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 denly became silent. His whole body trembled as if he were shaking with the ague, his face suddenly became rigid, his eye was fixed on the floor, his lips remained open. His folded hands quivered convulsively.

“And when did she die of that Mexican cholera—it can’t be so many years ago?” asked a close neighbor, speaking perhaps only to keep the conversation going.

“On the eleventh of June, 1854,” answered Beneš in a lifeless tone.

“The eleventh—why today it is just exactly—”

Beneš’s head sank down on his clasped hands. Within the room a sudden stillness followed, no one speaking a word. It was a painful silence, broken only by the old man’s audible, unspeakably heartbreaking sobbing.

For a long while the old man’s weeping continued, no one uttering even a whisper.

Suddenly the sobbing ceased. The old man raised himself and covered his eyes with his palm.

“Good night!” he said almost in a whisper and staggered towards the door.