Page 217 of 1294

He was not fully conscious when he passed through the gateway of

his house! He was already on the staircase before he recollected

the axe. And yet he had a very grave problem before him, to put

it back and to escape observation as far as possible in doing so.

He was of course incapable of reflecting that it might perhaps be

far better not to restore the axe at all, but to drop it later on

in somebody's yard. But it all happened fortunately, the door of

the porter's room was closed but not locked, so that it seemed

most likely that the porter was at home. But he had so completely

lost all power of reflection that he walked straight to the door

and opened it. If the porter had asked him, "What do you want?"

he would perhaps have simply handed him the axe. But again the

porter was not at home, and he succeeded in putting the axe back

under the bench, and even covering it with the chunk of wood as

before.