The World In Ermine

The weather man, in his office in the desert city, looked out of his window on a bright mid-November day. The sunshine was translucent silver and the sky a fathomless vault of infinite blue. Not a cloud, not even a vapor trail, disturbed the radiance of the mid-November day.

He turned to his charts and there the friendly and familiar symbols told him the weather story all the way from the stormy Aleutians to the snowclad Rockies. His immediate concern, though, was to predict the weather in the high country of northern and eastern Arizona. The prediction had to be made soon so that the afternoon broadcast could carry the tidings to thousands of listeners deeply and vitally concerned.

The nip of winter had already been felt in the high country. Maverick, that strange, weather-wise, lumber camp in the Whites, reported the first frost as early as mid-September. But all the following days had been clear and bright and crispy until just a few days ago when the skies had turned gray and somber.

In the forest regions of the high country all was still and silent. The summer birds and the summer vacationers had long since fled to warmer climes. A herd of deer, led by a many-antlered old patriarch, had left the higher elevations and was browsing its wise way to the green valley below.

The highway maintenance foreman in the mountain camp was once again inspecting the snow equipment to be sure all was in readiness for the first snowfall of the season when it came. It was his duty to circumvent any whims of the weather, to keep the road open and safe. The sky above him was heavy, dark and ominous and a sense of urgency gripped him as he went about his duties. Elsewhere on the mountain road a highway patrolman, cruising along, felt the same sense of urgency. Snow could bring trouble. A few years before the first snowfall came early. Then the storm passed and the thaw left the road icy and dangerous and it was then he had to help a battered and despairing family out of a deep ravine. As he drove along he passed the area where the fire had struck the summer before. Where once were tall, green trees there were only black stumps and ugly desolation. That very minute the sky was a listless, dark mantle hanging heavily over San Francisco Peaks. The operator of the ski run hoped the snow would fall, bringing the skiers early to the ski run. May it not be like last year, he thought wryly, when skiing wasn't good until the middle of January.

As the afternoon grew older all over the high country many pair of eyes were watching the skies. All were concerned - ranchers, sheep herders, lumbermen, motel operators, travelers, forest rangers, school children, their parents and their teachers. Concerned, perhaps most of all, were the railroad people at McNary. A heavy snowfall could close the spur to Maverick and that little community would be isolated and alone all winter long, except for helicopter. Radios were turned on for the late afternoon weather broadcasts. The weather man in the desert city, after a careful study of all the reports, had made his decision. Possible snowfall over the mountain regions of northern and eastern Arizona. They all heard it. Those living in the high country, and, with the wisdom brought by many winters, went about their business with resignation touched with expectancy. During the night the snow came the first snowfall of the season silent, fluffy, steady. The next morning all the high country was dressed in a cloak of ermine so thick and rich it even covered the black, ugly scar in the forest left by the cruel fire the summer before.