It was what the boys called "a sight for sore eyes."
They stood in droves, in the sheltered entrances of the halls, and occasionally darted out by ones and twos and threes to rescue distressed co-eds.
Down in the room over the tin and plumbing shop in which I lived, I found it cold indeed. I could afford no heat ... and, believing in windows open, knew every searching drop in the barometer.
But never in my life was I happier, despite my secretly cherished love for Vanna. For I assured myself in my heart of certain future fame, the fame I had dreamed of since childhood. And I wore every hardship as an adornment, conscious of the greatness of my cause.
Isolation; half-starvation; cold; inadequate clothing;—all counted for the glory of poetry, as martyrs had accepted persecution and suffering for the glory of God.
My two hours of daily work irked me. I wanted the time for my writing and studying ... but I still continued living above the din of the shop that I had grown accustomed to, by this time.
Rarely, when the nights were so subarctic as to be almost unbearable, did I slip down through the skylight and seek out the comparative warmth of the shop ... and there, on the platform where the desk stood so that it could overlook all the store, I wrote and studied.
But Randall said this worried the night watchman too much, my appearing and disappearing, all hours of the night. He didn't relish coming every time to see if the store was being burglarised.