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It was much easier going with the wind, and at first the older man, helped along by Fred, made good progress. Fred knew that every minute the drifts were growing higher and the road harder to keep. The night grew colder and darker, and the storm seemed to thicken. "Pretty hard going for an old man of sixty," the stranger said, stopping to get his breath. The storm seemed to choke him.
And so considered they afforded excellent specimens of two kinds of criminals which a study of assize courts reveals the criminal who drifts and the criminal who plans; the former usually termed by counsel and judge "unhappy," the latter more sternly dubbed "dangerous." Lady Tristram had always drifted and was drifting still; Harry had begun to plan at fifteen and still was busy planning.
As he was hurrying homeward he bethought himself of a short road to the village, a winter highway, that went up the ravine, past the Drowned Lands, following the old abandoned corduroy track. It had been made by Sandy McQuarry's teams hauling logs up to the mill, and being sheltered, was comparatively free from drifts.
I had the road; there was no mistaking it; it ran along between trees and fences which were plainly visible; but there were ditches and brush buried under the snow which covered the grade to a depth of maybe three feet, and every bit of these drifts was of that treacherous character that I have described.
We turned down, padding softly in the wet fox-red drifts under the beechtrees, whereon the last leaves still flickered out in the darkening whiteness, that now seemed so little eerie. We passed the grey-green skeleton of the farm-yard gate. A hen ran across us, clucking, into the dusk. The maze drew her long, home-coming snuffle, and stood still. 1910.
"It ain't goin' to be bad for several days," he said. "But when she drifts in earnest we all are liable to be stuck in here until spring. I ain't aimin' to get anxious, Dave, but we ain't fixed to buck snow." "She ain't goin' to turn back, so what can we do?" asked the other. "This here De Launay will probably be up near the crater. Once we get her up there we ain't responsible.
"No, I guess a snow man doesn't care how many times you hit him with snowballs," laughed the older boy, as he tried to catch a dog that was leaping about in the drifts, barking for joy. "The more snowballs you throw at a snow man the bigger he gets," said Bert.
Who had gouged out the bowls for those icy lakes? Why were some snowdrifts perennial? I puzzled over these conundrums, until, bit by bit, I solved them. The answers were more amazing than anything else I encountered in the wilds. I learned that those sand-coated drifts were not drifts at all, but glaciers, probably the oldest living things in the world.
Though the town seemed to Carol to change no more than the surrounding fields, there was a constant shifting, these three years. The citizen of the prairie drifts always westward. It may be because he is the heir of ancient migrations and it may be because he finds within his own spirit so little adventure that he is driven to seek it by changing his horizon.
We ascended to a great height, but becoming involved in the snow-drifts failed in reaching this wonderful lake, and had some difficulty in returning. I thought we should have lost our horses; for there was no means of guessing how deep the drifts were, and the animals, when led, could only move by jumping.
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