He stood for a moment after making the announcement, and then went back into the house.  A few isolated exclamations came from the crowd.

“To make a martyr of him!  Enthusiasm is infectious!”

“An enthusiast!  If he’s an enthusiast, I’m a rascal!”

“Why not?” replied a shock-headed man with a laugh.

“Move on!” ordered the police, who were now reinforced by the military.  The crowd yielded on all sides, and the tram rails were once more free.

A few minutes later a closed carriage was driven along the same road.  The glint of a bayonet could be seen through the window.  The crowd flocked after the carriage, but it went so swiftly over the paved road that the dust flew up under the horses’ hoofs, and at length it vanished in the poplar avenue that led to the prison.  Some of the people stopped, panting, and asked each other why they had run so fast.  “It won’t take place to-day.  We shall see in the papers when it’s to come off.”

“Do you think so?  I tell you it’s only for specially invited and honoured guests!  The times when executions were conducted in public are gone, my dear fellow.  The people are kept out of the way.”

“Patience, my wise compeer!  It’ll be a people’s holiday when the hangman is hung.”

The crowd melted into the ordinary traffic of the street.

A slender, stooping man sat handcuffed between two policemen in the carriage that rolled along the avenue.  He breathed so heavily that his shoulders heaved up and down.  He wore his black coat today, and white linen appeared at neck and sleeves.  His hair was reddish brown, he had brushed it carefully, and cheeks and chin were shaved smoothly.  He had felt sure that the day would restore him to liberty, or promise it him at no very distant date.  His pale face and sunken cheeks proclaimed him about forty, but he might have been younger.  His blue eyes had a far-away, dreamy expression, but they were now full of terror.  His face would have been handsome had not the look of terror spoiled it.  His fettered hands lay on his knees, which were closely pressed together, his fingers were intertwined, his head sunken so that his chin was driven into his chest:  he looked an utterly broken man.  He drew in his legs so that the policemen might be more comfortable.  One of them glanced at him sideways, and wondered how this gentle creature could have committed such a crime.

They drove alongside the wall of the large building, the gate of which was now opened.  In the courtyard the poor sinner was taken out of the carriage and led through a second gate into an inner courtyard where his handcuffs were removed.  He was led through vaulted corridors in which here and there small doors with barred windows might be seen.  The dark passage had many windings, and was lighted by an occasional lamp.  The air was cold and damp.  The openings high up in the wall, through which glimmered a pale