How did Smith manage to follow the road? I could no longer see it, and had more than enough to do to cling to the pitching seat of the wagon. We headed straight [[59]]into the blackness. What yawning precipices might be awaiting us! I became chilled and cramped, and was thankful for that greatcoat, though it did not pad me against the rude shocks of the going.
“How much farther is it to this Agency?” I asked.
“Oh! over in the hills a bit—‘bout three miles furder to go yit. It ain’t an agency, yeh know—nothin’ but a missionary and a log hut.”
And we plunged into another of the dark defiles. Then out of the black, on a bit of cold wind, came a desert welcome that one never forgets, a promise of rare comfort when one is hungry and cramped with cold, the pungent incense of burning cedar. Now from the deep shadow of a hillside arose a thin column of sparks, glinting, flying jewels of the night.
“There’s it,” he announced, as if somewhat relieved, himself.
It was a little house, built of boards, having but two rooms, one large enough for a bed and dresser, the other containing a cookstove, table, and two chairs. Its outside dimensions could not have been more than twelve by twenty feet. And when the stove was filled with dry cedar one was tempted, after a complete toasting on one side, to dispense with the table. But there was no complaint to make of this on our arrival. The fire had the cheering crackle of Yuletide, and soon coffee and bacon added their aroma. The hospitality of the good missionary and his wife was like all those welcomes extended in the solitary places, when the visitor is not touring with a notebook and a nose. The meal ended, and all news exchanged, we said good night and opened the door.
“’Ere’s a go!” one might have exclaimed, without hurting the feelings of a preacher. It was snowing! And [[60]]even a preacher would have remarked further, probably with adjectives, on seeing that Government house in which we were to spend the night. It was a log hut in truth, built corral-fashion, the poles set on end, the chinks originally plastered with adobe. There was but one room, containing a single bunk made of boards, an old cookstove, and a collection of broken tools and empty canned-goods cases. The floor was of packed earth. Without exaggeration, I may say that the roof and the floor were intact; but practically all the caulking had escaped from the log walls, and the wind felt its way inside with long icy fingers. The mechanic dropped into the bunk and was asleep almost instantly; and, after building a rushing fire in the stove, I rolled myself in Government blankets, and rolled again, this time under the stove, to pass the night.
But I did not rest in the poetry of the wild. The refulgent moon did not come up to spill its splendor through the open door, nor even through the extensive openings of the wall; the perfume of the growing pines did not soothe with healing balsam, the cry of the loon did not sound from across the lake, and so forth. The floor, however, was under that stove; and the floor had not been constructed along those scientific lines followed in the building of Ostermoor mattresses. Plastic as is my figure, it refused to conform.
And to add to my distress, someone in all that vast and lonely country owned an old gray horse. I know he was old, and I know he was gray, for he acted just like a silly old gray horse. And he was hobbled, and he was out in the snow, and he had a bell tied to his neck.
Clankety-clank-clank, clang, claaangngng—clankety, clang, clank! [[61]]