He lay back again, prostrated by his sustained effort of speech, and closed his eyes. Sylvester leaned forward, half reclining on the bed, still holding his father's hand. And as he sat there silent, a veil seemed to be drawn from before his vision.
“She—Constance must have suffered,” he said at last.
Matthew opened his eyes and met his son's gaze wistfully.
“Don't we all? If the stainless like you suffer, what of us poor sinners who struggle towards the light! Think of the agony of that pure and delicate soul who bore you, my son. Pray for all poor souls, Syl.”
His voice had grown singularly faint. The tears leaped to Sylvester's eyes. He tried to speak, but his throat was clogged with unaccustomed sobs. With instinctive ashamedness he buried his face in the pillow next to his father, still holding his hand. He lay there a long time, his heart aching with the returning love as a limb to which the tourniquet has been applied aches with the returning blood. Once the old man whispered a prayer for the son's forgiveness, and when Sylvester pressed his hand, relapsed into his half-sleep as if reassured. Time went by. Presently Sylvester heard him murmuring in a scarcely audible voice. Gradually the sense of the words came to him. The old man was repeating scraps of verse:—
“Freres humains, qui apres nous vivez,
N'avez les cueurs contre nous endurciz,
Car, si pitié de nous pouvres avez,
Dieu en aura plustost de vous merciz.
Ne soyez done de nostre confrairie,