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that you just didn't joke about. Most of us had our weak point, some obsession dear to our hearts, and men learnt not to talk lightly of these things.
    'I tell you,' repeated Heide, 'that bastard's got it coming to him.'
    'You bet!' said Porta, clapping him on the shoulder. You'll . get him all right, don't you worry.'
    Turkey! We could hardly believe our luck when we learntthat we were within easy reach of the border. It seemed toogood to be true. Within seconds of hearing the news we wereindulging in our usual wild flights of sexual fancy. We dreamt of brothels and harems, of belly-dancing and of exoticwomen.
    Within easy reach of the border! So near, and yet so very far. ... It seemed too good to be true: it was good to be true. Our fantasies were short-lived. There was no way of crossing the frontier ...
    We left the village as we had entered it, Alte driving the dog team, the rest of us on skis, Heide cursing the mangy yellow cur. The only difference was that now we had a prisoner to accompany us on our long trek.

CHAPTER FOUR
    T HE dogs were exhausted. They stretched out, panting, in the snow, their flanks heaving, their tongues lolling. It was plain for all to see that we were an inexperienced crew when it came to handling dog teams. Even Alte, the all-wise, was by no means an expert. He was a miller by profession, and doubtless a most excellent one. He was a soldier by necessity. A first-class soldier. He loved the former and he loathed the latter. As for the dog team, he did his best and certainly he handled them better than the rest of us could have done, but the fact remained, the dogs were exhausted.
    We ourselves were in no better state. The country was hostile. It breathed hostility in every fresh gust of wind. We felt it every minute of the day, and we felt that it was slowly destroying us. We fought and bickered amongst ourselves, we moaned ceaselessly, spirits were low and tempers generally were at breaking point. That very morning Little John and Heide had fought each other with bare fists and in bitter silence for more than twenty minutes. Heide's nose was battered to a raw bleeding pulp. It had been left to Alte to end the fight by threatening the two combatants with his revolver. There was never any question of his using it, and both Little John and Heide were well aware of the fact, but there was more authority in Alte's quiet voice than in a whole regiment of sergeant majors. The fighting ceased, although the abuse continued. They threatened each other with death, and they seemed to mean it.
    One of the dogs was limping badly and in obvious pain. It was decided to put an end to its misery, and Little John offered to do the job. He slit the creature's throat from ear to ear, grinning all the while like a maniac. When we protested, he rounded furiously upon us.
    'Why shouldn't I enjoy it? It wasn't the dog I was killing, it was Julius Heide and his insane prejudices!'
    We pushed on with the rest of the team. Quite suddenly, for no apparent reason, Alte pulled to a halt at the top of a small slope. We hurried up to him and stared ahead in amazement. 'Allah!' said the Legionnaire, wonderingly. 'It looks like the sea.'
    "That's impossible.'
    'What is it, then?'
    We checked the map, we checked the compass, and when we looked again the sea was still there, in all its miraculous impossibility. Alte shook his head. He had not mistaken the route we were taking, and the sea was hundreds of miles away. Or should have been.
    'Strange,' said Porta. 'I'd have sworn it was only about thirty metres ahead of us.'
    'It is.'
    'What the hell is it, then?'
    'A lake?'
    'Which lake?' said the Legionnaire.
    We turned back to the map. No lake was indicated.
    'I don't understand it,' confessed Alte.
    We stood in a line, silently contemplating the vast expanse of frozen water.
    'A marsh?' suggested the Professor, squinting through the one remaining lens of his spectacles: the other had been broken days before hi one of his