"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 turned
back 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 road
came upon Laodice walking; behind her Momus; at her side was Julian of
Ephesus.
Immense strain had sharpened their sense of fear until it was as acute
as an instinct. Before the sound of the Maccabee's furious approach
reached Julian, the Ephesian whirled.
Towering over him, the very picture of retribution, was the man he had
left, apparently dead by his hand, by the roadside in the hills of
Judea 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, the
moment after.
"Philadelphus--Maccabaeus!"
When his outraged kinsman put out vengeful hands to seize him, the
Maccabee grasped the air. Julian of Ephesus had vanished!
* * * * * Among the rocks at the base of the cliff that sheltered Christian
Pella from the rude winds of the Perean mountains, the procurator of
the city, Philadelphus Maccabaeus, and his wife, Laodice, sat side by
side in the morning sun. There was a path little wider than a man's
hand wandering along below them toward a well in the hollow of the
rocks. Along this way, in early morning, Joseph, the shepherd, was in
the habit of driving his sheep to drink. And hither the procurator and
his 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 its
winds 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 for
him.
Laodice rested against her husband's arm, laid along the rock behind
her. Presently he freed that arm and with the ease of much usage
withdrew the bodkins from her hair. The heavy coil dropped over his
breast down to his knee. With delicate touches he began to free from
the splendid tangle a single strand of glistening white hair. When she
saw it shining like spun silver across the back of his hand, she
looked up at him. With infinite care he searched her face, while she
waited 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 of
desolation."