I shouted “Driver! Alyoshka!” but my voice I felt was caught up by the wind out of my very mouth and in one second carried far away from me. I went in the direction where the sledge had been⁠—there was no sledge there. I went to the right, it was not there. I am ashamed when I remember the loud, shrill, almost despairing, voice in which I shouted once more, “Driver!” when he was only a couple of paces from me. His black figure, with his whip and his huge hat flapping down on one side, suddenly started up before me. He led me to the sledge.

“We must be thankful, too, that it’s warm,” said he; “if the frost gets sharp, it’s a bad lookout.⁠ ⁠… Lord, ’a’ mercy!”

“Let the horses go, let them take us back,” I said, settling myself in the sledge. “They’ll take us back, driver, eh?”

“They ought to.”