Well, it was bearable, certainly, or I should not be here; and yet I can aver that the horror of it has not been more than half told yet.
Thank God, we had plenty of food and firing, and as I said to my poor chum, "I'll bet there are many miserable beggars scattered about this Yukon country and Alaska who are worse off than we are by a long shot."
He smiled at my enthusiasm, and added, "But I hope there are no broken legs amongst them."
At which I felt rather subdued. But I had talked, and continued to do so thus, to cheer him if I could, and to make him think that I was quite happy and contented.
Really, at heart, I was neither. He did not seem to me to be improving. He told me of the pain he suffered in his leg. I suggested that it was caused by the bone growing together. I said I had heard that was usually the most painful time, and he hoped I was right. He was very pale and thin. I tried to believe that was only the effect of his lying so long and being in the dim light. His appetite troubled me: he ate very little, and did not fancy anything we had.
One time he talked to me about the girl he loved at home. He showed me her portrait. Her name is Fanny Hume. I thought she must be very pretty from her photo. He declared she was that—lovely. They had been engaged for four years. She was to have come out to him, if he had done well in the prairie country. They had experienced great disappointment at his failure there, but his good fortune up here the year before had altered matters. If he had got out this fall they were to have been married by Christmas.
He told me of the plans he had laid for his mother's comfort, and of the dreams he had about the home he would make for his bride with the good fortune that had come to him. "And now," said he in grievous tones, "all this is ended, all my plans frustrated. God knows how hard it is; it looks almost cruel, doesn't it?"
What could I say? I begged him not to lose hope. I besought him to remember that God did know—that for some mysterious reason He had allowed this terrible disaster to take place, that we must just put our trust in Him. We were assured, and, I hoped, believed, that He does all things well, and that we must just leave it so.
Oh! how I longed to have more power of comforting him. How impotent I felt, and was. I could only keep saying, "Look up, Meade! look up! from there alone can come our help."
One day said he, "I'd give anything for a bit of fresh mutton. Just fancy a mutton chop at Pimm's, in the Strand, and a glass of their stout, eh!"