There was a
gleam of teeth from under the lip. The eyes had closed peacefully; the
lids lay light upon their secrets as if they might flutter and open
again. On cheek and chin was a discernible growth of dark beard; the
hair above the brow was black and abundant. It was a kingly face, a face
of command, though benign. It was all too easy to believe that a crown
had become it well. And there had been no weakening at the end, no
sunken cheeks nor hollowed temples. The lines were full. The general
colour was of rich red mahogany.
He ran a tremulous hand over the face, smoothed the thick hair, fingered
the firm lips that almost smiled. Under the swathing of linen he could
see where the hands were folded on the breast. Low down on the right jaw
was unmistakably a mole, a thing that had strangely survived on Bean's
own face. Again he ran a hand over the features, then a corroborating
hand over his own. Intently and long he studied each detail, nostrils,
eyebrows, ears, hair, the tips of the just-revealed teeth.
"God!" he breathed. It was hardly more than a whisper and was uttered in
all reverence.
Then--
"_God! how I've changed!_"
VIII
On the following afternoon, among the Sunday throng in the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, a slender young man of inconsiderable stature, alert as
to movement, but with an expression of absent dreaming, might have been
observed giving special attention to the articles in those rooms devoted
to ancient Egypt.
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