The keeper lighted a small fire and shyly attended to the ladies, removing their snow-shoes with clumsy fingers.

He closed the door, and arranged a branch of larch across the window so that they could stand near it without being seen.
They had not been there long before De Chauxville appeared.

He moved quickly across the clearing, skimming over the snow with long, sweeping strides.

Two keepers followed him, and after having shown him the rough hiding-place prepared for him, silently withdrew to their places.

Soon Karl Steinmetz came from another direction, and took up his position rather nearer to the hut, in a thicket of pine and dwarf oak.