"But I can't write without a pen," returned Konrad.

"That's not my business; I can't let you have a pen," the old man a.s.sured him.

"The judge gave me permission to have one," Konrad remonstrated modestly.

Then the old man exclaimed afresh: "Do you know this judge, he just comes up as far as this," and he placed his hand on a level with his chin. "He crumbles everything up and then we're to spoon it out."

Then he muttered indistinctly in his beard; "I say just this, if they let a man hang for a week before they hang him, it's a--a--good G.o.d! I can't properly--I can't find any more fine words! If a man puts a knife into himself, no wonder!"

"I shan't kill myself," said Konrad quietly. "They say I may put my hopes in the king."

"And you want to write to him? That won't help much, but you can do it if you like; there's time. For once it's a good thing that our officials are so slow. If it's any comfort to you, you may know that they wrong me, too. They won't accept my resignation. Yes, that's how it is with us," concluded the old man.

Then he went and brought a pot with rusty steel pens. "But don't you spoil them!" For they were the very pens with which death-warrants had been signed--the old man had a collection of such things and hoped to sell it to a rich Englishman. "Does your honour require anything else?" With those mocking words he left the cell and raged and cursed all along the corridor. The prisoners thought he was cursing them.

The judge, his hands behind his back, walked up and down his large study. What a cursed critical case! If the Chancellor had not been given up by the doctors on the day of the trial, the sentence would have been different. The pet.i.tion for mercy! Would it have any result except that of prolonging the poor man's torture? Whether in the end it would not have been better----? Everything would have been over then. An old official came out of the adjoining room and laid a bundle of papers on the table.

"One moment. Has the pet.i.tion for mercy been sent to His Majesty?"

"It has, sir."

"What's your opinion?" asked the judge.

The counsellor raised his shoulders and let them fall again.

Konrad cowered down and stared at the table.

On it lay everything--paper, ink, pens. What should he write? He might describe his sadness, but how did a man begin to do that? He lifted up his face as if searching for something. His glance fell through the window on to the wall, the upper part of which was lighted by the evening sun. The mountain tops glowed like that. Ah, world, beautiful world! Still three weeks. Or double that time. Then--the very beating of his heart hurt him; his temple throbbed as though struck by a hammer. For he always thought of the one thing--and it suddenly flashed into his mind--there were other executioners! His supper was there--a tin can with rice soup and a piece of bread. He swallowed it mechanically to the last crumb. Then came night, and the star was again visible in the sc.r.a.p of sky between the roof and the chimney. Konrad gazed at it reverently for the few minutes until it vanished. Then the long, dark, miserable night. And this was called living! And it was for such life that you pet.i.tioned the king. But if a king grants mercy, then the sun shines. The kindness shown him by the judge had strengthened him a little, but the last of his surging thoughts was always, "Hopeless!"

The next night Konrad had another visitor--his mother, in her Sunday gown, just as she used to go to communion. And there was some one with her. She went up to her son's bed, and said: "Konrad, I bring you a kind friend."

When he felt for her hand, she was no longer there, but in the middle of the dim cell stood the Lord Jesus. His white garment hung down to the ground, His long hair lay over His shoulders. His shining face was turned towards Konrad.

When the poor sinner woke in the morning his heart was full of wonder.

The night had brought healing. He jumped blithely out of bed. "My Saviour, I will never more leave you."

Something of which he had hardly been conscious suddenly became clear to him. He would take refuge in the Saviour. He would sink himself in Jesus, in whom everything was united that had formed and must form his happiness--his mother, his innocent childhood, his joy in G.o.d, his repose and hope, his immortal life. Now he knew, he would rely on his Saviour. He would write a book about Jesus. Not a proper literary work; he could not do that, he had no talent for it. But he would represent the Lord as He lived, he would inweave his whole soul with the being of his Saviour so that he might have a friend in the cell.

Then perhaps his terrors would vanish. In former days it had pleased him, so to speak, to write away an anxiety from his heart, not in letters to others, but only for himself. Many things which were not clear to him, which he found incomprehensible--with pen in hand he succeeded in making clearer to his inward eye, so that vague pictures almost a.s.sumed corporeal shape. He had in that fashion created many comrades and many companions during his wanderings in strange lands when he was afraid. So now in his forlorn and deserted condition he would try to invite the Saviour into the poor sinner's cell. No outward help was to be hoped, he must evoke it all out of himself. He would venture to implore the Lord Jesus until He came, using his childish memories, the remains of his school learning, the fragments of his reading, and, above all, his mother's Bible stories.

And now the condemned man began to write a book in so far as it was possible to him. At first his dreams and thoughts and figures were disconnected through timidity, and the painful excitement which often made his pulses gallop and his heart stop beating. Then he cowered in the corner, and wept and groaned and struggled in vain with the desire for mortal life. When he succeeded in collecting his thoughts again, and he took up his pen afresh, he gradually regained calm, and each time it lasted longer. And it happened that he often wrote for hours at a stretch, that his cheeks began to glow and his eyes to shine--for he wandered with Jesus in Galilee. Suddenly he would awake from his visions and find himself in his prison cell, and sadness overcame him, but it was no longer a falling into the pit of h.e.l.l; he was strong enough to save himself on his island of the blessed. And so he wrote and wrote. He did not ask if it was the Saviour of the books. It was his Saviour as he lived in him, the only Saviour who could redeem him.

And so there was accomplished in this poor sinner on a small scale what was accomplished among the nations on a large scale; if it was not always the historical Jesus as Saviour, it was the Saviour in whom men believed become historical, since he affected the world's history through the hearts of men. He whom the books present may not be for all men; He who lives in men's hearts is for all. That is the secret of the Saviour's undying power: He is for each man just what that man needs. We read in the Gospels that Jesus appeared at different times and to different men in different forms. That should be a warning to us to let every man have his own Jesus. As long as it is the Jesus of love and trust, it is the right Jesus.

It often happened that during the prisoner's composition and writing, a wider, softer light from the window spread through the cell, flickered over the wall, the floor, the table, and then rested for a s.p.a.ce on the white paper. And so light even entered the lonely room, but unspeakably more light entered the writer's heart.

The gaoler saw little of the writing. Directly he rattled his keys, it was hidden under the sheet--just as children hide their treasures from intrusive eyes. When five or six weeks had gone by, hundreds of written sheets lay there.

Konrad placed them in a cover and wrote on it

I.N.R.I.

CHAPTER I

When darkness covers the world men look gladly towards the east. There light dawns. All lights come from out of the east. And the races of men are said to have come hither from that quarter. There is an ancient book, in which is written the beginning of things and of men.

The book came from the nation of the Jews, and the old Jews were called the people of G.o.d, for they recognised only one eternal G.o.d. And great men and holy prophets arose in that nation. The greatest of them was named Moses, and it is written that he it was who brought down to men the Ten Commandments. But the Jews fell on evil times, they sank lower and lower and were heavily oppressed by stronger nations. Like us, they suffered poverty and curses and despair, and this lasted for a thousand years and more. Prophets appeared from time to time, and with words of mercy announced that a Saviour would come to lead the Jews into the kingdom of glory. For that Saviour they waited many hundreds of years. Oftentimes one would appear whom they took for Him, but they were deceived. And when at last the real Saviour, the real, mighty Saviour appeared, they did not recognise Him. For He was different from what they had imagined.

Shall I try to tell how it happened, just as my mother used to tell me, her little boy, the story on winter evenings? Shall I recite it to myself like one who desires to wake himself at midnight before the Lord comes? Shall I, who am without learning, search in my poor confused head for the fragments that have remained in it? So much has been lost in the wear and tear of the world, and yet since it has grown so dark with me something flashes out, and shines forth on high, like some starry crown in the night! Shall I invoke the holy figures that they may stand by me through the anguish of my last days, that they may surround me with their glad eternal light, and let no spirit of despair come near me?--The path between the walls of this cruel fortress is narrow, and through it only a feeble light penetrates to me.

As G.o.d wills. I am grateful for and content with the pale reflection of the sky that comes to me from the holy east through the cracks in the wall. Oh, G.o.d, my Father, let glad tidings come to me from distant lands and far-off times, so that my simple heart can hold and understand them. I am thirsty for G.o.d's truth, and whatever shall strengthen, comfort, and save me, will be for me G.o.d's truth. Oh, thou pale light! Art thou my mother's heritage and blessing? Oh, my mother! From out the eternal dwelling speak to thy unhappy son--oh, speak!

Did I not always see you in the woman who, during the cold winter season, was compelled to go across the mountains far from home? And so I will begin.

At that time the land of the Jews was under the dominion of the Romans.

The Roman Emperor wished to know how many Jews there were, and commanded that an enrolment of the people should be made in Judaea.

All the Jews were to go to the place of their birth, and there report themselves to the Imperial officer. In the little town of Nazareth, in Galilee--a mountainous district of Judaea--there lived a carpenter. He was an elderly man, and had married a young wife of whom a folk-song still sings--

"As beautifully white as milk, As marvellously soft as silk; A woman very fair to see, Yet full of deep humility."

They were poor people, but pious and industrious and obedient. No man in the wide world troubled about them, and yet had it not been for them the Roman Empire might not have fallen. Years afterwards, indeed, it fell because of that carpenter. People from all quarters of the globe dwelt in Galilee, even barbarians who had wandered there from the west and the north. And it was often difficult to distinguish their descent. Our carpenter was born in the south of Judaea, in the town of Bethlehem, which, in olden times, had been the native place of King David. Joseph, the carpenter, was not unwilling to speak of that, and even to let it be known that he was of the house of David, the great king. But yet he might well have thought it a finer thing to rise up from below than to come down from above. And is it not so? Does not man rise up from below, and G.o.d come down from high? In his boyhood David was a shepherd; it is said that he slew the leader of the enemy with stones from his sling, and that was why he rose so high. Now for that reason, and because Joseph, the carpenter, was glad to visit his native town once again, and to take his wife with him and show her the land of his youth, the enrolment of the people was right pleasing unto him. So the two made their plans, and set out for Bethlehem. It was three days' journey and more, and they might well have complained. If a workman to-day has not all that is of the best, he should think of Master Joseph, who always cared more for good work than good money.

They probably took a packet of food with them from home, and the bride was often obliged to rest by the way. The path over the rocky mountains was difficult and tiring, and they had to pa.s.s through the suspected land of Samaria. But Joseph never grumbled. And at last they reached Judaea. And when they came upon ancient monuments, he liked to stop, first in order to see how they were built, and then to ponder over the great men and great deeds of olden times. They spent a night at a place called Bethel, and there Joseph dreamed that he saw a ladder before him, and that it reached from earth to heaven. And Joseph thought, if the rungs would bear him, he might perhaps ascend it; meanwhile, he saw how an angel, robed in white, slowly descended it until he came down to where Joseph was. But when Joseph stretched out his hand to him, the angel was no longer to be seen. Joseph awoke, and the sweet dream filled his soul. It was the place where once the Patriarch Jacob saw the heavenly ladder, and there it had remained ever since, so that angels might continually descend and ascend between heaven and earth. And then they cheerfully continued their way.

Joseph was afraid when he heard the jackals shriek in the desert and saw the Bedouin camps. But he thought the angel who had come down was hovering near him, and often imagined that he felt his wings fanning his cheek.

The land through which they journeyed was barren; the plants were dried up by the frost and were all faded. Snow lay on the summits of Lebanon, which the travellers now saw from afar, away in their native land, and pale gleams fell on to the lowlands of Judaea through the cloudy atmosphere, so that stones and gra.s.s were white. When they rested beside a brook the woman gazed thoughtfully into the pool and said, "Look, Joseph; what are the wonderful plants and flowers on the surface of the water?"

And Joseph said, "Haven't you ever seen them before, Mary? You are young and have only known a few cold winters. And you don't know what these flowers mean? Let me tell you. A maiden stands in the dawn.

Her feet are on the moon and the stars circle round her head. And under her foot she crushes the head of the serpent who betrayed our first parents in Paradise. And see, Spring courts the maiden and brings her his roses. And Winter, too, courts the maiden, and because he has no other flowers he makes these to grow on the surface of the water and on the window-panes. But they are stiff and cold, and the maiden, the mysterious rose, of whom a prophet sang, 'All nations shall call thee blessed!' she chose the Spring."

That was the story Joseph told, Joseph whose beard was white as the ice-flowers. Mary listened to the tale and was silent.

On the third day the royal city lay before our wanderers. Magnificent it stood on the hill-top with the domes and pinnacles of its temples.

At that time Herod, king of the Jews, sat on the throne and imagined that he ruled. But he only ruled in so far as the strangers allowed him to rule. The town which had once been the pride of the chosen people, now swarmed with Roman warriors, who filled the streets with noise and unruly conduct. Joseph led his young wife down towards the sloping rocks where were the graves of the prophets. There he was so overcome that suddenly he stretched forth his hands to heaven: "Almighty Jehovah, when will the Messiah come?" His cry was re-echoed in the hollows of the rocks, and Mary said: "You should not shout so, Joseph. The dead will not awaken, and Jehovah hears a prayer that is quietly spoken."

Mary had hoped in her heart that they would enter Jerusalem and spend the night there. Joseph said it could not be, for he had no relatives in the town who could give them lodging, and he had not money enough to pay strangers for a lodging. Also he did not like the strange ways of the place; he yearned for his beloved Bethlehem. It wasn't very far off now; could she manage it?

Mary signed "Yes" with her head, and gathered together all her remaining strength. But just beyond the city walls she sank down exhausted, and Joseph said: "We will stay here so that you may rest, and to-morrow I can show you the Temple."

There was a man on a stony hillock nailing two beams of wood together.

Joseph understood something of that sort of work, but he was not quite clear over this particular thing. So he asked what it might be.

"He for whose use it is, doesn't want it," replied the workman. It then flashed into Joseph's mind that it was a gallows.

Mary grasped his arm: "Joseph, let us go on to Bethlehem." For she began to be frightened.

They staggered along the road. A draught of the spring of the Valley of Jehoshaphat refreshed them. Farther on in the fertile plain of Judaea lambs and kids were feeding, and Joseph began to speak of his childhood. His whole being was fresh and joyful. Home! And by evening time Bethlehem, lighted by the setting sun, lay before them on the hill-top.

They stood still for a s.p.a.ce and looked at it. Then Joseph went into the town to inquire about the place and the time of the enrolment, and to seek lodging for the night. The young woman sat down before the gate under the fan-shaped leaves of a palm-tree and looked about her.