The story begins with the nameless main character, referred to simply as “the man”, on the Yukon Trail. He finds himself in the middle of a cold and isolated environment. The ground is covered in snow, and it is ‑75 degrees F. The man is a Yukon newcomer who is travelling alone with his dog. They are going to a camp where the man will join his companions. The man thinks happily of his lunch and looks forward to finding his friends at night. He doesn’t mind the cold, even if the ice has frozen his lips together.
On the other hand, the dog senses the danger posed by the extreme cold. He expects the man to find shelter or make a fire. The omniscient narrator also comments on the threat in the man’s limited vision and lack of understanding.
The man walks along a frozen stream and notices water running into the ice, which forms puddles where he could get very wet if he falls through. The man knows that wet feet will cause problems and delay his journey, but he does not fully consider the danger of wet feet. Nevertheless, he is careful as he walks across the ice. At one point, he forces his dog to walk across the dangerous ice, and it breaks in. The dog climbs out, and the water freezes on his legs and paws. The dog bites off the ice, and the man helps him free his paws.
By midday, the man is satisfied with his progress. He sits down and tries to eat his lunch but is shocked to realize that his hands have gone numb and his lips are too frozen. He admits that he should build a fire. The man remembers how “a man from Sulphur Creek” had warned him about the cold, but he had ignored the danger. Slowly, he builds a fire and eats lunch. After smoking a pipe, he sets off again. The dog enjoys the warm fire and is reluctant to leave it. The dog’s instinct tells him they shouldn’t be out in the cold but must find shelter.
The man and the dog continue up the stream until the man falls into a pool and is soaked up to his knees. He is angry but not scared. He needs to make a fire to dry his socks and moccasins. Slowly, he builds a fire with grass, bark, and larger sticks. The narrator explains that a man needs to warm up quickly when his feet are wet at this low temperature. The man also knows this because the old Sulphur Creek man told him so. He also has no feeling in his feet and numb hands. Now that he is no longer walking, he can feel the cold. He is surprised at how quickly his hands go numb, and his face freezes, but the man is confident about his growing fire. He plans to warm his moccasins and feet there. He thinks back to the older man at Sulphur Creek and laughs at his warning that one should not travel alone in this cold. He is confident that he has saved himself.
But disaster takes its course. The man has built his fire under a tree whose branches are covered in snow. When he pulls the sticks loose, he dislodges some of the snow. The snow falls from all the branches onto his fire in a cascade effect. It extinguishes the fire. The man finally begins to realize that he is in danger. He wonders if he should have brought a companion on the journey who could have built a second fire, but he must try to build another fire himself. He makes a pile of dry grass, sticks and branches in an open area. The dog anxiously looks on as he depends on the man building a fire. The man tries to find his piece of tree bark but can’t. He realizes his feet are freezing and flaps his hands until he feels enough to see his bark. He is jealous of the dog’s warm fur as he struggles to light a match. But his hands are too numb, and he drops them all in the snow. He even tries to light one with his teeth, but he coughs and drops it in the snow.
The man becomes more and more desperate. He burns all seventy matches at once. He tries to light the tree bark and burns his hands in the process. Finally, he lights the bark and tries to start the fire with his teeth and hands. But he accidentally scatters the fire, and it goes out. The man sees that the dog is looking at him uneasily. He decides to kill the dog and use its warm body to thaw his hands. He calls the dog, but the dog hears a strange, frightened tone in his voice and won’t obey. He crawls towards the dog, but it backs away. The man forces himself to stand up, which calms the dog so much that the man can grab him with his arms because his hands are too frozen. He realizes that his hands are too frozen to kill the dog anyway. Even beating his hands for five minutes does not bring back the feeling.
The man now knows that his life is in danger. Full of fear, he runs up the stream bed, the dog following him. He wavers between hoping to run to the camp and knowing he is too frozen to make it. He can’t even feel his feet as he runs. He falls and feels warm and comfortable, although he has no feeling in his face either. He is frightened by this and continues running but falls a second time. He is annoyed by the dog’s apparent warmth, shouts at him and starts running again. This time, he only makes it about a hundred meters before falling. At this point, the man accepts his impending death. He imagines himself as one of the “boys” coming down the trail and finding his body in the snow. In his mind, the man tells the older man in Sulphur Creek that he is right. He falls into a peaceful sleep as he freezes to death. The dog is confused for a while, and he does not understand why the man did not make a fire. Eventually, it realizes that the man is dead and goes in search of other people to give it food and warmth.
