And the day, in its spirit of vigorous life and wholesome gayety, was suited to the mood of the tiny temporary town, which sprawled here in the wilderness. For the place was en fête. The hardy men who had thus ventured into the wilds of the North welcomed the diversion of this romance among them, which was to culminate to-day in the wedding of Jack Reeves and Nell Ross at the Dyea Hotel. Public sentiment had insisted that the nuptials should be celebrated at the hotel. The hotel, truth to tell, was neither commodious nor imposing. But it was a boarded structure, the only one in the village, and it was by far the largest, small though it was. And the citizens were determined that they should be permitted to assemble in force on this auspicious day, when the glamour of love was to soften in some degree the austerity of the arctic land. So, betimes, the men of the community gathered at the hotel to await the marriage ceremony. A scant half-dozen women, courageous followers of the men they loved, were there as well. Some had been at pains to bring heaps of evergreen boughs, and with these the main room of the hotel--at once lobby, bar and office--was decorated. Caribou Bill brought a great bank of moss, for which he had dug through six feet of snow. To it was attached a piece of flaming-red paper, in which tea had originally been packed, and this paper had been laboriously cut by Caribou Bill into the shape of two hearts, lovingly joined as one. The symbol of wedded happiness was established by its smirking inventor on the central shelf above the bar, where it commanded the enthusiastic admiration of the populace.
It was noon to the second when Nell Ross and Jack Reeves stood in the center of the main room of the hotel before the one who was to make them man and wife. He, too, was at heart a pioneer, and he was, as well, an earnest worker for the saving of souls. His own preference, with a roving commission, had brought him to this remote place. He found a singular pleasure in the fact that his ministrations were required for the uniting of this winsome maiden and this virile, clean young man. It was as if the ceremony typified in some fashion the purity and vigor of life here within the frozen North.... It was noon to the second! The time-keeper was Harry, the Dog-Man, who carried a Waterbury watch, on the accuracy of which he would cheerfully have staked his hopes of eternal happiness. Because of the exactness of his time-piece, which none cared to deny, he had usurped the office of master of ceremonies. When he saw the two hands of the watch blent as one upon the hour of twelve, he raised his arm, and Nell and Jack moved forward within the little lane walled by the crowd, to stand before the clergyman, who regarded them with a benevolent smile, in which, unknown to himself, was something almost of envy in the presence of their youth and happiness and love.