"Pooh! that is nothing; no one better than the beggars, they whine for every man's gold in his own tongue. Ha, ha! 'Thou shouldst have perfumed garlands,' saidst thou with tongue as smooth as Sesame oil; then I saw only a flying bundle of red cloth. Besa was gone. Ha, ha!"
"Why didst thou not seize her, fool?" snarled the other, grinding his teeth. "I will find her should I look a lifetime, if only to twist that little singing throat of hers."
"That shalt thou not do, friend; that singing throat is gold and it is mine. Come, we will go back; they are not here."
"What is this?" said Besa triumphantly, dismounting from his ass and holding up a brilliant bit of striped drapery; "this, or one like it, was on the girl's neck yesterday."
Amu, for so was the other man called, made no reply: he was looking fixedly into a narrow cleft of the rocks. Presently he too dismounted. "Some one has been here," he said, pointing to the fresh footmarks in the sand which had drifted deep into the opening.
CHAPTER III.
AT THE PALACE OF THE HIGH PRIEST.
"It is well that by the blessing of Jehovah thou hast recovered thy health, my son, for though we have accomplished the death of the blasphemer, there yet remains the rabble of his followers. With the trunk of the poisonous vine we must also thoroughly burn the branches lest they bud anew."
"Thou hast the tongue of wisdom," said Caiaphas in a tone of dull indifference, his eyes fixed vacantly on the range of blue hills at the verge of the horizon.
Annas glanced impatiently at the white worn face. "They are already spreading reports both in Jerusalem and in all Galilee that the man is alive again, that, forsooth, he has been seen of them. The temple resounds daily to the voice of their noisome praises and thanksgivings. I have counseled that they be thrust out," he continued frowning, "for what is it else than blasphemy--lies. It cannot be true!" And the speaker started to his feet, and began to pace up and down the terrace of the roof garden. "The Sanhedrim seems satisfied that nothing will come of it," he went on angrily. "'Let be,' say they, 'the thing will die even as the man.' Pah! they are blind. Look you! here are the facts. The man's body disappears on the third day after the crucifixion, the Roman guards tell a drunken tale of earthquake and the appearance of an angel with a sword; lies, all lies! That I have managed--gold worketh wonders; they know now that they were drunken, and that his disciples stole the body away while they slept. So far, well. Then there is the matter of the rent veil before the Holy of Holies; a sore mischance, the fabric had been eaten of insects, there is no question of it, how else should it----"