The wind had risen and the snow, half turned to sleet, was now beating furiously into their faces. It was all they could do to keep their feet. They struggled on after their guide as best they could, till he turned out of the high road into a lane; and thankful were they when he stopped, and, pushing open a gate that creaked on rusty hinges, led them up a narrow, gravelled pathway to a small, bare house, flanked on either side by some dreary bushes of evergreens. In answer to his peremptory knock, the door was opened by a man slighter and shorter than himself, but sufficiently like him to be known as his brother, and the travellers staggered in--the door, with a heavy crash, blowing to behind them. Perhaps now for the first time it really struck Babette that she had been headstrong in persisting in her journey, and in trusting herself and child to the mercy of utter strangers so far from home. The same thought passed through the old pedlar's mind, but it was too late to retreat, so they silently followed their new host and his brother. They went down a passage and into a room, half kitchen, half parlour, snugly and even comfortably furnished. [Illustration: "A MAN AND A WOMAN SAT OVER THE FIRE."] Heavy wooden shutters dulled the noise of the boisterous gale outside. A thick red curtain hung over the door, and a cheery log fire burnt in the stove. A man and woman sat over it; the man, a tall, repulsive-looking creature, with unkempt hair and matted beard, his age apparently about fifty. The woman looked seventy or more. She too had once been tall, but now old age gave her a withered, witch-like appearance, in spite of her great height. She was dressed in limp, faded garments, with a tattered shawl crossed over her chest, and had a scared, miserable look in her bleared old eyes. There were a few words of explanation from the man who had come home, and then, in gruff but not unkindly tones, he bade Babette be seated, and told his mother to get some supper speedily. She spread a coarse cloth on the wooden table, and when all was ready, lifted a large black saucepan from the stove and turned out a smoking, savoury-looking stew. The youngest son produced a bottle containing the thin acid wine of the country, and another of spirits. As he set them on the table, Babette noticed that across one of his hands, which were much smaller and whiter than those of his brothers, there ran a dull red scar that looked as if he had had a bad cut there. Then they all sat down, excepting the old mother, who busied herself in waiting on them. "It's the last good meal you'll get for some time, I'm thinking," she croaked, as she watched them devouring their supper, "unless you turn to and find more work than you've done lately. The landlord called for his rent again to-day and swore he would wait no longer, but turn us out if we did not pay in three days' time."