Instantly, the watchman was himself again. The galoshes had transformed
him into the lieutenant, as we have seen. He was far less contended up
there, and preferred to be just what he had been. So the watchman turned
back into a watchman.
“I had a bad dream,” he said. “Strangely enough, I fancied I was the
lieutenant, and I didn't like it a bit. I missed my wife and our youngsters,
who almost smother me with their kisses.”
He sat down and fell to nodding again, unable to get the dream out of his
head. The galoshes were still on his feet when he watched a star fall in the
sky.
“There goes one,” he muttered. “But there are so many it will never be
missed. I'd like to have a look at those trinkets at close range. I'd especially
like to see the moon, which is not the sort of thing to get lost in one's hands.
The student for whom my wife washes, says that when we die we fly about
from star to star. There's not a word of truth in it. But it would be nice, just
the same, if I could take a little jaunt through the skies. My body could stay
here on the steps for all that I'd care.”
Now there are certain things in the world that we ought to think about
before we put them into words, and if we are wearing the galoshes of
Fortune it behooves us to think twice. Just listen to what happened to that
watchman.
All of us know how fast steam can take us. We've either rushed along in a
train or sped by steamship across the ocean. But all this is like the gait of a
sloth, or the pace of a snail, in comparison with the speed of light, which
travels nineteen million times faster than the fastest race horse. Yet
electricity moves even faster. Death is an electric shock to the heart, and the
soul set free travels on electric wings. The sunlight takes eight minutes and
some odd seconds to travel nearly one hundred million miles. On the wings
of electricity, the soul can make the same journey in a few moments, and to
a soul set free the heavenly bodies are as close together as the houses of
friends who live in the same town with us, or even in the same
