In a bank near the creek, which was about twenty yards wide and had a fairly swift current, there was a rough door, which, being half open, disclosed a dark cave within. One sees similar places in railway cuttings and cliffs in Britain, where workmen keep their tools.
In this "dug-out" Meade had lived.
A few cut stumps, some wood chopped for fuel, and the ground bared around this door, were the only indications of any person having ever been about.
There was a quantity of timber growing around, but no really large trees; all were of the fir tribe. The earth was, as usual, covered with moss some feet in thickness, much of it pink and golden, and very beautiful. From the lower branches of trees hung long streamers of gray lichen; rotting logs, dead branches, and rock were cushioned in brilliant mosses, green and orange, whilst creepers and bushes were thickly matted everywhere. Yet, as we well knew, beneath this and for many feet below it the ground was frozen, in spite of the sun's great heat, which could not penetrate that mass of vegetation.
There we were, then, entirely alone, so far as we could tell, many miles from any one but Jim and his klootchman. Yet we thought it better, in spite of this belief, not to put up our white tent: some wandering prospector might come our way, and it was better not to attract attention, therefore we decided to enlarge this dug-out and dwell in it.
Fancy a hole scooped out of the bank about ten feet square, very little higher than a man, with a hole in one corner of the roof to allow the smoke from the fire to escape: that was all, and that was to be our home—for three months, we said.
How little we knew what was before us!
The front of this luxurious habitation was built up with logs, the chinks between stuffed with moss; the door was of rough split slabs; it had no hinges—to open and close it one had to lift it bodily. There were a few notches in the top which admitted all the light we had when it was shut.
The remains of Meade's last year's bedding (fir twigs), a few old tins, and bits of rubbish, strewed the floor. It was just a den, and a very dismal one at that,—far worse than the meanest hopper's crib in Kent.
First we lit a big fire inside, and when the frost was driven out we set to with pick and shovel and very quickly enlarged it by about five feet, after which we strewed a thick layer of fresh pine brush over the floor, spread our bedding, and were at home!