Outside, a blizzard raged. The wind howled through the trees, snow covered the windows like a thick white curtain, and the whole world seemed frozen in silence. No one would come visiting on a night like this.

So when someone knocked at the door, Margaret froze.

She hesitated, then carefully opened it a crack — and saw a man in his forties, drenched, shivering, his face pale and tired. In his arms, wrapped in a thin blanket, was a baby.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “My car got stuck on the road. I’m alone with my child… Could we stay here until morning?”

Margaret hesitated, but when she looked at the child — small, trembling, his lips bluish from the cold — her heart melted.
“Come in,” she said. “You can’t stay outside in this weather.”

She lit the fireplace, warmed some tea and milk, and handed it to him.
“Where’s the baby’s mother?” she asked gently.
He looked away. “She’s gone. It’s just me and him now.”

He didn’t talk much. His voice carried exhaustion, but there was something else — a strange sadness, a heavy silence between his words.

Margaret made up a bed for them near the fire, gave them blankets, and wished them good night. The wind howled outside, but inside the warmth returned, and soon the soft breathing of the man and the baby filled the room.

When she woke up the next morning, everything was too quiet.

The fire had gone out. The blankets were neatly folded. The teacup on the table was empty — and beside it lay a small baby rattle. The man and child were gone.

Margaret stepped outside. The snow was deep, but she saw tracks — footprints leading toward the forest. Large prints, small prints… and next to them, something strange, a long uneven trail, as if someone had dragged something heavy through the snow.

Her heart started to race. She ran back inside — and then she saw it.

On the table lay a passport. She picked it up, opened it… and felt the blood drain from her face. The photograph showed the same man — but the name… she knew that name.

A week earlier, the local news had reported an escaped patient from a psychiatric hospital — a man who had lost his wife and baby in a fire. The report said he’d gone mad, insisting his child was still alive and that he had to “bring him home.”

Margaret’s hands shook. She hurried to the cellar — maybe he was hiding there. But when she opened the door, her scream echoed through the empty house.

In the corner lay a small, bloodstained baby’s hat.

She ran upstairs, slammed the door, pushed a dresser against it. And then — knock, knock.

At first soft. Then louder.

“Please… open the door…” whispered a voice she recognized.

Margaret froze. She didn’t breathe. The voice came again, this time from right outside the door.
“Thank you… for the night… He’s asleep now… He’s warm…”

A heavy thud shook the door. Then another. Then silence.

When the police arrived that evening, they found Margaret unconscious on the floor. The man and the baby had vanished. Outside, in the snow, the footprints stopped suddenly — as if both had dissolved into the frozen air.

Later, investigators confirmed that the passport belonged to a man named Daniel B., the same patient who had escaped from the mental hospital. He was never found.

Margaret sold the house soon after and moved away. But the villagers say that on stormy winter nights, when the wind screams through the trees, you can still hear a faint whisper from the empty house at the edge of the forest:
“Thank you… for the night… He’s asleep now…”