Jones strode away abruptly on his journey, and if the moisture about his eyes was in excess of what was required in their normal condition, it was probably due to the bracing and biting frostiness of the morning air.

And so they resigned themselves to their winter’s prison on the Blue—­Old Platte stolidly and contentedly, Thompson uneasily and restlessly, and Gentleman Dick peacefully and calmly, knowing full well that spring would never bloom again for him.  Thus the December days flew by, growing colder and colder, and the snow-line crept gradually down the slopes of the range until it reached the edge of the timber, where it seemed to pause for a few days in its advance.  It had already snowed several times in the valley, and the afternoon sun had always melted it away; but they knew by experience that it would soon come down in good earnest and cover everything up for the winter in a mantle of snow some six or seven feet deep.  And as the days sped on Gentleman Dick grew paler and paler, and his bright eyes shone with a brighter lustre, while he seemed to be gradually slipping away, losing little by little his hold upon life.  He was a mystery to his companions, for he had no disease that could be detected, and why he should sink thus without any apparent cause was more than they could understand.

* * * * *

The wind came roaring down the canon in wild, fierce gusts; the dead, frost-hardened, brittle branches of the sturdy old pines rattled and cracked and broke as it swept by laden with glittering crystals, stolen from the range above, where it circled madly around the snowy peaks, and whirled away great winding-sheets of snow—­fine, sleety snow, that filled the atmosphere with sharp prickly needles, that made their way inside Old Platte’s rough woolen shirt as he chopped away at the woodpile, and made him shiver as they melted down his back.  Everything was frozen hard and fast; the Blue was silent in its bed; stones and sticks adhered to the ground as if part and parcel of it, and each piece of wood in the pile that Old Platte was working at stood stiffly and firmly in its place.  The wind, just before a snow-storm, always comes down the canons in fierce premonitory gusts, and as it was desirable to get in a good stock of wood before the snow-drifts gathered around the cabin, Old Platte had been hacking manfully for some hours.  The sun sunk low in the hollow of the hills to the westward while he was still working, and lit up with a cold yellow glare the snowy wastes and icy peaks of the mighty mountains that stood guard over the Blue.  The whistling of the wind among the pines died gradually away, and the silence that seemed to fall with the deepening shadows was only broken by the ringing strokes of the axe and the crack of the splitting wood.  When he ceased the valley had faded into darkness, and the range with its sharp outlines was only faintly discernible against the sombre gray pall that had overspread the sky.