"You can't see," answered the voice softly, "because, my man of bones, you are dead and buried under the snow."
Nod grew cold. He pinched his legs; he opened and shut his mouth, and took long, deep breaths; then he laughed. "It's none so bad, then, being dead, Voice-of-Kindness," he said cheerfully, "if it weren't for this sore shoulder of mine."
But to this the morose voice made no answer. Not yet, even, could Nod remember all that had happened. "Hey, there!" he called out again presently, "who buried me, then?"
"Buried you? Why, Mishcha and Môha, the old witch-hares, who found you snuffling in the snow in your stolen sheep's-coat—Mishcha and Môha, who wouldn't touch monkey-skin, not for a grove of green Candar-trees."
"I remember Môha," said Nod meekly, "a gentle and sleek, a very, very handsome old Quatta. And is she dead, too?"
But again the sour voice made no reply.
"Once," said Nod, in a little while, "I had two brave brothers. I wonder where those Mulla-mulgars are now?"
"He wonders," said the voice slowly—"he wonders! Frizzling, frizzling, frizzling, my pretty Talk-by-Night, with seven smoking Gelica-nuts for company on the spit."
At this Nod fell silent. He lay quaking in his warm, rustling bed, with puckered forehead and restless eyes, wondering if the voice had told him the truth, while daybreak stole abroad in the forest.
When dusk began to stir within the Dragon-tree, Mishcha awoke and came and looked at him.