“Oh, you have to come out,” she said, pleading. “You have to come out, there’s too much fog.”

“Why don’t you come in?” Morrison said. That would be easier to handle. Maybe she’d been into something, if that was all it was he could wait it out. He’d been cautious himself; it was a small place and the local pusher was likely to be one of your own students; also he had no desire to reduce his mind to oatmeal mush.

“No,” she said, “I can’t go through this door any more. It’s wrong. You have to come out.” Her face became crafty, as though she was planning. “It will do you good to get out for a walk,” she said reasonably.

She was right, he didn’t get enough exercise. He pulled on his heavy boots and went to find his coat.

As they creaked and slid along the street Louise was pleased with herself, triumphant; she walked slightly ahead of him as if determined to keep the lead. The ice fog surrounded them, deadened their voices, it was crystallizing like a growth of spruce needles on the telephone wires and the branches of the few trees which he could not help thinking of as stunted, though to the natives, he supposed, they must represent the normal size for trees. He took care not to breathe too deeply. A flock of grosbeaks whirred and shrilled up ahead, picking the last few red berries from a mountain ash.

“I’m glad it isn’t sunny,” Louise said. “The sun was burning out the cells in my brain, but I feel a lot better now.”

Morrison glanced at the sky. The sun was up there somewhere, marked by a pale spot in the otherwise evenly spread grey. He checked an impulse to shield his eyes and thereby protect his brain cells: he realized it was an attempt to suppress the undesired knowledge that Louise was disturbed or, out with it, she was crazy.

“Living here isn’t so bad,” Louise said, skipping girlishly on the hard-packed snow. “You just have to have inner resources. I’m glad I have them; I think I have more than you, Morrison. I have more than most people. That’s what I said to myself when I moved here.”