"Gentlemen," he begins again, but his voice is milder, and a second time he breaks off.
Then, from out the same throat, comes in a voice that is almost gentle:
"Gentlemen! He was silent! I will be silent, too!"
There is a hush—and there sounds in front a new, soft, trembling voice:
"Bontzye, my child," it speaks like a harp, "my dear child Bontzye!"
And Bontzye's heart melts within him. Now he would lift up his eyes, but they are blinded with tears; he never felt such sweet emotion before. "My child!" "My Bontzye!"—no one, since his mother died, had spoken to him with such words in such a voice.
"My child," continued the presiding judge, "you have suffered and kept silent; there is no whole limb, no whole bone in your body, without a scar, without a wound, not a fibre of your soul that has not bled—and you kept silent.
"There they did not understand. Perhaps you yourself did not know that you might have cried out, and that at your cry the walls of Jericho would have shaken and fallen. You yourself knew nothing of your hidden power.
"In the other world your silence was not understood, but that is the world of delusion; in the world of truth you will receive your reward.
"The Heavenly Court will not judge you; the Heavenly Court will not pass sentence on you; they will not apportion you a reward. Take what you will! Everything is yours!"