e che lo nuovo peregrin d’amore
punge, se ode squilla di lontano,
che paia il giorno pianger che si more;
quand’ io incominciai a render vano
l’ udire ed a mirare una dell’ alme
surta, che l’ ascoltar chiedea con mano.
The huge clock of the cathedral boomed again and yet again. His lips still moved softly to the music they emitted. No dray and no great horse had arrived. But his resolve was undaunted; his faith remained inviolate. His frame was growing numb and chill. The stone had grown very cold. The stealthy hues of the night were wrapping themselves about everything. The lamps were now lit in Saint Paul’s Churchyard. A serried bank of dark clouds was looming up out of the west. At his heart was a curious sinking; he seemed to feel a little faint.
It still wanted a few minutes to seven by the stolid face that peered at him from across the street, when his devout patience and his simple faith met with their reward. Just as he had foreseen, a heavy dray drawn by a great horse came rattling round the corner of the cathedral. As it neared the warehouse on the steps of which he sat, it began to slow up. Yes, never a doubt about it, it was coming to stand under the creaking piece of iron above his head, the crane dangling from the second storey.
This dray stopped precisely as the other one had done at the other warehouse. In a precisely similar fashion the drayman cast the reins loose on the great horse’s neck. Again the drayman stood up and called unintelligible words into the second storey. The door opened as before; the crane began to squeak and grunt; the box hung suspended in mid-air. Swinging and rotating it descended to the drayman’s arms. And then just as before the mighty animal began to prance.
With his heart beating as though it would break him in pieces the boy rose from the bottom step of the warehouse. He pressed his hands to his sides. “Courage, Achilles!” he muttered under his breath, “Courage, Achilles!”