“A fifth-year student of the Faculty of Philology was walking along the odd side of the street. Every now and then he slows down his steps, looking past the snow-covered poplars, over the snowdrifts, across the compacted road at the facades. And finally, through the slowly falling snow, he distinguished two black numbers on a white square on a motley wall, as if wounded animals on a freezing lake. Placing the briefcase at his feet - his boots were swollen from the adhering snow - the student took off his gloves, finger by finger, and put them in his pockets , unbuttoned the top buttons of the heavy coat and took out a note with an address from the hot depths of the jacket - the scarf then came out and bulged..."