"It is more than anybody does. You are a vain fellow. You want to be a hero. That is why you do such silly things.... A hero!... I don't quite know what that is: but, you see, I imagine that a hero is a man who does what he can. The others do not do it." "Oh!" sighed Christophe. "Then what is the good of living? It is not worth while. And yet there are people who say: 'He who wills can!'"... Gottfried laughed again softly. "Yes?... Oh! well, they are liars, my friend. Or they do not will anything much...." They had reached the top of the hill. They embraced affectionately. The little peddler went on, treading wearily. Christophe stayed there, lost in thought, and watched him go. He repeated his uncle's saying: "_Als ich kann_ (The best I can)." And he smiled, thinking: "Yes.... All the same.... It is enough." He returned to the town. The frozen snow crackled under his feet. The bitter winter wind made the bare branches of the stunted trees on the hill shiver. It reddened his cheeks, and made his skin tingle, and set his blood racing. The red roofs of the town below were smiling under the brilliant, cold sun. The air was strong and harsh. The frozen earth seemed to rejoice in bitter gladness. And Christophe's heart was like that. He thought: "I, too, shall wake again." There were still tears in his eyes. He dried them with the back of his hand, and laughed to see the sun dipping down behind a veil of mist. The clouds, heavy with snow, were floating over the town, lashed by the squall. He laughed at them. The wind blew icily.... "Blow, blow!... Do what you will with me. Bear me with you!... I know now where I am going." REVOLT I SHIFTING SANDS Free! He felt that he was free!... Free of others and of himself! The network of passion in which he had been enmeshed for more than a year had suddenly been burst asunder. How? He did not know. The filaments had given before the growth of his being. It was one of those crises of growth in which robust natures tear away the dead casing of the year that is past, the old soul in which they are cramped and stifled.