Rodens Corner | Page 2

of slate-coloured gloves and an umbrella. His whole
appearance bespoke learning and middle-class respectability. It is, after
all, no use being learned without looking learned, and Professor von
Holzen took care to dress according to his station in life. His attitude
towards the world seemed to say, "Leave me alone and I will not
trouble you," which is, after all, as satisfactory an attitude as may be
desired. It is, at all events, better than the common attitude of the many,
that says, "Let us exchange confidences," leading to the barter of two

valueless commodities.
The professor stopped at the door of No. 15, St. Jacob Straat--one of
the oldest houses in this old street--and slowly lighted a cigar. There is
a shop on the ground-floor of No. 15, where ancient pieces of
stove-pipe and a few fire-irons are exposed for sale. Von Holzen,
having pushed open the door, stood waiting at the foot of a narrow and
grimy staircase. He knew that in such a shop in such a quarter of the
town there is always a human spider lurking in the background, who
steals out upon any human fly that may pause to look at the wares.
This spider presently appeared--a wizened woman with a face like that
of a witch. Von Holzen pointed upward to the room above them. She
shook her head regretfully.
"Still alive," she said.
And the professor turned toward the stair, but paused at the bottom
step.
"Here," he said, extending his fingers. "Some milk. How much has he
had?"
"Two jugs," she replied, "and three jugs of water. One would say he has
a fire inside him."
"So he has," said the professor, with a grim smile, as he went upstairs.
He ascended slowly, puffing out the smoke of his cigar before him with
a certain skill, so that his progress was a form of fumigation. The fear
of infection is the only fear to which men will own, and it is hard to
understand why this form of cowardice should be less despicable than
others. Von Holzen was a German, and that nation combines courage
with so deep a caution that mistaken persons sometimes think the
former adjunct lacking. The mark of a wound across his cheek told that
in his student days this man had, after due deliberation, considered it
necessary to fight. Some, looking at Von Holzen's face, might wonder
what mark the other student bore as a memento of that encounter.

Von Holzen pushed open a door that stood ajar at the head of the stair,
and went slowly into the room, preceded by a puff of smoke. The place
was not full of furniture, properly speaking, although it was littered
with many household effects which had no business in a bedroom. It
was, indeed, used as a storehouse for such wares as the proprietor of the
shop only offered to a chosen few. The atmosphere of the room must
have been a very Tower of Babel, where strange foreign bacilli from all
parts of the world rose up and wrangled in the air.
Upon a sham Empire table, très antique, near the window, stood three
water-jugs and a glass of imitation Venetian work. A yellow hand
stretching from a dark heap of bedclothes clutched the glass and held it
out, empty, when Von Holzen came into the room.
"I have sent for milk," said the professor, smoking hard, and heedful
not to look too closely into the dark corner where the bed was situated.
"You are kind," said a voice, and it was impossible to guess whether its
tone was sarcastic or grateful.
Von Holzen looked at the empty water-jugs with a smile, and shrugged
his shoulders. His intention had perhaps been a kind one. A bad mouth
usually indicates a soft heart.
"It is because you have something to gain," said the hollow voice from
the bed.
"I have something to gain, but I can do without it," replied Von Holzen,
turning to the door and taking a jug of milk from the hand of a child
waiting there.
"And the change," he said sharply.
The child laughed cunningly, and held out two small copper coins of
the value of half a cent.
Von Holzen filled the tumbler and handed it to the sick man, who a
moment later held it out empty.

"You may have as much as you like," said Von Holzen, kindly.
"Will it keep me alive?"
"Nothing can do that, my friend," answered Von Holzen. He looked
down at the yellow face peering at him from the darkness. It seemed to
be the face of a very aged man, with eyes wide open and blood-shot. A
thickness of speech was accounted for by the absence of teeth.
The man laughed gleefully. "All the same, I