"How could they prevent it? The divine Augustus Julian himself ordered it. The god's blue eyes were used as an ornament on the robe of the Crucified that's all.... They talk about charity and justice, and they themselves are the worst of brigands! See how beautifully the stones fit into their old setting!..."
The god fixed his sapphire eyes on Gnyphon. The old man recoiled and crossed himself, seized with dread.
"Lord have mercy on us! It's horrible!"
Remorse filled his soul, and while sweeping he began, as was his wont, to talk to himself—
"Gnyphon! Gnyphon! what a poor creature you are!... Just like a mangy dog one might say.... You're ending your days in a nice way! Why have you gone and damned yourself? The fiend has over-tempted you!... And now you go into everlasting fire without a chance of salvation. You've smirched soul and body, Gnyphon, by serving the abomination of the heathen!... Better had it been for thee hadst thou never been born!"
"What are you groaning at, old man?" Philomena the draper's wife enquired.
"My heart is heavy!... Oh, how heavy!"
"Are you a Christian?"
"Christian?—I am a betrayer of Christ!" answered Gnyphon, using his broom vigorously.
"Would you like me to take away your sin so that not a trace of heathen defilement shall stick to you? You see I'm a Christian too, and yet afraid of nothing. Do you think I'd have undertaken work like this, if I hadn't known how to purify myself after it?"