snow. Hibbert watched and waited.

And in the morning the world lay smothered beneath its fresh white
carpet. It snowed heavily till noon, thickly, incessantly, chokingly, a
foot or more; then the sky cleared, the sun came out in splendour, the
wind shifted back to the east, and frost came down upon the mountains
with its keenest and most biting tooth. The drop in the temperature was
tremendous, but the ski-ers were jubilant. Next day the "running" would
be fast and perfect. Already the mass was settling, and the surface
freezing into those moss-like, powdery crystals that make the ski run
almost of their own accord with the faint "sishing" as of a bird's wings
through the air.




IV


That night there was excitement in the little hotel-world, first because
there was a _bal costume_, but chiefly because the new snow had come.
And Hibbert went--felt drawn to go; he did not go in costume, but he
wanted to talk about the slopes and ski-ing with the other men, and at
the same time....

Ah, there was the truth, the deeper necessity that called. For the
singular connection between the stranger and the snow again betrayed
itself, utterly beyond explanation as before, but vital and insistent.
Some hidden instinct in his pagan soul--heaven knows how he phrased it
even to himself, if he phrased it at all--whispered that with the snow