fer DOLL OF DAWSO!)

By HELEN BERG

Heartbreak and Joy Were Common Emotions on the Trail of ‘98—and in This
Story of Mae Field (Published by Courtesy of the “Alaska Sportsman”) Are
Some Interesting First Hand Sidelights on the Yukon’s Roaring Metropolis

YOU REALLY didn’t care for gold?” I
sked of her in astonishment.

“No, not for the gold,” answered the
ragile little woman who sat across the
uaint, old-fashioned parlour from me. A
eminiscent look dwelt upon the sweet, old
ace, and although her blue eyes looked into
nine, I knew they didn’t see me. They were
joking backward, back into the chaotic
lays of the Klondike, when gold had been
s commonplace as sand.

“T didn’t care for the gold,” she con-
inued in the voice that, in spite of the
nany years of pleasure and pain which had
assed to mellow its tone, still rang as clear
sa bird song. “It was only what the gold
ould buy—the pleasure it could give
‘thers, and the suffering it could alleviate.
[he gold itself was too common, just like
sebbles that were picked up and thrown
iround.”

When I had called on Mrs. Mae Field,
| had found her in the apartment in the
ower floor of her home. Some departing
enants had left the place in lamentable
jisarray, and this tiny woman was busily
butting things into spotless order. I wanted
o-do it for her. Somehow the tasks of
mopping a dirty floor and cleaning out a
sreasy sink seemed too humble for that
proud head, and too menial for the ex-
quis'tely delicate little lady whose age-mel-
lowed features showed the ghost of almost
unbelievable loneliness and beauty.

She had laughed at the idea; and in the
days that followed, when we chatted many
long hours together, I was to learn that a
dauntless courage and a self-sacrificing re-
gard for others had always been as much a
part of this woman’s character as fragile
loveliness was an inseparable attribute of
her person.

People of Ketchikan had known and
loved Mrs. Field for 30 years; everyone
knew her, and thought they knew all about
her. I was to learn, however, that a capri
cious fate had tossed her on waves of
heavenly joy and abyssmal sadness about
which even her friends knew nothing.

Sitting cozily at the tea table, while the
ever-falling rain beat upon the windows,
she told me of her girlhood in a quite Min-
nesota town.

“My parents were respectable God-fear-
ing people of the old school. They were
horrified with me, because I wanted to
dance.” A shining light came into her eyes.

FOURTEENTH EDITION

During the Gold Rush.

“And I did dance! The stage was in my
blood! I ran away from home, and went to
Duluth. ‘Whiskey’ Bartlett, at the Comique
Theatre, gave me a chance to act and dance;
he was pushing me ahead fast, and I think
I could have had a career. But then my
brother found me, and made me come home!
How ashamed they were of me—to them
the devil lurked behind the theatre stage.”

“But did you stay home then?”

“Only for a few months. Then I ran
away again, and was dancing at Hill City,
South Dakota.”

The smile faded from her lips, and the
reminiscent look was one of pain. I knew

. —

Pretty Mollie Walsh operated a grub tent on the
Chilkoot Pass. Many men loved her, but she
married Mike Bartlett.

—Photo by Winter © Pond.

why. I knew that her mind’s eye was seeing
other things besides the theatre stage at
Hill City; for it was there that she had met
and fallen in love with Arthur Field.
Arthur was the son of a wealthy family
of Hot Springs, South Dakota. Beautiful
little Mae, at barely seventeen, had given
up her burning desire for stage stardom to

marry the handsome man whom she loved
even more than dancing, and whom, I am
sure, she loves even yet.

“But didn’t you ever dance again?” I
asked, trying to bring her thoughts back
from Hill City, and the smile back to her
lips.. “Surely, as young and beautiful as
you were, and as much as you loved it, you
must have danced again!”

But no smile came back to her lips, and
the look of pain deepened.

“Yes, I danced again. I danced in Daw-
son, at the Floradora. That was after—
after Arthur went away. But that was dif-
ferent. The Floradora wasn’t a theatre, it
was a dance and gaming hall. I danced with
men, to make a living.”

“That must have been exciting,” I cried.
“And I'll bet you were the pet of the
place!”

She laughed, and the expression of her
face became one of enthusiasm. “Of course
I'm not beautiful now, I’m an old woman.
But I must have been beautiful then. Every-
one said so. Can you guess what they called
me in Dawson?”

I knew that in those early Gold-rush days
everyone had some sort of “handle,” like
those of the many friends she had told me
about. There were Goldtooth Gertie, the
Texas Fillie, and Klondike Kate—Kate
Rockwell, who is now Mrs. John Matson
of Bend, Oregon. Such names may have
fitted other girls, but not this sweet, gentle
little person.

“It would have done you justice only if
they had called you ‘The Queen of Daw-
son’,” I replied

“Silly,” she laughed. “I certainly
couldn’t have been queen of anything. Kate
Rockwell was the queen.* They called me
‘The Doll of Dawson’.”

Of course! No other name would have
fitted her, so like a Dresden doll as she must
have been, and as she still was.

“And it was a woman who gave me the
oe
name,” she added.

“Arthur was a son of a wealthy family,”
I mused. “Why on earth did he take you
as a bride into such an unsuitable setting
as the rough Klondike country?”

“The lure of gold just got him, I guess,
as it did so many others. And besides,”

* The life story of Kate Rockwell will appear in
the next (15th) edition of THE SHOULDER
STRAP.

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