small sound — that very small sound which was like
a soft but compelling summons; and a lizard would
lift its throat to the sun, then glance brightly at
Christophers hand and move nearer, then all of a
sudden it would be on his hand or his arm, to be
followed by another and another— for at last he
had won the friendship of these creatures. Yet his
heart was so full of trouble these days that he would
not always call his companions, but would sit staring
down at the roofs of Saint Loup, or away to the sea
that spread bluely beyond them, while his mind
sought in vain to explain itself and the unsolved
enigma of his existence.
Brooding darkly he would conjure up all his
troubles: his stupidity at school which perpetually
shamed him; his constant and unhappy quarrels
with Jan —always quarrels in spite of their great
devotion; the thoughts that would come into his
head undesired — thoughts of pity, of anxious and
eager compassion; his misery over the sufferings and
pain of all speechless and thus defenceless creatures
. . . that mark on his shoulders when Jan struck the
couleuvre. And his hands, the great fear he had felt
of his hands since the night when their power had
released Mireio —or had she been actually going
to die? Had he only imagined that his touch had
released her? And the day when he put on his first
pair of sandals . . . that queer falling asleep at his
father's workbench . . . that queer waking up with
a sense of dread because of something that he must
do. But what? he had brought back no memory of
it. Then those pictures — Christ holding the sing-
ing bird —Christ healing the maltreated beast of
burden — Christ laying His hands on Mireio's head
... on Mireio's head? but Mir&o had been NOW.
It was he and not Christ who had laid hands upon
her, and the town had not been Nain but Saint
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