The only exception was a squad of six soldiers, passing calmly and quietly, with regulated step, through the throng, in single file. It was the patrol. Johannes knew it, and it gave him a feeling of rest and contentment, as if there was something else in human beings save rudeness and debauchery; that a little self-restraint and worthiness still remained. Up above--beyond that petty tumult--beyond that ruddy flaming and flickering, the moon was shining, silver-white and stately. Johannes looked up longingly. He found his task an awful one, and the people worse than he had expected. But of one little being he thought with tenderness; and in her case he would persevere. "Let us go to sleep," he begged. "Very well," said his Guide, opening a tavern door. It was oppressive there, and reeking with the fumes of gin and tobacco. They pressed their way through the crowd and went up to the bar. "Have you lodgings for us, Vrouw Schimmel?" asked Johannes' Guide. "Lodgings? Well, seeing it's you, Markus. But otherwise not! See? Go now--the two of you!" They crept up to a small dark garret, and there received a couple of mattresses which the maid had dragged upstairs; and then they could lie down. Johannes lay awake through the clamor and jingling and the stamping of the Fair-goers downstairs until long after the morning light had broken. The day just passed--long as a year, and full of great and weighty matters--was thought over from beginning to end. Serene, open-eyed--quietly, not restlessly, he lay there meditating till morning dawned, and the sunlight, like a red-gold stain, touched the wall above him, and till the din downstairs had subsided and died away. Then he fell asleep, thinking of Marjon--her bright eyes and silver crown. II He was awakened by jovial sounds. There was something hopeful and powerful about and within him when he opened his eyes again, and looked around the close, dark little garret. A column of sunbeams stood slanting from the floor to the little dormer window, and motes were glistening in the light. Both out-of-doors, and below him, Johannes heard the women singing, and busily, merrily talking--the way women do mornings as they hurry with their kitchen and door-yard tasks. The rubbish of the day before was thrust aside, and everything was in readiness for a new Fair day. Beside him lay his Guide, still calmly sleeping. He had removed nothing but his coat with which he had covered himself, and his shoes which were standing beside the mattress. He was in a profound sleep--his head upon his rolled-up mantle. His curling hair was now dry, and looked dark and glossy, and his cheeks bore a little more color. Johannes gazed attentively at his right hand hanging down from under his coat, over the mattress to the floor. It was a slender, shapely hand, with short-cut nails, but the blackening which Johannes had seen the day before was still there. That stamp of toil could not be washed away.