noon
She was a common creature . Such very little things could make her happy . She sang as she worked ; and what with the drumming of her boy , and the little exulting shrieks of her baby , the shack was filled with a deafening and exhilarating din . It was a little past noon , when she became conscious that there was sweeping down on her a gray sheet of snow and ice , and not till then did she realize what those lowering clouds had signified . For one moment she stood half paralyzed . She thought of everything , -- of the cattle , of the chance for being buried in this drift , of the stock of provisions , of the power of endurance of the children . While she was still thinking , the first ice-needles of the blizzard came peppering the windows .