"Hard as ever?"
"I'm afraid so but, to tell the truth, I didn't pay much attention to it."
"It doesn't seem to be blowing quite so hard."
When Bob's watch told him it was seven o'clock he declared that he was going to get breakfast wolves or no wolves.
"I haven't heard them for the last half hour and they've probably gone," he told Jack.
The wind was still blowing a gale and the snow was driving with unbated fury outside, but within the fringe of trees it was not so bad and, after he had replenished the fire with almost the last of the wood, he got the meat from where he had hung it in a tree and cut off two thick steaks. Then he melted some snow and mixed up a batch of flapjacks with the water as the condensed milk was all gone.
"Venison steak and flapjacks," he announced a half hour later as he brought the food in to Jade. "What more could you want?"
"A cup of coffee."
"That would go good, but we'll have to make out without it this morning, I reckon."
After they had eaten, Bob made an examination of the injured ankle and was gratified to find that the swelling had nearly vanished.