As the schoolmaster wended his way homeward, cold, hungry, and
worn he was buoyant in spirit to the point of ecstasy. But he was
chastened, for he had stood upon the Mount of Transfiguration and
knew as never before that the mission of the schoolmaster is to find
and restore the lost child.
CHAPTER XXIX
LONGEVITY
I'm quite in the notion of playing a practical joke on Atropos, and,
perhaps, on Methuselah, while I'm about it. I'm not partial to
Atropos at the best. She's such a reckless, uppish, heedless sort of
tyrant. She rushes into huts, palaces, and even into the grand
stand, and lays about her with her scissors, snipping off threads
with the utmost abandon. She wields her shears without any sort of
apology or by your leave. Not even a check-book can stay her
ravages. Her devastation knows neither ruth nor gentleness. I don't
like her, and have no compunction about playing a joke at her
expense. I don't imagine it will daunt her, in the least, but I can
have my fun, at any rate.
It is now just seven o'clock in the evening, and I shall not retire
before ten o'clock at the earliest.
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