Unto the judgment-seat of Him who sealed me with His seal,
'Gainst evil men, and evil tongues, I make my last appeal.'
THE next morning Hubert came as usual to his lord for instructions. Dismissing his chaplain, Charlier, with whom he had been in conversation, the chancellor turned towards him and said, ‘I have no need of you today.'
The color mounted quickly to the brow of Hubert. Could he have heard from someone of what he had done on Wednesday? Yet he read no added sternness in that always stern and sorrowful face. ‘Am I not, then, to write in the Council for my lord?' he asked.
‘No, my son. That is otherwise provided for. Do not attend today.'
To Hubert this command seemed impossible to obey. Never before had he questioned the chancellor's lightest word; but now he inquired with a look of great distress, ‘And why? Have I offended my lord? '
‘Thou hast not offended,' returned the chancellor kindly; and his sad eyes rested, with an expression almost of tenderness, on his eager young disciple. ‘But you look tired. To such as you, the toil and confinement of these last days has been hard to bear. Where is now that pleasant-faced young brother who used to come and bear you company? Go to him today, and amuse yourself, as young men love to do. I command it.'
His tender thoughtfulness touched Hubert to the heart. But he scrupled to accept it whilst there lay between them unconfessed the thing that he had done. He murmured a word of thanks; then added boldly, though with an effort, ‘My lord, I have somewhat to tell.'
The chancellor, occupied with many affairs, thought this some mere matter of business, and said rather indifferently, ‘Speak on.'
‘Somewhat—that I fear may have been a wrong-doing,' pursued Hubert with hesitation.
The chancellor looked at him more attentively and with growing uneasiness. ‘Hast thou done wrong?’ he asked quickly. He knew at least that Hubert was no tale-bearer; if he told of wrong, it would be of his own.
‘My lord, that is what I know not.'
‘You know not? Have you been so ill-instructed?’ asked the chancellor sharply. ‘This is a wicked city, full of snares; especially for the young,' he added. ‘What have you done? '
‘It is not so much a deed which I have done as words which I have spoken.'
The chancellor's brow cleared. A youth of Hubert's impetuous character might well have spoken unadvisedly with his lips, and no great harm done after all. A wise master takes care not to know too much of what is said by his servants. ‘Have you, by deed or word, committed a mortal sin?' he asked gravely.
'I have—not,' said Hubert after a pause, during which he ran over in his mind the familiar list of the ‘seven deadly sins.'
‘Then I do not wish to hear what you have said or done. If there was wrong towards me, I forgive it.'
‘There was not, my lord,' said Hubert, quickly, and in a tone which made the deep lines of the chancellor's face relax into a grave smile.
‘If there was wrong towards others, or towards God, tell your confessor, and take the penance he allots with patience —in any case, tell your tale to him. Now, go in peace and enjoy your holiday.'
He waved his hand, and Hubert was dismissed, his heart very grateful for the chancellor's trust in him, but his mind and conscience still unsatisfied. It was not that he cared in the least for the severe penance he was sure to undergo, Charlier, his rival in the chancellor's favor, being confessor to the household. But he was intensely anxious about the prisoner who was to stand again that day before the Council; vibrating between sympathy and admiration for the man, and fear of incurring sin (or was it of displeasing the chancellor?) by making common cause with the heretic. Was he a heretic after all?
Hubert passed from the chancellor's cabinet into the outer room, where he was accustomed to write. There, on a desk, lay the chancellor's copy of the Vulgate, a huge, weighty volume. Hubert went over to it, and, having found with some difficulty the place he was in search of, stood reading.
He was still absorbed in his occupation when the chancellor came forth. Thinking, perhaps, that he had been too sparing of ghostly counsel to the young soul committed to his charge, he laid his hand on the lad's shoulder and said kindly, That is a good day which begins with the perusal of Holy Scripture. "Understandest thou what thou readest?" '
‘No, my lord,' said Hubert, as he turned and bowed.
‘How readest thou? '
Hubert read aloud in Latin:
'" Blessed are ye when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake."'
‘That is a passage which presents no difficulty, even to the unlearned,' said the chancellor. ‘A child could understand it. You ought to know that it was meant for the holy saints and martyrs, who lived in the early ages of the faith.'
‘Might it come true of any man even now, my lord?’
‘Doubtless. Of Christians who dwell amongst the heathen, in pairtibus infidelium.'
Hubert's heart sprang to his lips, and found utterance ere he knew.
‘Oh, my lord, God forgive me if I sin; but I shall never hear or read those words again without seeing the face of that man who stood so calmly before all the angry Council!'
The chancellor started, not visibly, but inwardly. He had not liked the look in his young secretary's face the day before, especially when the prisoner was mocked or insulted: yet he had not feared anything so dreadful as this. You speak idly, and as one without understanding,' he said, with grave displeasure.
Read the passage again: "Falsely, for My sake."'
“Falsely" was it not, when never a word was proved against him?’ cried Hubert, growing bolder. "For My sake!" That appeal of his to our Lord Jesus Christ seemed to make those Italians (of course it must be the Italians, my lord, and the Germans) more wroth than aught else he said. ‘Save, indeed, that word about Wickliffe. Was that wrong, my lord?'
`He would have his soul with his,' said the chancellor, with a deep sigh. ‘In truth, his soul—or else he repents—is like to be ere long with the lost soul of John Wickliffe.'
Hubert shuddered. All that was within him rose in revolt against the terrible word.
'But, my lord,' he cried, ‘he holds Catholic doctrine; he loves and studies above all things the Holy Scriptures; his life is without spot or stain, his enemies themselves being judges’; is he not, then, "in the grace of God?" '
‘My son, I perceive thou art much in need of instruction. We must distinguish between graces of God, which are given to many (and to this unhappy man, I must own, in large measure), and the grace of God, which only the faithful have, and which even they have only as long as they are faithful. These, however, are amongst the deep things of God. Even the wisest of us cannot understand how it is that He denies many things to those who are thankful and would use them well, and yet gives them to the unthankful who yet fight against Him.' He sighed again, and remained for some moments absorbed in thought; then continued, partly to Hubert and partly to himself: "It is undeniable that upon some who, like Judas, are to perish everlastingly, He bestows the grace of divers virtues." '
Hubert gazed at him with eyes full of wonder.
'I thought,' he said, ‘that to be good was to be in the grace of God.'
‘My son, there are faithless children and wicked servants, to whom, nevertheless, the Heavenly Father sometimes gives of the fat of wheat, and satiates them with honey out of the rock; even as some kings have sent to persons condemned to death meat from their own table." Great spiritual gifts are to be found sometimes with the cursed and reprobate children, either to the increase of their damnation, or as a sort of transitory reward for their labors, as false and unprofitable. So they hear the Gospel, "Take that thine is and go thy way." But be not cast down, my son; these mysteries concern not simple souls like thine. Leave them alone, and occupy thyself with the duties and the pleasures befitting thy condition.'
He turned to go, but Hubert cried impetuously: 'May I speak but one word more to my lord? '
‘If you will,' he said, pausing, but half reluctantly.
‘It is some three years now since a poor boy, overwhelmed with guilt and shame, stood before you. He had neither gift nor grace, nothing to recommend him, save perhaps that he scorned a coward's lie. Yet you deigned to say that he was worth saving (Hubert's strong voice quivered at the words), and you saved him. Of how much greater worth in the eyes of God and man is he who is to be judged today, and who need not stand where he does now if he could lie or feign? '
The chancellor was moved. It was some moments before he could answer, then he said gently: ‘What I did for thee, my son, that have I never regretted. As for the other matter, leave thou it in wiser hands. Think no more of this man, who is a dangerous heretic, and would turn the world upside down. Moreover, do not fancy that I can do anything for him. A heretic can no man save, if he will not save himself by timely submission and repentance. All that remains for us is to save others from the deadly infection of his teaching and example.'
He went out, and Hubert presently followed him with a heavy heart. He spent the day wandering idly here and there, deriving neither pleasure nor profit from his enforced leisure. He would not go to Armand, not caring in his present mood to be talked to about the queen's ladies, or the Kaiser's hawks, or to be taunted with the misdoings of the Holy Council. However, towards evening Armand came to him, as he was walking about the Stefan's Platz, in order to be at hand when the Council broke up, and to hear the earliest tidings.
Armand had with him a little old man dressed in a sad-colored gown trimmed with rich fur, with a four-cornered cap, starched ruff, and sword by his side, and carrying a cane with a large golden head.
The brothers greeted, and Armand spoke of the eclipse. He had been at Petershausen at the time, and he gave a vivid picture of the terrors of Queen Barbe and her ladies.
‘Surely it portends some great calamity,' he went on.
‘But if it be the Kaiser's glory which is to suffer eclipse, I know not. Or, more likely, that of the Holy Council, which you think is the sun in the heavens—eh, Hubert? '
‘Hold thy peace about the Council,' said Hubert shortly.
But here the stranger struck in. I am a man of no account with you, gentlemen,' he said. ‘Yet, if you hearken, I can tell you that which will allay your idle fears. See your own shadow there, master squire; yesterday, just such a shadow fell, not on the sun, but on the earth, and that was what you saw. It had no more to do with the Kaiser or the Council than with this cane in my hand.'
Hubert looked at him in amazement.
‘Good master,' he said, ‘you are jesting with us. How can you expect anyone to believe such folly? It was the sun which was darkened, not the earth—I saw it with these eyes. There was a black veil drawn over the face of it.'
But Armand, when the old man was not looking, glanced at him and touched his own forehead with a rapid, but very significant gesture. So Hubert heard his answer with pitying tolerance. ‘You are not the first, young sir, nor will you be the last, to put the darkness in the heavens when it is at your own feet.' Saying this, he raised his cap and moved away. Then Hubert asked, ‘Who is that mad fellow?'
‘That is Queen Barbe's Jewish physician, Dr. Nathan Solito. He used to belong to the pope, but he came to Petershausen after his flight. Oh yes, he is certainly a little crazy, but very clever and immensely learned-learned, too, in some things which are not quite lawful, you understand? The queen's court is a strange place, Hubert, and one hears strange things there. I have met people who do not believe in heaven, or hell, or purgatory; no, not in God Himself, nor even '—added Armand, as a carefully-reserved climax— ‘nor even in the devil! Our little doctor says there are many people in the world like that— Italians especially.'
‘I marvel the sky does not fall upon them,' cried Hubert indignantly. ‘Talk of heresy, indeed, after that! Why do you listen to such wickedness? '
‘Oh! ' said Armand complacently, as he arranged the lace ruffles on his wrists, and threw back his short velvet cloak to show his doublet of violet satin to advantage, one listens to everything. ‘Still, I don't want to scandalize a good churchman like you.'
‘I am not a churchman,' said Hubert, ‘for the hundredth time; and I never will be!’ he added, a new resolve taking form and shape within him at the moment.
‘Now you are jesting. What is to become of you if you throw away the chancellor's patronage, after all? And yet, brother, you are far too good for that trade. But let that be; I have other hawks to fly now. Listen, there has been a letter from the duke.'
‘Of Burgundy? '
‘Who else? He is coming here, not exactly to the town, but to yonder forest, where he will set up his tents, and live in camp like a soldier during the pleasant summer weather. He says he longs to hear the stags belling at night. But methinks the music he really longs to hear is the voice of the Holy Council acquitting Jean Petit.'
‘He will never hear that,' said Hubert. ‘On the contrary, Jean Petit will soon be solemnly condemned.'
‘I thought the Council had far other affairs on hand. But I need not tell you that we Burgundians rejoice greatly at these tidings of the duke. I have special grounds for joy, as my lord hath sent me a kind message, intimating that he will need my services near his person. But, Hubert,' he added, lowering his voice, ' there is a matter upon which I have often wished to ask your opinion. It is for one of my fellow esquires, who has put the case to me; he is dreading, for reasons of his own, the coming of his lord. Suppose now you had done your chancellor a disservice, which yet he never knew of, should you feel bound to reveal it, at the risk of losing his favor? And if—if an innocent person had been compromised, but could not now be righted, nor the wrong undone in any way—how would you act? '
At any other time Hubert would have said, 'Tell the truth boldly.' But now lie was in a bitter, perverse mood, in which it seemed to him as if even truth availed not, either with God or man. He answered briefly, ‘I cannot tell.'
Armand, instead of pursuing the subject, observed that the place was filling rapidly, and remarked upon the crowd of servants leading richly-caparisoned horses, and waiting for their masters to come forth from the Council; there were even some costly litters, draped and curtained with silk, for the older or more luxurious prelates. ‘It will soon be over now,' he said; and time it was too. ‘I am here to learn what has been done today, not of my own will, but as in duty bound, fulfilling the commands of a lady. Our Burgundians are bitter against this John Huss, though not the Bishop of Arras so much as that base-born varlet, Pierre Cauchon, who I verily believe wants the man burned just that he may see it done. At Petershausen are some who wish him well, especially you little Jewish doctor, who cured him of a fever, and one fair lady whom I know. Thanks to the Jew and his stories, Demoiselle Jocelyne is as tender over this heretic as though he were a falcon with a broken wing. She says she would rather confess to him than to any bishop in the Council. Our friend Robert would be well pleased to hear her. By St. Catherine, there is Robert himself, I think, standing over yonder in the crowd! But he is in plain cloth hose and jerkin like a townsman.'
It was Robert. Armand caught his eye, and beckoned him to join them as they stood on the steps of St. Stefan's Church. ‘How is thy Nänchen, good friend?’ he asked, greeting him with far less constraint than did Hubert. ‘But what has become of the abbot's badge upon your sleeve? Are you no longer with the Black Monks on the Island? '
‘I am not, sir. I have a boat now, and fish upon the lake or the river. You see, it is but an idle way of life to bear arms when there is no real fighting to do; and the other calling, at least, is one of honest toil, whereby a man may help himself and his fellows.' Then, turning to Hubert with an anxious look, and pointing to the Franciscan House: 'Master Hubert, have you been in there today? '
‘I have not,' said Hubert sadly. ‘But yesterday gave small hope of any end save one for the man you love so well.'
Robert looked at him intently, with keenly inquiring eyes, which were soon lit up with a gleam of satisfaction. But he only said, ‘Then, sir, you were there yesterday? '
‘I was, and on Wednesday. Yesterday I heard, but did not see him. On Wednesday I saw, but scarcely heard him.’
'How did he look, sir?’ asked Robert eagerly.
‘Like a soldier sent on a forlorn hope, who is weary and sore wounded, yet will die unflinching where he stands,' said the soldier's son with deep feeling.
There were tears in the eyes of Robert, and his hand moved instinctively towards that of Hubert. But the difference of rank-in those days so marked and definite-made him draw it back again. He only said, ‘Ah, sir, I knew that good heart of yours would speak, if you only saw him. And I have never seen him since they took him to Gottlieben. On Wednesday morning they brought him back; and now he lies in the dungeon yonder. Good care they take that none of us shall come, even into the court outside of it.' Having said this, Robert moved away, with a brief farewell to the brothers, to speak to someone whom he saw in the crowd.
He had told Armand the truth, yet not all the truth, about his present calling. There was but one service which friends outside could render to the lonely prisoner, and in this they had not failed. During the greater part of his long and cruel imprisonment they had succeeded in keeping up communication with him, had supplied him with writing materials, had sent him letters, and received answers from him. But the task had been difficult and dangerous. More than once it happened that, in spite of the most anxious precautions, a letter was lost, or fell into hostile hands. A servant of Chlum's, named Vitus, had been the innocent cause of some misadventure of this kind. Chlum was very angry, and Vitus himself sorely discomfited; all the more because he knew that the story of his failure had reached the prisoner. 'I would not care for anything,' said he, ‘if only Master John does not think I failed him in his need.'
But Robert, who knew every man and woman in the town and about it, proved an active and efficient helper. He could do much that the Bohemians, as strangers, could not attempt. During the past three months his new fishing-boat had found constant employment on the Rhine, near the Castle of Gottlieben. And now that the prisoner was removed to the Franciscan House, it proved that Nänchen also could help in the work which they both had at heart. Amongst her acquaintances were certain poor, obscure women, ‘the keepers' wives,' of whose lowly ministrations a hint has come clown to us across the centuries.
At last, very late in the evening, the Council broke up. There was a great stir and confusion in the Stefan's Platz, as bishops, abbots, and doctors poured forth from the doors of the Franciscan House, many of them calling loudly for their servants, who, with horses or litters, tried to get near them, and pushed and jostled one another in the crowd. Charlier, who, much to his own satisfaction, had been doing Hubert's work that day, saw Hubert and Armand standing together watching the scene, and crossed the Platz to speak to them. He rather liked Armand, and his sense of a petty triumph gained over Hubert made him more amiably disposed even towards the favorite, whom he considered as his rival.
‘He is doomed!’ he said without preface or comment. ‘All that remains now is to pronounce the sentence.'
From Hubert there was neither word nor sign, but Armand cried out, ‘Doomed?—and what for? '
‘Heresy,' said Charlier. The one word was enough; speaker and hearers knew it meant death.
There was a moment's silence; then Armand asked in a mocking tone, which nevertheless it cost him an evident effort to assume, ‘What heresy, if you please, sir chaplain? That is, if an ignorant layman may presume to inquire.'
‘Divers and manifold heresies. I cannot remember all, nor the half of them. Nor, if I did remember, could you understand, master squire; being, as you say, a layman, although doubtless not ignorant.'
`Still, you might give me a specimen. Just for my own instruction.'
‘Ay, but where to begin? The business was interminably long; sooth to say, we were all tired out. Yet stay—I will try. You man hath said that " Jesus Christ, not the pope, is the Head of the Church; "that" the pope who lives not the life of Christ is no vicar of Christ, but a forerunner of Antichrist; "that" the Church could subsist, if God willed it, without a pope at all, and still be governed by Christ, as indeed it had sometimes done." This I do remember, perchance the best of all, for the man's look and gesture come back to me as he added—"But what do I say? Is not the Church even now without a visible head? And yet Jesus Christ does not cease to govern it." '
‘Wrong!—wrong there, at least!’ Hubert broke in impetuously. ‘Jesus Christ cannot be governing the Church now, or such things could not be done in it.'
Charlier turned and looked at him, all the bitterness of jealousy reviving in his heart. ‘You had better take care of yourself, Master Hubert Bohun,' he said; and Armand added, 'Hush, Hubert; let him go on.'
He went on accordingly. ‘Another scandalous proposition was that about heretics, that they should not be corporeally punished. How grievous a heresy this is the chancellor hath proved long ago. Our heretic had the grace, or the prudence, to qualify it a little, though his meaning was plain enough throughout. Then a blasphemous article from one of the books was read aloud, in which he compared churchmen who caused heretics to be put to death to the wicked scribes and Pharisees in the Bible. At this, as was natural, the Council waxed furious. Never heard I such an outcry! I thought the roof would come down on us. The shout rings yet in my ears, "Who—who are like them? Whom do you compare to the scribes and Pharisees?" "Those that deliver over an innocent man to the secular arm," saith he in answer, more calmly than I speak now to you. Can you conceive such audacity? '
‘I can,' said Armand, with a dangerous quiver in his voice. ‘For I have heard how my father stood alone, and kept the bridge against a troop of Armagnacs. But go on, master chaplain. What followed? '
‘Much that I cannot tell you now. For instance, his heretical proposition that popes and priests in mortal sin are not true popes and priests at all. But this, through the will of Providence, turned to his own undoing. For he must needs go on: "Nor is a king in mortal sin a true king." Whereat we all shouted, "Call the Kaiser!" for his highness being weary—and no wonder—had gone out upon the balcony. When he came in, John Huss was ordered to repeat what he had just said, which he did with his unfailing hardihood. I rather suspect we shall hear no more, henceforward, of the Kaiser's protecting him.
‘At last they had done with reading the evidence; and the Kaiser himself, the Cardinal of Cambray, and many others, began to urge him to abjure, and throw himself on the mercy of the Council.'
‘Did he?’ asked Armand eagerly.
‘Not he! With the greatest humility of manner, but the utmost arrogance of soul, he said that he could not abjure, as he had not held any heresy. So meekly he spoke, you thought he would have yielded everything; yet he yielded not one hair's breadth. Moreover, by this time he was deadly pale, and shaking with ague. Though he is a heretic, someone in charity ought to give him a live spider, wrapped in a piece of linen, to bind upon his arm.’
‘So they had to let him go, I suppose.'
‘Not they. A great deal was done after that. He underwent a long examination about some doings at Prague, and other matters, which I cannot call to mind in detail. That clever Bohemian, Palec̆, came well to the front, and pressed him hard—I hope the bishops will remember to give that man a good benefice, or some other gratification. Our cardinal, too—rightly is he called "the hammer of heretics." '
‘And your great chancellor,' asked Armand, ‘did not he take some part in the matter? '
‘Strangely enough, indeed,' Charlier confessed, he was silent the whole time. He sat still in his place, looking grieved and weary. ‘I doubt he is wearing himself out; of late, I know he has slept but little. But there were plenty to speak instead of him, though few, or none, as able as he. John Huss was beset on all sides; one taking up the word as soon as another was answered—often before it. Such a cross-fire of accusations, questions, reproaches, I trove no man ever stood before. How he stood it, and found an answer for all—ill and suffering though he plainly was—only the Evil One, whose servant I suppose he is, can explain. However, the thing is settled now. He abjures or he dies.'
‘Not that last, I hope,' said Armand in a low voice.
‘I should have better hopes of him,' said Charlier, if he were scornful and defiant, or proud and boastful, as heretics are wont to be. But what can be done with a man who is at once so quiet and so immovable? Even the Kaiser could make nothing of him; though he condescended to argue. "I pray and conjure of you," said our heretic, "not to constrain me to do what my conscience forbids me. As I have never held several of these articles, how can I abjure them? While as to those I have acknowledged, if any man will teach me better, I will readily do what you require." '
‘Then why don't they teach him better?’ said Armand. ‘There is the whole Council, with all the collective wisdom of the Church, to do it.'
‘Under favor, master squire, you speak now as a layman. The Council has done all you ask, and all that beseems it. The Council has informed him that the articles are heretical, and that he must abjure them.'
‘What? Those that he has never held, along with those that he acknowledges?'
‘That is only a subterfuge,' said Charlier hastily. ‘He has held them all—and worse.'
‘I suppose the Council, being infallible, knows what a man holds and believes better than he does himself,' returned Armand.
Not detecting the sarcasm, Charlier answered approvingly, ‘You are right, master squire, and your apprehensiveness puts to shame others who have had larger opportunities '—with a glance at the angry face of Hubert. The decision of the Holy Council is final, and cannot be questioned without mortal sin. For, being the sacred depository of the light and guidance which has been promised to the Church, it is infallible, as my lord the chancellor hath so ably proved.' Infallible, and all-powerful too,' pursued Armand. There is the secular arm, the Kaiser and all his hosts, behind it. Strange indeed will it be if the Holy Council—with all the wisdom of the Church and all the power of the world—cannot vanquish this one poor priest, alone and helpless, ill and in chains! '
‘Of course it can vanquish him, and will. If he is converted—and God knows I hope he may be—it will triumph in his salvation, if not, in his condemnation and punishment. Thus, as the holy doctors say, God is glorified, even in the wicked. Bohun, are you coming home to supper? It was late enough on Wednesday ere you saw fit to make your appearance. But, indeed, you do for the most part what you please.'
Hubert vouchsafed him no answer. As soon as he was gone Armand turned to his brother and said, ‘As to this man's opinions, I cannot profess to judge of them one way or another. Though I own that, to a layman like me, it seems passing strange that the Council should fall upon him for attacking the power of the pope, when they have just deposed that same pope themselves; ay, and could find nothing bad enough to say of him. However, I admit their triumph over him. Now they want another, over this poor priest. He too must lie in the dust at their feet; he must say and swear that black is white at their bidding. Being a brave man, it will go hard with him. But he will have to do it—Hubert, what ails you? '
‘This,' Hubert broke out fiercely, ‘that I think there is no more justice or mercy anywhere on earth or in heaven. It is not the Council only—say what you will of the Council now, Armand, I stand silent and ashamed!—but the chancellor even—the chancellor himself—thinks that all this is right and necessary, and according to the will of God! Yes, the will of God, Armand—think of that! He says that God deals thus with men—that He is hard and pitiless, and what we at least would call unjust! And who should know God if he does not—holy doctor and saint as he is? I can make nothing of it; it is all dark—dark to me, like that strange darkness yestermorn.'
Armand was terrified at the strong passion that surged through his brother's soul—a passion he was incapable of sharing, or even of understanding, although in his own way he was angry enough with the Council. He said, ‘Perhaps, after all, the chancellor does not know God any better than you or I, or even than you man they call heretic knows Him. But, Hubert, I pray of you take care; you will get into trouble with this wild, reckless talk of yours.'
‘Take care of what? I wish I was done with it all! I wish I was a soldier like my father, or like you, Armand; would go back to France and fight. They are fighting there now, it seems. That, at least, would be something a true man might do. But, I suppose,' he added sorrowfully, ‘I suppose the darkness would be there too.'