J. S. MACHAR
ten minutes; they led me in, and when she caught sight of me, she burst into tears and could not utter a single word—she did nothing but cry. In number 60 there was no mirror, but I felt my ailing appearance and the decrease in all my bodily strength. In front of Frank, however, I had not shown any signs of this, and all my visitors hitherto, as if guessing my wishes, had not alluded to my health either by remark or question,—until this lady had revealed her tears at my wretched condition in front of the German. With his cold eyes he looked at her and at me; this glance scalded my soul, I felt shame for her unaffected tears, and I would have given a year of my life to have prevented them. My body was weak and ailing, but my spirit was so strong, that I knew, even if they had led me to the gallows, I should have gone with upraised head and should have whistled a defiant song; and lo and behold, now a visitor came, of Czech race, and was weeping in front of this German. Hitherto I had not heard a human word from him; he had always been stiff and cold as the letter of the law; in the correspondence which were sent me he expunged all the names, greetings from acquaintances, news of weddings and deaths, and if during our conversations he diverged by a question or a remark from the official path, I had the feeling that he was laying a trap for me, that he was seeking something which I was hiding from him, and wanted to be assured that it was something which in reality it was not. For me he was an immediate representative of the system current in the years 1915 and 1916, which recognised no accused, but only culprits, for which one's nationality was enough to rouse suspicion, and three words written or uttered sufficed to draw up a charge of a serious crime. And it was in front of this automaton of the law that my visitor was weeping. I made some joke or other, asked after her husband and children, spoke about the weather, but I
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