"Urban, the pastor, took me there. It was in the days of mine instruction for baptism. He went to Jerusalem to trial, but there was disorder in the city about the procurator, who was driven out that day, and Urban was not called. But he remained, lest he be accused of fleeing, and then it was he took me over the walks of Jesus."
"Jesus–that is the name," the Maccabee said to himself. "They are born, given in marriage, fall or flourish, live and die in that name. Likewise they pick up a wounded stranger and care for him in that name. They are a strange people, a strange people!"
"They would not let us into the Temple," Joseph went on, "because I am an Arab, born a Christian. So I could not see where Jesus was presented, in infancy. But we went to the synagogues where He taught; we went out upon Olivet to Gethsemane where He suffered in the Garden; we climbed that hill to the south from which He looked upon the City and wept over it, and prophesied this hour. Then we sought the ravine where Judas betrayed Him with a kiss, and afterward Urban led me over the streets by which He was taken first to Annas and to Caiaphas and thence to Pilate and to Herod. After that, by the Way of the Cross to Golgotha; from there to His Tomb. And when we had seen the Guest-chamber and stood upon the Place of the Ascension, I needed no further instruction."
The boy had forgotten his guest. By the rapt light in his eyes, the Maccabee knew that the boy was once more journeying over the stones of the streets of the Holy City, or standing awed on the polished pavements of its lordly interiors, or on the topmost point of her hills with the broad-winged wind from the east flying his long locks.
"If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy," the Maccabee said, half to himself.
The boy heard him, but his patient's words merged with the dream that held him entranced. The Maccabee went on.
"So said the Psalmist to himself," he said. "What had he to do for Jerusalem; what did he fear would win him away from that labor for Jerusalem, that he took that vow? It was easy enough to revile Babylon, the oppressor, that stood between him and Jerusalem; but what if he had been the captive of beauty, and chained by the bonds of lovely hair!"
The boy turned now and looked at the Maccabee. The eyes of the two met fair. Then the Maccabee unburdened his soul and told of the girl to this child, who was a Christian and a humble shepherd in the starved hills of Judea.
"I met her," the boy said after a long silence. "And by what I learned of her spirit that night, she will not be happy to know that you have stepped aside for her sake."
"You met her, also; and you loved her, too?"