[Illustration: DECORATED TITLE PAGE - PORTRAIT _The True_ _Life Story of_ _Swiftwater Bill Gates_ _By His_ _Mother-in-Law,_ _Mrs. Iola Beebe._ ] Copyrighted 1908, by Mrs. Iola Beebe. TABLE OF CONTENTS. CHAPTER I.--Swiftwater First Hears of the Golden Find on Bonanza, in the Klondike. CHAPTER II.--Lure of Great Wealth and Love of Gussie Lamore Starts Swiftwater on His Career--True Story of Famous Egg Episode in Dawson. CHAPTER III.--Swiftwater Buys Gussie’s Love by Giving Her Virgin Gold to the Exact Amount of Her Weight--Fickle Girl Jilts Him in San Francisco and He Marries Her Sister, Grace--Burglarizes His Own Residence After Quarrel With Bride. CHAPTER IV.--Our Hero, Now a Big Operator and Promoter, Meets His Future Mother-in-Law in Seattle for the First Time. CHAPTER V.--Love on First Sight of Bera Beebe Is Followed by an Elopement, Which Ends Haplessly on the Hurricane Deck of the Steamer in Seattle Harbor. CHAPTER VI.--Swiftwater Again Elopes With Bera, and They Are Married in the Yukon. CHAPTER VII.--First Born of Swiftwater and Bera Sees Light of Day on Quartz Creek, Where First Gold Was Found in the Klondike--Financial Entanglements Drive Swiftwater to Abandon Immensely Rich Property. CHAPTER VIII.--Swiftwater Deserts His Child and Authoress in Dawson and Skips for the Nome Country. CHAPTER IX.--Hard Lines for a Deserted Woman in Dawson--Driven From Shelter by Phil Wilson, Swiftwater’s Friend--Mounted Police Are Kind to Deserving Unfortunate. CHAPTER X.--Swiftwater Elopes With Kitty Brandon, His Fifteen-Year-Old Niece, After Deserting Bera in Washington, D. C.--Is Pursued by Kitty’s Mother, but Escapes at Night from Seattle. CHAPTER XI.--One Woman’s Ingratitude to Another, Who Had Befriended Her--Bera Is Sent Home Penniless--The Return to Seattle. CHAPTER XII.--Swiftwater Returns, a Broken Man, to Seattle--Hides Under the Bed Clothes at His Hotel in Terror When Discovered by His Mother-in-Law--My Gems Are Pledged to Raise Money to Get Him a New Start in Alaska. CHAPTER XIII.--Swiftwater Gives Business Men Swell Banquet on Borrowed Money and Then Decamps for the Tanana Country--A Spring Rush to the New Gold Fields Brings Picturesque Crowd to Seattle. CHAPTER XIV.--Swiftwater Strikes It Rich on No. 6 Cleary Creek--Trip to the Interior Over the Ice--Swiftwater Promises to Make Reparation. CHAPTER XV.--We Come Out Together From the Tanana--Bera Has Swiftwater Arrested on Landing in Seattle for Wife Desertion. CHAPTER XVI.--How Swiftwater Secures His First Great Miscarriage of Justice--Remarkable Legal Transaction in a Seattle Hotel, Involving Court and Lawyers--Bill Persuades Bera to Secure a Divorce. CHAPTER XVII.--Swiftwater, Again in His Familiar Role as the Artful Dodger--I Take Another Trip Over the Ice to the Yukon--Gates Makes More Fair Promises and Then Runs Away to the States.