XV

Clothes and stage trappings can neither add nor detract from our respect
for death. He is the same grim old gentleman, be his mouldy bones naked,
or clothed in robes of the most gaudy or brilliant hues. A blue death, a
red death or a yellow death is just as grizzly and awe-inspiring as one
of any shade of gray. Even a black death excites no emotions not touched
by the first name, for it is the dread messenger himself whom we respect
and not his fanciful robes of office.

As far as I am personally concerned, I confess that Big Pete's painful
suggestion about the coyotes had more to do with keeping my mouth shut
than any terror inspired by the lily-like purity of the garments of the
white death; what made my bones ache was the thought of the wolves
gnawing them.

Overhead the sun shone with an unusual brilliancy, and the atmosphere
had that peculiar crystalline transparency which kills space and brings
distant objects close to one's feet. Where then was the terrible white
messenger? Why must my head be muffled like a mummy? Why must I keep my
mouth shut, while the curiosity mill within me was working overtime
grinding out questions I should dearly love to ask?

Again and again I looked around me to see where this ghostly white
terror might lurk, and now, as I gazed at the mountains, I was surprised
and annoyed to discover that the distant peaks were gradually
disappearing, being blotted out of the landscape before my eyes; a
ghost-like mantle was creeping over and enshrouding the mountains.

Like Big Pete, the witch-bear, the ptarmigan and the stinging insects,
the mountains themselves had joined in the weird game and were donning
their fernseed caps of invisibility. Now the air around and about me
seemed to be filled with powdered dust of mica that glinted, sparkled
and scintillated in the sunshine. The breeze which was tossing about the
bright atoms loosened the handkerchief which swathed my nose and mouth,
and I was seized with a violent fit of coughing.

It was no gentle hand which Big Pete laid on my shoulder before he again
bound the handkerchief around my face and motioned for me to follow him.

Evidently my guide had been making good use of his time while I was
engaged in idle speculation, for he led me to a point about fifty yards
from the goat trail where there was a possible place to descend the
cliff to a ledge fifty feet below. By this time I had become enough of a
mountaineer to follow my guide