The argument was settled, for every man of them knew that nothing could turn Boone back from a thing once begun.
Yet there were muttered comments that drew Black Morgan Gandil and Bud Mansie together.
And Gandil, from the South Seas, growled with averted eyes: "This is the most fool stunt the chief has ever pulled." "Right, pal," answered Mansie.

"You take a snake in out of the cold, and it bites you when it comes to in the warmth; but the chief has started, and there ain't nothing that'll make him stop, except maybe God or McGurk." And Black Gandil answered with his evil, sudden grin: "Maybe McGurk, but not God." They started on again with Garry Patterson and Dick Wilbur riding close on either side of Pierre, supporting his limp body.

It delayed the whole gang, for they could not go on faster than a jog-trot.

The wind, however, was falling off in violence.

Its shrill whistling ceased, at length, and they went on, accompanied only by the harsh crunching of the snow underfoot..