--Dinner will be ready for you in the schoolroom at
seven."
At the door of his room the old man left him, and after listening
for a moment to his descending steps, Donal re-entered his chamber.
Why they put him so apart, Donal never asked himself; that he should
have such command of his leisure as this isolation promised him was
a consequence very satisfactory. He proceeded at once to settle
himself in his new quarters. Finding some shelves in a recess of
the wall, he arranged his books upon them, and laid his few clothes
in the chest of drawers beneath. He then got out his writing
material, and sat down.
Though his window was so high, the warm pure air came in full of the
aromatic odours rising in the hot sunshine from the young pine trees
far below, and from a lark far above descended news of heaven-gate.
The scent came up and the song came down all the time he was
writing to his mother--a long letter. When he had closed and
addressed it, he fell into a reverie. Apparently he was to have his
meals by himself: he was glad of it: he would be able to read all
the time! But how was he to find the schoolroom! Some one would
surely fetch him! They would remember he did not know his way about
the place! It wanted yet an hour to dinner-time when, finding
himself drowsy, he threw himself on his bed, where presently he fell
fast asleep.
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