Then he went and brought a pot with rusty steel pens.  “But don’t you spoil them!” For they were the very pens with which death-warrants had been signed—­the old man had a collection of such things and hoped to sell it to a rich Englishman.  “Does your honour require anything else?” With those mocking words he left the cell and raged and cursed all along the corridor.  The prisoners thought he was cursing them.

The judge, his hands behind his back, walked up and down his large study.  What a cursed critical case!  If the Chancellor had not been given up by the doctors on the day of the trial, the sentence would have been different.  The petition for mercy!  Would it have any result except that of prolonging the poor man’s torture?  Whether in the end it would not have been better——?  Everything would have been over then.  An old official came out of the adjoining room and laid a bundle of papers on the table.

“One moment.  Has the petition for mercy been sent to His Majesty?”

“It has, sir.”

“What’s your opinion?” asked the judge.

The counsellor raised his shoulders and let them fall again.

Konrad cowered down and stared at the table.

On it lay everything—­paper, ink, pens.  What should he write?  He might describe his sadness, but how did a man begin to do that?  He lifted up his face as if searching for something.  His glance fell through the window on to the wall, the upper part of which was lighted by the evening sun.  The mountain tops glowed like that.  Ah, world, beautiful world!  Still three weeks.  Or double that time.  Then—­the very beating of his heart hurt him; his temple throbbed as though struck by a hammer.  For he always thought of the one thing—­and it suddenly flashed into his mind—­there were other executioners!  His supper was there—­a tin can with rice soup and a piece of bread.  He swallowed it mechanically to the last crumb.  Then came night, and the star was again visible in the scrap of sky between the roof and the chimney.  Konrad gazed at it reverently for the few minutes until it vanished.  Then the long, dark, miserable night.  And this was called living!  And it was for such life that you petitioned the king.  But if a king grants mercy, then the sun shines.  The kindness shown him by the judge had strengthened him a little, but the last of his surging thoughts was always, “Hopeless!”

The next night Konrad had another visitor—­his mother, in her Sunday gown, just as she used to go to communion.  And there was some one with her.  She went up to her son’s bed, and said:  “Konrad, I bring you a kind friend.”

When he felt for her hand, she was no longer there, but in the middle of the dim cell stood the Lord Jesus.  His white garment hung down to the ground, His long hair lay over His shoulders.  His shining face was turned towards Konrad.

When the poor sinner woke in the morning his heart was full of wonder.  The night had brought healing.  He jumped blithely out of bed.  “My Saviour, I will never more leave you.”