The snow must have been falling for several hours, for it was already deep in the path. He went on in constant fear of losing his way along the precipices. The path led through two or three tunnels cut out of the rock a little beyond the summit of the pass. The obscurity of these tunnels was so intense that he was blinded as in the depths of some cavern. He held his cane forward in his right hand, his left arm, with the satchel, stretched out, and went along tapping. He plunged at each step into the puddles of water that dripped through the rocks, and could feel the rush of the outer air at the other end long before he got his sight again. Such obstacles as these along the road only hardened his courage. Young people must have tests; they seek out love more from the eager desire of living than from voluptuous fancy. Maurice did not suffer from his losses, though he had lost everything, and was leaving his happiness behind him, reduced to the status of a beggar. He struggled bravely against the cold and snow, the night and fear, but the combat kept him warm. Day spread round him gradually, but he profited little by it, for the white mist of falling snow-flakes flowed round him like the sea around an island. This route he travelled, so picturesque on clear days, with its view of the Bernese Alps, the Aletsch glacier, the magnificent and varied spurs of the Rhone valley, seemed to him like a road cut through hills of cotton-wool. Sometimes a pine tree, laden with hoar-frost, would loom up at the path’s edge, ten steps away from him, having passed which he would search for some other landmark and go on. Tediously and monotonously he came at last to Brieg. It was the end of the heroic period of his journey. The day in the railway carriage was long and uncomfortable, in spite of the nearer and nearer approach to his native countryside. He left the train about six in the evening at Viviers, which is the station next to Chambéry. A foolish fear of being recognised and arrested when he should arrive at Chambéry suggested this plan to him. He set out for home on foot, therefore, from Viviers by the Aix road. It passed the Calvary of Lemenc, which rose above him at one point, and he stopped near it, thinking of his love. “Edith,” he sighed. It came over him how far these days had separated him from her already, and, as he still loved her, he grieved within himself for his cruelty to her. He moved nearer to the railing that protected the rock-hewn road along the hillside. The lights of Chambéry shone out, and he took his bearings. His impulse was to go to his mother first, but he found the graveyard closed, and could not get in. From there by various back routes he reached his father’s house. A clock struck eight. He was chilled and hungry: where should he go if not home? With beating heart he pressed the bell. A new maid opened the door for him, and instead of entering freely, he had to ask admittance formally, like a stranger.