Britton smiled indulgently. It was only another of the five hundred kindly hints which had been given him by well-disposed people; for well-disposed people never think that these vague pieces of information, very often acquired simply by hearsay, waste a man's time, by sending him off on false and useless scents. Britton had had plenty of such news, and he thought no more of it till he heard it whispered about the Post that there was something big on Samson Creek.
He learned, too, that Franco Lessari had quitted the Government service to go prospecting, and that lent more significance to what the Corsican had told him. When he went to bed that night, he counted the contents of his slack money-belt. There remained about enough to purchase a team of dogs, with some dollars left over for supplies. With his present means he could go on one more stampede. If he failed to strike anything, he would be stranded. Success or failure depended upon which direction he took. There was another rumor in the air, the tale of riches in the Logan Valley, and he did not know which way to turn. In his strait he remembered the fatalistic beliefs of the Arabs in Algiers, and flipped a coin to decide whether he should go on or turn back.
It fell heads–to go on–and Britton accepted the decision. Larry Marsh and McDonald had gone south of Lake Le Barge, so he purchased his dogs from another musher and set forth next day. The frost held lakes and rivers with two-foot ice, and the snow had fallen heavily for a week.
He worked across the frozen lakes; ranged the jammed curves of Thirty Mile River; and reached the ice bridges of the White Horse. The travelling was tedious, and he saved his dogs, going into camp every night at six.
At the Mounted Police post on the Big Salmon, Britton rested half a day, and then mushed along, undeterred by a filled trail, to the Little Salmon, Pelly, and Selkirk, making halts where he must.
Between Selkirk and Stewart River, when Britton pulled out at dawn, he could discern another team travelling behind him at a considerable distance. He watched it with interest because it was the first company he had seen on the trail since leaving Big Salmon, but the sled did not appear to come any nearer no matter how slowly he himself mushed.
"Who's behind?" asked the keeper of the roadhouse at Stewart River, when Britton passed through.
"Don't know," Rex answered. "He will not come close enough for examination."
"A shirker!" was the man's judgment on the laggard team, as he watched the Englishman's sturdy figure breaking the way to Sixty Mile.
CHAPTER VII.