ter some minutes.

Still he gazed at his work, and the impression stole over him that but
for a slight thing he might yet have killed his brother. If he had left
the figure more securely propped upon the pad, it could not have slipped
upon the bench; it could not have made that small distinct sound just as
he was examining the place which was to have been his brother's grave;
he would not have been suddenly frightened; he would not have gone over
the matter in his mind as he had done, from the point of view of a
future fear; he would have waited anxiously for another opportunity, and
when it presented itself he would have struck the blow, and Paolo would
have been dead, if not to-day, to-morrow. There would have been a search
which might or might not have resulted in the discovery of the body.
Then there would have been, the heartrending grief of his wife, of
Lucia, and the black suspicious looks of Gianbattista. The young man had
heard him express a wish that Paolo might disappear. His home would have
been a hell, instead of being emancipated from tyranny as he had at
first imagined. Discovery and conviction would have come at last, the
galleys for life for himself, dishonour and contempt for his family.

He remembered Paolo's words as he stood contemplating the crucifix just
before that moment which had nearly been his last. _Qui propter nos
homines et propter nostram salutem_--"Who for us men and for our
salvation came down from Heaven." In a strange revulsion of feeling
Marzio applied the words to himself, with an odd simplicity that was at
once pathetic and startling.

"If Christ had not died," he said to himself, "I should not have made
this crucifix. If I had not made it, it would not have frightened me. I
should have killed my brother. It has saved me. 'For us men and for our
salvation'--those are the words--for my salvation, it is very strange.
Poor Paolo! If he knew to what he owed his life he would be pleased. Who
can believe such things? Who would have believed this if I had told it?
And yet it is true."

For some minutes still he gazed at the figure. Then he shook himself as
though to rouse his mind from a trance, and took up his tools. He did
not glance behind him again, and, for the time at least, his nervous
dislike of the box in the corner seemed to have ceased. He laboured with
patient care, touching and re-touching, believing that each tap of the
hammer should be the last, and yet not wholly satisf