“I sought Maria. Oh, I knew quite well that all the thousands could not hide her from me. If she were here I should find her out, as a bird finds its way to its nest. But my heart lay as if dead in my breast. Yet I could not help looking for her. I wandered about the place where I had already waited for her once before.... Yes—so may a bird wander about the place where was its nest which it cannot find again, because the lightning or the storm has destroyed it.
“And, when I came to the side-niche, in which Death stands, as a minstrel, playing upon a human bone, the niche was empty, Death had disappeared....
“It was as though the Death of my dream had not returned home to his following....
“Do not speak, Josaphat! It is really of no importance ... a coincidence.... The carving was, perhaps, damaged—I do not know! Believe me: it is of no importance.
“But now a voice yelled out:
“'Repent! The kingdom of heaven is at hand!'
“It was the voice of Desertus, the monk. His voice was like a knife. The voice peeled bare my spine. Deathly stillness reigned in the church. Among all the thousands round about, not one seemed to breathe. They were kneeling and their faces, pale masks of horror, were turned towards the preacher.
“His voice flew through the air like a spear.
“'Repent! The kingdom of heaven is at hand!'
“Before me, by a pillar, stood a young man, once a fellow member of mine, of the ‘Club of the Sons.’ If I had not personally experienced how vastly human faces can change, in a short time, I should not have recognised him.