“Do be careful,” I insisted—foolishly, seeing the boy was as careful as he could be already.
“I'm coming,” he returned. “I've got all the moon I want to-night.”
I heard a rustling and a rustling drawing nearer and nearer. Three or four minutes elapsed, and he appeared at length creeping down his little ladder. I took him in my arms, and set him on the ground.
“Thank you, sir,” he said. “That's the north wind blowing, isn't it, sir?”
“I can't tell,” I answered. “It feels cool and kind, and I think it may be. But I couldn't be sure except it were stronger, for a gentle wind might turn any way amongst the trunks of the trees.”
“I shall know when I get up to my own room,” said Diamond. “I think I hear my mistress's bell. Good-night, sir.”
He ran to the house, and I went home.
His mistress had rung for him only to send him to bed, for she was very careful over him and I daresay thought he was not looking well. When he reached his own room, he opened both his windows, one of which looked to the north and the other to the east, to find how the wind blew. It blew right in at the northern window. Diamond was very glad, for he thought perhaps North Wind herself would come now: a real north wind had never blown all the time since he left London. But, as she always came of herself, and never when he was looking for her, and indeed almost never when he was thinking of her, he shut the east window, and went to bed. Perhaps some of my readers may wonder that he could go to sleep with such an expectation; and, indeed, if I had not known him, I should have wondered at it myself; but it was one of his peculiarities, and seemed nothing strange in him. He was so full of quietness that he could go to sleep almost any time, if he only composed himself and let the sleep come. This time he went fast asleep as usual.
But he woke in the dim blue night. The moon had vanished. He thought he heard a knocking at his door. “Somebody wants me,” he said to himself, and jumping out of bed, ran to open it.
But there was no one there. He closed it again, and, the noise still continuing, found that another door in the room was rattling. It belonged to a closet, he thought, but he had never been able to open it. The wind blowing in at the window must be shaking it. He would go and see if it was so.