"
Greatly pleased, I started down the valley. It was still early when I
reached Sunburst. I went directly to the little tavern from whence the
note had come, and remained an hour or more. The result of that hour's
conversation with the writer of the note was memorable, as was the hour
itself. I began to hope fondly for the success of my scheme.
From the tavern I went to the village, with an elation hardly disturbed
by the fact that many of the salmon-fishers were sullen, because of
foolish depredations committed the evening before by idle river-men and
mill-hands of Viking. Had I not been so occupied with Mrs. Falchion and
an event wherein she must figure, I should have taken more seriously the
mutterings of the half-breeds, the moroseness of the Indians, and the
nervous threatenings of the white fishers: the more so because I knew
that Mr. Devlin had started early that morning for the Pacific Coast, and
would not be back for some days.
No two classes of people could be more unlike than the salmon-fishers of
Sunburst and the mill-hands and river-drivers of Viking. The life of the
river-men was exciting, hardy, and perilous; tending to boisterousness,
recklessness, daring, and wild humour: that of the salmon-fishers was
cheerful, picturesque, infrequently dangerous, mostly simple and quiet.
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