“Grandfather, what a comfort and help it is to pray!” as she turned toward Seti and laid her hand on his arm.
“I have found it out, my child, though not as soon as I could wish. But the knowledge will remain. Straits crowd one toward the Unseen Helper.”
And now the castle was in full view. On a promontory that curved out boldly into the river, skirted both above and below by a thick grove of mingled mimosas, acacias, sycamores, and palms, each of which groves screened a little bay and hamlet, stood a quadrangular fortress with its defiant encompassing wall. Rachel drew her harp toward her and began to play—at first softly and slowly, and then with a stronger and more rapid hand. As the pinnace approached the castle she began to accompany the instrument with her voice: and, when fully in front, the voice surged up over the promontory in melodious billows and seemed to envelop it in floods of exultant song, every word of which was rendered with wonderful distinctness. It was a chant. It was a chant in the original tongue of these words from the Book of Daniel. “Now when he came to the den he cried with a lamentable voice unto Daniel: and the king spake and said to Daniel, ‘O Daniel, servant of the living God, is thy God whom thou servest continually able to deliver thee from the lions?’”
Again and again the words rose and beat their delicious music against the castle like an invading army. Seti narrowly watched the premises as the pinnace glided by, but saw no sign of life. But as soon as they had gone a little farther, rounded the promontory, and then silently veered into the sheltered nook by the hamlet, they saw the peddler on the wharf with his professional pack on his back.
When the vessel was fairly moored, the man begged to be allowed to come on board and exhibit his goods, which he protested were the finest and cheapest to be found outside of Alexandria. The beautiful lady would certainly find something she would like among his various stores. In short, his eloquence was so great that he was at length allowed to come on board and ostentatiously spread out his wares about Rachel and Seti.
“Say that he is living,” she almost gasped, though scarcely above a murmur.
“He is, my lady.”
“Say that food has been given him daily.”
“At least since I came.”
“Now tell us,” she said, with a firmer but still low voice, “while you slowly display your goods, piece by piece, what you have done—in as few words as possible.”