One of them, of a particularly ferocious aspect, and not unlike the
headsman in certain Renaissance pictures which represent executions,
tortures, and the like, advanced upon him with an implacable air to take
his 'things.' But the harshness of his steely glare was compensated by the
softness of his cotton gloves, so effectively that, as he approached
Swann, he seemed to be exhibiting at once an utter contempt for his person
and the most tender regard for his hat. He took it with a care to which
the precision of his movements imparted something that was almost
over-fastidious, and with a delicacy that was rendered almost touching by
the evidence of his splendid strength. Then he passed it to one of his
satellites, a novice and timid, who was expressing the panic that
overpowered him by casting furious glances in every direction, and
displayed all the dumb agitation of a wild animal in the first hours of
its captivity.
A few feet away, a strapping great lad in livery stood musing, motionless,
statuesque, useless, like that purely decorative warrior whom one sees in
the most tumultuous of Mantegna's paintings, lost in dreams, leaning upon
his shield, while all around him are fighting and bloodshed and death;
detached from the group of his companions who were thronging about Swann,
he seemed as determined to remain unconcerned in the scene, which he
followed vaguely with his cruel, greenish eyes, as if it had been the
Massacre of the Innocents or the Martyrdom of Saint James.
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