“As Aldebaran the star shines in the heavens” (no light within itself, but borrowing from the Central Sun), “so Aldebaran the man might shine among his fellows.” (Beggared of joy himself, yet flashing its reflection athwart the lives of others.)

When next he went into the town he no longer shunned the sights that formerly he’d passed with face averted, for well he knew that if he would shed joy and hope on others he must go to places where they most abound.  What matter that the thought of Vesta stabbed him nigh to madness when he looked on hearth-fires that could never blaze for him?  With courage almost more than human he put that fond ambition out of mind as if it were another sword he’d learned to sheathe.  At first it would not stay in hiding, but flew the scabbard of his will to thrust him sore as often as he put it from him.  But after awhile he found a way to bind it fast, and when he’d found that way it gave him victory over all.

A little child came crying towards him in the market-place, its world a waste of woe because the toy it cherished had been broken in its play.  Aldebaran would have turned aside on yesterday to press the barbed thought still deeper in his heart that he had been denied the joy of fatherhood.  But now he stooped as gently as if he were the child’s own sire to wipe its tears and soothe its sobs.  And when with skilful fingers he restored the toy, the child bestowed on him a warm caress out of its boundless store.

He passed on with his pulses strangely stirred.  ’Twas but a crumb of love the child had given, yet, as Aldebaran held it in his heart, behold a miracle!  It grew full-loaf, and he would fain divide it with all hungering souls!  So when a stone’s throw farther on he met a man well-nigh distraught from many losses, he did not say in bitterness as once he would have done, that ’twas the common lot of mortals; to look on him if one would know the worst that Fate can do.  Nay, rather did he speak so bravely of what might still be wrung from life though one were maimed like he, that hope sprang up within his hearer and sent him on his way with face a-shine.

That grateful smile was like a revelation to Aldebaran, showing him he had indeed the power belonging to the stars.  Beggared of joy, no light within himself, yet from the Central Sun could he reflect the hope and cheer that made him as the eye of Taurus ’mong his fellows.

The weeks slipped into months, months into years.  The Jester went his way unto his kindred and never once was missed, because Aldebaran more than filled his place.  In time the town forgot it ever had another Jester, and in time Aldebaran began to feel the gladness that he only feigned before.

And then it came to pass whenever he went by men felt a strange, strength-giving influence radiating from his presence,—­a sense of hope.  One could not say exactly what it was, it was so fleeting, so intangible, like warmth that circles from a brazier, or perfume that is wafted from an unseen rose.