"Maybe snow, but more likely sleet, and that, too, before morning," he replied. "It's early for such things, but all the signs point that way."
I asked him no more. This was most unpromising, and gave full warrant for his grave looks. The mists were lifting, though very slowly, and were gathering in clouds above us. The peaks were ghostly gray, and the moon narrowed to a half-rim of steel and then disappeared altogether. The dampness remained in the air, but the cold was too great for rain. As Crothers said, either snow or sleet would come.
I suggested to Crothers that we make some sort of protection for Miss Hetherill. We built up little walls of brush on three sides of her and covered them over with the same material. She slept so heavily from exhaustion, poor girl, that she never awakened to our noise, and when we finished our improvised hut our satisfaction was all the greater because we had not disturbed her at all.
Then we built up the fires and waited for what might come. I dozed awhile, and awoke to find that the clouds had thickened. All the peaks were hidden by them, and there was some wind, just enough to make a subdued moan. Crothers said it lacked about two hours of day. I noticed that he had put the men at work again, and they had gathered brushwood sufficient to make the camp-fire of a regiment.
"The clouds will do what they are going to do very soon," said Crothers; and he was right. Presently we heard a patter upon the dry leaves like the falling of dust-shot. Little white kernels rebounded and fell again. One lodged in my eye, and I winked until I got it out. The patter increased; the dust-shot turned to bird-shot.
"Hail," said Crothers. "We're in for it."
We woke all the men and made shelter for ourselves as best we could in the lee of the cliff. Another blanket spread over the top of Grace's rude bower was sufficient protection for her. Soon we had a fine downpour of hail. It was like a white bombardment, from which we were safe within our works. I would have been content to watch it, had it not put such obstacles in the way of our pursuit. The ground whitened quickly under the fall of the hail, and by and by, when the wind shifted to the south, the clouds discharged rain instead of hail. This was no improvement, and in fact its probable sequel was what we dreaded most. The shift of the wind came again, and then happened what often happens in our fickle climate: the rain which covered everything turned to ice under the wind from the north, and in an hour the earth was clad in a complete suit of white armor.
The sun was just rising above the last peaks. Every cloud had gone from the sky, and the day, hidden before by the wall of mountains, seemed to come all at once. Every ray of the sun was caught up by the sheet of white and gleaming ice and reflected back. Our eyes were dazzled by the brilliancy of the morning, for the ice covered everything. Every leaf, every twig, was encrusted with it. It was all very beautiful, and all very dangerous. Mountain-climbing on sheets of ice is a slippery business.
As usual, I turned to Crothers for advice.
"We'll have to creep along as best we can," he said. "But, while we can't go fast, neither can the doctor nor the colonel."