ay. There was no reason to
apprehend any difficulty in reaching the settlements, and in their
relief at the unexpected rescue their thoughts went no further. After
the hunger and nervous strain they had borne, they were blissfully
satisfied with their present ease. There would be time enough by and
by to consider the future.

At length Sergeant Lane got up and shook the snow from his blanket.

"I've seen a better fire, boys, but I've camped with none at all on as
cold a night," he said. "So far as I can figure, we have grub enough,
but now there are three more of us we don't want to lose time. You'll
be ready to pull out by seven in the morning."

They lay down in the most comfortable places they could find, though
the choice was limited, and spent the night in comfort, though Harding
was once awakened by a dog that crept up to him for warmth.

CHAPTER XXVII

A STARTLING DISCOVERY

It was getting light next morning when the reinforced party entered a
belt of thicker timber where they first clearly realized the fury of
the storm. The trees were small and sprang from a frozen muskeg so
that they could not be uprooted, but the gale had snapped the trunks
and laid them low in swaths. Even in the spots where some had
withstood its force the ground was strewn with split and broken
branches, to lee of which the snow had gathered in billowy drifts. The
scene of ruin impressed the men, who were forced to make long rounds in
search of a passage for the sledge.

"About as fierce a blizzard as I remember," Sergeant Lane remarked.
"We were held up three days and thought ourselves lucky in making a
ravine with a steep bank, but the wind couldn't have been quite so
strong back north a piece. There'd have been two names less on the
roster if we'd been caught down here."

Harding thought this was probable. He had had a protecting rock at his
back, but there was no shelter in the valley from the storm that had
levelled the stoutest trees. Even the four-footed inhabitants of the
wilds could hardly have escaped, and as he stumbled among the wreckage
he thought about the man whose footsteps they had seen near the Indian
village. Unless he had found some secure retreat he must have had to
face the fury of the gale, and Harding felt convinced that the man was
Clarke. It was curious that he should have been living alone among the
empty tepees, but Harding imagined that he was in some way accountable
for the Indians