Page:Lazarus, a tale of the world's great miracle.djvu/392

380 The Magdalene bent her eyes on it, and a great fear crept over her.

"Well, either thou or Lazarus shall die by this. I would rather it were thou; but, if thou weddest Lazarus, then will I kill him."

Helplessly the Magdalene looked around her; but save where, here and there, the moon half-heartedly lit up a tree, the darkness was profound. In her heart she cried to Heaven for help, for her own thoughts were so bewildered that she failed to realise that a great purpose was being accomplished.

Who was she to wed a man so good as Lazarus? Why had she ever thought such sins as hers could end with such mad joy? And Lazarus, what if her love and presence should hamper him along the path he had cut out; what if these two brands, plucked from the fire and united in the fierce flames of earthly passion, should forget—forget their close companionship with the Christ, the Immortal Example, the Stupendous Sacrifice, the gigantic trust He had left behind, the forgiveness, the miracles, the gift of the Holy Spirit, their mission to others? Then a voice that seemed to her as if the Christ still spoke on earth, a voice that, with its music as of low-pitched organs playing by the side of mountain torrents, brought back the remembrance of a holy adoration that pressed out all possibility of lesser or mere earthly love; that voice spoke to her once more the words, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend."

"If it must be Lazarus or I," she murmured faintly—for the flesh is very weak; the weaker, when the spirit is the strongest, as if the devil cried