It was snow too that fell all Christmas week that year up in the Gauertal, that year
they lived in the woodcutter's house with the big square porcelain stove that filled half the
room, and they slept on mattresses filled with beech leaves, the time the deserter came
with his feet bloody in the snow. He said the police were right behind him and they gave
him woolen socks and held the gendarmes talking until the tracks had drifted over.