“Wild Water,” Smoke went on, in the same grudging, complaining voice, “if I didn't know you so well, I wouldn't sell you a single besotted share. And, anyway, Shorty and I won't part with more than five hundred, and they'll cost you fifty dollars apiece. That's the last word, and if you don't like it, good-night. Bill can take a hundred and you can have the other four hundred.”
Next day Dawson began its laugh. It started early in the morning, just after daylight, when Smoke went to the bulletin-board outside the A. C. Company store and tacked up a notice. Men gathered and were reading and snickering over his shoulder ere he had driven the last tack. Soon the bulletin-board was crowded by hundreds who could not get near enough to read. Then a reader was appointed by acclamation, and thereafter, throughout the day, many men were acclaimed to read in loud voice the notice Smoke Bellew had nailed up. And there were numbers of men who stood in the snow and heard it read several times in order to memorize the succulent items that appeared in the following order:
The Tra-Lee Town-Site Company keeps its accounts on the wall. This is its first account and its last.
Any shareholder who objects to donating ten dollars to the Dawson General Hospital may obtain his ten dollars on personal application to Wild Water Charley, or, failing that, will absolutely obtain it on application to Smoke Bellew.
MONEYS RECEIVED AND DISBURSED
From 4874 shares at $10.00...............................$48,740.00
To Dwight Sanderson for Town-Site of Tra-Lee..............10,000.00
To incidental expenses, to wit: powder, drills,
windlass, gold commissioner's office, etc.............1,000.00
To Dawson General Hospital................................37,740.00
Total..........................................$48,740.00
From Bill Saltman, for 100 shares privately
purchased at $50.00.................................$ 5,000.00
From Wild Water Charley, for 400 shares privately
purchased at $50.00..................................20,000.00
To Bill Saltman, in recognition of services as
volunteer stampede promoter...........................5,000.00
To Dawson General Hospital.................................3,000.00
To Smoke Bellew and Jack Short, balance in full on
egg deal and morally owing...........................17,000.00
Total..........................................$25,000.00
Shares remaining to account for 7126. These shares, held by Smoke
Bellew and Jack Short, value nil, may be obtained gratis, for the
asking, by any and all residents of Dawson desiring change of domicile
to the peace and solitude of the town of Tra-Lee.
(Note: Peace and solitude always and perpetually guaranteed in town
of Tra-Lee)
(Signed) SMOKE BELLEW, President.
(Signed) JACK SHORT, Secretary.
XII. WONDER OF WOMAN
“Just the same, I notice you ain't tumbled over yourself to get married,” Shorty remarked, continuing a conversation that had lapsed some few minutes before.
Smoke, sitting on the edge of the sleeping-robe and examining the feet of a dog he had rolled snarling on its back in the snow, did not answer. And Shorty, turning a steaming moccasin propped on a stick before the fire, studied his partner's face keenly.
“Cock your eye up at that there aurora borealis,” Shorty went on. “Some frivolous, eh? Just like any shilly-shallyin', shirt-dancing woman. The best of them is frivolous, when they ain't foolish. And they's cats, all of 'em, the littlest an' the biggest, the nicest and the otherwise. They're sure devourin' lions an' roarin' hyenas when they get on the trail of a man they've cottoned to.”