Absorbed as he was by such thoughts, there is little wonder that the young Athenian missed his way, and that he unconsciously wandered in a direction different from that which he had intended to take. The moonlight also failed him, clouds had arisen, and only now and then a fitful gleam fell on his path. Lycidas became at last uncertain even as to the direction in which Jerusalem lay. The young Athenian was weary, less from physical fatigue than from the effects of strong excitement upon a sensitive frame. Sometimes he fancied now that he heard a stealthy step behind him, and stopped to listen, then felt assured that his senses must have deceived him, and went on his way, groping through the darkness. What a strange episode in his existence that night appeared to the Greek—scarcely a mere episode, for it seemed to him that it absorbed into itself all the true poetry of his life as regarded the past, and gave him new aspirations and hopes as regarded the future. To Lycidas the remembrance of his poetical triumph in the Olympic arena, the plaudits which had then filled his soul with ecstatic delight, was little more than to a man is the recollection of the toys which amused his childhood. The Greek had been brought face to face with life's grand realities, and what had strongly excited his ambition once, appeared to him now as shadows that pass away.
"And yet," mused the young poet, "I would fain once more win the leafy crown, that I might lay it at Zarah's feet. But what would such a trophy of earthly distinction be to her? not worth one of the flowers, hallowed by her touch, which she cast into the martyrs' grave! Ha! again! I fancied that I heard a rustle of garments behind me! How powerful is the imagination, that mirage of the mind, that makes us fancy the existence of things that are not!"
Lycidas had now reached a part of the road which bordered an abrupt descent to the left, the hill along whose side the path wound appearing to have been scarped in this place, probably to leave wider space for some vine-clad terrace below. Lights were gleaming in the far distance, marking the position of the city in which the guests of Antiochus, preceded by torch-bearers, were wending their way back to their several homes. Sounds of wild mirth, from those reeling back from the revels, were faintly borne on the night breeze from the distant streets.
Lycidas, however, when he reached the point whence the lights were visible, was not left a moment either to gaze or to listen.
"Dog of a Gentile—I have you!" hissed a voice from behind; and Lycidas was instantly engaged in a life or death hand-to-hand struggle with Abishai the Jew, who, as soon as he could steal away from his companions at the grave, had followed and dogged the steps of the Greek. It was almost a hopeless struggle for the young Athenian; his enemy surpassed him in strength of muscle and weight of body, wore a dagger, and was determined to use it, though some wild sense of honour had prevented Abishai from stabbing the unconscious youth without warning, when he stole upon him from behind. But the love of life is strong, and desperation gives almost supernatural power. Lycidas felt the keen blade strike him once and again, he felt his blood gushing warm from the wounds, he caught the arm uplifted to smite, with despair's fierce energy he endeavoured to wrench the murderous weapon away. The two men went wrestling, struggling, straining each sinew to the utmost, drawing nearer, inch by inch, to the brink of the steep descent. Abishai dropped his dagger in the struggle, and could not stoop to attempt to recover it in the darkness, but he grasped with his sinewy hand the gasping youth by the locks, and, with a gigantic effort, hurled him over the edge.
With dilating eyeballs and a look of fierce triumph Abishai leant over the brink, trying to distinguish through the deepening gloom the lifeless form of his victim.
"I have silenced the Gentile once and for ever!" cried the fierce Hebrew through his clenched teeth. "I said not 'Content' when the question was put, but I say it now!" He drew back from the edge, wiped the moisture from his heated brow, and left a red stain upon it.
"Ere I go to rest," said the stern Jew, "I will let Hadassah know that my arm has achieved that safety for her and our brave companions which her wild folly would have sacrificed. I marvel that Judas, son of Mattathias, a bold man, and deemed a wise one, should have let himself be swayed from his purpose by the idle words of a woman. But I trow," added Abishai with a grim smile, "that a glance from Zarah went further with him than all the pleadings of Hadassah. It is said amongst us, their kinsmen, that these twain shall be made one; but this is no time for marrying and giving in marriage, when the unclean swine is sacrificed on God's altar, and the shadow of the idol darkens the Temple, and the sons of Abraham are given but the alternative to defile themselves or to die. The day of vengeance is at hand! may all the enemies of Judah perish as that poor wretch has perished this night!"
Abishai sought for his dagger, and found it; he then left the scene of his act of ruthless cruelty, with a conscience less troubled by so dark a deed than it would have been had he rubbed corn between his hands on the Sabbath, or neglected one of the washings prescribed by the traditions of the elders.
CHAPTER V.
THE DREAM.
At sunrise on the following morning two women were seated on the ground, in the back part of a small flat-roofed house, situated in a very secluded spot amongst the hills, not a mile from Jerusalem. They sat opposite to each other, engaged—after the manner of the East—in grinding corn, by moving round, by means of handles, the upper millstone upon the nether one.
The room in which they were, if room it could be termed, was a narrow place on the ground-floor, partitioned off from a larger apartment, and devoted to holding stores, and other such domestic uses. Here corn was ground, rice sifted from the husk, and occasionally weaving carried on. Large bunches of raisins hung on the walls, jars of olive-oil and honey were neatly ranged on the floor; nor lacked there stores of millet, lentiles, and dried figs, such being the food on which chiefly subsisted the dwellers in that lonely home. A curtain, now drawn aside divided this store-place from the larger front room, which opened to the road in front. It had a door communicating with a small patch of cultivated ground behind, in which were a few flowers tended by women's hands, the fairest clustering round a bright little spring which gushed from the hill on whose steepest side the small habitation seemed to nestle.
One of the women, busy with the laborious task of grinding, was a Hebrew servant, past the prime of her days, but still strong to work; the other was fair and young, her delicate frame, her slender fingers, looking little suited for manual labour. With a very sad countenance and a heavy heart sat Zarah that morning at the millstone, engaged in her monotonous task. It was not that she was unwilling to spend her strength in humble toil, or that she murmured because her grandmother Hadassah had no longer men-servants and but one maid-servant to do her bidding. Zarah had too much of the spirit of a Ruth to shrink from work, or to complain of poverty, if shared with one who was to her as a mother; nay, her cheerfulness at labour was wont to gush forth in song. It was not a personal trial that now made the tears flow from Zarah's lustrous eyes, as she slowly turned round the millstone; no selfish sorrow drew heavy sighs from her bosom, as she murmured to herself, "Oh, cruel—cruel!"
"Peace be unto you, my child. You are early, and it was late ere you could retire to rest," said the voice of Hadassah, as, pale and sad in aspect, the widow lady entered the apartment.
Zarah arose from her humble posture, approached her grandmother, first meekly kissed the hem of her garment, and then received her tender embrace.
"I could not sleep," faltered the maiden; "I dared not close my eyes lest I should dream some dream of horror. Oh, ruthless Abishai, most cruel of men! will not the All-merciful, who cares for the stranger, require that young Greek's blood at his hand?"—Zarah covered her face and wept.
"His was an unrighteous and wicked deed," said Hadassah.
"And it was I who betrayed the stranger," sobbed Zarah. "It was my start and exclamation which directed the murderer's eyes to his place of concealment! I shall never be happy again!"
"Nay, you did no wrong, my white dove,"