Page:Cornelia Meigs-The Pirate of Jasper Peak.djvu/216

 anything that might have escaped destruction. Part of a side of bacon was found wedged under a fallen beam and a very small quantity of flour,  happening to be in a tin container, had not been  consumed. That was the whole extent of their salvage.

The snow had only been falling fitfully during the night, but about the middle of the morning  the storm settled down, like a blinding white curtain that shut off all the rest of the world. Once or twice the rising wind tore the dense veil apart,  showing them the stormy lake, the bowing woods  and Jasper Peak for a fleeting moment, before all  was blotted out again. The boys had managed to mend the hole burned in the roof and to shut  off the door that had once led into the storehouse,  and now were warming themselves at the fire  after their severe labors outside. Dick went to the window and took a long survey of the snow.

“If I know anything of Minnesota weather,” he remarked, “this is the sort of storm that will  last for days, three or four, at least, and then it  will clear and get cold, colder than anything you