But competition at Forty Mile was limited. With the camp devoting its
energies to the equipping either of Jack Harrington or Louis Savoy, no
man was unwise enough to enter the contest single-handed. It was a
stretch of a hundred miles to the Recorder's office, and it was planned
that the two favorites should have four relays of dogs stationed along
the trail. Naturally, the last relay was to be the crucial one, and for
these twenty-five miles their respective partisans strove to obtain the
strongest possible animals. So bitter did the factions wax, and so high
did they bid, that dogs brought stiffer prices than ever before in the
annals of the country. And, as it chanced, this scramble for dogs turned
the public eye still more searchingly upon Joy Molineau. Not only was
she the cause of it all, but she possessed the finest sled-dog from
Chilkoot to Bering Sea. As wheel or leader, Wolf Fang had no equal. The
man whose sled he led down the last stretch was bound to win. There
could be no doubt of it. But the community had an innate sense of the
fitness of things, and not once was Joy vexed by overtures for his use.
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