"Hotels and saloons of Cortez ..... $17,000 City Council .......................15,000 Prospectors......................... 7,000 Ladies' Guild of Cortez .............. 740 School-children of Cortez............. 420" Tom grew red in the face and gave his characteristic snort. "I don't mind his stringing the City Council and the saloons, and even the Ladies' Guild," he growled, "but when he steals the licorice and slate-pencils from the kids it's time he was stopped." Murray agreed. "I think we are about done with Gordon. He has led his ace." "I'm not sure. This is a kind of popular uprising, like a camp-meeting. If I went to Cortez now, some prattling school-girl would wallop me with her dinner-bucket. We can't shake Gordon loose: he's a regular splavvus." "What is a splavvus, Tom?" inquired Dr. Gray. "It's a real peculiar animal, being a cross between a bulldog and a skunk. We have lots of 'em in Maine!" O'Neil soon found that the accounts he had received of Gordon's last attempt to recoup his fortunes were in no way exaggerated. Cortez, long the plaything of the railroad-builders, had been ripe for his touch: it rose in its wounded civic pride and greeted his appeal with frantic delight. It was quite true that the school-children had taken stock in the enterprise: their parents turned their own pockets inside out, and subscriptions came in a deluge. The price of real estate doubled, quadrupled, and Gordon bought just enough to establish the price firmly. The money he paid was deposited again in his new bank, and he proceeded to use it over and over in maintaining exorbitant prices and in advancing his grandiose schemes. His business took him often to Seattle, where by his whirlwind methods he duplicated his success in a measure: his sensational attack upon the money powers got a wide hearing, and he finally secured an indorsement of his scheme by the Businessmen's Association. This done, he opened splendid offices and began a wide-spread stock-flotation campaign. Soon the Cortez Home Railway became known as a mighty, patriotic effort of Alaskans to throw off the shackles of oppression. Gordon perfectly understood that something more than vague accusations were necessary to bring the public to his support in sufficient numbers to sweep him on to victory, and with this in mind he laid crafty plans to seize the Heidlemann grade. The Trust had ceased active work on its old right-of-way and moved to Kyak, to be sure, but it had not abandoned its original route, and in fact had maintained a small crew at the first defile outside of Cortez, known as Beaver Canon. Gordon reasoned shrewdly that a struggle between the agents of the Trust and the patriotic citizens of the town would afford him precisely the advertising he needed and give point to his charge of unfair play against the Heidlemanns.