six o'clock
No man in these mountains could have so much as kept him in sight , saving alone Swen Brodie , and he was left far back yonder , miles on the other , lower , side of the ridge . By mid-forenoon King had outstripped the springtime and was among snow patches which grew in frequency and extent ; at noon he built his little fire on a snow crust . He crossed a raging tributary of the American , travelling upward along the rock-bound , spray-wet gorge a full mile before he came to the possible precarious ford . At six o'clock he made a second fire in a bleak windy pass , surrounded by a glimmering ghostly waste . Trees were stiff with frost ; the wind whistled and jeered through them and about sharp crags , filling the crisp air with eerie , shuddersome music . He set his coffee to boil while meditating that down in the Sacramento Valley , which one could glimpse from here by day , it was stifling hot , like midsummer . He rested by his fire with his canvas drawn up about his shoulders , smoked his pipe , remade his pack , and went on .