"I smoke at home. I mean I did. It's getting to be the thing to do among the girls I know. Someway, the thought of it doesn't seem interesting any more."
"Did you—really enjoy it then? If you did, I'll split my store with you. You've got as much right to it as I." The man spoke rather heavily.
"I didn't think I did enjoy it. I did it—I suppose because it seemed sporting. It never made me feel peaceful—only nervous. I don't believe tobacco is a temperamental need with women as it is with some men—otherwise it wouldn't have taken so many centuries to establish the custom. It would only—seem silly, up here."
He had an impression that she was speaking very softly. The quality of absolute and omnipresent silence had passed from the wilderness. There was a low stir, a faint murmur that at first was so far off and vague that neither of them could name it.
But slowly the sound grew. The tree tops, silent before with snow, gave utterance; the thickets cracked, stirred, and moved as if some dread spirit were coming to life within them. The candle flickered. A low moan reached them from the chimney. Bill strode to the door and threw it wide.
He did not have to peer out into that unfathomable darkness to know the enemy that was at his gates. It spoke in a sudden fury, and the snow flurries swept past, like strange and wandering spirits, in the dim candle light. No longer the flakes drifted easily and silently down. They seemed to be coming from all directions, whirling, eddying, borne swiftly through the night and hurled into drifts. And a dread voice spoke across the snow.
"The north wind," Bill said simply.
Virginia's eyes grew wide. She sensed the awe and the dread in his tones; even she, fresh from cities, knew that this foe was not to be despised. She felt the sharp pinch of the cold as the heat escaped through the open door. The temperature was falling steadily; already it was far below freezing. Bill shut the door and walked back to her.
"What does it mean?" she asked breathlessly.
"Winter. The northern winter. I've seen it break too many times. Perhaps we can drown out the sound of it—with music."