Page:Karel Čapek - The Absolute at Large (1927).djvu/184

 "Marek, Engineer"—he repeated the address to himself. "Well, he certainly don't belong to these parts. But a telegram's urgent, you never know what it's about—one of his family, maybe, or something important"

The storm calmed down a little, and the messenger struck out across the Maiden's Bridge and up along the stream. The snow crunched under his heavy boots, and his feet were frightfully cold. Once more the wind began to howl, and great lumps of snow fell from the trees; the messenger caught a full load of it on his head and under his scarf; a trickle of icy water ran down his back. But what plagued him most was that his feet were slipping wickedly on the hardened snow, and his path now ran steeply up the slope. Next moment he was caught in a hurricane of snow. Like a white wall it came crashing down upon him. Before the messenger had a chance to turn, he got the full force of it in his face; he bent forward with the utmost effort, gasping for breath. He took a step upward and fell. Then he sat up with his back to the wind, but he was seized with a dread of being buried by the snow. He got up and tried to scramble on, but slipped again, fell on both hands, pulled himself up again, but slid backward a good way. He held on to the trees to steady himself, breathing heavily. "Curse it," he said to himself, "I've got to get up there somehow."