"A hull outfit o' gals," expatiated Mops. "And one, perched up by the driver, jest the swellest, jim-dandiest little female proposition you ever seen in all your life! Say, I wisht I hadn't left my dress-suit in cold storage!"
"Any one lend me a comb?" Any one being unable to oblige him, Bill ran a corkscrew through his curly hair. "Well, anyway, my face is clean!"
"All ye can see av it, for the dhirt that's on it," Barney encouraged him.
The horn blew a gay fanfare; the driver's whip cracked with more than wonted smartness; the bells on its four horses jingled merrily as the cumbersome old stage rattled into Lost Shoe Creek, and drew up before Gumboot Annie's hostelry to an enthusiastic ovation of hurrahs, cap-tossings, and gun-firings from the male populace.
A handsome girl, wearing her modish clothes with a too conscious effect of style, from her place on the box bowed pleased acknowledgments in all directions for the cheering, but at the volley of shots gave a little startled cry, which was taken up in louder note by her companions.
Doffing his hat, Parson Maclane came forward, with a reassuring smile. "Only a Klondike welcome, young ladies," he explained.
"That's what!" the men confirmed him. "A Klondike welcome!"
"How quite too utterly charming!" exclaimed the young lady. "Girls! Sarah!" she appealed to the others of the party. "Aren't they too dear and picturesque for anything!" That "they" were human beings and not part of the brilliant panorama seemed hardly to occur to her.
A score of pairs of rough but willing hands stretched up to help the speaker from her high throne, but the honor fell to Scarlett, or rather was appropriated by that masterful young man as, putting the other aspirants aside, he lifted her over the wheel and swung her lightly to the ground. Without waiting for her thanks he returned to his wood-chopping with a sense of one of life's minor miracles upon him. "By St. Bridget!" he was thinking, "but that's my picture-girl!"
When all the passengers had alighted safely the boys pushed their leader to the front. "Speech! Speech! Bully Nick!" they insisted. "Speech!"