the ragged shoes and sour bread of the present. The fog outside had
thickened, and the face of Odo's friend was now discernible only as a
spot of pallor in the surrounding dimness. Even he seemed farther away
than usual, withdrawn into the fog as into that mist of indifference
which lay all about Odo's hot and eager spirit. The child sat down among
the gourds and medlars on the muddy floor and hid his face against his
knees.

He had sat there a long time when the noise of wheels and the crack of a
postillion's whip roused the dogs chained in the stable. Odo's heart
began to beat. What could the sounds mean? It was as though the
flood-tide of the unknown were rising about him and bursting open the
chapel door to pour in on his loneliness. It was, in fact, Filomena who
opened the door, crying out to him in an odd Easter Sunday voice, the
voice she used when she had on her silk neckerchief and gold chain or
when she was talking to the bailiff.

Odo sprang up and hid his face in her lap. She seemed, of a sudden,
nearer to him than any one else--a last barrier between himself and the
mystery that awaited him outside.

"Come, you poor sparrow," she said, dragging him across the threshold of
the chapel, "the abate is here asking for you;" and she crossed herself,
as though she had named a saint.

Odo pulled away from her with a last wistful glance at Saint Francis,
who looked back at him in an ecstasy of commiseration.

"Come, come," Filomena repeated, dropping to her ordinary key as she
felt the resistance of the little boy's hand. "Have you no heart, you