I was in the open country, and I did not know where the road was leading to, but that did not matter. I was as near home in one place as in another.
From one point of the sky, probably the north, I saw the clouds rising, covering up the stars, and at last blotting the moon off the sky as a picture is wiped off a slate. It was more dismal than ever when the moon and stars were gone, for now I was alone with the night and the darkness. I could hear the wind as it passed through the telegraph wires by the roadside. It was a weeping wind, and put me in mind of the breeze calling down the chimney far away at home in Glenmornan.
A low bent man came out of the darkness and shuffled by. "It looks like snow," he said, in passing.
"It does," I replied. I could not see his face, but his voice was kindly. He shuffled along. Perhaps he was going home to a warm supper and bed. I did not know, and I wondered who the man was.
Suddenly the snow from the darkness above drifted down and my clothes were white in an instant. My bare knee became very cold, for the flakes melted on it as they fell. The snow ran down my legs and made me shiver. I took off my muffler and tied it around the hole in my trousers to prevent the snowflakes from getting in. I felt wearied and cold, but after a while I got very angry. I got angry, not with myself, but with the wind, the snow, my leaky boots and ragged clothes. I was angry with the man who carried the devil's prayer book, and also with the man who broke a biscuit in two because he was an honest body and a believer in fair measure. Perhaps I ought to have been angry with myself, for did I not spend all my money at the card school, and was it not my own fault that now I had only one penny in my possession? If I had saved my money like Micky's Jim I would have now eight or nine pounds in my pocket.
Suddenly the snow cleared, and my eyes fell on a farmhouse hardly a stone's-throw away from the road. Thinking that I might get a shed to lie in I went towards it. There was no light showing in the house and it must have been long after midnight. As I approached a dog ran at me yelping. I turned and fled, but the dog caught my trousers and hung on, trying to fasten his teeth in my leg. I twisted round and swung him clear, then lifted my boot and aimed a blow at the animal which took him on the jaw. His teeth snapped together like a trap, and he ran back squealing. I took to my heels and returned to the road. From there I saw a light in the farmhouse, so I ran quicker than ever. I was frightened at what I had done; I had committed a crime in looking for a night's shelter along with the beasts of the byre. I could not get sleeping with men; I was not a man. I could not get sleeping in a shed; I was not even a brute beast. I was merely a little boy who was very hungry, ragged, and tired.
I ran for a long distance, and was sweating all over when I stopped. I stood until I got cool, then continued my walking, walking through the darkness. I was still walking when the day broke cold and cheerless. I met a navvy going to his work and I asked him for a penny. He had no money, but he gave me half of the food which he had brought from home for his daily meal.
On the outskirts of Paisley I went to the door of a mansion to ask for a penny. A man opened the door. He was a fat and comfortable-looking, round-paunched fellow. He told me to get off before the dog was put after me. I hurried off, and forsook the big houses afterwards.
Once in Paisley I sat down on a kerbstone under the Caledonian Railway Bridge in Moss Street. I fell asleep, and slept until a policeman woke me up.
"Go away from here!" he roared at me. I got away.