Ulema and Lazarus were the last persons in the world whom the host would have invited to his banquet. He paid no attention to Martha's question. To Mary's he replied by drawing a parchment from his bosom.

"Listen!" said he; "a letter from Lazarus!"

The faces of the young girls grew anxious.

"DEAR UNCLE:

"Excuse me for spending the night with my father. He is better, happy and well provided. But I have many things to say to him, and my visit has given him so much pleasure. I know I must submit on my return to the law of purification, which will separate me many days from my sweet sisters.

Take them to your own house and make them happy. I will return to-morrow.

"Your loving nephew, "LAZARUS."

Magistus looked up: the sisters were weeping.

"I was half angry at first," he said, "at this strange disobedience. On reflection, I am satisfied. It confers immense happiness on both father and son; and their consultations may be of great service to you all. And, besides, it gives me such a good opportunity to become better acquainted with my charming nieces."

He pa.s.sed the ma.n.u.script to my sisters, who inspected it closely. It was my handwriting without doubt. The reader need not be told that it was a base forgery; for at that very moment my poor father was ill in the cave of John the Baptist, and I was bound in expectation of death on the sh.o.r.e of the Salt Sea.

My sisters appeared to resume their composure and the feast proceeded, although they partook very lightly of its delicacies. Musicians came in, and the harp, the timbrel, the flute, the cymbals, the drum, and the silver bugle enlivened the entertainment. Caiaphas and Magistus grew warm and witty and convivial over their wine, which they pressed in vain upon the timid girls. Even Mary Magdalen merely sipped it in deference to both parties.

What a delicate thermometer is the heart of a young girl! Without thinking, how innocent! Without reasoning, how wise! A thoughtful shadow crept over Martha's face. Mary sank into a deep reverie, from which the playful sallies of the rest could not arouse her. These young girls were thinking, and their thoughts ran in the same channel.

The sudden change of Magistus from indifference to suavity; this gorgeous and secluded feast; Lazarus and his father away off in the wilderness; their poor aunt shut up in her sick chamber; this strange woman who wept so bitterly in the garden: these pagan pictures and statues so revolting to their chaste religious instincts: the lights; the music; the noisy laughter of these usually sedate men; all these things overwhelmed them with sudden apprehensions and vague terror. Each divined the feelings of the other by some secret sympathy; and bursting into tears at the same moment, they both rose from their seats.

"Stay!" exclaimed Magistus, nourishing his wine-cup and maddened by its contents-"Stay! you lose the cream and essence of the feast. I will show you now how the dancing-girls of Babylon intoxicate the king of a.s.syria."

At these words they fled from the room.

"Follow them," said Caiaphas to Mary Magdalen, "and quiet their apprehensions."

"Put your babies to bed," roared Magistus, "and come back yourself."

I will not describe the new parties who were introduced to the feast, nor how it degenerated into a revel, and the revel into an orgy. Mary Magdalen did not return to the supper-room; and long after midnight the drunken master of the house was borne off to a sleep from which he ought never to have awakened, and to dreams of conquests which he never achieved.

The shadow of other spheres more powerful than his own, was already approaching to thwart his plans and change his destiny!

An hour after all was quiet, a strange sound was made at the back gate in the wall nearest the lodging-rooms of the domestics of the establishment.

It was a double sound; the first part of it being a loud and peculiar whistle, the last part a powerful and startling hiss or rattle. The first sound seemed to summon some one to appear; the second, to threaten him if he did not obey. The first was a call; the second a menace.

There was one person on the premises, and only one, who knew the full meaning of that strange summons. He trembled on his couch when he heard it. Great drops of sweat came out on his forehead as he listened. He strove to rise as if to obey it, but fell back as if paralyzed with fear.

The call was twice repeated with a weird ferocity in its tone; and the black eunuch, Ethopus, staggered from his chamber and groped his way into the open air and to the gate. He opened it softly with a private key, and stepped into the street. Do not men, like moths, fly sometimes stupidly into the candle of danger?

A remarkable vehicle, drawn by two great black horses and driven by a hideous black servant, stood in the street. It was showily gilded, and had several little doors and windows in it. It resembled the chariots on which mountebanks and jugglers perambulated the country, but was of larger size and more tastefully constructed.

Ethopus paid no attention to this equipage. Right before him stood an object capable of inspiring him with the deepest horror. It was a tall figure with a huge yellow serpent coiled about his neck and body, and a leopard standing quietly at his side. The leopard growled and the serpent hissed as the black man approached their master.

"Be quiet, Moloch!" he said to the leopard. "Hush, Beelzebub," he whispered to the snake. "This is a friend and fellow-servant."

The poor black prostrated himself in the dust before this mysterious night-visitor and his b.e.s.t.i.a.l attendants. He signified his total submission by raising the man's foot and placing it on his head as he groveled on the ground. When he released it, he kissed it with the most abject servility. His abas.e.m.e.nt was extreme.

"That is right, Ethopus!" said his master, "that is right. I rejoice to find you in such a becoming frame of mind. Conduct me promptly to the secret chamber of magic. Then return to my servant and give him suitable accommodations. Inform Magistus of my arrival early in the morning. I have come on a grand errand to this village of Bethany."

Ethopus obeyed these orders without noise. All was at length silent.

Perhaps all slept: the drunken proprietor, the wicked priest, the remorseful Magdalen, the frightened eunuch, the strange guest, and Mary and Martha locked in each other's arms, their beautiful faces bathed in tears, and their sweet souls dreaming that their angel-mother was watching them from heaven.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ornament]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ornament]

VI.

_THE CHAMBER OF MAGIC._

[Ill.u.s.tration: Initial]

There are few sights more touching than that of a man struck speechless in the course of disease, yet retaining his mental faculties. Death perhaps approaches; weighty business presses on his mind; solemn secrets demand revelation; confessions of soul struggle for utterance. He makes inarticulate sounds, incomprehensible gestures. He writhes; he moans with the burden of thoughts he cannot express. His eyes speak and plead with a mute eloquence. His ideas play upon his countenance like lambent lightning, but die away, voiceless, indefinite, unrevealed.

Such was the state of Ethopus, the dumb eunuch, the day after the treacherous banquet. There was a great solitude about the house; for Magistus, Caiaphas, and Simon Magus the magician, made an early and prolonged visit to Jerusalem. Mary Magdalen took the sisters over the beautiful and extensive grounds, and paid another visit to the tomb of our mother, carrying some exquisite flowers in her own hand as a little offering to the maternal shade. Ethopus flitted about here and there in a state of unaccountable excitement. He followed the sisters all day at a respectful distance; and when his duties called him off imperatively, he went precipitately about everything until he could a.s.sure himself again that they were free and out of danger.

"Ethopus has something extraordinary on his mind," said Martha, to herself; but she did not communicate her observation to her timorous and sensitive sister.

The case was evidently this: Ethopus had discovered the plot of Magistus against us all, and he felt certain that the arrival of the magician boded no good. He was struggling between his disinterested affection for us and his intense fear of his wicked masters. He felt his own weakness, increased by his inability to speak; and he was laboring to devise some plan by which the sisters could be brought to share his knowledge, and to concert measures of escape from some impending catastrophe.

He seemed to divine that Martha was more thoughtful, courageous and trustworthy than her sister. It was late in the afternoon when he made her a signal, seen by herself alone, to follow him. She understood his meaning, and contrived to withdraw without exciting the suspicion of her companions. Ethopus conducted her to the chamber of Ulema. Scarcely giving her time to exchange kisses with her aunt, he pushed her into a little recess in the wall which was concealed by a hanging curtain. Between the folds of this, Martha could peep cautiously into the room. In a few moments Magistus entered.

He seemed hurried and fl.u.s.tered, and had a dark frown upon his brow.

"No message from Barabbas to-day. Something has gone wrong. Put this woman to sleep immediately."

Ethopus adjusted a large mirror of polished metal on a table. Ulema arose from her couch without speaking a word, and seated herself in a chair about four feet in front of the mirror and gazed steadfastly into it.

Magistus stood a little one side, and made rapid pa.s.ses with his hands and arms from her head to her feet, nearly touching her body. His black eyes were fixed fiercely upon her face, and his heavy breathing could be heard by Martha at every pa.s.s he made.