"There is nothing more," she added. "I thank you."
Dismissal was so evident in her voice that he prepared to depart.
"Shall you move on, then, in the morning?" he asked.
"We have seven days in the wilderness," she explained. "We can not hasten. It is only a little way to Jerusalem."
"But it is a long road and a weary one for tender feet," he answered; "and it is a time of warfare and much uncertainty."
She lifted her eyes now with trouble in them.
"Is there any less dangerous way than this?" she asked.
The Maccabee sat down and clasped his hands about his knees. This grasping at the slightest excuse to remain exasperated the perplexed Momus, who could not understand the stranger's assurance. But the Maccabee failed to see him.
"There is," he said to Laodice. "One can journey with you. I am under no restriction, and the rabbis do not bind you against me. I can secure you comforts along the way, and give you protection. There in no such dire need that I enter Jerusalem under seven days."
Laodice was confused by this sudden offer of help from a stranger in whom her confidence was not entirely settled. Nevertheless a warmth and pleasure crept into her heart benumbed with sorrow. She did not look at Momus, fearing instinctively that the command in her old servant's eyes would not be of a kind with the grateful response she meant to give this stranger.