"I jest can't bear to separate from grub," he explained. "I know
it's downright foolishness, but I jest can't help it. It's all I
can do to tear myself away from the table when I know I'm full to
bustin' and ain't got storage for another bite. I'm going back
to Circle to camp by a cache until I get cured."
Daylight lingered a few days longer, gathering strength and
arranging his meagre outfit. He planned to go in light, carrying
a pack of seventy-five pounds and making his five dogs pack as
well, Indian fashion, loading them with thirty pounds each.
Depending on the report of Ladue, he intended to follow Bob
Henderson's example and live practically on straight meat. When
Jack Kearns' scow, laden with the sawmill from Lake Linderman,
tied up at Sixty Mile, Daylight bundled his outfit and dogs on
board, turned his town-site application over to Elijah to be
filed, and the same day was landed at the mouth of Indian River.
Forty miles up the river, at what had been described to him as
Quartz Creek, he came upon signs of Bob Henderson's work, and
also at Australia Creek, thirty miles farther on. The weeks came
and went, but Daylight never encountered the other man.
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