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He made his programme for the day, for he had a vague dread of solitude. On week days he was surrounded by the school-boys, and although he had no love for those wild beasts whose taming, or rather whose efficient acquisition of the difficult art of dissembling, was his life task, yet he felt a certain void when he was not with them. Now, during the long summer vacations, he had established a holiday school, but even so he had been compelled to give the boys short summer holidays, and, with the exception of meal times when he could always count on the bookseller and the second violin, he had been alone for several days.

“At two o’clock,” he mused, “when the guard has been relieved, and the crowds have dispersed, I’ll go to my restaurant to dine; then I’ll invite the bookseller to Stromsborg; there won’t be a soul to-day; we can have coffee there and punch, and stay till the evening when we’ll return to town and to Rejner’s.” (Rejner’s was the name of his restaurant in Berzelius Place.)

Punctually at two o’clock he took his hat, brushed himself carefully and went out.

“I wonder whether there’ll be stewed perch to-day,” he thought. “And mightn’t one treat oneself to asparagus, as it’s midsummer-day?”

He strolled past the high wall of the Government Bakery. In Berzelius Park the seats which were usually occupied by the nursemaids of the rich and their charges, were crowded with the families of the labourers who had appeared in great numbers with their perambulators. He saw a mother feeding her baby. She was a large, full-breasted woman, and the baby’s dimpled hand almost disappeared in her bosom. The schoolmaster turned away with a feeling of loathing. He was annoyed to see these strangers in his park. It was very much like the servants using the drawing-room when their master and mistress had gone out; moreover, he couldn’t forgive them their plainness.

He arrived at the glass verandah, and put his hand on the door handle, thinking once more of the stewed perch “with lots of parsley,” when his eyes fell on a notice on the door. There was no necessity to read it, he knew its purport: the restaurant was closed on midsummer-day; he had forgotten it. He felt as if he had run with his head into a lamp-post. He was furious; first of all with the proprietor for closing, then with himself for having forgotten that the restaurant would be closed. It seemed to him so monstrous that he could have forgotten an incident of such importance, that he couldn’t believe it and racked his brain to find someone on whom he could lay the blame. Of course, it was the fault of the proprietor. He had run off the lines, come into collision. He was done. He sat down on the seat and almost shed tears of rage.

Thump! a ball hit him right in the middle of his starched shirt front. Like an infuriated wasp he rose from his seat to find the criminal; a plain little girl’s face laughed into his; a labourer in his Sunday clothes and straw hat appeared, took her by the hand and smilingly expressed a hope that the child had not hurt him; a laughing crowd of soldiers and servant girls stared at him. He looked round for a constable for he felt that his rights as a human being had been encroached upon. But when he saw the constable in familiar conversation with the child’s mother, he dropped the idea of making a scene, went straight to the nearest cab-stand, hired a cab, and told the driver to drive him to the bookseller’s; he could not bear to be alone any longer.

In the safe shelter of the cab he took out his handkerchief and flicked the dust from his shirt front.

He dismissed the cab in Goten Street, for he felt sure that he would find his friend at home. But as he walked upstairs his assurance left him. Supposing he were out after all!