Their attendant, satisfied that the three children were fast asleep, left the room and went about her business. Thereupon Jezreel got out of bed, moved a chair near to the door, sat down and listened.
Below he heard his father's and mother's voices. Words were spoken in a high, shrill tone, loud and harsh, but indistinct. There were short periods of silence, followed by explosive sentences that sounded like threats. If he could only understand what it was all about! But he couldn't, until, finally all was silent in the room below.
Then Jezreel heard the street door close with a bang.
Going to the window that looked out into the street, Jezreel saw his mother standing alone in front of the house. It was an unusually moonlit night. Samaria, a beautiful city in the daytime, was a very dark and gloomy place at night, except when the moon and stars reigned in their glory in clear skies. This happened to be just such a night.
The yellow moon was reflected from the red-tiled housetops. In the distance were the famous Samarian houses of stone and marble, dark and foreboding against the moonlight. Above all the houses towered the royal palace—in which Zechariah, Jeroboam II's son, had been king since his father died, six months before—with its bright, gilded domes, like a sentinel wearing a brass helmet.
But the little boy, in his night clothes, looking out of the window of his room into the moonlit and shadowed street, saw only his mother standing there below.
His attention was called suddenly away from the window by loud sobbing. He hurried to the door, but did not dare open it. He listened until the sobbing ceased. Then he returned to the window, to find the street empty and deserted. His mother had evidently gone away.
He shivered. He folded his arms tightly, as if hugging himself to keep warm. Then he brought his chair from the door to the table, sat down and listened. In the room below he heard his father walking up and down with regular step. The house was completely silent but for Hosea's footfalls.
Jezreel drew his legs up under him on the chair. He was tired and rested his head upon his arms on the table. The silence and the monotony of the regular heavy walking in the room under him, made him drowsy. His little heart ached, though he could not explain why. He tried hard to keep awake, but finally fell asleep, there at the table. At one time he shivered, when the street door of the house shut again with a bang; but he did not wake up.
Below, a great big, powerful man had been keeping up a continuous march up and down the room. He was brooding over the events that had just preceded and thinking over the years of his married life.