Having seen them go, he returned to his room, finding his spectacles—unbroken—on the steps as he descended them. Once more he took up his awl and fell to work, but had done little before he found it difficult to distinguish the stitches, and the lamplighter had passed on his rounds. “I too must light up,” he thought to himself. So he trimmed the lamp, hung it up, and resumed his work. He finished one boot completely, and then turned it over to look at it. It was all good work. Then he laid aside his tools, swept up the cuttings, rounded off the stitches and loose ends, and cleaned his awl. Next he lifted the lamp down, placed it on the table, and took his Testament from the shelf. He had intended opening the book at the place which he had marked last night with a strip of leather, but it opened itself at another instead. The instant it did so, his vision of last night came back to his memory, and, as instantly, he thought he heard a movement behind him as of someone moving towards him. He looked round and saw in the shadow of a dark corner what appeared to be figures—figures of persons standing there, yet could not distinguish them clearly. Then the voice whispered in his ear: “Martin, Martin, dost thou not know me?” “Who art Thou?” said Avdeitch. “Even I!” whispered the voice again. “Lo, it is I!”—and there stepped from the dark corner Stepanitch. He smiled, and then, like the fading of a little cloud, was gone. “It is I!” whispered the voice again—and there stepped from the same corner the woman with her baby. She smiled, and the baby smiled, and they were gone. “And it is I!” whispered the voice again—and there stepped forth the old woman and the boy with the apple. They smiled, and were gone. Joy filled the soul of Martin Avdeitch as he crossed himself, put on his spectacles, and set himself to read the Testament at the place where it had opened. At the top of the page he read: “For I was an hungred, and ye gave Me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took Me in.” And further down the page he read: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto Me.” Then Avdeitch understood that the vision had come true, and that his Saviour had in very truth visited him that day, and that he had received Him. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ WOOD-LADIES[5] By PERCEVAL GIBBON Footnote 5: By permission of the author. Copyright by Charles Scribner’s Sons.