Page:Lazarus, a tale of the world's great miracle.djvu/135

Rh feared me that, if I had thee not with me, thou wouldst warn Him, and so I should lose my prey. Therefore I behaved to thee as if I too were a believer in this blasphemer."

But Nicodemus answered nothing, and Caiaphas with a little less certainty in his manner went on: "But He fooled us, this Nazarene; for where I, Caiaphas, expected to find Him, He was not; so our night errand was a wasted one, and thou mayst mock Caiaphas and point thy finger at him for a fool. What sayest thou now, Nicodemus? Did I not feign well?"

"Not better than could be expected of the High Priest," replied Nicodemus in a tone of asperity and cynicism, of which Caiaphas had not thought him capable, and which might hide meaning he would not relish.

Yet he continued: "I knew thou wouldst be angry, for no man likes to be fooled by another; but, last night, we were both fools, for thou fooledst me and the blasphemous Nazarene fooled us both." Here he laughed harshly. "But at any rate we have done with Him; He hath disappointed the people. His power, 't is evident, cannot always be put forth, or He would have spared His friend Lazarus the pains of death." Then, reseating himself, Caiaphas continued unctuously: "So it is that all that is not true cometh to an end. At one time it seemed truly, from what the people said, that this Galilean did participate in some way of the divine; but praise be to God (here Caiaphas rolled his eyes upward toward the ceiling), who doth not let the wicked flourish for ever. This wavering of the