n, succeeded by a
feeling of chill. Luther scanned the horizon and stepped faster. When the
advance guard of fine snow began to sift down from the leaden sky above,
he started to run. He had lived in the north, and knew the meaning of the
rapidly darkening sky. The signs were unmistakable. Presently the fine
flakes began to rush along toward the south with greater force. The wind
came on steadily now. Luther looked about anxiously, making a note of the
location of things. It was still a quarter of a mile to Hunter's. As he
peered ahead, wishing himself nearer protection, with a roar the blizzard
fell upon him, blotting out the landscape before him as completely as if a
curtain had fallen between.

With all his might Luther struggled forward. The wind came from the right
side and almost carried him from his feet. He had been standing over a
steaming kettle and scalding barrel most of the day, and the icy blast
went through him, chilling his blood instantly. Luther knew his danger.
This was not a cyclone where men were carried away by the winds of summer;
this was a winter's storm where men could freeze to death, and men froze
quickly in blizzards. The driving particles of snow and ice made it
impossible to look ahead. He shielded his face with his right arm, and
tried, as he hurried forward, to keep in mind the exact direction of the
Hunter house. If he could only reach that he would be safe. The road was a
new one, recently opened, and not well defined. It was almost at once
obliterated. Little needles of ice thrust themselves at him with stinging
force, and he could not see; the blinding snow whirled and whistled about
his feet, and in five minutes Luther Hansen realized that he had got out
of the road. He stopped in alarm and, turning his back to the storm, tried
to see about him. The gray wall of snow completely obscured every object
from his sight. He had a sense of being the only thing alive in the
universe; all else seemed to have been destroyed. His every nerve ached
with the cold, but peer about as he would he could not possibly tell where
he was. He remembered that there had been a cornfield on his right, and
thought that he must have gone too far south, for he was certainly in the
meadow now. The pressure of the wind, he reflected, would naturally carry
him in that direction, so he faced around and started on, bearing
stubbornly toward the north. Every fibre in him shook; no cold he had ever
felt in Minnesota w