For a full moment Bill gave little attention to the deepening clouds of
pungent, biting wood smoke that the wind whipped in through the hole he
had cut in the door. Likely it was just a momentary gust, a shifting in
the air currents, and the wind would soon resume its normal direction.
Besides, the discovery that he had just made seemed to hold and occupy
all the territory of his thought: he was scarcely aware of the burning
pain that the acrid, resinous green-wood smoke brought to his eyes.
This was the most bitter moment of his life, and he was lost and remote
in his dark broodings. The smoke didn't matter.
He began really to wonder about it when the room grew so smoky that
it no longer received the firelight. The hole in the door was like
a flue: the smoke--that deadly green-wood smoke known of old to the
woodsman--streamed through in great clouds. He had shut his eyes at
first; now he found it impossible to keep them open. The pungent
smoke crept into his lungs and throat, burning like fire. He knew
that it could no longer be disregarded.
It had been part of his wilderness training to respond like lightning in
a crisis. Many times on the forest trails life itself had depended upon
an instantaneous decision, then immediate effort to carry the decision
out. The fawn that does not leap like a serpent's head at the first
crack of a twig as the wolf steals toward him in the thicket never lives
to grow antlers. The power to act, to summon and focus the full might
of the muscles in the wink of an eye, then to hurl them into a breach
had been Bill's salvation many times. But to-night the power seemed
gone. For long seconds his muscles hung inert. He didn't know what to
do.
The capacity for mighty and instantaneous effort seemed gone from his
body. His mind was slow too,--blunted. He could make no decisions.
He only seemed bewildered and impotent.
The truth was that Bill had been near the point of utter exhaustion from
his day's toil in the snow and his labor of building the fire. The
vital nervous fluids no longer sprang forth to his muscles at the
command of his brain: they came tardily, if at all. The fountain of his
nervous energy had simply run down as the battery runs down in a motor,
and it could only be recharged by a rest. But there was a deeper reason
behind this strange apathy. The last blow--the sight of the
photograph of his father's murderer and its new connection with his
life--had for the time being at least crushed the fighting spirit within
the man. The fight for life no longer seemed worth while. In his
bitterness he had lost the power to care.
The smoke deepened in the cabin. It seemed to be affecting his power to
stand erect. He tried to think of some way to save himself; his mind
was slow and dull.
He knew that he couldn't get out of the cabin. There was only a little
hole in the door; to crawl through it, inch by inch as he had entered,
would subject him to the full fury of the flames. Oh, they would sear
and destroy him quickly if he tried to creep through them! All night
they had been mocking him with their cheerful crackle; they had only
been waiting for this chance to torture him. He had to spring high to
enter the little hole at all; there was no way to dodge the flames
outside. But he might knock the logs apart and put the fire out.
There was only a distance of two paces between him and the door, but he
seemed to have difficulty in making these. He reeled against the wall.
But when he tried to thrust his arms through to reach the burning logs,
the cruel tongues stabbed at his hands.
But in spite of the pain, he reached again. The skin blistered on his
hands, and for a long, horrible instant he groped impotently. The flame
was raging by now, two or three pitch-laden spruce chunks blazing
fiercely at once, and it seemed wholly likely that the cabin itself
would catch fire. But he couldn't reach the logs.
He remembered his gloves then and fumbled for them in his pocket. The
smoke could only be endured a few seconds more. He caught hold the edge
of the opening and tried to spring up. But the flames beat into his
face and drove him down again.
For a moment he stood reeling, trying to think, trying to remember some
resource, some avenue of escape. There was no furniture to stand on.
If he could cover his face he might be able to leap part way through the
opening and knock the burning logs apart. He tried to open his smarting
eyes, but the lids were wracked with pain and would not at once respond.
He made it at last, but the dense smoke was impervious to his vision.
The firelight gave it a ghastly pallor.
His ax! With his ax he could chop the door away. His hand fumbled at
his belt. But he remembered now; he lad left his ax outside the cabin,
its blade thrust into the spruce log that had supplied his fuel.
Suddenly he saw himself face to face with seemingly certain death. It
was curious that he did not feel more fear, greater revulsion. It was
almost as if it didn't matter. While the steady sinking of the burning
logs lessened, in some degree, the danger of the cabin igniting--a few
inches of snow against the door remaining unmelted--the smoke clouds
were swiftly and surely strangling him. Already his consciousness was
departing. He leaped for the opening again and fell sprawling on the
dirt floor. He started to spring up----
But he suddenly grew inert, breathing deeply. There was still air close
to the ground. Strange he hadn't thought of it before,--just to lie
still, face close to the dirt. It pained him to breathe; his eyes
throbbed and burned, but at least it was life. He pressed his face to
the cool earth.
Yet unconsciousness was sweeping him again. He would feel himself
drifting, then with all the faltering power of his will he would
struggle back. But perhaps this sweet oblivion was only sleep. His
nerves were crying for rest. Once more he floated, and the hours of
night crept by.
When Bill wakened again, the last pale glimmer of the lighted smoke was
gone. He was bewildered at first, confusing reality with his dreams,
but soon the full memory of the night's events swept back to him. His
faculties had rallied now, his thought was clearer. The few hours that
he had rested had been his salvation.
Yet it was still night. He raised his hands before his eyes but could
not see even their outline. And the cabin was still full of smoke. But
it seemed somewhat less dense now, less pungent. But the smarting in
his eyes was more intense.
The fire had evidently burned down and out. He struggled to open his
eyes, then gazed around the walls in search of the opening in the door.
But he could not see the reflection of an ember. He fought his way to
his feet.
His fumbling hands encountered the log walls; he then groped about till
he found the plank door. His gloved hands smarted, but their sense of
touch did no seem blunted. He had never known a darker night! Now that
he found the hole in the door, it was curious that he could not see one
star gleaming through. But perhaps clouds had overspread.
A measure of heat against his face told him that coals were still
glowing under the ashes, yet he might be able to creep through. It was
worth a trial: the smoke in the cabin was still almost unbearable. His
muscles were more at his command now; with a great lurch he sprang up
and thrust head and shoulders through the opening.
The hot ashes punished his face, and his hand encountered hot coals as
he thrust them through. Yet with a mighty effort he pushed on until his
wrists touched the icy snow. He knew that he was safe.
He stood erect, scarcely believing in his deliverance. And the snow had
crusted during the night; it would almost hold him up without snowshoes.
As soon as the light came, he could mush on toward his Twenty-three Mile
cabin. It would be a cold and exhausting march, but he could make it.
The night was bitter now, assailing him like a scourge the moment he
left the warm cabin; and the temperature would continue to fall until
after dawn. The wind still blew the snow dust--a stinging lash from
the north and west--and it had brought the cold from the Bering Sea.
It was curious that a cloudy night could be so cold. Yet when he opened
his eyes he could not see the gleam of a star. The red coals of the
fire, too, were smothered and obscured in ashes. He stepped toward
them, intending to rake them up for such heat as they could yield.
Presently he halted, gazing with fascinated horror at the ground.
He was suddenly struck with a ghastly and terrible possibility. He could
not give it credence, yet the thought seemed to seize and chill him like
a great cold. But he would know the truth in a moment. It was always
his creed: not to spare himself the truth. Surely it would simply be an
interesting story--this of his great fear--when he returned with his
backload of supplies to Virginia. Something to talk about, in the
painful and embarrassed moments that remained before Virginia and her
lover went out of his sight forever.
His hand groped for a match. In his eagerness it broke off at his
fingers as he tried to strike it. But soon he found another.
He heard it crack in the silence, but evidently it was a dud! The
darkness before his eyes remained unbroken.
Filled with a sick fear, he removed his glove and passed his hand over
the upheld match. There was no longer a possibility for doubt. The
tiny flame smarted his flesh.
"Blind!" he cried. "Out here in the snow and the forest--blind!"
It was true. The pungent wood smoke had done a cruel work. Until time
should heal the wounds of the tortured lenses, Bill was blind.