"Is that you, Józef?"
"Yes; how are you?" a voice, hoarse with the frost, cried from a distance; and presently a man of middle height, dressed in fur from head to foot, emerged from the darkness. "What are you doing, you silly fellow, standing out here in a blouse in cold like this? You are certain to catch pneumonia."
"And why not?... A year sooner or later——"
"All very fine! But I confess to you, Stefan, I shouldn't like to die here. One can't even decay like a human being; one would have to lie here for centuries like an ice statue, while the dogs would howl and howl——"
"Well, they are howling unbearably now; it's as if they scented something. They are worse than ever to-day."
"They are certain to smell something; in the town they say that the Chukchee are encamping here, and I have just come to tell you of it. But let us go indoors; it's terribly cold, worse than it has yet been this year."
They went in. Stefan lighted the fire and busied himself with getting tea ready; Józef threw off his furs and paced up and down the room with long strides.
"I say! This news is not quite without importance for us."
"What?"
"That they have come."