I found I liked Mattias, now I had discovered him to be something more than the careless, hedonistic student I had once imagined. In fact, I was ridiculously comfortable among these people I had come to hurt...
* * * *
We did our best, the Enemy and I, but that first day at Szelényi, our hearts just were not in the serious business of education. The sun was shining too enticingly. They wanted to be outside or with their grandfather, or both; I was consumed with the desire to explore, both outside and in.
Somehow we got through until lunch, which was served in the schoolroom; but while the children ate obediently, their eyes kept straying to the window — I know because I was looking all too often in the same direction.
Fortunately, we had a visitor, a thin, untidily fluttering lady of u
