The walls of the little room seemed higher, the light stronger, the prayer devouter, the company more numerous. Instead of the two little Sabbath candles and the earthenware dishes, I saw a barbaric blaze of gold and rich stuffs and jewels, and my eyes blinked before the flames of tall candles shining in gold candlesticks on a magnificent altar, in the niche of which stood a black cedar-wood idol, crowned and holding a crowned doll, and wrapped in a marvellous ornate vestment widening out like a bell. Over my head around the rough, liver-coloured stone walls hung lamps and bronzes and candles held by Cupids, and gilded busts, and medallions and hearts and bronze reliefs and pictures, and even a cannon-ball, and at my feet surged the white head-shawls of prostrate worshippers, like a great wave breaking on the crimson steps of the altar.
And gradually I became aware that the room had now doors on the right and the left, and these of bronze and wondrously wrought after the fashion of the Renaissance, through which a stream of worshippers poured, kissing the bronze as they passed in and out. And following one stream and vaguely looking for Miriam and her husband and the Passover table, I was borne back into the room, through another door, and now found myself in a narrow and still more crowded space at the back of the altar, where the gorgeous jewelled black idol with her doll stood in her niche in the gleam of ever-burning silver lamps, and I saw a golden eagle in a yellow sun flying over her head, and over the eagle two gilded angels holding a glittering wreath, and still higher, through a hole in the roof, as riding on clouds, a blue-mantled Mother and Child among a soaring escort of angels, while near the floor I beheld a large metal box with a yawning slit, into which a kneeling, weeping press of people rained money.
“Il Santo Camino, signore!” said an ingratiating voice, and looking up I perceived at my side a beadle with a wand.
“The holy kitchen?” I repeated in amaze.
“Si, signore. Here is the hearth at which the Madonna cooked for the Holy Family.”
He pointed to the money-box, and I now indeed recognised the fireplace whence Miriam had taken the roasted bone and egg. But it had moved to another side of the living-room, unless I was confused by the altar planted in the place of the Passover table.
“Then this is the house of Nazara?” I said in a whisper, for, dazed as I was, I feared to disturb the worshippers.
“Sicuro!” He smiled reassuringly. “La Santa Casa! Here the Holy Family abode in the peace and love of the Holy Ghost. And here there is Plenary Indulgence every day in the year. Ecco! One of their pots!” And he produced a terra-cotta vessel, not unlike one I had seen the little olive-eyed woman wiping, save that it was lined with gold and adorned with bas-reliefs of the Manger and the Annunciation.
“That must have cost money,” I murmured feebly.
“Già,” he assented complacently. “And behold the Madonna Nera, carved by St. Luke. Her attire is worth 1,800,000 lire.”