ONCE more it was spring. Once more were the rains over and the air balmy and the water courses quiet so that sheep might pass them and not be afraid. Once more were faint paths made across the sands of the wilderness and the stony hillsides by caravans large and small, abroad on errands of business or pleasure, and once more did the House of Naaman pass a restless night, for on the morrow Miriam was to depart for her beloved Land of Israel.
Roused from happy dreams, she could not understand for a moment the medley of confused but pleasurable sensations which surged over her; then she remembered clearly. Eli had come long months ago to take her back to things as they used to be, back to her mother and father—nay, with a rush of tears, not her father. Never again would she see that fond expression in his eyes, never again hear his kind voice, never again look upon his dear face. And her mother, old and broken, she was told. She could not realize it. Yet soon would she clasp that mother in her arms; soon see her and know for herself. To-morrow Isaac’s band would give the captives in Syria safe conduct, Rachel and the babe riding in the chariot beside her, and Benjamin leading his sheep before them. And all through this time of waiting Eli had been here: Eli, who had suffered with and for her, who had toiled and sacrificed and then found it had been in vain. Oh, Eli was so wonderful!
In another part of the House of Naaman he of whom she thought was also awake, a little smile on his lips, a little thrill in his heart. To have found her unchanged and unspoiled in the midst of all this heathen luxury! To have found her beautiful and true and sweet! To have thought that he toiled for the sake of the mothers, not knowing it was for Miriam, not understanding that there was just one maiden—only one!
But nights have a way of ending, and dawn came as radiant as Miriam’s countenance when the household thronged around the altar which had been erected in one of the more private courtyards immediately after Naaman’s return from Israel. In appearance it was merely a raised mound made of ordinary Syrian soil upon which had been spread the “two mules’ burden of earth” he had begged from the Man of God. Thus hallowed by the sacred earth from the locality in which Jehovah was supposed to especially delight, it was considered a fitting place for the burnt-offering which Naaman himself piously sacrificed each morning.
This accomplished, the worshipers kneeling in petitions more or less heartfelt, they rose and the service closed with a psalm of David, painstakingly taught by Miriam to the household singers. To-day the hymn concerned itself with the wonders of nature, not in and for themselves as did the psalms of the sun-worshipers, but extolling Jehovah as Lord over nature.
Miriam’s voice led:
“The heavens declare the glory of God,
And the firmament showeth his handiwork.”
The chorus responded:
“Day unto day uttereth speech,
And night unto night revealeth knowledge;
There is no speech, there are no words,
Neither is their voice heard.
Yet is their line gone out through all the earth,
And their words to the end of the world.”
Miriam’s voice again:
“In them hath Jehovah set a tent for the sun,”
And the chorus once more:
“Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
And rejoiceth as a strong man to run his course.
His going forth is from the end of the heaven,
And his circuit unto the ends of it:
And there is nothing hid from the heat thereof.”
At the close of the service Eli had speech with Miriam for a moment. “They go now,” she told him, “to the House of Rimmon, where the old King Ben-hadad leaneth for support upon the hand of his well-beloved servant, Naaman, my master. Isaac attendeth upon him. Thou wilt wish to go to see for thyself this sun-worship while I wait upon my mistress ere we depart.”
“Always thou hast refused to go,” Isaac reminded, seconding the invitation, and Eli, after a little hesitancy, consented.
Lemuel, with a smile meant to be friendly, joined the group as Miriam hastened away. “Once more hath Rimmon, our sun-god, vanquished the darkness and started his victorious journey across the face of the sky, but whether it be Rimmon, god of Syria, or Baal, god of Phœnicia, or Jehovah, God of Israel, let each worship according to the custom of the land, say I.” He lowered his voice. “But didst thou think that Naaman would risk the favor of the king by importing a different God for worship at his private altar?”
Isaac sprang to his master’s defense. “It proveth the generous kindness of the king, and is but what might be expected in gratitude for healing at the hands of Jehovah’s prophet. Did not Naaman speak to Elisha, who refused to condemn his faithfulness to his old master, the king?”
Half an hour later they were all in the large and splendid Temple of Rimmon, the pride of Damascus architecture and decorating. It was beautiful with flowers, the air heavy with incense. Eli noted the service, burdened with ceremony, the reverence during the sacrifice of the burnt-offering, the earnestness of the murmured prayers, the spreading out of the hands in formal attitudes of supplication, the general singing of hymns of praise. Even the lewd dancing of the sun virgins filled him with pity rather than horror.
He spoke his mind to Miriam as he rode beside the chariot that afternoon on the way to Israel. “To be so sincere yet so mistaken; to go from the altar of Jehovah to the Temple of Rimmon; to turn from the true God to the false; to have none to show them a better way! Nay, thou couldst not be reconciled to dwell in this heathen land.”
For some reason Miriam resented his half-pitying, half-complacent tone. The quiet which had possessed her since the tearful farewells at Naaman’s gate suddenly forsook her. “The daybreak, Eli, how cometh it, suddenly and with the noise of a trumpet or silently and by degrees, one faint radiance succeeding another until all is light?”
It was a moment before he caught her meaning. “Yea, I see,” he said, glowing with admiration, “and thou hast led this household to its first, faint gleam—the gleam which shineth more and more unto the perfect daybreak.”
In the most splendid house of the “city” of Hannathon, the house with the courtyard which Judith had so coveted, Abner addressed her, a little frown on his forehead:
“One field after another have I added to what I already had. Anxious enough were our neighbors to sell and remove hence when the Syrian raid left them hungry and desolate and afraid. For almost nothing did many part with their possessions. And now the best vineyard of them all, that held by Sarah, widow of Caleb, I cannot buy because thou dost withhold the pearl which I might offer as surety for payment in full when the grapes be gathered in the fall. So obstinate is a woman! Long hath Sarah held the land and offer after offer hath she refused, saying the vineyard be all of her living save a few olive trees. Now, with Eli gone, a price hath been agreed upon, but she demanded of me a pledge. Come, give me the pearl.”
Judith’s eyes besought him piteously. “I cannot,” she faltered.
He smiled unpleasantly, quite misunderstanding the reason for her hesitancy. “Because it is Sarah, who hath shared her home with thee? Because she is old before her time and sick? Because thou thinkest I offer her too little? Five years ago thou wert ready to leave her roof for mine. Hath she treated thee better than I?”
Again Judith’s eyes spoke, this time with a flash of indignation. “Never hath she treated me well. Grudgingly always did she offer me a home. Daughter that I have been to her for the past five years since Miriam was taken away, never doth she look at me but always through me. My services are acceptable but not myself. Never doth she let me forget that I am of strange people. It was Caleb, husband of Sarah and brother to my father, who was ever my friend.” Her voice broke, but in a moment she went on more steadily: “What I do for her is in memory of him and of the little maid who loved me.”
“I see,” he declared, his eyebrows drawn together until they made one line: “So it is because I refused help to that visionary, Eli, who desired a gift toward the maid’s ransom, that thou dost revenge thyself upon me by withholding the pearl. As if he would find trace of her! As if he would want to find what he would find! Thinkest thou a little maid would be safe in the midst of a rough soldiery? Thinkest thou the cruel Syrians would deal gently with a child? Nay, but when Eli returneth with a tale too pitiful to tell a sorrowing mother—”
Judith interrupted, her words coming chokingly: “When Eli failed to secure thy help, I besought thine aid for Miriam, adding my tears to his, thinking thou wouldst understand and sympathize, thou, a sorrowing father, who had himself lost a little maid, a maid so tiny and so sweet, stolen by Death, not by the Syrians—”
She turned her head and a sob escaped her. There was absolute silence in the apartment. Abner cleared his throat.
“Thou dost evade the question. Come, acknowledge the truth. Thou dost revenge thyself upon me by withholding the pearl.”
“Nay,” returned Judith, “I would scorn to avenge myself upon thee. I—I—have lost the pearl.”
He looked at her in amazement.
“And I feared to tell thee lest thou be angry,” she added, not looking at him.
He strode across the room and took her face between his hands, striving to read her expression. Something he saw there dictated his next words:
“Unless it had been stolen from thee, small chance hast thou had to lose it. Nay, but thou dost deceive me. Speak without fear. What hast thou done with the jewel?”
She hesitated. “I lost it,” she reiterated.
Storm clouds gathered on his face and the tempest broke in fury upon her: “Thinkest thou to deal doubly with me and yet find confidence and affection? Nay, but truth will I have from thee, else this home is no longer thine. Speak! What hast thou done with the pearl?”
Judith meditated. To confess while he was in that mood was to find neither understanding nor approval. She would wait until his heart was more tender toward her.
“I have lost it,” she repeated, sullenly, and cowered as he came toward her.
Laying a rough hand on her shoulder he pointed to the door: “Go thou and enter not again until truth be thy companion.”
Shaking off his hand she faced him. Not a word did she utter, but the look he never forgot. In a moment she had passed out of the door into the sun-kissed air, divorced by the one word which an Oriental husband may speak at any time to the wife of whom he has tired, and which even a Jew occasionally spoke in defiance of Mosaic law.
At the top of the hill which crowned the Valley of Jiptha-el, a woman bent and worn sat patiently on the coarse green grass under the shade of a wild fig tree. As Judith appeared she addressed her without salutation and without taking her eyes from the path.
“Day after day, from sunrise to sunset, have I stayed here, waiting for Eli to bring them back to me. Yet if they were coming, would they not have been here a month ago? Early were the rains over and long hath travelers been passing the mouth of the valley, but they for whom I wait come not.”
Her voice had in it that note of calm endurance which belongs to those who have suffered. Judith, observing her in the strong sunlight, thought she had never looked so frail.
“To-day and to-morrow and the day after will I wait,” went on Sarah, “and then—” she put her hand over her heart—“then if they come not, I will know he hath not found them and I think I cannot wait longer.”
Judith was startled out of her own sad musings. “It is the first time I have heard thee hint at surrender,” she said, reproachfully. “Nay, but be of good courage. What if they should come later?”
“If they come after I am gone,” was the answer, the worn hand still over the tired heart, “tell them I waited as long as I could, as long as the pain would let me. Tell Eli that I say his faithfulness hath never let me feel the lack of a son, and tell Miriam that no one could take her place, but that thou, like a dear, elder daughter, hath filled a corner in my heart all thine own.”
Judith stared incredulously. “Thou canst not mean—” she began, but Sarah went on, unheeding the interruption:
“Strange that the maiden I could not welcome should have been my stay and comfort these five years and more! And tell Benjamin, my beloved—”
Judith brushed away the tears: “Oh but thou dost not know the wrong—”
Sarah was shading her eyes with her hand: “What meaneth that cloud of dust in the valley?”
“Sheep,” declared Judith with a careless glance. “Why, if I had ever known that thou hast even thought of me kindly—and thou couldst not if thou knewest—”
“A flock of sheep larger, yea, twice as large as Benjamin tended,” commented Sarah. “See, the shepherd turneth them aside into the old sheepfold which hath not seen the like since the Syrians swooped down upon us so long ago. And a band of horsemen and a chariot! Thinkest thou the king’s messengers come this way? But why the flock escorted by soldiers?”
She turned a wondering face toward Judith, but her question was answered when a tall youth and a maiden, the first of the party to reach the top of the hill, paused to take breath after the steep climb. With true Eastern hospitality Sarah rose and tottered feebly toward them. A moment more and Eli’s voice sounded in her ears and Miriam’s arms were around her. Another moment and Benjamin was bending over her. She looked in bewildered fashion from one to the other as if scarce comprehending. At last she smiled upon them.
“Judith,” she called, “Judith, come thou. My children must be all together,” and closed her eyes with a little sigh of contentment.
“Then Rachel must be here also,” said Benjamin, drawing her toward him as she held the babe.
“And Nathan too,” put in Eli, taking his brother by the arm.
Among them all they carried Sarah to her old home and, without one backward glance, the happy, chattering group entered, leaving a lone figure upon the hilltop.
It was a strange sight to be seen in Israel, that soldier in splendid Syrian dress, lingering there. He noted the village straggling up the unpaved street, the tender green of growing things in the valley beneath, the low cloud of dust hovering over the sheepfold. Memory was likewise busy. He recalled Miriam’s joy in Eli’s coming to Damascus, her unwonted gayety since they had started for the Land of Israel, her present absorption in her mother. Yet could aught else be expected? Reasoning with himself, excusing her, striving to stifle the pain of her thoughtlessness, he descended the hill to the encampment of the soldiers.
“Yea,” he said mournfully to himself, “we have lost our little maid,” and then, again, with heart-sick despair, “I have lost my little maid.”