The momentary excitement brought Mr. Oakhurst back to the fire with his usual calm.  He did not waken the sleepers.  The Innocent slumbered peacefully, with a smile on his good-humored, freckled face; the virgin Piney slept beside her frailer sisters as sweetly as though attended by celestial guardians, and Mr. Oakhurst, drawing his blanket over his shoulders, stroked his mustaches and waited for the dawn.  It came slowly in a whirling mist of snow-flakes, that dazzled and confused the eye.  What could be seen of the landscape appeared magically changed.  He looked over the valley, and summoned up the present and future in two words,—­“snowed in!”

A careful inventory of the provisions, which, fortunately for the party, had been stored within the hut, and so escaped the felonious fingers of Uncle Billy, disclosed the fact that with care and prudence they might last ten days longer.  “That is,” said Mr. Oakhurst, sotto voce to the Innocent, “if you’re willing to board us.  If you ain’t—­and perhaps you’d better not—­you can wait till Uncle Billy gets back with provisions.”  For some occult reason, Mr. Oakhurst could not bring himself to disclose Uncle Billy’s rascality, and so offered the hypothesis that he had wandered from the camp and had accidentally stampeded the animals.  He dropped a warning to the Duchess and Mother Shipton, who of course knew the facts of their associate’s defection.  “They’ll find out the truth about us all when they find out anything,” he added, significantly, “and there’s no good frightening them now.”

Tom Simson not only put all his worldly store at the disposal of Mr. Oakhurst, but seemed to enjoy the prospect of their enforced seclusion.  “We’ll have a good camp for a week, and then the snow’ll melt, and we’ll all go back together.”  The cheerful gayety of the young man, and Mr. Oakhurst’s calm infected the others.  The Innocent, with the aid of pine-boughs, extemporized a thatch for the roofless cabin, and the Duchess directed Piney in the rearrangement of the interior with a taste and tact that opened the blue eyes of that provincial maiden to their fullest extent.  “I reckon now you’re used to fine things at Poker Flat,” said Piney.  The Duchess turned away sharply to conceal something that reddened her cheeks through its professional tint, and Mother Shipton requested Piney not to “chatter.”  But when Mr. Oakhurst returned from a weary search for the trail, he heard the sound of happy laughter echoed from the rocks.  He stopped in some alarm, and his thoughts first naturally reverted to the whiskey, which he had prudently cached.  “And yet it don’t somehow sound like whiskey,” said the gambler.  It was not until he caught sight of the blazing fire through the still blinding storm and the group around it that he settled to the conviction that it was “square fun.”