CHAPTER III

It was eleven o’clock when the boy woke.  All the excitement of the past days had culminated in the great exhaustion of the night before.

He had slept as a child might sleep—­dreamlessly, happily, unthinkingly.  In that silent hour Nature had drawn him into her wide embrace, lulling him with a mother’s gentleness; and now, in the moment of waking, it seemed that again the same beneficent agency was dispensing love and favor, for he opened his eyes upon a changed world.  A magician’s wand had been waved over the city during his hours of sleep; the mist and oppression of the night had disappeared with the darkness.  Paris was under the dominion of the frost.

Instinctively, even before his eyelids lifted, the northern soul within him apprised him of this change.  He inhaled the crisp coldness of the air with a vague familiarity; he opened his eyes slowly and stared about the unknown room in an instant of hesitating doubt; then, with a great leap of the spirit, he recognized his position.  Last night—­the days and nights that had preceded it—­flooded his consciousness, and in a moment he was out of bed and pulling back the drab-hued curtains that hid the window.

Having freed the daylight, he leaned out, peering greedily down into the well-like court, where even the stunted trees in their painted tubs were coated white with rime; then, with another impulse, as quickly conceived, as quickly executed, he drew back into the room, fired with the desire to be out and about in this newly created world.

By day, the details of the room stood out with a prominence that had been denied them in the dim candle-light of the night before, and he realized now, what had escaped him then, that there was neither dressing-table, wardrobe, nor chest of drawers, that the entire space of the small apartment was filled by the clumsy bed, a folding wash-stand, and two ponderous arm-chairs covered in shabby red velvet.  These, with a dingy gold-framed mirror hanging above the tiny corner fireplace, and a gilt clock under a glass shade, formed the comforts purchasable for three francs.

He studied it all solemnly and attentively, not omitting the gray wall-paper of melancholy design, and content that he had acquitted himself dutifully toward his surroundings, he unpacked his valise, and proceeded to dress for the day’s happenings.

The contents of the valise were not imposing—­a change of linen, a soft felt hat, a pair of shoes, and a well-worn blue serge suit.  The boy looked at each article as he drew it forth with a quaint attentiveness quite disproportionate to either its appearance or its value.  But the process seemed to please him, and he lingered over it, ceasing almost reluctantly to appraise his belongings, and beginning to dress.

This morning he discarded the high Russian boots and the fur cap of yesterday, and arrayed himself instead, and with much precision, in the serge suit.  Worn as this suit was, it evidently retained a pristine value in its owner’s eyes, for no sooner had he fastened the last button of the coat than he looked instinctively for the mirror in which to study the effect.