With every week the cold grew in intensity, and with every storm the
snow grew deeper, hiding the smaller trees entirely and reaching up
towards the lower limbs of the larger ones. The little tilts were
covered to the roof, and only a hole in the white mass showed where
the door was.
The sun now described a daily narrowing arc in the heavens, and the
hours of light were so few that the hunters found it difficult to
cover the distance between their tilts in the little while from dawn
to dark. On moonlight mornings Bob started long before day, and on
starlight evenings finished his day's work after night. His cheeks and
nose were frost-bitten and black, but he did not mind that for he was
doing well. Two weeks before Christmas he brought to the river tilt
the fur that he had accumulated. There were twenty-eight martens, one
mink, two red foxes, one cross fox, a lynx and a wolf. These last two
animals he had shot. Bill was already in the tilt when he arrived, and
complimented him on his good showing.
Christmas fell on Wednesday that year, and Bill brought word that Dick
and Ed were coming up to spend the day with him and Bob. They would
reach the tilt on Tuesday night and use the remainder of the week in a
caribou hunt, as there were good signs of the animals a little way
back in the marshes and they were in need of fresh meat.
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