Patch and I lay there warm and snug enough. It was, however, a most dismal experience—worse even than that Nansen endured on his famous expedition towards the Pole, for he had companionship. I had none.
I tried hard to pull myself together, to make some sort of programme for future action, but I could do very little—the power of consecutive thought seemed to have left me. I passed the time eating, smoking, sleeping—it was to me like some dreadful dream, and I often, often caught myself wondering when I should awake, and the misery would be over.
I suppose it was then the end of November, and I knew there would be no real spring, no open water, till June; seven months of this desolation and loneliness to look forward to! for I had come to the resolve that, in any event, so long as provisions held out, even for months, or years, I would not abandon the gold.
I had calculated, and I knew perfectly well, that Patch and I together could not haul it out on a sled, with what we must take of gear and food. No; we must stay there till spring, and what I could, or would, do then I did not settle: I only had a vague idea that I would pack everything on the all but finished raft, and somehow float it down to Dawson.
I had plenty of time to plan all this, I knew. At intervals my memory dwelt on what now seemed to me to have been the real comfort, the real content, which Meade and I had experienced in that miserable dug-out before his accident. My mind reverted to the pleasant evenings he and I had passed with books and pipes, anticipating the joys that were in store for us when we had got out, and had once more set foot upon dear English soil. How we used to talk, and plan, and prophesy! Alas! all was ended, his career had been cut short, as we have seen, and mine—well, I did not think about mine very much, the present was what troubled me: the awful loneliness, the misery of it, was what occupied me.
I was forced to go into the den occasionally for necessaries. I had not removed the covering from my friend's face, but I had grown a little bit familiar with that melancholy heap of bedding, and the fact that he lay there, frozen, did not now so greatly agitate me.
The storm raged ceaselessly for quite a week, then suddenly there was perfect silence outside. I went forth to investigate; whether it was day or night I could not tell, for there was but little sunrise really then—the stars were gleaming in a cloudless sky. It was absolutely calm, so the cold was bearable, yet I knew it was more intense than I had ever before felt it.
The moon was rising, and a wonderful scene it was that her beams shone on; beautiful, I have no doubt, but to me then, and always, it was most awful desolation.
Everything—our workings, the raft, the creek—was covered deeply with snow; I could barely make out the door of the dug-out. I looked at it very sorrowfully, and I wished—I was almost ashamed of that wish, I thought it desecration—that I dare go in and live there, even with the companionship of all that remained of my dear friend.
I brought the shovel, removed the snow, and as I was doing so it came to my mind that if I were only able to bury Meade's body I could return to the den and pass the winter there.