"I think it must be the ice," Harold said. "I will go out and see."
On issuing from the hut he was for a time blinded by the force of the wind and the flying particles of snow. The din was tremendous. He made his way with difficulty in the teeth of the storm to the edge of the rocks. Then he started in surprise. A great bank of cakes and fragments of ice was heaped up against the wall of the rock, crashing and grinding against each other as they were pressed onward by fresh additions from beyond. Already the bank was nearly level with the top of the rock, and some of the vast blocks, two feet in thickness, had been thrust on to it. The surface of the lake beyond was no longer a brilliant white. Every particle of snow had been swept away and the dull gray of the rough ice lay unbroken.
He made his way at once to the hut of the men, and just as he reached the entrance Peter (who had also been out to reconnoiter) came up, and before Harold had turned to speak he put his head into the hut.
"Turn out!" he said. "I tell ye we're in a fix. This aint no common gale. I don't know as ever I've been in a worse one."
"What's the use of turning out?" Pearson asked. "We can't do nothing, and it's warmer here a sight than it is outside."
"I tell ye ye've got to go. The ice is breaking up fast and it's level with the top of the island already. Unless I'm mistaken there'll be forty foot of ice piled over this island afore an hour."
This was, indeed, alarming news. And in a minute the occupants of the hut were all in the open air.
"You can call in your scouts, Seneca. There aint no fear of an attack to-night. No mortal soul—not even an Injun—could stand the force of the wind out on the lake."
A very short examination sufficed to show the truth of Peter's anticipations.
Already the upper part of the bank was sliding over the rock, and it was clear that in a very short time the whole would be covered.