They proceeded on their uncertain journey, but were soon floundering in soft snow. They kept on. It was easy enough to say "keep going down-hill," but, so far as John was concerned, he seemed to be walking up-hill all the time. They frequently exchanged shouts, and so remained together.
For hours they plodded on, the snowfall growing less, but the cold greater.
John began to act, to call, mechanically. His mind in that desolate trampling was transported to happier places. He thought of his Alice Peel. She was probably, he mused, thinking of him also. Did her mind ever picture such experiences as he was now realizing? She would possibly read in the newspapers of the great rush of gold-seekers over those terrible mountains and through the stormy passes. If he should die in that storm, and months afterwards she heard of his demise?... The thought drifted along to several loose ends. He must not sleep, or he would die; and it was his duty to live; but—oh! to sleep!... His father, and the old school, the church services! How much he would like to hear the old organ and the choir!... It had been the family wish that he should take Holy Orders, and he had refused the vocation, feeling it not his. Had he done right? He believed yes.... He might be about to meet his Creator. What might his record be?...
His mind went back to an occasion in Australia, when he had been lost in the Bush, and had wandered for days without water, till some blacks found him. He remembered, before going into unconsciousness with his back against a rock, that a vulture was watching him. He had taken a piece of stone, and, pretending it was a pistol, had pointed it at the bird....
John Berwick's mind was picturing sand and heat, while above him roared the Arctic storm.
How cold it was getting, and the wind was beginning to blow! The parka did not sufficiently protect his face.
Hugh shouted out that they were crossing a lake, and there might be a camp along its edge. They came in due course to the other side of the lake, with the cliff so steep they could not climb it. They followed the shore to the right, facing the storm. They crossed another lake, and still another. The air had grown intensely cold; the wind was higher, and ever there came that terrible inclination to lie down and sleep.
After they had passed over the last little lake Hugh shouted to John that they were surely now far from the proper trail, as he could recollect no such water near Bennett. Lake Lindeman was four miles long.
The wind was rising, and the increasing cold told that it came from the north. Hugh began now really to doubt whether they would live through the storm.
Soon afterwards fine ice crystals impinged against their faces. Great swirls of wind fell upon them. This new severe onslaught of nature aroused John, who called to his comrade. He had suddenly realized how very, very close they were to death.