“The Phallus! The Phallus! The Phallus!” the maddened priests were crying in an ecstasy. “Where is thy Phallus, O radiant god? Come, fecundate the goddess! Her bosom languishes with desire! Her womb is like a desert in the sultry months of summer!”
And now a fearful, insane, piercing scream for an instant drowned all sound of the chorus. The priests quickly parted, and all those in the temple beheld the anchorite of Lebanon, utterly nude, horrible with his tall, gaunt, yellow body. The high priest held out the knife to him. The temple grew unbearably still. And he, quickly stooping, made some motion, straightened up, and with a wail of pain and rapture suddenly cast at the feet of the goddess a formless, bloody piece of flesh.
He was tottering. The high priest carefully supported him, putting his arm around his back; led him up to the image of Isis, painstakingly covered him with the black pall, and left him thus for a few moments, in order that in secret, unseen of the others, he might imprint his kiss upon the lips of the impregnated goddess.
Immediately thereafter he was laid upon a stretcher and borne from the altar. The priest who kept the gates went outside the temple. He struck an enormous copper disc with a wooden mallet, proclaiming to all the universe that the great mystery of the fecundation of the goddess had been consummated. And the high, singing sound of the copper floated away over Jerusalem....
Queen Astis, her body still quivering without cease, threw back Eliab’s head. Her eyes were aflame with an intense, red fire. And she spake slowly, word by word:
“Eliab, wouldst have me make thee king over Judæa and Israel? Wouldst thou be sovereign over all Syria and Mesopotamia, over Phœnicia and Babylon?”
“Nay, queen, I desire thee alone....”
“Yea, thou shalt be my lord. All my nights shall belong to thee. My every word, my every glance, my every breath shall be thine. Thou knowest the shibboleth. Thou shalt go this day into the palace and slay them. Thou shalt slay them both! Thou shalt slay them both!”
Eliab was fain to speak. But the queen drew him to her, and her burning lips and tongue clung to his mouth. This lasted excruciatingly long. Then, suddenly tearing the youth away from her, she said curtly and imperiously:
“Go!”