He beckoned to them, and while he went from one to another, saying: “The sibyl was my mother—Zorrillo has murdered my mother,” the coffin was borne into the house.
In the vestibule, he leaned his head against the wall, moaning and sighing, until Florette was laid in her last bed, and a soldier put his hand on his shoulder. Then Ulrich strewed flowers over the corpse, and the joiner came to nail up the coffin. The blows of the hammer actually hurt him, it seemed as if each one fell upon his own heart.
The funeral procession passed through the ranks of soldiers, who filled the street. Several officers came to meet it, and Captain Ortis, approaching close to the Eletto, said: “The bishop refuses the catafalque and the solemn requiem you requested. Your mother died in sin, without the sacrament. He will grant as many masses for the repose of her soul as you desire, but such high honors....”
“He refuses them to us?”
“Not to us, to the sibyl.”
“She was my mother, your Eletto’s mother. To the cathedral, forward!”
“It is closed, and will remain so to-day, for the bishop....”
“Then burst the doors! We’ll show them who has the power here.”
“Are you out of your senses? The Holy Church!”
“Forward, I say! Let him who is no cowardly wight, follow me!”