knife through the silent night. Silent? but the night
was quivering with bells: 'Jesus Christ, the Shepherd,
the Lamb, and the Victim.'
Metal clinked against metal; the silver rood was
clinking against a button of his tunic. Too much
noise, too much noise! A large, muscular hand moved
upward and closed itself over the rood, firmly holding
the cross in position. Then the body paused in a patch
of blue darkness to take off its boots and its blood-
stiffened socks which it carefully hid in some neigh-
bouring bushes; then it started to move its toes this
way and that with a sigh of relief. There wer$ stones
on the plain yet the naked feet did not feel the stones
— it was good to be once more wearing sandals.
On and on. But how long had that body been
walking? A very long time for the body felt tired, and
it seemed to have lost all sense of direction. The hill
that the patrol had been skirting was gone, it had
suddenly vanished from off the earth —but then
perhaps it had never existed. And the bells were
fainter; so faint they had grown that their tune was
incomplete, notes were missing: "Jesus . . . Shepherd,
the Lamb . . .' breathed the bells; a soft blur of
indistinct, somnolent sound before that last all but
deafening peal: 'Jesus Christ, the Shepherd, the Lamb,
and the Victim.9
Rest — the body must rest. It must sit with its
aching head and shoulders supported. It must sit
or drop down on this spot where it stood. But if it
failed now who would speak the words? Someone
called Anfos had known of the words a long time
ago, a lifetime ago: 'The words! the words! Master,
where are the words?5 'What words? I tell you they
do not exist!' A most cowardly lie, a most damn-
able lie —the words were the Life, which alone
existed.
. He groped his way forward and sank to the ground
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