perceptible shiver of emotion, a fluttering sigh such as steals over a
pine-wood toward dawn ran through all ranks. Far to the south-east a
speck of light now showed, which grew in intensity as it came swiftly
nearer, and seemed presently to be a ball of vivid fire surrounded by
a shroud of lit vapour. Again, as by a common consent, the crowd
parted, stood ranked, with an open lane between. The on-coming flare,
grown intolerably bright, now seemed to fade out as it resolved itself
into a human figure. A human figure at the entry of the lane of people
there undoubtedly was, a figure with so much light about him, raying
(I thought) from him, that it was easy to observe his form and
features. Out of the flame and radiant mist he grew, and showed
himself to me in the trim shape and semblance, with the small head and
alert air of a youth; and such as he was, in the belted tunic and
peaked cap of a telegraph messenger, he came smoothly down the lane
formed by the obsequious throng, and stood in the midst of it and
looked keenly, with his cold, clear eyes and fixed and inscrutable
smile, from one expectant face to another. There was no mistaking him
whom all those people so eagerly awaited; he was my former wonder of
Gray's Inn, the saviour of old Mr. Fowkes.

But all my former wonder paled before this my latter. For he stood
here like some young Eastern king among his slaves, one hand on his
hip, the other at his chin, his face expressionless, his eyes fixed
but unblinking. Meantime, the crowd, which had stretched out arms to
him as he came, was now seated quietly on the grass, intently waiting,
watching for a sign. They sat, all those people, in a wide ring about
him; he was in the midst, a hand to his chin.

Whether sign was made or not, I saw none; but after some moments of
pause a figure rose erect out of the ring and hobbled toward the boy.
I made out an old woman, an old wreck of womanhood, a scant-haired,
blue-lipped ruin of what had once been woman. I heard her snivel and
sniff and wheeze her "Lord ha' mercy" as she went by, slippering
forward on her miserable feet, hugging to her wasted sides what
remnant of gown she had, fawning before the boy, within the sphere of
light that came from him. If he loathed, or scorned, or pitied her, he
showed no sign; if he saw her at all his fixed eyes looked beyond her;
if he abhorred her, his nostrils did not betray him. He stood like
marble and suffered what followed. It was str