ON SHORT RATIONS
Apprehensive as all had been of the coming of the big storm, and fully
warned by the hunter, none of the picture players was quite prepared for
what they saw--or, rather, for what they could not see. For not a window
on the lower floor of the Lodge but was blocked by a bank of snow, so
that only the tops of the upper panes were clear of it. And through
those bits of glass all that could be seen was a whirling, swirling
mass, for the white flakes were still falling.
Not an outer door of the house but was blocked by a drift, and it was
useless to open the portals at present, as the snow fell into the room.
"But what are we to do?" asked Mr. Pertell, when the situation had been
made plain to him. "We can't take any moving pictures; can we?"
"Not in this storm," Mr. Macksey declared. "It would be as much as your
life is worth to go out. It is bitter cold and the wind cuts like a
knife!"
"I wish I could get some views," spoke Russ. "It would give New York
audiences something to talk about, to see moving pictures of a storm
like this."
"You might go up in the cupola on the roof," suggested Mr. Macksey. "You
could stand your camera up there and possibly get some views."
"I'll do it!" cried Russ.
"And may I come?" asked Alice, always ready for an adventure of that
sort.
"Come along!" he cried, gaily.
The cupola was more for ornament than use, but it was large enough for
the purpose of Russ. After breakfast he took his moving picture camera
up there, and managed through the windows, to get some fairly good
pictures. The trouble was, however, that the snow was falling so thickly
that it obscured the view. At times there would come a lull in the
storm, and then Russ was able to get scenes showing the great black
woods, and the white banks of snow.
"Oh, but it's cold work!" he cried, as he stopped to warm his hands, for
the little room on the roof was draughty, and the snow blew in.
"It's a wonderful storm," cried Alice. "I wouldn't have missed it for
worlds!"
All that day the storm raged, and all that night. There was nothing
which could be done out of doors, and so the players and the men of the
Lodge were forced to remain within. Great fires were kept up, for the
temperature was very low.
The wise forethought of Mr. Macksey in providing for the stock prevented
the animals from starving, as they would have done had not a supply of
fodder been left for them. For it was out of the question to get to the
barns.
After two days the storm ceased, the skies cleared and the sun shone.
But on what a totally different scene than before the coming of the
great blizzard!
There had been plenty of snow in Deerfield before, but now there was so
much that one old man, who worked for Mr. Macksey, said he never
recalled the like, and he had seen many bad storms.
"Well, now to tunnel out!" exclaimed Mr. Macksey when it had been
ascertained, by an observation from the cupola, that the fall of snow
was over. "We'll see if we can't raise the embargo."
But it was no easy matter. All the doors were blocked by drifts, and in
making a tunnel through snow it is just as necessary to have some place
to put the removed material as it is in tunneling through the side of a
hill.
"We can't start in and dig from the door, for we'd have to pile the snow
in the room back of us," said the hunter. "So the only other plan is to
get outside, somehow, and work up to the house, tossing the snow to one
side. I may have to dig a trench instead of a tunnel. I'll soon find
out."
Finally it was decided that the men should go to the second story, out
on a balcony that opened from Mr. DeVere's room, and get down into the
snow that way. They would use snowshoes so as to have some support, and
thus they could attack the drifts.
This plan was followed. Fortunately Mr. Macksey had thought to bring in
snow shovels before the storm came, and with these the men attacked the
big white piles.
It was hard work, but they labored with a will, and there were enough of
them to make an effective attack. Mr. Macksey, in spite of the fact that
he had food and water for his stock, was anxious to see how the animals
were doing. So he directed that first paths, tunnels or trenches be made
to the various barns.
In some places, around the lee of a building, the ground was bare of
snow, and in other places the drifts were fully fifteen feet high.
Russ, who had not gone out to shovel snow, was observed to be nailing
some light broad boards together in a peculiar way.
"What are you making?" Ruth asked him.
"Snowshoes for my camera," was his surprising answer.
"Snowshoes for your camera?"
"Yes, I want to get out and take some views, but I can't stand the thin
legs of the camera on the snow. They'd pierce through it. So I'm going
to put a broad board under each leg, and that will hold the machine up
as well as snowshoes hold me."
"What a clever idea!" she cried. "I'm going to watch you. What sort of
views do you expect to get?"
"Some showing the men digging us out. We can get up a film story and
call it 'Prisoners of the Snow,' or something like that."
"Fine!" cried Alice. "I'm coming out, too."
She and Ruth got their snowshoes, and by this time the men had a deep
trench up to the front door, so that it was not necessary for the girls
to go out by the way of the balcony. They were delighted with the
strange scene, and Russ obtained many fine pictures of the men laboring
in the snow.
It was hard work to tunnel and trench out to the barn where the animals
were, but finally it was done. They were found to be all right with two
exceptions. A horse had died from getting into the oat bin and eating
too much, and a cow was frozen, having gotten away from the rest, and
broken into a small outbuilding.
But the rest of the stock was in good condition, and, as Alice said,
they seemed almost human, neighing or lowing at the sight of the men.
"I believe they were actually lonesome," said Alice.
"Indeed, animals do get that way!" declared Mr. Macksey.
As the snow was so deep, no dramas could be filmed in it, so Mr. Pertell
and his players were enjoying enforced idleness. The time was spent,
however, in learning new parts, in readiness for the time when some of
the snow should have melted.
Many more paths, tunnels and trenches were made, but it was impossible
to go more than a short distance from Elk Lodge, even on snowshoes.
Later, when the snow had packed more, and a crust had been formed, it
was planned to take many pictures of various happenings in the great
piles of white crystals.
Three days after the storm saw little change in the appearance of the
country and landscape about the hunting lodge. It was snow, snow, snow
everywhere--on all sides. Within the house it was warm and cozy, and for
months afterward it was a pleasant recollection to talk of the hours
spent about the great fire in the living room.
But in spite of the fact that his animals were safe, except for the two
that had died, Mr. Macksey seemed worried. Several times he paid a visit
to the cellar, or the store room, where the provisions were kept, and
more than once the girls heard him murmuring to himself.
"What is the trouble?" Alice asked him once, as he came up from a trip
to the cellar.
"Well, I'm afraid you folks will have to go on short rations if the
supplies don't come in soon from the store," he replied. "I've got
plenty of meat on hand, but other things are somewhat scarce."
"Then we won't starve?" she asked.
"Well, maybe not actually starve, but you may be hungry for certain
things."
"Oh, I'm not fussy!" Alice laughed. "I can eat anything."
The storm was so severe and so wide-spread, that, in about a week, there
was an actual shortage of provisions at Elk Lodge. The meals had to be
curtailed in regard to certain dishes, and there were loud complaints
from Mr. Bunn and Mr. Sneed, as well as from Miss Pennington and Miss
Dixon. But the others made the best of it.
"I wish I had never come to this horrid place!" exclaimed Miss
Pennington, when her request for a fancy dish had to be denied.
"You may go back to New York any time you wish," observed Mr. Pertell,
with a grim humor, as he looked out on the great piles of snow. It would
have been impossible to get half-way to the station.
Miss Pennington "sniffed" and said nothing.
But there was no actual suffering at Elk Lodge. Before it got to that
point Mr. Macksey hitched up six horses to a big sled and made his way
into town. He brought back enough provisions for a small company of
soldiers.
"Now let it 'bliz' if it wants to!" he cried, as he and his men stocked
up the storeroom.