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"She said she would be straight ahead," said Diamond to himself. "This must be the place." He could reach th erock with only short leap.

He found a narrow, stony path that wound up into the moutain. After a little while it went into a small valley cut into the side of the slope. The floor of this valley was a long sheet of ice. At the far end a sharp ridge of rock and ice stretched across the width of the valley. In the middle of this ridge was a gap. Just before this gap was what looked like a person sitting. As Diamond came closer and closer he saw who it was.

"This must be the place"

"North Wind!" he cried. "At her doorstep." He ran up to her. But suddenly he stopped and stared. Her face was as white as the snow, her eyes as blue as the air. She sat very still, her arms drooping. She was staring ahead but didn't seem to see Diamond.

Finally, his voice trembling, Diamond said, "North Wind?"

"Well, child?" she said faintly, her lips hardly moving.

"Are you ill, North Wind?"

"No. I am waiting."

"What for?"

"Until I'm wanted."

"You don't care for me anymore," said Diamond, about to cry.

"Yes, I do," she said. "Only I can't show it. All my love is down at the bottom of my heart. But I feel it bubbling there."

"What do you want me to do next?"

"What do you want to do yourself?"

"To go into the country at your back."

"Then you must go through me."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I mean just what I say. You must walk on as if I were an open door and go right through me."

"But that will hurt you!" Diamond said.

He could touch nothing.

A few clumsy steps more and his legs wouldn't move.

"Not in the least," she said. "It will hurt you, though."

"I don't mind that, if you tell me to do it."

"Do it," she said, very faintly.

Diamond stepped up to her and out out his hand. He could touch nothing. His heart pounding, he walked on. Suddenly the cold stabbed into him. All around him was nothing but blinding whiteness. He stumbled ahead, gasping in pain from the cold. A few clumsy steps more and his legs wouldn't move. Then he was falling forward, feeling nothing, falling, falling, falling.

He woke and sat up. The cold was gone. He was lying in a meadow of soft, sweet-smelling grass, full of bright red and yellow flowers. A little stream flowed softly through the meadow. Its bed was not pebbles or mud, but only the meadow grass, which wafted gently in the slow current.

Nearby were trees, tall and thick and deep green. The leaves were so full that Diamond could see no branches. A gentle breeze stirred the trees and the meadow grass. As Diamond stood up he felt the breeze on his face. It was neither warm nor cold. It felt just right, he thought.

He could see no sun in the sky, yet there was bright, golden light. As diamond slowly wandered along the stream he began to hear, or to think he heard, a quiet, peaceful song from somehwere. He stood still for a while, listening. The music seemed to come from the stream as it ran glistening and bubbling along. But as he stood listening it seemed that he wasn't hearing the song with his ears but in his head, as if he were dreaming. He thought he could hear words, but he wasn't sure what they were. There was something very soothing about the song.

The music seemed to come from the stream.

He stayed here for many days, wandering among the trees, sitting by the stream, or lying in the meadow grass. Day by day, he began to hum softly to himself. He didn't know the songs he hummed, but they seemed to be the ones that the stream sang.

There were other people here. They would smile when they met Diamond, but no one spoke. Everyone seemed to be at peace, very content. Yet there was something else in their faces, Diamond thought. Not sadness, exactly. But not gladness, either. Some kind of longing, perhaps. Or remembering.

Then one day he remembered. North Wind! And his mother! And home!