“And thou dost think thou couldst go alone, half round the world, find that renegade wanderer, bring him here, make him good, tolerable, and re-unite our family? Thou?” Rizpah stopped, her voice almost at the pitch of a scream; her utterance ending in a groan that died with a hiss.
Miriamne responded calmly: “I can not tell what I may achieve, that is with God; but I know what I must attempt. The path of duty is clear, and I enter it unwaveringly.”
“And I, as unwaveringly, forbid.”
“I expected this command, and in all love for thee, my mother, shall disobey it.”
Rizpah turned pale, her eyes became leaden. She was for an instant like one stunned by a sudden, heavy blow, and disarmed. The little submissive child that she deemed her daughter to be, was suddenly transformed before her; changed in fact to a firm, strong, brave woman. But the elder quickly recovered, and while clearly perceiving that violence would be futile, had recourse to the last arm of the half-defeated, to ridicule.
“Disobedience, oh, I see, this is a part of this superior religion of thine and that old ‘Old Clock Man;’ this Gombard, ha! ha! It was always so. New religions please by freeing from law! What an old idiot that Solomon of the ancients! He taught ‘forsake not the law of thy mother.’”
“Mother, I have two parents and obligations to both. I find our home shattered, and I for most of my life half orphan. I have thereby great and lasting loss. My brothers and you suffer as well. I am led of God, in a desire to seek a remedy for our troubles. I would gladly obey your edicts, but first I must obey my Maker and King.”
“Girl, false teachings lure thee to a curse.”
“You know mother, you yourself cursed the memory of Herod not long ago, when we wandered amid the ruins at Kauawat and saw the remnants of his image, as angry Christians left it, shattered years ago. That day you said a curse on him that broke up families or made innocents mourn, whether he lived anciently or now.”