"Now go to bed.

You are tired.

Good night." Left alone, she walked up to the window, and stood there looking into the street.

Outside it was cold and cheerless.

The wind howled, blowing the snow from the roofs of the little sleeping houses.
Striking against the walls and whispering something, quickly it fell upon the ground and drifted the white clouds of dry snowflakes across the street.
"O Christ in heaven, have mercy upon us!" prayed the mother.
The tears began to gather in her eyes, as fear returned persistently to her heart, and like a moth in the night she seemed to see fluttering the woe of which her son spoke with such composure and assurance.
Before her eyes as she gazed a smooth plain of snow spread out in the distance.