. Stephen stood for an instant, then came
back to the hearth.

"Talbot!" he said, standing in front of him.

The other looked up. "Well?"

"Come with me. Help me to find her and bring her back."

Talbot compressed his lips.

"Aren't you capable of managing your own 'wife yourself?" he asked.

"You have so much influence with her," said Stephen, pleadingly.

"I suppose I only have that influence because I am not quite a fool,"
returned Talbot angrily, commencing to pull off his slippers.

He was angry with Stephen, and feeling excessively wearied and
disinclined for further effort. He hated to turn out again, and his
whole physical system was craving for food and rest. But he was not the
man to resist an appeal in which he saw another's whole soul was
thrown, and angry and annoyed as he was with Stephen, he still disliked
the idea of letting his friend go out alone in the Arctic night on such
an errand. It seemed to him supremely ridiculous for Stephen to have to
call in another man's aid in these personal matters, but then he was
more than twice Stephen's age, and had got into the habit of making
excuses for him. So, tired and exhausted though he was, he dragged on
his frozen boots again, and prepared to accompany Stephen.

"You'd better have some of this first," he said, pouring out a cup of
the coffee he had made, which stood ready on the stove.

They each took a cup standing, and then turned out of the cabin, locking
the door behind them. The atmosphere and aspect, the whole face of the
night, had changed since the girl started. The fog had lifted itself and
rolled away somewhere in the darkness. The air was now clear and keen
as the edge of steel. The stars were of a piercing brilliance, and all
along the black horizon flickered and leaped a faint rosy light. The two
men, stiff, tired, and aching, took much longer to accomplish the
distance than the girl had done with her light, eager feet, and when
they got down to the town the night was well on its way. At the bottom
of Good Luck Row, which is, as explained already, one of the first
streets you come to, on the edge of the town, they halted and took
counsel as to where they would be most likely to find the object of
their search.

"Perhaps she's gone up to the 'Pistol Shot,'" suggested Stephen. "We'd
better go up to old Poniatovsky."

"She hasn't come down to see her father, I should imagine," remarked
Talbot, in his dryest tone.

But Stephen persis