The Angler's Story 47 



" Yes, and Bill 's off his base. But that ain't 

 the worst of it ; that kid 's goin' to starve to 

 death." 



" Not on your life," cried Clancy, pointing to 

 the table. " Why, there 's his first birthday 

 present." 



" It would n't help if it had a bushel of blue 

 chips," answered Alec. " What the kid wants 

 is milk, first, last, and all the time, and there 

 ain't but one can of the stuff between here and 

 the open, and the snow 's forty foot on the level, 

 and Ealsdorf five days off; the kid's up against 

 it." 



The players cashed in their chips in silence, 

 got into their coats, and moved to the door that 

 could hardly be seen in the dim light, as banked 

 up against every window was snow; snow that 

 reached not only to the roof, but ten, twenty 

 feet above it. The entrance to Clancy's was a 

 snow chute or tunnel, with steps of snow leading 

 upward, and as the men crawled out into the 

 open, they stood high above the house and village. 



Endless snow-storms had fallen, until the little 

 mining hamlet, that in the summer stood in a 

 pleasant mountain-environed valley, was now 

 forty feet under the snow. Stores and houses 

 were completely out of sight, and the only things 

 to suggest the presence of a town were chimney 

 extensions and flags, rising from the field of 

 white on two sides of a straight line that in- 



