Knowing not a word of Italian he entered the
shop of a tobacconist and imitated the gesture of smoking with such
success that the proprietor straightway understood and supplied him
with a packet. Then he remembered that he also needed matches. This
called for a gesture rather more complex; so complex, indeed, that
perhaps nobody but a Nepenthean--gifted, as all his nation is, with
alert intuition--could have divined the Apostle's want. The tobacconist
was equal to the occasion. With a friendly smile of comprehension he
laid on the counter a diminutive pack of wax vestas, price two sous.
There the matter might have rested but for the new Revelation, which
prompted the sturdy stranger to investigate the composition of the
article tendered. He took out one match and examined it carefully.
Then, triturating its substance between his fingers, he applied his
nose to the product and sniffed critically. The outcome was suspicious
in the highest degree. There was no perceptible odour of beeswax; the
object had been compounded, only too plainly, of the fat of dead
animals; it was the Abomination, the Unclean Thing.
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