“Perhaps, Gerande”
“Tell us, then,” cried Scholastique eagerly, economically extinguishing her taper.
“For several days, Gerande,” said the young apprentice, “something absolutely incomprehensible has been going on. All the watches which your father has made and sold for some years have suddenly stopped. Very many of them have been brought back to him. He has carefully taken them to pieces; the springs were in good condition, and the wheels well set. He has put them together yet more carefully; but, despite his skill, they will not go.”
“The devil’s in it!” cried Scholastique.
“Why say you so?” asked Gerande. “It seems very natural to me. Nothing lasts for ever in this world. The infinite cannot be fashioned by the hands of men.”
“It is none the less true,” returned Aubert, “that there is in this something very mysterious and extraordinary. I have myself been helping Master Zacharius to search for the cause of this derangement of his watches; but I have not been able to find it, and more than once I have let my tools fall from my hands in despair.”
“But why undertake so vain a task?” resumed Scholastique. “Is it natural that a little copper instrument should go of itself, and mark the hours? We ought to have kept to the sun-dial!”
“You will not talk thus, Scholastique,” said Aubert, “when you learn that the sun-dial was invented by Cain.”
“Good heavens! what are you telling me?”
“Do you think,” asked Gerande simply, “that we might pray to God to give life to my father’s watches?”