letter across the table. "Then I'm going for old Leeson now. Hustle, and wire those people that we want an option on that steamboat firm until to-morrow."
He strode out of the office, and when Jimmy reached the street a minute later he saw him running hard in the direction of Leeson's house.