"How still the garden!" Mary said, speaking to herself. "Scarce breathing is the summer night—waiting it doth seem for something to give it life. The leaves wait—wait for the evening breeze to touch them into morion. The valley waiteth—waiteth for the song of the pilgrim to break its hush with gladness. So waiteth my soul for sight of a face that shall drive back the shadows of fear. So waiteth my heart for the sound of a voice that shall stir the silence of the waiting into wild glad music. Will he come? Or will—but no, no—it can not, can not be that he will come no more. The God that fashioned me of dust formed likewise the mystery of life, my love for him and his for me. . . . And lo, then did the hand of Jehovah make the feet of him I love to enter in upon the path my feet do tread. So hath my soul been bound to his soul and there are no more two souls, but one soul. And having wrought thus blessedly, will God play with the love he hath put in a woman's heart and bring to her soul such agony as doth wring drops of blood from her? Nay, nay! It can not be! He must come! He will come! Hasten, my beloved; I am waiting!"
Mary walked around the circular pool slowly. As she did so, the crowing of a cock, its sharpness muffled by some distance, sounded on the stillness. "The cock croweth the midnight hour," she said as the last faint vibration died. "Until the crowing of the cock did he bid me wait to see his face. Yea, until the breaking of the day will I wait. Until the sunset of my life will I wait. Yea, even until the Resurrection of the dead will I wait to see his face!"
She crossed the garden and back, paused, and raised her face to the vault above where the moon was casting floods of silver over the billowing clouds. She sighed and the words she spoke were breathed out softly as if they too were a part of the passing night. "The hours move on and naught there is but silence! What a silence it is! Like a pall hangeth it over the Judean hills! Like a shroud falleth it over Olivet! Like grave wrappings huggeth it the valley! God! The silence of this night! Hath there been before such silence? It doth make of itself feet that tread upon my soul and, treading, leave wounds with living tongues which call in agony, 'I am waiting! I am waiting in the garden!' No sound cometh to break this that oppresseth? The silence deepens and its mystery doth affright my soul!"
For a moment she stood under the flood-light from above like a white veiled statue, yet softer than marble, locked in the pervading and low brooding hush. Then, suddenly, she turned her ear in the direction of the highway. "A sound breaketh the stillness!" she exclaimed in an excited undertone. "Faint and far it is—but a sound!" With light steps she ran to her watching place by the stone wall. "Yea, a sound!" and she leaned over the wall. "It groweth on the air. What cometh? A speck it is against the gray! It moveth! It groweth larger! Aye, it cometh! It cometh! It taketh on the shape of flying garments—yea, flying garments! What meaneth this? He cometh as if pursued! Aye, if danger threaten, may Israel's God lend speed to his feet!"
The first faint sounds had rapidly grown more distinct. Mary leaned as far across the wall as safety permitted and peered into the roadway. "What is it I see? There are two running as doth the hind run to escape the pursuing dogs! On, on they come! Close—they draw nigh! They are here! They pass!" With the last words she dropped from the wall just as the runners dashed by.
"Ho! Stop!" cried one of them. "This is the place."
"The home of Lazarus?" the other panted.
"Yea! Hast thou voice left to shout?"
"Yea, while thou dost beat the door!"
Before Mary could reach the house she heard the runners pounding on the door and shouting, "Open! Open!" and when she entered at the back her brother was unbarring the front door. "What news?" he demanded as the two rushed in.