Presently the subdued light that filtered through the frosted windows of the Klondike Palace came into view, and as they reached the place Zinn led the way to the rear, and pushed open a door. Snowdrift found herself in a dimly lighted hallway. Cuter Malone stepped forward with a smile:
"Jest a minute, lady. Better put this here veil over yer face. He's up stairs, an' we got to go in through the bar. They's a lot of folks in there, an' they ain't no use of you bein' gopped at. With this on, they won't notice but what it's one of the women that lives here."
Snowdrift fastened the heavy veil over her face, and taking her arm, Malone piloted her through the bar-room and up the stairs. Through the mesh of the veil, Snowdrift caught a confused vision of many men standing before a long bar, of other men, and women in gay colors dancing upon a smooth stretch of floor, and her ears rang with the loud crashing of the piano. Bewildered, confused, she tightened her grasp upon Malone's arm. At the head of the stairs, the man paused and opened a door. "You kin take off the veil, now," he said, as he locked the door behind them, "They ain't no one up here."
A sudden terror possessed the girl, and she glanced swiftly into the man's face. "But—where is he?"
"Oh, he's on up," he assured her, "This way." He led the way across the room known as the small dance hall, and through a passage from which doors opened on either side, to a flight of stairs in the rear. At the head of the stairs the girl could see a light burning. He motioned her to proceed, and as she gained the top, a man stepped out from the shadow and seized her arms.
One look into his face and the girl gave a wild shriek of terror.
The man was Johnnie Claw.
The next moment she found herself thrust into a room lighted only by a single candle. It was a bare, forbidding looking room, windowless and with a
door of thick planking, secured by a hasp and padlock upon the outside. Its single article of furniture was a bed.
"So," leered Claw, "You thought you could git away from me did you? Thought you was playin' hell when you an' Ace-In-The-Hole hit fer Dawson, did you? Well, you played hell, all right—but not like you figgered. Yer mine, now." Trembling so that her limbs refused to support her, Snowdrift sank down upon the bed.