desisted, and remained couched patiently before the churches until such
time as the boy reappeared. It was not the fact of his going into them
which disturbed Patrasche: he knew that people went to church: all the
village went to the small, tumble-down, gray pile opposite the red
windmill. What troubled him was that little Nello always looked
strangely when he came out, always very flushed or very pale; and
whenever he returned home after such visitations would sit silent and
dreaming, not caring to play, but gazing out at the evening skies beyond
the line of the canal, very subdued and almost sad.

What was it? wondered Patrasche. He thought it could not be good or
natural for the little lad to be so grave, and in his dumb fashion he
tried all he could to keep Nello by him in the sunny fields or in the
busy market-place. But to the churches Nello would go: most often of all
would he go to the great cathedral; and Patrasche, left without on the
stones by the iron fragments of Quentin Matsys's gate, would stretch
himself and yawn and sigh, and even howl now and then, all in vain,
until the doors closed and the child perforce came forth again, and
winding his arms about the dog's neck would kiss him on his broad,
tawny-colored forehead, and murmur always the same words: "If I could
only see them. Patrasche!--if I could only see them!"

What were they? pondered Patrasche, looking up with large, wistful,
sympathetic eyes.

One day, when the custodian was out of the way and the doors left ajar,
he got in for a moment after his little friend and saw. "They" were two
great covered pictures on either side of the choir.

Nello was kneeling, rapt as in an ecstasy, before the altar-picture of