It was a moment for swift decision. Ruth made hers instantly. She took the baby from the front seat, wrapped him close to her in all the blankets she had, and started forward toward a deserted miner’s cabin built in a draw close to the trail.
Half a mile is no distance when the sun is shining and the path is clear. But near and far take on different meanings in a blizzard. Drifts underfoot made the going slow. The pelting wind, heavy with the sting of sleet, beat upon her, sifted through her clothes, and sapped her vitality. More than once her numbed legs doubled under her like the blades of a jackknife.
Ruth knew she was in deadly peril. She recalled stories of how men had wandered for hours in the white whirl, and had lain down to die at last within a stone’s throw of their own houses. A young schoolteacher from Denver had perished three years before with one of her hands clutching the barbwire strand that led to safety.
But the will to live was strong in the young mother. For the sake of that precious young life in her arms she dared not give up. Indomitably she fought against the ice-laden wind which flung sleet waves at her to paralyse her energy, benumb her muscles, and chill the blood in her arteries. More than once she went down, her frozen legs buckling under her as she moved. But always she struggled to her feet again and plowed forward.
At last she staggered down an incline to a dip in the road. This might or might not be the draw that led to the cabin. There was no way of telling. But she had to make a choice, and life for both her and the baby hung upon it.
Her instinct told her she could go no farther. Ruth left the road, plunged into the drifts, and fought her way up the gulch. It was her last effort, and she knew it. When she went down it was all she could do to drag herself to her feet again. But somehow she crawled forward.
Out of the whirling snow loomed a log wall within reach of her hand. She staggered along it to the door, felt for the latch, found it, and stumbled into the hut.