Now the two on the hill stood too remote to distinguish sounds or faces, while the conformation of the rocks hid the shore from their view. But of a sudden, as they looked, the forms in the boat started erect, and, all standing in a huddled group, appeared to gaze landwards. And instantly, as if they had received therefrom some direction, they seized and cast their net the other side of the boat and drew on it, and the watchers saw by their straining muscles that the net was full. Perceiving which, one of the fishermen, a burly fellow, quitted his hold of the cords, and, leaping into the water, floundered for the shore and disappeared.
“What now?” said the soldier. “Do they spy and seek us?” He muttered vacantly, and glanced again at his spearhead, and shook the haft impatiently. But the sunrise would not be detached from it.
Now the goatherd ran to a cleft which commanded the shore below, and, glaring a moment, returned swiftly, his face alight.
“Rabboni,” he said excitedly, “it is the man of Nazareth himself come back, and he ascendeth the hill towards us, and the spell will be removed from me so that I shall taste fish once more.”
But the words were hardly out of his mouth when the soldier seized his arm, and, dragging him to the shelter of a great boulder at a distance, forced him to crouch with him behind it, so that they might see without being seen. And so hidden, they were aware of a shape that came into the firelight, and it was white like a spirit of the hills and waters, and it stretched its hands above the embers, so that they leaped again.
And the goatherd heard the soldier mutter in his ear:
“A practical man—you say you are a practical man! Now, who is it?”
“Jesus of Nazareth,” he answered.
But the soldier looked at his javelin and it ran with sunrise.
“That cannot be,” he said, “for seven days ago I opened his side with this spear as he hung upon the cross, and there is the blood to testify to it.”