Part 5 (1/2)

He stretched himself sleepily, smiling as he did so.

”What nice dreams I have had,” he said to himself. ”I wonder if they come of working well at my lessons? _They_ said it was to be a treat for me. I wish I could go to sleep and dream it all over again.”

But just then he heard his mother's voice calling up the stair to him.

”Are you up, Gratian? You will be late if you are not quick.”

Gratian gave himself a little shake of impatience under the bedclothes; he glanced at the window--the sky was gray and overcast, with every sign of a rainy day about it. He tucked himself up again, even though he knew it was very foolish thus to delay the evil moment.

”It's too bad,” he thought. ”I can _never_ do what I want. Last night I had to go to bed when I wanted to sit up, and now I have to get up when I do so want to stay in bed.”

But just at that moment a strange thing happened. The little cas.e.m.e.nt window burst open with a bang, and a blast of cold sharp wind dashed into the room, upsetting a chair, scattering Gratian's clothes, neatly laid together in a little heap, and flinging itself on the bed with a whirl, so that the coverlet took to playing antics in its turn, and the blankets no doubt would have followed its example had Gratian not clutched at them. But all his comfort was destroyed--no possibility of feeling warm and snug with the window open and all this uproar going on.

Gratian sprang up in a rage, and ran to the window. He shut it again easily enough.

”I can't think what made it fly open,” he said to himself; ”there was no wind in the night, and it never burst open before.”

He stood s.h.i.+vering and undecided. Now that the window was shut, bed looked very comfortable again.

”I'll just get in for five minutes,” he said to himself; ”I'm so s.h.i.+vering cold with that wind, I shan't get warm all day.”

He turned to the bed, but just as one little foot was raised to get in, lo and behold, a rattle and bang, and again the window burst open!

Gratian flew back, it shut obediently as before. But he was now thoroughly awakened and alert. There was no good going back to bed if he was to be blown out of it in this fas.h.i.+on, and Gratian set to to dress himself, though in a rather surly mood, and keeping an eye on the rebellious window the while. But the window behaved quite well--it showed no signs of bursting open, it did not even rattle! and Gratian was ready in good time after all.

”You look cold, my boy,” said his mother, when he was seated at table and eating his breakfast.

”The wind blew my window open twice, and it made my room very cold,” he replied rather dolefully.

”Blew your window open? That's strange,” said his father. ”The wind's not in the east this morning, and it's only an east wind that could burst in your window. You can't have shut it properly.”

”Yes, father, I did--the first time I shut it just as well as the second, and it didn't blow open after the second time. But I _know_ I shut it well both times. I think it must be in the east, for it felt so sharp when it blew in.”

”It must have changed quickly then,” said the farmer, eyeing the sky through the large old-fas.h.i.+oned kitchen window in front of him. ”That's the queer thing hereabouts; many a day if I was put to it to answer, I couldn't say which way the wind was blowing.”

”Or which way it _wasn't_ blowing, would be more like it,” said Mrs.

Conyfer with a smile. ”It's to be hoped it'll blow you the right way to school anyway, Gratian. You don't look sure of it this morning!”

”I'm cold, mother, and I've always got to do what I don't want. Last night I didn't want to go to bed, and this morning I didn't want to get up, and now I don't want to go to school, and I must.”

He got up slowly and unwillingly and began putting his books together.

His mother looked at him with a slight smile on her face.

”'Must”s a grand word, Gratian,” she said. ”I don't know what we'd be without it. You'll feel all right once you're scampering across the moor.”

”Maybe,” he replied. But his tone was rather plaintive still. He was feeling ”sorry for himself” this morning.

Things in general, however, did seem brighter, as his mother had prophesied they would, when he found himself outside. It was really not cold after all; it was one of those breezy yet not chilly mornings when, though there is nothing depressing in the air, there is a curious feeling of mystery--as if nature were holding secret discussions, which the winds and the waves, the hills and the clouds, the trees and the birds even, know all about, but which we--clumsy creatures that we are--are as yet shut out from.