The front door of the cabin faced south to the Albreda Glacier. There were two big rooms and a woodshed the full width of the house attached to the back. A trap door opened over a roomy cellar dug beneath the back room.
With her cookstove installed in the back and a heater stove in the front room, Edith felt more at home. The log house with its pole and sod roof seemed almost luxurious after the rigors of the trail. The floor was smooth puncheon hand-hewed with adzes.
Fred dug a roothouse deep into the hillside above the cabin and lined it and roofed it with cedar logs. He hung a double-thick wooden door on heavy forged hinges to secure their food against animals, and added a massive padlock against any human pilferers. When that was done he hired a crew to put up a barn sixty by eighty feet. He mowed the wild hay and put up fodder for the winter.
Edith was nearly content. The children had taken to the mountain valley, riding and exploring, and Charles fished daily along the stream. She worried about Fred, though. He rose at dawn and drove himself until after dusk, fencing, clearing, cutting wood, tending stock and riding out to locate stands of wood suitable for ties. He seemed distracted and barely noticed Edith or the children. Edith put his odd behavior down to the enormous amount of work he was doing and hoped it would change. . . |
