TO ALASKA FOR GOLD.
CHAPTER I.
A LETTER FROM THE WEST.
"It is not a question of what we should like to do, Randy; it is a question of what we must do."
"I know it, Earl. One thing is certain: the way matters stand we can't pay the quarter's rent for this timber land to-morrow unless we borrow the money, and where we are going for it I haven't the least idea."
"Nor I. It's a pity the Jackson Lumber Company had to go to pieces. I wonder where Jackson is."
"In Canada most likely. They would put him in jail if they could catch him, and he knows it."
"He ought to be put in jail!" burst out Earl, who was the elder of the two Portney brothers. "That two hundred dollars he cheated us out of would just put us on our feet. But without it we can't even pay bills now owing; and Caleb Norcross is just aching to sell this land to Dan Roland."
"If we have to get out, what are we to do?" questioned Randy, soberly. "I don't believe we can get work, unless we go into the woods as mere choppers."
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