CHAPTER XXIX--Tom Tramps Down McDonald Creek in a Chinook Wind,

and Reaches Shelter Almost Exhausted

Meanwhile, Tom had been losing no time. An hour after he had yelled to Joe from the top of the danger zone on the wall, he had gone over the pass and reached the Granite Park chalet. Here he paused a few moments for breath, and looked across the shadow-filled canyon to the great white pinnacle of Heaven's Peak, rosy-white with the sunrise. Then he plunged down the trail, with little fear of snowslides on this side because of the trees to anchor the drifts, and in another hour reached the Lake McDonald trail at the bottom. Without any pause, he plugged steadily along through the tall, silent, lonely forest, over such deep snow that he was elevated far above the underbrush and had difficulty sometimes in spotting the trail, and kept at it till noon. Then he paused to build a fire of dead pine limbs on trodden snow and cook himself some bacon, roasting it on a stick.

It was not till this lunch was eaten that he noticed the dusking of the sun, and looking up saw a great, ugly, dark cloud coming over the range to the west.

His heart, like Joe's back in the cabin a little later, went down somewhere into his moccasins. But, he kept telling himself, he had only a dozen or fifteen more miles to go, he was in the protection of woods, and he couldn't get lost because the canyon walls would always show him the way. Besides, he had his sleeping-bag. He could crawl into some hollow tree with it, if the blizzard got too bad. But he must not stop if he could help it.

"Mills' life or mine!" he kept saying. "It's up to me to save the Ranger!"

And he shouldered his pack once more, and pressed on, with one anxious eye on the trail, one on the cloud above, which was rapidly spreading across to the eastern range and enveloping the Divide. Every second he expected to see the first white, driving sheets of the blizzard, for the cloud was racing now, the wind up there was blowing hard. Yet no snow came. In fact, Tom began to get hot. He thought it was the exertion of trying to increase his pace. But when he stopped to rest his weary shoulders a moment, he was still hot. The wind was certainly beginning to come roaring down into the trees above him now. At last it hit his face. It was a hot wind!

Then, suddenly, he realized what was coming. "The Chinook!" he cried aloud.

It was the Chinook! In half an hour, Tom was in a wringing perspiration, and his fur coat had taken its place on his pack. Under his feet a miracle was being performed. The level of the snow was steadily sinking--slowly, to be sure, here in the woods, but steadily. It was sticky on his snow-shoes, but not half so sticky as he thought it would be. The wind seemed so dry that it just soaked the snow up, instead of melting it.

On and on Tom plodded, wearily, almost exhausted now, going on sheer nerve, till close to five o'clock he got a hint of the lake. Then he picked up other snow-shoe tracks, and Robinson Crusoe could not have been more delighted at the sight of a human footprint.

"There's somebody at the hotel!" Tom cried, again aloud.

This sight gave him a second wind, and he plugged on, with clear hints of the lake through the trees now, and what seemed like open water. But the trail kept off to the east of it, and it was getting rapidly dark when he finally came into a clearing and saw the hotel.

The hotel was dark, but near by, in a smaller house, there shone a light! Tom hurried, with his last ounce of strength, to the door, and pounded.

The door was opened, and Tom almost fell in. A strong hand caught him, and steadied him while he got off his snow-shoes, and then steadied him to a chair.

"Well, who be you, and where'd you come from?" a voice asked.

Tom could see little but the warm lamplight. The room, the face of the man, were all a blur.

"Many Glacier, over Swift Current," he gasped. "Mills ate something last night--he's awful sick--telephone to the superintendent--or somebody--send a doctor."

"You mean to tell me you've come over Swift Current since last night, in that snow, and then through the Chinook?"

"Yes--'phone for a doctor--quick!"

"Why didn't you 'phone from Many Glacier?"

"Wire's on the bum--can't you hurry and 'phone?" Tom almost wailed.

"Easy, son, easy," the voice steadied him. "Nobody can start back now till mornin'. I want to get this right. I can hardly believe it."

"Oh, you _got_ to believe it!" Tom cried.

The man rose and began to work at the stove. Presently he brought Tom a big cup of hot coffee, and a plate of food, and stood by while he drank and ate.

As the hot coffee and the food began to revive him, Tom told the whole story over again, more calmly, and the caretaker listened, his eyes big.

"Well, son," he said, "you're all to the mustard. Now, if you're able, we'll go 'phone."

He led the way, and Tom repeated his story to the Park superintendent's office.

"Be ready to start back at daylight," a voice said. "If the Chinook's cleared open water enough for the launch to get up the lake, we'll pick you up where you are. Otherwise, meet us at the fork of the east and west trail at the head of the lake an hour after sunrise--that is, if you are up to going back with us."

"I'll be there!" Tom said.

His new friend now took him back into the warm, lighted room, made him undress and give himself a good rub, and then put him to bed on a couch in the corner.

"If you're goin' back over that trail to-morrow," he said, "you'll need all the sleep you can get to-night."

"I guess you're right," Tom answered, as he fell wearily, helplessly, upon the soft spring, and almost immediately felt his eyelids close of their own accord. That was the last he remembered till a hand on his shoulder was shaking him,--it seemed about five minutes later.