But with the struggle to speak he awoke. He was in his own bed of
course, and by the light he saw that it must be nearly time to get up.
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 casement
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 shivering 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
shivering 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 fashion, 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."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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