o the figure prone on the bed,
which often could not acknowledge my presence but by a slow movement of
the eyes, put my lips dutifully to the nerveless hand lying on the
coverlet, and tip-toe out again. Then I would go to bed, in a room at
the end of the corridor, and often, not always, cry myself into a good
sound sleep.

I looked forward to what was coming with an incredulous terror. I turned
my eyes from it sometimes with success, and yet all the time I had an
awful sensation of the inevitable. I had also moments of revolt which
stripped off me some of my simple trust in the government of the
universe. But when the inevitable entered the sick room and the white
door was thrown wide open, I don't think I found a single tear to shed. I
have a suspicion that the Canon's housekeeper looked on me as the most
callous little wretch on earth.

The day of the funeral came in due course and all the generous "Youth of
the Schools," the grave Senate of the University, the delegations of the
Trade-guilds, might have obtained (if they cared) _de visu_ evidence of
the callousness of the little wretch. There was nothing in my aching
head but a few words, some such stupid sentences as, "It's done," or,
"It's accomplished" (in Polish it is much shorter), or something of the
sort, repeating itself endlessly. The long procession moved out of the
narrow street, down a long street, past the Gothic front of St. Mary's
under its unequal towers, towards the Florian Gate.

In the moonlight-flooded silence of the old town of glorious tombs and
tragic memories, I could see again the small boy of that day following a
hearse; a space kept clear in which I walked alone, conscious of an
enormous following, the clumsy swaying of the tall black machine, the
chanting of the surpliced clergy at the head, the flames of tapers
passing under the low archway of the gate, the rows of bared heads on the
pavements with fixed, serious eyes. Half the population had turned out
on that fine May afternoon. They had not come to honour a great
achievement, or even some splendid failure. The dead and they were
victims alike of an unrelenting destiny which cut them off from every
path of merit and glory. They had come only to render homage to the
ardent fidelity of the man whose life had been a fearless confession in
word and deed of a creed which the simplest heart in that crowd could
feel and understand.

It seemed to me that if I remained longer ther