“Oh! Oh! Lord be praised!” George whispered fervently.
Ten minutes later, as they drew their boat up on the beach, the cabin door was thrown open and a man, holding a candle close to his face, peered into the darkness to call, “You all come right on up, whoever you all are.”
“That,” said Lawrence in a surprised whisper, “is Smokey Joe.”
“Smokey Joe, you old bear-cat!” Blackie shouted.
The grizzled prospector let out a dry cackle. “Come on up an’ rest yerself,” he welcomed. “I got a Mulligan on a-cookin’.”
At first Lawrence found it hard to believe that this was really Smokey Joe. “How,” he asked himself, “could he come all this way?” As he studied a faded map on the deserted cabin’s wall, however, he realized that the distance overland was short compared to the way they had traveled by water.
Joe’s Mulligan stew proved a rich repast. He had killed a young caribou two days before. There had been bacon and hardtack in his kit. Besides these, he had found dried beans and seasoning in the cabin.
“Yep,” he agreed, as Blackie complimented him after the meal was over, “hit’s plum grand livin’ when you sort of git the breaks.
“An’ listen,” his voice dropped. “Hit’s plumb quare how things git to a comin’ yer way. Yesterday I found gold. Struck hit rich, you might say.” From a moose-hide sack he tumbled a handful of nuggets.
“Gold!” Blackie exclaimed.