Publisher's Synopsis
It was a quiet night in the Shovel. At the bar, which ranged along one side of the largechinked-log room, leaned half a dozen men, two of whom were discussing the relative merits ofspruce-tea and lime-juice as remedies for scurvy. They argued with an air of depression and withintervals of morose silence. The other men scarcely heeded them. In a row, against the oppositewall, were the gambling games. The crap-table was deserted. One lone man was playing at thefaro-table. The roulette-ball was not even spinning, and the gamekeeper stood by the roaring, red-hot stove, talking with the young, dark-eyed woman, comely of face and figure, who wasknown from Juneau to Fort Yukon as the Virgin. Three men sat in at stud-poker, but they playedwith small chips and without enthusiasm, while there were no onlookers. On the floor of thedancing-room, which opened out at the rear, three couples were waltzing drearily to the strains ofa violin and a piano
