"Many sorrows shall be to the wicked, but he that trusteth in the Lord, mercy shall compass him about." "My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my sore and my kinsmen stand afar off." "They also that seek after my life lay snares for me; and they that seek for my hurt speak mischievous things and imagine deceits all day long." The words rang out ever stronger and eddied through the air like the breath of a mighty power that bent low all foreheads and cast them down into the dust with tears of sorrow, penance, and supplication. All those present repeated them after the old man and that confused, tearful and monotonous murmur of voices awoke Janina from her torpor. She felt that she was still alive, so she knelt down on the threshold of the room and with fever-parched lips whispered those sweet words long since forgotten, and drew from them a deep comfort full of sadness and tenderness. "Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be whiter than snow." "Hide not thy face from me, lest I be like unto them that go down into the pit." "And of thy mercy cut off mine enemies, and destroy all them that afflict my soul, for I am thy servant." She repeated the words fervently and large tears rolled down her face, uniting with the tears of all the other mourners and purging her soul of all sorrows and memory of what had passed. But after a while those tears began to stream so freely and stifle her so that Janina quietly arose and left the place. On the street she met Wladek running toward the house in haste and fear. He stopped to ask her about his mother, but she went on without even glancing at him. Almost all feelings were dead within Janina, save that of a deathly weariness. She entered the lighted Church of St. Ann on the Cracow Suburb and, seating herself in one of the pews, gazed at the illuminated altar and the throng of kneeling worshipers. She heard the solemn tones of the organ and a wave of song rising above it. She saw looking at her from the walls and the altars the peaceful and happy faces of saints, but all this did not awaken a single emotion in her. "Thou wilt cut off mine enemies and destroy all them that afflict my soul. Thou wilt destroy them . . ." Janina repeated mechanically and left the church. No, no, she could not pray she could not. Janina slept after all this with a deep, stony sleep that was free from dreams. On the following day Cabinski gave her a big role that used to be Mimi's. Janina accepted it with indifference. With the same indifference she went to Niedzielska's funeral. She walked at the end of the procession unnoticed by anyone and gazed indifferently at the thousands of graves in the cemetery and at the coffin and not a scintilla of feeling stirred in her even at the sound of the sobbing over the grave. Something had broken within her and she had lost all ability to feel what was going on about her.