hich the sun sets,
quiet waters near which a lonely bird is calling, and over all the
solemn, beautiful sound of bells. He must go there. He stretched out
his arms longingly, the eyes that were swollen with weeping
flashed.

If they were to keep him with them, keep hold of him! No, they could
not hold him. He must go there.

He crept nearer to the window as though drawn there. It was high up,
too high for a jump, but he would get down nevertheless. He could not
go down the stairs of course, they would hear him--but like this, ah,
like this.

Kneeling on the window-sill he groped about with his feet to find
the water-pipe that ran down the whole side of the house close to the
window. Ah, he felt it. Then he slid down from the sill, only hanging
on to it by the tips of his fingers, dangled in the air for a few
moments, then got the water-pipe between his knees, let go of the
window-sill altogether, grasped hold of the pipe and slid down it
quickly and noiselessly.

He looked round timidly: nobody had seen him. There was nobody in
the street, and there were only a few people walking in the distance.
He bent his head and crept past the windows on the ground-floor--now he
was in the garden behind the bushes--now over the hedge his trousers
slit, that did not matter--now he looked back at the house with a
feeling of wild triumph. He stood in the waste field, in which
no houses had been built as yet, stood there hidden behind an
elderberry-bush, of which he had planted the first shoot years before
as a child. He did not feel the slightest regret. He rushed away into
the sheltering wood like a wild animal that hears shots.

He ran and ran, ran even when it was not necessary to run any more.
He did not stop until complete exhaustion forced him to do so. He had
run straight across the wood without following any path; now he no
longer knew where he was. But he was far away, so much was certain. He
had not got so far into the wood on his robber expeditions with his
play-fellows, and, in his walks, had never gone into the parts
where there were no paths whatever and where it was quite lonely. He
could rest a little now in peace.

He threw himself on the ground, where the sand showed nothing but
fine grass and some bracken in small hollows. Trees in which there was
not the slightest motion towered above him all around, like slender
pillars that seemed to support the heavens.

He lay there for some time on his back, and let