“Sure thing,” Saltman corroborated.  “This has the makin’s of a Jim-dandy suburb, an’ it sure looks like it’ll be some popular.”

“Well, we’re not selling lots over in that section where you’re heading,” Smoke answered.  “Over to the right there, and back on top of the bluffs are the lots.  This section, running from the river and over the tops, is reserved.  So come on back.”

“That’s the spot we’ve gone and selected,” Saltman argued.

“But there’s nothing doing, I tell you,” Smoke said sharply.

“Any objections to our strolling, then?” Saltman persisted.

“Decidedly.  Your strolling is getting monotonous.  Come on back out of that.”

“I just reckon we’ll stroll anyways,” Saltman replied stubbornly.  “Come on, Wild Water.”

“I warn you, you are trespassing,” was Smoke’s final word.

“Nope, just strollin’,” Saltman gaily retorted, turning his back and starting on.

“Hey!  Stop in your tracks, Bill, or I’ll sure bore you!” Shorty thundered, drawing and leveling two Colt’s forty-fours.  “Step another step in your steps an’ I let eleven holes through your danged ornery carcass.  Get that?”

Saltman stopped, perplexed.

“He sure got me,” Shorty mumbled to Smoke.  “But if he goes on I’m up against it hard.  I can’t shoot.  What’ll I do?”

“Look here, Shorty, listen to reason,” Saltman begged.

“Come here to me an’ we’ll talk reason,” was Shorty’s retort.

And they were still talking reason when the head of the stampede emerged from the zigzag trail and came upon them.

“You can’t call a man a trespasser when he’s on a town-site lookin’ to buy lots,” Wild Water was arguing, and Shorty was objecting:  “But they’s private property in town-sites, an’ that there strip is private property, that’s all.  I tell you again, it ain’t for sale.”

“Now we’ve got to swing this thing on the jump,” Smoke muttered to Shorty.  “If they ever get out of hand—­”

“You’ve sure got your nerve, if you think you can hold them,” Shorty muttered back.  “They’s two thousan’ of ’em an’ more a-comin’.  They’ll break this line any minute.”

The line ran along the near rim of the ravine, and Shorty had formed it by halting the first arrivals when they got that far in their invasion.  In the crowd were half a dozen Northwest policemen and a lieutenant.  With the latter Smoke conferred in undertones.

“They’re still piling out of Dawson,” he said, “and before long there will be five thousand here.  The danger is if they start jumping claims.  When you figure there are only five claims, it means a thousand men to a claim, and four thousand out of the five will try to jump the nearest claim.  It can’t be done, and if it ever starts, there’ll be more dead men here than in the whole history of Alaska.  Besides, those five claims were recorded this morning and can’t be jumped.  In short, claim-jumping mustn’t start.”