to expose myself to the robbers if they stayed while the fire
burned, as they probably would. I thought of the cellars, but it did
not seem that I could make one of them do in any way.

My fright was, after all, a good thing, because it made me think of
all possible dangers, and consequently, as it seemed, ways to meet
them. It was at this time that the idea of a tunnel under the snow
across the street from the hotel to the bank occurred to me; but I was
not sure about this. Still, some way to cross the street without being
seen kept running in my mind. In short, I walked and thought myself
into a much better state of mind, and, though I still started at every
sound, I was no longer too frightened to control myself.

When it came bedtime I decided to follow out my plan for sleeping away
from the hotel without delay. There was an empty store building to the
north of the hotel. It was new, and had never been occupied. I had
often noticed that one of the second-story windows on the side was
directly opposite one in the hotel, and not over four feet away. I
carried up the ironing-board from the kitchen, opened the hotel
window, put the board over for a bridge, stepped across and entered
the vacant building.

I thought I had never seen a place quite so cold before; but I carried
over the mattress from my bed, together with several blankets, and
placed them in a small back room in the second story. The doors and
windows of the first story were all nailed and boarded up, and it
seemed about the last place that you would expect to find any one
sleeping. I left the dog and cat in the hotel, took one of the rifles
with me, and pulled in my drawbridge. I almost dropped it as I did so,
for at that instant the wolves set up another unearthly howling. I got
into bed as quick as I could. They went the length of the street with
their horrible noise; and then I heard them scratching at the doors
and windows of the barn. I could have shot them easily in the bright
moonlight; but I remember that I didn't do so.

CHAPTER VIII

I begin my Letters to my Mother and start my Fortifications: then I
very foolishly go away, meet with an Accident, and see Something which
throws me into the utmost Terror.

The next day, the nineteenth of December, was Sunday. I had been left
alone (or, rather, let me say the truth, I had like a fool refused to
go) on Friday, which seems in this case to have been unlucky for me,
however it may ordinar