32. CHAPTER XXXII.
WE seemed to be in a road, but that was no proof. We tested
this by walking off in various directions—the regular snow-mounds
and the regular avenues between them convinced each man that
he had found the true road,
and that the others had found only false
ones. Plainly the situation was desperate. We were cold and stiff
and the horses were tired. We decided to build a sage-brush fire
and camp out till morning. This was wise, because if we were
wandering from the right road and the snow-storm continued
another day our case would be the next thing to hopeless if we kept
on.
All agreed that a camp fire was what would come nearest to
saving us, now, and so we set about building it. We could find no
matches, and so we tried to make shift with the pistols. Not a man
in the party had ever tried to do such a thing before, but not a man
in the party doubted that it could
be done, and without any trouble—because every man in the party
had read about it in books many a time and had naturally come to
believe it, with trusting simplicity, just as he had long ago
accepted and believed that other common
book-fraud about Indians and lost hunters making a fire
by rubbing two dry sticks together.
We huddled together on our knees in the deep snow, and the
horses put their noses together and bowed their patient heads over
us; and while the feathery flakes eddied down and turned us into a
group of white statuary, we proceeded with the momentous
experiment. We broke twigs
from a sage bush and piled them on a little cleared place in the
shelter of our bodies. In the course of ten or fifteen minutes all
was ready, and then, while conversation ceased and our pulses beat
low with anxious suspense, Ollendorff applied his revolver, pulled
the trigger and blew the pile clear out of the county! It was the
flattest failure that ever was.
This was distressing, but it paled before a greater horror—the
horses were gone! I had been appointed to hold the bridles, but in
my absorbing anxiety over the pistol experiment I had
unconsciously dropped them and the released animals had walked
off in the storm. It was useless to try to follow them, for their
footfalls could make no sound, and one could pass within two
yards of the creatures and never see them. We gave them up
without an effort at recovering them, and cursed the lying books
that said horses would stay
by their masters for protection and companionship in a distressful
time like ours.
We were miserable enough, before; we felt still more forlorn,
now. Patiently, but with blighted hope, we broke more sticks and
piled them, and once more the Prussian shot them into
annihilation. Plainly, to light a fire with a pistol was an art
requiring practice and experience, and the middle of a desert at
midnight in a snow-storm was not a good place or time for the
acquiring of the accomplishment. We gave it up and tried the
other. Each man took a couple of sticks and fell to chafing them
together. At the end of half an hour we were thoroughly chilled,
and so were the sticks. We bitterly execrated the Indians, the
hunters and the books that had betrayed us with the silly device,
and wondered dismally what was next to be done. At this critical
moment Mr. Ballou fished out four matches from the rubbish of an
overlooked pocket. To have found four gold bars would have
seemed poor and cheap good luck compared to this.
One cannot think how good a match looks under such
circumstances—or how lovable and precious, and sacredly
beautiful to the eye. This time we gathered sticks with high hopes;
and when Mr. Ballou prepared to light the first match, there was an
amount of interest centred upon him that pages of writing could
not describe. The match burned hopefully a moment, and then
went out. It could not have carried more regret with it if it had
been a human life. The next match simply flashed and
died. The wind puffed the third one out just as it was on the
imminent verge of success. We gathered together closer than ever,
and developed a solicitude that was rapt and painful, as Mr. Ballou
scratched our last hope on his leg. It lit, burned blue and sickly,
and then budded into a robust flame. Shading it with his hands,
the old gentleman bent gradually down and every heart went with
him—everybody, too, for that matter—and blood and breath stood
still. The flame touched the sticks at last, took gradual hold upon
them—hesitated—took a stronger hold—hesitated again—held its
breath five heart-breaking seconds, then gave a sort of human gasp
and went out.
Nobody said a word for several minutes. It was a solemn sort
of silence; even the wind put on a stealthy, sinister quiet, and made
no more noise than the falling flakes of snow. Finally a sad-voiced
conversation began, and it was soon apparent that in each of our
hearts lay the conviction that this was our last night with the living.
I had so hoped that I was the only one who felt so. When the
others calmly acknowledged their conviction, it sounded like the
summons itself. Ollendorff said:
"Brothers, let us die together. And let us go without one hard
feeling towards each other. Let us forget and forgive bygones. I
know that you have felt hard towards me for turning over the
canoe, and for knowing too much and leading you round and round
in the snow—but I meant well; forgive me. I acknowledge freely
that I have had hard feelings against Mr. Ballou for abusing me
and calling me a logarythm, which is a thing I do not know what,
but no doubt a thing considered disgraceful and unbecoming in
America, and it has scarcely been out of my mind and has hurt me
a great deal—but let it go; I forgive Mr. Ballou with all my heart,
and—"
Poor Ollendorff broke down and the tears came. He was not
alone, for I was crying too, and so was Mr. Ballou. Ollendorff got
his voice again and forgave me for things I had done and said.
Then he got out his bottle of whisky and said that whether he lived
or died he would never touch another
drop. He said he had given up all hope of life, and although
ill-prepared, was ready to submit humbly to his fate; that he
wished he could be spared a little longer, not for any selfish
reason, but to make a thorough reform in his character, and by
devoting himself to helping the poor, nursing the sick, and
pleading with the people to guard themselves against the evils of
intemperance, make his life a beneficent example to the young,
and lay it down at last with the precious reflection that it had not
been lived in vain. He ended by saying that his reform should
begin at this moment, even here in the presence of death, since no
longer time was to be vouchsafed wherein to prosecute it to men's
help and benefit—and with that he threw away the bottle of
whisky.
Mr. Ballou made remarks of similar purport, and began the
reform he could not live to continue, by throwing away the ancient
pack of cards that had solaced our captivity during the flood and
made it bearable.
He said he never gambled, but still was satisfied that the meddling
with cards in any way was immoral and injurious, and no man
could be wholly pure and blemishless without eschewing them.
"And therefore," continued he, "in doing this act I already feel
more in sympathy with that spiritual saturnalia necessary to entire
and obsolete reform." These rolling syllables touched him as no
intelligible eloquence could have done, and the old man sobbed
with a mournfulness not unmingled with satisfaction.
My own remarks were of the same tenor as those of my
comrades, and I know that the feelings that prompted them were
heartfelt and sincere. We were all sincere, and all deeply moved
and earnest, for we were in the presence of death and without
hope. I threw away my pipe, and in doing it felt that at last I was
free of a hated vice
and one that had ridden me like a tyrant all my days. While I yet
talked, the thought of the good I might have done in the world and
the still greater good I might
now do,
with these new incentives and higher and better aims to guide
me if I could only be spared a few years longer, overcame me and
the tears came again. We put our arms about each other's necks
and awaited the warning drowsiness that precedes death by
freezing.
It came stealing over us presently, and then we bade each other
a last farewell. A delicious dreaminess wrought its web about my
yielding senses, while the snow-flakes wove a winding sheet about
my conquered body. Oblivion came. The battle of life was
done.