Publisher's Synopsis
Vassili Andreitch Brekhounov, a rich merchant, is not the man to let a good deal pass: one winter afternoon, he decides to visit a neighbor to negotiate the purchase of a forest, despite the storm of raging snow. Nikita, her old servant, accompanies her. But the two men soon get lost and what should have been just an incident gradually takes on the proportions of a drama: master and servant understand that death awaits them, in the night and in the cold.
