Page:Lost Ecstasy (1927).pdf/334

 posed grass, scanty as it was. But they learned before long; they even followed the plough. For the time at least they were saved.

He was completely exhausted, almost snow-blind. The rims of his eyes were swollen and excruciatingly painful, he limped badly, he had not shaved for three weeks. He went back to the house, fell on his unmade bed, and slept twenty-four hours before he moved.

When he got about again he heard terrible tales of disaster. Only the disappearance of the snow would enable the cattlemen to total their losses, but compared with theirs his own were negligible.

He was not through, of course.

Early in February came a chinook. A warm wind began to blow, the snow melted rapidly, and the cattle, inured now to the cold, began to drop all over the pastures. They would get down and be too enervated to rise, and there they would lie until they died unless they were forced to their feet again. Once again he began his battle, this time to "tail them up." It took all his strength and more agility than his bad foot permitted him. More than once a "tailed" steer, on its feet and angry, tried to hook him. Once indeed he was knocked down, but the animal was too unsteady to pursue his advantage.

But at last, miraculously, the spring came. In the tracks made by his snow-plough, in the bare spaces on the ridges, the brown grass took on a greenish hue. The nights were still cold, but at midday the sun was warm. His eyes commenced to improve. His cows began to drop their calves, awkward little creatures, pop-eyed and dazed; they lay for a time, moved, got up, and stood gazing about on legs which still shook under them.

He felt no exultation; only a vague relief.