A murmur was heard from the crowd which threatened to grow into a mighty demonstration, when, beginning on the outer edge, it died suddenly. In its place was heard the measured tramp of feet and the clanking of arms. As if a magic wand had been extended over the people, the mass separated in the middle, forming an aisle through which came the High Priest's guard of Roman spearmen. Tongues stopped wagging. Something was going to happen. The tinkle of golden bells told that the High Priest himself approached, and every eye was turned to look upon him. Imperious in the splendor of his exalted office he made his way. His robe of blue and purple and scarlet, his gorgeous colored coat, his purple mitre and above all the sacred breast-plate sparkling with its twelve emblematic jewels as it hung in place on blue cords through gold rings, were in strong contrast to the plain and worn garment of the man who waited under the high arch of the Beautiful Gate with arms folded across his breast. An intense stillness fell over the gathering—such a hush as marked the circus arena in Rome when gladiatorial combatants came together in the death-struggle. As Annas, the All-Powerful head of God's elect priesthood, neared the end of the open path cut through the throng, the Galilean lifted his eyes from the surrounding scene and entered into some high place of communion. The flush of anger left his face. The calm of the Eternal took its place, and the High Priest with his Roman spearmen lined behind him stood without recognition for a moment. When the Galilean turned his eyes on Annas he looked down as if from some vast height.
The lips of the High Priest moved, but something in the majestic mien and unfathomable eye of the one before him stopped the words half-formed. A second and third time his tongue raised itself to shape words, but the silent one before him gave unuttered command for silence. The conflict was on. Not a conflict of gleaming blades; not a conflict of cunning, neither of Senatorial oratory, nor contention of the wise gone mad. In the arena of the occult was the conflict on between such forces as move constellations and give birth to worlds. And the one force was white and the one was black. The one was the will of God leading by way of man's reason to Liberty and Life. The other was perversion leading by way of servile obedience to Bondage and Death. The one was Reality; the other but the Passing Show. So intense was the conflict of these unseen forces that it drew the multitude into its silent circle and held it spellbound. On the face of Annas alone was the progress of the fierce and deadly conflict written in terms of such hatred as made him appear almost inhuman. Yet the destructive force of the terrible vibration he sent out touched not the poise and calm of the Galilean, but after the law of like force it followed the arc of its own circle back into the breast that wore the twelve-jeweled breast-plate.
The nerve strain that seemed tearing the soul of the High Priest was communicating itself to the congregation when the tense and awful stillness was broken by a shout. "Thou art the King!" a mighty voice called above the heads of the people. "Jesus of Nazareth, thou art the King!"
With an involuntary sigh of relief the people turned from the silent actors in the drama taking place under the Beautiful Gate, to learn who had spoken. A third time the shout rang out: "Thou art the King!" Now the people saw. It was a fisherman supported above the crowd on the shoulders of two Galileans. He shook a dingy red head-cloth as he shouted. The suppressed feeling of the crowd now gave way to a great murmur like that of a sea with a tide turning in, but before there was a demonstration a wild cry sounded through the court.
A soldier standing beneath the shouting fisherman had bent his body backward, as he gave command for silence, that he might the better face him who did the unlawful act. Casting his eye down as the soldier prodded him on the leg, the fisherman saw something that changed the shout on his lips to a curse. The next instant, as if it had been hurled from the heavens, the keen, two-edged blade of a fishing knife had lodged its point in the heart of the Roman. While the dying cries of the spearman yet moved the multitude to frenzied curiosity, Jael the fisherman, the High Priest and Jesus of Nazareth, each according to his own way, left the Temple.
CHAPTER XXIV
BY THIS WITNESS
At the Bethany home on the following afternoon Joseph of Arimathea and Lazarus discussed the great drama that had taken place in the Temple and the danger coming out of it that would be added to the peril the Galilean was already in, because of his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. While the men discussed the day's excitement, Martha told Mary of her visit to Jerusalem, as they sat in the garden on the edge of the stone basin, from which place Martha could watch the gate for the arrival of Eli from market.
"To-day while in Jerusalem," said Martha, "did Anna and Debora and I seek to make our way into the Temple, yet we got no farther than Solomon's Porch for here a thick crowd did stay our steps. As we pressed around one of the great pillars, we heard a voice. 'It is thy friend Rabbi Jesus,' said Anna. And by squeezing and struggling we pressed close until our eyes fell upon him in the midst of his disciples and a throng of strangers. When I did cast my eye from him to the other side, it fell upon a beautiful woman wearing a dull mantle and a veil about her head. Beside her stood a massive slave with a scar on his cheek like the cut of a thrashing scythe. And the face of the woman and the face of the slave were set toward the Master. As she stood, a passer-by brushed her veil from her head, when, from under her dull cloak she did reach a hand as resplendent with jewels as the breast-plate of the High Priest. Then her arm appeared, and, lo, it was banded with gold and with chains of jewels, and also where the dull garment did part I saw the sheen of rare silk and fringes of silver and gold that glistened. Anna also saw and whispered 'Who is she?' Yet neither the woman nor the slave saw aught but Jesus. And as they listened to his words, tears gathered in the dark eyes of the great slave and like rivers of water crossing a deep gorge did pass the bold scar and drop over its edge. And as his tears fell Jesus turned to the scarred face, and Mary—what thinkest thou? It were as though I could read the look Jesus gave, which was writ in the light that did break over that scarred face, making it shine like the sun. And, too, his eye did find the woman of rich robes well concealed, and did rest on her face, and her face gave back an answer which was none other than that she loved him. It passed in a moment and the woman spoke to the scarred slave who wiped the tears from that cruelly marked face, as slowly they turned away, the slave following the woman at a distance because of those who pushed between. And when the slave was passing the place where Jesus stood, the Master moved near him and spoke a few words which again did bring such a light as was a miracle on so ugly a countenance. While he paused, the woman looked back and seeing who spoke with her slave, waited. Then did Anna and Debora and thy sister Martha follow them to the portico."
"Thou hast forgotten something, Martha. Of importance, it is," Mary said.