The glass roof of my bedroom is as heavy as a coffin-lid.  I sleep with my window open, and when there comes a blast of wind my eyes are filled with snow.  This morning, when I woke, my pillow-case was as wet as though I had been crying all night.

Torp already sees us in imagination snowed up and receiving our food supplies down the chimney.  She is preparing for the occasion.  Her hair smells as though she had been singeing chickens, and she has illuminated the basement with small lamps and red shades edged with pearl fringes.

Jeanne is equally enchanted.  When she goes outside without a hat her hair looks like a burning torch against the snow.  She does not speak, but hums to herself, and walks more lightly and softly than ever, as though she feared to waken some sleeper.

...  I remember how Malthe and I were once talking about Greece, and he gave me an account of a snowstorm in Delphi.  I cannot recall a word of his description; I was not listening, but just thinking how the snow would melt when it fell upon his head.

He has fulfilled my request not to write.  I have not had a line since his only letter came.  And yet....

* * * * *

I have burnt his letter.

I have burnt his letter.  A few ashes are all that remain to me.

It hurts me to look at the ashes.  I cannot make up my mind to throw them away.

I have got rid of the ashes.  It was harder than I thought.  Even now I am restless.

* * * * *

I am glad the letter is destroyed.  Now I am free at last.  My temptations were very natural.

The last few days I have spent in bed.  Jeanne is an excellent nurse.  She makes as much fuss of me as though I were really ill, and I enjoy it.

* * * * *

The Nirvana of age is now beginning.  In the morning, when Jeanne brushes my hair, I feel a kind of soothing titillation which lasts all day.  I do not trouble about dressing; I wear no jewellery and never look in the glass.

Very often I feel as though my thoughts had come to a standstill, like a watch one has forgotten to wind up.  But this blank refreshes me.

Weeks have gone by since I wrote in my diary.  Several times I have tried to do so; but when I have the book in front of me, I find I have nothing to set down.

In the twilight I sit by the fire like an old child and talk to myself.  Then Torp comes to me for the orders which she ends by giving herself, and I let her talk to me about her own affairs.  The other day I got her on the subject of spooks.  She is full of ghost stories, and relates them with such conviction that her teeth chatter with terror.  Happy Torp, to possess such imagination!

Some days I hardly budge from one position, and can with difficulty force myself to leave my table; at other times I feel the need of incessant movement.  The forest is very quiet, scarcely a soul walks there.  If I do chance to meet anyone, we glare at each other like two wild beasts, uncertain whether to attack or to flee from each other.