And Paul was a pretty gay blade. Rough, boisterous, wild in manner, he picked companions like himself. Kimberker' 5 house soon became a noisy place. There were dinners at which the wine went round very freely, plenty of cards and dice, now and then brawling quarrels. It did not suit Stanislaus at all. He was too much of a gentleman, and too good, to act unpleasantly or resent the rough company that Paul brought home. But he could not mix freely with them, he did not like their talk or their manners, and he slipped quietly away from their noisy gatherings as soon as he decently could. And so he was left alone; and lonesomeness for a boy of fourteen is a very unpleasant thing. He still did well in his classes, but he was no book-worm. When he had done his duty in study, the books had no further claim upon him, and no attraction in themselves. And yet he kept up his wonderful brightness and cheeriness all the time; so that Bilinski often wondered at him. And it was worth wondering at, for there is nothing, as everybody knows, which sooner breaks down one's spirits and brings on the blue devils than being left alone, without friends and companionship. How did he do it? The fact is, he refused to be alone. As his friends in Vienna left him, he simply turned more to his friends in heaven. And heaven came down to him. Any old vacant room in the big, half-empty house was his chapel. And through the long, lonely days, often through great part of the night, he prayed. If you could have seen him pray! Imagine any good-hearted boy who has been away from home for a long stretch, say a couple of years, and who comes back and meets father, mother, brothers, sisters. He may not say much, but he LOOKS a good deal, and he feels more than any words can say. That is the way Stanislaus prayed. He just turned to God and his Mother in heaven, with all his love in his eyes and immense happiness in his heart. And if he spoke, or said things to them in his mind, he could speak simply, like a little child, because no one else would hear him and he would not need be shy or bashful.