Out under the arched gate they rode in the moon’s silvered dark, Apollos in a litter on a camel, leading down the narrow precipitous causeway. The Princess Bernice, too, rode a camel, but her form was swathed in cloak; and the old Idumean rode before her on Arab horse, while the young presbyter walked by her side. He carried his sword in his hand.
Down the narrow bridle path from the causeway led the road to the Jordan and Jericho and Jerusalem, scarce broad enough for the beasts, steep and winding as a circular stair. Once where the way narrowed so that those on stirrups had to dismount and only the camels kept sure footing, the Idumean dismounted and held back to give right of way to the Princess’ beast, before he turned his own horse and the young presbyter’s free to let themselves down on their haunches.
“Well rid of her! Well rid of her!” grumbled the old man. “If she had not been going off with you, I would not have let her go. Have you no other Nazarene teachers can rid me of the other two? Had she attempted to escape to Titus, the General’s son, I would have cut her throat.”
Down, down, the narrow winding way, the caravan descended, and where the hot brooding malarial air of the Jordan smote them, the pebbly shaly path turned to clay trampled to mire by the refugees fleeing the siege for open desert and rocky cave. The current was dark and sullen and flowed with the hurrying rage of human passion driving to the nemesis of its own destiny. The heat was hideous and the din deafened thought.
At the ford of the sullen dark river, they paused to water their beasts, and mounting his horse, the young presbyter rode abreast the Princess’ camel and signaled the Idumean to ride for her safety on the other side.
“So would I ride with you through the Gates of Death, my Princess,” he whispered, leaning towards the white face in the muffled cloak. “ ’Twas here Christ was baptized and tempted of Self and the Evil One, and renounced all earthly power to save men for the Glad Kingdom. You, too, another time in safer place shall join our ranks by the sacred rite of baptism, my Bernice.”
But the white face answered never a word. She reached out her arm, where she sat, and touched his brow with a hand cold as death. Then the caravan plunged in the ford. The horses swam and scattered slightly, heading downstream with the waves, but the camels kept footing and floundered. As the beasts came panting up the far bank in a thicket of willows and oleanders, the Idumean led to force the way, for the narrow road past Jericho was packed with a slow-moving mass of fleeing women and children and aged, escaping from the siege of the Holy City on Zion Hill.
Apollos, the great master, rode back abreast the Princess, and the presbyter, Onesimus, led her camel afoot.
“And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, know that the desolation thereof is nigh,” Apollos said. “Let them which are in Judea flee to the mountains. They shall fall by the edge of the sword. They shall be led away captive into all nations. Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles. When these things begin to come, then look up, and lift up your heads; for redemption draweth nigh. Know you Who spoke those words, your Highness?”