frosty faint cumulous structures , cloud traces of the ghastly face powder that every old lady in those years dusted liberally over themselves , clung in a gossamer film to what looked like dewlaps , yes , dewlaps for certain , on a great white wattle of a neck , the convoluted crevasses into which no party of skiers would dare to playfully trail their poles , for those were polar inclines of unimaginable peril .