"The snow is very loose and deep." He went out, and Barrington, who looked after him with a curious expression in his face, nodded twice as if in approval.

Twenty minutes later, he took his place in the sleigh that slid away from the Grange, which lay a league behind it when the sunrise flamed across the prairie.

The wind had gone, and there was only a pitiless brightness and a devastating cold, while the snow lay blown in wisps, dried dusty and fine as flour by the frost.

It had no cohesion, the runners sank in it, and Winston was almost waist-deep when he dragged the floundering team through the drifts.

A day had passed since he had eaten anything worth mention, but he held on with an endurance which his companion, who was incapable of rendering him assistance, wondered at.