“Of course—you surely never doubt?”
“No.” Georges d’Espagnac smiled dreamily. “I have done nothing yet. I have no task, no duty, no burden; there is nothing put to my hand—everything is so golden that it dazzles me. I think that will clear like dawn mists, and then I shall see what I am to do. You understand, Monsieur?”
The young captain smiled in answer.
“I brought you here to say a prayer to St. Wenceslas,” he said.
M. d’Espagnac looked up at the picture above the altar.
A prince, and young; a saint, and brave; a knight, and murdered—it was an ideal to call forth admiration and sorrow. The lieutenant went on his knees and clasped his hands.
“Ah, Monsieur,” he said, half wistfully, “he was murdered—a villain’s knife stopped his dreams. Death is unjust”—he frowned, “if I were to die now, I should be unknown—empty-handed—forgotten. But it is not possible,” he added sharply.
He drew from the bosom of his uniform a breviary in ivory with silver clasps, opened it where the leaves held some dried flowers and a folded letter, then closed it and bent his head against the altar rail as if he wept.
Luc de Clapiers went to the bronze gates and looked thoughtfully down the vast dusky aisles of the church, so cold, so alluring yet confusing to the senses, so majestic and silent.
He stood so several minutes, then turned slowly to observe the young figure kneeling before the barbaric Christian altar.