Sunday, January fifth.
Olson is still away. It is wearing to wait this way in hope,—for we will hope even if the wind blows and the snow falls. And so it has done. The day following Olson’s departure it was wonderfully fair and calm, but the next day, it being the day he should have returned, a heavy snowstorm set in. And to-day with less snow there was more wind,—not so much that he could not have come but enough that he didn’t. We walked down the beach and scanned the bay with the glasses, and up to dark I looked continually for the little boat to be rounding the headland.
ANOTHER OF ROCKWELL’S DRAWINGS
It seems as if that were all the news, but the days have really been full of work and other interest. The snow itself, lying deep and light and over all—even the tree tops—is a delight. Rockwell and I played bear and hunter to-day tracking each other in the woods. Only the goats are miserable these days with their browse all covered but what they can gnaw from the tree trunks. Billy at this season is a fury. One has really to go armed with a clout. Yesterday he burst in the door of Olson’s shed and then inside managed to shut the door on himself. When I investigated the strange banging that I’d been hearing for some time, I found him. He had even piled things against the door. While no actual damage has been done he has tossed every blessed thing about with his horns. Boxes, pails, sacks of grain, cans, rope, tools, all lie piled in confusion about the floor. It does no good to beat the creature. He will learn nothing. It is about one-thirty A. M. I’ve written more than I intended writing. My heart is set upon the mail and nothing else.