Page:The Best Continental Short Stories of 1923–1924.djvu/61

 life. Have you not got a feeling that this imprint is the finest of any you have seen hitherto?”

The other man replied: “I am thinking of the Seven League Boots. Perhaps such footprints have been found before and perhaps people thought of that explanation. Who knows? Perhaps these other footprints are near Pardubice or Kolin. Perhaps the next similar ones will be in the neighborhood of Rakovnik. But I can also imagine that the next footprint is no longer on snow, but in the midst of a crowd, mixed up with some event or accident that has already happened or that may yet come to pass, in short that this footprint is one of a continuous series of such footprints. Suppose such a series. If the press had a perfect reporting system we might find in the police court or local or miscellaneous news the other footprints and thus trace out the unknown’s journey. Some demigod on his rounds? Marching on incoherently, spasmodically. Some sort of guide, of leader, to be followed? We might then follow up the divine track step by step. That might be the way of salvation. All these things are possible It is terrible to think that here is one of these steps and that one cannot follow it up.”

Boura started. He rose. The snow was falling ever more thickly and the trodden field, with its great central footprint, was being buried under a new layer of snow.

“I will never let this go,” said the man.

“What? This imprint that is no more and never will be ” added Boura pensively.

And they went their opposite roads.

That evening, Boura was giving a lecture to the “Aristotelian Society.” Although there was but a sparse audience, he was feeling exhausted and absent-minded. He felt his hearers were not convinced and that he would have to engage on a debate for which he had a vague antipathy. For a moment he listened to his own voice; it sounded thick and veiled to him, heavy in cadence and affected in accent. In vain did he try to correct and get it under control; he heard it with displeasure.