"Think!" she replied in scorn. "If it were Bill he wouldn't stop to think. He'd just act. You won't go, then?"
"Don't be foolish, Virginia."
Angry words rose in her throat, but she suppressed them. A daring idea had suddenly filled her with wonder. It came full-grown: that she herself should start forth into the snow deserts to find Bill herself.
Virginia had not been trained to self-reliance. Except for her northern adventure, she had never been obliged to face difficulties, to care for and protect herself, to work with her hands and do everyday tasks. To build a fire, to repair a leaking tap, to take responsibility for anything above such schoolday projects as amateur plays an social gatherings would have seemed tasks impossible of achievement. At first it had never occurred to her that she might herself be of aid to Bill. The old processes of her mind still ran true to form; she had gone to ask a man to carry out her wish. At first she had felt wholly helpless at his refusal. But why should she not go herself?
If indeed Bill had reached the Twenty-three Mile cabin, he would be mushing home by now; she would meet him somewhere on his snowshoe trail. No harm would be done. It might even be a pleasant adventure to mush with him in the snow. The snow itself was perfect for travel; and she had learned that her strong young body was capable of long distances in a day. And if he were in trouble she could help him.
It might mean building a fire in the snow and possibly camping out through the day and night to come. It would be a dreadful and dangerous experience, yet she saw no reason why she couldn't endure it. Bill had showed her how to make the best of such a bad situation as this. He had taught her how to build a fire in the snow; her round, slender arms—made muscular in her weeks in the North—could cut fuel to keep it burning. Besides, she would carry the caribou robe—one of the cot coverings that Bill had stored in his cabin and which, though light as down, was practically impervious to cold. Besides, there was no one else to go.
She went swiftly to her cabin, put on her warmest clothing, and, as Bill had showed her, rolled a compact pack for her back. She took a little package of food—nourishing chocolate and dried meat—the whisky flask that had been her salvation the night of the river experience, and a stub of candle for fire-building, tying them firmly in the caribou robe. The entire package weight only about ten pounds. She fastened it on her shoulders, hung a camp ax at her belt; and as she waited for the dawn, ate a hearty but cold breakfast. Then, with never a backward look, she started away, down the dim, wind-blown, snowshoe trail.
XXV
Now that the fight was done, Bill lay quite calm and peaceful in the drifts. The pain of the cold and the wrack of exhausted muscles were quite gone.