THE SPOILERS
marked first upon the good music, next upon the good looks of the women, and then upon the shabby clothes of the men - for some of tham were in "mukluk," others in sweaters with huge initials and winged emblems, and all were collarless.
Outside in the main gambling-room there were but few women. Men crowded in dense masses about the faro lay -out, the wheel, craps, the Klondike game, pangingi, and the card-tables. They talked of business, of home, of women, bought and sold mines, and bartered all things from hams to honor. The groomed and clean, the unkempt and filthy jostled shoulder to shoulder, equally affected by the license of the goldfields and the exhilaration of the New. The mystery of the North had touched them all. The glad, bright wine of adventure filled their veins, and they spoke mightily of things they had resolved to do, or recounted with simple diffidence the strange stories of their accomplishment.
The " Bronco Kid," familiar from Atlin to Nome as the best " bank" dealer on the Yukon, worked the shift from eight till two. He was a slender man of thirty, dexterous in movement, slow to smile, soft of voice, and known as a living flame among women. He had dealt the biggest games of the early days, and had no enemies. Yet, though many called him friend, they wondered inwardly.
It was a strong play the Kid had to-night, for Swede Sam, of Dawson, ventured many stacks of yellow chips, and he was a quick, aggressive gambler. A Jew sat at the king end with ten neatly creased one-thousanddollar bills before him, together with piles of smaller currency. He adventured viciously and without sys70