"And you learned what of her?"
"Little save the long hope. She taught me an old chant of the coming.
If you wish, I will sing it."
Being bidden, he sang, as she had sung who hushed the revels of
Antipater, of signs and fears and of arrows to fly as the lightning.
Words, melody, emotion, the note of inveterate wrong, were those of the
slave-girl.
"The same nose and blue eyes, and fair, curly locks—the same feeling and chant of faith," said Vergilius, thoughtfully. "Did you not live in Galilee and suffer ill fortune?"
"We lived in Galilee, and, by-and-by, were as those hurled into
Gehenna."
"And have you a sister in Rome?"
"I have a sister, but know not where she may be. Cyran the Beloved, so my mother called her."
Then Vergilius told his companion how he had won her from the son of
Herod and left her in the keeping of Arria. David wept as he listened.
When the tale was finished he spoke bitterly: "'Twas she—the Beloved. My father was put to death, his property seized, his wife and children dragged to captivity. My heart is faint with sorrow. God! I weary of thy slowness.
"Send, quickly send the new king, whose arrows
shall fly as the lightning
Making the mighty afraid and the proud to bow
low and the wicked to tremble."