they neared their cache.

A few minutes later they broke out into the edge of the small clearing
with its downed spruce and the two Sno cars. From the carriers they
extracted light-weight collapsible plastic domed shelters. A half hour
later the domes were joined together by a two-man shelter tube and
their sleeping bags were spread in the rear dome. While Alec was
shaking out the bags and stowing gear, Troy set up the tiny camp
stove in the front dome, broke out the rations and began supper. The
detachable, mercury-battery headlight from one of the Sno cars hung
from the apogee of the front dome and the other car light was in the
sleeping dome.

By the time they had finished eating, the wind had died but the snow
continued to fall, piling up around the outside of the plastic dome as
it drifted and fell. Its sheltering bulk added to the already
near-perfect insulation of the domes. The outer air temperature had
fallen to minus fifteen degrees but the temperature below the surface
of the snow held at a constant twenty-five degrees above zero and
within the front dome with its light and stove, it was a warm
seventy-five. The excess heat escaped through a flue tube in the top
of the dome.

Both men had stripped down to shorts and T-shirt and now quietly
relaxed.

"That's a goodly amount of precip piling up out there," Alec remarked
languidly. "God knows we can use it."

"If this keeps up all night," Troy said, "we may have to dig ourselves
outta here in the morning." He leaned back and surveyed the rounded
roof above him. "Remember what I said this afternoon about nothing
ever changing in DivAg?"

Alec nodded.

"Well, sir, here's another fine example of progress halted dead in its
tracks," the lanky hydrologist went on. "For centuries the Eskimos
have lived through Arctic winters in igloos, made of snow blocks, cut
and rounded to form a cave in the snow.

"What's good enough for the Eskimos is good enough for DivAg. Here we
are right back in the Ice Age, living in an igloo. If that stove used
blubber or seal oil instead of chemical fuel, the picture would be
complete."

Alec grinned. "Just because something is old doesn't mean it's no
good, Dr. Braden," he said. "The Eskimos proved the efficiency of the
igloo. We've just adopted the principle and modernized it. It still
works better than any other known snow-weather shelter. But I didn't
see you cutting any snow blocks with your skinning knife to build this