“But Oscar will be back soon,” insisted Dick eagerly. “He must be back soon. Gee, it’s cold!”
“Yes,” returned Hugh, “he may be back any day now.”
Yet he spoke absent-mindedly, as though his thoughts were upon other things. It was because he was swinging the lantern as he went along and his attention had been suddenly caught by something unexpected. In the circle of yellow light he saw a whirling flurry of tiny flakes of snow.
CHAPTER XI
THE WHITE FLAG
Hugh had thought, when he saw those first snowflakes, that he understood a little of what was before them. He had later to learn that winter as he knew it and winter as it could be in northern Minnesota were two very different matters. To lose all their possessions at just the season when cold weather was closing in was a mishap desperate indeed, yet the boys, after a moment of being stunned by the gravity of the situation, faced it gayly.
That same night Hugh insisted on going out to look for the fishing basket that he had thrown aside when he ran to the rescue of Hulda. With Nicholas to help him, he managed to find it, so, that evening at least, they did not have to go supperless to bed. Early next morning they arose to search the ruins of the storehouse for anything that might have escaped destruction. Part of a side of bacon was found wedged under a fallen beam and a very small quantity of flour, happening to be in a tin container, had not been consumed. That was the whole extent of their salvage.
The snow had only been falling fitfully during the night, but about the middle of the morning the storm settled down, like a blinding white curtain that shut off all the rest of the world. Once or twice the rising wind tore the dense veil apart, showing them the stormy lake, the bowing woods and Jasper Peak for a fleeting moment, before all was blotted out again. The boys had managed to mend the hole burned in the roof and to shut off the door that had once led into the storehouse, and now were warming themselves at the fire after their severe labors outside. Dick went to the window and took a long survey of the snow.
“If I know anything of Minnesota weather,” he remarked, “this is the sort of storm that will last for days, three or four, at least, and then it will clear and get cold, colder than anything you ever dreamed of—thirty—forty—fifty below zero, maybe. If we should start now, we might be able to get to Rudolm, but if we wait until the snow is deep we could not even attempt it. What do you say, Hugh, shall we go or stay?”
“I don’t know,” answered Hugh from beside the fire; “do you want to go?”