Laurance had finished his single glass of punch and was drawing on his short, black pipe. He disdained the long, fat cigars of Jarmand and the three C's, and cursed the ill-smelling, coronet-banded cigarettes of Simpson and Bonneaves. The oddest figure in the group himself, he felt nothing but contempt for the others. The only thing about them he respected was the business instinct of their sober moments, and there seemed but little chance for a display of that now.
The Alaskan waited till the fourth bowl of punch ran low, hoping that Simpson would open his mouth to speak sound sense, instead of salacious nonsense, and tell them why he had invited them to supper, but when the concoction of a fifth bowl was begun, amid most uproarious hilarity, Laurance inwardly fumed, making up his mind that he would not sit there much longer.
Unconsciously, he was frowning through the drifting haze of smoke at his companions. There was no stern decorum present, nor any nicety of attire. To be sure, Simpson, as host, and Bonneaves, to imitate his model, wore dinner clothes, but the rest were dressed in the ordinary dress which occupation demanded. The three C's were in black broadcloth; Jarmand sported a suit of loud check pattern; Fripps favored grey, as wrinkled and faded as his skin. The others of the company were mostly mining men who had come in corduroys, with trousers stuffed in knee-high cruisers, and had hung fur coats and caps on the pegs behind their chairs. Laurance, travelling by dog-train to Dawson, wore the musher's outfit of the trails.
He looked rough and uncouth, but very much a man. His beard was disreputable as ever; the iron-gray hair stood up stiffer and stubbier, allowing his rat ears to be seen; his nose peeped out, cherry-red and snub. He was lowering on the foolish antics of the rest of the men, and his keen blue eyes were narrowed so much that they did not flash.
"What's the matter with you, Laurance, old sport?" cried Bonneaves, joyously. "Look as if you'd buried your best friend in the punch-bowl!"
"Why," shouted Simpson, "if that's so, we'll resurrect him! Resurrect's the word, boys. Eh? How's that?" He seized the bowl in both arms and emptied it to the last drop in the array of glasses. Then he turned the dish upside down on the table and hammered upon its bottom, while the company roared as if he had done some extremely witty thing.
"What say, Laurance?" asked young Bonneaves. "Feel any better?"
"I feel like twistin' your cussed neck, young man," answered Laurance, wrathfully. "What did I come here for? To eat a decent meal an' talk business! I didn't come to swill meself–I'm certainly certain of that! We're men anyhow, an' there's no call for us to act like a lot of calf youngsters as can't pull the draw-string on their gullets. I say we're here to talk business!"
"H–l, yes," grunted Bonneaves, with the air of sudden recollection. "You're right, sport, now I come to remember. Simp did bring us here for a purpose, and that's no lie. Give us your scheme, Simp. Hot and heavy and fast–that's the way!"
Because their tastes palled a little, the others added their clamorous entreaties. Their exhortations made a confused babel: