Page:Lazarus, a tale of the world's great miracle.djvu/38

26 a sudden, paralysing shock, as if an ice wind had blown across her cunning heart. An overpowering terror seized her. Was this indeed the Christ, or was He a devil? What spirit of folly had led her forth that night to listen to such things? Truly 't was a moral earthquake to hear this Man speak.

From very terror, she seized Lazarus's arm and gasped: "Who is this Man? Who is this Man?"

"Surely 't is the Son of God," said Lazarus. For one instant both hearts were locked in a common interest, while he, believing in her, breathed a prayer to God to open the heart of Rebekah, and, through her, that harder one of Caiaphas.

But the Christ was moving on and the multitude was following Him. The pale moon floated gently above the blue-grey olive trees, giving a weird, subdued colouring to the scene; while on in front the white robe of the Nazarene seemed to glow with a supernatural luminosity that guided the crowd along the mountain path.

Then, in dismay, Rebekah looked round for her attendant maidens; but they were nowhere to be found. They, too, were seeking her, but, in such a crowd, 't would be no easy task to find her in her disguise.

"I know not what I shall do!" she cried. "I cannot see my maidens!"

Unnerved by the words of the Nazarene, and filled with terror at her loneliness and at the growing darkness, her voice trembled with no feigned concern.

"Doubtless we shall find them," answered Lazarus consolingly; "but if we find them not, I will accompany thee to thine house."