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 a
bridge. Go thence to the hither side of that bridge, pass down the
ravine and cross to the other side against Moriah. There thou shalt
see a new Greek house. It is the residence of Amaryllis."
Laodice thanked her informant and began the pursuit of the cloudy
directions to her destination. Twice before she brought up at the
sentry line before the house of the Seleucid, she asked further of
other citizens. Many times she met affront, once or twice she
perilously escaped disaster. At last, near sunset, she stood before
the dwelling-place of the one secure citizen of the Holy City.
A sentry dropped his spear across her path and she had not the
countersign to give him. There she and her helpless old attendant
stood and looked hopelessly at the refuge denied them.
Presently a man appeared in the colonnade across the front of the
house and descending to the sentry line called to him the officer in
command. They stood within a few paces of Laodice and she heard the
soldier address the man as John, and heard him deliver a report of the
day.
When the soldier withdrew to his place, Laodice stepped forward and
called to the Gischalan. He stopped, noted that she was beautiful and
waited.
"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 a
vestibule. Here, a porter took charge of Momus and showed him into a
side passage, while Laodice followed her conductor through a corridor
into an interior hall of splendid simplicity. Lounging on an exedra
was a young woman in a woolen chiton, barefoot and trifling with the
Greek 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 you
will find strangers awaiting you there, also without the password. You
will lose Jerusalem trifling with me. I have spoken!"
John filliped her ear as he passed through into a corridor which must
have led into the Temple precincts. Under the light, Laodice saw that
he was a middle-aged Jew, not handsome, but luxuriant with virility.
His face showed great ability with no conscience, and force and charm
without balance or morals. Here, then, thought Laodice, is the first
of Philadelphus' enemies.