d with
his countenance lowered, his folded hands immovable as stone, while Gordon
Makimmon consumed the cold food. Once the priest replenished the other's
glass with milk.

If there had been a gleam of fraternal feeling, the slightest indication
of generous impulse, a mere accent of hospitality, in the priest's
actions, Gordon, accepting them in such spirit, might have been at ease.
But not the faintest spark of interest, of curiosity, the most perfunctory
communion of sympathy, was evident on Merlier's immobile countenance; his
movements were machine-like, he seemed infinitely removed from his
charitable act, infinitely cold.

Gordon's discomfort burned into a species of illogical, resentful anger.
He cursed the priest under his breath, choked on the food; he was heartily
sorry that he had obeyed the fleeting impulse to enter. But even the
anger expired before Merlier's impassivity--he must as well curse a figure
carved from granite, cast in lead. He grew, in turn, uneasy at the other's
supernatural detachment; it chilled his blood like the grip of an
unexpected, icy hand, like the imminence of inevitable death. The priest
resembled a dead man, a dead man who had remained quick in the mere
physical operations of the body, while all the machinery of his thoughts,
his feelings, lay motionless and cold within.

Gordon found relief in a customary cigarette when the uncomfortable repast
was finished. The priest removed the dishes, and reappeared with bed
linen, with which he proceeded to convert the bare couch into a provision
for sleeping. Then he returned the lamp to the center of the table, opened
the book and seated with his back squarely toward the room, addressed
himself to the pages.

Gordon Makimmon's head throbbed, suddenly paining him--it was as though
sharp, malicious fingers were compressing the spine at the base of his
brain. That, and the profound weariness which swept over him, were
disconcerting; he was so seldom ill, so rarely tired, that those unwelcome
symptoms bore an aggravated menace; it was the slight, premonitory
rusting, the corrosion of time, upon the iron of his manhood.

In an instinctive need for human support, the reassurance of the
comprehension of his kind, he directed an observation at the broad, squat,
somber back. "I might have been drunk a month," he asserted, "by the way I
feel." The priest paused in his reading, inserted a finger in the page,
and half turned. Gordon could see the f