IN THE PATIO OF MIRIAM.
A party of four sat at the supper board of Miriam. It was spread in the roofed cloisters, midway between the patio where the margherites, like Psyche, flirted with their own fair image in the fountain, and the house, where, through gold embroidered gauze curtains, an occasional glimpse was had of a vast inner apartment set with mosaics.
Before the guests, who sat on mats, were spread tempting dulces (sweets) and heaped up salvers of the strange fruits of the tropics, the butter, eggs, and custards that grow on trees.
A servant brought cups of frothing chocolate to the two women, Ahah, whose gold crowned head rose like an aureole above the sea foam green of her gown, and her mother Miriam, massive and handsome despite her years. Shem, an aged traveler from the far south, was scooping out spoonfuls of papaya, a peptonized squash, while Seantum leaned against a marble pillar, his pale face with its weak features peering luridly through clouds of tobacco smoke.
The murder of the morning was under discussion.
"Who are these Gadiantons?" asked Shem, who was a stranger in the country. "Methinks it was they who robbed a pack train of a merchant in our town. Though he carried the matter to the tribunal he could get no restitution."
"Restitution!" Miriam smiled grimly. "How can we expect justice when the Nephite officials are in secret league with the robbers?"
"They have been a menace to our nation since their organization," hastily interposed Seantum, anxious to change the subject.
"Indeed." Shem thoughtfully stroked his long beard while his Jewish face bent forward with interest.
"The chief judges have been their victims ever since Kishkumen, an unscrupulous adventurer stabbed the judge Pahoran. The good Heleman would have suffered a like fate had not a servant of his overheard the plot and killed Kishkuman first. The blackguard followers of this professional assassin were organized into a secret society by Gadianton who introduced Satan's own machinations. After that the bandits fled to the mountain where they have subsisted ever since."