Part 92 (2/2)
”He drove over to the neighboring village to bring a doctor for you.”
”No harm has come to him?”
”You might have heard his voice through the window, when all was over.
He could not come in, because the door was closed. His first care was to bring a surgeon for you.”
The girl sighed.
”If he comes too late....”
”Don't fret about that. Your wound is not fatal; only be calm.”
”I know better,” said the girl in a flush of fever. ”I feel that I shall not live.”
”Don't worry, Czipra, you will get better,” said Topandy, taking the girl's hand.
And then the girl locked her five fingers in those of Topandy, so that they were clasped like two hands in prayer.
”Sir, I know I am standing on the brink of the grave. I have now grasped your hand. I have clasped it, as people at prayer are wont to clasp their hands. Can you let me go down to the grave without teaching me one prayer. This night the murderer's knife has pierced my heart to liberate yours. Does not my heart deserve the accomplishment of its last wish? Does not that G.o.d, who this night has liberated us both, me from life, you from death, deserve our thanks?”
Topandy was moved. He said:
”Repeat after me.”
And he said to her the Lord's Prayer.
The girl devoutly and between gasps repeated it after him.
How beautiful it is! What great words those are!
First she repeated it after him, then again said it over, sentence by sentence, asking ”what does this or that phrase mean?” ”Why do we say 'our Father?' What is meant by 'Thy Kingdom?' Will he forgive us our trespa.s.ses, if we forgive them that trespa.s.s against us? Will he deliver us from every evil? What power there is in that 'Amen!'”--Then a third time she repeated it alone before Topandy, without a single omission.
”Now I feel easier,” she said, her face beaming with happiness.
The atheist turned aside and wept.
The shutters let in the rays of the sun through the holes the bullets had made.
”Is that sunset?” whispered the girl.
”No, my child, it is sunrise.”
”I thought it was evening already.”
Topandy opened one shutter that Czipra might see the morning light of the sun.
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