THE CITY OF DELIGHT

A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem

by

Elizabeth Miller

Author of_The Yoke_ and _Saul of Tarsus_

With Illustrations byF. X. Leyendecker

IndianapolisThe Bobbs-Merrill CompanyPublishers1908March

[Illustration]

ToMy Elder BrotherOtto Miller

CONTENTS

Chapter Page

 I A Prince's Bride 1

 II On the Road to Jerusalem 31

 III The Shepherd of Pella 56

 IV The Travelers 85

 V By the Wayside 108

 VI Dawn in the Hills 124

 VII Imperial Cęsar 148

 VIII Greek and Jew 169

 IX The Young Titus 189

 X The Story of a Divine Tragedy 212

 XI The House of Offense 233

 XII The Prince Returns 253

 XIII A New Pretender 274

 XIV The Pride of Amaryllis 284

 XV The Image of Jealousy 300

 XVI The Spread Net 322

 XVII The Tangled Web 337

 XVIII In the Sunless Crypt 358

 XIX The False Prophet 374

 XX As the Foam upon Water 390

 XXI The Faithful Servant 408

 XXII Vanished Hopes 417

 XXIII The Fulfilment 427

 XXIV The Road to Pella 441

THE CITY OF DELIGHT

Chapter I

A PRINCE'S BRIDE

The chief merchant of Ascalon stood in the guest-chamber of his house. 

Although it was a late winter day the old man was clad in the freewhite garments of a midsummer afternoon, for to the sorrow ofPhilistia the cold season of the year sixty-nine had been warm, wetand miasmic. An old woman entering presently glanced at the closedwindows of the apartment when she noted the flushed face of themerchant but she made no movement to have them opened. More than thewarmth of the day was engaging the attention of the grave old man, andthe woman, by dress and manner of equal rank with him, stood asideuntil he could give her a moment. 

His porter bowed at his side. 

"The servants of Philip of Tyre are without, " he said. "Shall theyenter?"

"They have come for the furnishings, " Costobarus answered. "Take thouall the household but Momus and Hiram, and dismantle the rooms forthem. Begin in the library; then the sleeping-rooms; this chambernext; the kitchen last of all. Send Hiram to the stables to exceptthree good camels from the herd for our use. Let Momus look to thebaggage. Where is Keturah?"

A woman servant hastening after a line of men bearing a great divan, picking up the draperies and pillows that had dropped, stopped andsalaamed to her master. 

"Is our apparel ready?" he asked. 

"Prepared, master, " was the response. 

"Then send hither--" But at that moment a man-servant dressed in thegarb of a physician hastened into the chamber. Without awaiting thenotice of his master he hurried up and whispered in his ear. Costobarus' face grew instantly grave. 

"How near?" he asked anxiously. 

"In the next house--but a moment since. The household hath fled, " wasthe low answer. 

"Haste, haste!" Costobarus cried to the rush of servants about him. "Lose no time. We must be gone from this place before mid-afternoon. Laodice! Where is Laodice?" he inquired. 

Then his wife who had stood aside spoke. 

"She is not yet prepared, " she explained unreadily. "She needs afrieze cloak--"

Costobarus broke in by beckoning his wife to one side, where theservants could not hear him say compassionately, "Let there be no delay for small things, Hannah. Let us haste, forLaodice is going on the Lord's business. "

"A matter of a day only, " Hannah urged. "A delay that is furthernecessary, for Aquila's horse is lame. "

The old man shook his head and looked away to see a man-servantstagger out under a load of splendid carpets. The old woman cameclose. 

"The wayside is ambushed and the wilderness is patrolled with danger, Costobarus, " she said. "Of a certainty you will not take Laodice outinto a country perilous for caravans and armies!"

"These very perils are the signs of the call of the hour, " hemaintained. "She dare not fail to respond. The Deliverer cometh; everyprophecy is fulfilled. Rather rejoice that you have prepared yourdaughter for this great use. Be glad that you have borne her. "

But in Hannah's face wavered signs of another interpretation of thesethings. She broke in on him without the patience to wait until he hadcompleted his sentence. 

"Are they prophecies of hope which are fulfilled, or the words of theprophet of despair?" she insisted. "What saith Daniel of this hour?Did he not name it the abomination of desolation? Said he not that thecity and the sanctuary should be destroyed, that there should be aflood and that unto the end of the war desolations shall bedetermined? Desolations, Costobarus! And Laodice is but a child anddelicately reared!"

"All these things may come to pass and not a hair of the heads of thechosen people be harmed, " he assured her. 

"But Laodice is too young to have part in the conflict of nations, thebusiness of Heaven and earth and the end of all things!"

A courier strode into the hall and approached Costobarus, saw that hewas engaged in conversation and stopped. The merchant noted him andwithdrew to read the message which the man carried. 

"A letter from Philadelphus, " he said over his shoulder, as he movedaway from Hannah. "He hath landed in Cęsarea with his cousin Julian ofEphesus. He will proceed at once to Jerusalem. We have no time tolose. Ah, Momus?"

He spoke to a servant who had limped into the hall and stood waitingfor his notice. He was the ruin of a man, physically powerful but as atree wrecked by storm and grown strong again in spite of itsmutilation. Pestilence in years long past had attacked him and hadleft him dumb, distorted of feature, wry-necked and stiffened in theright leg and arm. His left arm, forced to double duty, had becometremendously muscular, his left hand unusually dexterous. Much of hisfacial distortion was the result of his efforts to convey his ideas byexpression and by his attempts to overcome the interference of his wryneck with the sweep of his vision. 

"Whom have we in our party, Momus?" Costobarus asked. As the man maderapid, uncouth signs, the master interpreted. 

"Keturah, Hiram and Aquila--and thou and I, Momus. Three camels, oneof which is the beast of burden. Good! Aquila will ride a horse; ha! ahorse in a party of camels--well, perhaps--if he were bought inAscalon. How? What? St--t! The physician told me even now. Let none ofthe household know it--above all things not thy mistress!" The lastsentence was delivered in a whisper in response to certain uneasygestures the mute had made. The man bowed and withdrew. 

A second servitor now approached with papers which the merchantinspected and signed hastily with ink and stylus which the clerk bore. When this last item was disposed of, Hannah was again at her husband'sside. 

"Costobarus, " she whispered, "it is known that the East Gate of theTemple, which twenty Levites can close only with effort, opened ofitself in the sixth hour of the night!"

"A sign that God reėntereth His house, " the merchant explained. 

"A sign, O my husband, that the security of the Holy House isdissolved of its own accord for the advantage of its enemies!"

Costobarus observed two huge Ethiopians who appeared bewildered at thethreshold of the unfamiliar interior, looking for the master of thehouse to tell them what to do. The merchant motioned toward a tallebony case that stood against one of the walls and showed them thatthey were to carry it out. Hannah continued:

"And thou hast not forgotten that night when the priests at thePentecost, entering the inner court, were thrown down by the tremblingof the Temple and that a vast multitude, which they could not see, cried: 'Let us go hence!' And that dreadful sunset which we watchedand which all Israel saw when armies were seen fighting in the skiesand cities with toppling towers and rocking walls fell into red cloudsand vanished!"

"What of thyself, Hannah?" he broke in. "Art thou ready to depart forTyre? Philip will leave to-morrow. Do not delay him. Go and prepare. "

But the woman rushed on to indiscretion, in her desperate intent tostop the journey to Jerusalem at any cost. 

"But there are those of good repute here in Ascalon, sober men andexcellent women, who say that our hope for the Branch of David is toolate--that Israel is come to judgment, this hour--for He is come andgone and we received Him not!"

Costobarus turned upon her sharply. 

"What is this?" he demanded. 

"O my husband, " she insisted hopefully, "it measures up with prophecy!And they who speak thus confidently say that He prophesied the end ofthe Holy City, and that this is not the Advent, but doom!"

"It is the Nazarene apostasy, " he exclaimed in alarm, "alive thoughthe power of Rome and the diligence of the Sanhedrim have striven todestroy it these forty years! Now the poison hath entered mine ownhouse!"

A servant bowed within earshot. Costobarus turned to him hastily. 

"Philip of Tyre, " the attendant announced. 

"Let him enter, " Costobarus said. "Go, Hannah; make Laodiceready--preparations are almost complete; be not her obstacle. "

"But--but, " she insisted with whitening lips, "I have not said that Ibelieve all this. I only urge that, in view of this time of war, ofcontending prophecies and of all known peril, that we should keep her, who is our one ewe lamb, our tender flower, our Rose of Sharon, yetwithin shelter until the signs are manifest and the purpose of theLord God is made clear. "

He turned to her slowly. There was pain on his face, suffering thatshe knew her words had evoked and, more than that, a yearning torelent. She was ashamed and not hopeful, but her mother-love wasstronger than her wifely pity. 

"Must I command you, Hannah?" he asked. 

Her figure, drawn up with the intensity of her wishfulness, relaxed. Her head drooped and slowly she turned away. Costobarus looked afterher and struggled with rising emotion. But the curtain dropped behindher and left him alone. 

A moment later the curtains over the arch parted and a middle-agedJew, richly habited, stood there. He raised his hand for the blessingof the threshold, then embraced Costobarus with more warmth thanceremony. 

"What is this I hear?" he demanded with affectionate concern. "Thouleavest Ascalon for the peril of Jerusalem?"

"Can Jerusalem be more perilous than Ascalon this hour?" Costobarusasked. 

"Yes, by our fathers!" Philip declared. "Nothing can be so bad as thecondition of the Holy City. But what has happened? Three days ago thouwast as securely settled here as a barnacle on a shore-rock! To-daythou sendest me word: 'Lo! the time long expected hath come; I gohence to Jerusalem. ' What is it, my brother?"

"Sit and listen. "

Philip looked about him. The divan was there, stripped of its coveringof fine rugs, but the room otherwise was without furniture. Preparedfor surprise, the Tyrian let no sign of his curiosity escape him, and, sitting, leaned on his knees and waited. 

"Philadelphus Maccabaeus hath sent to me, bidding me send Laodice tohim--in Jerusalem, " Costobarus said in a low voice. 

Philip's eyes widened with sudden comprehension. 

"He hath returned!" he exclaimed in a whisper. 

For a time there was silence between the two old men, while they gazedat each other. Then Philip's manner became intensely confident. 

"I see!" he exclaimed again, in the same whisper. "The throne isempty! He means to possess it, now that Agrippa hath abandoned it!"

Costobarus pressed his lips together and bowed his head emphatically. Again there was silence. 

"Think of it!" Philip exclaimed presently. 

"I have done nothing else since his messenger arrived at daybreak. Little, little, did I think when I married Laodice to him, fourteenyears ago, that the lad of ten and the little child of four might oneday be king and queen over Judea!"

Philip shook his head slowly and his gaze settled to the pavement. Presently he drew in a long breath. 

"He is twenty-four, " he began thoughtfully. "He has all the learningof the pagans, both of letters and of war; he--Ah! But is he capable?"

"He is the great-grandson of Judas Maccabaeus! That is enough! I havenot seen him since the day he wedded Laodice and left her to go toEphesus, but no man can change the blood of his fathers in him. AndPhilip--he shall have no excuse to fail. He shall be moneyed; he shallbe moneyed!"

Costobarus leaned toward his friend and with a sweep of his handindicated the stripped room. It was a noble chamber. The stamp of theelegant simplicity of Cyrus, the Persian, was upon it. The ancientblue and white mosaics that had been laid by the Parsee builder andthe fretwork and twisted pillars were there, but the silky carpets, the censers and the chairs of fine woods were gone. Costobarus lookedsteadily at the perplexed countenance of Philip. 

"Seest thou how much I believe in this youth?" he asked. 

A shade of uneasiness crossed Philip's forehead. 

"Thou art no longer young, Costobarus, " he said, "and disappointmentsgo hard with us, at our age--especially, especially. "

"I shall not be disappointed, " Costobarus declared. 

The friendly Jew looked doubtful. 

"The nation is in a sad state, " he observed. "We have cause. Theprocurators have been of a nature with their patrons, the emperors. Itis enough but to say that! But Vespasian Cęsar is another kind of man. He is tractable. Young Titus, who will succeed him, is well-named theDarling of Mankind. We could get much redress from these if we wouldbe content with redress. But no! We must revert to the days of Saul!"

"Yes; but they declare they will have no king but God; no commanderbut the Messiah to come; no order but primitive impulse! But theMaccabee will change all that! It is but the far swing of the firstrevolt. Jerusalem is ready for reason at this hour, it is said. "

"Yes, " Philip assented with a little more spirit. "It hath reached us, who have dealings with the East, that there is a better feeling in thecity. Such slaughter has been done there among the Sadducees, suchhordes of rebels from outlying subjugated towns have poured theirlicense and violence in upon the safe City of Delight, that thecitizens of Jerusalem actually look forward to the coming of Titus asa deliverance from the afflictions which their own people have visitedupon them. "

"The hour for the Maccabee, indeed, " Costobarus ruminated. 

"And the hour for Him whom we all expect, " Philip added in a low tone. Costobarus bowed his head. Presently he drew a scroll from the foldsof his ample robe. 

"Hear what Philadelphus writes me:

 Cęsarea, II Kal. Jul. XX. 

 To Costobarus, greetings and these by messenger;

 I learn on arriving in this city that Judea is in truth no man's country. Wherefore it can be mine by cession or conquest. It is mine, however, by right. I shall possess it. 

 I go hence to Jerusalem. 

 Fail not to send my wife thither and her dowry. Aquila, my emissary, will safely conduct her. Trust him. 

 Proceed with despatch and husband the dowry of your daughter, since it is to be the corner-stone of a new Israel. 

 Peace to you and yours. To my wife my affection and my loyalty. 

 PHILADELPHUS MACCABAEUS. 

 Nota Bene. Julian of Ephesus accompanies me. He is my cousin. He will in all probability meet your daughter at the Gate. 

 MACCABAEUS. "

Slowly the old man rolled the writing. 

"He wastes no words, " Philip mused. "He writes as a siege-enginetalks--without quarter. "

Costobarus nodded. 

"So I am giving him two hundred talents, " he said deliberately. 

"Two hundred talents!" Philip echoed. 

"And I summoned thee, Philip, to say that in addition to my house andits goods, thou canst have my shipping, my trade, my caravans, whichthou hast coveted so long at a price--at that price. I shall giveLaodice two hundred talents. "

"Two hundred talents!" Philip echoed again, somewhat taken aback. 

Costobarus went to a cabinet on the wall and drew forth a shittim-woodcase which he unlocked. Therefrom he took a small casket and openedit. He then held it so that the sun, falling into it, set fire to abed of loose gems mingled without care for kind or value--a heap ofglowing color emitting sparks. 

"Here are one hundred of the talents, " Costobarus said. 

A flash of understanding lighted Philip's face not unmingled with thesatisfaction of a shrewd Jew who has pleased himself at business. Onehundred talents, then, for the best establishment in five cities, inall the Philistine country. But why? Costobarus supplied the answer atthat instant. 

"I would depart with my daughter by mid-afternoon, " he said. 

"I doubt the counting houses; if I had known sooner--" Philip began. 

"Aquila arrived only this morning. I sent a messenger to you at once. "

Philip rose. 

"We waste time in talk. I shall inform thee by messenger presently. God speed thee! My blessings on thy son-in-law and on thy daughter!"

Costobarus rose and took his friend's hand. 

"Thou shalt have the portion of the wise-hearted man in this kingdom. And this yet further, my friend. If perchance the uncertainties oftravel in this distressed land should prove disastrous and I shouldnot return, I shall leave a widow here--"

"And in that instance, be at peace. I am thy brother. "

Costobarus pressed Philip's hand. 

"Farewell, " he said; and Philip embraced him and went forth. 

Costobarus turned to one of his closed windows and thrust it open, forthe influence of the spring sun had made itself felt in the pastimportant hour for Costobarus. 

Noon stood beautiful and golden over the city. The sky wasclean-washed and blue, and the surface of the Mediterranean, glimpsedover white house-tops that dropped away toward the sea-front, was awandering sheet of flashing silver. Here and there were the ruins ofthe last year's warfare, but over the fallen walls of gray earth thecharity of running vines and the new growth of the spring spread abeauty, both tender and compassionate. 

In such open spaces inner gardens were exposed and almond trees tossedtheir crowns of white bloom over pleached arbors of old grape-vines. Here the Mediterranean birds sang with poignant sweetness while thenew-budded limbs of the oleanders tilted suddenly under their weightas they circled from covert to covert. 

But the energy of the young spring was alive only in the birds and theblossoming orchards. Wherever the solid houses fronted in unbrokenrows the passages between, there were no open windows, no carpetsswung from latticed balconies; no buyers moved up the roofed-overStreet of Bazaars. Not in all the range of the old man's vision was tobe seen a living human being. For the chief city of the Philistinecountry Ascalon was nerveless and still. At times immense andponderous creaking sounded in the distance, as if a great rusted craneswung in the wind. Again there were distant, voluminous flutterings, as if neglected and loosened sails flapped. Idle roaming donkeysbrayed and a dog shut up and forgotten in a compound barkedincessantly. Presently there came faint, far-off, failing cries thatfaded into silence. The Jew's brow contracted but he did not move. 

From his position, he could see the port to the east packed withlifeless vessels. The stretches of stone wharf and the mole werevacant and littered with rubbish. The yard-arms of abandonedfreighters were peculiarly beaded with tiny black shapes that movedfrom time to time. Far out at sea, so far that a blue mist embracedits base and set its sails mysteriously afloat in air, a great galley, with all canvas crowded on, sped like a frightened bird past the portthat had once been its haven. 

A strange compelling odor stole up from the city. Costobarus glanceddown into his garden below him. It was a terraced court, withvine-covered earthen retaining walls supporting each successive tierand terminating against a domed gate flanked on either side by a tallconical cypress. 

He noted, on the flagging of the walk leading by flights of steps downto the gate, a heap of garments with broad brown and yellow stripes. Wondering at the untidiness of his gardener in leaving his tunic herewhile he worked, Costobarus looked away toward the large stones thatlay here and there in gutters and on grass-plots, remnants of the workof the Roman catapults the previous summer. In the walls of houseswere unrepaired breaches, where the wounds of the missiles showed. Ona slight eminence overlooking the city from the west center-poles ofnative cedar which had supported Roman tents were still standing. Butno garrison was there now, though the signs of the savage Romanobsession still lay on the remnants of the prostrate western wall. Soas Costobarus' gaze wandered he did not see far above that heap ofstriped garments in his garden walk, fixed like an enchanted thing, moveless, dead-calm, a great desert vulture poised in air. Presentlyanother and yet another materialized out of the blue, growing largeras they fell down to the level of their fellow. Slowly the threeswooped down over the heap on the garden walk. The tiny black shapesthat beaded the yard-arms in port spread great wings and soaredsolemnly into Ascalon. The three vultures dropped noiselessly on thepavement. 

Cries began suddenly somewhere nearer and instantly the tremendousbooming of a great oriental gong from the heathen quarters swept heavyfloods of sound over the outcry and drowned it. The vultures flew uphastily and Costobarus saw them for the first time. A chill rushedover him; revulsion of feeling showed vividly on his face. He shut thewindow. 

Noon was high over Ascalon and Pestilence was Cęsar within its walls. 

It was the penalty of warfare, the long black shadow that the passageof a great army casts upon a battling nation. Physicians could notgive it a name. It seized upon healthy victims, rent them, blastedthem and cast them dead and distorted in their tracks, before helpcould reach them. It passed like fire on a high wind through wholecountries and left behind it silence and feeding vultures. 

As Costobarus turned from his window to pace up and down his chamber, Hannah's argument came back to him with new energy. He felt with akind of panic that his confident answer to her might have been wrong. When a girl appeared in the archway, he moved impulsively toward her, as if to retract the command that would send her out into this landthat the Lord had spoken against, but the strength and repose in herface communicated itself to him. 

Above all other suggestions in her presence was that overpoweringrichness of oriental beauty which no other kind in the world maysurpass in its appeal to the loves of men. Enough of the Roman stockin her line had given structural firmness and stature to a type whichat her age would have developed weight and duskiness, but she wastaller and more slender than the women of her race, and supple andalive and splendid. About her hips was knotted a silken scarf of redand white and green with long undulant fringes that added to the lithegrace in her movements. Under it was a glistening garment of silvertissue that reached to the small ankles laced about by the ribbons ofwhite sandals. For sleeves there were netted fringes through which thefine luster of her arms was visible. About her wrists, her throat andin her hair, heavy and shining black, were golden coins that markedher steps with stealthy tinkling. 

Costobarus, in spite of the shock of doubt and fear in his brain, looked at her as if with the happy eyes of the astonished Maccabee. Inthose full tender lips, in the slope of those black, silken brows, inthe sparkling behind the dusky slumbrous eyes, there was all the fireand generosity and limitless charm that should make her lover's worlda place of delight and perfume and music. 

"How is it with you, Laodice?" he asked, faltering a little. 

"I am prepared, my father, " she answered. 

"I commend your despatch. I would be gone within an hour. "

She bowed and Costobarus regarded her with growing wistfulness. Atthis last moment his love was to become his obstacle, his fear for hischild his one cowardice. 

"Dost thou remember him?" he asked without preliminary. 

Laodice answered as if the thought were first in her mind. 

"Not at all; and yet, if I could remember him, I may not discover inthe man of four-and-twenty anything of the lad of ten. "

"He may not have changed. There are such natures, and, as I recallhim, his may well be one of these. His disposition from childhood toboyhood did not change. When I knew him in Jerusalem, he was worthythe notice of a man. The manner he had there he bore with him to this, a smaller city, and hence to Ephesus, a city of another kind. It wasgood to see him examine the world, reject this and that and look uponhis choice proudly. He made the schools observe him, consider him. Hedid not enter them for alteration, nor was he shut up in a shell ofself-satisfaction. He entered them as a citizen of the world and as anexaminer of all philosophy. Yet the world taught him nothing. It gavehim merely the open school where regulation and atmosphere helped himto teach himself. O wife of a child, thou shalt not be ashamed of thyhusband, man-grown!"

"How is he favored?" she asked with the first maiden hesitationshowing in the question. 

"He was slender and dark and promised to be tall. He was quick inmovement, quick in temper, resourceful, aye, even shifty, I shouldsay; stubborn, cold in heart, hard to please. "

"Fit attributes for a king, " she said, half to herself, "yet he willbe no soft husband. "

Costobarus looked away from her and was silent for a time. 

"Daughter, " he said finally, "thou hast learned indeed that thine isto be no luxurious life. In thy restrained heart there are no dreams. Let not thy youth, when thou seest him, put obstacle in the way of thyduty. Whether thou lovest him or lovest him not, he is thy husband, thy fellow in a great labor for God and for Israel. Remember the timesand the portents and shut thine ears against selfish desire. Thouseest Judea. That which the Lord hath uttered against it through theprophets has come to pass. Abandon thy hopes in all save the Son ofGod; forget thyself; prepare to give all and expect nothing but thecoming of the King! For verily thou lookest over the edge of the worldpast the very end of time!"

The solemn announcement of the Advent by this white-bearded prophetshould have discovered in her a very human and terrified girl. But itwas no new tidings to her. Since her earliest recollection she hadheard it, expected it, contemplated it, till the magnitude and terrorof it had been lost in its familiarity. She clasped her hands anddropped her eyes and her lips moved in a silent prayer. 

Costobarus remained for a space sunk in glorified meditation. Butpresently he raised himself, with signs of his recent feeling showingon his face. 

"Send hither thy mother; bid Aquila and our servants stand here beforeme a little later. "

She bowed and withdrew. As she passed out a servant stepped aside togive her room and at a sign from his master approached. 

"A messenger from Philip of Tyre, " he said. 

A moment later an old courier carrying a sheepskin wallet came intothe chamber. He salaamed and produced a tablet which he handed toCostobarus. 

 Herewith, O my brother, I send thee one hundred talents. May it prove part of the corner-stone of a new Israel. Peace to thee and thine!

 PHILIP OF TYRE. 

Costobarus looked up at the old courier. 

"Take my blessings to thy master. May he come to a high seat in thatnew Israel which he hath helped to build! Farewell. "

The courier withdrew. When his footsteps died away the old merchantreached under the divan and drew forth the shittim-wood box. Producinga key he unlocked and opened it. From his bosom he drew forth theletter from Philadelphus and laid it within. 

"Let her take it with her, " he said, speaking aloud. "Here, " lifting acylinder of old silver exquisitely chased, "are her marriage papers;this, " lifting delicately embroidered squares of linen, "her marriagetokens, and here, her dowry. "

He opened the inner box and laid the sheepskin wallet in upon thegems. He closed the lid, and, locking the case, lifted it and set itbeside him on the divan. 

When he looked up, he saw a man standing within a few paces of him andperfunctorily gazing at anything but the display of Laodice's fortune. 

He was lean, muscular, somewhat younger than forty but already gray atthe temples, of nervous temperament, direct of gaze and of attractivepresence. He wore a tunic of gray wool bordered with red, and a graymantle hung negligently from his shoulders. Limbs and arms were bareand his head-covering of red wool hung from his arm. 

Costobarus, a little discomfited that he had been surprised withLaodice's dowry exposed, spoke briskly. 

"Well, Aquila? Prepared?"

"Everything is in order. I am ready to proceed at once. "

"How many in your party?"

"But myself. "

"Have you ever been to Jerusalem?"

"Never. "

"How, then, " Costobarus asked, with a keen look, "came Philadelphus toappoint you to conduct Laodice to the city?"

"His retinue is small; he could not come himself, and he chose me assafer than the other member of his party, " was the direct reply. 

Costobarus studied this reply before he questioned his son-in-law'scourier further. 

"Jerusalem, they say, is in disorder. How will you get my daughter toshelter when you have reached the city?"

"Philadelphus hath instructed me that there will be a Greek at the SunGate daily, awaiting us. He will wear a purple turban embroidered witha golden star. He will conduct us to the house of Amaryllis theSeleucid, who is pledged to the Maccabee's cause. Philadelphus will bein her house. "

"Why hers?" Costobarus persisted. 

"Because it is the only secure house in Jerusalem. She stands in thegood graces of John of Gischala and she is safe. "

Costobarus ruminated. 

"There is too much detail; too many people to depend upon andtherefore too many who may fail you. Aquila!"

"Sir?"

"I am going to Jerusalem with you. "

He turned without waiting to see the effect of this speech upon theMaccabee's courier and clapped his hands for an attendant. To theservitor who responded he said:

"Send hither our party. It is time. Bring me my cloak. "

He looked then suddenly at Aquila. The Roman's face had cleared of itsastonishment and discomfiture. 

"Well enough, " the courier said bluntly and closed his lips. Theservitor reappeared with his master's cloak and kerchief. After himcame Keturah, the handmaiden, and Hiram, a camel-driver, prepared fora journey. The mute Momus presently appeared. Costobarus got into hiscloak without help, made inquiry for this detail and that of hisbusiness and of his journey, gave instruction to his attendants, andthen asked for Laodice. 

There was a moment of silence more distressed than embarrassed. Momusdropped his eyes; Keturah looked at her master with moving lips andsudden flushing of color, as if she were on the point of tears. Aquilastared absently out of the arch beyond. 

Costobarus glanced from one to the other of his company and then wenttoward the corridor to call his daughter. As he lifted the curtain, hestarted and stopped. 

[Illustration: At her feet Hannah knelt. ]

The lifted curtain had revealed Laodice. At her feet Hannah knelt, asif she had flung herself in her daughter's path, her arms clasping theyoung figure close to her and an agony of appeal stamped on herupraised face. The last of the rich color had died out of the girl'sface and with pitiful eyes and quivering lips she was stroking thedesperate hands that meant to keep her for ever. 

Except for the sudden sobbing of the woman servant, tense andanguished silence prevailed. The old merchant was confronted with aperplexity that found him without fortitude to solve. He felt hisstrength slip from him. He, too, covered his face with his hands. 

At the opposite arch another house servant appeared, lifted adistorted, blackening face and, doubling like a wounded snake, fellupon the floor. 

A moment of stupefied silence in which Hannah, with her motherinstincts never so acutely alive, turned her strained vision upon thewrithing figure. Then shrieks broke from the lips of theserving-woman; the hall filled with panic. Hannah leaped to her feetand thrust Laodice toward her father. 

"Away!" she cried. "The pestilence! The pestilence is upon us!"

Chapter II

ON THE ROAD TO JERUSALEM

News of the appearance of the plague in the house of Costobarustraveled fast after the death of the gardener, who had fallen in theopen and in sight of the watchful inhabitants of Ascalon. So by thetime the house servants of the merchant were made aware of their perilby the death of one of their own number, Philip of Tyre with thecourage of affection and loyalty stood on the threshold of theguest-chamber informed of the situation and prepared to help. Hannah, supported by the Tyrian's assurance of her rescue and protection, succeeded in urging Costobarus and Laodice not to delay for her to theperil of the thrice precious daughter. 

So with his house yet ringing with the first convulsion of terrorCostobarus ordered his party with all haste to the camels. 

Keturah, Laodice's handmaiden, had fainted with terror and was carriedparcel-wise over the great arm of Momus, the mute, out into the streetand deposited summarily on the floor of Laodice's bamboo howdah. Thecamel-driver, Hiram, seemed only a little less stupefied than she. Themute, with a face as determined and threatening as an uplifted gad, drove him from the shelter of a dark corner out to his place on theneck of his master's camel. Aquila, the emissary, showed theimmemorial composure in the face of disaster that was the badge of theRoman in the days of the degenerate Cęsars, and, mounting his horsewhen the rest of the party were in their places, headed the processiontoward the northeast. 

From an upper window behind a lattice, Hannah cried her farewells andfluttered her scarf. She was smiling the drawn, white smile of amother who is forcing herself to be cheerful in the face of danger, for the peace of those she loves. Laodice understood the tenderdeception and when a sharp turn of the street cut off the sight of theplumy trees of the garden, she covered her face and wept inconsolably. 

On either side of the passage there came muffled sounds from houses;out of open alleys leading into interior courts stole the fetor ofdeath that even the spice of burning unguents could not smother. Thewhole air shuddered with the drumming of heathen physicians in thepagan quarters, through which the silence of long stretches ofominously quiet houses shouted its meaning. At times frantic barefootflights could be glimpsed as households deserted stricken houses, butwhatever outcry arose came from bedsides. Ascalon fled as a frightenedanimal flees, silently and under cover. 

They rode now through a shrieking wind, burdened with sallow smoke anddreadful odors. Denser and denser the cloud grew till the streetsahead were hidden in yellow vapor and near-by houses loomed with dimoutlines as if far off, and even the sounds of death and disasterbecame choked in the immense prevalence of smell. Blinded, with scarfand kerchief wrapped over mouth and nostril, the fleeing party sweptdown upon the very heart of that stifling mystery. Through itpresently, as the houses thinned out, they saw cores of great heatsurmounted by black-tipped flames that crackled savagely. Momus, nowin the lead, turned sharply to his right and the next instant had thewind behind him. Almost involuntarily each member of the party lookedback. Outside the breach of the broken wall, standing clear to viewwith the wind from the hills sweeping townward from them, werediabolical figures, naked and black, feeding immense pyres withhideous fuel. 

Past this grisly line, a camel with a single rider swept in fromseaward. The traveler lifted an arm and signaled to the party. Aquilaseemed not to see this hail, and rode on; but Costobarus, after thetraveler motioned to them once more, spoke:

"Does not this person make signs to us, Aquila?"

The pagan looked back. 

"Why should he?" he asked. 

"He can tell us, " the master observed and spoke to Momus and Hiram, who drew up their camels. The traveler raced alongside. 

It was a woman, veiled and wrapped with all the jealous care of theEast against the curious eyes of strangers. Aquila took in herfeatureless presence with a single irritated look and apparently lostinterest. 

"Greeting, lady, " Costobarus said. 

"Peace, sir, and greeting, " she replied respectfully. Her tones weremarked with the deference of the serving-class and Costobarus gave herpermission to speak. 

"Art thou a Jew and master of this train?" she asked. 

Costobarus assented. 

"I was journeying to Jerusalem with a caravan of which my master wasowner, but the Romans came upon us and took every one prisoner, exceptmyself. I escaped, but I am without protection and without friends. InJerusalem, I have relatives who will care for me, yet I fear to makethe journey alone. I pray thee, with the generosity of a Jew and theauthority of a master, permit me to go in the protection of thycompany!"

Costobarus reflected and while he hesitated he became aware that Momuswas looking at him with warning in his eyes. But Laodice, so filledwith loneliness and apprehension, was moved to sympathy for thesolitary and friendless woman. She leaned toward her father and saidin a low voice:

"Let her come with us, father; she is a woman and afraid. "

Aquila heard that low petition and he flashed a look at the strangerthat seemed reproachful. But Costobarus was speaking. 

"Ride with us, then, and be welcome, " he said. 

The woman bowed her shawled head and murmured with emotion after asilence:

"The blessings of a servant be upon you and yours; may the God ofIsrael be with you for evermore. "

She dropped back to the rear of the party and the train moved on. 

Meanwhile, Keturah, who sat huddled on the floor of Laodice's howdah, had not moved since they had left the doorway of Costobarus' house. Momus, on the neck of Laodice's camel, had observed her once or twice, and now he reached back and touched her. He jerked his hand away andbrought up his camel with a wrench. Hiram, following close behind, bydint of main strength managed to avoid a collision with Momus' beastso suddenly halted. The mute leaped down from his place and in aninstant Costobarus joined him. Alarmed without understanding, Laodicehad risen and was drawn as far as she might from the serving-woman. Momus, lifting himself by the stirrup, seized the stiff figure andlaid it down upon the sands. Aquila dismounted and the three men bentover the woman. Then Costobarus glanced up quickly at Laodice, made asign to Momus, who, with a face devoid of expression, climbed backinto his place on the neck of the camel. 

The strange woman who had stood her ground was heard to say in a lowvoice, half lost in the muffling of her wrappings:

"One!"

Momus drove on leisurely and Laodice, knowing that she must not look, slipped down in her place and wrapped her vitta over her face. 

Pestilence was riding with them. 

After a long time, Costobarus' camel ambled up beside hers, and sheventured to uncover her eyes. Her father smiled at her with that sameheart-breaking smile which her mother had for her in face of trouble. 

"The frosts! The frosts!" he whispered to Momus, and the mute laidgoad about his camel. 

Aquila, seeing this haste, checked his horse's gait and fell backbeside the strange woman. Together they permitted the rest of theparty to ride ahead, while they talked in voices too restrained to beheard. 

"There is pestilence in this company, " Aquila said angrily; "will thatnot persuade you to abandon this plan?"

"No. When all of you are like to die and leave this great treasuresitting out in the wilderness without a guardian?" she said lightly. There was no trace of a servant's humility in her tone. 

"Hast had the plague that thou seem'st to feel secure from it?" hedemanded. 

"O no; then there would be no risk in this game. There is no sport inan unfair advantage over conditions. No! But how comes this Costobaruswith you?"

"He would not trust his daughter and a dowry to me, alone. "

"How shall we get to Emmaus, then?" she asked. 

"We shall not get to Emmaus; so you must inform Julian, who willexpect us there, " he declared. 

The woman played with the silken reins of her camel. Behind her veil asarcastic smile played about the corners of her mouth. Aquila watchedher resentfully, waiting with an immense reserve of caustic words forher refusal to accept the charge. 

"So, my Mars of the gray temples, thou meanest in all faith to deliverup this lady and her treasure to Julian?"

"By those same gray temples, I do! And hold thy peace about my whitehairs. Nothing made them so but thyself--and this evil plot in which Iam tangled. What does Julian mean to do with this poor creature?"

"He has not got her yet and by the complication thou seest now, wearing its turban over one ear in yonder howdah, it may come to passthat he will never have her--and her dowry. "

"Pfui! How little you know this Julian! Besides, I am pledged todeliver him--at least the treasure. "

"And thou meanest to line his purse with this great treasure becausehe paid thee to do it?"

"I shall; and be rid of it!"

The woman smiled sarcastically. 

"And scorn it for thyself?"

Aquila made no answer, but rode on in sulky silence. 

"Perpol, it must be pleasant to be a queen, " the woman observed withan assumption of childishness in her voice. 

"Peril's own habit!" Aquila declared. 

"Peril! Fie! That is half the pleasure of this game of life. It istiresome to live any other way than hazardously. "

"Thou shalt have pleasure enough in this journey thou art to take, "Aquila declared a little threateningly. 

The woman laughed. When Aquila spoke again, his voice was full ofconcern. 

"I was a fool for not forcing you to stay in Ascalon. You arereckless--reckless!"

"It was that which made me attractive, " the woman broke in, "to Nero, to Vitellius and to you. "

"Reckless and useless!" Aquila went on decisively. "Hear me, now; Itrifle no longer. Sometime to-night thou'lt leave us and journey toEmmaus and inform Julian what has wrecked his plans, and send him withdespatch to Zorah. This thou wilt do, by all the Furies, or when I docatch thee as I shall, since there is no other fool in Judea who willundertake to feed thee, I shall leave the print of my displeasure onthee from thy head to thy heel! Mark me!"

The woman laughed aloud, with such peculiar insolence and amusementthat one of the servants heard her and turned his head that way. 

"Pah! What a timid villain thou art, " the woman said, when the servantlooked away again. "How much better it would have been had Julianfixed upon _me_ as his confederate!"

"Not for Julian! You plot against him even now. But say what you will, you go to Emmaus to-night, without fail. I have spoken!"

Aquila touched his horse and riding away from the woman came up besideCostobarus who was gazing over the country through which they werepassing. 

It was a great plain, advancing by benches and slopes to the edge of arocky shore. Without forests, spotted only with verdure, vast, barren, exhausted with the constant production of fourteen centuries, it was acheerless sea-front at its best. To the west the wash of the tidelessMediterranean tumbled along an unindented coast; to the east thesallow stony earth went up and up, toward an ever receding sallowhorizon. Between lay humbled towns, wholly abandoned to the bats andto the ignoble wild life of the Judean wilderness. There were no sheepor cattle. Vespasian had passed that way and required the flocks ofthe nation for the subsistence of his four legions. There were noolive or fig groves. They had been the first to fall under the Romanax, for the policy of Roman warfare was that the first step insubduing a rebellious province was to starve it. The vineyards hadsuffered the same end. The enriched soil of these inclosures, made onenow with the wild at the leveling of their hedges, produced acres ofprofitless weeds, green against the rising brown bosom of thehill-fronts. Here and there were the fallen walls of isolatedhomes--wastes of masonry already losing all domestic signs. There wereno gardens; it had been two seasons since the wheat and the barley hadbeen reaped last, and the seaboard of southern Judea, in the path ofRome the destroyer, was a wilderness. 

Over all this immense slope the eyes of Costobarus wandered. Howeverhe had felt in the preceding days when he looked upon this ruin of theland of milk and honey, he realized now suddenly and in all itsfearful actuality the predicament of Judea, its despair and thegigantic travail before those who would save it from the unitedsentence passed upon it by God and the powers. Immense dejectionseized him. He looked from the face of the country, upon which not asingle thing of profit showed, toward the bowed head and oppressedfigure of his young and inexperienced daughter who was to put hertender self between Ruin and its victim. Chills, succeeded by flashesof fever, swept over him. He raised himself as if to give command toAquila but settled back under the canopy, grown immeasurably older andfeebler in that moment of helpless surrender to conditions of which hehad been part an artificer. It was not as if he had made an incautiousmove in a political game; it was, as it seemed to him undeniably then, that he had advanced against the Lord God of Hosts, and there was noturning back!

He settled slowly into a stunned anguish that seemed to risegradually, like a filling tide, shutting out the sunset and theseaboard, the bald earth and the streaming wind, and engulfing him inroaring darkness and intense cold. 

They were in sight of a cluster of Syrian huts, the first inhabitedvillage they had come upon since leaving Ascalon, but he was not awareof it. The sudden halting of his camel and a hoarse strained cry athand seemed to bear some relation to his condition, but he did notcare. He felt his howdah lurch to one side as some one leaped upbeside him; he felt remotely the great grasp of hands on him, whichmust have been Momus'; the quick military voice of Aquila he heard andthen, keen and distinct as a call upon him, the sound of Laodice'stones made sharp with terror. 

He opened his eyes and saw her, holding him in her arms. Somewhere inthe background were the faces of Momus and Aquila. Between the paganand the old servant passed a look that the old man caught. Then heheard Aquila say:

"The village--his sole chance, if there is a physician there. "

Laodice held him fast only for a moment, when it seemed that she waswrenched away. The dying man was glad. If this were pestilence, sheshould not come near. The hiss of the lash and the bound of the stungcamel disturbed him but he lapsed into the immense cold again as theyraced down the slight declivity toward the Syrian village. ButPestilence was riding with them and the odds were with it. 

But the dwellers of that little huddle of huts had nothing to do butto sit in their doorways and suspect. Whatever came their way from thesea for many months had brought them disaster and long since they hadlearned to defend themselves. So now, when a party riding at breakneckspeed, bearing with them an old man on whom the inertia of death wasplain, came across the frontiers of their little town, they met themwith the convenient stones of their rocky streets, with their savage, stark-ribbed dogs, with offal from kitchen heap and donkey stall andwith insults and curses. 

"Away, ye bringers of plague! Out, lepers; be gone, ye unclean!"

Laodice and Aquila who rode in the open were fair targets for half thehail that fell about them. The girl groaned as the missiles fell intothe howdah upon the helpless shape of Costobarus, who did not lift ahand to fend off the stones. The pagan, bruised and raging, drew hisweapon and spurred his horse to ride down his assailants, but theyscattered before him and from safe refuge continued their assault withredoubled determination. 

Momus, seeing only injury in attempting to enforce hospitality, turnedhis camel and, swinging around the outermost limits of the settlement, fled. Aquila followed him, and a moment later the rest of the partyjoined them. 

Without the range of the village, the party halted. Momus and Aquilalifted Costobarus down and laid him on a rug that Laodice had spreadfor him. But when she would have knelt by him, he motioned to Aquilanot to permit her to approach. The mute stood by his master. In thatcountenance fast passing under shade was written charge and injunctionas solemn as the darkness that approached him. 

"Here, O faithful servant, is the wife of a prince, the daughter ofthy master, the joy of thine own declining days. Shield her againstwrong and misfortune by all the strength that in thee lies, as thouhopest in the King to come and the reward of the steadfast. Promise!"

They were silent lips that once knew the art and the sound of speech. The old habit never entirely fell away from them. Under this anguishthey moved--fruitlessly; over the deformed face flitted the keenagony of regret; then he lifted his great left arm and bent it upwardat the elbow; the huge, even monstrous muscles, knotted and kinkedfrom shoulder to elbow, sank down under the broad barbarian braceletof bronze and rippled under and rose again from elbow to wrist, ferocious, superhuman! In that movement the dying man read the mute'sconsecration of his one great strength to the protection of thetenderly loved Laodice. Costobarus motioned to the shittim-wood casketand Momus undid it and strapped it on his own belt. 

"The frosts! The frosts!" the dying man whispered. The muteunderstood. Then the father's eyes wandered toward the figure of hisdaughter fended away from him by the pagan. The agony of her sufferingand the agony of his distress for her bridged the space between them. And while they yearned toward each other in a silence that quiveredwith pain, the light darkened in Costobarus' eyes. 

When Laodice came to herself, she was laid upon a spot of rough grass, in the shelter of an overhanging bluff. It was not the scene uponwhich her sorrow-stunned eyes had closed a while before. The villagewas nowhere in sight; the plain had been left behind; any further viewwas shut off by Aquila's horse, and the two camels whose bridles werein the hands of Hiram. Beside the stricken girl knelt Momus andAquila; standing at her feet was a new-comer, on whom her wandering andhalf-conscious gaze rested. 

He was an old man, clad in a short tunic, ragged of hem and girt abouthim with a rope. Barefoot, bareheaded and provided only with a staffand a small wallet, he was to outward appearances little more than oneof the legion of mendicants that infested the poverty-stricken land ofJudea. But his large eyes, under the tangle of wind-blown white hairand white shelving brows, were infinitely intelligent and refined. Now, they beamed with pity and concern on the bereaved girl. 

But she forgot him the next instant, for returning consciousnessbrought back like a blow the memory of the death of her father. 

From time to time she caught snatches of conversation between the oldwayfarer and Aquila. They were spoken in low tones and only from timeto time did they reach her. 

"He was Costobarus, principal merchant of this coast, " she heardAquila explain shortly. 

"I shall go on to Ascalon; I do not fear, " the old man said next. "Ishall bring his people to fetch his body. I marked the spot. Comforther with that, when she can bear to talk of it. "

"We go to Jerusalem, " Aquila went on, some time later, "else we shouldturn back with him ourselves. But we dare not risk the pestilence onher account, for it seems that she is very necessary to the Jews atthis hour--very necessary. "

"I follow to the Holy City, " the old wayfarer added at last. "ThePassover is celebrated there within two weeks. But I shall not fail;nothing will harm me. "

"What talisman do you carry to protect you?" the pagan asked a littleirritably. 

"No talisman, but the love of Jesus Christ, the Saviour!"

"A Christian!" Aquila exclaimed. 

Even through her stupor of grief and hopelessness, Laodice heard thisexclamation. Here, then, was one of the Nazarenes, that mysterioussect whose tenets she had never been permitted to hear; But also, sheknew that the old apostate had braved the plague and had buried herfather. She turned to look at him in time to see him extend his handsin blessing over her. 

"_The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and his comfort be with you, forever; amen_. Farewell. "

He was gone. Momus raised her in his arms and, lifting her into herhowdah, laid her tenderly on the improvised reclining seat that hadbeen made of the chair therein. In a twinkling the whole party hadmounted, and passed swiftly on toward Jerusalem. As they movedforward, the strange woman murmured softly:

"Two!"

Laodice's camel mounted the slope toward the east and stretched awayon a comparative level toward an immense white moon. Aquila's horsekept up with the matchless speed of the tall camel only at times, andLaodice, dully sensing that they were going at hot haste, realizedthat a race was on between them and the pestilence. Momus was wieldingthe goad for a run to the frosts. 

A camel raced up beside Aquila. 

"Look!" the woman said to him in a lowered tone, showing back over theroad by which they had come. Aquila turned in his saddle and looked. Momus rose in his seat and looked. Behind them only one camel rockedalong in their wake. The other and its driver had disappeared. 

"Deserted!" Aquila exclaimed under his breath. 

"Three!" the woman said. 

"A pest on your counting for a Charon's toll-taker!" Aquila whisperedsavagely. "We will have no more of it!"

"No?" the woman said with a meaning that made the pagan shiver. 

Momus laid goad about his camel. 

The way continually ascended toward the east; the soil was no longersandy, but rocky; no longer given up to desolate gardens, but blackwith groves of cedars and highland shrubs. They swung off a plateauthat would have ended in a cliff, down a shaly sheep-path into a wady. Under the moonlight, the bottom was seen to be scarred with marks ofhoof and wheel. It debouched suddenly into a Roman road, straight, level, magnificently built and running as a bird flies on toJerusalem. 

The camel's gait increased. Momus settled himself in a securerposition and Laodice, careless of the outcome of this breathlesshurry, yielded herself to the careen of her howdah. At times, herindifferent vision caught, through moonlit notches and gaps, glimpsesof great blue vapors, crowned with pale fire and piled in gloriousdisorder low on the eastern horizon. They were the hills encompassingJerusalem. The stream of wind on her face cooled and drove stronger. 

Aquila rode closer to her, his horse panting under the effort. Hisface looked strange and distressed. 

"Lady, " he said in low tones, "necessity forces me to speak to you inyour grief; do not blame me for indifference to your desire to bealone. But we must care for you, though in your heart this moment youmay resent a wish to live. But your father commanded me!"

She gave him attention. 

"Let us not carry peril with us, " he added in a half-whisper. "Let usnot carry food for pestilence with us. "

"I do not understand, " she answered, adopting his low tone. 

"The more we are, the more of us to die. You must live; I must live, "he explained, nodding toward Momus. 

After a little silence, she asked:

"Do we not ride toward the frosts?"

"Yes; but even now pestilence may ride on beside us--your servant andthis woman. Let us save ourselves. "

"Abandon them?" she questioned. 

"Lest they go on without us, " he added. 

Momus turned suddenly and gazed at Aquila. Then he imperiously signedthe pagan to fall back. 

They rode on. 

The pagan slackened his horse's gallop and reined in beside the woman. They talked together, argumentatively, for a single tense minute andthen Aquila, with a bitter word, put spurs to his animal and dashed upbeside Laodice's camel. In his one uplifted hand a knife gleamed. Theother reached toward the casket bound to Momus' hip. Laodice, raisedto an upright attitude in her fresh fright, saw that his face wasblack and twisted and that he wavered stiffly in his saddle. 

But the mute did not await the attack. He seized the pagan'soutstretched hands with that monstrous left and flung him backward. Without an effort to save himself, falling rigidly and with a strangecry, Aquila dropped back over his horse's crupper into the dust of theroad. 

"Momus!" Laodice screamed. 

Back of her the woman cried out:

"On! On! It is the pestilence!"

Momus wielded his goad. Laodice, shaking and crying aloud, looked backto see the strange woman swerve her camel past the dark shape lyingwith out-flung arms in the road and sweep quickly on after them. 

The scourge had overtaken Aquila. 

All night the camels fled east, all night the soft footfall of thewoman's beast pursued them; all night the wind freshened untilLaodice's bared face stiffened with the cold and the breath of themute that sat upon her camel's neck steamed in the moonlight. Up andup, by steep and winding wadies they mounted; under overhanging cliffsand past bald towers of hill-rock staring white in the moon, alongblack passes between brooding eminences of solid night, crowned withghost-light; over high plateaus darkened with groves, down dales withsinging, invisible streams running seaward and up again and on untilthe hills engulfed them wholly and those before were higher than anythey had seen. Then their flying beasts, leaving the Roman road overwhich they had sped for some distance, followed a sheep-path and burstinto an open immersed in moonlight. Below in the distance was acluster of huts, white and lifeless. But abroad, over the crisp grassand misty white on all the exposed slopes, sparkled the deep hoarfrost!

Chapter III

THE SHEPHERD OF PELLA

Momus drew up his camel. The woman who had followed halted. Except forthe hurried breathing of their beasts, a critical silence brooded overthe moon-silvered wilderness. The moment was tense with the agony ofhuman bitterness against the immitigable despatch of death. Therecould be no thanksgiving for their own safety from those who were notglad to be given life. Laodice resented her preservation; old Momus, aside from the wound of personal loss sore in his heart, was strickenwith the realization of the grief of his young mistress, which hecould not help. He did not raise his eyes to her face when he turnedtoward her; there was no speech. In the young woman's heart the painwas too great for her to venture expression safely. The silence waspoignant with unnatural restraint. 

Presently Momus inquired of her by signs if she wished to go on to thelifeless village below the camp. She did not observe his gestures, andMomus decided for her. He drove on and the woman, who had wrapped hercloak about her as the biting wind of the hills heightened through thenarrow defiles to the north, followed. 

But almost the next instant Momus drew up his mount so suddenly thatLaodice was roused. He turned and began to make rapid signs. Laodicehalf rose as she read them and pressed her hands together. 

"Seven days!" she exclaimed in dismay. There was silence. 

Momus made the camel kneel. He dismounted slowly, and began to undothe tent-cloth in a roll beside the howdah. The woman rode up andinstantly the mute stepped between her and his young mistress and wenton with his work. 

Laodice understood the question in the woman's attitude although, withtrue sense of an inferior's place, the stranger did not speak. 

"We are unclean, " Laodice said with effort. "We have come from apestilential city and we have touched the dead. We can not enter atown with these defilements upon us, except to present ourselves to apriest for examination and separation. Furthermore, we must burn ourunessential belongings. If you are a Jewess all these things are knownto you. "

The woman extended her hands, palms upward, with a grace that wasalmost dainty. 

"Lady, " she said behind her unlifted veil, "I am an unlettered womanand have been accustomed to the instruction of my masters. I amobedient to the laws of our people. "

"You would have been in less peril to have ridden alone, " Laodicesighed. "Our company has been no help to you. "

"We can not say that confidently. There are worse things thanpestilence in the wilderness, " the woman replied. 

Momus seemed to observe more confidence than was natural in the readyanswers of this professed servant, and before he would leave Laodiceto pitch camp, he helped her to alight and drew her with him. Thewoman remained on her mount. 

Gathering up sticks, dead needles of cedar and last year's leaves, hemade a fire upon which he heaped fuel till it lighted up the near-byslopes of the hills and roared jovially in the broad wind. 

It was a pocket in the heart of high hills into which they had fled. The bold, sure line of a Roman road divided it, cutting tyrannicallythrough the cowed hovels of the town as an arrow drives through aflock of pigeons. On either side were the dim shapes of great rocksand semi-recumbent cedars. Retiring into shadow were the darkeroutlines of the surrounding circle of hills, rived by intervals ofblack night where wadies entered. From their summits the flying archof the heavens sprang, printed with a few faint stars, but allsilvered with the flood-light of a moon cold and pure as the frostitself. It was unsympathetic, aloof and wild--a cold place into whichto bring broken hearts to assume banishment from the comfort andcompanionship of mankind. 

Laodice slowly and with effort began to separate those belongingswhich were to be laid upon the fire from those which were toonecessary to be burned. The woman alighted but, on offering to assist, was warned away from the girl with a menacing gesture of Momus' greatarm. The stranger drew herself up suddenly with a wrath that shehardly controlled but came no nearer Laodice. When the girl finallyfinished her selection, the woman begged permission to attend to thecamels and getting the beasts on their feet led them together to betethered. 

Laodice, assisted by Momus, took up the condemned supplies and flungthem one at a time upon the roaring fire. Little by little, withgrowing reluctance, the heap of spare belongings was examined andcondemned, until finally only the garments they wore, the tents thatwere to shelter them and the essential harness of the camels wereleft. Then Momus drew from his wallet a fragment of aromatic gum andcast it on the blaze. While it ignited and burned with great vapors ofpenetrating incense, he unstrapped the precious casket, set it downbetween his feet, stripped off his comfortable woolen tunic and passedit through the volumes of white smoke piling up from the fire. 

And while he stood thus a deft hand seized the casket from behind. There was a sharp, warning cry from Laodice. The old man staggeredonly a moment from the tripping that the wrench gave him, but in thatinstant of hesitation the pillager vanished. 

The old mute shouted the infuriated, half-animal yell of the dumb andstarted in pursuit, but at his second step he saw the fleeter camelswing down the declivity, at top-speed, with the other trailing withdifficulty at full length of its bridle behind. The next instant themuffled beat of the padded hooves drummed the solid bed of the Romanroad, and the shapes of camels and fugitive were lost in blue darknessbeyond the town. 

There was no need for the pair left behind to await a realization ofall that the loss meant to them. One running swiftly as a fine youngcreature can run when spurred by desperation, and the other, lamelybut doggedly, as an old determined man, rushed down the rough side ofthe slope, leaped into the roadway and ran irrationally after thefugitive mounted upon a camel, fleeter than the fastest horse. 

Momus saw with fear that Laodice on this straight inviting road wouldout-distance him to her peril. He shouted inarticulately after her, but her reply came back, high with desperation and terror. 

"The corner-stone of Israel! All his treasure! God's portion, lost, lost!"

She was out of his sight. The sudden barking of dogs told him that shehad crossed the outskirts of the village, and groaning with alarm forher the old man stumbled on after her. He saw lights flash out; heardshouts, and out of the confusion distinguished Laodice's, vehement andurging. The yapping of the town curs became less threatening and, bythe time Momus reached the settlement, half-dressed Jews were hurryingeast out of the village after the flying feet of the girl, in pursuitof the robber. 

For unmeasured time, while the moon crossed its meridian and slopeddown the west, the search continued. Momus did not overtake thefleet-footed party that preceded him. Stragglers that lost interestdropped back with him from time to time; but finding him dumb andimmensely distressed, they disappeared eventually and returned to thetown. One by one, at times by twos and threes the party dropped off. The three or four who remained helpful continued against hope, forsimple pity for the girl. But when she dropped suddenly by thewayside, exhausted with the strain of many troubles, they stopped totell her that the chase was fruitless and to offer their roughcondolences. 

Then Momus hobbled up to them. Laodice refused to raise her head tolisten to them and they turned to the old man. But by signs, he showedthem that his tongue was dead, and finally, with suppressed remarksupon the exceeding misfortune of the pair, they, too, disappeared. Athoughtful one invited them to return to the village. Laodice, careless now of what he should think of his exposure to pestilence, told him bluntly that they were unclean. Hastily he exclaimed at thesum of their troubles, hastily blessed them, and hastily departed. 

There was a pallor along the under-rim of the east; the wind freshenedwith the sweet vigor of early morning. 

Over the stunned silence came the sound of the infinite trotting oftiny hooves and a high, wild, youthful yell. Laodice, too worn toobserve, sat still; but Momus, with a rush of old fairy-tales in mind, sprang to her side and seized her arm. His alarmed eyes searched thedark landscape for whatever visitation it had to reveal. 

There was the rush of countless hoof-beats and a low cloud of dustobscured the crest of the hill just above them. The soft tremolo ofmultitudinous bleating came out of it. The quick excited bark of afresh Natolian sheep-dog wakened an echo in one of the ravines througha hill on the opposite side of the road, while strong and insistentand happy the young cry preceded this sudden animation in thewilderness. 

There was a fall of gravel on the slope over their heads and the nextinstant a fourteen-year-old boy descended upon the pair in a fall ofearth, his sandaled feet planted one ahead of the other, his bare armsthrown above his head as he balanced himself, his long, stiff, crinkled black locks blowing backward, his face bright with the eagerenjoyment of his simple feat. 

After him came a veritable avalanche of Syrian sheep, scrambling toright and left as they parted behind Momus and Laodice and eddyingaround the young shepherd who stopped at seeing the pair. His yelldied away at once, though the effort of sliding down a frozen, rockyslope had not interfered with a single note. 

He might well have been a young satyr, fresh from the groves ofAchaia, with his big, serious mouth and its range of glittering teeth, his shining deer-like eyes, wide apart, his faun curls low on hisforehead, his big head set on a short neck, his shoulders yetchildish, his slim brown body half smothered in skins, half bare as hewas born, his large hard hand gripping a crook of horn and wood. Hisgaze at Momus was frank with boyish curiosity. His bright eyes plainlyremarked on the oddity of the old servant's appearance. Havingcatalogued old Momus as worthy of further inspection, he looked thenat Laodice. Under the lowering moon and the listless effort of comingday, her unmantled dress of silver tissue made of her a moon-spirit, banished out of her world of pallor and solitude. Before her splendidyoung beauty, pale with distress and weariness, he was not abashed. His simple eyes studied her with equal frankness, but with anadmiration beyond words. 

Feeling somehow that his sudden appearance might have distressed her, he said finally:

"Go on, lady, or stay as it pleases you. I will not hurt you. "

Momus' shoulders submerged his ears in an indignant shrug. That thisyoung calf of the pastures should insure him safe passage!

But Laodice was still filled with the calamity of her loss. 

"Hast seen a robber, here, along this road?" she asked. 

"Many of them, " was the prompt answer. 

"With a chest of jewels?"

The boy shook his head. 

"I never examined their booty, " he said with perfect respect. 

"Or then a woman riding one camel and leading another?"

"Never anything like that. "

Laodice, with this hope gone, let her face fall into her hands. 

"His fortune given freely to Israel, " she groaned. "His whole life'sambition reduced to material form for the help of his brethren--gone, gone!"

The shepherd grew instantly distressed. He looked at Momus and askedin a whisper what had happened. But the old servant signed to his lipsirritably, and stroked his young mistress' hair in a dumb effort tocomfort her. The silence grew painful. In his anxiety to relieve them, he bethought him of their uncovered heads and houseless state. 

"Do you live in the village; or do you camp near by?"

Momus shook his head. Laodice appreciated the boy's concern for thembut could not make an attempt to explain. 

"Then, " he offered promptly, "come have my fire and my rock. It is thebest rock in all these hills; and my tent, " he added, showing theskins that wrapped him. "I wear my tent; it saves my carrying it. Indeed I do not need it; you may have it. Come!"

He spoke hurriedly, as if he would thrust his desire to comfortbetween her and the wave of disconsolation that he felt was about tocover her. 

Old Momus, sensibly accepting the boy's suggestion as the wisestcourse, raised Laodice and motioning the shepherd to lead on, led hisyoung mistress up the hill as the boy retraced his steps. The flood ofSyrian sheep turned back with him and followed bleating between theurging of the sheep-dog, as the boy climbed. 

On a slope to the west as a wady bent upon itself abruptly before itdebouched upon the hillside, there was a deep glow illuminating aspace in the depression. The shepherd dropped down out of sight. Hisvoice came over the shuffle and bleat of the sheep. 

"Follow me; this is my house. "

Momus led his mistress over to the wady. There the shepherd withuplifted hands helped her down with the superior courtesy of ahouseholder offering hospitality. There was a red circle of fire inthe sandy bottom of the dry wady, and beside it was a flat boulder atthe foot of which were prints of the shepherd's sandals and, on thebank behind it, the mark where his shoulders had comfortably rested. He made no apology for the poverty of his entertainment; he had neverknown anything better. 

"Now, brother, " he said busily to Momus, "if thou'lt lend me of thyheight, thou shalt have of my agility and we will set up a douar forthe lady. "

With frank composure he stripped off the burden of skins that coveredhim until he stood forth in a single hide of wool, with a tumble ofsheep pelts at his feet. In each one was a thorn preserved for use andwith these he pinned them all together, scrambled out on the bank, emitting his startling cry at the sheep that obstructed his path. Fromabove he shouted down to Momus. 

"Stretch it, brother, over thy head. I shall pin it down with stoneson either side. Now, unless some jackal dislodges these weights beforemorning, ye will be safe covered from the cold. There! God never madea man till He prepared him a cave to sleep under! I've never slept inthe open, yet. How is it with thee now, lady?"

He was down again before her with the red light of the great bed ofcoals illuminating him with a glow that was almost an expression ofhis charity. 

She saw that he had the straight serious features of the Ishmaelite, but lacked the fierce yet wondering gaze of the Arab. Aside from thesesuperior indications in his face there was nothing to separate himfrom any other shepherd that ranged the mountainous pastures ofPalestine. 

She, who all her life had never known anything but to expect thetenderest of ministrations, was humbly surprised and grateful at thefree-handed generosity of the young stranger. Momus looked at him withgrudging approval. 

"It is kindly shelter, " she said finally with effort, "and it is warm. You are very good to us!"

"But you have not eaten of my salt, " he declared. 

Momus showed interest. It had been long since the last meal in theluxurious house of Costobarus. The boy in the meantime producedunleavened loaves from the carry-all of sheepskin that hung over hisshoulders, and without explanation disappeared among his flock. Presently he returned with a small skin of milk. 

"We have goats in the flock, " he said. "A shepherd can not livewithout a goat. You do not know about shepherds, " he added. 

Laodice thought that she detected tactful inquiry in his last remarkand roused herself painfully to make due explanations to her host. Buthe waved his hands at her, with the desert-man's courtesy which coversfine points better than the greater ones. 

"Eat my fare; I do not purchase thy history with salt and shelter, " hesaid, with a certain sublimity of honor. 

Momus ate, and looked with growing grace at his young host. ButLaodice succeeded only in drinking the goat's milk and lapsed intobenumbed gazing at the red glow of fire that cast its warmth abouther. The shepherd talked on, attempting to interest her in somethingother than her consuming sorrow. 

"These be Christian sheep about you, friends, " he said, "and I am aChristian shepherd. "

Momus sat up suddenly with a bit of the boy's bread arrested on itsway to his lips. He was eating the fare of an apostate, of a despisedNazarene. The boy went on composedly. 

"We are from Pella, the Christian city. We are, my sheep, my city andI, the only secure people in all Judea. We, I and the sheep, have beenin the hills since the first new grass in February. We are manyleagues from home. "

"So am I, " Laodice said wearily. 

"Jerusalem?" the shepherd asked, glad he had brought out a response. "No? Yet all Judea is going to Jerusalem at this time. Are youfugitives?"

Momus nodded. 

"Come then to Pella, " the shepherd urged. "You will be fed there;Titus will not come there. We are poor but we are happy--and we aresafe. "

Laodice thanked him so inertly that he sensed her disinterest, andwhile he sat looking at her, searching his heart for something kind tosay, she put out her hand impulsively and took his. 

"God keep thee and forget thy heresy, " she said. "If thou livest inPella, Pella is indeed happy. "

He laughed with a flush stealing up under the brown of his cheeks. Afaint light came into Laodice's eyes as she looked at him; he returnedher gaze with a gradual softening that was intensely complimentary. Between the two was effected instant and lasting fellowship. BeforeMomus' indignant eyes the shepherd was blushing happily. 

"Who art thou?" Laodice asked. 

"They call me Joseph, son of Thomas. "

After a silence she said softly, "I am not at liberty to tell my name. " She remembered the secrecy ofPhiladelphus' mission. "Yet perchance if the God of my fathers prosperme and my husband, I may come to Pella--as thy queen. "

The boy's eyes brightened and he drew in a sharp breath, but almostinstantly the animation died and he looked at her sorrowfully. Itseemed that she read dissent and sympathy commingled in his gaze. Buthe was a Christian; he could not believe and hope as she hoped. 

"Can I do aught for you?" he asked disjointedly. 

"Our duty is rather toward you, child, " she answered, suddenlyarousing to the peril they might bring their free-handed host. "Wehave newly come from a country where there is pestilence. "

But he smiled down on her uplifted face, with immense confidence. 

"I am not afraid. Besides, if I perish giving you comfort, I have doneonly as Jesus would have me do. "

"Who is Jesus?" Laodice asked. 

The shepherd made a little sign and bent his knee. 

"The Christ!" he responded. 

Momus plucked quickly at Laodice's sleeve and shook his head at her inan admonitory manner. He had laid down his bread unfinished. But theshepherd looked at him sympathetically. 

"Never fear, " he said. "It will not hurt her to hear about Him. Hemakes Pella safe from armies. Let her come there and see for herself. "

Laodice pressed his hand. 

"I shall come, " she said. 

He heaved a contented sigh--contented with himself, contented with herpromise to come. Then he drew his hands away. 

"The sheep are noisy; they will not let you sleep. We shall go. " Thenas if afraid of her thanks he drew away, and halted at the thresholdof the shelter. Then the boy extended his hands with a gesture sosolemn that both of his guests bowed their heads instinctively. 

"_The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you for evermore_. Farewell, " he said in a half-whisper. 

He was gone. 

Presently the rush of little feet swept after him and his high, wild, youthful yell rang faintly in the distance. The delicate cracklingfrom the heated bed of coals was all that was heard in the shelteredwady roofed with skins. 

For the second time within the past few hours, Laodice had met aChristian. Both had helped her; both had blessed her. And one was anold man and one was a child. 

The interest of the recent interview and the excitement of the nightslowly died away, leaving Laodice in the dead hopelessness of wearydespair. She lay down suddenly with her face against the warmed sandand wept. Momus sat down beside her, covered her with a leopard skintaken from his own swarthy shoulders, and soothed her with awkwardtouches on cheek and hair, till her tears exhausted her and she slept. 

Stealthily then the old man rolled up her own mantle and put it underher head and prepared to watch. And then as he sat with his knee drawnup, his head bowed upon it, the weakness of slumber gradually stoleaway his watchfulness and his concern. 

Some time later, before the deliberate dawn of a March day had put outthe last of the greater stars, two men on horses descended thedeclivity just above the shelter of sheepskins and attracted by thedull glow of the fire drew up cautiously. 

At a word from one of the men, the other alighted and, peering fromthe shelter of a prostrate cedar, inspected the pair. After assuringhimself that there were but two about the camp, one a woman and bothasleep, he tiptoed back to his fellow. 

"Only a man and a woman, " he said. "Jews on their way to the Passover. Their fire is almost out. Let us ride on. "

"What haste!" the one who had kept his saddle said. "One would thinkit were you going forward to meet a bride and her dowry! I am hungry. Let us borrow of this fire and get breakfast. "

"Emmaus is only a little farther on, " the first man protested. "I amtired of wayside meals, Philadelphus. I would eat at a khan againbefore I forget the custom. "

"How is the pair favored?" the other said provokingly. 

"I did not approach near enough, " the other retorted. "It seemed to bean old man and a girl. "

"Pretty?" the one called Philadelphus asked. 

"I did not see. "

"Married, Julian?"

"How could I tell?" Julian flared. 

Philadelphus laughed, and dismounted. 

"I shall see for myself, " he declared, walking over to the shelteringcedar to look. 

Julian followed him nervously, saying under his breath:

"You waste time deliberately!"

"Tut! You merely wish to keep me from seeing this girl, " Philadelphusretorted. 

He, too, stopped at the prostrate cedar and gazed under the saggingshelter of skins. 

"Shade of Helen!" he exclaimed under his breath as the firelight gavehim perfect view of the sleeping girl. "What have we here?"

Julian made no response. He drew nearer and looked in silence. 

"Now what are they to each other?" Philadelphus continued. "Father anddaughter; lady and servant or--a courtezan and her manager?"

At the continued silence of his companion, he argued his questionhimself. 

"No such ill-fashioned peasant loins as his ever begat such sweetpatrician perfection as that!" he declared. "And a lady rich enough tohave one servant would travel with more than one or not at all--"

Julian broke in with sudden avid interest. 

"Look at that deal of feminine flummery--that dress of silver tissue, the ends of that silken scarf you see below the covering--all thosejewels and trinkets! Odd garb for travel afoot, is it not? It is abadge not to be put off even in as barren a market as this. She isgoing to Jerusalem for the Passover. He will carry the purse, however, mark me. "

"How well you know the marks of delinquency!" Philadelphus said with aglimmer of resentment in his eyes. 

"Who does not? What do the Jewish psalmists and proverbialists andpurists depict so minutely as that migrating iniquity, the strangewoman?"

"But look at her!" Philadelphus insisted. "I have not seen anything sobewitching since I left Ephesus!"

"No; nor a long time before!" Julian declared. "I must have a nearerlook. "

"Careful! You will wake her!"

Julian's face showed a sneer at his companion's concern. 

"I'll have a care not to wake the old Boeotian, " he said. 

He stepped between Laodice and her sleeping servant. The mute with thestupor of slumber further to disable his dulled hearing, did not move. 

"Young!" Philadelphus exclaimed in a whisper. "And new to the life!"

"Pfui!" Julian scoffed. "Sleep makes even Venus look innocent!"

"Then this is the most innocent wickedness I have seen in months!"

"So you catalogue innocence as a charm! It's not here. But if she hadno beauty but that eyelash I'd be speared upon it!"

Philadelphus turned toward the old servant plunged in the exhaustedsleep of weary age. 

"Thou grizzled nightmare!" he exclaimed vindictively. 

He glanced again at the girl. Julian had knelt beside her. Between thetwo men passed a look that was mutually understood. 

"Remember, " Julian whispered, "you are a married man. "

Philadelphus paled suddenly with anger as the intent of his companiondawned upon him, but he put off his temper shrewdly. 

"And so approaching a time when wayside beauties will no longer befree to me, " he said, cutting off his fellow in the beginning of hispreėmption. "And you have a long freedom before you. "

There was so much challenge in his manner that Julian accepted it. Hereached into his tunic and drew forth a pair of dice. 

"We will play for her, " he said. 

The Maccabee put the tesserae aside. 

"We will not use them, " he said. "I know them to be cogged. Let ushave the judgment of a coin. "

A bronze coin of Agrippa was produced. Julian in getting at his pursebrushed against the sleeping girl and as the pair glanced at herbefore they tossed, her large eyes opened full in Julian's face. Amoment, almost breathless for the two, and terror flared up in hereyes. She started up, but Julian's hand dropped on her. 

"Peace, Phryne!" he said. 

She shrank from his touch, literally into the arms upon whichPhiladelphus rested his weight. She looked up into his eyes, and sawthem soften with a smile, and moved no farther. Philadelphus took thecoin. 

"Let Vespasian decide for me, " he said. 

"For me Fortunatus, " said Julian. 

Philadelphus filliped the coin and flung out a strong and fending handagainst his fellow covering it. Under the brightening day, thelowering profile of the old plebeian emperor Vespasian showeddistinctly on the newly minted bronze. 

Julian made a sharp menacing sound, and with clenched hands rose onhis knees. But Philadelphus looked at him steadily, half-amused at theimplied threat, half-inviting its fulfilment, and under his gaze, Julian rose slowly and drew away. Philadelphus tossed the coin afterhim. His cousin picked it up and put it in his purse. 

[Illustration: Philadelphus looked down upon his prize. ]

Philadelphus looked down at his prize. 

She had not flinched from him when she had found him beside her, withJulian threatening her. But now her wide open eyes fixed upon hisbrimmed with an agony of appeal. Innocent of the world's wickedness, she could only sense supreme peril in this mysterious game withoutunderstanding the stake. Momus was not in sight--dead for all sheknew--and the desert was an ally against her. Over her, now, bent aface characteristic of a great spirit, yet one which was coeval withthe times--times of violence and the supremacy of force. His lips werethin, the contour of his face angular at the jaw, the nose straightand long, his brows black and low over dark blue eyes of a fathomlessdepth, the forehead strongly molded, and marked with deepperpendicular lines between the eyes. He was dark, heavy-haired, young, lean, broad and of fine height even as he knelt beside her. Laodice did not note any of these things. She was only conscious ofthe immense power her terror and her helplessness had to combat. Backof all this iron selfishness, she hoped that somewhere was agentleness, even if inert and useless. All her strength wasconcentrated in the effort to bring it to life. 

He gazed at her, apparently unconscious of the desperation in the facelifted to him. The slow smile that presently grew again in his eyeswas none the less unthoughted. He slipped his hand under a strand ofher rich hair that had fallen and drew it out, slowly, at full length. Slowly his eyes followed it as inch by inch it slipped through hisfingers. Old memories seemed to struggle to the surface; oldtendernesses; recollection of pure hours and holy things; paganismdropped from him like a husk and the spiritual hauteur of a Jewbrought the expression of the unhumbled house of Judah into his face. Through a notch in the hills a golden beam shot from the sun andpenetrating this inwalled valley lay like an illuminating fire on theman's face and glorified it. Laodice's breath stopped. 

Slowly his fingers slipped along the fine silken length of thatshining strand until his arm extended to the full; and the end of thelock yet rested on her breast. Thus might have been the hair of thatRahab, who was no less a patriot because she was frail; thus, the hairof Bathsheba, who was the mother of the wisest Israelite though shesinned; thus the hair of that mother of Samson, who slew armiessingle-handed! Badge of Judah, mark of the haughty strength of theoldest enlightenment in the world! He would not initiate his succor ofIsrael with violence against its purest type. 

He smiled slowly; slowly let the strand fall through his fingers. Helooked into her eyes and she saw a sudden light immeasurablycompassionate and tender grow there. A weakness swept over her; shefelt that she had been longing for that light. Then he rose quicklyand moved away. 

Old Momus, the mute, with his head on his knees slept on. 

Julian, who had been halted involuntarily by the attitude of hiscompanion and had been an amazed witness of this extraordinary end ofthe incident, looked at Philadelphus' face in frank stupefaction. ButPhiladelphus laid a hand so forceful and compelling on his companion'sshoulder that it left the pink print of his fingers on the flesh, turned him toward the horses and led him away. 

"We will breakfast farther on, " he said. 

A moment and they were swinging down the stony side of the hill towardthe east, and Laodice, with her hand clutching her excited heart, hadnot thought of flinging herself upon Momus. She raised herselfgradually to watch them as far as she could see, and her fixed andstunned gaze rested with immense homesickness and longing on thetaller man radiant against the background of a risen sun. 

Chapter IV

THE TRAVELERS

The Maccabee rode on, unconscious of Julian's critical gaze. The smileon his lips flickered now brightly, now very faint. The incident inthe hills had not made him entirely happy, but it had awakened in himsomething which was latent in him, something which he had never feltbefore, but which held a sweet familiarity that the blood of hisfathers in him had recognized. 

Julian was intensely disgusted and disappointed. But there was still asensation of shock on his shoulder where the Maccabee's iron hand hadrested and his famous caution stood him in stead at this moment when aquarrel with such intense and executive earnestness in his companion'smanner might prove disastrous. If quarrel they must before theyreached Emmaus, now but a few leagues east of them, he must insurehimself against defeat much less likely to be suffered from a manreluctant to quarrel. He had been hunting for a pretext ever sincethey had left Cęsarea, but this one, suddenly opened to him, startledhim. He admitted now that it would not be wise to force a fight. Whatever must be done should be done with least danger to himself. Itwere better, he believed, to allay suspicion. 

He spoke. 

"How far is it to Jerusalem?"

"About eighty furlongs. "

"Then if we continue, we shall approach the gates after nightfall. "

"We shall not continue, " Philadelphus remarked. "We shall halt atEmmaus. "

"Do you think it would be better for us to camp here in the hillsrather than to stop without the walls of Jerusalem between the cityforces and the winter garrison of Titus and await the opening of theGates?" Julian asked after thought. 

"We shall wait in Emmaus, " the Maccabee repeated, his soul too filledwith dream to note the change in his companion's manner. 

"You have already lost three days, " Julian charged him irritably. 

"Jerusalem may be besieged; it may be long before I can ride in thewilderness again, " the Maccabee answered. 

"Right; your next journey through this place may be afoot--at the endof a chain, " Julian averred. 

The Maccabee raised his brows. 

"Losing courage at the last end of the journey?" he inquired. 

"No! I never have believed in this project, " Julian declared. 

"Why?"

"Who believes in the prospects of a man determined to leap intoHades?"

But the Maccabee was already riding on with his head lifted, his eyesset upon the blue shadows on the western slopes of hills, liftedagainst the early morning sun. Julian went on. 

"You go, cousin, on a mission mad enough to measure up with the anticsof the frantic citizens of Jerusalem. It will not be even a gloriousdefeat. You will be swallowed up in an immense calamity too tremendousto offer publicity to so infinitesimal a detail as the death of onePhiladelphus Maccabaeus. Agrippa has deserted the city and when aHerod lets go of his own, his own is not worth the holding. The cityis torn between factions as implacable as the sea and the land. Theconservatives are either dead or fled; pillage and disorder are themain motives of all that are left. And Titus advances with fourlegions. What can you hope for this mob of crazed Jews?"

Julian's words had been more lively than the Maccabee had expected. Hewas obliged to give attention before his kinsman made an end. 

"You are fond of summaries, Julian, " he said, "dealt in your own coin. Look you, now, at my hope. You confess that these Jews lack a leader. They have lacked him so long that they hunger and thirst for one. Alsothey have suffered the distresses of disorder so intensely that peacein any form is most welcome to them. Titus approacheth reluctantly. Hehad rather deliver Jerusalem than besiege it. I am of the loved anddethroned Maccabaean line--acceptable to every faction of Jewry, fromthe Essenes to the Sicarii. Titus is my friend, unless he suspects meas coming to undermine his better friend, the pretty Herod. I shallhelp Jerusalem help herself; I shall make peace with Rome; I shall beKing of the Jews!--Behold, is not my summary as practical as yours?"

Julian laughed with an amusement that had a ring of contempt in it. 

"There is naught to keep an astronomer from planning a rearrangementof the stars, " he said. 

But the Maccabee rode on calmly. Julian sighed. After a while hespoke. 

"Well, how do you proceed? You tell me that these very visionarieswhom you would succor have never laid eyes on you. What marks you asroyal--as a sprig of the great, just and dead Maccabee?"

"I bear proofs, Roman documents of my family and of my birth. Certainof my party are already organized in Jerusalem and are expecting me, and I wear the Maccabaean signet. Is not that enough?"

"Nothing of it worth the security of private citizenship and a wholehead!"

"No? Not when there is a dowry of two hundred talents awaiting mycourage to come and get it?"

"Ha! That wife! But will you enter that sure death for a woman you donot know?"

"And for a fortune I have not possessed and for a kingdom that I neverowned. "

"She will not be there! Old Costobarus is not so mired in folly as tosend his daughter into the Pit to provide you with money to--payCharon. "

"Aquila sent me a messenger at Cęsarea, " Philadelphus continuedcalmly, "saying that Costobarus was transfigured when he had mysummons. He feels that his God has been good to him to choose hisdaughter to share the throne of Judea. Hence, by this time my ladyawaits me in Jerusalem. "

Again Julian sighed. 

"And there is none in Jerusalem who knows your face?" he asked after asilence. 

"None, except Amaryllis, and she has not seen me since I was sixteenyears old. "

"And there also is an obstacle which I had forgotten to enumerate, "Julian said argumentatively. "You have put your trust in a frailwoman. "

"Amaryllis may be frail, " the Maccabee admitted, "but she issufficiently manly to have all that you and I demand of a man to putfaith in him. She is a good companion and she will not lie. "

"Impossible! She is a woman!" Julian exclaimed. 

"Even then, " the Maccabee returned patiently, "her own ambitionsafeguards me. She can not succeed except as I am successful, and herpurposes are of another kind than mine. She helps herself when shehelps me. Therefore I am depending on her selfishness. It is usually adependable thing. "

"What does she want?"

"The old classic times of the _heterae_ in Greece. She wants to be thepioneer of art in Jerusalem. It is a fertile and a neglected field. She had rather be known as the mother of refinement in Judea than asthe queen of kings over the world. "

"A modest ambition!"

"A great one. How many monarchs are forgotten while Aspasia isremembered! Who were the reigning kings during Sappho's time?"

"But go on. You repose much on her influence. Perhaps she has the willbut not the power to help you. "

"Power! She is the mistress of John of Gischala and actual potentateover Jerusalem at this hour. "

"Unless Simon bar Gioras hath taken the upper hand within the last fewdays. Remember the fortunes of factionists are ephemeral. "

Philadelphus jingled his harness. He was sorry that he had permittedthis discussion. Now its continuance was particularly irritating, whenhe had rather think of something else. He was near Jerusalem; but hewas not going forward, now, with the same eagerness, nor with the sameenthusiasm for his cause. The incident in the hills had marked thechange in him. It was not, then, with a patient tongue that hedefended his intentions, which had grown less inviting in the lasthour. 

"How little your wife will enjoy her, " Julian's smooth voice broke inonce more, "seeing that the frail one is lovely. "

"I do not know that she is lovely. "

"What!" Julian exclaimed in genuine amazement. "You do not know thatshe is lovely! Years of correspondence with a woman whom you do notknow to be lovely! Reposing kingdoms on a woman's influence whom youdo not know to be beautiful!"

"Beauty is no tie, " the Maccabee retorted. "Have you forgotten Salome, the Jewish actress who could play Aphrodite in the theaters ofEphesus, to the confusion of the goddess herself? They said she snaredthree procurators and an emperor at one performance and lost them in aday!"

"Have you seen her?" Julian asked with a sidelong glance. "Till yourown eyes prove it, you should not accept that she is so bewitching. "

"There is no need that I should see her; Aquila swears it! And I wouldtake his word against the testimony of even mine own eyes. "

Julian looked up in a startled manner and hurriedly looked away again. A half-frightened, half-amused smile played about his lips. 

"Aquila is no judge of woman, " he said finally. "And furthermore, theysay she got to trifling with magic and prowling about the temples tosee if the gods came true. They were afraid she would get them blastedalong with her sometime for her sacrilege. I know all this becauseAquila declared she attached herself to him in sheer poverty inEphesus and swore to follow him to the ends of the earth. "

The Maccabee smiled. 

"Nevertheless, he told me that he was afraid of her, but that she wasa woman and in need and he could not reject her. "

Julian's eyes grew insinuating. 

"How much then your behavior this morning would have shocked him!" hemurmured. 

The smile died on the Maccabee's face. Reference to the girl in thehills seemed blasphemy on this man's lips. 

"And you do not recall your wife's face?" Julian persisted. 

The Maccabee's face hardened more. But he shook his head. 

"Fourteen years can change a woman from a beauty to--a--a Christian, ugly and old and cold, " Julian augured. 

The Maccabee turned his head away from his tormentor and Julian'slaughter trailed off into a half-jocular groan. 

"How much you harp on beauty!" the Maccabee said deliberately. "Areyou then going to regret the actresses you left behind when I tore youfrom your exalted calling as the forelegs of the elephant in thetheaters at Ephesus?"

Julian's face blackened. A foolhardy daring born of rage resolved himat that instant. He flung himself out from his saddle and raised hishand with a knife clenched in it. But the Maccabee with a composedlaugh caught the hand and wrenching it about, dropped it, red andcontracting with pain, at his companion's side. 

"Tut! Julian, you are a bad combatant. If you must make way with aman, " the Maccabee advised, "stab him in the back. It is sure--foryou. Ha! Is this Emmaus we see?"

They had ridden up a slight eminence and below them was a disorder offallen or decrepit Syrian huts in the hollow place in the hills. 

It had been the history of Emmaus for centuries to be known. The feetof the Crucified One had pressed its ruined streets and His devotedchroniclers had not failed to set it down in their illuminatedgospels. Army after army in endless procession had thundered throughit since the first invader humbled the glory of Canaan, and few of thehistorians had forgotten to record the unimportant incident. Warfarehad hurtled about it for centuries; the Roman army had come upon itand would continue to come. It had not the spirit to resist; it wasnot worthy of conquest. It simply stood in the path of events. 

A single citizen appeared at the doorway of the most habitable houseand looked absently over the heads of the new-comers. As theyapproached, the villager did not observe them. Instead, he looked atthe near horizon lifted on the shoulder of the hills and meditated onthe signs of the weather. It was Emmaus' habit to find strangers atits door. 

Julian, with natural desire to be first on this perilous ground andaway from the side of the man who had defeated him and laughed at him, rode up to the door. The villager, seeing the traveler stop, gazed athim. 

Julian had about him an air of blood and breeding first to be remarkedeven before his features. The grace of his bearing and the excellenceof his bodily condition were highly aristocratic. His height was good, his figure modestly athletic as an observance of fine form rather thana preparation for the arena. He was simply dressed in a light bluewoolen tunic. A handkerchief was bound about his head. His foreheadwas very white and half hidden by loose, curling black locks thatescaped with boyish negligence from his head-dress. His eyes wereblack, his cheeks tanned but colorless, his mouth mirthful and red buthard in its outlines. Clean-shaven, lithe, supple, he did not appearto be more than twenty-two. But there was an even-tempered cynicismand sophistication in the half-droop of his level lids, indifference, hauteur and self-reliance in the uplift of his chin. His soul wastherefore older, more seasoned and set than the frame that housed it. Now there was considerable agitation in his manner, enough to make himsharp in his speech to the villager. 

"Is there a khan in Emmaus?" he demanded. 

"There is, " the villager responded calmly. 

"Where?"

The citizen motioned toward a low-roofed rambling structure of stonepicked up on the native hills. 

"Ask there, " he said and passing out of his door went his way. 

Julian touched his horse and rode through the worn passage and intothe court of the decrepit khan of Emmaus. The Maccabee followed. 

The Syrian host who was both waiter and hostler met Julian enteringfirst. 

"Quick!" Julian said, leaning from his horse. "Is there a young manhere with gray temples? A pagan?"

The Syrian, attracted by the anxiety in the demand, followed a trainof surmise before his answer. 

"No pagans, here. Naught but Jews, " he observed finally. 

"Or a young woman of wealth? Quick!"

"No wealth at all; but plenty of women. The Passover pilgrims. "

Julian heaved a sigh of relief and dismounted. The Maccabee rode intothe court of the khan at that instant. 

The khan-keeper took their horses and a little later the two men wereled into the single cobwebby chamber, low-ceiled, gloomy, cold andcheerless as a cave. There they were given food and afterward a cornerof the hall where a straw pallet had been laid and a stone troughfilled with water for a bath. After refreshing himself the Maccabeelay down and slept with supreme indifference to the rancor of the manwho had attempted to kill him. 

But Julian had another idea than pressing his vengeful advantage atthat time. He went out into Emmaus and engaging the unemployed of thethriftless town sent them broadcast into the hills in search of apagan who was young, yet gray at the temples. 

Some of them went--and they were chiefly boys who were not old enoughto know that these strangers who come in pagan guise to Emmaus arefull of guile. But none returned to him. They had neither seen norheard of a pagan who was young though the white hair of an old mansnowed on his temples. 

So Julian storming within went out into the hills himself, to search. 

Meanwhile the Maccabee, a light sleeper and readily restored, awokeand found himself alone. The khan-keeper informed him on inquiry thatJulian had ridden away. 

"Too fair a hope to think that he has deserted me, " the Maccabeeobserved. "I shall await him a decent time. He will return. "

He tramped about the chamber waiting for something that was notJulian, intending to do something but unable to define that thing. There was a vague admission that this last pause before his entry intoJerusalem where he must accomplish so much was an opportunity for somesort of preparation, but he lacked direction and resource. He wasirritable and purposeless. 

Out of the low door that opened into the lewen of the khan he caughtglimpses of the town spread over the tilt of the hill before him. Ithad become active since he had looked upon it in the very early hoursof the day. Over the gate he could see the toss of canopies and theheads of camels passing; he could hear the ring of mule-hooves on thestones and the tramp of wayfarers. There were shoutings and debate;the cries of servants and the gossip of parties. All this moved onalways in the direction of Jerusalem. Few paused. The single shop inEmmaus became active; the khan caught a little of the drift, but thegreat body of what seemed to be an unending stream of pilgrims passedon. The Maccabee spoke to his host. 

"What is this?" he asked. 

The publican raised his brows. 

"Hast never heard of the Passover?" he asked. 

The Maccabee started. How far he had drifted from the customs of hispeople, to fail to remember its vital feast--he who meant to be kingover the Jews!

He turned away a little abashed. The train of thought awakened by thekhan-keeper's answer led him back to the hieratic customs of his race. What was his status as a Jew after all these years of delinquency?What atonement did he owe, what offering should he make?

He went out over the cobbled pavement of the lewen to the gate. Herehe should see part of his people and learn from simple observationwhat material he would have in his work for Israel. 

From his memories of the old Passovers of his boyhood, he sawinstantly that there had come a change over Judea and the worshipingsons of Abraham. 

They went in bodies, in numbers from a handful from some remote butpious hamlet to great armies from the leveled cities of Joppa, Ptolemais and Anthedon, from Cęsarea and Tyre and Sidon, from theenthusiastic towns in Galilee, and even from far-off Antioch andEphesus. They were not fewer in number, because of a year of warfareand the menace of an approaching army upon the city in which they wereto take refuge. But there were more--double, even triple the numberthat usually went up to Jerusalem at this time. For of the millions ofinhabitants in Judea in the unhappy year of 70 A. D. , a third of themwere plundered and homeless refugees from ruined cities. Therefore, instead of the armies of men, happy, hopeful and enthusiastic, who hadjourneyed in former years to Jerusalem, there passed before theMaccabee a mixed multitude of men and women and children. Thousandscarried with them all that warfare had left to them--pitiful parcelsof treasure or household goods, or extra clothing; other thousandsbore nothing in their hands, and by the wear in their garments and thehunger in their faces, it seemed that they owned nothing to carry. 

The Maccabee noted finally the entire absence of the travelers whofared in state. Not in all that long procession that wound up thestony passage from the west, did he see a single Sadducee. There wentmobs of laborers and farmers, tradesmen, servants and small merchants, but the Jewish friends of Rome that had once made part of the Passoverpilgrimage a royal progress were nowhere to be seen. Under the vast, vivid blue of the mountain skies they moved, indifferent to thesplendid benevolence of the untroubled day. The pure wind swept infrom the radiance in the east, flinging out multi-colored garments andscarves, rushing with its bracing chill without obstruction througheven the compactest mass of wayfarers. The cedars on the hills aboutthe little town whistled continuously and at times some extremelynarrow defile with an uninterrupted draft would take voice and cryhumanly. But there was no responsive exhilaration to the vigor ofmorning on a mountain-top. The great ever-growing migration was dark, dangerous and moody. 

Somewhere beyond the highest of the blue hills to the east, the whitewalls of the city of David were receiving all this. Somewhere to thewest the four brassy legions of Titus were marching down upon allthis. About the Maccabee were assembling all the circumstances thatgovern a tremendous struggle. Eagerness, earnestness, all the strengthand resolution of his strong and resolute nature surged into his soul. It was his hour. It should find him prepared. 

He turned out of the gate and crowding along by the stone wall to passin the opposite direction from the flood of pilgrims pouring throughEmmaus, he searched for the synagogue of the little town. 

He came upon it, a solid square building of stone with an Egypticfaēade and an architrave carved with a great stone flower set in anolive wreath. Without was the proseuchae, paved with boulders now wornsmooth by the summer sittings of the congregation who gathered aroundthe reader's stone. The Maccabee stopped at the gate and unlacing hispagan sandals set them outside the threshold. 

Once over the stone sill with the imminent gloom covering him, he feltthe old sanctity envelop him with a reproach in its forgottenfamiliarity. Old incense, old litanies, old rites rushed back to himwith the smell of the stagnant fragrance. He heard again from thefarther depths of the dark interior the musical monotone of a rabbireciting a ritual. The voice was young and low. Presently he heard theresponses spoken in a woman's voice, so tender, so soft and so sadthat he sensed instantly the meaning of the sympathy in the youngpriest's voice. Out of the incense-laden dusk he found old customstealing back upon him. His lips anticipated words unreadily; gladlyhe realized that he could say these formulas, also; he had notforgotten; he had not forgotten!

In this little synagogue in a poor town there were no privacies;communicants had to depend on the courtesy of their fellows foruninterrupted devotion. The wanderer had not forgotten this. So heeffaced himself in the darkness and awaited his own turn. 

He hardly knew why he had come. For what should he ask--forgiveness orfor the hope of the King who was to come? What should he do--makeatonement or promises; give an offering or ask encouragement? He didnot doubt for an instant that he had done wisely in seeking thesynagogue, but what had he for it, or what had it for him?

Meanwhile the voice of the priest, disembodied in the gloom, had putoff its ritualistic tone and was delivering a charge:

"Since you are in haste to reach Jerusalem, you may depart, so thatyou will give me your word that you will in all faith abide upon theroad seven days; and that at the end of the separation you willpresent yourselves for examination and cleansing at Jerusalem, andthat you will in nowise transgress the law of separation on thejourney hence. "

The Maccabee heard the woman give her word. After a little furthercommunication, he heard them move toward the entrance. 

The white light from the day without revealed to him in a few steps, aveiled woman, a deformed old man and a young rabbi. He did not need totake the evidence of her dress or of her companion to recognize underthis veil the girl whom he had won from Julian of Ephesus, in thehills, that very morning. 

As if in response to his inner hope that she would see him, she raisedher eyes at the moment she passed, and started quickly. Even under theshelter of her veil he saw her flush. 

The next instant she was out of the synagogue and gone. 

The Maccabee hesitated restlessly, forgot his mission to the synagogueand then, with no definite purpose, followed. 

At the edge of town, where the huddle of huts left off and the graveland rock and cedar began, he saw the priest dismiss the pair with hisblessing and turn back. 

Undecided, restless and regretful, the Maccabee lingered, lookingafter her as she went into the hills, unattended, except for ananomalous old man. The sun of noon shone on her silver dress that thedust of the wayside had not tarnished. He was gloomy and wistfulwithout understanding his discomfort, and afraid for the beautifulunknown going out for seven days into the unfriendly wilderness. 

There was the click of a horse's hoof beside him. He glanced up with anervous start to see Julian of Ephesus, scowling, at hand. 

"It is time, " he said, "for us to be off. "

The Maccabee instantly determined that Julian of Ephesus should notcome up with this defenseless girl again. 

"I am not ready, " he returned promptly. 

"It was three days, this morning, that you have lost. To-morrow itwill be four. "

"And Sabbath, it will be seven. A long time, a long time!"

The Maccabee turned and went back to the khan. A gap in the hills hadhidden the girl in the silver tissue, and the blitheness of theMaccabee's spirit had gone with her. 

Chapter V

BY THE WAYSIDE

By sunset, the Maccabee and Julian of Ephesus had taken the road toJerusalem again. 

As they reached the crest of a series of ridges there lay before thema long gentle slope smooth and dun-colored as some soft pelt, droppingdown into a tender vale with levels of purple vapor hanging over it. At the end of this declivity, leagues in length, was a faint blueshape, cloudlike and almost merged with the cold color of the easternhorizon, but suddenly developing at its summit a delicate white peak. The sunset reaching it as they rode changed the point to a pinnacle ofruby before their eyes. Their shadows that had ridden before themmerged with the shade over the world. Then with a soft, whispery, ghost-like intaking of the breath, a quantity of sand on the straightroad before them got up under their horses' feet and moved away toanother spot and dropped again with a peppering sound and was deadmoveless earth again. The little breath of wind from under the edge ofthe sky had fallen. 

In the silence between the muffled beat of hooves the Maccabee heardat his ears the quick lively throb of a busy pump. With it went thefirm rush of a subdued stream. He was hearing his own heart-beat, hisown life flowing through his veins. Since nature in him had hurriedhim out of the synagogue after its own desire, he seemed to havebecome primitive, conscious of the human creature in him. Now, thoughhe rode through a bewitching air through an enchanted land, he did notride in a dream. All his being was alert and sagacious. Though theconfusion of footprints in the dust showed plainly where men hadpassed by thousands, he did not follow their lead. Over the tangle ofmarks lay a slim paw-printed, confident, careless trail of a jackal, following the scent to a well. The Maccabee was obedient to theinstinct of the animal instead of the reason of man. At the end ofthat trail, surer than Ariadne's scarlet thread in the labyrinth, heknew that thirst had taken the girl in the dress of silver tissue. Soas he rode along this faultless highway that fared level andundeviating by arches, causeways and bridges across mountains, overblack marshes and profound valleys, he kept his eyes on the jackal'strail. 

Long after moonrise they came to a spot in the road where the humanmarks passed on, by hundreds, by other hundreds deserted the road andclambered up the side of the hill. Over this deviation the jackal hadtrotted. The Maccabee, tall on his horse, raised his fine head andsearched all the brooding shapes of the hills about. 

The road at this point ran through a defile. On either side the slopescrowded upon the pass. Above them were bold summits with groves ofcedars, and in one of these the Maccabee made out a thin curl of smokedimly illuminated by a moon-drowned fire. Up there in the covert ofthe trees the girl in the silver tissue was resting from her perilousand outlawed journey. 

"We will eat here, " the Maccabee said abruptly to Julian. 

"Eat!" Julian exclaimed. "What?"

The Maccabee signed to the pack on Julian's horse. Julian dismounted, shaking his head. 

"What a savage appetite this travel in the untaught wilds of Judeahath bred in you, my cousin! You, whom once a crust of bread and a cupof wine would satisfy!"

But the Maccabee climbed out of the roadway and, finding a shelteredspot behind a boulder, kicked together some of the dead weeds andtwigs and set fire to the heap with flint and steel. Then he lostinterest in the preparation of his comforts. He turned to look up atthe faint column of illumination in the little copse of cedars andpresently, stealthily, went that way. 

It was a poor encampment that he came upon. 

From the low-growing limbs of a couple of gnarly cedars, old Momus hadstretched the sheepskins which Joseph, the shepherd, had given them. Three sides of the shelter were protected thus, and the fourth sideopened down-hill, with a low fire screening them from the mountainwind. Within this inclosure, wrapped in the coarse mantle of herservant, sat Laodice. She had raised her veil and its misty textureflowed like a web of frost over her brilliant hair and framed her facein cold vapor. In spite of the marks of grief that had exhausted hertears, the fatigue and discomfort, she seemed, to the Maccabee's eyes, more than ever lovely. He was angry with the hieratic banishment thatsent her out to subsist by the roadside for seven days in earlyspring; angry with the harsh inhospitality of the hills; and angrierthat he could not change it all. He looked at the old mute to see thathe was carefully putting away the remnants of a meal of durra breadand curds. The primitive gallantry of the original man stirred in theMaccabee. He had come unseen; with silent step he departed. 

A little later he stepped boldly into the circle of light from theircamp-fire. To Laodice, in her lowly position, he seemed superhumanlybig and splendid. Without mantle or any of the accessories that wouldshow preparation against the cold, his bare arms and limbs and darkface, tanned, hardy and resolute, seemed to be those of a strongaborigine, sturdy friend of all of nature's rougher moods. 

He did not look at Momus, who got up as quickly as he might at theintrusion of the big stranger. His dark eyes rested on Laodice, whosat transfixed with her sudden recognition of the visitor. 

He held in one hand a brace of fowls, in the other a skin of wine. 

When he spoke the polish of the Ephesian andronitis in his voice andmanner destroyed the primitive illusion. 

"Lady, I heard in the synagogue at Emmaus to-day the exclusion that islaid upon you for seven days. This is a hungry country and no manshould waste food. I shall enter Jerusalem to-morrow by daybreak; we, my companion and I, have no further use for these. They are Milesianducks, fattened on nuts. And this is Falernian--Roman. I pray you, allow me to leave them with your servant with my obeisances. "

Without waiting for her reply the Maccabee passed fowls and skin intothe hands of Momus who stood near. 

"Sir, " she answered unreadily, with her small hands gripping eachother before her and her eyes veiled, "I thank you. It was not theleast of my anxieties how we should provide ourselves with food underprohibition and in a country perilous with war. You have madeto-morrow easy for us. I thank you. "

"To-morrow; yes, " he argued, seizing upon a discussion for an excuseto remain, "but the next day, and the next five days, what shall youdo?"

"Perchance, " she said gravely, "God will send us another stranger of agenerous heart, with more than he needs for himself. "

Not likely, indeed, he thought, would such beauty as hers go hungry aslong as there were hearts in the wilderness as impressionable as his. But the thought of another than himself providing for her did not makehim happy. 

There was nothing more to be said, but he did not go. In his facegathered signs of his interest in her identity. 

"Is there more that I can do for you?" he asked. "Have you friends inJerusalem? I will bear your messages gladly. "

But it was a grateful privilege which she had to refuse withreluctance. If her husband awaited her in Jerusalem, he must wait, rather than be informed of the cause of her delay at peril of exposinghis presence in the city. She shook her head. 

"There is nothing more, " she added. "I thank you. "

Dismissal was so evident in her voice that he prepared to depart. 

"Shall you move on, then, in the morning?" he asked. 

"We have seven days in the wilderness, " she explained. "We can nothasten. It is only a little way to Jerusalem. "

"But it is a long road and a weary one for tender feet, " he answered;"and it is a time of warfare and much uncertainty. "

She lifted her eyes now with trouble in them. 

"Is there any less dangerous way than this?" she asked. 

The Maccabee sat down and clasped his hands about his knees. Thisgrasping at the slightest excuse to remain exasperated the perplexedMomus, who could not understand the stranger's assurance. But theMaccabee failed to see him. 

"There is, " he said to Laodice. "One can journey with you. I am underno restriction, and the rabbis do not bind you against me. I cansecure you comforts along the way, and give you protection. There inno such dire need that I enter Jerusalem under seven days. "

Laodice was confused by this sudden offer of help from a stranger inwhom her confidence was not entirely settled. Nevertheless a warmthand pleasure crept into her heart benumbed with sorrow. She did notlook at Momus, fearing instinctively that the command in her oldservant's eyes would not be of a kind with the grateful response shemeant to give this stranger. 

"I have no right to expect so much--from a stranger, " she said. 

"Then I shall not be a stranger, " he declared promptly. "Callme--Hesper--of Ephesus. "

"Ephesus!" she echoed, looking up quickly. 

"The maddest city in the world, " he replied. "Dost know it?"

She hesitated. Could she say with entire truth that she did not knowEphesus? Had she not read those letters that Philadelphus had writtento her father, which were glowing with praise of the proud city ofDiana? Was it not as if she had seen the Odeum and the great Theater, the Temple with its golden cows, the mount and the plain and the broadwandering of the Rivers Hermus, Ca’ster and Maenander? Had she notmade maps of it from her young husband's accounts and then withenthusiasm traced his steps by its stony, hilly streets from forum tostadium and from school to museum? Had she not dreamed of its shallowport, its rugged highways and its skyey marshes? It had been her prideto know Ephesus, although she had never laid eyes upon it. Even shehad come to believe that she would know an Ephesian by his aggressivejoy in life! It went hard with her to deny that she knew that citywhich she had all but seen. 

The Maccabee observed her hesitation and when she looked up to answer, his eyes full of question were resting upon her. 

"I do not know Ephesus, " she said quickly. "Are--are you a native?"

"No. "

She wanted mightily to know if he had met the young Philadelphus inthat city, but she feared to ask further lest she betray him. 

"A great city, " he went on, "but there are greater pagan cities. It isnot like Jerusalem, which has no counterpart in the world. Even themost intolerant pagan is curious about Jerusalem. "

She looked again at his face. It was not Greek or Roman, neither moreindicative of her own blood. 

"Are you a Jew?" she asked. 

He remembered that she had seen him in a synagogue. 

"I was, " he said after a silence. 

She looked at him a moment before she made comment. 

"I never heard a Jew say it that way before. "

He acknowledged the rebuke with the flash of a smile that appearedonly in his eyes. 

"A Jew entirely Jewish wears the mark on him. You have had to ask if Iwere a Jew. Would I be consistent to claim to be that which in no wiseshows to be in me?"

"It is time to be a Jew or against the Jews, " she said gravely. "Thereis no middle ground concerning Judea at this hour. "

Serious words from the lips of a woman in whom a man expects to findentertainment are obtrusive, a paradox. Still the new generosity inhis heart for this girl made any manner she chose, engaging, so thatit showed him the sight of her face and gave him the sound of hervoice. 

"Seeing, " he said, "that it is the hour of the Jewish hope, is itpolitic for us to declare ourselves for its benefits?"

"The call at this hour, " she exclaimed reproachfully, "is to be greatin sacrifice--not for reward. It is the word of the prophets that weshall not attain glory until we have suffered for it. We have not yetmade the beginning. "

She touched so familiarly on his own thoughts which had haunted himsince ambition had awakened in him in his boyhood, that his interestin his own hope surged to the fore. 

"How goes it in Jerusalem?" he asked earnestly. 

"Evilly, they say, " she answered, "but I have not been in the city. Yet you see Judea. That which has destroyed it threatens the city. Jews have no friends abroad over the world. We need then our own, ourown!"

"Trust me, lady, for a good Jew. I have said that I had been one, because I admit how far I have drifted from my people. But I am goingback!"

Somehow that strong avowal touched the deep springs of her grief. Sheknew the pleasure that her father would have felt in it. With thegreatness of his sacrifice in mind, she filled with the determinationthat his work should not have been in vain. 

She rose and flung back the cumbrous striped mantle on her shouldersand put out her hands to the Maccabee. 

"Hast seen these pilgrims going to the Passover?" she exclaimed, withcolor rising as her emotion grew. "All day they have passed; armyafter army of Jews, not only strong, but filled with the spirit thatmakes men die for a cause! Hast seen Judea, which was once the land ofmilk and honey? Wasted! a sight to make Jews gnash their teeth and dieof hate and rage! What hast thou said of Jerusalem? 'The perfection ofbeauty and the joy of the whole earth!' threatened with this sameblight that hath made a wilderness of Canaan! If the hour and thecircumstance and the cause will but unite us, this unweaponed hostwill stretch away at once in majestic orders of tens ofthousands--legions upon legions that would shame Xerxes for numbersand that first Cęsar for strength. Then--oh, I can see that calmbattle-line pass like the ocean tide over the stony Roman front, andforget as the sea forgets the pebbles that opposed it!"

She halted suddenly on the edge of tears. The Maccabee, astonished andmoved, looked at her in silence. This, then, was what even the womenof the shut chambers of Palestine expected of him--if he freed Judea!If such spirit prevailed over the armies of men assembling in the HolyCity, what might he not achieve with their help! The Maccabee feltconfidence and enthusiasm fill his heart to the full. He rose. 

"Our blows will never weaken nor our hearts grow faint, " he said, "ifwe have such eloquence and such beauty to inspire us. "

She drew back a little. His persistent happiness of mood fell cruellyon her flinching heart at that moment. He noted her sudden relapseinto dejection, with disappointment. 

"Do not be sad, " he said. "Discomforts do not last for ever. "

"It is not that, " she said in a low voice. "I have buried beloved deadon this journey and I have surrendered all my substance to apillager. "

There was the silence of arrested thought. The Maccabee was takenaback and embarrassed. He felt that he was an intruder. But even theflush on her face in restraining emotion made her loveliness more thanever winsome. He let his hand drop softly on hers. But in thegenuineness of his sympathy he was not too moved to feel that her handwarmed under his clasp. 

"The difference between a fool and a blunderer, " he said contritely, "is that the blunderer is always sorry for his mistakes. I will go. None has a right to refuse another his hour to weep. "

He hesitated a moment, as if he would have kissed her hand. Sheglanced up at him with eyes too filled with the darkness of grief forwords. 

The slow unconscious smile that had worked such perfect transformationthat first morning grew in his eyes. It was comfort, compliment andprotection all in one. Then he went away into the moonlight. 

Within a few feet he came upon Julian of Ephesus with immense rancorwritten on his face. The Maccabee was disturbed. It was not well thatthis conscienceless man should have discovered that they weretraveling near this girl and her old servant. Much as the young manwished to loiter along the road to Jerusalem to keep her in sightwhile he could, he saw plainly that to defend her from Julian he mustride on and leave her. 

"Your meal, " said Julian, "is as cold as Jugurtha's bath. "

"I have lost my appetite, " the Maccabee said carelessly. "Saddle andlet us ride on. "

At his words, a picture of his own comfortable progress to Jerusalemcompared to her long foot-weary tramp for days over the inhospitablehills appeared to him. The instant impulse did not permit himself toargue the immoderation of his care of her. Julian clung to his sideuntil they were ready to depart. Then the Maccabee, using subterfugeto give him opportunity to escape the vigilant eyes of the Ephesian, suddenly clapped his hand to his hip, exclaiming that he had left hisweapon at the camp. 

Before Julian's sneer reached him, he mounted quickly and rode up thehill, meaning to offer his horse to the girl. 

The bed of coals still glowed cheerily, but the shelter of sheepskins, the old servant and the girl in the tissue of woven moonbeams weregone. 

He stood still, vexed, disappointed and resentful. 

"The old incubus has made her go on, purposely, to get rid of me!" hedecided finally. "Perpol! He won't!"

Chapter VI

DAWN IN THE HILLS

It was a night that the Maccabee did not readily forget. Since thegirl had moved on to avoid him, he had become alive to a delinquencythat was more of a sensation than an admission. His thought of her, that had been a diversion before, now seemed to be a transgression. Anincident of this nature during the fourteen years of his life inEphesus would have engaged his conscience only a moment if at all, butat this last hour it amounted to a deflection from his newly resolveduprightness. 

Julian rode in a constant air of expectancy and increasing irritation. The slightest sound from the haunted hills elicited a start from himand his intense attention until the origin of the sound proved itself. Many Passover pilgrims who had proceeded by night passed under hisclose scrutiny and from time to time he stopped the Maccabee in aspeech with a peremptory command to listen. All this engaged theMaccabee's interest, but he made no comment until, on occasion of hiscasual word in praise of the fidelity of Aquila, Julian flew into arage and reviled the emissary until the Maccabee brought him up with asharp word. 

"Enough of that!" he exclaimed. "What ails you, man?"

Julian caught his breath and after a silence replied in a voiceconsiderably sweetened that Aquila was a conscienceless pagan and notto be praised till he was dead. But the Maccabee, with the girluppermost in his mind, believed that his cousin was inwardly resentinghis preėmption of the pretty stranger. The fact that Julian hadchanged the pace of their advance confirmed him in this suspicion. From the smart trot that they had maintained from the time they hadleft Cęsarea, they had declined to a walk. Julian next showedinclination to loiter. He spent an unusual length of time at everyspring at which they watered their horses; an unseen break in hisharness engaged a prolonged halt on the road; he stopped at anunroofed hut to rouse sleeping Passover pilgrims who had taken refugewithin to ask how far they were from Jerusalem, and wrangled with thesleepy Jew for many minutes over the hazy estimate the man had givenhim. With each of these pretenses the Maccabee's conviction grew thatthe girl had something to do with the altered behavior of his cousin. And with that growing conviction, he became the more convinced that heought to maintain an espionage of Julian. 

At midnight they were both tired, exasperated, moody, and determinedagainst each other. They had not journeyed thirty furlongs. 

In one of the high valleys in the hills a great well bubbled up from ahollow by the road, overflowed the stone basin that the ancients hadbuilt for it and wasted itself in the undrained soil about. Here, then, was one of the few marshes in Judea. The road by a series ofarches crossed it and continued up the shoulder of the hills towardthe east. All about it flourished the young growth of the rough sedgegrass, green as emerald. The spot was treeless and marked with broadlow hummocks of new sod. 

Julian halted. 

"Shall we camp here?" he asked. 

"It hath the recommendation of variety, " the Maccabee said wearily. "Eheu! How I shall miss the greensward of Ephesus! Yes, we'll camp!"

They dismounted and while Julian unpacked their blankets, the Maccabeecollected dead reeds and cedar twigs and built a fire. Then hestretched himself by the sweet-smelling flame. 

"She can not have kept up with our horses; indeed it is unlikely thatthey moved far, " he thought, and thus assured that there was no dangerto the girl for whom he had become a self-constituted guardian, he atea piece of bread, drank a cup of wine and fell asleep. 

His slumber was not entirely unconscious. So long as the movements ofhis cousin continued regular about him, he lay still, but once, whenJulian approached too near, his eyes opened full in the face of theman about to lean over him. The Ephesian raised himself hastily andthe Maccabee's eyes closed again. 

"A pest on an eye that only half sleeps!" Julian said to himself. "Hehasn't lost count on the minutes since he left Cęsarea!"

The morning broke, the sun mounted, the deserted road became populouswith all the previous day's host of pilgrims, and the silence in thehills failed before the procession that should not cease till nightfell again. Through all the shouting at camel and mule, the talk ofparties and the dogged trudging of lonely and uncompanionablesolitaries, the Maccabee slept. From time to time Julian, who hadwakened early, gazed with smoldering eyes at the insolent composure ofhis enemy sleeping. But slumber with so little control over the sensesof a man was not to be depended upon for any work that demandedstealth. At times the gaze he bent upon the long lazy shape halfburied in the raw-edged grass was malevolent with uneasiness and hate. Again, some one of the passing travelers that bore a resemblance tothe expected Aquila would bring the Ephesian to his feet, only to sinkback again with a muttered imprecation at his disappointment. 

"A pest on the waxen-hearted satyr!" he said to himself finally. "Whyshould he have been more faithful to me than to his first employer! Iam old enough to have learned by this time not to trust my success toany man but myself. Now where am I to look for him--Ephesus, Syene, Gaul, Medea? Jerusalem first! By Hecate, the fellow is handsome! Andthese Jewesses are impressionable!"

The rumination was broken off suddenly by a glimpse of an old deformedman bearing a burden on his shoulders, followed by a slender figure, jealously wrapped in a plebeian mantle that left only a hem of silvertissue under its border. They were skirting along the brow of the hillopposite, away from the rest of the pilgrims on the road. Both werewalking slowly and the old man seemed to be examining the fartherslope, as if meditating a halt. Julian got upon his feet and watched. He saw the old man sign to the girl presently and they moved down thefarther side of the hill and were lost to view. 

Julian cast a look at the sleeper and hesitated. Then he scanned theroad; he might miss Aquila. He seemed to relinquish the intent thathad risen in him, and sat down again. 

After a while as his constant gaze at the passers-by led him againtoward the overflowing well, he saw there, standing in a long line, awaiting turn to dip a vessel in the water, the old bowed servant, with a skin in his hand. The girl was nowhere to be seen. 

Julian sprang to his feet and, hastening across the road, considerablybelow the well, climbed the hill in the direction in which he had seenthe girl disappear. 

That watchful alarm in the brain which, at moments of demand, isinstantly alive in certain sleepers, aroused the Maccabee almost assoon as the stealthy, receding footsteps of Julian died away. Hestirred, sat up and looked about him. Julian was nowhere to be seen. Both horses were feeding a little distance away. The Maccabee sprangup and looked toward the well. There patiently but apprehensivelywaiting was old Momus. The girl was not with him. Suspicion grew vividin the Maccabee's brain. The tender rank grass about him showed theprint of his cousin's steps as they led away toward the road. Hefollowed intently. The slim marks of the well-shod feet led him acrossthe dust of the road up into gravel on the slope and finally eludedhim on the escarpment that soared away above him. 

The Maccabee hurried to the top of the declivity to gain whatever aidthat point of vantage might offer and from that height saw below himto the west a single nook shaped of rock and hummock and a tree out ofwhich rose a blue thread of smoke. He dropped down the farther slopeat a pace little short of a run. 

He mounted the slight ridge that overlooked the depression in time tosee Julian of Ephesus appear over the opposite side. Within, with hermantle laid off, her veil thrown back, the girl knelt over a bed ofcoals, baking one of the Maccabee's Milesian ducks. Julian had made asound; the Maccabee had come silently. She looked up and saw the lesskindly man first, flashed white with terror, sprang to her feet with acry, and whirled to flee up the other side. There she confronted theMaccabee with hands extended to ward off the encroachment of hiscousin. Without an instant's hesitation she flew into the Maccabee'sarms. His clasp closed around her and she shrank against him, clingingto the folds of his tunic over his breast with hands that weretremulous. 

Her flight to him for refuge achieved an instant change in theMaccabee. The fear of defeat, the primal hate of a rival, died in him. All that remained was big wrath at the presumption and effrontery ofJulian of Ephesus. He had no definite memory of what followed, becauseof the rush of blood in his veins, the whirl of pleasurable sensationin his brain and the weight of a sweet frightened figure pressed tohim. The Ephesian went, leaving an impression of a most vindictivethreat in the glittering smile and the motion of his shapely handclenched at the victorious Maccabee. The girl drew away hastily. Theveil was over her face and through its silken meshes he saw the glowon her cheeks and the sweep of her lowered lashes down upon thatbloom. 

She was faltering her thanks and her apologies. 

"It is mine to ask pardon, " he exclaimed, still smoldering with wrath. "I had no part in this, except to interfere with this bad companion ofmine. I did not follow you; believe me. "

It confused her to know that he had guessed why she had moved fromtheir encampment the night before. As necessary as old Momus had madeit seem to her then, it seemed now to have been ungrateful. She couldmake no reply to that portion of his speech. 

"My servant went to the well, " she said. "He will return presently. Iam not afraid now. "

"I am; you ought to be. I shall wait till your extraordinary servantreturns. "

At this decided speech Laodice showed a little panic. 

"No, no! I am not afraid. He--"

But the Maccabee ignored the implied dismissal. 

"I owe him both a reproof and thanks for leaving you here alone forany wayfarer to approach--and for me to discover. I wish, " gazingabroad over the broken horizon, "there were no well between here andJerusalem, and that he were as thirsty as Tantalus. "

She made no reply to this remark, but her whole presence expresseddiscomfort in his determination to remain. 

"Heathen Hecate ought to get him in these wilds for forcing that crueljourney on you last night, when you were so weary and sad! There wasno good in it. He wanted simply to get you away from me! Let us hopethat Titus has got him for his museum by this time, and be at ease!"

She raised her head and reproach flashed through the meshes of herveil. 

"Momus is a good man, " she said. 

"He can not be, " he insisted. "Have I not set forth his iniquitieseven now?"

"It was a short task, " she maintained. "But time is not long enough tocount his virtues. "

"I can spend time better, " he declared. 

He saw her silken brows lower in a spirited frown and he was glad. Shewas showing some other feeling than that dead level of unhappinessthat had possessed her from the first moment he had seen her. His wasnot the heart contented to go astray after a tear. Men fall in searchof joy. 

"Momus is carrying a burden under which more brilliant men wouldfalter, " she averred. "I am beyond reckoning his debtor!"

"Since he has shifted that sweet burden for a time on my shoulders, Iwill forgive him for his looks. If he will stay away, I'll be hisdebtor further. But enough of Momus! I came to ask after your health, when your long journey by night is done. "

"I am well; we did not journey all night. "

"Sit, I pray you. There is no need for you to stand with that air offinality. I am not going, yet. I went back to your camp last nightwithin a short time after I left you and found the camp broken andyour fire lonely. I wanted to offer you my horse. "

"We did not walk all night. We camped a little farther on, and movedat daybreak this morning, " she explained. 

He cast a reflective look at the sun and considered how much timeJulian of Ephesus had lost for him upon the road, or else how long hehad slept, that this pair, who had camped all night and had journeyedafoot by day, had caught up with him. 

"Still it was a cruel journey--for those little feet, " he said. 

She glanced involuntarily at her sandals, worn and dusty. 

"Yes, " he said compassionately, following her eyes. "But let me see nomore, else I meet this good and burdened Momus with the flat of myhand when he comes! What is he to you?"

"My servant--now almost my father!" she insisted, trying to cover thetacit accusation that she had made in admitting by a glance that shewas weary. "He orders all things for my good. Do you think that eachof the stones over which I stumbled to-day did not hurt him worsebecause they hurt me? Do you think he would have me go on, unless thestake were worth the pain I had to endure? Say no more against him!"

The Maccabee shrugged his shoulders; then noting that she still stood, he smoothed down a spot of the sand with his foot, tossed upon it oneof the sheepskins that Momus had unrolled, and extending his handpolitely pressed her down on the place he had made. Then he droppeddown beside her, lounging on his elbow. 

"What is the stake?" he asked after he had composed himself. 

She hesitated, regretting that her defense of Momus had led her tohint her mission and touch upon her husband's ambition. 

"The welfare of hosts!" she replied finally. 

"Heavens! What a menace I was!" the Maccabee smiled. 

She colored quickly and he resented the veil that was shutting away somuch that was fine and fleeting by way of expression under its folds. 

"But you are just as dangerous, " he declared. "Now, we should be inJerusalem this hour. Our welfare and the welfare of others depend uponus--I mean my companion and me. But there is no devoted prodigy tobear me away--thank fortune! I have come out of a great turmoil; Imust plunge into a greater one before many days. Let me rest betweenthem. It will be a long time before I shall possess anything so sweetas the smell of this cedar fire and the picture of you against thisfair sky!"

She looked down quickly. 

"Was Ephesus in turmoil?" she asked disconnectedly. 

"Ephesus was never in any other state! A fit preparation for thedisorder in Jerusalem! I was met at Cęsarea with such tales asdepressed me until it required such delight as you are to bring backmy spirits again! What takes you to Jerusalem?" he asked earnestly. "The Passover? God will forgive you if you neglect it one year. Nothing but the sternest necessity should send any one there at thishour. "

"My necessity is stern--it is Judea's necessity, " she answered. 

"More similarity!" he exclaimed. "That is why I go! Certainly Judea'sfortunes have bettered with you and me both hastening to her rescue. Come, let us compare further. I am going to crown a king over Judea!"

She raised her veil to look at him with startled eyes. The glimpse ofher face, for ever a delight and an astonishment to him because of itsextraordinary loveliness, swept him out of the half-serious air intowhich he had fallen. He stopped and looked at her with pleased, boyish, happy eyes. 

"Aurora!" he said softly. "I see now why day comes gradually. Mankindwould die of excitement if the dawn were unveiled to them like thissuddenly every morning!"

She released the veil hurriedly, but before it fell he put out a hand, caught it and tossed it back over her head. 

"Be consistent with your part, " he said, still smiling. "No man eversaw day cancel her dawn and live. "

It was pleasant, this sweet possession and command. How much like anovergrown boy he had become, since she had wakened to find herself inhis power that morning in the hills! The harshness and inflexibilityhad left his atmosphere entirely. She was only afraid of him nowbecause he had refused to be dismissed. But she drew down the veil. 

"I, too, expect a king, " she said in a lowered tone. "A conqueror anda redeemer. "

"The Messiah?" he said, and she knew by the inflection that he had notmeant that King when he had spoken. 

He noted that her hair was coiled upon her head when he threw back herveil and he turned to that at once. 

"You wear your hair in a fashion, " he said, "that once meant thatwhich men dislike to discover of a woman whom they greatly admire. Ihope it is no longer significant. "

"I go, " she said after a silence, "to join my husband in Jerusalem. "

The Maccabee's lips parted and an expression of disappointment with anadmixture of surprise and vexation came over his face. But what did itmatter? Were she as free as air, he was a married man. The humor ofthe situation appealed to him. He dropped his head into the bend ofhis elbow and laughed. 

"Welladay, this is a respite for us both, then, " he said. Butrealizing that an admission that he was married might hopelesslyreduce their hour to a formal basis, he took refuge in a falsehood. 

"My companion expects to meet a wife in Jerusalem, " he continued. "Aroyal creature, daughter of an ancient and haughty family, with allher life purpose congealed in lofty and serious intent, her cofferslined with gold and her face as determined and unbending as Juno'swith her jealousy stirred. He is not delighted, poor lad!"

Laodice sat very still and listened. There was enough similarity inthis story to interest her. 

The Maccabee, seeing that he had made an impression with thisdeception and feeling somehow a relief in making it, went on, delighted with his deceit. 

"He has not seen her since he married her in his childhood, but heknows full well how she will look when he meets her. "

Surprise paralyzed Laodice. Was the smiling and dangerous companion ofthis man, her husband?

The Maccabee, meanwhile, deliberately remarked her charms andrecounted their antithesis in making up a picture of the woman heexpected to meet as his wife. 

"She will, according to his expectations, be meager and thin, notplump! Thoughtful women and women with a purpose are never plump! Andshe will be black and pale, all eyes, with a nose which is not thenoble nose of our race. She will be religious and it will not make herhappy. She will realize her value to her husband and he will not bepermitted to forget it. She will be ambitious and full of schemes. Shewill be the larger part of his family, though by the balance she willweigh not so much as an omer of barley. "

Laodice got upon her feet in her agitation and raised her veil tostare at this slander. Was this a picture of herself she heard? TheMaccabee was enjoying himself uncommonly. 

"She will wear the garments of a queen, but--how little a slip ofsilver tissue will become her!"

Laodice looked down in alarm at her gleaming garment, and reached forher mantle. The Maccabee had no idea how much pleasure he was toderive in making his own story, Julian's. He continued, almostrecklessly, now. 

"Small wonder that he is so delinquent in the wilderness, with suchsquare-shouldered righteousness awaiting him in town! Forgive him, lady, for his iniquities now, for he will be a good man after hereaches Jerusalem; by my soul, you may be sure he will be good!"

Laodice gasped under the pressure of astonishment and indignation. Itwas bad enough to be pictured thus unprepossessing, but to be suddenlymade aware of her husband in a man whom she feared, was desperate. Shestared with frank and horrified eyes at her tormentor. 

"But--but--" she stammered. 

"True, " he sighed. "One can not know what calamity forces another intomisdeeds. Now were I my unfortunate friend, perhaps I should afflictyou with my hunger for sweetness also. "

And that smooth, insinuating, violent pagan was PhiladelphusMaccabaeus! But what had her father said of him, as a child? "Quick intemper, resourceful, aye, even shifty, stubborn, cold in heart, hardto please!" And to this man she must present herself, late, pennilessand unhelpful. Panic seized her! How could she go on to Jerusalem!

That long graceful figure stretched on the sand was speaking. What wasit in his voice that drew her so mightily from any terror thatpossessed her at any time?

"Sit down, sit down! I have more to say, " he was urging her. 

She obeyed him numbly. 

"He gets worse as he approaches the city. I think I ought to leavehim. It will not be safe to be near him when his moneyed lady claimshim for her own!"

"She--she--" Laodice burst out, "is--may be such a woman!"

"Such a woman as you! No; she will not be. That is what makes him bad. And now that I bethink me, perhaps it is just as well that you proceedto Jerusalem. He may comfort himself with a sight of you, now andthen. "

"I? I comfort him?" she exclaimed. 

"By my soul I know it! What blunders Fortune makes in bestowing wives!Perchance your husband could have got on as well without so radiant aspouse, while my poor beauty-loving friend must needs be paired witha--Alas! there is too much marrying in this world!"

There was a ring of genuine dejection in his voice and when she lookeddown at him, she saw that his eyes were larger and more sorrowful thanshe believed they could be. He was hurting himself with his owndeceit. She looked away hastily, frightened at the sudden tendernessthat his pathetic gaze had wakened in her. 

"Alas!" he went on. "The greatest sacrifice and the frequentest inthis world of cross-purposes never gets into poetry. I--" he halted amoment and looked away, "I ought to be sorry for her, too. She is notgetting the best of men. "

"Verily!" she exclaimed impulsively. 

He whirled his head toward her, stared; then with a flash of intenseexpression in his eyes burst into a ringing laugh that shook him fromhead to foot. He flung out his hand and catching hers passed it acrosshis lips without kissing it, and let it go before he regainedcomposure enough to speak. 

"No! Not a good man! Verily! But hath he no cause to be delinquent?"

"No!" she said stubbornly. "He has judged her without seeing her, when, by your own words, he expects her to bring him fortune andposition. What is he bringing her?"

The Maccabee looked at her thoughtfully before he answered. 

"Nothing! Not even his heart!" he vowed. 

Laodice caught her breath in an agony of indignation and distress. 

"He does not in any way deserve--" she stopped precipitately. She wasabout to add "the great fortune he is to get, " when she realized thatshe was taking this husband nothing--not even her own heart. She wenton, for the first time a little glad that she was penniless. 

"He may find--neither fortune, nor position, nor heart awaiting him!"she finished pointedly. 

The Maccabee pulled one of his stubborn locks that had fallen over hiseyes. The smile grew less vivid. 

He had no comment to make to this. Meanwhile Laodice looked at him. 

"Shall--you be with--your friend in Jerusalem?" she asked. 

"It depends on his wife, " he retorted with a grimace. 

She would be glad if this tall, comely trifler, with a voice asmusical as some grave-toned viol, were to be seen from time to time torelieve the tedium of life with the offensive Philadelphus. Thisadmission instantly brought a shock to her. She had learned to studyherself in these last few days since she had become aware of the waysof the world. Life was to be no longer a period of obedience to lawswhich the Torah had laid down; it was to be a long resistance againstdesirable things that she yearned for but which she dared not have. She learned at this moment that she could be her own chiefstumbling-block, and that love, the most precious illumination inevery life, might be a destruction and a consuming fire. She looked atthis man, who lounged beside her, with a new sensation. He waswinsome, and therefore the more perilous. That smooth insultingstranger whom this man had revealed as her husband with all hisviolence and license was a humble and harmless thing compared to thisone, who had snared her by his care of her and by his charming self. 

She felt a desire to cry out for Momus to take her back to the innerchamber of the shut house in Ascalon, away from her danger to herselfand from the sight of the man who had done her no harm--yet. 

She did not know how plainly all this wrote itself on her candid face. Wise pupil of that unbridled school, the city of Diana, he could readin that slight frown on her forehead and the pathetic curve of herlips, that she was contented with him--that she was not glad to go onto that husband in Jerusalem. He was near to her before she knew hehad moved. 

"After all, " he was saying in a low voice, "I am glad you are going toJerusalem. You shall not be lost from me again. Whose house shall Iask for when I can not endure separation longer?"

She moved away from him. There was a step behind her and Laodice, coloring shamedly, looked straight into the accusing eyes of Momus whostood there. The stranger rose. 

"I shall see you again, " he said to her. 

He took her hand and lifted it to his lips. The next instant he wasgone. 

Chapter VII

IMPERIAL CĘSAR

When the Maccabee had returned to the spot in the sedgy valley wherehe and Julian had halted, he found the Ephesian white to the lips andwith ignited eyes awaiting him. 

"How much longer?" the Ephesian demanded. 

"What! Fast and slow!" the Maccabee said calmly. "Last night youwasted hours to spite me. To-day you begrudge me a moment's talk witha lovely wayfarer. Or is it because she prefers me? You have orderedour progress long enough. I shall move when it pleases me. "

He sat down by the fire, clasping his hands back of his head, andhalf-closed his eyes. The Ephesian rose and tramped restlessly about. As he glanced down at the reposeful attitude of the man whom he couldnot exasperate he saw the sun glitter on the Maccabaean signet on thehand clasped back of Philadelphus' head. The sight of it in a waycollected Julian's purposes. He knew that by some misadventure he hadmissed Aquila whom he had hoped to meet in Emmaus, bearing treasurestolen from the daughter of Costobarus. By this time, then, theMaccabee's emissary had doubtless arrived in Jerusalem--the lastpossible point for the two conspirators to meet. To proceed toJerusalem without the Maccabee, with whatever excuse he could invent, would not deliver the dowry of the bride into his hands, in the eventthat Aquila had not succeeded in his instructions to make way withLaodice before he reached Jerusalem. Nothing occurred to Julian atthat moment but to impersonate the Maccabee until it was possible toget possession of the two hundred talents from those friends inJerusalem who were interested in his cousin's welfare. No one inJerusalem knew Philadelphus Maccabaeus. Aquila, as fellow-conspirator, would not dare to expose him if Julian appeared as his cousin. Perilous at best, it seemed the only plan by which he was to getpossession of a fortune which even Cęsar would be glad to have. 

The resolution formed itself in a brain turbulent with passion anddesperation. He halted silently back of his cousin and with a suddenflare of intent on his dead white face snatched a dagger from hisgirdle and drove it between the shoulders of the Maccabee. Without aword, Philadelphus turned upon his assailant and started to his feet. But Julian, catching a glimpse of the dire purpose in his cousin'sdarkened eyes, struck again. The knife, blindly wielded, glanced onthe Maccabee's head with wild force. Under a veil of scarletPhiladelphus sank to the earth. 

Julian with a sob of terror sprang out of range of his victim's gaze. After a time he took courage and looked. The lids were fallen and thebreast was still. 

Julian bent hastily and snatched the signet from the nerveless handand fumbling in the bosom drew forth the wallet there. He opened it, finding within ancient parchments with heavy seals, new writings, rolls of notes and a packet of letters. He rose, trembling violently, and backed away. After a moment's fascinated gaze at the roadway tosee if the pilgrims passing had seen what he had done, he whirledabout, mounted his horse and galloped frantically toward Jerusalem. 

Meanwhile the midday activity on the Roman roadway swept by thesmoldering fire and the motionless figure lying in the grass somedistance back from the highway. Along the splendid causeway thePassover pilgrims fared, men afoot, men on camels, families andsolitary travelers; the poor, the once rich, the humble and thehaughty; figures in burnooses, gabardines, gowns and tunics; stripedand checkered woolens, linens or rags; noisy or silent, angry or sad, hour in and hour out, until the hills were a-throb with the humanatmosphere. Time and again the sweet invitation of the rare grassalong the marsh invited the way-weary to halt to tie a sandal, to bindup a wound, to eat a crust spread with curds or simply to rest. No oneapproached the silent man who had fallen beside a dying fire. Theywere tired enough to refrain from disturbing a man who slept. So, though they looked at him from where they sat and two or three askedeach other if he were asleep or merely weary, he was left alone. Oneby one they who halted took up their journey again and the figure inthe grass lay still. 

Finally near the noon hour there came from the summit of a hilloverhanging the road, a high, wild, youthful yell that cut withstartling distinctness through the dead level of human communicationon the highway. Each of the travelers below looked up to see a youngshepherd in sheepskins with long-blowing stiff crinkled locks flyingback from a dusky face, with eyes soft and shining as those of somewild thing. Around him eddied a mob of sheep as wild as he, and aNatolian dog raced hither and thither in a cloud of dust, rounding theedge of the flock and shaping it to the advance of the young faun thatmastered it. 

"Sheep! by the prophets!" one of the sedate Jews exclaimed. 

"The only flock in existence in Judea, I venture!" his companiondeclared. 

"And so hopelessly doomed to Roman possession that it can not becalled in existence. "

"Heigh! Hello! Young David!" one of the younger men called up to theshepherd. "Does Titus pay you for minding his mutton?"

"Salute, neighbors!" another shouted. "Here is the Roman commissary!"

"Ill-fathered son of an Ishmaelite!" a Tyrian said to this jester. "That you should make sport of Judea's humiliation!"

The shepherd who had paused amid his whirlpool of sheep wisely heldhis peace. There was a division of sentiment here that were better notaggravated. He halted long enough for the road to clear below him andthen descended into the valley and crossed to the low meadow on theopposite side. 

His scamper of sheep flocked into the sedge, parting around theprostrate figure by a circle of coals now dead, and plunged into thepasture. The boy inspected the earth and shook his head. It was toowet for a long stay, inviting as it seemed. But here his flock mightpasture for a day without injury. 

He glanced at the sleeper as he passed and continued to the fartherside where the opposite hill sloped down into the depression. Here hefound for himself a comfortable spot and lay down, prepared to watchall day. From time to time he looked across at the motionless figurein the grass and commented to himself that it was a weary man whoslept so soundly, and then lost interest in the maze of dreams thatcan entangle the wits of a shepherd who is a boy. 

The march of the Passover pilgrims continued to Jerusalem. 

In mid-afternoon there came interruption. Along the level highway camethe rapid beat of hooves and the musical jingle of harness. Every soulwithin sound of that un-Jewish mode of travel turned apprehensivelyand looked back. Bearing down upon them from the west came a stampedeof Roman cavalry scouting. The sunshine on their brass armortransformed them into shapes of gold, and the recklessness of theiradvance swept the pilgrims out of their path as far as could be seen. Right and left the Jews scattered; some ran into the hills and hidthemselves; others merely stepped aside and with darkening faceswaited defiantly for the approach of the oppressor. The young shepherdfull of excitement sprang to his feet. 

Neither the fleeing Jews nor the Jews that had stood their groundattracted the attention of the approaching legionaries. It was theclose-packed, avid-feeding sheep, deep in the grass, that won theirinstant and enthusiastic notice. The decurion in charge of the squadbrought up his gray horse with such suddenness that the animal's feetslid in the gravel. 

"Sheep, by the wings of Mercury!" he shouted. "Dismount, fellows!Here's for a feast this night and an offering to Mars to-morrow!"

The ten in brazen armor threw themselves from their horses with theenthusiasm of boys and spread a panic of whooping and of waving armsabout the startled flock. The young shepherd, too long a fugitive fromthe encroachments of this same army to misunderstand the nature of theattack, ran into the thick of the shouting Romans. His valiant dogwith exposed teeth flew straight at the nearest legionary. 

"Cerberus!" the soldier howled, dodging. "Your pike, Paulus! Quick! ByHector, it is a wolf!"

But the quickest soldier would not have been quick enough to elude theenraged beast had not the shepherd with a spring and a warning cryseized his dog by the ears and stopped him mid-bound. 

"Down, Urge!" he cried. "Take away your men!" he shouted to thedecurion. "I can not hold him long. "

"Only so long, " Paulus growled, raising his pike over the snarlingdog. 

"Drop it!" the decurion ordered him peremptorily. "We are ten to oneand a dog. No blood-letting this day. It is Titus' order. Boy, get yougone; these sheep are confiscate. "

"I have been told they are only common stock, " the boy remonstratedgravely, "but you may be right. Howbeit, they are not mine and I cannot leave them. "

"You have been misinformed, " the decurion said gravely, while his men, circling around the growling dog, went on with their work. "These areRoman sheep, with the Flavian coat of arms and the mark of the army inblack on their hides--if you shear them. But if you make away as fastas you can I shall not tell Titus which way you went. "

The sheep had started pell-mell toward the Roman road. The decurionturned back to his horse. The shepherd released his dog, which ranafter the flock, and stepped into the decurion's way. 

"However these sheep look when they are sheared, " he said, "this seemsto be robbery to me. "

"Robbery!" the good-natured decurion exclaimed. "This is but areligious rite that Mercury got out of the cradle at two days toestablish. Only he took Apollo's cattle while we are contentingourselves with the sheep of mortal ownership. Robbery! What aninelegant word!"

Meanwhile the stampeded sheep were making in a cloud of dust back overthe road toward the west from which the Romans had come. 

"What shall I say to the citizens of Pella?" the little shepherdshouted, pursuing the decurion who was making back to his horse asfast as he could go. 

"Salute them for me, " the decurion shouted back, "and make them myobeisances, and say that I shall report on the flavor of the sheep bymessenger from Jerusalem. "

In a moment the boy sprang into the decurion's way so suddenly thatthe soldier almost fell over him. 

"Be fair!" the boy exclaimed. "At least leave me half!"

The decurion was losing patience and the shepherd had grown more thanever serious. 

"Fair!" the Roman echoed. "Why, I have been indulgent! This is war! Itis almost a breach of discipline to argue with you. Out of the way!"

"The Roman army has all the world to feed it; Pella has only itssheep. We, then, must face hunger and cold because your appetitescrave mutton this day!" the boy returned resentfully. 

The decurion pointed down the road. 

"Why waste your breath! There go the sheep. "

The boy's dark eyes filled with tears. The decurion swung around himand went back to the horses that waited in the road. He knotted theirbridles together and, leading one of the number, remounted and rodewest after the receding cloud of dust which hid the flock. 

The shepherd's head sank on his heaving breast and he stood still. 

"Lord Jesus, I pray Thee, give me my sheep again!" he prayed. 

A deep prolonged thunder that had been filling the hills with soundbegan to multiply as the nearest slopes caught it and tossed it fromecho to echo. It was not loud but immensely prevalent. Those wayfarerswho had fled came back to the brink of the hill and those who hadstood their ground walked out into the grass to look back. Around thecurve of a buttress of rock that stood out at the line of the road, the head of a column of Roman cavalry appeared. The superbcolor-bearer bore on his hip the staff supporting the Imperialstandard. 

At the forefront rode a young general; on either side a tribune. Behind came a detachment of six hundred horse. 

The sheep huddling in the way were swept like a scurry of leaves outinto the meadow alongside the road, and one of the tribunes and thegeneral turned in their saddles to look at the confiscated flock. Thesecond tribune observed their interest in this trivial incident withdisgust. The young general, whose military cloak flaunted a purpleborder, called the decurion boyishly:

"Well done, Sergius! A samnos of wine for your company to-night forthis. "

The decurion saluted. 

"Where did you get them?" the tribune demanded. 

The shepherd who had withdrawn to the side of the road on the approachof the column looked at the questioner with resentful eyes from whichthe moisture had not vanished. 

"From me!" he said. 

Both the purple-wearing young general and his tribune looked at himamusedly. 

"How many killed and wounded, Sergius?" the tribune asked. 

The silent and disapproving tribune, observing that the commandingofficer had not given an order to halt, brought the six hundred to, lest they ride their general down. 

"You!" the general exclaimed with his eyes on the young shepherd. 

The boy looked up into the face of the Roman who sat above him on asnow-white horse. 

It was a young face, tanned by the sun of Alexandria, but bright withan emanation of light that somehow was made tangible by the flash ofhis teeth as he talked and the sparkle of his lively eyes. For asoldier exposed to the open air and the ruffian life of the camp andburdened with the grave task of subduing a desperate nation, he wasfree of disfigurements. His brows were knitted as if to give his fullsoft eyes protection and the frown, with the laughing cut of hisyouthful lips, gave his face a quizzical expression that was entirelywinning. In countenance and figure he was handsome, refined andthoroughly Roman. The little shepherd was won to him instantly. Without knowing that the world from one border to the other hadalready named this charming young Roman the Darling of Mankind, thelittle shepherd, had his lips been shaped to poetry, would have calledhim that. 

So Joseph, the shepherd, son of Thomas, the Christian, and Titus, sonof Vespasian, Emperor of the World, looked at each other with perfectfellowship. 

"Those are sheep from Pella, " Joseph said soberly, "in my care. Theywere taken from me because, " he paused till a more tactful statementshould suggest itself, but, lacking it, drove ahead with spirit, "there was not more of me to stop your soldiers. "

"I believe you, " Titus replied heartily. "But that is the fortune ofwar. Still, you Jews have a habit of refusing to accept defeatrationally. "

"I am not a Jew, " Joseph explained. "I am born of Arab blood, and I ama Christian. "

"Worse and worse, " said Titus. 

Joseph shifted his position argumentatively. 

"Is it?" he asked. "Are you making war on Pella or Jerusalem? Was itPella or the hundred Jewish towns that cost Rome so much of late?Pella is not exactly your friend, though neither are most of yourprovinces; but are you going to pillage Egypt or Persia because Judeais in rebellion?"

Titus threw his plump leg over the horn of his saddle and satsidewise. One of his tribunes looked at the other with a flickeringsmile that was not entirely free of contempt. But his fellow returneda stare that for immobility would have done credit to the Memnon. 

"Now, " Titus began, "I have heard of this fault in the Christians. They don't understand warfare. "

"We don't, " Joseph declared bluntly. "We do not see why you shouldtake my sheep to feed your army, when we have had nothing to do withbringing your army over here. We haven't cost you one drop of Romanblood or one denarius of Roman money, and yet you are taking at oneact the whole of our substance and punishing us for the misdeeds ofothers--others whom you haven't succeeded in punishing yet. "

"That is bad judgment, " Titus said, frowning at the last sentence. 

"Unpleasant truth always is, " Joseph retorted. 

One of the tribunes laughed impulsively and Titus looked around at himreproachfully. 

"Come, come, Carus, " he said. 

"Thy pardon, Cęsar, " the tribune replied, "but we'll be whipped inthis wordy battle. And even a small defeat were an unpropitious signon this expedition. "

"To Hades with your signs! If I am whipped with six hundred back ofme, I ought to be! Boy, we have your sheep by conquest; you will haveto take them back the same way. "

Joseph's face fell. 

"I have had them since I was nine years old. I've tended them sincethey were lambs and their mothers before them. It is like surrenderingso many children, " he said dejectedly. "In truth I can fight for themeven if it be but to lose, and I am bidden not to fight at that. "

"By Hector, that is not a Jewish tenet!" Titus exclaimed. 

Joseph said nothing. He stood still in the path of the Roman sixhundred with his curly head sunk on his breast. There was silence. 

"Is it?" Titus demanded uncomfortably. 

"No; and for that reason you are still fighting them and will fightand lose and lose and lose, before you win. Still, it is no safeguardnot to fight you; you take our substance anyhow. Be we peace-lovers ornot, there is warfare; if we do not fight we are fought against. "

Titus thrust his helmet back from his full front of intensely blackcurls and wiped his forehead. 

"The sun is hot in these hills, " he said disjointedly to the tribunehe had called Carus, "and the wind is cold. Uncomfortable climate. "

Carus said nothing. 

"Is it not?" Titus demanded irritably. 

"Very, " Carus observed hastily. 

The little shepherd stood in the road and the six hundred were silent. 

"Well, " said Titus with a tone of finality, "you never remember thewrongs the strong man endured--wrongs that the weak man did himbecause of his weakness. "

"It never hurts the strong man, " Joseph said softly, "to give the weakone another chance. "

Titus closed his lips at that, and the tribune who had smiledsarcastically looked with sudden intent at Carus. Carus silently movedhis horse to the sarcastic tribune's side with such threateningexpression on his face that the other discreetly held his peace. 

"Perhaps, " Titus said thoughtfully, but the boy failed to see more inthat word than the simple expression. In his search for some furtherplea that would give him his sheep again, the presence of the youngRoman appealed to him with hope. Surely one so young and laughing, soready to stop an army to argue with a child, could not be beyond reachof persuasion. With the simple frankness so innocent of guile as tomake charming that which upon other lips would have been the broadestinsincerity, he put that moment's thought into words. 

"I thought, " he said slowly, "because your horse is so white and yourdress so golden and your face so beautiful that I would have but toask--and I would have my sheep again. "

Titus looked at him, not with the idea that his compliment waseffective, but with the thought that the boy was yet too young to havelost faith in attractive things; that another than himself would haveto teach the shepherd that lesson in disappointment. 

"Have you examined these sheep for disease, Sergius?" he demanded, with a show of severity. "I never saw a flock in this country that wasnot full of peril for the cavalry. "

Sergius, wisely catching excuse in this demand, saluted. 

"I did not, " he replied. 

"So? Well, do it hereafter. Go stop those legionaries and turn loosethat flock. We lost five hundred horse in Cęsarea for just suchnegligence. "

Joseph flung up his head, his eyes sparkling, his cheeks aglow, hiswhole figure alive with a gratitude so potent that it was painful. Titus, with the deep tide of a blush crawling over his forehead, scowled down at this joy. 

"Look well, " he continued severely to Sergius, "and if they arehealthy--"

But Joseph laughed and stepped out of the young general's path. 

"And, " said Titus, his face clearing before that laugh as he directedhis words to the little shepherd, "Jerusalem shall have anotherchance. "

Transfiguration brightened the small dusky face. He put up his handsfor that blessing that was a part of his farewell. 

"_May my God supply all thy need according to his riches in glory, byJesus Christ. Amen!_"

Titus, with a bowed head, touched his horse, and in response to asilent flash of an uplifted sword the picked six hundred of Cęsar'sarmy rode on in the subdued thunder of hoof and the music of jinglingharness toward Jerusalem. 

After a long time there came the quick patter of a running flock andthe multitudinous complaint of lambs, and up from the east rushed themob of sheep. Behind them trotting comfortably were the mountedscouts. The ten privates wore scornful countenances highly expressiveof their contempt for the unwarlike restitution they had been forcedto make, but as they rode past when the sheep swept out of the road totheir tender, Sergius, the decurion, dropped back and with his tonguein his cheek made such jovial threatening signs that the littleshepherd laughed again. 

The squad galloped after the main body and were lost to view. Many ofthe Jews called to the little shepherd, but after a time travel wasresumed on the road and deep monotonous composure settled upon thevalley again. 

But Joseph, the Christian, turned into the high grass of the meadowwith bowed head and clasped hands. 

"Lord Jesus, what may I do for Thee?" he asked impulsively. 

He stopped suddenly. At his feet lay the silent sleeper in the grass. On the tall growth upstanding about the prostrate form were clearshining scarlet drops. The little shepherd turned white and threwhimself down on his knees beside the still figure and put his handover the heart. Then he lifted his face to the skies. 

"_I was sick and ye visited me_, " he whispered radiantly. 

[Illustration: He threw himself down by the still figure. ]

Chapter VIII

GREEK AND JEW

Julian of Ephesus, now the presumptive Philadelphus Maccabaeus, rodeup the broad brown bosom of a hill that had confronted him for milesto the south, and the sun had sloped until its early spring raysstruck level from the west. At the summit, he drew up his horsesuddenly with a quick intaking of the breath. 

Below him lay Jerusalem. 

South and east the barren summits of brown hills shaped a depressionin which the city lay. North, clean-white and regular, the wall ofAgrippa was printed against the cold blue of the sky. Below on threelesser mounts and overflowing the vales between was the goodliest cityin all Asia. 

About it and through it climbed such walls, planted on such boldnatural escarpment, that made it the most inaccessible fortificationin the world. On its highest hill stood a vision of marble and gold--afortress in gemstone--the Temple. Behind it towered Roman Antonia. Westward the Tyropean Bridge spanned a deep, populous ravine. The highbroad street upon which the giant causeway terminated was marked bythe solemn cenotaphs of Mariamne and Phaselis and ended against theTower of Hippicus--a vast and unflinching citadel of stone. Under theshadow of this pile was the high place of the Herods; in sight was asecond Herodian palace. South was the open space of the great markets;near the southernmost segment of the outer wall was the semicircularHippodrome. Cut off from its neighbor by ancient walls were Ophlas, overlooking Tophet and under the shadow of the Temple; Mount Zionwhich the Lord had established, Akra of the valley, Moriah, the HolyHill, and Coenopolis or Bezetha which Agrippa I had walled. About theimmense outer fortifications crawled the shadowy valleys of Tophet, ofBrook Kedron and of Hinnom. Thickly scattered like fallen patches ofskies the pools of Siloam, Gihon, Shiloh, En-Rogel, the Great Pool, the Serpent's Pool and the Dragon's Well reflected the color of themountain heavens. Between them wandered the blue threads of certainaqueducts that supplied them. Everywhere rose the shafts of monumentsand memorials, old as the pride of Absalom, new as the folly of theHerods; everywhere the aggressive paganism of Rome and Greece, whichwould have paganized this monotheistic race out of very rancor againstits uprightness, violated with insolent beauty the hieratic severityof the city's face. Rich, bold, strong, beautiful, Jerusalem was atthat hour, as viewed from the hill to the north, the perfection ofbeauty and the joy of the whole earth. 

For a moment ambition struggled nobly in the breast of the man thatoverlooked it. Except for the obstacles he had placed in his own wayby his misdeeds, Julian of Ephesus at that moment might have becomegreat. But he had struck down his kinsman on the way, and such deedswere remembered even in war-ridden Judea; he had come to Jerusalemwearing his kinsman's name that he might despoil that kinsman's brideof her dowry; a hundred other crimes of his commission stood in theway to peace and success. 

But about him the Passover pilgrims, catching their first glimpse ofthe Holy City, gave way to the storm of emotion that had graduallygathered as they drew near to the threatened City of Delight. 

It had moved him to look upon this most majestic fortification, embattled and begirt for resistance against the most majestic nationin the world. But he who came as a stranger could not feel within himthe tenderness of old love, the sanctity of old tradition, and thedesperation of kin in his blood as he gazed upon Jerusalem. Yonder wasa roof-garden; to him, no more than that. But the inspired Jews besidehim knew that in that place the sun of noon had shone upon Bathsheba, the beautiful; and in that neighboring high place the heart of theSinging King had melted; to the north was a stretch of monotonousground overgrown with a new suburb; but that was the camp ofSennacherib, the Assyrian whom the Angel of the Lord smote and hisarmy of one hundred and four score and five thousand, before themorning. Yonder were squalid streets, older than any others. But theKings had walked them; the Prophets had helped wear trenches in theirstones; the heroes and the strong-hearted women of the ancient dayshad gone that way. No house but was holy with tradition; no street butwas sanctified by event. Small wonder, then, that these who came tothis Passover, the most momentous one since that calamity which hadoccurred forty years ago on Golgotha, wept, cried aloud to Heaven;became beatified and made prophecies; railed; anathematizedJerusalem's enemies; assumed vows and were threatening. Julian ofEphesus was shaken. He looked about him on the tempestuous host, thentouched his horse and rode down to the city. 

On the Hill Scopus over which he approached an inferior number ofRomans were camped, and these had maintained a semblance of siege onlysufficiently effective to close all the gates on three sides. The SunGate to the south of the city was therefore the most accessible pointof entry for the pilgrims. Following the people who had preceded him, Julian approached this portal, left his horse with the stable-keeperwithout and prepared to enter Jerusalem. 

Collecting at the causeway of the Sun Gate the pilgrims came with suchimpetus that the foremost were rushed struggling and protestingthrough the tunnel under the wall and forced well into Jerusalembefore they could control their own motion. Once within, the hostspread out so that one looking at the immense space they instantlycovered wondered how so great a mass ever passed through thecircumscribed limits of a fifty-foot gate. At times stopping wasimpossible. Again there were momentary lulls, as when the sea recoilsupon itself and is stilled for an instant. They who stood to watch, wearied of days of such invasion, unconsciously wished that theinterval might endure till they could rest their number-weariedbrains. But, as if the stagnation were the result of congestionsomewhere without the walls, when the wave returned it came withredoubled height and power and the Sun Gate would roar with the noiseof their entry. 

After the Ephesian had been swept in with his own company of pilgrims, he saw that which even few of the new-comers had expected to see. Theimmediate vicinity of the gate was laid waste. Up Mount Zion oppositeHippicus and along the margin of the Tyropean Valley where theHerodian and Sadducean palaces had seemed so fair from the north weregreat blackened shells of walls and leaning pillars, partly buried inruin and rubbish. Far and wide the streets were littered with debrisand charred fragments of burned timbers. At another place on thebreast of Zion was a chaos of rock where a mansion had been literallypulled down. Somewhere near Akra pale columns of pungent, wind-blownsmoke still rose from a colossal heap of fused matter that theEphesian could not identify. About it were neglected houses; not asign of festivity was apparent; windows hung open carelessly; thehangings in colonnades were stripped away entirely or whipped loosefrom the fastenings and abandoned to the winds. Numbers of dwellingsappeared to have been sacked; others were so closely barred andfortified that their exteriors appeared as inhospitable as jails. 

Confusion prevailed on the smoked and untidy marble Walk of thePurified leading down from the Temple. Here those who held fast to theLaw met and contested for their old exclusiveness with wild heathenIdumean soldiers, starvelings, ruffians and strange women fromout-lying towns. Far and wide were wandering crowds, surly, defiant, discourteous, exacting. Manifestly it was the visitors who were theaggressors. They had been overthrown and driven from their own into anunsubjugated city which was secure. They felt the rage of the defeatedwhich are not subdued, and the resentment against another's unearnedimmunity. The citizens of Jerusalem had not welcomed them and theywere enraged. Half a dozen fights of more or less seriousness were insight at once. A column of black wiry men in some semblance of uniformpushed across the open space toward the Essene Gate. They took no heedfor any in their path. Those who could not escape were overturned andtrampled on. Meeting a rush at the gate they drew swords and coollyhacked their way through screams of fear and pain and amazement. Afterthem went a wave of curses and complaint. Citizens against thevisitors; visitors against the citizens; soldiers against them all!

"And this cousin of mine meant to pacify all this!" the Ephesianexclaimed to himself. 

Jerusalem, that had for fifteen hundred years adorned herself at thistime with tabrets and had gone forth in the dance of them that makemerry, was drunken with wormwood and covered with ashes. 

All at once the Ephesian saw four soldiers standing together and withthem, manifestly under their protection, was a Greek of strikingbeauty. He wore on his fine head a purple turban embroidered with agolden star. 

Without a moment's hesitation, the Ephesian approached. The spears ofthe four soldiers fell and formed a barrier around the Greek. Thenew-comer smiled confidently. 

"Greeting, servant of Amaryllis, " he said. "I am your lady's expectedguest. "

The Greek came forth from the square formed by his guard. 

"I am that servant of Amaryllis, " he said courteously. "But show meyet another sign. "

The Ephesian drew from his bosom the Maccabaean signet and flashed itsblue fires at the Greek. The servant stepped hastily between thesoldiers and the new-comer. 

"Thy name?" he asked in a whisper. 

"I am Philadelphus Maccabaeus. "

The servant bent and taking the hem of the woolen tunic pressed it tohis lips. 

"Happy hour!" he exclaimed. "I pray you follow me. "

The pretender breathed a relieved sigh and joined his protector. 

They passed down into Akra and approached the straight column ofpungent smoke towering up from a charred heap that the Ephesian inspite of his haste inspected curiously. 

"What is that?" he asked of the Greek. 

"That, master, is the city granaries. "

"The granaries!" the Ephesian cried, aghast. 

The Greek inclined his head. 

"What--what--fired them?" the Ephesian asked. 

"John and Simon differed on the point of its control and each fired itto keep the other from possessing it!"

For a moment the Ephesian was thunderstruck. Then he quickened hispace. 

"By the horns of Capricornus!" he avowed. "The sooner one gets out ofthis, the wiser he must be counted!"

The Greek looked at him with lifted brows and led on. 

They crossed the Tyropean Valley and approached a small new house ofstone, abutting the vast retaining wall that was built against Moriah. A line of soldiers was thrown out from the entrance to the house andhis conductor, after whispering a word to the captain, led the way upto a double-barred door. A long time after he had rapped, there wasthe sound of falling chains and the door swung open. A second Greekservant of no less beauty bowed the new-comer and his companionwithin. The noise of the streets was suddenly cut off. Soft dusk andquiet proved that the doors of Amaryllis had been shut upon unhappyJerusalem. 

The second servant drew a cord and a roller of matting lifted andshowed a skylight. Philadelphus the pretender was in the andronitis ofa Greek house. 

It was typical. None but a Greek with the purest taste had planned it. Walls and pavement were of unpolished marble, lusterless white. Amarble exedra built in a semicircle sat in the farther end, facing achair wholly of ivory set beside a lectern of dull brass. At eitherend of the exedra on a pedestal formed by the arms, a brass staffupheld a flat lamp that cast its luster down on the seat by night. Against an opposite wall built at full length of the hall, was apigeonholed case, which was stacked with brass cylinders. This was thelibrary of the Greek. At a third side was a compound arch concealed bya heavy white curtain. There were low couches spread with costly whitematerial which were used when Amaryllis set her table in herandronitis, and at the arches leading into the interior of the housethere were draperies. But the chamber, with all its richness, had asplendid emptiness that made it imposing, not luxurious. 

After a single admiring survey of the hall in which he had been leftalone, the pretended Philadelphus fortified himself against his mostcritical test. 

Without a sound, without even so much as the rustling of a garment toannounce her, a woman emerged from a passage leading into the interiorof the house. He confronted the only person in Jerusalem who mightknow him as an impostor. 

The woolen chiton of her countrywomen draped a figure almost tooslender, yet perfect in its delicate modeling. Though her eyes wereblack, her hair was fair and brilliant with a wash of gold powder. Herfeatures were Hellenic, cold, pure and classic, and for all her youthand beauty there was an atmosphere about her of middle-age, immenseexperience, and old sagacity. 

The pretender braced himself for the scrutiny the eyes made of him. 

"You are that Philadelphus, as my servant tells me?" she asked. 

"I am he. "

She inclined her head. 

"Welcome; in the name of all the need of you!"

After a silence he came closer and lifted her hand to his lips. Headded nothing, but presently raised his eyes softened with feeling andunexpressed appreciation. 

"Certainly you have suffered, lady, " he said finally in a subduedtone. "But please God you will not suffer alone hereafter. "

Amaryllis' non-committal front changed. 

"You are gentler of speech than is common among the Maccabees, " shesaid. 

"Nevertheless the Maccabees are the more touched by devotion, " hemaintained. 

He led her to the exedra, unslung his wallet and laid it on thelectern before them. 

"When thou hast leisure, perchance thou wilt find interest in thesepapers here. "

She thanked him and there was a moment's silence. Under his lashes theimpostor saw that he had not filled her fancied picture of theMaccabee made from long years of correspondence. She was disappointed;her intuition was perplexed. He would complete his work and get awayin time. 

"My wife is here?" he asked. 

"She came yesterday, " Amaryllis responded, clapping her hands insummons. A female servant of such prepossessing appearance thatPhiladelphus looked at her again, bowed in the archway. 

"Send hither the princess, " Amaryllis said. 

"The princess, " Philadelphus repeated to himself. "Then, by Ate, I amthe prince!"

"While we wait, " Amaryllis continued, "let us talk of details whichyou may not have patience to hear after she comes. Jerusalem, as youhave learned, is in grave danger--"

"Jerusalem should fear the Roman army less than herself. I have seenits disease. "

"The citizens will hail Titus as a deliverer. But this week'sceremonies are bringing us disaster. Should Titus be forced to laysiege about us, how shall we feed this multitude of a million on thesupplies gathered for only a third of that number?"

"Gathered and burned. "

"Even so. But of your creature comforts. My house is open to yourchief enemy. It must be so. You must be hidden--not concealed, butdisguised. You know my weakness for people of charm and people ofability. My house is full of them. The master of this place isindulgent; he permits me to add to my collection whatever pleases mein the way of society. Therefore, you are come as a student of thiswonderful drama to be enacted in Jerusalem presently. You may liveunder part of your name. Substitute, however, your city for yoursurname. Be Philadelphus of Ephesus. No one then will question yourpresence here. 

"I have bound to me by oath and by fear one hundred Idumeans who willrise or fall with you. They are of John's own army and alienated toyou without his knowledge. Hence they are in armor and ready at anypropitious moment. This house is provisioned and equipped for siege;everything is prepared. "

"At what cost, my Amaryllis?" he asked tenderly. 

She drew away from him quickly, as if his tone had touched a place ofdeeper disappointment. 

"That I do not remember. I am your minister; you need no other. Morethan the one would be multiplying chances for betrayal. "

"And what wilt thou have out of all this for thyself?" he asked. 

Slowly she turned her face back to him. 

"I would have it said that I made a king, " she said. 

There was a step in the corridor leading into the andronitis, and, smiling, Amaryllis rose. Philadelphus got upon his feet and looked tocatch the first glimpse of the woman who was bringing him two hundredtalents. 

A woman entered the hall. Behind her came a servant bearing ashittim-wood casket. 

Had Amaryllis been looking for suspicious signs, she would haveobserved in the intense silence that fell, in the arrested attitude ofthe pair, more than a natural embarrassment. Any one informed thatthese were a pair of impostors would have seen that there was noconfusion here, but amazement, chagrin and no little fear. 

Instead, Amaryllis, nothing suspecting, glanced from one set face tothe other and laughed. 

"Poor children! Married fourteen years and more than strangers to eachother! I will take myself off until you recover. "

She signed to the servant to follow her and passed out of the hall. 

Philadelphus then put off his stony quiet and gazed wrathfully at thewoman who had entered. 

Hers was a fine frame, broad and square of shoulder, tall and lank ofhip as some great tiger-cat, and splendid in its sinuosity. She hadwalked with a long stride and as she dropped into the chair shecrossed her limbs so that her well-turned ankles showed and the handsshe clasped about her knees were long and strong, white and remarkablytapering. Her features were almost too perfect; her beauty wassensuous, insolent and dazzling. Withal her presence intimatedtremendous primal charm and the mystery of undiscoveredpotentialities. And she was royal! No mere upstart of an impostorcould have assumed that perfect hauteur, that patrician bearing. 

But the pretended Philadelphus was not impressed by this beauty. 

"How now, Salome?" he demanded. "What play is this?"

The Ephesian actress motioned toward the shittim-wood casket. 

"For that, " she said calmly. 

Her voice became, instantly, her foremost charm. It was a deep voice;the profoundest contralto with an illimitable strength in suggestion. 

"Where is--what is that?"

"Two hundred talents. "

Philadelphus took a step toward her. 

"What!" he exclaimed evilly. "Whose two hundred talents?"

"Mine. "

There was silence in which the man's fingers bent, as if he felt herthroat between them. Then he recovered himself. 

"But--this woman--where is she?"

The actress lifted her shapely shoulders. 

"Where is the Maccabee?" she asked in return. 

He made no answer. 

"Did you get that treasure here--since yesterday?" he asked at lastquerulously. 

"No, by Pluto! I got it in the hills near to Emmaus. You would havehad it in another day. " She laughed impudently, in spite of themurderous blackening in his face. 

"Then, since you are such a shrewd thief, why did you come here atall, since you had the gold?" he demanded, astonished in spite of hisrage. 

She waved a pair of jeweled hands. 

"They said that the Maccabee was strong and ambitious and forceful, that he would be king over Judea. Knowing you, I believed he wouldstill come to Jerusalem in spite of you. How did you do it? In hissleep? Now, I, " she continued with an assumption of concern, "failedin that detail. She was guarded by a monster. I could not get nearher. But I got the casket. "

"She will come here then!" Philadelphus exclaimed. 

"What of it! Amaryllis does not know her; no one else does. And I haveher proofs--and her dowry!"

After a silence in which she read the expression on his face, she roseand came near him with determination in her manner. 

"You will have the wisdom not to recognize her, " she said, "lest Isuddenly discover that you are not the Philadelphus I expected. "

He made rapid survey of her advantage over him, and submitted. 

"But there will be no need of waiting for such an issue, " he fumed, after a silence. "I am here and not the Maccabee, whose crown youcoveted. We shall get out of this perilous city. "

"So?" she said, lifting her finely penciled brows. "No, we shall not. "

"Why?" he stormed. 

"Because, " she answered, "John of Gischala may yet be king ofJudea--and John hath a queen's diadem for sale at two hundredtalents--or a heart which I can have for nothing. "

There was malevolent and impotent silence in the andronitis ofAmaryllis, the Greek. 

Chapter IX

THE YOUNG TITUS

They who stood on the wall by the Tower of Psephinos in Coenopolis ofJerusalem on a day in March, 70 A. D. , saw prophecy fulfilled. 

Since the hour in which the Roman eagles had appeared above thehorizon to the west in their circling over the rebellious province ofJudea there had not been one day of peace. Then their coming had meantthe approach of an enemy. But in a short time such implacable andfierce oppressors, with such genius for ferocity and bloodshed, haddeveloped among the Jews' own factions that the miserable citizens hadturned to the tyrant Rome for rescue. They who had risen againstFlorus and had driven him out would have willingly accepted him againin place of Simon bar Gioras and John of Gischala, before two yearshad elapsed. Now, their plight was so desperate that they clambereddaily upon the walls of their unhappy city to look for the firstglimpse of the approaching enemy, Titus, whom they had learned to callthe Deliverer. 

Near noon of this day in March certain citizens on the wall besideHippicus saw a flash down the road to the west beyond the Serpent'sPool near Herod's monuments. Again they saw it and again, until theyobserved that its appearance was rhythmic, striking through a softcolored cloud of Judean dust. 

Out of that yellow haze, rolling nearer, they saw now the glitteringRoman standards emerge, one by one; saw the spiky level of shoulderedspears; saw the shapes of horses, saw the shapes of men; heard thesoft thunder of six hundred horse on the packed earth, heard the musicof six hundred whetting harnesses; heard like a tender, far-off songthe winding of a Roman bugle and heard then in their own hearts, theshout: "He has come! The Deliverer!"

It was the hour of the City's last hope. 

On the near side of the Pool of the Serpent, they saw the body ofhorse break into a light trot and, wheeling in that fine concord inwhich even the dumb beasts were perfect, turn the broadside of thesplendid column to Jerusalem as it swept up Hill Gareb to the north. 

The citizens clambered down from the wall by Hippicus and, speedingsilently but with moving lips and shining eyes through alleys andbyways, came finally to an angle in Agrippa's wall that stood outtoward Gareb. Here was built the Tower of Psephinos. Dumb and callousas beasts to the blows and commands of the sentries there mounted, thecitizens clambered up on the fortifications and, with their chins onthe battlements that stood shoulder-high, gazed avidly at the sightthey saw. 

Scattered confidently over the uneven country the six hundred hadbroken file and were in easy disarray all over Gareb. Spears were atrest, standards grounded, many were dismounted, whole companiesslouched in their saddles. The Jews, long used to rigid militarydiscipline among the Romans, looked in amazement. Then a light clickof a hoof attracted their attention to the bridle-path immediatelyunder the overhanging battlements. 

There a solitary horseman rode. Not a scale of armor was upon hishorse; not a weapon, not even a shield depended from his harness. Hishead was uncovered and a sheeny purple fillet showed in the tumbled, dusty black hair. There was no guard on the hand that held the bridle;the cloak that floated from his shoulders was white wool; the tunicwas the simple light garment that soldiers usually wear under armor;the shoes alone were mailed. It seemed that the young Roman hadstripped off his helmet, breast-plate and greaves to ride lessencumbered or to appear less warlike. 

But the Jews who looked at him understood. Here was Titus come inpeace!

The horse went with loosened rein, while the young Roman's eyes raisedto the great wall towering over him had more of admiration and agenerous foe's appreciation of his enemy's strength than of thenote-making search of a spy in them. 

"Ha! By Hector, that penurious Herod was a builder!" they seemed tosay. "There is enough stone insolence in these walls to trouble Romefor a while!"

Rod after rod of the slowly rising ground he traversed; rod after rodof the tall fortification passed under his inspection, and now thetwin Women's Towers rose upon the ashes and scarped rock to the north. 

Titus spoke to his horse and rode faster. 

Meanwhile silent dozens climbed panting and dumbly resisting thesentries up beside the first Jews. They were citizens who dared notrejoice aloud. They followed the young Roman with brightened eyes, saying each within his heart:

"Thus David came up against Saul, unto Israel!"

But there was an increase of uproar in the city below, as if news ofthe coming of Titus had spread abroad. 

Titus was now almost a mile from the nearest of his soldiers. Hepassed the Gate of the Women's Towers. Hedges, gardens, ditches andwind-breaks of cedars of Lebanon from time to time obscured him. Whenhe came in sight again, he had placed obstruction between himself andretreat. 

The next instant the Gate of the Women's Towers swung in. Out of itrushed a sortie of motley soldiery, brandishing weapons and shoutingthe war-cries of Simon and John. 

The citizens on the walls pressed their hands to their temples andwatched, transfixed with horror. Jerusalem's defenders had gone outagainst the Deliverer!

The attack had been seen by the disorganized troops on Gareb and therapid trumpet-calls showed formation. But between the time of theirmovement and the moment of their relief a company could have beenunhorsed. Meanwhile Titus, with nothing less than Fate preserving himfor its own work, dodged javelins and, enraging the white stallionthat he rode, kept out of reach of hand-to-hand encounter with hisassailants. Back and forward he rode, his horse carrying him at timesout of range of missiles; again, all but surrounded by the unorganizedenemy. About his head whizzed axes and spears, wild, and frequentlyslaying their own. Far up the slope of Gareb the six hundred gathereditself and swept in mass down upon the conflict. 

Between them and Titus lay two furlongs. To join his column with allhonor to himself, he had to work back over the wadies he had crossedand circle the gardens that stood in his way. But a hedge pressed tooclose upon the space he must pass, between it and the enemy, before hecould return to his men. An ax glanced beside his ear; he wavered inhis saddle. Then, that happened which a Roman of that day could not beforced to do and forget. 

Titus wheeled his horse and, plunging his spurs into its sides, fledon into the open country to the north, with the jeers of the men ofSimon and John following him. 

His troops rushed down upon his assailants. But the wary soldiersturned when the Roman had fled and the Gate of the Women's Towersclosed upon them. 

Up from the visitors within the wall rose a shout:

"A sign, a sign! An omen! Thus shall the children of God overthrow theheathen in battle!"

But one of the Jews on the wall thrust his fingers under his turbanand seized his hair. 

"Jerusalem is fallen! Woe! Woe to the wicked city!"

He turned in his place and leaped a good twenty feet to the ground. When he raised himself the look of a maniac had settled on his face. Tearing his garments from him as he went, he entered a narrow streetthat made its ascent toward Zion by steps and cobbled slants. Here hecame upon great crowds of terror-stricken citizens who had rushedtogether as the news spread abroad over Jerusalem that the men ofSimon and John had gone out against the Deliverer. No definite news ofthe outcome of the sortie had reached them and they were moving in adense pack down toward the walls to hear the worst. The whole hurryingmass seemed to vibrate with suspense and dread. The maniac met them. 

"Woe, woe to Jerusalem!" he cried. 

A lean, apish, half-naked, lash-scarred idiot in the street, instantly, as if in echo to that mad cry, shouted in a voice of themost prodigious volume:

"A voice from the east, a voice from the west, a voice from the fourwinds, a voice against Jerusalem and the Holy house, a voice againstthe bridegrooms and the brides and a voice against this whole people!"

The temper of the crowd had reached that point of tension that neededonly a little more strain to become panic. Some one received thediscordant cries of the maniacs with piercing rapid screams. Instantlythe choked passage filled with frantic uproar. Scores attempting toflee blindly trampled over those transfixed with fear. They fought, men with women, youths with old age, children with one another. Hundreds attracted by the tumult rushed in on the panic and addedfresh victims and new death. Out of the horror rose the fearful criesof the madmen:

"Woe, woe to this wicked city!"

Meanwhile, the soldiers of Simon and John came to prevent citizensfrom gathering in bodies, and with sword and spear drove into thestruggle and added murder to it all. The spirit of terror then issuedout of that bloody alley and seized upon street by street. Far andwide the tumult ran, growing in volume with every accession, until theraging and humiliated Titus, among his six hundred, heard Jerusalemhowl like a beaten slave and hushed his pagan curses to listen. 

Late that same afternoon, the Esquiline Gate, inaccessible, despisedand sealed, was broken open from within and under it and down itsdifficult and dangerous approach poured a silent multitude, numberingthousands. They were abandoning the Rock of David to its fate. Amongthem went the last remnants of that sect of Christians who had tarriedlong after their brethren had been warned away, hoping against hope. 

They were not missed among the numbers in Jerusalem, for the Passoverhosts still poured through the gates to the south and took theirplaces in the unhappy city. And with these that same afternoon Laodiceand her old servant came into Jerusalem. 

It was the eighth day after they had applied to the priest at Emmauswhither they had fled in their search for the frosts, a good threeleagues north of the direct road to Jerusalem. They had stopped at theLavatory outside the walls, washed themselves and had purchased thewhite garments of the purified. Old Momus carried with him the priceof the lambs, of the fine flour and the oil for their cleansing andthe two were ready to present themselves for their purification at theTemple. But all the roar and disorder of the great city in its warfareand its discord confused them. Ascalon had not a thousandth part ofthis turmoil at its busiest season. Neither was there a servant in apurple turban with the gold star to meet them and they were bewilderedand lost. 

The rest of the visitors to the Passover hurried into the heart of thecity; wave after wave of new-comers replaced them; but the young womanand her dumb old servant stood aside just within reach of the shadowof the immemorial portal and waited. 

Time and again wolfish Idumean soldiers who were numerous about theplace noted the pair and commented to one another or spoke insolentlyto the shrinking girl who hid ineffectually behind her veil. Hourafter hour they stood with growing distress and no friendly face inall that army of hurrying, restless, quarreling Jews welcomed them. 

The afternoon waned. Laodice thought of the darkness and trembled. 

An old man fumbling a talisman of bone drew near them. Laodice tookcourage and approached him. 

"I pray thee, sir, I seek Amaryllis, the Seleucid. "

The old man turned large, grave eyes upon her. 

"Daughter, what dost thou know of this woman?" he asked. 

"My husband knows her; I do not. I am to join him under her roof. "

The old man looked reassured. 

"Follow this street unto one intersecting it on the summit of Zion. That will be a broad street and a straight one, terminating on abridge. Go thence to the hither side of that bridge, pass down theravine and cross to the other side against Moriah. There thou shaltsee a new Greek house. It is the residence of Amaryllis. "

Laodice thanked her informant and began the pursuit of the cloudydirections to her destination. Twice before she brought up at thesentry line before the house of the Seleucid, she asked further ofother citizens. Many times she met affront, once or twice sheperilously escaped disaster. At last, near sunset, she stood beforethe dwelling-place of the one secure citizen of the Holy City. 

A sentry dropped his spear across her path and she had not thecountersign to give him. There she and her helpless old attendantstood and looked hopelessly at the refuge denied them. 

Presently a man appeared in the colonnade across the front of thehouse and descending to the sentry line called to him the officer incommand. They stood within a few paces of Laodice and she heard thesoldier address the man as John, and heard him deliver a report of theday. 

When the soldier withdrew to his place, Laodice stepped forward andcalled to the Gischalan. He stopped, noted that she was beautiful andwaited. 

"I would speak with the Lady Amaryllis, " she hesitated. 

"Have you the countersign?" he asked. 

"No; else I should have entered. But Amaryllis will know me. "

"Enter then, " the Gischalan said. 

In a moment she was admitted at the solid doors and led into avestibule. Here, a porter took charge of Momus and showed him into aside passage, while Laodice followed her conductor through a corridorinto an interior hall of splendid simplicity. Lounging on an exedrawas a young woman in a woolen chiton, barefoot and trifling with theGreek ampyx that bound her golden hair. 

Laodice put up her veil and looked with hurrying heart at her hostess. Before she could get a preliminary idea of the woman she was to meet, John spoke lightly:

"Be wearied no longer. I have brought you a mystery--a stranger, without the countersign, asking audience with you. "

"Go back to the fortress, " the young woman answered. "Sometime youwill find strangers awaiting you there, also without the password. Youwill lose Jerusalem trifling with me. I have spoken!"

John filliped her ear as he passed through into a corridor which musthave led into the Temple precincts. Under the light, Laodice saw thathe was a middle-aged Jew, not handsome, but luxuriant with virility. His face showed great ability with no conscience, and force and charmwithout balance or morals. Here, then, thought Laodice, is the firstof Philadelphus' enemies. 

The idler in the exedra, meanwhile, was awaiting the speech of hervisitor. 

"Art thou she whom I seek?" Laodice asked. "Amaryllis, the Seleucid?"

"I am called by that name. "

"I was bidden, " Laodice continued, "by one whom we both know, to seekasylum with thee. "

"So? Who may that be?"

Laodice whispered the name. 

"Philadelphus Maccabaeus. "

The Greek's eyes took on a puzzled look. Then she surveyed the girland as a full conception of the beauty of the young creature beforeher formed in the Greek's mind, the perplexity left her expression. Her air changed; a subtle smile played about her lips. 

"He sent you to me for protection?"

"Until he arrives in Jerusalem, " Laodice assented. 

"But he is already here. "

It was the moment that Laodice had avoided fearfully ever since shehad gathered from that winsome stranger by the roadside that hiscompanion was her husband. Although, after that fact had been madeknown to her, she had felt that she ought to join Philadelphus andproceed with him to the Holy City, she had endured the exposure of thehills, the want and discomfort of insufficient supplies and theaffronts of wayfarers, that she might spare herself as long aspossible her union with the unsafe man who had become even morehateful by comparison with the one who had called himself Hesper. 

"Perchance thou wilt lead me to him, " Laodice said finally. 

Amaryllis made no immediate answer. It would have been a naturalimpulse for her to wish to inquire for the girl's business with theman that the Greek as hostess was expected to conceal. But Amaryllishad her own explanation for this visit. It had been plain to lessobservant eyes than hers that the newly arrived Philadelphus was notdelighted with the bride he had met. 

The Greek summoned a servant. 

"Go summon thy master, Prisca; and haste. I doubt not I have for him asweet relief. "

The woman bowed. 

"If it please thee, madam, the master is without in the vestibule, returning from the city. " Amaryllis signed to the ivory chair beforeher. 

"Sit, lady, " she said to Laodice. "He will come at once. "

The young woman dropped into the seat and gazed wistfully at herhostess. Instinctively, she knew that in this woman was no relief fromthe darkened life she was to lead with her husband. The Greek's face, palely lighted by a thoughtful smile, vanished in sudden darkness. Laodice saw instead an image of a strong intent face, brighteningunder the sunrise, saw it relax, soften, grow inexpressibly kind, thenpass, as a tender memory taking leave for ever. 

She was brought to herself by the Greek's rising suddenly. TheEphesian appeared at the arch, tossing mantle and kerchief to theporter as he entered. Laodice rose to her feet with difficulty. It washe, indeed!

He was kissing Amaryllis' hand. The Greek was smiling an accusing, conscious smile. She indicated Laodice. The Ephesian's face showedstartlement, suspicion and a quick recovery. He bowed low and waitedfor explanation. 

"Then I will go, " Amaryllis said with amusement in her eyes, "if youare acting pretenses for my sake. "

[Illustration: Amaryllis the Greek. ]

She turned toward the arch which led into the interior of the house. The pretender glanced again at Laodice and again at the Greek. 

"What is the play, lady?" he asked. 

Amaryllis looked at Laodice standing stony white at her place, andlost her confident smile. 

"Is this not he?" she asked. 

"Is this Philadelphus Maccabaeus?" Laodice asked. 

The Ephesian's face changed quickly. Enlightenment mixed withdiscomfiture appeared there for an instant. 

"I am he, " he said evenly. 

"Then, " Laodice said, "I am she whom thou hast expected. "

Philadelphus smiled and dropped his head as if in thought. 

"One always expects the pleasurable, " he essayed, "but at times onedoes not recognize it when it comes. Who art thou, lady?"

"Pestilence, war and the evil devices of men have desolated me, " shesaid coldly. "I have only a name. I am Laodice. "

"Laodice!" he repeated amiably. "A familiar name; eh, Amaryllis?"

Laodice waited. Philadelphus looked again at her and appeared to wait. 

"I am Laodice, " the girl repeated, a little disconcerted, "thy wife. "

"So!" Philadelphus exclaimed. 

There was such well-assumed astonishment in the exclamation that sheraised her eyes quickly to his face. There was another expressionthere; one wholly incredulous. 

"Now did I in the profligacy of mine extreme youth marry twoLaodices?" he said. "For another Laodice, wife to me, joined me somedays since. "

Laodice gazed at him without comprehending. 

"I say, " he repeated, "that my wife Laodice joined me some time ago. "

"Why, I--I am Laodice, daughter to Costobarus, and thy wife!" sheexclaimed, while her eyes fixed upon him the full force of herastonishment. 

He turned to Amaryllis. 

"What labyrinth is this, O my friend, " he asked, "in which thou hastset my feet?"

"I do not know, " Amaryllis laughed suddenly. "Call the princess. "

Philadelphus summoned a servant and instructed her to bring his wife. For a short space the three did not speak, though Laodice's lipsparted and she stroked her forehead in a bewildered way. 

Then Salome, late actress in the theaters at Ephesus, came into thehall. Amaryllis bowed to her and the impostor gave her a chair. Heturned to Laodice and with the faintest shadow of a grimace motionedtoward the new-comer. 

"This, " he said, "is Laodice, daughter of Costobarus. "

Laodice blazed at the insolent beauty who stared at her with curiouseyes. 

"That!" she cried. "The daughter of Costobarus!"

The fine brown eyes of the woman smoldered a little, but shecontinued to gaze without the least discomposure. 

"Who is this, sir?" she asked of Philadelphus. 

"That, " said Philadelphus evenly, to the actress, "is Laodice, daughter of Costobarus. "

"I do not understand, " the actress said disgustedly. "You are clumsy, Philadelphus, when you are playful. If this is all, I shall return tomy chamber. "

She rose, but Laodice sprang into her path. 

"Hold!" she cried. "Philadelphus, hast thou accepted this womanwithout proofs?"

Philadelphus smiled and shook his head. 

"And by the by, " he asked, "what proof have you?"

Up to that moment Laodice had burned with confident rage, feelingthat, by force of the justice of her cause, she might overthrow thispreposterous villainy, but at Philadelphus' question she suddenlychilled and blanched and shrank back. A new and supreme disadvantageof her loss presented itself to her at last. She could not prove heridentity!

Meanwhile, seeing Laodice falter, the woman's lip curled. 

"Weak! Very weak, Philadelphus, " she said. "You must invent somethingbetter. The success of a jest is all that pardons a jester. "

"She robbed me!" Laodice panted impotently. "Robbed me, after myfather had given her refuge!"

"Of what?" the Greek asked. 

"My proofs--and two hundred talents!"

"Lady, " the actress said to Amaryllis, "my husband's emissary, Aquila, was a pagan. He had with him, on our journey, this woman and her olddeformed father who fled when the plague broke out among us. Shehoped, I surmise, that we should all die on the way. Even Samson gaveup secrets to Delilah, and this Aquila was no better than Samson. "

Oriental fury fulminated in the eyes of Laodice. Philadelphus, fearingthat she was about to spring at the throat of her traducer, sprangbetween the two women. In his eyes shone immense admiration at thatmoment. 

There was an instant of critical silence. Then Laodice drew herself upwith a sudden accession of strength. 

"Madam, " she said coldly to Amaryllis, "with-hold thy judgment a fewdays. I shall send my servant back to Ascalon for other proof. _He_can go safely, for he has had the plague. "

Philadelphus started; the actress flinched. 

"Friend, " Philadelphus said in his smooth way, "I came upon this womanby the wayside in the hills. I and a wayfarer cast a coin forpossession of her--and the other man won. Give thyself no concern. "

Laodice flung her hands over her face and shrank in an agony of shamedown upon the exedra. Amaryllis looked down on her bowed head. 

"Is it true?" she asked. After a moment Laodice raised herself. 

"God of Israel, " she said in a low voice, "how hast Thy servantdeserved these things!"

There was a space of silence, in which the two impostors turnedtogether and talking between themselves of anything but the recentinterview walked out of the chamber. 

After a time Laodice lifted her head and spoke to the Greek. 

"If thou wilt give me shelter, madam, for a few days only, I promisethee thou shalt not regret it, " she said. 

The girl was interesting and Amaryllis had been disappointed inPhiladelphus. Nothing tender or compassionate; only a littlecuriosity, a little rancor, a little ennui and a faint instinctivehope that something of interest might yet develop, moved the Greek. 

"Send your servant to Ascalon for proofs, " she said. "I shall give youshelter here until you are proved undeserving of it. And since thetimes are uncertain, do not delay. "

Chapter X

THE STORY OF A DIVINE TRAGEDY

The following morning, there was a rap at the door of the chamber towhich Laodice had been led and informed that it was her own. 

She had passed a sleepless night and had risen early, but the knockcame late in the morning. 

She opened the door. 

Without stood a ten year old girl, of the most bewitching beauty, asbarely clad as ever the children of her blood went over the greenmeadows of Achaia. Her golden hair was knotted on the back of herpretty head and held in place by an ampyx. On her feet were tinysheepskin buskins; about her perfect little body, worn carelessly, wasa simple chiton, out of which her dimpled shoulders and small roundarms showed pink and tender as field-flowers. Nothing could have beenmore composed than her gaze at Laodice. 

"We breakfast in the hall, now. You are to join us, " she said. 

Laodice stepped, out of the chamber into the court and followed herlittle guide. 

"The mistress and her guests rise late, " the child went on. "Thatperforce starves the rest of us until mid-morning. Eheu! It is the oneinjustice in this house. "

Laodice dumbly wondered if she were to be classed with the houseservants while she waited until the return of her devoted old mute. 

She was led into a long narrow room, showing the same simple elegancethat marked all the house of Amaryllis, the Greek. Down the centerwere two tables, separated by a cluster of tall plants that almostscreened one from the other. 

At the first table place was laid for one. At the other, she found bythe talk and laughter the rest of the company were gathered. Thelittle girl led Laodice to the single place, seated her, and kissingher hand to her with an almost too-practised bow, fled around thecluster of tall plants. There she heard her childish voice imperiouslyordering a servant to attend the mistress' latest guest. 

Prisca appeared and silently served Laodice with melon, honey-cakesand milk. Other of the house-servants were visible from time to time. This, then, manifestly was not the breakfast of the menials. Sheglanced toward the cluster of tall plants. Through an interstice shewas able to see all the persons seated at the other table. 

There first was the blue-eyed, golden-haired girl. Beside her was ayouth, slim, dark, exquisitely fashioned, with limbs and arms asstrong as were ever displayed in the games, yet powerful withoutbrutality, graceful without weakness--marks of the ideal athlete thathad long since disappeared with the coming of the Roman gladiator. Opposite was a grown man, tall, broad and deep chested, with prominenteyes wide apart and a large mouth. There was a singleness of attitudein him, as in all persons reared to a purpose. It was that certainself-centeredness which is not egotism, yet a subconsciousness of selfin all acts. He was the finished product of a specific, life-longtraining, and the confidence in his atmosphere was the confidence ofone aware of his skill and prepared at all times. 

Besides these three, there were two women, both in the garments of theancient atelier. One was bemarked with clay; the other was stainedwith paint. Laodice knew at a glance that she looked at a gathering ofartists. 

"Evidently a gift from John, " the little girl was saying. "He can notsee that our lady does anything but collect curiosities in this hersearch after art, and so he must needs add a contribution in thisStygian monster we saw yesterday evening. "

Laodice knew that they discussed Momus. 

"Perhaps, " the athlete said, "he bought this left-handed catapultthinking he might throw the discus farther than I can throw it. "

"Well enough, " the woman with paint on her tunic put in; "she sent themonster packing. He went out of the gates post-haste last night, theysay. "

"The pretty stranger that came with him stayed, I observe, " theathlete said. 

"Pst!" the girl said in a low voice. "Where are the man's eyes in yourhead, that you do not see her?"

"Looking at you!" the athlete answered. 

"Too soon!" the child retorted. "A good six years before I shall knowwhat your looks mean!"

"Is she, this pretty stranger, something of John's taste?" the womanwho had blue clay on her garment asked. 

"Tut!" the athlete broke in. "John never departed from his ancientbarbarism to that extent. That, unless I misjudge my own inclinationsin a similar matter, is something this mysterious Philadelphus hatharranged to relieve the tedium of--"

"Tedium!" the girl exclaimed. "By Hector, this Jewish wife of hiswould open his Ephesian eyes were she to let loose all I suspect inher!"

"Brrr! But you are suspicious!" the athlete shivered. The little girlshaped her lips into a kiss and the athlete leaning across the tablesnatched it from her before she could avoid him. 

The women caught him by the back of his tunic and pulled him down inhis chair. 

"Sit down!" they whispered. "Don't you see that Juventius is about tospeak?"

The athlete glanced at the grown man, who had looked down into hisplate at the youth's frolic with the child, with the utmost disdainand boredom in his expression. Now that the silence became noticeable, he spoke in an affected voice, but one of the deepest music. 

"Alas, these Jews!" he said. "How little they know about art! How longhas it been since he introduced one of the Temple singers into ourlady's hall to show what a piercing high note could be reached by amale voice? And he had the creature sing to prove his contention. Ithought I should die! It was worse than awful; it was criminal!"

The athlete laughed. 

"Any singer, then, but Juventius therefore is a malefactor!" he said. 

"No, it does not follow, " Juventius protested in all seriousness, while the child flashed a look of intense amusement at the athlete. "But, " waving a pair of long white hands, "none should trifle withmusic. It is one of the graces of Nature, divine and elemental. Wherefore, anything short of a perfect production becometh a mockeryand a mockery against divine things is blasphemy. Ergo, the poormusician is in danger of Hades!"

"The monster is safe, safe!" the girl protested. "He does not sing, and from what I caught through the crack of the door, the prettystranger had better not. My lady, the princess, had a merry time withmy lord, the prince, at breakfast this morning, all about this samepretty one. So this is why she breakfasts with us--the second table. "

Laodice heard this with a sinking heart. This was a strange house inwhich to live at no definite status, with a future blank andinscrutable. 

"Is it, then, that you are wary of offending the over-nice exactionsof music, that you do not sing?" the athlete demanded of Juventius. 

"Song, " replied the singer gravely, "is originally the expression ofthe highest exaltation. To sing before the high mark of feeling isreached is an insincerity. "

"Alas, Juventius, " the girl was saying, "how much difficulty you layup for yourself in determining the limits of art! Teach broadly andthe fulfilment of your laws will not be such a task for the overworkedand irritable gods of art. "

"Child!" Juventius cried passionately. "Your ignorance outreaches yourpresumption!"

"Fie! Fie!" the athlete put in comfortably. "Let us make a truce, forI announce to you the opportunity each to have whatever you wish. Weare to have at the proper moment, according to the Jews, a celestialvisitation which will enable us to have what we most desire. "

"You announce it!" the girl scoffed indignantly. "I have heard of thatever since I was born!"

"I, too, have heard it, " said Juventius. 

"Well, " said the unabashed athlete, "the Pharisee that bringsAmaryllis her fruit is so full of it that he gets prophecies mixedwith his prices and the patriarchs with his fruit. He says that thereare those that declare he is already in the city. "

"That he has been seen?" Juventius asked, after a little silence. 

"No; merely suspected. They say that things go on in the Temple whichseem to show that some resident of their Olympus already inhabits theair. "

"I saw Seraiah to-day, " one of the women said in a low voice. 

"Silent as ever? Spotless as ever? Mysterious as ever?" the athleteasked. 

The woman who had spoken shook her head at him as if alarmed. 

"I can not bear to hear him ridiculed, " she said. "Somehow it seemsblasphemous. They say he marks every one who laughs in his hearing. "

"They are not many, " the girl said. "For the most part, the citizensof Jerusalem feel as apprehensive about him as you do. "

"I wonder that John will stay in the Temple with a god in it, "Juventius said, as if he had not heard the rest of the discussion. 

"John!" the athlete exclaimed. "John is an adventurer that believesin nothing, has no cause and furthers this warfare for loot and thepossible chance of escape when the conflict comes. "

"Simon is different, " another said. "Now he is wild and mad andinsolent and foolhardy, because he believes that, no matter whattangle the situation is in, the celestial emissary he expects willstraighten it out for him. "

"In short, he means to work such a complexity here that the man whounravels it must needs be divine. "

At this moment the door that cut off the rest of the house from thisdining-room opened smartly and the supposed Philadelphus stepped in. He closed the door behind him and glanced at the filled table. Thosethere seated rose. He spoke to each one by name, and after they hadgreeted him, they filed out into the court and the servants began toremove the remnants of their meal. Laodice rose at sign of thisconcerted deference to Philadelphus but sat down again, with her lipscompressed. However they had disposed her, she would not accept themenial attitude. She had not finished her honey-cakes. 

He came round to her, drew up a chair and sat down beside her. Sheignored him, making a feint that was not entirely successful atinterest in her fruit. 

"Who art thou, in truth?" he asked finally. 

"Laodice, " she answered coldly. 

He sighed and she added nothing more. 

"What can your purpose be in this?" he asked. 

She ignored the question. After a longer silence, he said in analtered and softened tone:

"What an innocent you are! Certainly this is your first attempt! Whatmarplot told you that such a thing as you have essayed was possible?"

She put aside her plate and her cup, and turned to him. 

"By your leave I will retire, " she said. 

"Not yet, " he answered, smiling. "It is my duty as a Jew to help youwhile there is time. "

She settled back in her chair and looked at the cluster of plantswhile he talked. 

"Nothing so damages the beauty of a woman as trickery. No bad woman isbeautiful very long. There comes a canker on her soul's beauty, in herface, that disfigures her, soon or late. Whoever you are, whateveryour condition, you are lovely yet. Be beautiful; of a surety then youmust be good. "

It was the same old hypocritical pose that the bad man assumes tocloak himself before innocence. Laodice remembered the incident in thehills. 

"Where, " she asked coldly, "is he who was with you at Emmaus?"

The pretender started a little, but the increase of alarm on his faceshowed that he realized next that here was a peril in this woman whichhe had overlooked. 

"Gone, " he said unreadily, "gone back to Ephesus. "

She did not know what pain this announcement of that winsomestranger's desertion would waken in her heart. Her eyes fell; herbrows lifted a little; the corners of her mouth became pathetic. Thepretender, casting a sidelong glance at her, saw to his own safetythat she had believed him. 

"He was a parasite, " he sighed, "living off my bounty. But even thatdid not invite him when he neared the peril of this city. So he turnedback. I--I do not blame him, " he added with a little laugh. 

"Blame him?" she said quickly. "You--you do not blame him?"

"No! Any place, any condition is more desirable than residence inJerusalem at this hour. "

"If one seeks but to be comfortable. But here is a place for work andfor achievement, " she declared. 

"Too desperate an extreme. Nothing can be done here, " he observed, shrugging his shoulders. 

She gazed at him with immense contempt. 

"That from a son of Judas Maccabaeus!" she exclaimed. 

He looked disconcerted. 

"Why not?" he urged. "It is neither rational nor practical to attemptthe impossible. Jerusalem is doomed. I would but add myself to thesacrifice did I interfere between destruction and its sure prey. "

After a silence in which she confronted him with many emotions showingon her face, she said with infinite pity and disappointment:

"O Philadelphus, you to throw greatness away!"

"Where, O my mysterious genius, are my army, my engines, mysubsistence, my advantage and the prize?"

"What was that dowry which was stolen from me to purchase for you butthese things? I brought it for this purpose. Another than myselfdelivered it to you; the end is achieved; what use will you make ofit?"

"There is no nation here for that dowry to defend, no crown for it tosupport. But for this same madness which possesses my lady, theprincess, I should depart this day for a safer venture, in some safercountry!"

She faced him intently. 

"And you will do nothing for Judea?" she asked. 

"What can be done?" he asked, throwing out his hands with a carelessgesture. 

"Oh, " she exclaimed with a rush of passionate feeling, "that I wereyou! You, with the materials for empire-building at your feet! You, with the hour beseeching you, with a people searching for you, with atreasury filled for you, with ancient prophecy establishing you, ancient precept teaching you, and the cause of God arming you!Philadelphus, son of a great patriot, what are you saying! What canthere be done! Oh rather, how dare you not do! What have you about youbut the inevitable end of Judah, living contrary to God's plan for it!It is the conscience of Israel rising against its sin and submission!It is the blood of David rebelling against the heathen yoke! It is thehour foretold by Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel and Daniel and theTwelve, when Israel shall repent and be chastened and return to theheritage of Jacob. Be the repairer of the breach! Be the restorer ofthe paths to dwell in, my husband! Go out and let Israel behold you!Help them to wipe out the shame of Babylonia and Persia and Macedoniaand Rome! Make Jerusalem not only a sanctuary but a capital! Restorethe glory of David and the peace of Solomon, for those were God's daysand Judah can not prosper except as it returns to them!Philadelphus--"

Laodice halted abruptly in her appeal, breathless with feeling. 

The amusement had gone out of his face and his expression was one ofmingled discomfort and surprise at her speech. 

"Since you are a thinking woman, " he answered, "I must answer yousoberly. Even I, expecting disorder and uproar in Jerusalem, when Icame from Ephesus, was not prepared for this chaos! Never was such atime! Order is not possible in this extreme. It is unthinkable. Nothing human can save Jerusalem!"

She laid her hand upon him. 

"Nothing human!" she repeated quickly. "Seest not that this is thetime of the Messiah? Be ready to be helped of God!"

Philadelphus drew away from her uneasily and looked at her from underlowered brows. 

"They say, " he said in a suppressed voice, as fearing his own words, "that He has come and gone!"

She looked at him blankly. He was glad he had thought of this; itwould divert her from a discourse momently growing unpleasant for him. And yet he was afraid of the thing he had said. 

"What dost thou say?" she asked. 

"He is come and gone--they say. "

"Come and gone!"

He nodded irritably. It made him nervous to dwell on the subject. 

"Who say?" she demanded. 

"Many! Many!" he whispered. 

"It is not--do you believe it?" she persisted, with strange terrorwaiting upon his answer. He moved uneasily but he answered the truth. It was superstition in him that spoke. 

"Something in me says it is true, " Philadelphus whispered. 

She stood transfixed; then all her horror rose in her and cried outagainst the story. 

"It can not be!" she cried. "See the misery and oppression, here, tenfold! Nothing has been done! Nobody heard of Him! He could notfail! What a blasphemy, what a travesty on His Word, to come andfulfil it not and go hence unnoticed! It can not be!"

"But, but--" he protested, somehow terrified by her denial, "only youhave not heard. Everywhere are those who believe it and I saw--Isaw--"

The growing violence of dissent on her face urged him to speak whathis shamed and guilty tongue hesitated to pronounce. 

"I saw in Ephesus one who saw Him; I saw in Patmos one who hadreclined on His breast!"

"A--a--woman?" she whispered. 

"No! No!" he returned in a panic. "A man, a prisoner, old and whiteand terrible! But it was in his youth! He told me! And the one inEphesus, a red-beard, hunchbacked and half-blind and even moreterrible than the first! He saw Him after He was dead!"

"Dead!" Her lips shaped the word. 

"They--yes! He was crucified!"

Her lips parted as if to speak the word, but her mind failed to graspit certainly. She stood moveless in an actual pain of horror. 

"But He rose again from the dead, " he persisted, "and left the earthto its own devices hereafter. And so behold Jerusalem!

"And there was one woman, " he added, "who had been a scarlet woman. She had anointed His feet with precious oil and wiped them with herhair. And I saw her also--I sought them all out, because they could domiracles and foretell events. Thousands upon thousands believe inthem. "

"Crucified!" she whispered. 

"They say, " he went on, "that He pronounced judgment on Jerusalem andthat it now cometh to pass!"

The accumulated effect of the calamitous recital was to stun her. Shegazed at him with unintelligent eyes, and her lips moved withoutspeaking. For one reared in constant contemplation of God's nearnessto His children, acquainted with divine politics, divine literatureand divine law, cut off from the world and devoted wholly to religion, the story of a divine tragedy carried with it the full force of itsfearful import. Philadelphus' narrative meant to her the crumbling ofearth and the effacement of Heaven. She cried wildly her unbelief whenwords returned to her. But under the fury of her denunciation, unconsciously directed against the conviction that the story was true, she felt her hope of a restored Kingdom of David wavering toward afall. 

While she stood thus, Amaryllis, languid and pre-occupied, entered theroom with John of Gischala at her side. The Greek noted Philadelphuswith a quick accession of interest. John's attention had beeninstantly arrested by the presence of the other man. Philadelphusturned with fine ease to meet the man whom he must regard as his enemyand Laodice shrank back in an attempt to get out of sight of the trio. 

"Welcome!" said Amaryllis to Philadelphus. "A fortunate visit thatmakes possible an amnesty for two of my friends at once. This, John, is Philadelphus of Ephesus, a seeker of diversion out of mine owncountry come to see the end of this great struggle thou wagest againstRome. And thou, Philadelphus, seest before thee, John of Gischala, thearbiter of Judea's future. Be friends. "

With a comprehensive sweeping glance John inspected the man beforehim. 

"John of Gischala, " he repeated in his feline voice, "the oppressorJohn. Art thou not afraid of me, sir?"

"Dost thou meditate harm for me, sir?" Philadelphus smiled. 

"Art thou, in that case, against me, sir?" John parried. 

"On that hingeth his answer, " Amaryllis said, glancing at Laodice. "And here is this same pretty stranger who bewitched thee yesterday. Know her as Laodice. Let that be parentage, history, ambition andreligion for her. She, too, seeks diversion in Jerusalem, and is myguest for a while. "

The Gischalan took Laodice's hand and held it. 

"Welcome, thou, " he said. "I will tolerate another man under thy roofif thou wilt but make this pretty bird of passage a permanency, " hesaid to the Greek, after a silent study of Laodice's beauty. 

"Let her be a hostage dependent on thy good behavior. Lapse, and Ishall send her back to Olympus where they keep such nymphs. "

Philadelphus smiled at Laodice, but the shock of their recent talk hadshaken her too much to enter into this idle chaff on the lips of thoseupon whom the fortunes of Israel depended at that very hour. 

John looked at her for a long time. 

"Amaryllis veils thee in the enchantment of mystery. I think she istired of me and would have me interested in another woman. She doesall things well. Who art thou, in truth?"

The Greek lifted her head and gazed with overt anxiety at the girl;Philadelphus turned toward her uneasily. Here was an opportunity forLaodice either as a disappointed adventuress or as a supplanted wife, to take revenge by exposing this pair of conspirators pledged toundermine the Gischalan. But the girl had no such thought. 

"I am Laodice, " she said unreadily. "What history I have belongs toanother. What future shall be mine depends on others. I wait. "

"If you mean to throw me off, Amaryllis, I shall not miss you, " saidJohn. 

The Greek smiled and plucking Philadelphus' sleeve led both men away. 

"Do not commit yourself, " she said to John, "there is yet anotherwoman under this roof. You shall have a choice. "

They disappeared in the direction of her hall. 

Laodice, stunned, amazed and shaken, stood still. The stock of hertroubles amounted to a sum of such magnitude that she could not graspit clearly. The entire structure which her life training and all herpurposes, the hope of her house and her husband's, the future of Judeaand the King to come, had constituted, had been attacked andthreatened to crumble and be swept away in a few hours' time. 

Out of the wreck she rescued one hope. Momus would return from thewest with proofs in a few days' time--only a few days!

Chapter XI

THE HOUSE OF OFFENSE

On his way to the oaken door that was for ever double-barred, in thatsmall hall which led to the apartments of Amaryllis' corps of artists, Philadelphus met Salome, the actress. He would have passed her withouta word, but the woman, armed with the nettle of a small triumph overthe man who held her in contempt, could not forbear piercing him as hepassed. 

"Hieing away to excite your disappointment further?" she said. "Hasthe forlorn lady convinced you, yet, that she is indeed your wife?"

"Had I that two hundred talents, I would confess her!" he declared. 

"Cruel obstacle! But that two hundred talents is locked away safely, out of your reach. Why do you not run away with this pretty creature?"

Philadelphus glowered at her. 

"I have been known to make way with those who stood in my way, " hedeclared. 

"I sleep with my door locked, " she answered, "and I ever face you. Ineed never be afraid, therefore. "

For a moment he was silent, while she sensed that overweening hate andmenace which charged the air about him. 

"It is not all as it should be, " he said finally. "You are not rid ofme. I shall stay. "

"You should, " she responded comfortably. "You are a show ofdomesticity which lends color to our claim of wedded state. But youmay go or stay. As usual, you are not essential. "

"I have been known to be superfluous. However it may be, I get muchpleasure in the companionship of this lovely creature, the single flawin the fine fabric of your villainy. Do not fear her convincing me. She might convince others. "

There was no response; after a silence he said as he moved on:

"I shall warn her to feed a morsel of her food to the parrots ere shetastes it, however. "

He was gone. The woman felt of the keys that swung under the folds ofher robes. Then she, too, went on. 

The oaken door was still fast closed when Philadelphus reached it, buthe knew that the girl, who lived within, came out to walk in thesunshine of Amaryllis' court at certain hours while the household wasengaged within doors. 

He had not long to wait. She came out in a little while, and glancedup and down the hall; but he had heard the turn of the bolt and hadstepped into shadow in time. Reassured that no one was near, sheemerged and passing down the hall entered the court. 

And there presently he joined her. 

He sat down on one of the stone seats and smiled at her. 

"Do I appear excited?" he asked. 

She glanced at him indifferently. 

"No, " she said. 

"I have this day seen destruction resolved for the city. "

She took his easy declaration with a frown. If it were true he shouldnot show that flippancy; if it were not he should not have jested. 

"I saw, " he continued, "Titus and his beloved Nicanor ride around thewalls. Though they were the full length of a bow-shot from me, I knewwhat they talked about. Now, this young Nicanor is a gad that ticklesTitus when his soft heart would urge him into tendernesses toward theenemy. But for Nicanor, Titus would have withdrawn his legions longago and left Jerusalem to die of its own violences. 

"On the day that you came into Jerusalem, Titus, as a display ofamicable intentions, rode up to the walls without arms or armor, trusting to the Jews' soldierly honor in refusing to attack an unarmedman. But the Jews have never been instructed in the nice points ofmilitary courtesy, so they went out against him by thousands. And butfor the fact that he is practised in dodging arrows and his horse isused to running away, Emperor Vespasian would have to leave the ęgisto the unlovely Domitian. 

"Any Roman but Titus would remember this against the Jews until he hadput the last one in bondage, but Titus is not a Roman. I thinksome-times that he is a Christian, since it is their boast to lovetheir enemies. Whatever his feelings after that ignominious adventureof a few days ago, forth he rides this morning; beside him the Gad, Nicanor; behind him, that sweet traitor, Josephus. 

"The Darling of Mankind rode so meditatively, so dejectedly, that Iknew by his attitude, he said: 'Alack, it galls me to go against thisgoodly city!'

"By the swagger of the Gad I knew he said: 'Dost gall thee, in truth?Then truly, alack! Withhold thy hand until the city comes out againstthee, so thou canst hush thy conscience saying that they began it!'

"Saith the Darling, 'But there be babes and innocent men and womenwithin those walls, who, deserving most of all, shall suffer thegreatest!'

"'By Hecate!' quoth the Gad, 'there is not a yearling within that citypossessing the power to pucker its lips but would spit upon thee!'

"'It would be sacred innocence!' declares Titus. 

"'Or an old man that would not burn thine ears with malediction!'

"'That would be holy dotage!'

"'Or a fine young man but would pale thee on a pike!'

"'Then let some one whom they hate less venomously, beseech them totheir own salvation, ' implores the Darling. 

"Whereupon the Gad beckons insinuatingly to Josephus. 

"'Josephus, ' says he, 'let us, being more lovable men than Titus, goup unto these walls and give the Jews a chance to be kind. '

"Josephus turns pale, but Nicanor rides upon Jerusalem. And at thatwhat should a miscreant Jew do but string an arrow and plunge itnicely, like a bodkin in a pincushion, in the fat shoulder of the Gad!Alas! It was the ruin of the Holy City! When Titus, pale with concern, reaches his friend kicking on the ground, does the Gad curse the Jewsand inveigh against the hardy walls that contain them? Not he! Hestruggles about so that he may look into the eyes of Titus andcommands him to make war on them instantly under pain of theaccusation of partiality to them against his friends! And behold, waris declared. I, with mine own eyes, saw siege laid effectively aboutour unhappy city!"

She gazed at him with alarmed, angry, accusing eyes. 

"And yet you do nothing!" she said to him. 

He smiled and let his lazy glance slip over her, but he made noresponse. 

"O Philadelphus, " she said to him, "how you affront opportunity!"

"There are more captivating things than such opportunity. I have knownfrom the beginning that there was nothing here. "

She looked at him with unquiet eyes. Why, then, had he written soconfidently to her father, if he had not believed in the hope forJudea?

"From the beginning?" she repeated with inquiry. "You wrote my fatherfrom Cęsarea--"

"Your father?" he repeated, smiling with insinuation. 

"My father!"

"Who is your father?" he asked. 

She turned away from him and walked to the other end of the garden. Hehad never meant to aspire to the Judean throne! He had simply writtenso determinedly to Costobarus, that the merchant of Ascalon would haveno hesitancy in giving him two hundred talents! In these past days, she had learned enough that was blameworthy in this Philadelphus tomake him more than despicable in her eyes. Again, as hourly since thelast interview in the depression in the hills beyond the well, thefine bigness of that lovable companion of his, that had vanished forall time from her life, rose in radiant contrast. She turned back toher husband, with the pallor of longing and homesickness in her face. 

"Does this other woman see no fault in this, your idleness?" shedemanded. 

"She! By the Shades, she sees nothing in me but fault! I would get meup like a sane man and go out of this mad place, but she hath lockedup her dowry away from me, which was the simple cause that invited meto join her, and bids me go without her. And I might--but for oneother attraction, dearer than the treasure, which also I would takewith me. "

"Even if she forces you into deeds, I shall forgive her, " she declaredat last. 

He smiled a baffling smile and she looked at him in despair. The verycharm of his personal appearance awakened resentment in her; his deftand easy complaisance angered her because it could be effective. Shehated the superficial excellence in him which made him a pleasantcompanion. He had refused to discuss her identity further, except toprevent her in her own attempts to identify herself. He did not referto the incidents of their journey to Jerusalem, but she felt that hewas conscious of all these things, and her resentment was so greatthat she put it out of sight, lest at the time when she should beproved she would have come to hate him to the further thwarting oftheir work for Israel. 

"It is sweet to have you concerned for me. Now you may understand howmuch I am troubled for your own welfare. Do not regard me with thatunbending gaze. I am, first and before all else, your friend. "

"You have changed, " she said slowly. "I did not find in you thissolicitude in the hills. "

"Unhappiness, " he sighed, "makes most men law-less. I should be evennow as bad, were I not sure of the sympathy you feel for me. "

She looked at him with large disdain. 

"Does not this woman treat you well?" she asked with the first glimmerof sarcasm in her eyes. 

"Her displeasure in me is that I do not make her a queen; yours, however, that I can not save this doomed nation! Her ambitions are forherself; yours are for me. Which waketh the response in my heart, lady?"

"What have I lived for?" she burst out. "For what was I brought up andschooled? For what have I sacrificed all the light and desirablethings of my youth, but for--"

"Nay! Do not show me, yet, that you are only bent on being queen!" heexclaimed. 

"I care for nothing but the rescue of Judea!" she cried passionately. "There is nothing left to me but that!"

"Then your ambitions are still for me. Alas, that the Messiah has comeand gone!"

It was his first reference to the great calamity he had told to her ashort time before. Its recurrence after she had resolved to regard itas an impossible and blasphemous tale brought a chill to her heart. 

"If I can prove to you that there is no hope for Jerusalem, whatthen?" he asked suddenly. 

She flung off the question with a gesture. 

"Answer me. What then?"

"It is unimaginable what shall come to pass when God deserts His own. "

"No need for imaginings. Look at Jerusalem and observe the fact. Andif we be abandoned, what fealty do we owe to a God that deserts us? Ifyou believe or not you are lost. Let us go out and live. "

"If God has deserted us, " she said scornfully, "how shall we behappier elsewhere than here?"

"Every god to its own country. The Olympians are a jovial lot. I haveseen Joy's very self in heathendom. "

She moved away but he rose and followed her. 

"Whoever you are, " he said in another tone, "your heritage ofinnocence and earnestness is plain as an open scroll upon your face. Nothing in all the world so appeals to the generosity in the heart ofa man as the purity of the woman who is pure. I have said that I amyour friend. I do not hold it against you that you doubt that word. Nothing remains but the deed to confirm it. This place is lost--asgood as a heap of ashes and splintered rock, this hour! Come away!I'll sacrifice the treasure to protect you!"

"Philadelphus, " she said gravely, "we were sent hither to succeed orto suffer the penalty of our failure. My father died that we mighthave this opportunity. We must use it, or perish with it!"

He shook his head and walked away a step or two. 

"You have not the true meaning of life, " he said. "Indeed how few ofus understand! Obstacles are not an incentive toward attainingimpossible things. They are barriers set up by the kindly disposedgods to inform man that he is opposing destiny when he aspires tothings he should not have. We were not made to fling ourselves againstmighty opposition throughout the little daylight we have; to woundourselves, to deny ourselves, to alienate that winsome spritePleasure, to attain something which was not intended for us by thesigns of the obstructions placed in our paths. Who are we that weshould achieve mightily! What are we when the gods have done with us, but a handful of dust! Who saves himself from age and unloveliness andultimate imbecility, by all the superhuman efforts he may exert! Apest on the first morose man that made dismal endeavor a virtue!"

She looked at him with amazement, though until that hour she believedthat this man could astonish her no more. 

"Misfortune comes often enough without our knocking at her door, " hecontinued. "Mankind is the only creature with conceit enough to seekto emulate the gods. It is wrong to think that to be moral is to bemiserable. Nature's scheme for us, faithfully fulfilled, is alwayspleasurable. We have only to recognize it, and receive its benefits. Nothing on earth is luckier than man, if he but knew it. A murrain onambition! Let us be glad!"

How could she be glad with such a man! The time, the call of the hour, the need of her nation, the obligation to her dead father--all thesethings stood in her way. How had she felt, were this that engagingstranger who had called himself Hesper, urging her to be glad withhim! She felt, then and there, the recurrence of guilt which the sightof the reproachful face of Momus had brought to her when she foundherself forgetting her loyalty in the presence of that winsome man. The thought stopped the bitter speech that rose to her lips. Shelooked away and made no answer. He was close beside her. 

"Come away and let this woman who wishes the kingdom have it. She hadliefer be rid of me than not. "

She gazed at him with a peculiar blankness stealing over her face. 

"Oh, for the quintessence of all compounded oaths to charge my vow!"he said. 

"For what?" she asked. 

"My love, Phryne!"

At the old pagan name with which he had affronted her that morning inthe hills, Laodice drew back sharply. 

"Dost thou believe in me?" she asked. 

"Believe what?"

"That I am thy wife. "

"Tut! Back to the old quarrel! No! But by Heaven, thou art mysweetheart!"

She stopped at the edge of an exclamation and looked at him withwidening eyes. 

"Come, let us get out of this place. I can get the dowry! Let her stayhere and be queen over this place if she will. I had rather possessyou than all the kingdoms!"

But Laodice flung him off while a flame of anger crimsoned her face. 

"Thou to insult me, thy lawful wife!" she brought out between clenchedteeth. "Thou to offer affront to thine own marriage! I to live inshame with mine own husband!"

The insult in his speech overwhelmed her and after a moment'slingering for words to express her rage, she turned and fled back toher room and barred her door upon him. 

After sunset the lights leaped up in the hall of Amaryllis the Greek. Presently there came a knock at Laodice's door. The girl, fearing thatPhiladelphus stood without, sat still and made no answer. A momentlater the visitor spoke. It was the little girl who acted as page forthe Greek. 

"Open, lady; it is I, Myrrha. "

Laodice went to the windows. 

"Amaryllis sends thee greeting and would speak with thee, in herhall, " the girl said. 

Reluctantly Laodice, who feared the revelation which the light mighthave to make of her stunned and revolted face, followed the page. 

The Greek was standing, as if in evidence that the interview would notbe long. She noted the intense change on the face of her young guestand watched her narrowly for any new light which her disclosure wouldbring. 

"I have sent for thee, " the Greek began smoothly, "to tell theesomewhat that I should perhaps withhold, that thou shouldst sleepwell, this night. But it is a perplexity perhaps thou wouldst face atonce. "

Laodice bowed her head. 

"It is this: Titus and his friend, Nicanor, approached too close thewalls this day, and Nicanor was wounded by an arrow. In retaliation, perfect siege hath been laid about the walls. None may come into thecity. "

"And--Momus, my servant, " Laodice cried, waking for the first time tothe calamity in this blockade, "he can not come back to me?"

"No. If he attempts it, he will be captured and put to death. "

Laodice clasped her hands, while drop by drop the color left her face. 

"In God's name, " she whispered, "what will become of me?"

Amaryllis made no answer. 

"Can--can I not go out?" Laodice asked presently, depending entirelyon the Greek as adviser. 

"You can--but to what fortune? Perhaps--" She stopped a moment. "No, "she continued, "you have never been in a camp. No; you can not goout. "

"What, then, am I to do?" Laodice cried with increasing alarm. 

Amaryllis shrugged her shoulders. 

"I can advise with John, " she said. "Doubtless he will allow you toremain here until you can provide yourself with other shelter. "

Laodice heard this cold sentence with a chill of fear that was new toher. Faint pictures of hunger and violence, terrifying in the extreme, confronted her. Yet not any of them frightened her more than theoffered favor of the Gischalan. Her indignation at the woman who hadsupplanted her swept over her with a reflexive flush of heat. 

"God of my fathers, judge her in her lies, and pour the fire of Thywrath upon her!" she exclaimed vehemently. 

Amaryllis gazed curiously at the girl. In her soul, she asked herselfif there might not be unsounded depths of fierceness in this naturewhich she ought not to stir up. 

"Thou hast hope, " she said tactfully. "She hath no such beauty asthine!"

"Nothing but my proofs!" Laodice broke in. 

"And Philadelphus is a young man. "

"Rejecting her only because I am fairer than she! He is no just man!"Laodice cried hotly. 

"Softly, child, " the Greek said, smiling; "thou hast said that he isthy husband. "

Laodice turned away, her brain whirling with anger, fear and shame. 

"Well?" said the Greek coolly, after a silence. 

"Where shall I go?" Laodice asked. 

"Thou hast been too tenderly nurtured to go into the streets. I shallask John to shelter thee until thou canst care for thyself. "

Laodice looked at her without understanding. 

"Thou canst not stay here for long because the wife to Philadelphus isin a way a power in my house and she will not suffer it. But neverfear; Jerusalem is not yet so far gone that it would not enjoy apretty stranger. "

The curious sense of indignation that possessed Laodice was purelyinstinctive. Her mind could not sense the actual insult in the Greek'swords. 

"I would advise you to be kind to Philadelphus. "

"But, but--" Laodice cried, struggling with tears and shame, "he hasthis day offered insult to his own marriage with me, by asking that Ilive in shame with him till it could be proved that I am his wife!"

The Greek's smile did not change. 

"If we weigh all the unpleasantness of wedded life in too delicate abalance, my friend, I fear there would be little, indeed, that wouldescape condemnation as humiliating. "

Laodice raised her scarlet face to look in wonder at the Greek. Thecold smiling lips dismayed her for a moment. 

"And thou seest no shame in this?" she faltered. 

"Thou sayest he is thy husband; why resent it?"

"Dost thou not see--see that--what am I but a shameless woman, if Ilive with him, though I be married to him thrice over!"

"After all, " said the Greek, after a silence which said more thanwords, "it is the consciousness of your own integrity which mustinfluence you; not what others think of you. It is not as if yourhusband thought better of you than you really are. "

"And you believe that I--" Laodice began and stopped, bewildered. 

Amaryllis, smiling, moved toward the inner corridor of her house. Atthe threshold of the arch she called back:

"Please yourself, my friend, " and was gone. 

Laodice was, by this time, stunned and intensely repelled. The hand onwhich Amaryllis had laid hers in passing tingled under the touch. Unconsciously she shook off the sensation of contact. The whole clearwhite interior of the hall became instantly unclean. Her standards ofright and wrong were shaken; the wholesale assaults on her ideals lefther shocked and unconfident. She felt the panic that all innocentwomen feel when suddenly aroused to the unfitness of theirsurroundings. 

When she turned to hurry to her room, a flood of scarlet rushed intoher cheeks and she shrank back, shaken with surprise and delight. 

Before her stood a man, pale and thin, with his eyes upon her. 

Chapter XII

THE PRINCE RETURNS

Joseph, the shepherd, son of Thomas of Pella, moved out of the greenmarsh before sunset, as he had planned to do, but not for the originalmotive. The sheep, indeed, would not have flourished in that dampness, rich as it was in young grass, but, more than that, there was noshelter for the wounded man who lay by the roadside. 

The shepherd, who knew the hills of Judea as far as the Plain ofEsdraelon as well as he knew the stony streets of the Christian city, located the nearest roof as one which a fagot-maker had occupied twoyears before. It was some distance up in the hills to the west. Sincethe scourge of war had passed over Palestine, there were scores ofsuch hovels, vacant and abandoned to the bats and the small wild lifeabout the countryside, and the boy doubted seriously if the thatchthat covered it were still whole. But he attracted the attention of apair of robust young Galileans on the way to the Passover, and, bytheir help, carried the wounded man to shelter in this hut. Urge, thesheep-dog, rushed the sheep out of the sedge and hurried them afterhis master, and in an hour Joseph was once more settled, his sheepwere once more nosing over the rocky slants of a hill, his dog oncemore flat on his belly, watching. But it was a different day, afterall. 

The hut of the fagot-maker was the four walls and a roof and the earththat floored it, but it was wealth because it was shelter. It had twodoors which were merely openings in the sides and between them lay theman on sheep-pelts with a cotton abas, which one of the Galileans hadleft, over him. At one of these doors, sitting sidewise, so that hecould watch in or out, sat Joseph. 

All night the man on the sheepskins spoke to the blackened thatchabove him of the siege of Jerusalem and the treachery of Julian ofEphesus. He read letters from Costobarus and instructed Aquila overand over again. Then he tossed a coin and spent hours counting thehairs in the long locks that fell from the shining head of the moondown upon his breast, at midnight. 

At times the boy, with the exquisite beauty of sleep on his heavylids, would creep over from his vigil at the door and lay his coolhand on the sick man's forehead. And the sick man would speak in a lowcontrolled voice, saying:

"Naaman being a leper, my friend, why was not the law fulfilledagainst him?"

But the soothing influence of that touch did not endure. Again, hetook census of the fighting-men of Judea, by the Roman statisticswhich he had from the decurion, and searched through his tunic for hiswallet to write down the result. Failing to find it, he raised himselfto shout for Julian to return his property. 

Again the cool hands would stroke the fevered forehead and the sickman would say:

"Good my Lord, they fetched snow from the mountains to cool thiswine. "

But how white the hands of that fair girl in the hills! Why, thesehands beside hers were as satyrs' hooves to anemones! Her lashes wereso long, and he knew that her lips were as cool as the heart of amelon; but that husband of hers knew better than he!

And he, grandson of the just Maccabee, allied by marriage to the nobleline of Costobarus through his daughter, Laodice, the bride with thegreatest dowry in Judea, had staked his soul on the toss of a coin andhad lost it!

At this the shepherd boy straightened himself and gave attention. 

But he was wholly lost, the sick man would go on, rolling his headfrom side to side; he could not join Laodice because he had loved awoman of the wayside and could not cast out that love; he was not aJew because he had rather linger with this strange beauty in the hillsthan hasten on the rescue of Jerusalem; he had not apostatized, thoughhe was as wholly lost as if he had done so; he hated the heathen andwould not be one of them. He would abide in the wilderness and perish, if this young spirit that abode by his side, with a face likeMichael's and a form so like the shepherd David's, would only sufferthe darkness to come at him. 

"Unless I mistake, " the little shepherd said at such times, "there ismore than a wound troubling this head. "

Thus day in and day out the shepherd watched by the sick man who hadno medicine but the recuperative powers of his strong young body. Sothere came a night when the boy, rousing from a doze into which he haddropped, saw the sick man stretched upon his pallet motionless as hehad not been for days. The shepherd felt the forehead and the wristsand sank again into slumber. At dawn he rose from the earth which hadbeen his bed throughout this time and went forth to attend his flocks, and when he was gone, the sick man opened his eyes. 

He looked up at the blackened rafters; he looked out at either doorand frowned perplexed, first at the hills, then at the valley. Heraised his head and dropped it suddenly with great amazement and muchweariness. Finally he ventured to lift a wilted and fragile hand andlooked at it. It was not white; but it was unsteady as a laurel leafbeside a waterfall. After a moment's rest from the exertion he partedhis lips to speak, but a whisper faint as the sound of the air in theshrubs issued from them. He listened but there was no answer. Therewas the activity of birds and insects, moving leaves and bleatingsheep without, but it was all blithely indifferent to him. Finally heextended his arms and pressing them on his pallet tried to rise, buthe could have lifted the earth as easily. Falling back and dazed withweakness, he lay still and slept again. 

When he awoke rested sufficiently to think, he recalled that he hadbeen twice stabbed by Julian of Ephesus by the marsh on the road toJerusalem. He had probably been carried to this place and nursed backto life by the householder. 

Then he remembered. In his search after cause for his cousin's attackupon him, he readily fixed upon Julian's rage at the Maccabee'spreėmption of the beautiful girl in the hills. Instantly, the disgraceof violence committed in a quarrel between himself and his cousin overthe possession of a woman, appealed to him. And even as instantly, hisdefiant heart accepted its shame and persisted in its fault. It is anextreme of love, indeed, if no circumstance however impelling raises aregret in the heart of a man; for he flung off with a weak gesture anychiding of conscience against cherishing his dream, and abandonedhimself wholly to his yearning for the girl in the tissue ofmoonbeams. 

There was a quiet step on the earth at the threshold. Joseph, theshepherd, stood there. The two looked at each other; one with inquiryand weakness in his face; the other with good-will and reassurance. 

"Boy, " said the Maccabee feebly, "I have been sick. "

"Friend, I am witness to that. I am your nurse, " the boy replied. 

After a little silence the Maccabee extended his hand. The boy took itwith a sudden flush of emotion, but feeling its weakness, refrainedfrom pressing it too hard, and laid it back with great care on hispatient's breast. The Maccabee looked out at the door, away from thefull eyes of his young host. 

He was touched presently, and a cup of milk was silently put to hislips. He drank and turning himself with effort fell asleep. 

When he awoke again, after many hours, it was night. In the door withhis head dropped back between his shoulders gazing up at the skyoverhead, sat the boy. 

"Where, " the Maccabee began, "are the rest of you?"

The boy turned around quickly, and answered with all seriousness. 

"I am all here. "

"Did you, " the Maccabee began again, after silence, "care for mealone?"

"There has been no one here but us, " the boy said, hesitating at thesymptoms of gratitude in the Maccabee's voice. 

"Us?"

"You and me. "

After another silence, the Maccabee laughed weakly. 

"It requires two to constitute 'us' and I am, by all signs, not awhole one!"

"But you will be in a few days, " the boy declared admiringly. "You arean excellent sick man. "

The Maccabee looked at him meditatively. 

"I am merely perverse, " he said darkly; "I knew it would be so muchpleasure to my murderer to know that I died, duly. "

The shepherd repressed his curiosity, as the best thing for hispatient's welfare, and suggested another subject rather disjointedly. 

"I have been thinking, " he said, "about Jerusalem. I was there onceupon a time. "

"Once!" the Maccabee said. "You are old enough to attend thePassover. "

"But our people do not attend the feast. We are Christians. "

The Maccabee moved so that he could look at the boy. He might haveknown it, he exclaimed to himself. It was just such an extreme act ofmercy, this assuming the care of a stranger in a wilderness, as he hadever known Christians to do in that city of irrational faiths, Ephesus. 

"Well?" he said, hoping the boy would go on and spare him anexpression on that announcement. 

"I can not forget Jerusalem. "

"No one forgets Jerusalem--except one that falls in love by thewayside, " the man said. 

Again the boy detected a ring of unexplained melancholy in hispatient's voice, and talked on as a preventive. 

"Urban, the pastor, took me there. It was in the days of mineinstruction for baptism. He went to Jerusalem to trial, but there wasdisorder in the city about the procurator, who was driven out thatday, and Urban was not called. But he remained, lest he be accused offleeing, and then it was he took me over the walks of Jesus. "

"Jesus--that is the name, " the Maccabee said to himself. "They areborn, given in marriage, fall or flourish, live and die in that name. Likewise they pick up a wounded stranger and care for him in thatname. They are a strange people, a strange people!"

"They would not let us into the Temple, " Joseph went on, "because I aman Arab, born a Christian. So I could not see where Jesus waspresented, in infancy. But we went to the synagogues where He taught;we went out upon Olivet to Gethsemane where He suffered in the Garden;we climbed that hill to the south from which He looked upon the Cityand wept over it, and prophesied this hour. Then we sought the ravinewhere Judas betrayed Him with a kiss, and afterward Urban led me overthe streets by which He was taken first to Annas and to Caiaphas andthence to Pilate and to Herod. After that, by the Way of the Cross toGolgotha; from there to His Tomb. And when we had seen theGuest-chamber and stood upon the Place of the Ascension, I needed nofurther instruction. "

The boy had forgotten his guest. By the rapt light in his eyes, theMaccabee knew that the boy was once more journeying over the stones ofthe streets of the Holy City, or standing awed on the polishedpavements of its lordly interiors, or on the topmost point of herhills with the broad-winged wind from the east flying his long locks. 

"_If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of mymouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy_, " the Maccabeesaid, half to himself. 

The boy heard him, but his patient's words merged with the dream thatheld him entranced. The Maccabee went on. 

"So said the Psalmist to himself, " he said. "What had he to do forJerusalem; what did he fear would win him away from that labor forJerusalem, that he took that vow? It was easy enough to revileBabylon, the oppressor, that stood between him and Jerusalem; but whatif he had been the captive of beauty, and chained by the bonds oflovely hair!"

The boy turned now and looked at the Maccabee. The eyes of the two metfair. Then the Maccabee unburdened his soul and told of the girl tothis child, who was a Christian and a humble shepherd in the starvedhills of Judea. 

"I met her, " the boy said after a long silence. "And by what I learnedof her spirit that night, she will not be happy to know that you havestepped aside for her sake. "

"You met her, also; and you loved her, too?"

The boy assented gravely. The Maccabee slowly lifted his eyes from theyoung shepherd's face, till they rested on the slope of sky filledwith stars visible through the open door. 

"And she would have me go on to this city, to the one who awaits methere and whom I shall not be glad to see; take up the labor that willbe robbed of its chief joy in its success and live the long, long daysof life without her?"

The boy made no answer to this; he knew that this white-faced man waswrestling with himself and comment from him was not expected. By thelight of the failing fire without, he saw that face sober, take onshadow and grow immeasurably sad. The minutes passed and he knew thatthe Maccabee would not speak again. 

Thereafter followed three days of silence, except the essentialcommunication or the mutterings of the Maccabee against his weaknessand unsteadiness. On the fourth day the Maccabee declared that he wasable to travel. Joseph protested, but not for long. He had learned inthe sojourn of his guest that this man was in the habit of doing as hepleased. So the shepherd sighed and let him go reluctantly. 

"But, " he insisted to the last moment, "remember that Pella is a Cityof Refuge. If Jerusalem ceases to be hospitable, come to Pella. "

A thought struck him. 

"She, " he said in a low tone, "promised that she would come. "

"Then expect me, " the Maccabee said. 

The shepherd boy smiled contentedly and blessed the Maccabee and lethim go. As long as the man could see, his young host watched him, andat the summit of the hill the Maccabee turned to wave his finalfarewell. When the path dipped down the other side of the hill, theman felt that more than the sunshine had been cut off by its greatshadow. 

He did not go forward with a light heart. The whole of his purpose hadsuddenly resolved itself into duty. There had been a certain nervousexpectancy that was almost fear in the thought of meeting the grownwoman he had married in her babyhood. He had lived in Ephesus with anunengaged heart in all the crowd of opportunities for love, good andbad. He had magnetism, strength, aloofness and a certain beauty--fourqualifications which had made him over and over again immenselyattractive to all classes of Ephesian women. But whatever his responseto them, he had not loved. Love and marriage were things so apart fromhis activities as to be uninteresting. When finally he was called infull manhood to assume without preliminary both of these things, hewas uncomfortable and apprehensive. But after he had met the girl inthe hills, his sensations of reluctance became emphatic, became anactual dread, so that he thrust away all thought of the domestic sideof the life that confronted him, and bitterly resigned all hope in thetender things that were the portion of all men. The villainy of Julianof Ephesus engaged him chiefly, and his punishment. After that, thenthe establishment of his kingdom, politics, conquest and power--butnot love!

Late that afternoon, he stepped out of a wady west of Jerusalem andhalted. 

Ahead of him ran a road depressed between worn, hard, bare banks ofearth, past a deserted pool, marged with stone, up shining surfaces ofoutcropping rock, through avenues of clustered tombs, pillars, paganmonuments which were tracks of the Herods, dead and abandoned, splendid pleasure gardens, suburban palaces lifeless and still, towardthe looming Tower of Hippicus, brooding over a fast-closed gate. 

The Maccabee nodded. It was as he had expected. The city was besieged. 

It was afternoon, a week-day at the busiest portal of Jerusalem; butsave for the fixed and pygmy sentry upon the tower, there was noliving thing to be seen, no single sound to be heard. 

Beyond the mounting hills of the City of David stood up, shoulderinglike mantles of snow their burden of sun-whitened houses. Above itall, supreme over the blackened masonry of Roman Antonia, stood aglittering vision in marble and gold--the Temple. At a distance itcould not be seen that any of those inwalled splendors lacked;Jerusalem appeared intact, but the multitudes at the gate were absentand the voice of the city was stilled. 

For one expecting to find Jerusalem animated and beholding it stilland lifeless, how quickly its white walls, its white houses and itssparkling Temple became haunted, dead crypts and sepulchers. 

But presently there came across the considerable distance that laybetween him and Jerusalem, a sound remarkably distinct because of theutter stillness that prevailed. It was the jingle of harness and thering of hoof-beats upon stones embedded in the gray earth. 

A Roman in armor polished like gold, with a floating mantlesignificantly bordered in purple, rode slowly into the open space, drew up his horse and stopped. The Maccabee looked at him sharply, then quitted his shelter and walked down toward the rider. At sight ofhim, the horseman clapped his hand to his short sword, but theMaccabee put up his empty hands and smiled at the man of all superioradvantage. Then the light of recognition broke over the Roman's face. 

"You!" he cried. 

"I, Cęsar, " the Maccabee responded. For a moment there was silence inwhich the Jew watched the flickering of amazement and perplexity onTitus' face. 

"What do you here, away from Ephesus, and worse, attempting to run mylines?" he demanded finally. 

The Maccabee signed toward the walls. 

"My wife is there, " he said briefly. 

The Roman made an exclamation which showed the sudden change toenlightenment. 

"Solicitous after these many years?" he demanded. 

"She has two hundred talents, " the Maccabee replied. 

Titus smiled and shook his head. 

"I ought to keep her there. Rome must get treasure enough out of thatrebellious city to repay her for her pains in subjugating it. "

"Pay yourself out of another pocket than mine. It will take twohundred talents to repay me for all that I have suffered to get it. Iwant the countersign, Titus. You owe me it. "

"Will you come out of there, at once?" the Roman demanded. "Not that Isuspect you will make the city harder to take, but I should dislike tomake war on an old comrade in my Ephesian revels. "

The Maccabee looked doubtful. 

"I can not promise, " he said. "At least do not hold off the siegeuntil you see me again without the walls. It might lose you prestigein Rome. "

Titus swung his bridle while he gazed at the Maccabee. 

"I wish Nicanor were here, " he said finally. "He might be able to seeharm in you; but I never could. You will have to promise mesomething--anything so it is a promise--before I can let you in. Something to appease Nicanor, else I shall never hear the last ofthis. "

The Maccabee laughed, the sudden harsh laugh of one impelled toamusement unexpectedly. 

"Assure Nicanor, for me, that I shall come out of Jerusalem one day. Dead or alive, I shall do it! You need not add that I did not specifythe date of my exodus. What is the word?"

"Berenice. And Jove help you! Farewell. "

Titus rode on. 

A little later, after a parley with the Roman sentries and again withthe sentries at the Gate of Hippicus, the Maccabee was admitted to theHoly City. 

About him as he passed through the gates were the soldiers of Simon. They were not such men as he expected to see defending the City ofDavid. There was an extravagant, half-pastoral manner about them, apose of which they should not have been conscious at this hour ofperil for the nation and the hierarchy. He looked at their incomplete, meaningless uniform, at their arms, half savage, at their faces, halfmad, and believed that he, with an army rationally organized andeffectually equipped, would have little difficulty in subduing theunbalanced forces of Simon. 

Since siege was laid, he did not expect to be met by Amaryllis'servant in the purple turban. He approached a citizen. 

"I seek Amaryllis, the Seleucid, " he said. 

The eye of the Jew traveled over him, with some disapproval. 

"The mistress of the Gischalan?" was the returned inquiry. TheMaccabee assented calmly. The young man indicated a broad streetmoving with people which led with tolerable directness toward the baseof Moriah. 

"Hence to the Tyropean Bridge at the end of this street; thence downbeside the bridge into Gihon. Cross to the wall supporting Moriah andbuilded against it thou wilt find a new house, of the fashion of theGreeks. If thou canst pass her sentries, thou wilt find her within. "

The Maccabee thanked his informant and turned through the Passoverhosts to follow the directions. 

To a visitor recently familiar with the city, Jerusalem would havebeen strange; he would have been lost in its ruined and disorderedstreets. But this man came with only the four corners of the compassto direct him and the Temple as a landmark to guide him. Thereforethough he entered upon territory which he had not traversed sincechildhood he went forward confidently. 

It was not simple; it was not readily done; but the darkness found himat his destination. 

When he was within a rod of the house, he was halted by a Jewishsoldier. He whispered to the man the word which Amaryllis had sent tohim, and the soldier stepped aside and let him pass. 

In another moment he was admitted to the house of Amaryllis. 

A wick coated with aromatic wax burned in the brass bowl on a tripodand cast a crystal clear light down upon the exedra and the delicatelectern with its rolls of parchment and brass cylinders from whichthey had been withdrawn. Opposite, with her arms close down to hersides, her hands clenched, her shoulders drawn up, stood the girl hehad played for and won in the hills of Judea!

Chapter XIII

A NEW PRETENDER

A sudden wave of delight, a sudden rush of blood through his veins, swept before it and away for that time all memory of his struggle andhis resolution to renounce her. All that was left was the irresistiblestorm of impulse upon his reserve and his self-control. 

When she recognized him, she started violently, smote her handstogether and gazed at him with such overweening joy written on herface, that he would have swept her into his arms, but for her quickrecovery and retreat. In shelter behind the exedra she halted, fendedfrom him by the marble seat. He gazed across its back at her with allthe love of his determined soul shining in his eyes. 

"You! You!" she cried. 

"But you!" he cried back at her across the exedra. 

The preposterousness of their greetings appealed to them at thatmoment and they both laughed. He started around the exedra; she movedaway. 

"Stay!" he begged. "I want only to touch--your hand. "

Shyly, she let him take both of her hands, and he lifted them in spiteof her little show of resistance and kissed them. 

"We might have saved ourselves farewells and journeyed together, " hesaid blithely. 

"But I thought you had gone back to Ephesus, " she said. 

"What! After you had told me you were going to Jerusalem? No. I havebeen nursing a knife wound in a sheep hovel in the hills since an hourafter I saw you last. "

Her lips parted and her face grew grave, deeply compassionate andgrieved. If there remained any weakness in his frame before thatmoment, the spell of her pity enchanted him to strength again. Hefound himself searching for words to describe his pain, that he mightelicit more of that curative sweet. 

"I was very near to death, " he added seriously. 

"What--what happened?" she asked, noting the pallor on his face underthe suffusion which his pleasure had made there. 

"There was one more in the party than was needed; so my amiablecompanion reduced the number by stabbing me in the back, " heexplained. 

There was instant silence. Slowly she drew away from him. Entirepallor covered her face and in her eyes grew a horror. 

"Did--do you say that Philadelphus stabbed--you--in the back?" sheasked, speaking slowly. 

"Phila--" he stopped on the brink of a puzzled inquiry, and for aspace they regarded each other, each turning over his own perplexityfor himself. 

"Ask me that again, " he commanded her suddenly. "I did notunderstand. "

She hesitated and closed her lips. Her husband had stabbed this man inthe back! Because of her? No! Philadelphus had refused to believe her. Why then should he have committed such a deed?

"So you are not ready to believe it of this--Philadelphus?" he asked, venturing his question on an immense surmise that was forcing itselfupon him. 

She looked at him with beseeching eyes. How was she to regard herselfin this matter? A partizan of the man she hated, or a sympathizer withthis stranger who had already given her too much joy? Was she never toknow any good of this man to whom she was wedded? For a moment losingsight of her concern for Judea and her resolution that her fathershould not have died in vain, she was rejoiced that another woman hadtaken her place by his side. The quasi liberty made her interest inthis stranger at least not entirely sinful. 

"Who are you?" he demanded finally. 

How, then, could she tell him that she was the wife of the man who hadtreacherously attempted his life? How, also, since she was denied byevery one in that house, expect him to believe her? The bitterness ofher recent interview with Amaryllis rose to the surface again. 

"I am nothing; I have no name; I am nobody!" she cried. 

He was startled. 

"What is this? Are you not welcome in this house?" he demanded. 

"Yes--and no! Amaryllis is good--but--"

"But what?"

She shook her head. 

"Surely, thou canst speak without fear to me, " he said gently. 

"There is--only Amaryllis is kind, " she essayed finally. 

He laid his hand on her wrist. 

"Is it--the woman from Ascalon?" he asked, his suspicion lightinginstantly upon the wife whom he had expected to meet. 

She flung up her head and gazed at him with startled eyes. He believedthat he had touched upon the fact. 

"So!" he exclaimed. 

"She has deceived Philadelphus--" she whispered defensively, but hebroke in sharply. 

"Whom hath she deceived?"

She closed her lips and looked at him perplexed. Certainly this wasthe companion of Philadelphus, who had told her freely half of herhusband's ambitions, long before he had come to Jerusalem. She couldnot have betrayed her husband in thus mentioning his name. 

"Your companion of the journey hither--whom you even nowaccused--Philadelphus Maccabaeus. "

There was a dead pause in which his fingers still held her wrist andhis deep eyes were fixed on her face. He was recalling by immensemental bounds all the evidence that would tend to confirm thesuspicion in his brain. He had told her his own story but had investedit in Julian of Ephesus. His wallet, with all its proofs, was gone;the Ephesian had examined him carefully to know if any one inJerusalem would recognize him; and lastly, without cause, Julian hadstabbed him in the back. Could it be possible that Julian of Ephesus, believing that he had made way with the Maccabee, had come toJerusalem, masquerading under his name?

While he stood thus gazing, hardly seeing the face that looked up athim with such troubled wonder, he saw her turn her eyes quickly, shrink; and then wrenching her hands from his, she fled. 

He looked up. Two women were standing before him. 

"I seek Amaryllis, the Seleucid, " he said, recovering himself. 

"I am she, " the Greek said, stepping forward. 

"Thou entertainest Laodice, daughter of Costobarus of Ascalon?" headded. 

The Greek bowed. 

"I would see her, " he said bluntly. 

Amaryllis signed to the woman at her side. 

"This is she, " she said simply. 

The Maccabee looked quickly at the woman. After his closecommunication with the beautiful girl for whom his heart warmed as ithad never done before, he was instantly aware of an immense contrastbetween her and the woman who had been introduced to him at thatmoment. They were both Jewesses; both were beautiful, each in her ownway; both appeared intelligent and winsome. But he loved the girl, andthis woman stood in the way of that love. Therefore her charms werenullified; her latent faults intensified; all in all she repelled himbecause she was an obstacle. 

The injustice in his feelings toward her did not occur to him. He wasangry because she had come; he hated her for her stateliness; he foundhimself looking for defects in her and belittling her undeniablegraces. Confused and for the moment without plan, he looked at herfrowning, and with cold astonishment the woman gazed back at him. 

"Thou art Laodice, daughter of Costobarus?" he asked, to gain time. 

She inclined her head. 

"When--when dost thou expect Philadelphus?" he asked next. 

"Why do you ask?" she parried. 

"I--I have a message for him, " he essayed finally. "Is he here?"

"Tell me, who art thou?" the woman asked pointedly. 

A vision of the girl, flushed and trembling with pleasure at sight ofhim, flashed with poignant effect upon him at that moment. The warmthand softness of her hands under the pressure of his happy lips wasstill with him. It would be infidelity to his own feelings to renounceher then. It was becoming a physical impossibility for him to acceptthis other woman. 

He hesitated and reddened. An old subterfuge occurred to him at adesperate minute. 

"I--I am Hesper--of Ephesus, " he essayed. 

"What is thy business with Philadelphus?" the woman persisted. 

Again the Maccabee floundered. It had been easy to invent a story tokeep the woman he loved from discovering that he was a married man, but the point in question was different. Now, filled with dismay andindignation, apprehension and reluctance, his fertile mind failed himat the moment of its greatest need. 

And the eyes of the Greek, filling with suspicion and intenseinterest, rested upon him. 

"I asked, " the actress repeated calmly, "thy business withPhiladelphus. "

At that instant a tremendous shock shook the house to its foundations;the hanging lamps lurched; the exedra jarred and in an instant severalof the servants appeared at various openings into passages. Before anyof the group could stir, a second thunderous shock sent a tremor overthe room, and a fragment of marble detached from a support overheadand dropped to the pavement. 

"It is an attack!" Amaryllis cried. 

"On this house?" Salome demanded. 

There was a clatter of arms and several men in Jewish armor rushedthrough the chamber from the passage that led in from the Temple. 

"I shall see, " said the Maccabee, and followed the men at once. 

Without he saw the night sky overhead crossed by dark stones flyingover the wall to the east. Warfare had begun. 

But the attack was simply preliminary and desultory. It ceased whilehe waited. Presently it began farther toward the north. The catapulthad been moved. The Maccabee hesitated in the colonnade. 

The beautiful girl in the house of Amaryllis was in no further danger. The interruption had saved him at a critical moment. 

He walked down the steps and out into the night. 

"Liberty!" he whispered with a sigh of relief. "Now what to do?"

Chapter XIV

THE PRIDE OF AMARYLLIS

The night following the wounding of Nicanor, John spent on hisfortifications expecting an attack. It was one of the few nights whenthe Gischalan kept vigil, for he refused to contribute fatigue to theprospering of his cause. 

Sometime in mid-morning he appeared in the house of Amaryllis and senta servant to her asking her to breakfast with him. The Greek sent himin return a wax tablet on which she had written that she was shut upin her chamber writing verse, but that she had provided him acompanion as entertaining as she. 

When he passed into the Greek's dining-room, the woman who calledherself wife to Philadelphus awaited him at the table. 

When he sat she dropped into a chair beside him and laid before him abunch of grapes from Crete, preserved throughout the winter in casksfilled with ground cork. 

"It is the last, Amaryllis says, " she observed. "And siege is laid. "

John looked ruefully at the fruit. 

"Perhaps, " he said after thought, "were I a thrifty man and a spitefulone, I would not eat them. Instead, I should have the same clusterserved me every morning that I might say to mine enemies, with truth, that I have Cretan grapes for breakfast daily. They will keep, " headded presently, "for it is tradition that stores laid up for siegenever decay. "

"Obviously, " said the woman, "they do not last long enough. "

John plucked off one of the light green grapes and ate it with relish. 

"Since thou doubtest the tradition, I shall not have these spoil. "

"But you destroy even a better boast over your enemy. Then you couldsay to him, 'We can not consume all our food. Behold the grapes rot inthe lofts!'"

John smiled. 

"Half of the lies go to preserve another's opinion of us. How much werespect our fellows!"

"Be comforted; there are as many lying for our sakes! But how goes itwithout on the walls?"

"Against Rome or against Simon?"

"Both. "

"Ill enough. But when Titus presses too close Simon will lay down hishostility toward me; and when Titus becomes too effective, we are tohave a divine interference, so our prophets say. "

"I observe, " the woman said, "we Jews at this time are relying much onthe prophets to fight our battles. Behold, our stores will hold out, we say, because it is said; and we shall fight indifferently, becauseDaniel hath bespoken a Deliverer for us at this time!"

John, with his wine-glass between thumb and finger, looked at her. 

"I should expect a heretic to be so critical for us, " he said. 

The woman sat with her elbows on the table, her chin in her hands, gazing moodily at the sunlight falling through the brass grill overthe windows on the court. She ignored his remark, but answeredpresently in another tone. 

"There is nothing to employ a surfeited mind in this city. "

"No?" he said lightly, while interest began to awaken in his eyes. "The making of enjoyment is here. I have found it so. "

"Perchance you have, " but she halted and resumed her moody gaze at theflood of sunlight. 

"Are you weary?" he asked. "What is it?"

"Idleness! Eating, sleeping--no; not even that; for idleness stealsaway my appetite and my repose. "

"Strange restiveness for one reared in the quiet inner chambers of aJewish house, " he observed. 

Her eyes dropped away to the floor; he saw that she was breathingquickly. 

"I dreamed of a free life once, " she said in a restrained way. "I havenot since been satisfied. I dreamed of cities and kings, that weremine! of crises that I dared, of--of things that I did!"

There was indignation and pride in the words, too much recollection ofan actuality to rise from the reminiscences of a dream. John watchedher alertly. 

"Enough will happen here in time to divert you, " he said. 

She made a motion with her hand that swept the round of masonry abouther. 

"Not until this falls. "

"Come, then, up into my fortress and see my fellows from Gischala, " heoffered. "They fled with me from that city when Titus took it andtogether we came to this place. They are hardened to disaster; theyand death are fellow-jesters. "

"Soldiers?"

"Everything! Better athletes than soldiers, better mummers thanathletes; villains most engaging of all!"

She showed no interest and, after a critical pause, he continued:

"They robbed the booth of some costumer whom the Sadducees had maderich and captured a maid whom they held until she had taught them howto use henna and kohl. So I had a garrison of swearing girls untilthey wearied of the fatigue of stepping mincingly and untangling theirgarments. It was that which robbed the sport of its pleasure andchanged my harem back to a fortress. But while it lasted they werekings over Jerusalem. And what dear mad dangerous wantons they were!What confusion to short-sighted citizens; what affrights to sociablemaidens! Even I laughed at them. "

"What antics indeed!" she murmured perfunctorily. 

"Now they want new entertainment; something immense and different, " hesaid. 

She looked up at him; in her eyes he read, "Even as I do!"

"But they are not unique in that, " he continued. "All the world seeksdiversion. Observe the pretty stranger come here fresh from somelady's tiring-room, hunting adventure, bearding thee and wearing thyname!"

Her eyes sparkled. 

"She shall have adventure enough, " she declared. 

"I hear, " John pursued, "that she does not expect her servant toreturn, whom she sent to Ascalon for proofs. "

"No?" the woman cried, sitting up. 

"How can she, when the siege is laid?"

There was a moment of silence. The woman drew in a deep breath thatwas wholly one of relief. 

"Now what will she do?" she asked. 

"She expects, " John answered, "the mediation of the Messiah. It is thetalk among the slaves that He is in the city and she has heard it. Sheseems not to be overconfident, however. "

"It is her end, " the woman remarked with meaning. 

"Perchance not. She is a good Jew, it seems, whatever else she may be, and every good Jew may have his wishes come to pass if the Messiahcome. So it has become the national habit to expect the Messiah inevery individual difficulty. Now, according to prophecies, the time isof a surety ripe and the whole city is expectant. She may have herwish. "

She stared at him coolly. There was implied disbelief in this speech. She debated with herself if it would serve to resent his doubt. Whatever her conclusion she added no more to the discussion ofLaodice's hopes. 

"Are you expectant?" she asked. 

"I see the need of a Messiah, " he responded. 

"Doubtless. You and Simon do not unite the city; nothing but anunited, confident and supremely capable people can resist Rome in eventhis most majestic fortification in the world--unless miracle beperformed, indeed. "

"Nothing but a divine visitor can achieve union here. "

"What an event to behold!" she mused. "That would be an excitement!Surely that would be a new thing! No one really ever beheld a godbefore. "

"What learned things dreams are! What things of experience!" heremarked with a sly smile. She refused to observe his insisteddisbelief in her claim, but went on as if to herself. 

"Whatever Jove can do, man can do!" she declared. "I never heard thatthe gods do more than change maidens into trees or themselves intoswans for an old mortal purpose that even man's a better adept at. Whycan there not rise one who is greater than Alexander and of stouterheart than Julius Cęsar? There is no limit to the greatness ofmankind. Behold, here is a city rich beyond even the wealth ofCroesus; and a country which the emperor is longing to bestow uponsome orderly king! Heavens, what an opportunity! I could pray, Jerusalem should pray, that the hour may bring forth the man!"

Her eyes shone with an unnatural yearning. The immense scope of herdesires suddenly brought a smile to his lips that he checked in time. He had remembered offering his Idumeans in women's clothing for herdiversion. 

Hunger for power, the next greatest hunger after hunger for love! Hefelt that he stood in the presence of a desire so immense that itbelittled his own hopes. He was not too much of a Jew to have sympathywith the ambition that dwells in the breasts of women. Cleopatra hadbeen an evil that he had admired profoundly, because she had attainedthat which his own soul yearned after but which had eluded him. Yet hewas large enough not to be envious of a success. He was made of thestuff that seekers of excitement are made of. If he could not furnishthe intoxication of activity he was a ready supporter of that one whocould. 

"What disorder, then, in the world, " she went on, as if she hadfollowed a train of imagination through the triumph of the risen greatman. "Rome, the ruler of nations humbled! Conquest from Germany to theFirst Cataract, from Gaul to the dry rocks of Ecbatana! A world inanarchy, for one greater than Alexander to subjugate! The ancientsplendor of Asia, the wisdom of Africa and the virginity of Europe tobe his, and the homage of the four corners of the earth to be to him!"

John said nothing. Before him, the woman had entirely stripped off herdisguise. Now for the purpose!

At that moment one of Amaryllis' servants, who had stood guard withoutthe door, dodged apprehensively into the room and fled across to theopposite arch. There he paused, ready for flight, and looked back withwide eyes. John turned hastily but with an impatient gesture fellagain to his neglected meal. The actress looked to see what hadannoyed him. There passed in from the outer corridor a young man, tall, magnificently formed, covered with a turban and draped in quaintgarments, which to her who was familiar with all the guises of thetheater seemed to be Buddhistic. He looked neither to the right norleft, but passed with a step infinitely soft and gliding across to thearch, from which the terrified servant vanished instantly. Thestranger stayed only a dramatic instant on the threshold and thendisappeared into the corridor which led up into the Temple. When hehad gone the startled actress retained a picture of a face, fearless, beatified, mystic to the very edge of the supernatural. 

"Who was that?" she asked of the Gischalan, who was gazing at thecolor of his wine, sitting in a shaft of sunlight. 

"Seraiah! But more than that, no one knows. He appeared with theslaying of Zechariah the Just. He haunts the garrisons. Hence hisname--Soldier of Jehovah!"

"He did not speak; why did he come?"

"He never speaks; he goes where he will; no one would dare to stophim!"

Then suddenly realizing that he was showing disinterest the Gischalandrew himself up and smiled. 

"He is mad; I believe he is mad. The city is full of demoniacs. "

"There is something great about him!" the woman declared. "He seems tobe the instrument of miracle. "

"Is it that?" John asked in an amused tone. 

She studied him for a moment that was tense with meaning. 

"Do you know, " she began slowly, "that neither you nor Simon, nor anyof these who aspire to the control of Jerusalem, have come upon theplan which will best appeal to your distracted subjects?"

"Have we not?" he repeated. "We have bought them and bullied them; weare fighting the Romans for them; we are preaching patience in thewill of the Lord. What more, lady?"

"What have you to offer them in their hope of a Messiah?" she saidpointedly. 

"Messiah! What else is preached in the Temple but the Messiah, or inthe proseuchae or the streets or on the walls? We eat, drink, sleep, fight, buy, sell, rob or restore in the name of the Messiah! They aresurfeited with religion. "

"Are they?" she asked sententiously. "But you haven't given them aMessiah. "

He looked at her without comprehending. 

"You have a mad city here; you can not reason with it; indulge it, then, as you indulge your lunatics, " she suggested. 

He shook his head, smiling that he did not understand her. She turnedagain to Seraiah. 

"Watch him, " she insisted. "He possesses me. "

After a long silence in which John trifled with his wine, she preparedto rise. 

"Send me the roll of the law, " the woman said suddenly. 

"Posthumus shall bring it. He is another lunatic. Experiment with himand learn how I shall act toward the city. "

"Well said, " she averred; "and I will see your Idumeans. Is it properfor me to appear in the Temple?"

The Gischalan's eyes flashed a sudden elation and delight. He bent lowand kissed her hand. 

"And I will fetch somewhat which will divert us, " she added and wasgone. 

When a few moments later John passed again into the Greek's apartment, Amaryllis entered from an inner corridor. Before she spoke to themaster of the house she addressed a servant who had been a momentbefore summoned. 

"Send hither my guest. "

"The stranger?" John asked. "Is she still with you?"

"I mean to add her to my household, if you will, " she explained. 

"Keep her or dismiss her at your pleasure. "

"It shall be for my pleasure. She has a charm that besets me. It willbe entertainment to discover her history. "

"I see no mystery in her. It is plain enough that there is between herand this married Philadelphus some cause for her coming. His wife ismuch more engaging. "

She sighed and dropped into her ivory chair, pushed back the locks offair hair that had loosened from their fillet and waited languidly. 

John studied her critically. In the last hour the slowly dissolvingbond between them seemed to have vanished, wholly, at once. 

"O Queen of Kings, " he said, "art thou lonely in this mad place?"

"I have found diversion, " she answered. 

"With these new guests?"

"With these new guests. Observe them; there are a pair of lovers amongthem, mersed in difficulty, hampering themselves, multiplying sorrowand sure to accomplish the same end as if they had proceeded happily. "

"Interested no longer in thine own passion? Alas, my Amaryllis, thatlove is dead that is interested no longer in itself. "

"O thou bearded warrior, are we then still in the self-centered periodof our romance?"

"I fear not; I see the twilight. "

Amaryllis looked down and her face grew more weary. 

"You have maintained a long fidelity, John, " she said. 

He gazed at her, waiting a further remark, and she went on at last. 

"I wonder why?"

He flung out his hands. 

"Shall I be faithless to Sheba? Is the charm of the Queen of Kingsfaded? Shall I turn from Aphrodite or weary of the lips of Astarte?"

"Nothing so stamps your love of me as wicked, in your own eyes, as thepaganism you fall into when you speak of it!"

He laughed. 

"But it is not that I am lovely which made you a lover--until now, "she went on. "I have seen men faithful to women unlovely as Hecate. Itis not that. And I am still as I was, but--"

He looked down on the triple bands of the ampyx that bound hergold-powdered hair and said:

"It is you who have grown weary; not I. "

She astutely drew back from the ground upon which she had entered. Itlay in the power of this Gischalan to refuse further protection to herout of sheer spite if she made her disaffection too patent. 

"O leader of hosts, canst thou be mummer, languishing poet, pettishwoman and spoiled princeling all in one? No! And I shall love theclanking of arms and thy mailed footsteps all the more if thoupermittest me to look upon irresponsible folly while thou art absent. "

"Have thy way. I have mine. Furthermore, I wish to thank thee for thecompanion thou sentest me at breakfast. He who dines alone with her, hath his table full. Farewell. "

Chapter XV

THE IMAGE OF JEALOUSY

The Maccabee resolved that in spite of his heart-hunger, he must notbe a frequent visitor to the house of Amaryllis because of theimminent risk of confronting the impostor Julian and the danger ofexposure. Not danger to his life, but danger to his freedom to courtthe beautiful girl, which an unmasking might accomplish. Besides, hehad made an extraordinary entry into the Greek's house in thebeginning, and he was not prepared to explain himself even now, if hereturned. 

But his longing to look at her again was stronger than his caution. Much had happened since he had left the house of the Greek on theevening of his first day in Jerusalem, and he feared that hisabsorption in his own plans might result in the loss of her soon orlate. So when the evening of the second week to a day of his sojournin the city came round, unable to endure longer, he turned his stepswith considerable apprehension toward the house of Amaryllis. 

When he was led across the threshold of the Greek's hall, he sawAmaryllis sitting in her exedra, her slim white arms crossed back ofher head, her tiring-woman, summoned for a casual attention, busy witha parted ribbon on the sandal of the lady's foot. 

The Maccabee awaited her invitation. Her eyes flashed a suddenpleasure when she looked up and saw him. 

"Enter, " she said, with an unwonted lightness in her voice that wasusually low and grave; "and be welcome. "

He came to the place she indicated at her side and sat. In silence hewaited until the tiring-woman had finished her service and departed. Then it was Amaryllis who spoke. 

"You left us abruptly on occasion of your first visit. "

"The siege was of greater interest to you than I was. When Idiscovered the cause of the disturbance, you would have failed toremember me. "

"Yet I recall you readily after many days. "

"The city is in disorder; conventions can not always be observed inwar-time. I returned when I could. "

"Our interest in you as our guest has not abated. Philadelphus isready to see you, at any time, " she said, watching his face. 

"And in time of war, " he answered composedly, "we intend many thingsin the first place which we do not carry out in the second. I do notcare to see--Philadelphus. "

She lifted her brows. He answered the implied question. 

"I was a familiar to this Philadelphus; he is young and boastful, talkative as a woman. If he means to be king, as those who knew him inEphesus were given to believe, it is not unnatural that some of us, without fortune or tie to keep us home, should follow him--asparasites, if you will--to share in the largess which he will surelygive his friends if he succeeds. "

He did not face her when he made this speech, and he did not observethe amusement that crept into her eyes. He could not sense his owngreatness of presence sufficiently to know that his claim to be aparasite upon so incapable a creature as the false Philadelphus wouldawaken doubt in the mind of an intelligent woman like Amaryllis. 

He felt that he was not covering his tracks well, and put hisingenuity to a test. 

"The boon-craver therefore should not sit like a dog, begging crumbs, till the table is laid. My hunger would appear as competition, if Ishowed it him, while he is yet unfed. Of a truth, I would not have himknow I am here. "

"I will keep thy secret, " she promised, smiling. 

"I thank you, " he said gravely. "I came, on this occasion, to askafter the young woman, whose name I have not learned--her whom youhave sheltered. "

Amaryllis' smiling eyes darkened suddenly. 

"Pouf!" she said. "I had begun to hope that you had come to see me!"

"I had not John's permission, " he objected. 

"Have you Philadelphus' permission to see her?"

He looked his perplexity. 

"What, " she exclaimed, "has she not laid her claim before you yet?"

The Maccabee shook his head. 

"Know, then, that this pretty nameless creature claims to be the wifeof this same Philadelphus. "

He sat up in his earnestness. 

"What!" he cried. 

"Even so! Insists upon it in the face of the lady princess' proofs andPhiladelphus' denial!"

The Maccabee's brows dropped while he gazed down at the Greek. 

Julian of Ephesus was then the husband that she was to join inJerusalem! Small wonder she had been indignant when he, the Maccabee, in the spirit of mischief, had laid a wife to Julian's door and haddescribed her as most unprepossessing. And that was why her terror ofJulian had been so abject! That was why she had flown to him, astranger, rather than be left alone with a husband who, it seemed, would be rid of her that he might pursue his ends the better!

"What think you of it!" he exclaimed aloud, but to himself. 

"And I never saw in all my life such pretensions of probity!" theGreek continued. "She is outraged by any little word that questionsher virtue; she holds herself aloof from me as if she were not certainthat I am fit for her companionship; and she flies with fluffedfeathers and cries of rage in the face of the least compliment thatcomes from any lips--even Philadelphus!"

The Maccabee continued to gaze at the Greek. He did not see thewoman's search of his face for an assent to her speech. He wasstruggling with a desire to tell her that he was eager to exchange hiswife for Julian's. 

"Perchance she is right, " he said instead. "What know we of thispaganized young Jew? He has been separated from his lady fromchildhood. It is right easy to marry, once we fall into the way. "

"No, no! Her claim is hopeless. She confesses it. But she maintainsthe assumption, nevertheless. "

"Absolutely? No little sign of lapse among thy handsome servants, here?"

"I do not see her when she is with the servants, " she said astutely. 

"What will you do with her?" he asked. 

"She is beautiful, unique, and so eligible to my collection of artsand artists under this roof. She shall stay till fate shows its handfor all of us. "

"You have housed Discord under your roof, then, " he said. "Laodice, the wife to this Philadelphus, will not be a happy woman; and I--Ishall not be a happy man. Let me return favor for your favor to me. Iwill take her away. "

She laughed, though it seemed that a hard note had entered her voice. 

"You will permit me, then, to surmise for myself why you came toJerusalem. You seem to have known this girl before. I shall not askyou; in return for that promise that I may conclude what I will. "

"If you are too discerning, lady, " he answered, while his eyes soughtdown the corridor for a glimpse of the one he had come to see, "youare dangerous. "

"And what then?"

"I must devise a way to silence you. "

She lifted her brows. In that very speech was the portrait of theMaccabee that she had come to love through letters. 

"There is something familiar in your mood, " she said thoughtfully. "Itseems that I have known you--for many years. "

He made no answer. He had said all that he wished to say to thiswoman. She noted his silence and rose. 

"I shall send the girl to you. "

"Thou art good, " he answered and she withdrew. 

A moment later Laodice came into the chamber. She was not startled. Inher innocent soul she did not realize that this was a sign of thedepth of her love for him. He rose and met her half-way across thehall; took her hand and held it while they walked back to the exedra, and gazed at her face for evidence that her sojourn in this house hadbeen unhappy or otherwise; noted that she had let down her hair andbraided it; observed every infinitesimal change that can attract onlythe lover's eye. 

"Sit, " he said, giving her a place beside him. "I came of habit to seeyou. Of habit, I was interrupted. Is there no way that I can talk toyou without the resentment of some one who flourishes a better rightto be with you than I can show?"

"Where hast thou been, " Laodice asked, "so long?"

"Was it long, " he demanded impulsively, "to you?"

"New places, new faces, uncertainty and other things make time seemlong, " she explained hastily. 

"Nay, then, " he said, "I have been busy. I have been attending to thatlabor I had in mind for Judea, of which we spoke in the hills thatmorning. "

Laodice drew in a quick breath. Then some one, if not herself or thehusband who had denied her, was at work for Judea. 

"There is no nation, here, for a king, " he went on. "It is a greathorde that needs organization. It wants a leader. I am ambitious andJudea will be the prize to the ablest man. Seest thou mine intent?"

"You--you aspire--" she began and halted, suddenly impressed with thecomplication his announcement had effected. 

"Go on, " he said. 

"You would take Judea?"

"I would. "

"But it belongs of descent to the Maccabees!"

"To Philadelphus Maccabaeus, yes; but what is he doing?"

She dropped her head. 

"Nothing, " she said in a half-whisper. 

"No? But let me tell you what I have done already. Three days agoTitus took revenge upon Coenopolis for her sortie against Nicanor byfiring the suburbs. The citizens could not spare water to fight thefire, and after futile attempts they gathered up food and treasure andfled into Jerusalem. Now, a thousand householders in the streets ofthis oppressed city, with their gods and their goods in their arms, made the pillagers of Simon and John laugh aloud. They fell upon thesewandering, bewildered, treasure-laden people and robbed them asreadily and as joyously as a husbandman gathers olives in a fat year. Oh, it was a merry time for the men of Simon and the men of John! ButI in my wanderings over the city came upon a party of Bezethans, reluctant to surrender their goods for the asking, and they werefighting with right good will a body of Idumeans twice their number. In fact they fought so well, so unanimously, so silently that I sawthey lacked the essential part of the fight--the shouting. That Isupplied. And when they had whipped the Idumeans and had a chance forflight before reinforcements came, they obeyed my voice in so far asthey followed me into a subterranean chamber beneath a burned ruin onZion. 

"We were not followed and our hiding-place was not discovered. Infact, their resistance was a complete success. Whereupon, they wereready to unite and take Jerusalem! No--it was not strange! It is thenature of men. I never saw a wine-merchant in Ephesus, who, afterclearing his shop of brawlers single-handed, was not ready thereuponto march upon Rome and besiege Cęsar on the Palatine! So it was withthese Bezethans. 

"I, with my voice, expressed the yearnings that they felt in theirvictorious breasts, and plotted for them. After council andorganization we went forth by night and finding Idumean patrols by thescore sleepy and inert from overfeeding we robbed them of that whichwas our own. Then we sought out hungry Bezethans and fed them whenthey promised to become of our party. Nothing was more simple! By dawnwe had a hundred under our ruin, bound to us by oath and theenticements of our larder, and hungry only for fight! Will you believeme when I boast that I have an army in Jerusalem?"

She heard him with a strange confusion of emotions. In her soul shewas excited and eager for his success; but here was a strong andgrowing enemy to Philadelphus, who was reluctant to become a king! Herimpulsive joy in a forceful man struggled with her sense of duty tothe man she could not love. 

"Why do you tell me these things?" she said uneasily. "It is perilousfor any one to know that you are constructing sedition against theseferocious powers in Jerusalem. "

"Ah, but you fear for me; therefore you will not betray me. None elsebut those as deeply committed know of it. "

He had confided in her, and because of it his ambitions took stealthyhold upon her. 

"But--but is there no other way to take Jerusalem, except--bypredatory warfare?" she hesitated. 

"No, " he laughed. "We are fighting thieves and murderers; they do notunderstand the open field; we must go into the dark to find them. "

"Then--then if your soldiers have the good of the city and the love oftheir fellows in their hearts, and if you feed them and shelterthem--why shall you not succeed?" she asked, speaking slowly as thesum of his advantages occurred to her. 

He dropped his hand on hers. 

"It lacks one thing; if I have discouragement in my soul, it willweaken my arm, and so the arm of all my army. "

Intuition bade her hesitate to ask for that essential thing; his eyesnamed it to her and she looked away from him quickly that he might notsee the sudden flush which she could not repress. 

"Tell me, " she said, "more of that night--"

"That would be recounting the same incident many times. But one thingunusual happened; nay, two things. In the middle of the night, afterwe had brought in our second enlistment of patriots, we were feedingthem and I was giving them instruction. At the entrance, I had posteda sentry; none of us believed that any one had seen us take refuge inthat crypt. Indeed, we were all frank in our congratulations anddefiant in our security. Suddenly, I saw half of my army scuttle tocover; the rest stood transfixed in their tracks. I looked up andthere before me in the firelight stood a young man, whom I had not, Iam convinced, brought in with me. He was tall, comely, dressed as Ihave seen the Hindu priests dress in Ephesus, but in garments thatwere fairly radiant for whiteness. But his face gave cause enough tomake any man lose his tongue. Believe me, when I say he looked as ifhe had seen angels, and had talked with the dead. His eyes gazedthrough us as if we had been thin air. So dreadful they were in theirunseeing look that every man asked himself what would happen if thatgaze should light upon him. He stood a moment, walked as soft-footedand as swiftly as some shade through our burrow and vanished as he hadcome. In all the time he tarried, he made not one sound!"

Laodice was looking at him with awed, but understanding eyes. 

"It was Seraiah, " she said in a low voice. "He entered this place on aday last week. All the city is afraid of him. "

"So my soldiers told me afterward, between chattering teeth. He almostdamped our patriotism. We uttered our bombast, sealed our vows andmade our sorties, thereafter, every man of us, with our chins over ourshoulders! Spare me Seraiah! He has too much influence!"

"Is he a madman?" she asked. 

"Or else a supernatural man. Would I could manage men by the fall ofmy foot, as he does. I should have Jerusalem's fealty by to-morrownight. But it was near early morning that the other incident occurred. That was of another nature. We stumbled upon a pair huddled in theshadow of a building. We stumbled upon many figures in shadows, butone of these murmured a name that I heard once in the hills hereabout, and I had profited by that name, so I halted. It was an old man, starved and weary and ill; with him was a gray ghost of a creaturewith long white hair, that seemed to be struck with terror the instantit heard my voice. At first I thought it was a withered old woman, butit proved to be a man--somehow seeming young in spite of thesnow-white hair and wasted frame. I had them taken up, the gray ghostresisting mightily, and carried to my burrow where they now lie. Theyeat; they take up space; they add nothing to my cause. But I can notturn them out. The old man disarms me by that name. "

He looked down at her with softening eyes. 

"And the shepherd held thy hand?" he said softly. She turned upon himin astonishment. How much of joy and surprise and hope he could bringin a single visit, she thought. Now, behold he had met that samedelightsome child that had passed like a dash of sunlight across herdark day. 

"Did you meet the shepherd of Pella?" she asked. Instant deductionsupplied her the name that had moved him to compassion. "And did heserve you in the name of his Prophet?" she whispered. 

"He saved my life in the name of his Christ, but was tender of me inthy name, " he replied. 

"His is a sweet apostasy, " she ventured bravely, "if it be hisapostasy that made him kind. And I--I owe him much, that he repairedthat for which I feel at fault. "

He smiled at her and stroked her hand once, soothingly. 

"Let us not remember blames or injury. It damages my happiness. But ofthis apostasy that the shepherd preached me. I passed the stones ofthe Palace of Antipas to-day, a ruin, black and shapeless. Thought I, where is the majesty of order and the beauty of strength that was thisplace? And then, " his voice fell to a whisper, "beshrew the boy'stattle, I said, the footprints of his Prophet before the throne ofHerod are erased. "

"Even then, " she whispered when he paused, "you do not forget!"

"No! Why, these streets, that should ring for me with the footsteps ofall the great from the days of David, are marked by the passage ofthat Prophet. I might forget that Felix and Florus and Gessius werelegates in that Roman residence, but I do not fail to remember thatthey took that Prophet before Pilate there. By my soul, the streetthat leads north hath become the way of the Cross, and there are threecrosses for me on the Hill of the Skull!"

She looked at him gravely and with alarm. What was it in this historyof the Nazarene which won aristocrats and shepherds alike? She wouldsee from this man if there were indeed any truth in the story thatPhiladelphus had told her. 

"I have heard, " she began, faltering, "I have heard that--" Shestopped. Her tongue would not shape the story. But after a glance ather, he understood. 

"And thou hast heard it, also?" he whispered. "Thou believest it?"

It seemed that to acknowledge her fear that the King had come and gonewould establish the fact. 

"No!" she cried. 

"It is enough, " he said nervously. "We do not well to talk of it. Icame for another reason. Tell me; hast thou other shelter than thishouse?"

"No, " she answered. 

"Hast thou talked with this Philadelphus, here?" he asked aftersilence. 

She assented with averted face. 

"Is he that one who was with me in the hills?" he persisted. 

Again she assented, with surprise. 

His hands clenched and for a moment he struggled with his rage. 

"This house is no place for you!" he declared at last. 

"What manner of house is this?" she asked pathetically. "It is sostrange!"

"Why did you come here?"

"Because there was nowhere else to go. "

He was silent. 

"Who is this Amaryllis?" she asked. 

"John's mistress. "

She shrank away from him and looked at him with horror-stricken eyes. 

"Hast thou not yet seen him, who buys thy bread and meat and insuresthis safe roof?" he persisted. 

"And--and I eat bread--bought--bought by--" she stammered. 

"Even so!"

Her hands dropped at her sides. 

"Are the good all dead?" she said. 

"In Jerusalem, yes; for Virtue gets hungry, at times. "

She had risen and moved away from him, but he followed her withinterested eyes. 

"Then--then--" she began, hesitating under a rush of convictions. "That is why--why I can not--why he--he--"

He knew she spoke of Philadelphus. 

"Go on, " he said. 

"Why I can not live in safety near him!"

He, too, arose. Until that moment it had not occurred to him thatJulian of Ephesus, as repugnant to her as she had shown him ever tobe, might prove a peril to her life as he had been to the Maccabee whohad stood in his way. 

"What has he said to you?" he demanded fiercely. "How do you live, here in this house?"

She threw up her head, seeing another meaning in his question. 

"Shut in! Locked!" she said between her teeth. 

"But even then you are not safe!"

She drew back hastily and looked at him with alarm. What did he mean?

He was beside her. 

"Tell me, in truth, who you are, " he said tenderly, "and I shallreveal myself. "

Then, indeed, Amaryllis had told him her claim and had convinced himthat it was fraudulent. 

"And she told you?" she said wearily. 

"Tell me, " he insisted. "I have truly a revelation worth hearing!"

She made no answer. 

"You owe it me, " he added presently. "Behold what damaging things Ihave intrusted to you. You can ruin me by the droop of an eyelash. "

"I should have told you at first who I am, " she said finally. "I willnot betray what you told me in ignorance--"

"But Amaryllis told me this before you came. "

"Nevertheless, tell me no more; if I must be a partizan, I shall be apartizan to my husband. "

"There is nothing for you here, clinging to this man, " he continuedpersuasively. "This woman brought him a great dowry. She is ambitiousand therefore jealous. You will win nothing but mistreatment, andworse, if you stay here for him. "

"It is my place, " she said. 

After a moment's helpless silence, he demanded bitterly:

"Dost thou love that man?"

The truth leaped to her lips with such wilful force that he read thereply on her face, though her eyes were down and by intense resolutionshe restrained the denial. He was close to her, speaking quickly underthe pressure of his earnestness. 

"I have sacrificed name, birthright, fortune--even honor--that I mightbe free to love thee!"

She drew back from him hurriedly, afraid that his very insistencewould destroy her fortitude. 

"Let me not have bankrupted myself for a trust thou wilt not give!"

"It--it is not mine to give, " she stammered. 

"Otherwise--otherwise--" he prompted, leaning near her. But she puthim back from her, desperately. 

"Go, go!" she whispered. "I hear--I hear Philadelphus!"

He turned from her obediently. 

"It is not my last hope, " he said to himself. "Neither has shesuffered her last perplexity in this house. I shall come again. "

He passed out into the streets of Jerusalem. 

Chapter XVI

THE SPREAD NET

Beginning with the moment that the Maccabee first entered her hall, Amaryllis struggled with a perplexity. Certain discrepancies in thehastily concocted story which that stern compelling stranger who hadcalled himself Hesper of Ephesus had told had started into life adoubt so feeble that it was little more than a sensation. 

Love and its signs had been a lifelong study to her; she knew itsstubbornness; she was wise in the judgment of human nature to knowthat love in this stranger was no light thing to be dislodged. And tofinish the sum of her perplexities, she felt in her own heart thekindling of a sorrowful longing to be preferred by a spirit strong, forceful and magnetic as was that of the man who had called himselfHesper of Ephesus. 

With the egotism of the courtezan she summarized her charms. Eventhere were spirits in that fleshly land of Judea to whom the delicaterefinement of her beauty, the reserve of her bearing and the power ofher mentality had appealed more strongly than a mere opulence ofphysical attraction. She had her ambitions; not the least of these wasto be loved by an understanding nature. The greater the congeniality, the greater the attraction, she argued; but behold, was this ironHesper, the man of all force, to be dashed and shaken by the richloveliness of Laodice, who was simply a woman?

"Such attachments do not last, " she argued hopefully. "Suchattachments make unfaithful husbands. They are monotonous andwearisome. She is but a mirror giving back the blaze of the sun, one-surfaced and blinding. It is the many lights of the diamond thatmake it charming. "

She had arrived at no definite resolution when she met Laodice in thehall that led to the quarters of the artists, as the Greek went thatway for her day's observation of their work. 

"What an unrefreshed face!" the Greek said softly, as the light fromthe cancelli showed the weariness and distress that had begun to makeinroads on the animation of the girl's beauty. "No woman who wouldpreserve her loveliness should let her cares trouble her dreams. "

"How am I to do that?" Laodice asked with a flare of scorn. 

"Do I perceive in that a desire for advice or an explanation of asituation?"

"Both. "

Amaryllis smiled thoughtfully at the girl, while the light of suddenintent appeared on her face. 

"You are unhappy, my dear, through your prejudices, " she began. "Wecall convictions prejudices when they are other than our own beliefs. By that sign, you shall know that I am going to take issue with you. Iam, perhaps, the ideal of that which you would not be. But no man willsay that my lot is not enviable. "

"Are you happy?" Laodice asked in a low voice. 

"Are you?" the Greek returned. "No, " she went on after a pause. "Awoman has the less happy part in life, though the greater one, if shewill permit herself to make it great. It was not her purpose on earthto be happy, but to make happy. "

"You take issue with Philadelphus in that, " Laodice interposed. "It ishis preachment to me that all that is expected of all mankind is to behappy. "

"He is a man, arguing from the man's view. It is inevitable law thatone must be gladder than another. Woman has the greater capacity forsuffering, hence her feeling for the suffering of others is thequicker to respond. And some creature of the gods must becompassionate, else creation long since had perished from the earth. "

Laodice made no answer. This was new philosophy to her, who had beentaught only to aspire at great sacrifice as long as God gave herstrength. She could not know that this strange and purposeful creedmight some day appeal to her beyond her strength. 

"Yet, " Amaryllis added presently in a brighter tone, "there is muchthat is sweet in the life of a woman. "

Laodice played with the tassels of her girdle and did not look up. What was all this to lead to?

"I have spoken to Philadelphus about you, " the Greek continued. "Hehas no doubt of this woman who hath established her claim to his nameby proofs but without the manner of the wife he expected. Yet he cannot turn her out. The siege hath put an end to your efforts in yourown behalf and it is time to face your condition and make the best ofit. John feels restive; I dare not ask too much of him. My householdwas already full, before you came. "

Laodice was looking at her, now with enlightenment in her face. 

"Philadelphus, " Amaryllis continued, following up her advantage, "isnothing more than a man and you are very lovely. "

"All this, " Laodice said, rousing, "is to persuade me to--"

"There are two standards for women, " the Greek interposed beforeLaodice finished her indignant sentence. "Yours and another's. Asbetween yours, who would have love from him whom you have married, andhers, who hath love from him whom she hath not married, there is onlythe difference of a formula. Between her condition and yours, she isthe freer; between her soul and yours, she is the more willinglyfaithful. If woman be born to a purpose, she fulfils it; if not shehath not consecrated her life to a mistake. You overrate theimportance of marriage. It is your whole purpose to preserve yourselffor a ceremony. It is too much pains for too trivial an end. At least, there are many things which are farther reaching and less selfish inintent. And who, by the way, holds the longest claim on history? Yourkind or this other? The world does not perpetuate in its chroniclesthe continence of women; it is too small, too personal, too common tobe noted. Cleopatra were lost among the horde of forgotten sovereigns, had she wedded duly and scorned Mark Antony; Aspasia would have beenburied in a gynaeconitis had she wedded Pericles, and Sappho--but thelist is too long; I will not bury you in testimony. "

Laodice raised her head. 

"You reason well, " she said. "It never occurred to me how wickednesscould justify itself by reason. But I observe now how serviceable athing it is. It seems that you can reason away any truth, any fact, any ideal. Perhaps you can banish God by reason, or defend crime byreason; reason, I shall not be surprised to learn, can make all thingspossible or impossible. But--does reason hush that strange speakingvoice in you, which we Jews call conscience? Tell me; have youreasoned till it ceases to rebuke you?"

"Ah, how hard you are to accommodate, " Amaryllis smiled. "I mean toshow you how you can abide here. I can ask no more of John. Philadelphus alone is master of your fate. I have not sought to changeyou before I sought to change Philadelphus. He will not change so longas you are beautiful. This is life, my dear. You may as well preparefor it now. "

Laodice gazed with wide, terrorized eyes at the Greek. She saw forcegathering against her. Amaryllis shaped her device to its end. 

"And if you do not accept this shelter, " she concluded, "what else isthere for you?"

Hesper, many times her refuge, rose before the hard-pressed girl. 

"There is another in Jerusalem who will help me, " she declared. 

"And that one?" Amaryllis asked coolly. 

"Is he who calls himself Hesper, the Ephesian, " Laodice answered. 

"Why should you trust him?" the Greek asked pointedly. 

"He--when Philadelphus--you remember that Philadelphus told you whathappened--"

"That he tossed a coin with a wayfarer in the hills for you?" theGreek asked. 

Laodice dropped her head painfully. 

"This Hesper let me go then, and afterward--"

"He has repented of that by this time. It is not safe to try him asecond time. Besides, if you must risk yourself to the protection ofmen, why turn from him whom you call your husband for this stranger?"

The question was deft and telling. Laodice started with the suddennessof the accusation embodied in it. And while she stood, wrestling withthe intolerable alternative, the Greek smiled at her and went her way. 

Laodice stood where Amaryllis had left her, at times motionless withhelplessness, at others struck with panic. On no occasion didhomelessness in the war-ridden city of Jerusalem appear half soterrible as shelter under the roof of that hateful house. 

The little golden-haired girl from the chamber of artists beyondskipped by her. 

"Hast seen Demetrius?" she called back as she passed. "Demetrius, theathlete, stupid!"

Laodice turned away from her. 

"Nay, then, " the girl declared; "if I have insulted you let me healover the wound with the best jest, yet! John hath written a sonnet onPhiladelphus' wife and our Lady Amaryllis is truing his meter for him. Ha! Gods! What a place this is for a child to be brought up! I wouldnot give a denarius for my morals when I am grown. There's Demetrius!Now for a laugh!"

She was gone. 

Where was that ancient rigor of atmosphere in which she had beenreared? thought Laodice. Had it existed only in the shut house ofCostobarus? Was all the world wicked except that which was confinedwithin the four walls of her father's house? Could she survive long inthis unanimously bad environment? But she remembered Joseph of Pella, the shepherd; even then his wholesomeness was not without its canker. He was a Christian!

Philadelphus was at her side. 

She flinched from him and would have fled, but he stopped her with asign. 

"My lady objects to your presence in this house, " he said. "You havenot made it worth my while to insist on your shelter here. "

"Your lady, " she said hotly, "is two-fold evilly engaged, then. Shehas time to ruin you, while she furnishes John with all theinspiration he would have for sonnets. "

"So she refrains from furnishing John with my two hundred talents, Ishall not quarrel with her. You have your own difficulties to adjust, and mine, only in so far as they concern you. "

His voice had lost none of its smoothness, but it had become hard andpurposeful. 

"I have come to that point, Philadelphus, where my difficulties andnot yours concern me, " she replied. "I had nothing to give you but mygood will. You have outraged even that. Hereafter, no tie binds us. "

"No? You cast off our ties as lightly as you assumed them. With a wordyou announce me wedded to you; with another you speak our divorcement. And I, poor clod, suffer it? The first, yes; but the last, no. Yousee, I have fallen in love with you. "

She turned her clear eyes away from him and waited calmly till shecould escape. 

"You have spent your greatest argument in persuading me to be a king. Kings, lady, are essentially tyrants, in these bad days. Wherefore, ifI am to be one, I shall not fail to be the other. And you--ah, you!Will you endure the oppressor that you made?"

There was enough that was different in his manner and his words forher to believe that something worthy of attention was to follow. Shelooked at him, now. 

"This roof, since the alienation of John to my wife, is mine empire. Within it, I am despot. From its lady mistress, the Greek, to themeanest slave, I have homage and subjection. Even thou wilt besubmissive to me--for having lost one wife through indulgence, I shallbe most tyrannical to the one yet in my power!"

She drew herself up in splendid defiance. 

"I have not submitted!" she said. "I will not submit!"

"No? Nothing stands in your way now but yourself. Your supplanter hathremoved herself. And I shall make your submission easy. "

She turned from him and would have hurried back into the Greek'sandronitis, but he put himself in her way. 

"Listen!" he said, suddenly lifting his hand. 

In the stillness which she finally was able to observe over thetumultuous beating of her enraged heart, a profound moan of greatvolume as from immense but remote struggle came into the corridor. Through it at times cut a sharp accession of sound, as if violenceheightened at intervals, and steadily over it pulsated the throb oftireless siege-engines. It was the groan of the City of Delight inmortal anguish. 

"This, " he said in a soft voice touching his breast, "or that, "motioning toward the dying city. "Choose. And by midnight!"

While she stood, gazing at him transfixed with the horror of herpredicament, there was the sweeping of garments, the soft tinkle ofpendants as they struck together, and Salome, the actress, was besidethe pair. Close at hand was Amaryllis. The Greek showed for the firsttime discomfiture and an inability to rise to the demand of theoccasion. The glance she shot at Laodice was full of cold anger thatshe had permitted herself to be surprised in company withPhiladelphus. 

Philadelphus drew back a step, but made no further movement towardwithdrawing. Laodice would have retreated, but the actress stood inher way. With a motion full of stately indignation, Salome turned toAmaryllis. 

"It so occurs, madam, that I can point out to you the disease whichsaps my husband's ambition. You observe that he is diverted now, asall men are diverted six weeks after marriage--by another woman. I amnot a jealous woman. I am only concerned for his welfare and thewelfare of the city of our fathers. For it is not himself that hisluxurious indolence affects; but all the unhappy city which issuffering while he is able to help it. He must be saved. And I shallgo with him out of this house into want and peril, but he shall besaved. "

Laodice said nothing. She stood drawn up intensely; her brows knitted;her teeth on her lip; her insulted pride and growing resolutioneffecting a certain magnificence in her pose. 

"I can find her another house, " Amaryllis said. 

"Also my husband can find it, " the woman broke in. "Let the streets dotheir will with the woman of the streets. Bread and shelter are tooprecious to waste on the iniquitous this hour. "

Amaryllis turned to Laodice. 

"What wilt thou do?" she asked. 

"The streets can offer me no more insult than is offered me in thishouse, " she said slowly. 

It was in her mind that there were certainly unprotected gates atwhich she could get out of the city and return to Ascalon. 

At least the peril for her in this house was already too imminent forher to remain longer. She continued to Amaryllis:

"Lady, you have been kind to me--in your way. You have been so in theface of your doubt that I am what I claim to be. How happy, then, youwould have made my lot had I not been supplanted and denied! For allthis I thank you. Mine would be a poor gratitude if I stay to make youregret your generosity. Wherefore I will go. "

She slipped past the three and entered her room. Before Amarylliscould gather resolution to protest, she was out again, clothed inmantle and vitta and, walking swiftly, disappeared into the vestibule. As they sat in the darkening hall, the three heard the doors closebehind her. 

"She will return, " said Philadelphus coolly, moving away. 

Gathering her robes about her, Salome swept out of the corridor andaway. Amaryllis stood alone. 

Somewhere out in the city was Hesper the Ephesian. Amaryllis knew thatLaodice would not return. 

Chapter XVII

THE TANGLED WEB

Meanwhile Jerusalem was in the fury of barbarous warfare. At thisravine and that debouching upon Golgotha, the Vale of Hinnom and theValley of Tophet, whole legions of besiegers were stationed. Along thewalls the men of Simon and the men of John tramped in armor. From thevarious gates furious sorties were made by swarms of unorganized Jewswho fell upon the Romans unused to frantic warfare, and slaughtered, set fire to engines, destroyed banks and threw down fortifications andretreated within the gates before the demoralized Romans could rally. 

Catapult and ballista upon the eminences outside the walls kept up anunceasing rain of enormous stones which whistled and screamed in theair and shook Jerusalem to its foundations. The reverberating boom andthe tremor of earth were varied from time to time by the splinteringcrash of houses crushing and the increase of uproar, as scores ofluckless inhabitants went down under the falling rock. Giant craneswith huge, ludicrous awkward arms, heaved up pots of burning pitch andoil and flung them ponderously into the city to do whatever horror offire and torture had not been done by the engines. Hourly the rattleof small stones increased, merely to attract the attention of thecitizens to an activity to which they were so accustomed that it wasalmost unnoticed. At times citizens and soldiers rushed upon athreatened gate or segment of the wall and lent strength to keep theRomans out; at other times the defenses were forsaken while thebesieged fell upon one another. Back from the broad summit of Olivet, which was the mountain of peace, the echoes gave all day long theshudder of the struggling city. 

The sun daily grew more heated; the cisterns and pools within the citybegan to shrink so rapidly that the inhabitants feared that the enemyhad come at the source of the waters of Jerusalem and had cut themoff. Hundreds of the wounded were allowed to die, simply as a defenseof the wells and store-houses. Burial became too gigantic a labor, andJohn and Simon ordered the bodies thrown over the walls to preventpestilence. 

Titus riding around the city on a day came upon a heap of this outcastdead and turned suddenly white. He rode back to his camp and withinthe hour there approached the walls under a flag of truce an imposingJew of middle-age, with a superb beard and a veritable mantle of richblack hair escaping from his turban and falling heavy with life andstrength upon a pair of great shoulders. He was simply dressed, buthis stately carriage and splendid presence made a kingly garment outof his white gown. 

Those upon the wall knew him and though they were obliged to respectthe banner under which he approached, they gnashed their teeth andgreeted him with epithets, poisonous with hate. He was FlaviusJosephus, one time patriot and enemy of Rome, but now secure underTitus' patronage, abettor of his patron against his fellow-countrymen. 

The Maccabee, among the fighting-men on the wall, saw his approach anddiscreetly stepped behind a soldier that he might not be singled outas a familiar toward which the approaching mediator would logicallydirect his appeal. He had no desire to be addressed by his name beforethis precarious mob already mad with rage at a turncoat. 

And thus concealed the Maccabee heard Josephus appeal to the Jews withapparent sincerity and affection, promise amnesty, protection andjustice in his patron's name; heard his overtures greeted with furyand finally saw the Jews swarm over the walls and drive him to fly forhis life up Gareb to the camp of Titus. 

It was not the first incident he had seen which showed him his ownfate if it became known that he intended to treat with Rome. He putaside his calculations in that direction as a detail not yet in order, and turned to the organization of his army. Here again he metobstacle. 

Among his council of Bezethans he found an enthusiasm for someintangible purpose, objection to his own plans and a certain hauteurthat he could not understand. 

"What is it you hope for, brethren?" he asked one night as he stood inthe gloom of the crypt under the ruin with fifty of his ablestthinkers and soldiers about him. 

"The days of Samuel before Israel cursed itself with a king, " one mandeclared. The others were suddenly silent. 

"Those days will not come to you, " he answered patiently. "You mustfight for them. "

"We will fight. "

"Good! Let us unite and I will lead you, " the Maccabee offered. 

"But after you have led us, perhaps to victory, then what?" they askedpointedly. 

The Maccabee saw that they were sounding him for his ambitions, anddiscreetly effaced them. 

"Do with me what you will; or if you doubt me, choose a leader amongyourselves. "

They shook their heads. 

"Then enlist under Simon and John and fight with them, " he cried, losing patience. 

Murmurs and angry looks greeted this suggestion, and the Maccabee putout his hands toward them hopelessly. 

"Then what will you do?" he asked. 

"It shall be shown us, " they replied; and with this answer, with hisorganization yet uneffected, his plans more than ever chaotic, theMaccabee began another day. Shrewd and resourceful as he believedhimself to be, he beheld plan after plan reveal its inefficiency. Forced by some act of the city to abandon one idea, the next thatfollowed found a new intractability. It seemed that there were no twoheads in Jerusalem of a similar thought. Whoever was not demoralizedby panic was fatally stubborn or mad. The single purpose that seemedto prevail was to hold out against reason. 

Finally he determined to pick the most rational of his men and shapean army that would be distinctly Jewish and enviable. Nothing Romanshould mar its organization. He would have again the six hundredGibborim of David, and after he had formed them into a body he wouldtrust to the existing circumstances to direct him how to proceed tothe assistance of Jerusalem with them. He should be the sole captain, the sole authority, the single commander of them all. He would nothave an unwieldy army, but one perfectly devoted. He would lead by hisown genius, attract and command by his own personality. With sixhundred absolutely subject to his will, trained in endurance andsteadfastness, he could achieve more surely than with an undisciplinedhorde which first of all must be fed. 

Throughout those days of predatory warfare he made careful selectionof material for his army. As yet, while famine had not reducedJerusalem to a skeleton, he could select for bodily strength andmental balance. He worked swiftly, sparing his men daily to thedefense of the city against the Roman and daily sacrificing preciousnumbers of them to the pit of the dead just over the wall. 

They were weary days--days of increasing storm and multiplyingcalamity. Famine in some quarters of the city reached appallingproportions. Insurrections in these regions were so vigorouslysuppressed that the victims chose to starve and live rather than torevolt and perish. Pestilence broke out among the inhabitants near theeastern wall, against the other side of which the dead had been castby hundreds; and a general flight from the city was stopped in fullflood by the spectacle of some scores of unfortunates crucified by theRoman soldiers and set up in sight of the walls. 

Simon and John had a disastrous quarrel and during the interval, whenthe sentries and the fighting-men were killing each other, the Romanspossessed the first fortification around Jerusalem, the Wall ofAgrippa. The following day Titus pitched his camp within the limits ofthe Holy City, upon the site of Sennacherib's Assyrian bivouac. 

At sight of this signal advance, tumult broke out afresh in the cityand for days Titus lay calmly by, merely harassing the Jews while hewatched Jerusalem weaken itself by internal combat. The Maccabee, steadily training his picked Gibborim, saw these lulls as signs thatTitus was still in the hope that the city would submit to occupationand spare him the repugnant task of slaughtering half a nation. In hissoul he knew that at no time would Titus be unwilling to receive thevoluntary capitulation of the city. 

So, composed and intent through struggle and terror, he continued toprepare for the day when an organized army could take the unhappyinhabitants out of the bloody hands of the two factionists, Simon andJohn. 

During one of the casual attacks on the Second Wall, a lean, lash-scarred maniac that had not ceased to cry night or day for sevenyears, "Woe unto Jerusalem!" mounted the Old Second Wall, and therepointed to his breast and added, "Woe unto me also!" At that instant agreat stone struck him and tumbling with it to the ground, he wascrushed into the earth and left so buried for all time. 

With the hushing of that embodiment of doom, silence fell upon thecity and after that, panic; and during that Titus heaved his fourlegions against the Second Wall and took it. Simon was seized withfrenzy, and with a body of crazed Idumeans rushed out upon the banksof the Romans and in one hour's time overthrew the army's work of daysand so thoroughly set back the advance of the besieger that Titusresolved that no more insane sorties should be made from the gates. 

He retired to his camp and in a short time soldiers appeared withtape, stakes, sledges and spades and laid out an immense circle, allbut compassing the great city of Jerusalem. 

The Maccabee saw all this. He stood on the wall above the roar andfrenzy and looked across bleached stretches of sunny, rocky earthtoward the orderly ranks of soldiers, the simple business, thetranquil speed of Rome making war, and understood that peacefuldespatch as deadly. 

He saw the young general ride down to this circle, dismount and, catching a spade from the nearest legionary, drive it into the earth. When he tossed out the first clay, each of the men in the visiblesegment of that great cordon struck his implement into the ground. Andeven as the Maccabee watched, he saw grow up under his eyes a wall!

He understood. Titus was walling against a wall; turning upon the Jewsthat same thing which they had reared against him. As the Maccabeestood gazing transfixed at this grim work, he heard beside him an oldvoice say, with terrible conviction:

"_O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonestthem which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thychildren together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under herwings, and ye would not!. .. For the days shall come upon thee, thatthine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with theground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not leave in theeone stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thyvisitation. _"

The Maccabee, shaken with the culmination of Rome's resolution andafraid in spite of himself, whirled angrily upon that voice speakingdoom at his side. There in the old ragged tunic bound about him withrope, stood the old man he had rescued and had sheltered persistentlyfor many days. 

The old man faced the young man's rage with supernatural composure andstrength. With clenched hands, the Maccabee stood away from him andfelt that he threatened with his fists a hoary citadel that armies hadbeaten themselves against in vain. 

The Maccabee did not speak to his old pensioner. He felt the futilityof words against this thing which seemed to be a revelation, denyingabsolutely all of his ambitions. He dropped from his position and, pushing his way through the distress upon the city, turned toward thehouse of Amaryllis. It was a climacteric hour, when men should lookwell to the protection of all that was near and dear to them. 

When he was gone a strange, bent figure with long white hair and agray distorted face came from the shadow of one of the towers andplucked the old Christian's tunic. The Christian turned and seeing whostood beside him said with intense surety in his tones:

"It is proven. Accept the Lord Jesus while it is time, my son, forbehold the hour of the last day of this city is fulfilled!"

The apparition lifted a palsied hand on which the skin was yet fairand young and pointed after the Maccabee, losing himself in thegroaning mass in the city. 

"If I believe, I must tell him!" he said. 

"Whatever thou hast done against that man must be amended, " theChristian declared. 

The palsied figure shrank and wringing his hands about each other saidin a whisper that sounded like wind among dried leaves:

"I, who saw the candor of perfect trust in his eyes, once, I can notbehold their reproach--I, who love him, and sold him--for a handful ofgold!"

The old Christian laid his hand on the other's arm. 

"Another Judas?" he said. The apparition made no answer. 

"Nay, then; tell it me, " the Christian urged. But the other shrankaway from him, while distrust collected in his eyes. 

"I fear thee; the evil man fears the good one, even more than the goodman fears the evil one. I will not tell thee. "

"But thou hast thy bread from this Hesper; thou hast thy shelter fromhim. He will not injure thee. "

"Injure me! Not with his hands, perhaps. But he would look at me, hewould kill me with his eyes! Thou canst not dream what evil I havedone him!"

The old Christian looked at him for a time, but with the hopefulnessof the spiritually confident. 

"Christ spare thee, till thou hast the strength to do right!" heexclaimed. But the palsied man covered his face with his hands andgroaned. The old Christian took him by the arm and led him down fromthe wall and back to the cavern under the ruins. 

"In thy good time, O Lord, " he said to himself, beginning with thatincident a ministry that should not end. 

It was dark when the Maccabee came down into the ravine in which theGreek's house was builded. In the shadow the house cast before it hesaw some one pass the sentry lines. The soldiers looked after thatfigure. Presently, emerging into the lesser darkness of the openstreets, it proved to be a woman. The Maccabee stopped. By themovements, now hurried, now slow, he believed that the night was fullof apprehension for this unknown faring into the disordered city. Shewas coming in his direction. He stepped into shadow to see who wouldcome forth from shelter at such an hour. 

The next instant she hurried by his hiding-place and the Maccabee sawwith amazement that it was the girl he loved. He sprang out to speakto her, but the sound of his footsteps frightened her and she ran. 

The whole hilly foreground of Jerusalem was lifted like a black andimpending cloud over her, a-throb with violence and strife. Here andthere were lights on the bosom of the looming blackness, but they onlyemphasized the darkness pressing on the outskirts of the radiance. Every area way and alley had its sound. The air was full of footsteps;behind her a voice called to her. She dashed by yawning darkness thatwas an open alley, hurried toward lights, halted precipitately atsignals of danger and veered aside at unexpected sounds. Once shestumbled upon the body of a sleeper who had come down into thedarkness of the ravine to pass the night. At her suppressed cry theMaccabee sprang forward, but she caught herself and ran faster. 

He ceased then to attempt to stop her. Curiosity to know what broughther out into danger at night impelled him to follow near enough toprotect her, but unsuspected until she had revealed her mission tohim. 

A hungry dog, probably the last one to escape the execution which hadbeen meted out to all useless consumers of food, barked at her heelsand brought her up sharply. 

The beast in his siege of her circled in the dark around near enoughto the Maccabee hidden in the darkness for him to deliver a vindictivekick in the staring ribs of the brute. When the howl of the surpriseddog faded up the black ravine, Laodice ran on. The Maccabee, silentlypursuing, heard with a contracting heart that she was crying softlyfrom terror and bewilderment. Not yet, however, had she approached thedanger of Jerusalem, which John had kept far removed from theprecincts of Amaryllis' house. 

She was entering Akra. The heap of grain, yet burning, showed a dullblack-red mound over which towered a column of strong incense. Here, for the night was cool, lay in circles many of the unhoused Passoverguests. Here, also, was wakefulness and the hatchment of evil. 

The running girl was upon them before she knew it. One of the figuresthat sat with its back to the dull glow saw her approaching. Instantlyhe rose upon one knee and snatched her dress as she ran. 

Jerked from her balance, she screamed and threw out her hands to keepfrom falling upon the shoulders of her assailant. One or two otherswith unintelligible sounds struggled up, and as she fell, the Maccabeeleaped from the darkness, wrenched her from the grasp of her captor, and warding off attack with his knife, fled with her into thedarkness. 

The transfer of control over her had been made so swiftly that in herstupor of terror she hardly realized it. She was struggling silentlyand strongly in his hold, when he clasped her to him with a firmerimpulsive embrace and whispered to her:

"Comfort thee, dear heart! It is I, Hesper!"

She ceased to resist so suddenly and was so tensely still that he knewthe shock of immense reaction was having its way with her. 

He knew without asking that she had been forced to leave the shelterof the Greek's roof, and though his rage threatened to rise up andblind him he was not entirely unaware of the benefit the inhospitalityof others had given him. At last she was with him; entirely in hiscare. 

It was a safe shelter into which she was brought, but no luxuriousone. There was light enough from the single torch stuck in a crevicein the ancient rock to show that it was habitable. The immense floorwas packed hard by the trampling of many feet; overhead, lost ingloom, there must have been a rocky roof, but it was invisible. On theledges of rocks were belongings by heaps and collections, showing thatthis was an abiding-place for great numbers. In the far shadows shedistinguished long, silent, mummied windrows of men wrapped inblankets, sleeping. Huge gloomy piles of provisions filled up shadowycorners; about under the light was the litter left in the wake ofhuman counsel; over all was the air of repose and occupancy that madea home out of the burrow. 

Though the place held a great number of refugees, the footstep of theMaccabee wakened resounding emptiness. At the threshold he slackenedhis step and looked with pathetic anxiety at whatever light onLaodice's face would show her opinion of her refuge. But the uncertaintorch revealed nothing and he led her in and across to a solitaryplace where rugs from some looted house had been folded up for apallet and spread about for carpets. She sat down and awaited hisspeech. 

He motioned to the spacious barrenness about him. 

"Canst thou content thyself in this place?" he asked, hesitating. 

She nodded, but feeling that her reply had not shown all that wordsmight, she lifted her face that he might see therein that which shecould not trust her lips to say. 

It was her undoing. Her weakness overwhelmed her and burying her facein the folds of her mantle, she wept. 

After a dismayed silence, he bent over her and said with a quiver ofdistress in his voice:

"I--I have work, here, to do, but I shall take thee out of the cityfor better refuge--"

That she should seem to be grieving over the nature of the sheltergiven her, stirred her deeply. She half rose and with the lightshining on her face, filled with gratitude in spite of her tears, tookhis hand in both of hers and pressed it with pathetic insistence. 

He understood her. 

He laid a hand unsteady with its tremor of delight and young eagernessupon the vitta and it slipped off her hair. As it dropped, the subtlewarm fragrance of the heavy locks, now braided in maidenly style, reached him; the liveliness of her relaxed young figure communicateditself to him without his touch; all the invitation of herhelplessness swept him to the very edge of abandoning his restraint. On his dark face a transformation occurred. All the hardness, even hisyears and his experience vanished from him and a soft recovering flushfaintly colored his cheeks. In that sudden bloom of beauty in his facewas stamped a realization of the far progress of his triumph. She wasin his house and dependent on him, within the very reach of his arms. 

When she looked up at him again, she read all this in his face, andinstantly there returned to her, with warning intensity, the fear ofher love of him. The last obstacle but her own conscience that stoodbetween her and his perfect supremacy over her life had suddenly beenswept away. 

She started away from him, and put up her hands to ward off his touch. 

"If you do that, " she said in a tone sharp with distress, "it is sinand I shall be cursed! I shall have to go back to him!"

Then she had voluntarily left Julian, perhaps to seek him!

"You shall not go back to him!" he exclaimed. "After I have given upeverything but my life to have you for myself!"

"You must not think of me in that way!" she commanded him vehemently. "I am a married woman! You shall remember that! If you forget it, Iwill go out into the streets and ask the Idumeans to kill me!"

"Nay, peace, peace! I shall do you no harm! You are frightened! I willdo nothing that you would not have me do! Be comforted. Not any one inall the world has your happiness at heart so much as I. Believe me!"

"Believe _me_!" she insisted. "I am weary of doubt and denial. I amonly safe if you recognize me as that which I claim to be. Answer me!You do believe I am the wife of Philadelphus?"

"I believed it, at once, " he said frankly. 

"Then--then--" but she flung her hands over her face and slipped downon the rugs. For a moment he hesitated, restraining the impulse tobreak over the limits she had laid down for him. 

Then he rose and, summoning one of the women who had taken refuge inthe crypt, sent her to remain with the girl, and departed, shaken anduncertain, to his own place. 

Chapter XVIII

IN THE SUNLESS CRYPT

The twilight of the cavern rarely revealed enough of the features ofher fellows to Laodice for her to identify them or for them toidentify her. She lived among them a dusky shadow among shadows. Andbecause of her fear that Philadelphus might be searching for her, shestayed in the sunless crypt day by day until the Maccabee, noting withaffectionate distress that she was growing white and weak, bade hertake one of the women and venture up to the light. 

There were, besides the women, two men who took no part in thepreparation for war which went on about them in the cavern day andnight. While weapons and armor were made and tramping ranks formed andbroke before the commands of the lithe dark commander of that fortressand subdued but fierce councils took place around torches--while allthis went on, they kept back, even apart from the women, and saidnothing. 

Laodice saw that they were physically unfit; that one was very old andthe other very feeble and her heart warmed again to that stern masterwho saw them fed as abundantly as his most valued men. These, then, were those Christians whom he had taken into his protection because ofthe Name which had inspired a shepherd boy to save his life. 

When he commanded Laodice to go up into the sunlight, he approachedthe corner in which the two useless men hid and bade them, too, to goup into the air. 

"Let us have no sickness in this place, " he said bluntly and turned onhis heel and left them to obey. 

Laodice took one of the older women and timidly climbing the stepsfrom which the rubbish had been pushed away by the climbing hundreds, went through the dusk of the passage that terminated in a brilliancythat dazzled her. And as she walked she heard the footsteps of the twomen behind her. 

Up in the chaos of fallen columns, she stood a moment with her handspressed over her eyes. Only little by little was she able to permitthe full blaze of the Judean sun to reach them. The uproar onJerusalem after the muffled silence of the underground cavern filledher with terror, and she pressed close to the shelter of the entranceuntil the woman at her side reassured her. 

"It is nothing, " the woman said, with a dreary patience. "It is as itwas yesterday. I come here every day. I know. "

After a while Laodice looked about her. The entrance to their refugewas about the middle of the ruin and therefore a great many paces backfrom the streets, so that she did not see Jerusalem's agonies face toface. But she saw enough to make her cold and to turn her shiveringand panic-stricken into the darkness of the crypt below. 

She saw the ascending streets of Zion and the tall fortificationsmounting the heights within the city's limits. There she saw the flashof swords, swung afar off, spears brandished and the running hitherand thither of defenders on the wall. Below she saw the remoteconstricted passages between rows of desolate houses, moving withpeople, sounding with clamor. There she saw combats, terrible scenesof frenzy, deaths and unnamable horrors; starvelings gnawing theirnails; shadows of infants pressed to hollow bosoms; old men too weakto walk that went on hands and knees; young men and young women inrags that failed to cover them, and wandering skeletons screaming, "Woe!"

Meanwhile huge stones mounted over the walls and fell within the city;three great towers planted beyond the walls, out of range of theJewish engines and equipped with superior machines, were steadilydevastating the entire quarter near which they were erected. Heretwo-thirds of the forces of Jerusalem were concentrated in a vaineffort to resist the dire inroads of these effective engines. Here, the Maccabee and his Gibborim stood shoulder to shoulder with theIdumeans and fanatics of Simon and John, and here the half-maddefenders awakened at last to the fact that only divine interferencecould save the city against Rome. 

In the south and the east conflagrations roared and crackled, whereburning oil had been scattered over some remaining structures near thewalls. When a great ram began its thunder somewhere near the SheepGate, there came a hollow booming noise of deafening volume from thecharnel pits outside the walls and a black cloud of incredible depthsoared up into the skies. 

Laodice, dumb with horror, looked at the prodigy withoutunderstanding, but the woman at her side shuddered. 

"God help us!" she exclaimed. "They are vultures!"

Laodice turned to rush back into the cavern and so faced the two menwho stood behind her. 

One, at sight of her, shrank with a gasp, and, averting his shaggyhead till the long white locks covered his face, fled back into thecrypt. 

The other was gazing with unseeing eyes across groaning Jerusalem. 

"_I am the man_, " he was saying aloud, but to himself, "_that hathseen affliction by the rod of His wrath. _"

The sight of him had a paralyzing effect upon Laodice. She saw, beforeher, Nathan, the Christian, who had buried her father, who had blessedher, who would know and could testify to a surety that she was thewife of Philadelphus!

She slipped by him without a sound and hurried down into the darkestcorner of the cavern. 

Circumstance had found her in her refuge and would drive her away fromthis sweet home back to that hateful house, to the man she did notlove!

For many days, with increasing distress, Laodice avoided Nathan, theChristian. With that fascinated terror which at times forces humancreatures to examine a peril, she felt irresistibly impelled to tryhis memory of events, that she might know if indeed he would recognizeher. 

Though she turned cold and flashed white when he came upon her one dayin the darkness of their shelter, she felt nevertheless the relief ofapproaching a solution to her perplexity. 

"They tell me, " he said with the deliberate speech of the old, "thatTitus is once more permitting citizens to depart from Jerusalemunharmed. "

"Then, " she said, grasping at this hope, "why do you stay here in thisperil?"

"Why should I leave it? Even with the singers who wept by the watersof Babylon, I prefer Jerusalem above my chief joy. Except for the timewhen we of the Way were warned to depart, I have been in Jerusalem allmy life. Then, though I had gone as far as Cęsarea on my way toAntioch to join the brethren there, homesickness overtook me and Iturned in my tracks, saying no man farewell, and came back. "

"A weary journey for one so old, " she said gently. 

Would he remember also that it had been dangerous?

"Nay, but a journey full of works and reward. And I discovered at theend of it that I had lived in error forty years; that Christ neverceases to prove Himself. "

Already the forbidden tenets of the Nazarene faith had entered intohis words. But feeling somehow that her deflection from uprightnesscovered her whole life, there was no reason why she should not hearwhat these people believed and have done with it. 

"Art thou a Christian?" she asked timidly. 

"I am a believer in Christ, but whether I may call myself one of theblessed I do not know, for they have had faith. But I demanded a sign. Behold it! The ruin of the City of David!"

Her eyes widened with alarm. 

"Is there no hope?" she exclaimed. 

He looked at her, even in his old age impressed with the immenseimportance life and love must have to so beautiful and beloved awoman. Presently he said, as if to himself:

"Yea, be thou blessed, O thou Redeemer, that givest life to them towhom life is dear and death approacheth. "

Her concern for concealment vanished entirely in her rising terror forthe future of the Holy City. 

"I pray thee, Rabbi, " she said in a low voice, drawing close to him, "tell me what thy people believe about the city. I have heard--but itcan not be true!"

"Do not be troubled about the city, " he answered. "Ask me rather howto become safeguarded against any disaster, greater even than the fallof cities. "

"It is not for myself, " she protested earnestly, "but for the world. Is there not a King to come to Israel?"

"There is, but not yet, my daughter. Of that day and hour no manknoweth. Now is Daniel's abomination of desolation; the generationpasseth and the prophecy is fulfilled. Jerusalem is perishing. "

Seeing the wave of panic sweep over her, he put out a soothing hand. 

"Yet, do not fear. For such as you the Redeemer died; for your kindthe Kingdom of Heaven is built, and the King whom the earth did notreceive is for ever Lord of it. "

The veiled reference to the tragedy which Philadelphus had recountedstood out with more prominence than the promise in his words. 

"Whom the earth did not receive?" she repeated. "O prophet, as thouboasteth truthful lips and a hoary head, tell me what hath befallenus. "

"Hear it not as a calamity, " he said reassuringly. "Thou canst make itof all things the most profitable, if thou wilt. Forget the city. I, who would forget it but can not, bid thee do this. Behold, there isanother Jerusalem which shall not fall. Look to that and be notafraid. "

Her lips, parted to protest against the vague answer, closed at thefinal sentence and the Christian pressed his advantage. 

"Of that Jerusalem there is no like on earth. Against its walls noenemy ever comes; neither warfare nor hunger nor thirst nor sufferingnor death. This which David builded is a poor city, a humble citycompared to that New Jerusalem. There the King is already come; therethe citizens are at peace and in love with one another. There thoushalt have all that thy heart yearneth after, and all that thy heartyearneth after shall be right. "

In that city would it be right that she love Hesper instead ofPhiladelphus, and that she should have her lover instead of her lawfulhusband?

While she turned these things over in her mind, he wisely went on withhis story. Shrewdly sensing the young woman's anxiety, the oldChristian guessed the interest to her of the Messiah's history beforeHis teaching and began with prophecy to support the authenticity ofthe wonderful Galilean's claim to divinity. It was no fisherman orweaver of tent-cloth who brought forth the declarations of thecomforter of Hezekiah, the captive prophet and the priest in the landof the Chaldeans. His was no barbarous manner or slipshod tongue ofthe market-place and the wheat-fields, but the polish and theclean-cut flawless language of the synagogues and the colleges. Laodice saw in the gesture and phrase the refinement of her father, Costobarus, of the gentlest Judean blood. 

"I saw Him, " he went on in a low voice. 

Laodice with her intent gaze on the beatified face put her hand to herheart. 

"Forty years ago, " the old voice continued, "I saw Him first inGalilee. There He was disbelieved and cast out. He came then untoJerusalem and I saw Him there heal lepers, cast out evil spirits, curethe blind and the sick and the palsied. And in the house of Jairus andat Nain, I saw Him raise the dead. 

"I saw Him come to Jerusalem. Multitudes followed Him and accompaniedHim, casting their mantles and palm-branches in the way that His mulemight tread upon them. "

The old man pointed south toward the single summit from which Christapproaching could overlook Jerusalem. 

"On that hill, " he said, "while the multitudes hailed Him and thesound of Alleluia shook the air, He reined in His meek beast andlooked upon this city, and wept over it. When He spoke, He said, _Ifthou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the thingswhich belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes. Forthe days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a trenchabout thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee;and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thouknewest not the time of thy visitation. _

[Illustration: "And there His enemies crucified Him. "]

"And three days later, I saw the Rock of David and all that multitudefollow Him unto the Hill of the Skull and there His enemies crucifiedHim!"

After a paralyzed silence, Laodice whispered with frozen lips, "In God's name, why?"

But he wisely did not pause with the calamity. He had the whole of thebeginnings of Christianity to tell, a long narrative that contained asyet no dogma. Paul had seen the great light on the road to Damascus, and accepting apostleship to all the world had fought a good fight andhad come unto his crown of righteousness; Peter had established theChurch and had fed the sheep and had been offered up by the Beast whowas Nero; John the Divine was seeing visions of the Apocalypse in theIsland of Patmos; Herod Antipas, "that fox, " had passed to his ownplace, prisoner and exile, sacrifice to a mad Cęsar's imaginings;Judas had hanged himself; Pilate had drowned himself; thousands of thesaints had died for the faith by fire and sword and wild beasts; kingshad been converted and of the believers in Rome it was said, _Yourfaith is spoken of throughout the whole world_. 

Laodice sat with clasped hands, intent on each word as it fell fromthe lips of the aged teacher, seeing at one and the same time theKingdom of Heaven constructed and her dream of an earthly empirefalling. 

"He said, " the Christian continued, "_They that are whole need not aphysician; but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. _"

Repentance was a rite for Laodice, a payment of offering, a process tothe righteously inclined, a thing that could in no wise purify thesinner as to make him worthy of association with the upright. The oldChristian's use of the word was different; he had said that theMessiah came to the sinner, and not to the righteous. Had the youngJewess been less in need of comfort in her own consciousness ofspiritual delinquency she would have set down the old teacher as oneof the idlest dealers in contradiction. But now she listened withkeener zest; perchance in this doctrine there was balm for her hurt. She made some answer which showed the awakening of this new interestand then with infinite poetry and earnestness he began to unfold theteachings of Christ. 

A woman came to them with wine and food, for the midday had come, butneither noticed it. In his fervor to enlighten this tender soul, theold man forgot his weariness; in her wonder at the strangely gentledoctrine which had contradicted all the world's previous usage, thegirl forgot her prejudice. She listened; and with such signs as changeof expression, flushes of emotion, movements of surprise andbrightenings of interest to encourage him, the old Christian talked. When he had progressed sufficiently to round out the theory ofChristianity, she had grasped a new standard. The contrast between theold and the new made itself instantly felt. On one hand was the simpleand logical; on the other the complex and dogmatic. The Christian wasable to measure proportionately how much should be laid upon her mindfor study at once and while she still waited, he rose from his place. 

"There is more; yet there are other days, " he said. 

But she caught his hand as he rose and with a sudden yearning in hereyes whispered:

"O Rabbi, what said He of love?"

"Love?" he repeated, with a softening about his lips. "The Masterblessed love between man and woman. "

"But, but--" she faltered, "if one love another than one's weddedspouse, then what?"

His face grew grave. 

"That is not lawful even among you, who are still of the old faith. "

"But suppose--"

He laid a kindly hand on the one that held his. 

"Suffer but sin not. He that endureth unto the end shall be saved. "

"What end?"

"Death. "

She was silent while she gazed at him with change showing on hergradually paling face. 

"Then--then what is in thy faith for the forlorn in love?" sheexclaimed. 

"Peace, and the consciousness of the joy of Christ in yoursteadfastness, " he said. 

She rose. How much longer had she to live?

"And thou sayest we die?"

"_Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill thesoul_, " he said gently. 

Fear Hesper, then, but not the Roman. While she stood in the immensedebate of heart and conscience he laid a tender hand on her head. 

"Perchance in His mercy thou shalt be welcomed there first by thyfather, whom I buried, and by thy mother. "

The sudden recurrence to that past tragedy and the unfolding of hisrecognition fairly swept Laodice off her feet with shock and alarm. Ifhe noted her feeling, he was sorry he had not succeeded in comfortingher with a promise of reunion with her beloved in that other land. Hetook away his tremulous hand from her hair. 

Leaving her transfixed with all he had said, he moved painfully away, stiffened by long sitting while he discoursed. 

Chapter XIX

THE FALSE PROPHET

It was a different Amaryllis that the pretended Philadelphus facednow, from the one who had welcomed him on his arrival in Jerusalemmonths ago. Then she had been so cold and self-contained that it wouldhave been effrontery to discuss her hopes with her. Now, with theavarice of love in her eyes, with wishfulness and defeat making theirsorry signs on her face, she was a creature that even the humblestwould have longed to help. 

Philadelphus sat opposite her in the ivory chair which was hers byright. She sat in the exedra and listened eagerly to the things hesaid with her finger-tips on her lips and her eyes gazing from underher brow as her head drooped. 

She had ceased long ago to debate idly on the actual identity of theman who had called himself Hesper of Ephesus. There was anotherquestion that absorbed her. Of late, it had been brought home to herthat the charm of Laodice for the stranger from Ephesus, to whom theGreek knew the girl had fled, had been her purity. Why should itmatter so much about virtue? she had asked herself. Why should itweigh so immeasurably more than the noble gifts of wit and beauty andstrength and charm? Behold, she was wise enough to educate a barbarousnation, beautiful enough to bewitch potentates--for a time--strongenough to take a city; yet Hesper, who best of all could appreciatethe value of these things, had turned from her to Laodice, who wasmerely chaste. 

The greater part of the jealous and bitter passion that had shaken herthen was dumb regret that the measure of charm was so irrational--andthat she had not believed in it, in time, in time!

Now, however, since she had become convinced that Laodice had gone toHesper for refuge, hope had awakened in her, but so filled withuncertainty and lack of confidence in another's weakness that it waslittle more than a torture to her. 

If Laodice had gone to this winsome stranger, either claiming to bethe wife of Philadelphus or acknowledging the imposture, there was nowno difference between Laodice and herself!

But, she asked herself, was it not possible that this lovely girl whohad shown signs of illimitable fortitude, could live in the shelter ofthe captivating Hesper as uprightly as she had lived under the roof ofthe man she called her husband?

In one exigency, the hopes of Amaryllis budded; in the other, herintuitive belief in the strength of Laodice discouraged her. And whileshe alternately hoped and doubted, Philadelphus, in the chair oppositeher, talked. 

"It follows that you and I must work together to gain diverse ends. Ifour fortunes are to be tragic, we are undoing each other in thisconjunction. Since I in all frankness prefer it to turn out comedy, let us make no error. Are you weary of John? Do you seek a newdiversion?"

She looked at him, at first puzzled, then with a frown. It leaped toher lips, grown impatient with suffering, to tell him all that she hadevolved of the histories of himself, his lady and of Hesper; but thereseemed to be an element of recklessness in that which threatened to doaway with a means for her success. He did not wait for her answer. 

"And I, " he said with mock intensity, "am done to death withweariness--with my moneyer, this lady of mine. Let us be divertedwhile we live, for by the signs we shall all die soon. "

"Where, " he began when her mind wandered entirely from him, "dost thouthink the mysterious man hath taken my other wife?

"I would I knew, " he continued, conducting his inquiry alone. "It willbe right simple to have her beauty spoiled in this hungry town, unlesshe takes tenderest care of her. "

There was still no comment, but the lively sparkle in the Greek's eyeshowed that he had touched upon a jealous spot. 

"And by the by, " he pursued, "what does this stranger, whom I can notremember having known, look like? A villain?"

She answered now in a voice filled with rancor. 

"Win away the girl from him and thou wilt know thyself to be thebetter man; but study how much he hath outstripped thee and thou shaltdecide for thyself, then, that he is handsomer, more winsome, strongerand more profitable. Describe him for thyself. "

"Out upon you! How irritable misfortune makes most of us! Now, here ismy lady. She would fail to see the humor in my fetching back thispretty impostor. Alas! Were I Deucalion or Pyrrha or whoever else itwas that repeopled the world, I should have left jealousy out of themake-up of wives. It is a needless element. It gives them no pleasure, and Jove! how inconvenient it is for husbands! Now, I am not jealousof my wife. In fact, had any man the hardihood to supplant me, Ishould not discourage him; I should not, by my soul!"

"Why, " she burst out again, irritated beyond control at his manner, "do you not leave this place?"

He swung his foot idly and smiled. 

"I shall when I can take with me this dear pretty impostor who is sodetermined to have me, " he answered lightly. 

"Will you?" she asked eagerly. "Is that why you remain?"

"And for my lady's dowry. She keeps the key. But had I the girlcloaked and hooded for flight, I might go, even without the treasure. The times are precarious, you observe. "

She rose almost precipitately and hurried over to the swaying curtainof some heavy white material like samite, covering that which appearedto be a blind arch in the wall. She drew the hanging aside. It hadhidden the black mouth of a tunnel, closed by a brass wicket which waslocked. 

"Here, " she said rapidly, "is what strengthens John in his folly. Thisis a passage that leads under the Temple through Moriah into Tophet. The whole city is underlaid with these galleries, but this is the onlyone which leads to safety. "

She dropped the curtain and approached him. 

"But thou canst not go out of that passage alone!"

He smiled, and then with that boyish impulsiveness that he hadcultivated to cover the evil in his nature, he thrust out his hand toher. 

"Here is my hand on it!" he exclaimed. 

"Go, then, and cease not till you have found her. Then, by any or allthe gods, I shall see that you do not go out of that passageempty-handed. "

He smiled at her radiantly and went at once to his chambers. 

When he reached the apartments, he found them silent and deserted. Heseized upon the opportunity as most propitious for a search for thepossible hiding-place of the dowry of two hundred talents. 

When he opened first the great press in which his lady kept herraiment he was confronted by emptiness. Dismayed, he turned to lookinto the room and found the chests for the most part open and rifled. On the brazier, now cold, lay a wax tablet. He snatched it up and read:

 Received of Julian of Ephesus the appended salvage in good repair. Items: One wife, Two hundred talents. 

 JOHN, KING OF JERUSALEM. 

He went back to the andronitis of Amaryllis. 

"I have lost interest in the treasure, " he said whimsically. "But I'llgo out and look for the girl. I--I should like to discover of a truthif the passage leads out of Jerusalem. "

Amaryllis closed her lips firmly. Philadelphus read in the look thathe could not escape without Laodice. 

Without further speech, he went to the vestibule, took his cloak andkerchief from the porter and went out into the city. 

It was nearly midnight when he passed into the streets. The tumult ofassault on the walls had ceased. The long lines of beacon-fires on thewalls showed only a few men in arms posted there. Without there cameno sound of activity in the camp of the Roman. The streets below, lighted up by the ever-burning beacons, showed its usual restlesstramping of houseless, hungry ones. But there was no talk; each onewho walked the passages went wrapped in his own dismal thoughts; thethousands took no notice of one another. Jerusalem was as silent as acity stricken with plague. 

From the summit of Zion, which Philadelphus mounted, he could seethree Roman war-towers, planted along the outer works, dimly lighted, and manned by a vigilant garrison of legionaries. These had been adread and a destruction which the Jews had been unable to overthrow;coigns of vantage from which the enemy had been able to deal thesturdiest blows of the campaign. They had permitted no rest to thedefenders on the wall; they had spread ruin by fire and carnage, byarrow and sling for days. Sorties against them had resulted in thedeath of their assailants, only. Jewish engines accomplished nothingagainst them. The three, alone, were taking Jerusalem. 

Philadelphus looked at their tall shapes, black against the remoteillumination of the Roman camp, and inwardly hoped that they wouldhold off complete destruction of the city, until he had found thedesirable woman. 

No one noticed him; men passed him like shadows with their eyes everon the ground; no one spoke; nothing disturbed the deadly quiet of thefalling city. 

But the next minute, Philadelphus, who walked alertly, saw people stepout into gutters or press against walls, as if to allow some one topass. Awakening interest ran abroad over the street ahead of him. Alane between the wandering multitude opened almost by magic. Throughit, walking swiftly, his head up, his mystic eyes ignited, cameSeraiah, soldier of Jehovah. There was no sound of his footfall. Hisgarments flashed in the light of the beacons, but there was not even awhisper of their motion. But he had changed. There was fierce, superhuman intent in the despatch of his gait and in the uplift of hissuperb head. After him, as he passed, ran whispers. Each one stoppedand looked. He went down the uneven slope of Zion as some great shadeborne on a swift air. 

Two or three bold ones began to move after him. Others followed. Thelittle nucleus grew. Philadelphus was caught in it. Numbers were addedas courage grew with numbers. From intersecting streets people came. Some, although oppressed by the silence, asked what it was and weresilenced quickly. Others began to mutter unintelligible predictions, and their neighbors shook their heads without understanding that whichwas said. 

The news of Seraiah's mysterious progress communicated itself to rankand rank and spread abroad. Faces appeared against a background oflights at barred windows, along the balustrades of house-tops, fromareas and ruins. Philadelphus, fascinated and astonished at thiscurious demonstration, was contented to pass with it. Silence, exceptfor the rustling of garments and the multitudinous footfall, fellabout the vicinity. 

Ahead of them, Seraiah moved. His steps, finely balanced, passed overobstructions where most of his followers stumbled, and when he turnedacross Akra and faced the Old Wall, the excitement became painful. 

His pace was flying; many of his followers were running. It seemedthat he was going against the Wall. Dozens anticipated that course andskirting through short ways clambered up on the fortifications andclung there though menaced by the sentries until Seraiah appeared. 

At a narrow point in the street that ended against the wall, Seraiahmet that Jew who had become a maniac on the day Jerusalem attackedTitus. Without warning the maniac leaped up into an intensely rigidposture; his legs spread, his lean arms upstretched at painfultension, his mouth wide, his eyes dilated immensely in their hollowdepths. 

Seraiah passed him as if no man stood in his way. Instantly the maniacwheeled, as a huge spread-eagle wind-vane on its staff, and stood atgaze, the broad uninterrupted light of the beacon shining down on himand the mysterious man. The street ended short of the wall. About thebase of the fortification was an open space, in which was planted ascaling-ladder. Seraiah climbed this, an infinitesimal detail on thegreat blank of blackened stone. 

Hundreds, rushing upon the wall, though a goodly distance from thepoint at which the strange man had mounted, climbed it and beat offthe sentries. 

And the foremost who reached the top saw the Roman Tower directlyopposite Seraiah shudder suddenly and sink in a roaring cloud of dustupon itself to the earth. 

Instantly the maniac below broke the tense silence with a scream thatwas heard in the paralyzed Roman camp:

"It is He, the Deliverer! Come!"

Of the thousands of Jews that heard the madman's cry, every heartcredited it. Hundreds melted away suddenly, as if stricken with terrorat what they might see; other hundreds scrambled down from theirplaces to run purposelessly, crying aimless things to the night overthe city; yet others covered their faces with their arms and fell intheir places, expecting the end of the world; and of the rest, theless imaginative, the more composed and the more curious, remained onthe walls to see enacted a further miracle. Uproar had broken outinstantly among the four stolid legions of Titus on the Assyrianbivouac. Lights flashed out everywhere; great running to and fro couldbe distinguished; rapid trumpet-calls and the prolonged roll of drumsfrom company quarters to quarters were echoed back from Antonia andfrom Hippicus. The startled shouts of commanders; the nervous droppingof arms; the sharp excited response to roll-call; the sound ofsentries challenging, the curt response by countersign, showedeverywhere irregularities and the symptoms of panic in the immovableranks of Titus. 

Seraiah meanwhile had disappeared from his place as mysteriously as hehad come. 

Many of the Jews who remained on the wall believed that he had passedinto the Roman camp and was troubling it. The fall of the tower, andthe confusion it had wrought in the Roman camp, never occurred to themto have been fortuitous incidents with which Seraiah had nothing todo. Of the thousands that witnessed that miracle, most of them wereconvinced that the hour had come. 

Meanwhile Jerusalem was roaring with excitement. The city was readyfor a Messiah. Seraiah had arisen at the psychological moment. Earlierthe Jews would have been too critical to accept him readily; laterthey would have reviled him for coming too late. Whatever his adventlacked in thunders, in darkness, voices, and shaking of the earth, hadbeen passed by his miraculous work against the Romans. 

Philadelphus, who had seen the fall of the tower, and had dropped downfrom the wall as soon as he had explained it all to himself, came uponnew disorders. Great concourses of awakened Jews were hurrying to thewalls to see what had happened, or to behold the Roman army wiped outby the Angel of Death as the army of Sennacherib had perished. Otherscollected at the end of the Tyropean Bridge and watched the pinnacleof the Temple for the miracle which should restore the city. But theburned ruin where the Herodian palace had stood was the center of themost characteristic frenzy. 

There thousands were congregated. A great bonfire had been kindled andabove the multitude, on a colossal architrave fallen at one end fromthe giant columns that had supported it, stood a figure, redlyilluminated by the fire, tiny as compared to the immense ruin of itshigh place, but Titan in its control over the wild mob below it. 

It was a woman, a Jewess, dressed in faithful imitation of the archaicgarb of the prophetesses, mantled with a storm of flying black hair, stripped of veil or cloak, and splendidly defiant of the restrictionslaid upon woman long after the days of Deborah. 

Over the heads of the panting multitude she shook a pair of arms thatglistened for whiteness, and bewitched by the spell of their motion. From under her half-fallen lids shot gleams of fire that transfixedany upon whom they fell; from her supple body shaken at times with thepower of its own dynamic force her hearers caught the grosserinfection of physical excitement; they swayed with her as blown by thewind; they ceased to breathe in her periods; they groaned as theintensity of her fervor pressed upon them for response that they couldnot shape in words; they wept, they shouted, they prophesied, and overthem swept ever the witchery of her wonderful voice, preachingimpiety--the worship of Seraiah!

Philadelphus looked at this frantic work with a creeping chill. Heknew the sorceress. Salome of Ephesus, who could send the satedtheaters wild with her appeal to their senses, had found enchantmentof a half-mad city not hard. Aside from the impiety, in fear of whichhis own irreligious spirit stood, he saw suddenly opened to him theimmense scope of her influence. Not Simon, not John, not Titus, haddiscovered the logical appeal to the city's unbalanced impulses. Butthe reckless woman, robing herself in the ancient garb of the days towhich the citizens would revert, assuming the pose of a woman they hadsanctified, preaching the dogma they would hear, showing them the signthat helped them most, held Jerusalem, at least for that hour, in herhands. 

He realized at once that to attempt to denounce her would expose himto destruction at the wolfish hands of the frenzied mob. There werenot soldiers enough in the city to destroy her influence, for she hadachieved in her followers that infatuation that goes down to deathbefore it relinquishes its conviction. Her control was complete. Seraiah was the anointed one, but the prophetess, the instigator, thefounder of the worship, as follows in all apostasies, was the finalrecipient of the benefits of that devotion. 

Philadelphus walked away from the sight of Salome's triumph. He hadsurrendered instantly his hope of regaining the treasure. The whole ofmad Jerusalem had ranged itself with her to protect it. And Laodicewas not yet found. 

Chapter XX

AS THE FOAM UPON WATER

The madness on Jerusalem poured like an overwhelming flood into thecavern under the ruin of the Herodian palaces. There was Hesper, withmost of his Gibborim gathered, preparing to proceed to the defense ofthe First Wall in Akra against which the Roman would hurl himself inthe morning. 

For days he had controlled his men only by the force of his fiercewill. Restlessness, little short of turbulence, had changed his sixhundred from earnest recruits to bright-eyed, contentious, irresponsible enthusiasts whom only intimidation could manage. Theyseemed to be balanced, prepared, ready at the least whisper in thewind to scatter madly, each in his own direction, after a vagary, albeit the end were destruction. 

Throughout these latter days the Maccabee had become strained andunnatural in his manner. There was a vehemence in all he did whichseemed to be a final resolution against despair. His decisions werearbitrary; his methods extreme. Laodice, sensing something climactericin his atmosphere, kept aloof from him, and regarded him from the duskof her corner with wonder and a pity that she could not explain. TheChristian on the other hand seemed always in an unobtrusive way to beat the Maccabee's elbow. The apparition with the long white hair, however, ran away and was found on the streets by the Christian andbrought back to the cavern, where he hid in a dark shadow in theremote end of the crypt and was not seen. 

Of late the cavern was always full of suppressed excitement;unpremeditated conferences among the Gibborim, which Hesper harshlyforbade; and general sharp resentment against imposed regulations andmilitary drill. On several occasions the six hundred were sent indefense of the walls only by sheer force of their leader's will-power. And there they fell in at once with the irregular methods of theIdumeans and fanatics that fought each after his own liking, and thecareful instruction of the Maccabee was disregarded. Only so long ashe cowed them, they obeyed him; and he seemed to feel, as they seemedto indicate, that when that thing happened which all Jerusalemindefinitely expected and could not name, his control over them wouldbe lost beyond restoration. 

On the night of the fall of the Roman tower, the Maccabee's forces hadbeen withdrawn for rest to their retreat and at midnight were formedagain for return to the fortifications. 

By the strange inscrutable spread of rumor, sweeping with the air, thetidings of the miracle and the rise of Seraiah poured in upon therestive hundreds that the Maccabee was attempting to form in hisfortress. It came like the gradual velocity of a burning star acrossthe sky. From the ranks nearest the exit from the burrow the murmurissued, growing into intelligible sound, mounting to the wildness ofhysteria and prevailing wholly over the Gibborim in the space betweenheart-beats. Everywhere they cast down their spears and their weapons, everywhere they gazed at him with brilliant threatening eyes and criedin loud voices so that the things each mad mind put into expressionwere lost in a great unintelligible raving. 

Laodice, the Christian and that white-haired trembler in his refuge, saw the Maccabee raise himself to his full height and lifting hissword confront in one grand effort at command a mob of six hundredmadmen!

Perhaps that manifestation of iron courage and strength, which thecrazy lot somehow realized, saved him from death. Instead of fallingupon him they turned away from the scene of the last vain effort fortheir own salvation and rushed, trampling one another, into the madcity of Jerusalem. 

From without, the hoarse uproar of their desertion was heard to mergewith the great tumult over the Holy City. Tense silence fell in thecrypt. 

The light of the torch wavered up and down the tall figure of theMaccabee as he stood transfixed in the attitude of command that hadachieved nothing. It seemed the final inclination beyond theperpendicular that precedes the fall. The Christian started from hisplace and hurried toward the tense figure in the torch-light. Laodice, unconscious of what she did, approached him with an agony of distressfor him written in her face. The white-haired apparition crept out alittle way on his knees and putting aside his tangled locks gazed withburning eyes at the defeated man. 

Laodice, in her anxiety, moved into the range of the Maccabee'svision. The next instant he had thrown away his sword and had caughther in a crushing embrace to him. His voice, blunted and repressed asif something had him by the throat, was stunning her ear. 

"And thou!" he was saying. "What from thee, now? Hate! Curses!Ingratitude! Hast thou poison for me, or a knife? Or worse, yet, scorn? Speak! It is a day of enlightenment! I'll brook anything butdeceit!"

She stopped him in the midst of his vehement despair, by laying herhands on his hair. There surged to her lips all the eloquence of herlove and sympathy, but beside her old Nathan stood--an embodiment ofher conscience, watching. 

Twice she essayed to put into words the comfort of her submission tohis love. Twice her lips failed her; but the third time she turned tothe Christian. 

"Rabbi, what shall I do?" she implored. "Tell me out of thy wisdom!"

"What is it?" he asked, feeling that there was more than sympathy forthe defeated man in her heart. 

"What would thy Christ have me to do?" she insisted. "This stranger, here, is the joy of my heart; I am like to die if I can not give himthe love that I feel for him this hour!"

The startled Christian looked at her with suspicion growing in hiseyes. 

"Art thou a wife? Wedded to another than this man?" he asked gravely. 

"Wedded, " she whispered, "to one who hath denied me, affronted me andcast me out of his house! In this man I have found favor from thebeginning. He has been tender of me, he has sheltered me, and he hasstrengthened me against himself to this hour. There has been nothingsinful between us!"

The old Christian's face grew immeasurably sad. 

"There is but one thing for you to do, " he said. 

She wrenched herself away from the Maccabee, who had been angrilyprotesting against her carrying his case to another for decision, andconfronted Nathan. 

"But he rejected me!" she cried with earnestness. "That alone isenough among our people for divorcement!"

The Christian shook his head sadly. He was not happy to lay down thisprohibition before them who suffered. 

"There is no help in thy faith for such as I am. In that thy religionfails!" she cried. 

"Love, now, is all in all to thee, daughter. It is but the speech ofthy young blood running through thy veins, the claim of thy youth tothy use upon earth. Resist it; for when thy years are as many as minethou wilt lose thy rebellious spirit and the fervor will have died outof thy heart. Then, if thou hast fallen in this hour, how vain andworthless it will seem to thee! Divine fires in the heart of men neverbecome changed in value. Love purely and thou wilt never repent; but Isay unto thee thou fashionest for thyself humbled and shamed old ageif thou transgressest the Law!"

"What mercy, then, since thou preachest mercy, in filling me with thisweakness if my life must be darkened resisting it, and my future showno relief for it?" she insisted passionately. 

It was the cry old as the world. He looked at her sadly, hopelessly. 

"As for God, His way is perfect, " he said. "_How unsearchable are hisjudgments, and his ways past finding out!_ Thou shalt struggle withthe truth, my daughter, but without fail and most readily thou shaltknow when thou hast sinned!"

She was past the influence of argument. Impulse controlled her nowentirely. She would see if there were not an intelligence, even areligion which would see her sorrow from her own heart's position. 

She listened now to the words of her lover. 

"He is an exclaimer, a prophet of doom!" he was crying. "Love me andlet us die!"

Without in the entrance of the crypt some great-lunged fanatic wascalling the multitude to harken to the prophetess. 

The Maccabee's lips were against her cheek as he continued to speak. 

"It is the end! There is no help for us. Love me, and let me be happyan hour before we perish! The Nazarene is right! The city is cursed!God's wrath is upon us. The hour is still ours. Love me and let usdie!"

Without the great voice, like an unwearying bell, was calling:

"A sign! A sign! Behold the Deliverer! Come all ye who would share histriumph and hear! Hear! Come ye and be fed, ye hungry; be drunken, yethirsty; love and be loved, ye forlorn!"

Laodice stiffened in the Maccabee's clasp. 

"Dost thou hear?" she whispered. "It may be true!"

He shook his head that he had bowed upon her shoulder. 

"Let us go, " she urged. "Perchance he has comfort for us. Come, Hesper; let us see what he has for the forlorn. "

"Who?" he asked dully. 

"They say the Deliverer has come. "

He shook his head again, but with her two hands she lifted his facefrom its refuge, and urging with her eyes and her hands and her lipsshe led him toward the stairs. The Christian looked after them. 

"_For there shall arise false Christs; and false prophets, and shallshew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, theyshall deceive the very elect_, " he said sorrowfully. 

The horror of the city augmented hour by hour. The Jerusalem Laodicelocked upon now was infinitely more afflicted than the one she hadseen in the daylight days before. 

The walls were now outlined by fire which illuminated all the citythat lay directly beneath the beacons. To the north gnomish outlinesby hundreds against the flames showed where the soldiers of thefactionists were placing the topmost stones upon an inner wall orcurtain erected just within the Old Wall, which was by this timeshaking and cracking under the assaults of a great siege-enginewithout. Titus, awakened by the fall of his tower, had immediatelyrenewed the attack, although the morning was still some hours distant. 

But the citizens were no longer disinterested, no longer wrapped inhopelessness and dull misery. 

Hungry, sleepless, houseless, diseased and mad though they were, theirhollow eyes gleamed now with hope that was almost defiant. Around theMaccabee and Laodice roared the comment of the multitude. 

"They say he climbed to the summit of the outer wall overlookingTophet and remains there a target for the Roman arrows, which reboundfrom him!" cried one. 

"One of John's men says that the heads of the arrows are blunted andthe most of them snapped in two when they are picked up. "

"The Romans have ceased to shoot at him!"

"They say that his footprints in the dust on the Tyropean Bridge areHebrew letters writing 'Elia' in gold!"

"It is said that the inner Temple is rocking with trumpet blasts andthat John is struck dead!"

"They say that those who believe in him shall ask for whatever theywould have and have it!"

"The breaches in the First Wall have been healed; the old rock is backin its place!"

"They say that the dead beyond the wall in Tophet are prophesying!"

"There is a bolt of lightning fixed in the sky over Titus' camp. Weare called to go forth and see it fall!"

A voice swept by distantly crying that a woman had eaten her child. Crazed Posthumus, self-elected guardian of the Law, with the sacredroll under his arm, declaimed, without any of his audience attending, that prophecy which this horror fulfilled. 

All Jerusalem was in the streets; all Jerusalem poured into theimmense open space where some palatial ruin stood, and melted in thegiant concourse that gathered to hear the prophetess. 

Laodice and the Maccabee were unable to see the woman; only her voice, mystic, musical, pitched at a singing monotone, intoning rather thanspeaking, reached them from the distance. The long harangue, deliveredas a chant, had long ago had a mesmerizing effect on her audience. Absolutely she controlled them; along the dead level of her preachingthey maintained a low continuous murmur, accompanied by a slight slowswaying of the body; in the climaxes of the appeal they responded withcries and wild gestures, flinging themselves about in attitudescharacteristic of their frenzy. In their faces was the reflection of apeculiar light that proved that derangement had settled overJerusalem. It was the end of the reign of reason. 

"It is the abomination of desolation. Even so, it is finished! It isthe time, it is full time, and Michael hath come. There are seventyweeks; behold them. The transgression is finished and the end heretoof all sins. Approacheth the hour for the reconciliation for iniquityand to bring in everlasting righteousness and to seal up the visionand prophecy and to anoint the most Holy! Prepare ye!"

Somewhere in the city a voice that was heard even by the fighting-menon the wall in Akra cried:

"The Sacrifice has failed! The Oblation is ceased! There is noOffering for the Altar; none is left to offer it!"

The vast gathering heard it, and immediately from the high place ofthe prophetess came back the words, prompt and effective:

"_And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in themidst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation tocease!_"

Posthumus, buried in the midst of the crowd, was shouting, but overhim the splendid mesmerism of the prophetess' voice soared. 

"_The hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own children; theywere their meat in the destruction of the daughter of my people . .. The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter ofZion; . .. And for the overspreading of abominations he shall make itdesolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall bepoured upon the desolate_!"

Among the crowd now growing frantic, people began to cry:

"A sign! A sign!"

Others shouted:

"Lead us!"

"Persecute and destroy them in anger from under the Heaven of theLord!"

"Lead us!" they still shouted. 

They were hungry; they had been abstinent; they had surrendered theirriches and their comforts. It was not independence but necessitiesthat they wanted now. The primal wants were at the surface. 

"Come up and be filled!" she cried. "Ask and it shall be given untoyou! Eat of the grapes and the honey; drink of wine and warm milk;sleep as kings; be housed in mansions; be rulers; command potentates!Let kings bow at your footstools! Be replenished; be great! Sufferinghath been your portion since the earth was; but the end is come. Drawnigh and have your recompense. Laugh, you whose eyes have trickleddown with the waters of affliction! You in the low dungeon come forthand range all the free boundaries of the world. Whosoever hath gravelbetween his teeth, let them be grapes! He who sitteth alone, gathercompany and revel unto him! Feast, ye hungry; be drunken, ye thirsty;love and be loved, ye forlorn!"

Laodice leaned forward suddenly and hung on the woman's words. 

"The time for sacrifice and humiliation is paid out! It was a longtime! Now, behold in the generosity of his repentance, ye shall askand nothing shall be denied. Speak! Ask! The whole world, Heaven andearth and the delights of all the years are yours, now and for alltime!"

At Laodice's side was Amaryllis. The Greek's face was pale but lightedwith a certain enlightenment that was almost threatening. 

Startled and frightened Laodice moved back from the Greek, who movedwith her, without a glance at the Maccabee. 

The voice of the prophetess swept on:

"Ye have bowed to tyrants and bent your necks to murderers; ye havewaged wars for pillagers and shared not in the spoils. Why are yehungry now? Who is full-fed in these days of want, yourselves or yourmasters? A sword, a sword is drawn; uphold the arm that wields it!"

"Sedition!" Amaryllis whispered, as the mob began to murmur and stirat this new doctrine. 

"For behold, he shall go forth with great fury to destroy and utterlyto make away many!"

Amaryllis bent so she could whisper in Laodice's ear. 

"John hath taken him a new woman to keep him cheerful this hour. I wasnot daring enough. Philadelphus' wife hath supplanted me. Your placewith him is vacant. Go back and possess it!"

"Why was appetite and desire and thirst of power and the love ofriches lighted in you, but to be satisfied?" The prophetess' wordsswept in after Laodice's sudden fear of returning to Philadelphus. "Wehave expiated the sin of Adam, the greed of Jacob and the fault ofDavid. The judgment is run out; ye have come to your own! Verily, Isay unto you, if ye follow me in the name of him who hath come untoyou, the world shall be yours!"

Amaryllis still continued to whisper, and Laodice, fearing that theMaccabee might hear, drew farther away. He stood where she had lefthim, with his head lowered, waiting--at last a creature dependent onanother's will. 

"Listen!" Amaryllis said. "I have been seeking you since midnight!Philadelphus' doubt was awakened in this woman. He questioned her, sominutely that she betrayed ignorance of many things she should haveknown had she been the real daughter of Costobarus. And when finallyhe taxed her with imposture, she robbed him of the dowry and fled toJohn. Convinced that you are his wife, he set forth and hath sincesearched for you without ceasing! See, over there! He seeks you, now!"

Laodice looked the way the Greek pointed and saw Philadelphus, standing with lifted head and stretched to his full height, as ifsearching over the crowd for her. 

Panic seized her. She wrenched herself from the Greek's hold and, forgetting even the protection of Hesper who was within touch of her, she threw herself into the crowd behind her and struggled out of thepress. 

Nathan, the Christian, saw her turn and followed instantly in the pathshe made. 

Once out, she turned in a bewildered manner this way and that. Whatrefuge, now, for her, indeed, but the cavern under the ruin and thecare of Hesper, until the end which should swallow them all!

A trembling hand was laid on her arm. 

She whirled, expecting to find Philadelphus. Beside her, his old faceradiant with emotion, stood Momus!

Chapter XXI

THE FAITHFUL SERVANT

Within the Roman lines was a bent and deformed figure of an old waifthat the soldiers had picked up attempting to run the lines intoJerusalem the second day after the siege had been laid about the HolyCity. 

The old man, though wrinkled and twisted and bowed, had fought withsuch terrible savagery and had incontinently laid in the dust insuccession three of the camp's best fighting-men, that the Romansoldiers, for ever partizan to the strong man, had finally with greatdifficulty succeeded in trussing the old belligerent and had broughthim before Titus. 

There they laid the twisted old burden before the young general andshamelessly told how he, thrice the age of the vanquished men, hadfinished them with despatch. 

It was evident that the old man was a Jew; it became also apparentthat he was dumb and partly deaf, and further to their amazement andadmiration, they discovered that his right leg and arm were too stifffor ordinary use and that he had done his wonderful execution withterrific left limbs. 

This saved his life and gave him a partial liberty. Titus, however, admitted to Carus that the old man's distress at being kept out ofJerusalem was pitiable enough to urge the young general to deport himand get him out of sight. 

For it was manifest that the old minotaur was in deep trouble. But hisparalyzed tongue would not serve him, and his menial ignorance had notprovided him with the means of telling his desire by writing. Tituswas unable to understand from his signs anything further than that hewished to get into the city. The young general in one of his outburstsof generosity would have permitted this, but that Nicanor happened inat an evil moment and drew such pictures of calamitous effect inpassing the old servant into Jerusalem that Titus was forcedreluctantly and irritably to be convinced of the folly of hiskindness. So here, through the terrible days of the siege, old Momusat times desperate and savage, at others piteously suppliant, wore onthe sentries' peace of mind and stood like a shadow, for ever watchingthe white walls of the besieged city. 

The Romans were now within the city. Only Zion and the Temple heldagainst them. A wall built with the thoroughness of David, theancient, and solidified by the mortising of Time, ran directly fromHippicus to the Tyropean Valley, joining the tremendous fortificationsof Moriah and so cut off Zion from the advance of the army. Securelyintrenched within that quarter and the Temple, Simon and John beganthe last resistance which should tax Roman endurance and Romanpatience as it had not been taxed before. 

Titus no longer lagged. Famine had long since become a powerful allyand the honor of the Flavian house rested upon his immediatesubjugation of the rebellious city. He no longer expectedcapitulation; yet he did not neglect to be prepared for it and toencourage it. Though the heart of the historian Josephus broke, he didnot fail to serve his patron as mediator, though without hope. Titushimself, as from time to time the horror of his work impressed itselfupon him, made overtures to the factionists, neglecting no art orinducement which should convince the seditious that their resistancewas foolhardy, even mad. At such times, Nicanor's face becamecontemptuous and Carus himself frowned at the young general'sattitude. But the spirit of a Roman and the traditions of a soldiereven could not prevent the young man from weakening at times beforethe charnel pit in Tophet where countless thousands of vulturesfattened with roaring of wings and hissing of combat. 

But under an ever-thickening veil of horrid airs, the struggle wenton. 

The Roman Ides of July arrived. 

Titus had erected banks upon which his engines were raised to batterthe walls of the Temple. 

From Titus' camp, the Romans on sick leave, the commissaries, thoseattached to the army who were not fighting-men, and old Momus, sawfirst, before the attack on the Temple began, a soft increasingdun-colored vapor rise between the Temple and Antonia. It issued fromthe cloister at the northwest which joined the Roman tower. As theywatched, they saw that vapor grow into a pale but intensely luminoussmoke, as if fine woods and burning metals were consumed together. Ina moment the whole north-west section was embraced in a sublime pallof fire. 

John was burning away the connection between the Temple and the towerand was making the sacred edifice four-square. 

As soon as it became confirmed, in the minds of the watchers in theRoman camp, that the Temple had been fired, the old mute among themseemed to become wholly unbalanced. Without warning, he leaped uponthe nearest sentry who, not expecting the attack, went down with aclatter of armor and a shout of astonishment. The next instant the oldman was making across the intervening space between the camp andJerusalem as fast as his stiff legs could carry him. 

The purple sentry sprang to his feet and strung an arrow, but beforehe could send it singing, the old minotaur was mixed with a secondsoldier in such confusion that the first sentry hesitated to shootlest he should kill his fellow. Another moment and a second soldierwas struggling in the impediment of his armor in the dust and the oldmute was again hobbling straight away toward the walls of Jerusalem. He was now a fair mark for the first sentry, but that Roman's rancordied after he had seen his own disgrace covered by the overthrow ofhis fellow. Two of Titus' scouts next stood in the path of the runningold man. One went to the ground so suddenly and so violently that thewatchers, now breaking into howls of delight, knew that he had beentripped. The other stood but a moment longer, than he, too, rolledinto the dust. 

The old man might have gone no farther at this juncture, for at everylatest triumph he left a crimson soldier murderous with shame. Butbefore the arrow next strung to overtake him could fly, Titus, Carusand Nicanor, accompanied by their escort, rode between the fugitiveand the men he had defeated. 

"There goes our minotaur, " Carus said quietly. Titus drew up his horseand looked. Nicanor with a sidelong glance awaited the young Roman'scommand to his escort to ride down the fugitive. But he waited, andcontinued to wait, while Titus with lifted head and with indecision inhis eyes watched the deformed old shape hobble on toward the Wall ofCircumvallation. 

"Shall we let him go?" Nicanor inquired coldly. 

"If some of my legionaries or those erratic Jews fail to get himbetween here and Jerusalem, he shall get into Jerusalem. But byHector, he will earn his entry!"

They saw the old man mount by the causeway of earth which the Romanshad built over the siege wall for the passage of the troops, saw himan instant outlined against the sky on the summit, and the nextinstant he disappeared. 

Titus touched his horse and rode at a trot toward the causewayhimself. He would see the end of this mad venture. 

In the hour of sunrise the sentinel above the North Gate in the OldWall saw among the ruins of the houses of Coenopolis a figure dodgingpainfully hither and thither. It was not habited in the brasses of theRoman armor. Also, it hobbled as if lame and ran toward the gate fastclosed below the sentry. 

The Jew, too intensely interested in the great climax enacting in thecity below, ceased to remark on this figure. 

Presently, however, he looked again into ruined Coenopolis. He sawthere this un-uniformed figure wrapped in fierce embrace with a younglegionary. Almost before the sentry's astonishment shaped itself intoexclamation, the legionary was tumbled aside as if crushed and the oldfigure hobbled on. 

Suddenly there appeared in the path of the wayfarer a gallopinghorseman, who drew his mount back on his haunches, then spurred him toride down the old man. 

The sentry on the Old Wall made a choked sound, unslung his bow andsent an arrow singing. There was a shout and the figure of thehorseman plunged from his saddle face down on the earth. 

The wayfarer flung himself away and rushed toward the wall, only alittle distance away. 

But all Coenopolis seemed to swarm now with legionaries, afoot orhorseback. 

The Jewish sentry rushed to the edge of the tower overhanging thegate. 

"Open!" he shouted below. "One cometh!"

With a rattle and clang of falling bars and chains the gate of the OldWall swung. 

Disregarding the known wishes of Titus, two of the legionariessimultaneously let fly their javelins. But the mute, hobblinguncertainly, was not a steady mark and under the whistle of arrowsreceived and sent, he blundered up the causeway leading to the Gate ofthe Old Wall, and the portal slowly and ponderously closed behind him. 

Wild howls of derision and exultation went up from the Jews. Many ofthe soldiers clambered down to satisfy their curiosity about thelatest addition to the starving garrison. But he proved to be adeformed old man, mute and weary, who was distressed for fear he wouldbe detained by them and who hobbled out into the besieged city andposted as fast as his legs could carry him toward the house ofAmaryllis, the Seleucid. 

But at the edge of a great open space where the Herodian palaces hadstood he came upon a concourse which seemed to be all Jerusalem. Itwas a gaunt horde, shouting, raging, prophesying and drowning the roarof battle at the Temple fortifications with the sound of religiousfrenzy. 

Momus, fresh from the orderly camp of Titus, was struck with terror. He would have retreated and followed some side street toward hisdestination, when he caught sight of a girl on the very outskirts ofthis mob. Momus laid a trembling hand on her arm. She threw up herhead with a start. 

Chapter XXII

VANISHED HOPES

The tremulous old man, weakened from his long and superhuman struggleto enter the doomed city, held Laodice to his breast while she strokedhis rough cheeks and murmured things that he did not hear and whichshe did not realize in the rush of her helplessness and dismay. 

At the corner of Moriah and the Old Wall, the tumult was infernal. Outof the suffocating sallow smoke from the tuns of burning tar heavedover the fortification upon the engines and their managers, the stonesfrom the catapults soared into view and fell upon the sun-coloredmarbles that paved the Court of the Gentiles. Clouded by the vapor, targets for the immense missiles, the Jews heaving and writhing inpersonal encounters appeared black and inhuman. Every combatantshouted; the great stones screamed; the boiling pitch hissed androared, and the thunder of the conflict shook the Temple to its veryfoundations. 

Without, the Romans planted scaling ladders, mounted them and werepitched backward into the moat regularly. Regularly, the ladders wereset up again after struggle, mounted without hesitation and throwndown again, with an inevitability which furnished a grim travesty tothe struggle. The two remaining towers were set in position againstthe base of Moriah and resumed execution. One after another theengines of the Romans were hauled into position, and workedunceasingly until covered with burning oil from the battlements aboveand consumed. Others were hauled into place; fresh detachments ofRomans seized upon the scaling-ladders or mounted to the towers, andthe roar of the conflict never abated. 

Meanwhile on the slopes of Zion the whole of Jerusalem, gaunt, dyingand demoniacal, was packed in the ruins of the palace of Herod. 

Old Momus with triumph and tearful exultation was holding out toLaodice a heavy roll of writings, dangling important seals, ancientpapers showing yellow beside the fresh parchment, and an old recorddark with long handling. 

Here were the proofs of her identity!

Laodice shrank from him with a gasp that was almost a cry. Behold, thefaithful old servant had suffered she knew not what to bring suchevidence as would force her to do that which she believed she couldnot do and survive!

Momus sought to put the papers in her hands, but she thrust them awayand he stood looking at her in amazement and sorrow. 

Nathan, the Christian, stood close to her. From the opposite side, Philadelphus rounded the outskirts of the mob, searching. He did notsee her. She flung herself between Momus and Nathan and cowered downuntil Philadelphus had passed from sight. When she lifted her head, Momus was gazing at her with the light of shocked comprehensiongrowing in his eyes. Nathan, the Christian, touched her. 

"Who was that man?" he asked gravely. 

She rose and laid her hands on the Christian's shoulders. 

"My husband, " she said. 

Something had happened at the Temple. She saw the Jews at the wallrecoil from the dust of battle, rally, plunge in and disappear. Fromout that presently shone now and again, then with increasing frequencyand finally in great numbers, the brass mail of Roman legionaries. Titus' forces had scaled the wall. 

From her position, she saw running toward them John of Gischala, withhis long garments whipping about him, wrapping his tall figure in livecerements. He was disarmed and bleeding. She saw next Amaryllis, withcompassionate uplifted hands stop in his way; saw next the Gischalanthrust her aside with a blow and the next instant disappear as if theearth had swallowed him. 

Nathan was speaking to her. 

"How often, O my daughter, we recognize truth and deny it because itdoes not give us our way! God put a sense of the right in us. Wetransgress it oftener than we mistake it!"

The roar of the turning battle and the mob about her drowned his nextwords, except, "You can not be happy in iniquity; neither blessed; but you are sureto be afraid. Right has its own terror, but there is at least couragein being right, against your desires. "

He was talking continuously, but only at times did the wind from theuproar sweep his fervent words to her. 

"Christ had His own conflict with Himself. What had become of us hadHe listened to the tempter in the wilderness, or failed to accept thecup in the Garden of Gethsemane! How much we have the happiness ofChrist in our hands! Alas! that His should be a sorrowful countenancein Heaven!

"The love of a man for a woman was near to the Master's heart! How canyou feel that you must love and be loved in spite of Him! Pityyourself all you may you can not then be pitied so much as He pitiesyou!

"Love as long and as wilfully as you will, and then it is only alittle space. The time of the supremacy of Christ cometh surely, andthat is all eternity! Which will you do--please yourself for an hour, or be pleased by the will of God through all time? Love is in thehands of the Lord; you can not consign it longer than the little spanof your life to the hands of the devil. "

Momus, in whose mind had passed an immense surmise, was again at herside. 

"O daughter of a noble father, " his dumb gaze said, "wilt thou putaway that virtue which was born in thee and let my labor come tonaught?"

But the preaching of Nathan and the reproach of Momus were feeble, compared to the great tumult that went on in her soul. She had seenJohn of Gischala cast Amaryllis aside. Even the Greek's sympathy washateful to him. Yet when Laodice had first entered the house ofAmaryllis, the woman had been obliged to dismiss John from herpresence for his own welfare and the welfare of the city. Why thischange?

Amaryllis was no less beautiful, no less brilliant, no less attractivethan she had once been; but the Gischalan had wearied of her. 

Laodice recalled that she had not been surprised to see the man throwAmaryllis aside. It seemed to be the logical outcome of love such astheirs. How, then, was she to escape that which no other woman escapedwho loved without law? In the soul of that stranger who had calledhimself Hesper, were lofty ideals, which had not been the least charmwhich had attracted her to him. Was she, then, to dislodge these holyconvictions, to take her place in his heart as one falling short ofthem, or were they still to exist as standards which he loved andwhich she could not reach? In either event, how long would helove--what was the length of her probation before she, too, wouldencounter the inevitable weariness?

It occurred to her, then, how nearly the natural law of such loveparalleled the religious prohibition that the Christian had shown toher. However harsh and unjust the sentence seemed, it was rational. With her own eyes she had seen its predictions borne out. Already therelief of the sorrowing righteous possessed her. She turned to theChristian. 

"Take me to my husband, " she said. "Now! While I have strength. "

Momus caught the old Christian by the arm and, signing eagerly that hewould lead, hurried away in advance of the two down into the ravineand crossed to the house of Amaryllis. 

There were no soldiers to stop them about the house. When no responsewas made to her knock, Laodice opened the door and passed in. 

Her old conductors followed her. 

Amaryllis sat in her ivory chair; opposite her in the exedra wasPhiladelphus. At sight of him, the last of the soft color went out ofLaodice's face. A curve of despair marked the corners of her mouth andshe seemed to grow old before those that looked at her. 

Philadelphus and the Greek sprang to their feet, the instant the groupentered. 

Laodice waited for no preliminary. Amaryllis' design was patent toher; it was part of her sorrow that now Hesper would be free to thedevices of this deceitful woman. So she did not look at the Greek. Sheaddressed Philadelphus in a voice from which all hope and vivacity hadgone. 

"I have brought proofs. Behold them!"

Nathan, the Christian, stood forth. 

"I, Nathan of Jerusalem, met and talked with this Laodice, daughter ofCostobarus, in company with Aquila, the Ephesian, three men-servantsin all the panoply and state of a coming princess three leagues out ofAscalon, her native city. I buried by the roadside her father, whodied of pestilence on their journey hither. I bear witness that she isthe daughter of Costobarus and thy wedded wife. "

A great light sprang into the face of the Greek. Philadelphus, nervous, albeit the news he heard filled him with pleasure, stood andwaited. 

The Christian stepped back and Momus, bowing, approached and handedthe leather roll into the none too steady hands of the Ephesian. Heopened it and drew forth parchments. 

Aloud he read a minute description of Laodice from the rabbi of thesynagogue in Ascalon; under the great seals of the Roman state, hefound and read the oath of the prefect, that such a maiden as therabbi had described had been married before him to PhiladelphusMaccabaeus fourteen years before. Then followed the depositions offorty Jews and Gentiles who were nurses, tradesmen and other peoplelike to have daily contact with the young woman in her house, settingentirely at naught any claim that Laodice was other than the wife whohad been supplanted by an adventuress. Philadelphus did not read themall. Before he made an end he dropped the documents and flung wide hisarms. But Laodice with a countenance frozen with suffering held himoff for a moment. 

"Go, " she said to the old Christian, "unto Hesper and lead him intothe belief of the Lord Jesus Christ which is mine. "

The old Christian approached the fountain in the center of theandronitis and taking up water in his palm sprinkled a few drops onher hair while she knelt. 

"In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, I baptizethee, Laodice. Amen!"

While she knelt, he said:

"I shall search for him also. Christ have mercy on thee now and forever. Farewell. "

He was gone. 

Chapter XXIII

THE FULFILMENT

When Nathan, the Christian, stepped into the streets once more therewas an immense accession of tumult about him. 

He turned to look toward the corner of the Old Wall in time to beholdJews in armor and Romans in blazing brass rush together in a greatcloud of dust as the Old Wall went in and Titus swept down uponJerusalem. 

At the same instant from the ruined high place upon Zion came a roarof stupendous menace. The Christian, with sublime indifference todanger, kept his path toward the concourse from which he had takenLaodice. As he ascended the opposite slope of the ravine, he saw, descending toward the battle, the front of a rushing multitude, asirresistible and as destructive as a great sea in a storm. 

He saw that the mob was turning toward Akra, and to avoid it, theChristian climbed up to the Tyropean Bridge, and from that pointviewed the whole of Jerusalem sweeping down upon the heathen. 

At the head of the inundation passed a melodious voice crying:

"An end, an end is come upon the four corners of the land! Draw nearevery man with his destroying weapon in his hands for the glory of theLord! For His house is filled with cloud and the Court is full of thebrightness of the Lord's glory! A sword! A sword is sharpened! The wayis appointed that the sword may come! For the time for favor to Zionis here; yea, the set time is come!"

After this poured a gaunt horde numbering tens of thousands. They borepaving-stones, stakes, posts, railings, garden implements, weaponsfrom kitchens, from hardware booths and from armories; anything thatone man or a body of men could wield; torches and kettles of tar;chains and ropes; knotted whips, and bundles of fagots; iron spikes, instruments of torture, anything and everything which could be turnedas a weapon or to inflict pain upon the Roman, who believed at thismoment that Jerusalem was his!

The Christian overlooked this ferocious inundation and shook his head. On a mound near him stood the spirit of the mob concentrated andpersonified. It was crazed Posthumus. 

He was screaming: "It is finished; the law is run out! All prophecy isfulfilled!"

And over his head he was swinging a parchment fiercely burning. 

It was the Scroll of the Law!

After uncounted minutes, vibrating with roar, the terrible floodrushed by. Feeble arms clasped the Christian about the knees and helooked down on the tangled white locks of the palsied man, who hadsearched for him until he had found him. The Christian laid his handon the man's head but did not speak. 

At the breach in the Old Wall, the watchers on that almost desertedstreet saw the brazen wave of four legions gather and sweep forward togain ground in the city before the mob swept down on them. 

Between the two warring bodies, one orderly, prepared butapprehensive, the other mad and perishing, was a considerable space. Fighting still went on at the breach in the walls, but the supremeconflict of a comparatively small body of soldiers and an uncountedhorde was not yet precipitated. 

Ordinarily, the Roman army could have reduced any popular insurrectionwith half that number of men. But at present the legionariesconfronted desperate citizens who were simply choosing their own wayto die. Reason and human fear long since had ceased to inspire them. They were believing now and following a prophet because it was thefinal respite before despair. There was no alternative. It was deathwhatever they did, unless, in truth, this splendid sorceress wasindeed the Voice of the Risen Prince. Force would be of no availagainst them. Madness had flung them against Rome; only some othermadness would turn them back. 

The Christian, from his commanding position, expected anything. 

It was the moment which would show if the false prophet would triumph. If the four legions went down before the multitude, it would mean theascendancy of a strange woman over Israel, and the obliteration of thefaith in Jesus Christ in the Holy Land. 

It can not be said that the Christian watched the crisis with a calmspirit. He did not wish to see the heathen overthrow the ancientpeople of God, nor could he behold the triumph of a false Christ. Heput his hands together and prayed. 

A figure appeared between the two bodies of combatants, rushing onintensely, to grapple. 

It was a tall commanding form, clothed in garments that glittered forwhiteness. By the step, by the poise of the head, the Christianrecognized Seraiah. 

The front of the multitude fell on their faces at that moment as if hehad struck them down. 

Out of the forefront, the prophetess appeared. The Christian heard hersplendid voice out of the uproar, and while he gazed, he saw madSeraiah turn away from her, with the front of the mob turning afterhim, as a needle turns to the pole. 

In that fatal moment of pause, out of which the warning cry of theprophetess rang wildly, the Roman tribune, in view for a moment underthe blowing veils of smoke, flung up his sword, the Roman bugle sang, and the brassy legions of Titus hurled themselves upon the halted mob. 

The Christian dropped his head into the bend of his elbow and stroveto shut out the sound. The nervous arms of the palsied man at his feetgripped him frantically. 

Up from the corner of the Old Wall, came the prolonged "A-a-a-a!" ofdying thousands. 

Jerusalem had fallen. 

The foremost of the mob, turning with Seraiah, escaped the onslaughtof the Romans, and as the mad Pretender strode toward the broad streetfrom which the Tyropean Bridge crossed to the demesnes of the Temple, they followed him fatuously, blind to the death behind them and theoncoming slaughter in which they might fall. 

Seraiah passed above the spot where the sorrowful Christian stood, crossed the great causeway leading toward the Royal Portico and afterhim six thousand blind and insane enthusiasts followed, expectingimminent miracle. Above them towered the heights of Moriah, now veiledin smoke. Up the great white bank of stairs they rushed after him, facing an ordeal which must mean a baptism in fire, and on through acurtain of luminous smoke into a gate pillared in flame, up into theRoyal Portico, resounding with the tread of the advancing Destroyer, out into the great Court of Gentiles wrapped in cloud through whichthe Temple showed, a stupendous cube of heat, through the GateBeautiful where the Keeper no longer stood, thence into the Women'sCourt, raftered with red coals, up smoking stones tier upon tier tillthe roof of the Royal Portico was reached. 

At the brink of the pinnacle, they saw through tumbling clouds Seraiahtowering. He was looking down through masses of smoke upon the City ofDelight, perishing. They who had followed watched, uplifted withterror and frenzy, and while they waited for the miracle which shouldsave, the roof crumbled under them and a grave of thrice heated rockreceived them and covered them up. 

Below, Nathan, the Christian, seized upon the shoulders of theMaccabee as he was dashing after the thousands. His face was blackwith terror for Laodice. He struggled to throw off Nathan, cryingfutilely against the uproar that Laodice was perishing. 

"Comfort thee!" the Christian shouted in his ear. "She is saved. Shesent me to thee. "

The Maccabee stopped, as if he realized that he need not go on, buthad not comprehended what was said to him. 

Nathan dragged him out of the way, still choked with people strugglingto pass on to the Temple or to flee from it. Half-way down the Vale ofGihon, where speech was a little more possible, the Maccabee, who hadbeen crying questions, made the old man hear. 

"Where is she? Where is she?"

"She has returned to her husband. In love with thee, she has done thatonly which she could do and escape sin. She has gone to shelter withhim whom she does not love!"

The Maccabee seized his head in his hands. 

"It is like her--like her!" he groaned. 

In the Christian's heart he knew how narrowly Laodice had made herlover's mark for her. 

"It is her wish, " Nathan continued, "that I teach thee Christ whom shehath received. "

"How can I receive Him, when He sent her from me?" the unhappy mangroaned, unconscious of his contradictions. 

"How canst thou reject Him when His teaching led thy love to do thatwhich thine own lips have confessed to be the better thing?"

"Then what of myself, when I love where I should not love?" theMaccabee insisted. 

"You may suffer and sin not, " the Christian said kindly. 

The unhappy man dropped to his knees. 

"O Christ, why should I resist Thee!" he groaned. "Thou hast strippedme and made me see that my loss is good!"

The Christian laid his hands on the Maccabee's head. 

"Dost thou believe?" he asked. 

"Will Christ accept me, coming because I must?"

"It is not laid down how we shall baptize in the thirst of a famine, "Nathan said, "yet He who sees fit to deny water never yet hath deniedgrace. "

But the Christian's hand extended over the kneeling man was caught ina grip steadied with intense emotion. The unknown had seized him. 

But for his feeling that this interruption was necessary to thewelfare of another soul, the Christian would not have paused in hisministry. 

The phantom straightened himself with a superb reinvestment ofmanhood. 

"Thou, son of the Maccabee, Philadelphus!" he exclaimed to thekneeling man. 

The Ephesian's arms sank. 

"Who art thou that knoweth me?" he asked in a dead voice. 

"I am all that plague and sin hath left of thy servant Aquila, " thephantom declared. 

The Maccabee lifted his face for what should follow this revelation. It was only a manifestation of his subjection to another will than hisown. He was not interested--he who was hoping to die. 

"Hear me, and curse me!" Aquila went on. "But save thy wife yet. I sayunto thee, master, that she whom thou hast sheltered in the cavern isthy wife, Laodice!"

The Maccabee struggled up to his feet and gazed with stunned andunbelieving eyes at this wreck of his pagan servant, who went onprecipitately. 

"Her I plotted against at the instigation of Julian of Ephesus. Her, my mistress, Salome the Cyprian, robbed and hath impersonated thuslong to her safety in the house of the Greek. This hour, throughignorance of thine own identity, through my fault, she hath gonereluctantly to his arms. Curse me and let me die!"

The Maccabee seized the hair at his temples. For a moment the awfulgaze he bent upon Aquila seemed to show that the gentler spirit hadbeen dislodged from his heart. Then he cried:

"God help us both, Aquila! My fault was greater than thine!"

He turned and fled toward the house of the Greek. 

The four legions of Titus swept after him. 

Aquila lifted his eyes for the first time and gazed at Nathan. 

"I cursed thee for sparing me to such an existence as was mine!Behold, father, thou didst bless me, instead. I am ready to die. "

"Wait, " the Christian said peacefully. 

A moment later, the Maccabee dashed into the andronitis of Amaryllis. 

After him sprang a terrified servant crying:

"The Roman! The Roman is upon us!"

A roar of such magnitude that it penetrated the stone walls ofAmaryllis' house, swept in after the servant. Quaking menials began topour into the hall. Among them came the blue-eyed girl, the athleteand Juventius the Swan. These three joined their mistress who stoodunder a hanging lamp. Into the passage from the court, left open bythe frightened servants, swept the prolonged outcry of perishingJerusalem. Over it all thundered the boom of the siege-engines shakingthe earth. 

The slaves slipped down upon their knees and began to groan together. The silver coins on the lamp began to swing; the brass cyanthus whichAmaryllis had recently drained of her last drink of wine movedgradually to the edge of the pedestal upon which she had placed it. 

The dual nature of the uproar was now distinct; organized warfare andpopular disaster at the same time. The Roman was sweeping up theancient ravine. Jerusalem had fallen. 

The gradual crescendo now attained deafening proportions; the hanginglamp increased its swing; the silver coins began to strike togetherwith keen and exquisitely fine music. Juventius the Swan, with his dimeyes filled with horror, was looking at them. The peculiar desperateindifference of the wholly hopeless seized him. His long white handsbegan to move with the motion of the lamp; the music of the meetingcoins became regular; he caught the note, and mounting, with a bound, the rostrum that had been his Olympus all his life, began to sing. Themelody of his glorious voice struggled only a moment for supremacywith the uproar of imminent death and then his increasing exaltationgave him triumph. The great hall shook with the magnificent power ofhis only song!

The Maccabee confronted Amaryllis, with fierce question in his eyes. She pointed calmly at the heavy white curtain pulled to one side andcaught on a bracket. The brass wicket over the black mouth of thetunnel was wide. 

Without a word, the Maccabee plunged into it and was swallowed up. 

Amaryllis looked after him. 

"And no farewell?" she said. 

The thunder of assault began at her door. Juventius sang it down. Theathlete and the girl crept toward the mouth of the black passage, wavered a moment and plunged in. After them tumbled a confusion ofartists and servants who were swallowed up, and the hall was filledonly with music. 

The woman by the lectern and the singer on the rostrum had chosen. Tolive without beauty and to live without love were not possible to theone who had known beauty all his life, to the one who had learned loveso late--after she had been beggared of her dowry of purity. 

There was hardly an appreciable interval between the time of thedesertion of her artists and the thunder of assault at her door, butin that space there passed before Amaryllis that useless retrospectwhich is death's recapitulation of the life it means to take. And outof that long procession, she singled one conviction which made thestep of the Roman on her threshold welcome. It was an old, old moral, so old that it had never had weight with her, who believed it was timeto reconstruct the whole artistic attitude of the world. 

And that was why she waited impatiently at her doorway for death, which was a kinder thing than life. 

Chapter XXIV

THE ROAD TO PELLA

There was no incident in the Maccabee's long struggle through the inkyblackness of the tunnel leading under Moriah. 

It was night when the first new air from the outside world reachedhim. So he rushed into great open darkness, lighted with stars, beforehe knew that he had emerged from the underground passage. 

Entire silence after the turmoil which had shaken Jerusalem for manymonths fell almost like a blow upon his unaccustomed ears. The air wassweet. He had not breathed sweet air since May. The hills weresolitary. Week in and week out, he had never been away from the soundof groaning thousands. Not since he had assumed his disguise toLaodice in the wilderness had he been close to the immemorial reposeof nature. All his primitive manhood rushed back to him, nowinfuriated with a fear that his love was the spoil of another. 

All instinct became alert; all his intelligence and resource assembledto his aid. It came to him as inspiration always occurs at such times, that if the pair proceeded rationally, they would move toward a secureplace at once. Pella occurred to him in a happy moment. 

He took his bearings by the stars and hurried north and east. 

He came upon a road presently, almost obliterated by a summer's driftof dust and sand. It had been long since any one had gone up that wayto Jerusalem. There was no moon to show him whether there were anyrecent marks of fugitives fleeing that way. 

He did not expect that Julian of Ephesus would have courage to haltwithin sight of the glow on the western horizon which was the burningfrom the Temple. He expected the Ephesian to flee far and long, and inthat consciousness of the cowardice of his enemy he based his hope. 

But he ran tirelessly, seeking right and left, led on by instincttoward the Christian city in the north. 

At times, his terror for Laodice made him cry out; again, he madeviolent pictures of his revenge upon Julian; and at other moments, hebelieved, while drops stood on his forehead from the effort of faith, that his new Christ would save her yet. There were moments when he wasready to die of despair, when he wondered at himself attempting totrace Julian with all the directions of wild Judea to invite thefugitives. Why might they not have fled toward Arabia as well, or eventoward the sea? Perhaps they had not gone far, but had hidden in therock, and had been left behind. Conflicting argument strove to turnhim from his path, but the old instinct, final resource after the mindgives up the puzzle, kept him straight on the road to Pella. 

He came upon the rear of a flock of sheep, heading away from him. ANatolian sheep-dog, galloping hither and thither in his labor atkeeping them moving, scented the new-comer. There was a quick savagebark that heightened at the end in an excited yelp of welcome. Theshepherd, a dim figure at the head of the flock, turned in time to seehis dog leaping upon the Maccabee. 

"Down, Urge, " the shepherd cried. 

"Joseph, in the name of God, " the Maccabee cried, "where is Laodice?"

He threw off the excited dog and rushed toward the boy, who turnedback at the cry with extended hands. 

"True to thy promise, friend, friend!" the boy cried. "She is here!"

The Maccabee stiffened. 

"Is there one with her?" he demanded fiercely. 

"A man and her servant. "

The Maccabee threw off the boy's hands. 

"Where?" he cried. 

"Ahead of the sheep, " the boy said a little uncertainly. 

The Maccabee dashed through the flock and rounding a turn in the roadcame upon Laodice walking; behind her Momus; at her side was Julian ofEphesus. 

Immense strain had sharpened their sense of fear until it was as acuteas an instinct. Before the sound of the Maccabee's furious approachreached Julian, the Ephesian whirled. 

Towering over him, the very picture of retribution, was the man he hadleft, apparently dead by his hand, by the roadside in the hills ofJudea months and months before. 

For an instant, Julian stood petrified. Over his lips came a faint, frozen whisper that Laodice heard--that was proof enough to her, themoment after. 

"Philadelphus--Maccabaeus!"

When his outraged kinsman put out vengeful hands to seize him, theMaccabee grasped the air. Julian of Ephesus had vanished!

 * * * * *

Among the rocks at the base of the cliff that sheltered ChristianPella from the rude winds of the Perean mountains, the procurator ofthe city, Philadelphus Maccabaeus, and his wife, Laodice, sat side byside in the morning sun. There was a path little wider than a man'shand wandering along below them toward a well in the hollow of therocks. Along this way, in early morning, Joseph, the shepherd, was inthe habit of driving his sheep to drink. And hither the procurator andhis wife came to visit the boy from time to time. Within their hall, there was too much state. Something in the wild open of Judea with itswinds gave them all an ease whenever they wished to talk with Joseph. 

But the shepherd was not in sight. The pair sat down and waited forhim. 

Laodice rested against her husband's arm, laid along the rock behindher. Presently he freed that arm and with the ease of much usagewithdrew the bodkins from her hair. The heavy coil dropped over hisbreast down to his knee. With delicate touches he began to free fromthe splendid tangle a single strand of glistening white hair. When shesaw it shining like spun silver across the back of his hand, shelooked up at him. With infinite care he searched her face, while shewaited with questioning in her tender eyes. 

"This, " he said, lifting the hand that supported the silver threads, "is the sole evidence that thou hast seen the abomination ofdesolation. "

"And that came the night I journeyed away from Jerusalem, withoutyou, " she declared. "But, my Philadelphus, " she said, turning herselfa little that she might hide her face away from him, "had I stayedwith you against my conscience, I had been by this time wholly white. "

He kissed her. 

"I did not expect you to stay, " he said. "I knew from the beginningthat you would not. Ask Joseph. He will bear me out. "

Low on the slope of the hill, the shepherd approached, calling hissheep that trailed after him contentedly by the hundreds. The excitedbark of Urge, the sheep-dog, came up faintly to them. 

While they leaned watching them, old Momus, bent and broken, stoodbefore them. Laodice hurriedly drew away from her husband's clasp. Itwas a habit she had never entirely shaken off, whenever the muteappeared, in spite of the old man's pathetic dumb protest. 

He handed a linen scroll to his master. 

It read:

 The captives whom thou hast asked for freedom at Cęsar's hand are this day sent to thee, Philadelphus, under escort. They should reach thee a little later than this messenger. However, it is Cęsar's pain to inform thee that the Greek Amaryllis as well as the actress Salome were not to be found. Julian of Ephesus, who named the woman for us, is here at Cęsarea, but being a Roman citizen, is not a captive. However it shall be seen to that his liberty is sufficiently curtailed for the welfare of the public. Also, I send herewith a shittim-wood casket found with John of Gischala when he was captured in a cavern under Jerusalem. It contains treasure and certain writings which identify it as property of thy wife. There were other features in it which, coming to my hand first, made it advisable that the State should not know of its existence. And privately, it will be wise in thee to destroy them. 

The Maccabee stopped at this point and looked at Laodice. 

"What does he mean?" he asked. 

"My father put your last letter in the case, " she said, with a littlepanic in her face. 

The Maccabee laughed, and went on, Those that go forward to thee are Nathan of Jerusalem and Aquila of Ephesus. To thy wife my obeisances. To thyself, greeting. 

 CARUS, TRIBUNE. 

THE END