And maybe you’ll get like him, with a gold watch and chain.’ And then, suddenly⁠—and what was it all about? Why should anyone want to kill me? Why was it done?”

So the grey lips. And so the hurt in the eyes. A hurt like a child’s, at punishment unexplained That makes the whole child-universe fall to pieces. At the time of death, most men turn back toward the child.

Brown did not know at first that the first man dead By the sword he thought of so often as Gideon’s sword Was one of the race he had drawn that sword to free. It had been dark on the bridge. A man had come And had not halted when ordered. Then the shot And the scrape of the hurt man dragging himself away. That was all. The next man ordered to halt would halt. His mind was too full of the burning judgments of God To wonder who it had been. He was cool and at peace. He dreamt of a lamb, lying down by a rushing stream.