Again he lay still and regarded the picture. The tears began to stream down his cheeks. “I mourn over thy death, thou Unknown!” he whispered.
“Faustina!” he cried out at last. “Why did you let this man die? He would have healed me.”
And again he was lost in the picture.
“O Man!” he said, after a moment, “if I can not gain my health from thee, I can still avenge thy murder. My hand shall rest heavily upon those who have robbed me of thee!”
Again he lay still a long time; then he let himself glide down to the floor—and he knelt before the picture:
“Thou art Man!” said he. “Thou art that which I never dreamed I should see.” And he pointed to his disfigured face and destroyed hands. “I and all others are wild beasts and monsters, but thou art Man.”
He bowed his head so low before the picture that it touched the floor. “Have pity on me, thou Unknown!” he sobbed, and his tears watered the stones.
“If thou hadst lived, thy glance alone would have healed me,” he said.
The poor old woman was terror-stricken over what she had done. It would have been wiser not to show the Emperor the picture, thought she. From the start she had been afraid that if he should see it his grief would be too overwhelming.
And in her despair over the Emperor’s grief, she snatched the picture away, as if to remove it from his sight.