He walked down to the end of the loft and looked out the high gable window at the country below, the pieced land dead and gray, the fence, the road.

By contrast, the "big room" at Bear Creek feels like a cathedral, with its struts and open roof beams, wood-framed windows, Oriental rug and 30-foot-high gable window funneling soft streams of light.

His mother, who did not know of the change, calling one afternoon, sat on an easy chair, close by the gable window, knitting.

They do not come in single file, but sun themselves on the fences by the half dozen, run over the green-house, breaking panes of glass, climb up on the outside to the gable window of the barn, flit across the garden walks at twilight, conceal themselves under the low shrubbery, as if defying all efforts at dislodgement.

We sat together on the shavings that littered the bench before the high gable window, and looked out over the brooks and the woods and the ponds.