What was to be done? The blockhouse was the solution.
We stopped at a primitive cafe and lunched. Jo gave the children some
chocolate. They did not know what it was. She smeared some on to the
baby's lips, and after that it sucked hard. Soon the little girl licked
hers; but the boy, more suspicious, would not eat, holding the lump till
it melted into a sticky mass in his fingers. The scenery was very
beautiful. There was a faint rain which greyed everything, and the near
birches had lost all their leaves and the twigs made a reddish fog
through which could be seen the slopes of the opposite hillsides. The
professor began to be worried about the rain.
"If this should turn to snow," said he, "we would be snowed up. And I am
sure I don't know what I should do if I were snowed up."
We hoped to reach our halting place, which was called Vrbitza, before
dark; but it was further away than our informant had said. Once more we
found ourselves floundering about in the mud of the village path after
dusk.
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