f I hurry, I shall
spoil the wood, and it is too beautiful to be spoiled."

But he trembled again when Pierre came into the workshop, and he stood
up and touched his cap.

"Is the cabinet finished, _imbecile_?" asked Pierre. And Hyacinthe
answered in a low voice, "No, it is not finished yet, monsieur."

"Then work on it all night, and show it to me completed in the
morning, or thy bones shall mourn thine idleness," said Pierre, with a
wicked look in his little eyes. And he shut Hyacinthe into the shed
with a smoky lamp, his tools, and the sandalwood cabinet.

It was nothing unusual. He had been often left before to finish a
piece of work overnight while Pierre went off to his brandies. But
this was Christmas eve, and he was very tired. Even the scent of the
sandalwood could not make him fancy he was warm. The world seemed to
be a black place, full of suffering and despair.

"In all the world, I have no friend," said Hyacinthe, staring at the
flame of the lamp. "In all the world, there is no one to care whether
I live or die. In all the world, no place, no heart, no love. O kind
God, is there a place, a love for me in another world?"

I hope you feel very sorry for Hyacinthe, lonely, and cold, and shut
up in the workshop on the eve of Christmas. He was but an overgrown,
unhappy child. And I think with old Madame that for unhappy children,
at this season, no help seems too divine for faith.

"There is no one to care for me," said Hyacinthe. And he even looked
at the chisel in his hand, thinking that by a touch of that he might
lose it all, and be at peace, somewhere, not far from God. Only it was
forbidden. Then came the tears, and great sobs that shook him, so that
he scarcely heard the gentle rattling of the latch.

He stumbled to the door, opening it on the still woods and the frosty
stars. And a lad who stood outside in the snow said, "I see you are
working late, comrade. May I come in?"

Hyacinthe brushed his ragged sleeve across his eyes and nodded "Yes."
Those little villages strung along the great river see strange
wayfarers at times. And Hyacinthe said to himself that surely here was
such a one. Blinking into the stranger's eyes, he lost for a flash the
first impression of youth, and received one of incredible age or
sadness. But the wanderer's eyes were only quiet, very quiet, like
the little pools in the wood where the wild does went to drink. As he
turned within the door, smiling at Hyacinthe and sha