north. It was also very helpful to the three men. They wanted to make a journey to look for gold in the east, and they needed money. They were in a bar one day when some of the men started to talk about dogs. One man said that he had a dog who was strong enough to pull a sledge with two hundred kilos on it. Another said his dog could pull two hundred and fifty. A third man, called Matthewson, said his dog could pull three hundred kilos.
'That's nothing,' said Thornton. 'Buck can pull three hundred and fifty.'
'Can he break the sledge out when it's frozen to the ice and then start it moving? And pull it a hundred metres?' asked Matthewson.
'He can break it out, and start it, and pull it a hundred metres,' said Thornton.
'Well,' said Matthewson, speaking slowly and loudly. 'I've got a thousand dollars here, and I say he can't.' As he spoke, he took a bag of gold and put it down on the table.
Suddenly Thornton was worried. He knew Buck was strong, but was he strong enough? Now ten men were watching him and waiting. He didn't have a thousand dollars, and neither did Hans or Pete.
'I've got a sledge outside with three hundred and fifty kilos on it,' said Matthewson. 'So it's easy if you want to try.'
Thornton didn't know what to say. He looked at the other men in the bar. One of them was an old friend, Jim O'Brien.
'Can you lend me a thousand dollars, Jim?' he asked softly.
'Sure,' said O'Brien, putting another bag of gold next to Matthewson's. 'But I don't think the dog can do it, John.'
Everybody went out into the street. There were two or three hundred men around Matthewson's sledge. The sledge had been outside the bar for two hours, and it was frozen to the ice, in a temperature of 50° below zero. Most of the men thought that Buck was not strong enough, and Matthewson smiled happily.
'Shall we make it two thousand dollars?' he asked.
Thornton, Hans and Pete talked for a minute. They had only four hundred dollars, but they added this to O'Brien's thousand. Matthewson, very sure of winning, also put down another four hundred dollars.
Matthewson's ten dogs were taken away, and Buck, who could feel the excitement in the air, was harnessed to the sledge. Buck was, without question, a very fine animal -bright-eyed,