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me. Here is my question: Is it true, great Father, that the
story is told somewhere in the Lives of the Saints of a holy
saint martyred for his faith who, when his head was cut off
at last, stood up, picked up his head, and, ‘courteously kiss-
ing it,’ walked a long way, carrying it in his hands. Is that
true or not, honoured Father?’
‘No, it is untrue,’ said the elder.
‘There is nothing of the kind in all the lives of the saints.
What saint do you say the story is told of?’ asked the Father
Librarian.
‘I do not know what saint. I do not know, and can’t tell.
I was deceived. I was told the story. I had heard it, and do
you know who told it? Pyotr Alexandrovitch Miusov here,
was so angry just now about Diderot. He it was who told
the story.’
‘I have never told it you, I never speak to you at all.’
‘It is true you did not tell me, but you told it when I was
present. It was three years ago. I mentioned it because by
that ridiculous story you shook my faith, Pyotr Alexandro-
vitch. You knew nothing of it, but I went home with my faith
shaken, and I have been getting more and more shaken ever
since. Yes, Pyotr Alexandrovitch, you were the cause of a
great fall. That was not a Diderot!
Fyodor Pavlovitch got excited and pathetic, though it
was perfectly clear to everyone by now that he was playing a
part again. Yet Miusov was stung by his words.
‘What nonsense, and it is all nonsense,’ he muttered. ‘I
may really have told it, some time or other... but not to you. I
was told it myself. I heard it in Paris from a Frenchman. He