On the glare ice of the glacier, a mile straight up the ridge from the cabin, she saw the figure of a man. Far as it was, one glance told her it was not merely a creature of the wild, a bear disturbed in his winter sleep or a caribou standing facing her. It was Ned, of course, taking the perilous path over the ice, instead of keeping to the blazed trail of his trap line. On the slight downward slope toward her, clearly outlined against the white ice, she could see every step he took.
He was walking boldly over the glassy surface. Didn’t he know its terrors, the danger of slipping on the icy shelves and falling to his death, the deep crevices shunned by the wild creatures? She watched every step with anxious gaze. When he was almost to safety she saw him stop, draw back a few paces, and then come forward at a leaping pace.
What happened thereafter came too fast for her eyes to follow. One instant she saw his form distinctly as he ran. The next, and the ice lay white and bare in the wan light, and Ned had disappeared as if by a magician’s magic.
For one moment she gazed in growing horror. There was no ice promontory behind which he was hidden, nor did he reappear again. And peering closely, she made out a faint, dark line, like a pencil mark on the ice, just where Ned had disappeared.
The truth went home in a flash. The dark line indicated a crevice, to the bottom of which no living thing may fall and live. Yet to such little wild creatures, red-eyed ermine and his fellows that might have been watching her from the snow in front, Bess gave no outward sign that she had seen or that she understood.
She stood almost motionless at first. Her eyes were toneless, lightless holes in her white face; the face itself seemed utterly blank. She seemed to be drawing within herself, into an eerie dream world of her own, as if seeking shelter from some dire, unthinkable thing that lay without. She was hardly conscious, as far as the usual outward consciousness is concerned; unaware of herself, unaware of the snow fields about her and the deepening cold; unaware of the onward march of time. She seemed like a child, hovering between life and death in the scourge of some dread, childhood malady.
Slowly her lips drew in a smile; a smile ineffably sweet, tender as the watch of angels. It was as if the dying child had smiled to reassure its sobbing mother, to tell her that all was well, that she must dry her tears. “It isn’t true,” she whispered, there in the stillness. “It couldn’t be true—not to Ned. There is some way out—some mistake.”
She turned into the cabin, bent, and added fresh fuel to the stove. Its heat scorched her face, and she put up her hand to shield it. The cabin should be warm, when she brought Ned home. She mustn’t let the cold creep in. She must not forget the cold, always watching for every little opening. Perhaps he would want food too: she glanced into the iron pot on the stove. Then, acting more by instinct than by conscious thought, she began to look about for such tools as she would need in the work to follow.
There was a piece of rope, used once on a hand sled, hanging on the wall; but it was only about eight feet in length. Surely it was not long enough to aid her, yet it was all she had. Next, she removed a blanket from her cot and threw it over her shoulder. There might be need of this too,—further protection against the cold.
Heretofore she had moved slowly, hardly aware of her own acts; but now she was beginning to master herself again. She mustn’t linger here. She must make her spirit waken to life, her muscles spring to action. Carrying her rope and her blanket, she went out the door, closed it behind her, and started up toward the glacier.