noon
It was filled with something more grim , something that tightened his muscles , kept him ceaselessly alert . He would come on DeBar -- and there would be a fight . DeBar would not be taken by surprise . At noon he halted and built a small fire between two rocks , over which he boiled some tea and warmed his meat . Each day he had built three fires , but at the end of this day , when darkness stopped him again , it occurred to him that since that morning DeBar had built but one . Gray dawn had scarcely broken when he again took up the pursuit . It was bitterly cold , and a biting wind swept down across the barrens from the Arctic icebergs .