“And what,” Philippe had asked, “do you do, Grandfather, when the sun is under the clouds, and there is no shadow to tell the time?”
“Well, then we must needs look at the clock which ticks on the mantelshelf over the fire,” Grandfather said with a twinkle of his old, blue eyes, eyes half hidden by the tufts of white eyebrows.
Although the day had commenced unusually fine, and the calm, blue sea of sky had been without an island reef or bar of cloud to wreck the golden galleon of the sun, by the time Philippe had been tubbed, scrubbed, dressed in his best, had been rehearsed in his address to his uncle, kissed good-by, and given a little nosegay of pansies and lilies of the valley in a paper twist for his Grandmother, and had crossed the twelve fields and picked his way carefully through the woods to avoid the sharp brambles that reached out after him with long and sinuous arms—by the time all this had come to pass, and Philippe was actually in sight of his grandparents’ cottage, it began to rain from a sky as heavily gray as it had been brightly blue before. It started so suddenly that Philippe had to run across the last field to keep the big drops from ruining his new black velvet cap.
The inside of the house was very dark, with only two windows, like half-closed eyes, looking out on the world. Through these windows entered shafts of pale, watery light that cut blue paths in the wreaths of wood smoke creeping around the rafters. Pots, pans, and kettles of burnished copper hung from hooks in the ceiling, and mirrored in tiny points the flames leaping on the hearth. It was like another world, small but complete, inside Grandmother’s and Grandfather’s house: the floor was the earth itself, trampled until it was as hard as brick, the wreaths of smoke were thin clouds flung across a dark sky where yellow and red stars winked and twinkled. At one end of the room, where Grandmother and Anjou, the cat, were busy preparing dinner over the bright fire, it was gay and warm: Day; but at the farther end, where Grandfather sat stroking his long white beard, it was dark and chilly: Night.
When Philippe entered, he had to blink his eyes for some time before he could adjust himself to the darkness. Then he handed his Grandmother the bouquet he had carried so carefully, politely wishing her health and happiness.
There were tears in Grandmother’s eyes as she bent over and kissed her Grandson’s pink and shining cheek, but then there were always tears in Grandmother’s eyes—why, Philippe never could understand. Did she weep because of the stinging smoke that the chimney seemed too small to carry off? Or because she was sad? Not sad, thought Philippe, or Grandmother would not be all the time smiling.
“Hey-O!” sang Grandmother in her high little voice, dropping a tear in the yellow heart of a purple pansy. “What pretty flowers you have brought me, my Philippe, and see, here is a raindrop in one of them shining as prettily as a glass bead!”
Philippe did not like to tell her that it was her own tear.
“Then it is raining out?” she asked. “It will make a wet home-coming for your uncle, but it is lovely, nevertheless, and if it comes down hard enough, it will make the river flow along more happily than it has for a long day. Won’t that be beautiful, Philippe?”
“Yes, Grandmother Marianne,” Philippe agreed politely, and then asked: “When will my Uncle Pablôt be here? Mother has taught me what to say when I make my bow to him, and if he is too long in coming, I am afraid that I may forget it.”