V.

Dolf went off into the town one morning.

Funeral bells were tolling, and their knell echoed through the air like the hoarse cry of gulls and petrels above the shipwrecked.

A long procession disappeared through the church porch, and the altar draped in black shone with its many wax lights, which glistened as the tears in a widow’s eyes.

“Who has died in the town?” Dolf asked of an old beggar sitting at the threshold of the church, his chin on his knees.  “The son of a rich family, a man of property, Jacques Karnavash.  Give a trifle for the repose of his soul.”

Dolf took off his hat and entered the church.

He hid himself behind a pillar and saw the silver-nailed coffin disappear beneath the black catafalque.

“Lord God,” he said, “may Thy will be done.  Forgive him as I have forgiven him.”

When the crowd made their taper-offering, he took a wax light from the chorister and followed those who walked round the branch candlesticks mighty as trees, which burned at the four corners of the pall.

Then he knelt down in the dark corner, far from the men and women who had come out of respect for the dead, and these words were mingled with his prayer: 

“God, Father of men, forgive me also; I saved this man from drowning, but my courage failed when I first saw that it was my Riekje’s seducer, and I desired vengeance.  Then I pushed from me the man who had a mother, and whom I was to restore to that mother; I thrust him back under the water, before I saved him.  Forgive me, O Lord, and if I must be punished for this, punish me only.”

Then he left the church and thought deep down in his heart: 

“Now there is no one living who can say that Riekje’s child is not my child.”

“Hey!  Dolf,” voices called to him from the quay.

He recognized those who had seen him bring Jacques Karnavash to the bank.

Their rude hearts had trembled for him like women’s hearts; they had clung to him and said: 

“Dolf, you are worth all of us put together.”

Suddenly he had fallen on the pavement, but they had carried him near the kitchen fire of an inn, had revived him with gin and looked after him until he felt strong enough to run back to his beloved Riekje.

“Dolf,” they now cried.

And when Dolf turned, the old boatman clasped him in his arms and said: 

“My dear son, I love you as if you were my own flesh and blood.”

The others pressed his hand heartily, saying: 

“Dolf, we shall at least have known one really brave fellow before we die.”

“As for me, comrades,” said Dolf, laughing, “I shall not die before I drink a glass with you to the health of the fine little chap Riekje gave me the other night.”

IN LOVE WITH THE CZARINA