As our serialization of Burning Daylight rattles toward its climax, Steyn Clubber Rich Klein, a First Weekend Founding Member, writes from Illinois:
I love it. I'm hoping against hope that it will have a triumphant, or at least happy, ending for Burning Daylight. I really appreciated the early Klondike episodes because while on the second Steyn cruise (to Alaska) I went on a train tour at Skagway, where I learned what the miners went through just to get to the gold fields. That tour and the Klondike episodes were quite a revelation to a desk jockey like me. From Wikipedia I learned that Jack London died at age 40. Quite a productive and adventure-filled life! Thanks, Mark, for choosing Burning Daylight.
My pleasure, Rich. As to that happy ending for our hero, well, in tonight's penultimate episode of our tale, the old lean, lithe Daylight is back:
As he had prophesied to Dede, Burning Daylight, the city financier, had died a quick death on the ranch, and his younger brother, the Daylight from Alaska, had taken his place. The threatened inundation of fat had subsided, and all his old-time Indian leanness and of muscle had returned. So, likewise, did the old slight hollows in his cheeks come back. For him they indicated the pink of physical condition. He became the acknowledged strong man of Sonoma Valley, the heaviest lifter and hardest winded among a husky race of farmer folk...
A sugar king, whose breeding farm and training stables were at Caliente, three miles away, sent for him in time of need, and, before the year was out, offered him the management of the stables. But Daylight smiled and shook his head...
"We've got the ranch and each other," he told his wife, "and I'd sooner ride with you to Hood Mountain any day than earn forty dollars. You can't buy sunsets, and loving wives, and cool spring water, and such folderols, with forty dollars; and forty million dollars can't buy back for me one day that I didn't ride with you to Hood Mountain."
Hood Mountain is named for the Scotsman William Hood, who climbed it in 1846 and who has yet to be supplanted by someone less white and privileged. Members of The Mark Steyn Club can hear me read Part Forty-Five of Burning Daylight simply by clicking here and logging-in.
If you're new to our Club, or if the day's developments simply make you despair, there's nothing healthier than taking a short break from the hell of the hamster-wheel news-cycle and exploring the delights of our Tales for Our Time home page. It's configured in Netflix tile style, with the stories organized by category - thrillers, fantasy, romance, etc - which we hope will make it easy for you to find a favorite diversion of an evening.You can access four dozen of our cracking yarns here - and all previous episodes of our current adventure here.
If you've yet to hear any of our Tales for Our Time, you can do so by joining The Mark Steyn Club and enjoy our nightly audio adventures every evening twenty minutes before lowering your lamp - or hoard the episodes and binge-listen at the weekend or on a long car journey, if your government still permits you to take one. For more details on that and other benefits to Steyn Club membership, see here - and don't forget our special Gift Membership.
Please join me right here tomorrow evening for the conclusion of Burning Daylight.
