And those fools told me: 'At one o'clock in the afternoon, your Excellency!' and they thought I would be glad.

But instead of that Death stationed itself in the corner and would not go away.

It would not go away because it was my thought.

It is not death that is terrible, but the knowledge of it: it would be utterly impossible to live if a man could know exactly and definitely the day and hour of his death.

And the fools cautioned me: 'At one o'clock in the afternoon, your Excellency!'" He began to feel light-hearted and cheerful, as if some one had told him that he was immortal, that he would never die.