He remembered that, about a mile from Overdale, the coachman had pointed out the road to Northridge; and he began to walk in that direction.  Once in the road, he had the gale in his face, and the wet snow on his moustache and eye-lashes instantly hardened to metal.  The same metal seemed to be driving a million blades into his throat and lungs, but he pushed on, desperately determined, the vision of the warm room pursuing him.

The snow in the road was deep and uneven.  He stumbled across ruts and sank into drifts, and the wind rose before him like a granite cliff.  Now and then he stopped, gasping, as if an invisible hand had tightened an iron band about his body; then he started again, stiffening himself against the stealthy penetration of the cold.  The snow continued to descend out of a pall of inscrutable darkness, and once or twice he paused, fearing he had missed the road to Northridge; but, seeing no sign of a turn, he ploughed on doggedly.

At last, feeling sure that he had walked for more than a mile, he halted and looked back.  The act of turning brought immediate relief, first because it put his back to the wind, and then because, far down the road, it showed him the advancing gleam of a lantern.  A sleigh was coming—­a sleigh that might perhaps give him a lift to the village!  Fortified by the hope, he began to walk back toward the light.  It seemed to come forward very slowly, with unaccountable zigzags and waverings; and even when he was within a few yards of it he could catch no sound of sleigh-bells.  Then the light paused and became stationary by the roadside, as though carried by a pedestrian who had stopped, exhausted by the cold.  The thought made Faxon hasten on, and a moment later he was stooping over a motionless figure huddled against the snow-bank.  The lantern had dropped from its bearer’s hand, and Faxon, fearfully raising it, threw its light into the face of Frank Rainer.

“Rainer!  What on earth are you doing here!”

The boy smiled back through his pallor.  “What are you, I’d like to know?” he retorted; and, scrambling to his feet with a clutch on Faxon’s arm, he added gaily:  “Well, I’ve run you down, anyhow!”

Faxon stood confounded, his heart sinking.  The lad’s face was gray.

“What madness—­” he began.

“Yes, it is.  What on earth did you do it for?”

“I?  Do what? ...  Why, I ...  I was just taking a walk. ...  I often walk at night. ...”

Frank Rainer burst into a laugh.  “On such nights?  Then you hadn’t bolted!”

“Bolted?”

“Because I’d done something to offend you?  My uncle thought you had.”

Faxon grasped his arm.  “Did your uncle send you after me?”

“Well, he gave me an awful rowing for not going up to your room with you when you said you were ill.  And when we found you’d gone we were frightened—­and he was awfully upset—­so I said I’d catch you. ...  You’re not ill, are you?”