Chapter 2 - Page 2

began to pace the room. Then suddenly I
remembered that to-day we were to go to confession, and that
therefore I must refrain from doing anything wrong. Next, with
equal suddenness I relapsed into an extraordinarily goodhumoured
frame of mind, and walked across to Nicola.

"Let me help you, Nicola," I said, trying to speak as pleasantly
as I possibly could. The idea that I was performing a meritorious
action in thus suppressing my ill-temper and offering to help him
increased my good-humour all the more.

By this time the putty had been chipped out, and the screws
removed, yet, though Nicola pulled with might and main at the
cross-piece, the window-frame refused to budge.

"If it comes out as soon as he and I begin to pull at it
together," I thought, "it will be rather a shame, as then I shall
have nothing more of the kind to do to-day."

Suddenly the frame yielded a little at one side, and came out.

"Where shall I put it?" I said.

"Let ME see to it, if you please," replied Nicola, evidently
surprised as well as, seemingly, not over-pleased at my zeal.
"We must not leave it here, but carry it away to the lumber-room,
where I keep all the frames stored and numbered."

"Oh, but I can manage it," I said as I lifted it up. I verily
believe that if the lumber-room had been a couple of versts away,
and the frame twice as heavy as it was, I should have been the
more pleased. I felt as though I wanted to tire myself out in
performing this service for Nicola. When I returned to the room
the bricks and screws had been replaced on the windowsill, and
Nicola was sweeping the debris, as well as a few torpid flies,
out of the open window. The fresh, fragrant air was rushing into
and filling all the room, while with it came also the dull murmur
of the city and the twittering of sparrows in the garden.
Everything was in brilliant light, the room looked cheerful, and
a gentle spring breeze was stirring Nicola's hair and the leaves
of my "Algebra." Approaching the window, I sat down upon the
sill, turned my eyes downwards towards the garden, and fell into
a brown study.

Something new to me, something extraordinarily potent and
unfamiliar, had suddenly invaded my soul. The wet ground on
which, here and there, a few yellowish stalks and blades of
bright-green grass were to be seen; the little rivulets
glittering in the sunshine, and sweeping clods of earth and tiny
chips of wood along with them; the reddish twigs of the lilac,
with their swelling buds, which nodded just beneath the window;
the fussy twitterings of birds as they fluttered in the bush
below; the blackened fence shining wet from