Both men had led forlorn hopes in their time,—led, with a curse or a jest on their tongues, and in their souls an unswerving faith in the God of Chance. But that merciful deity had been shut out from the present deal. They studied the face of Malemute Kid, but they studied as one might the Sphinx. As the quiet minutes passed, a feeling that speech was incumbent on them began to grow. At last the howl of a wolf-dog cracked the silence from the direction of Forty-Mile. The weird sound swelled with all the pathos of a breaking heart, then died away in a long-drawn sob.
"Well I be danged!" Bettles turned up the collar of his mackinaw jacket and stared about him helplessly.
"It 's a gloryus game yer runnin', Kid," cried Lon McFane. "All the percentage to the house an' niver a bit to the man that 's buckin'. The Devil himself 'd niver tackle such a cinch—and damned if I do."
There were chuckles, throttled in gurgling throats, and winks brushed away with the frost which rimed the eyelashes, as the men climbed the ice-notched bank and started across the street to the Post. But the long
