"When I say so." And Judas turned away.
XXXI
THE SHEIKHS
Deborah's flight from the city had not been for her own personal safety, else she would have taken Caleb with her. When she emerged from the crevice, instead of going northward toward the fastnesses of the Maccabæans, she turned to the east, at first keeping close to the city wall. The night was dark except for the occasional flashes of lightning, the couriers of a coming storm. In the momentary glare she took in the stations of the few Greek sentinels who patrolled the immediate fields. They were looking for no danger from the direction of the walls, but peered outward, questioning with spear-point every shadow which the sudden flashes projected beyond the rocks and bushes.
It was thus not difficult for Deborah to reach without detection the extreme northeastern angle of the city. She here sat down to watch for opportunity to pass unobserved into the open ground beyond. She thought of the old walls at her back, worn by the storms of centuries, and broken by the war-shocks of many generations; the armored forms close to her, each one like the claw of the monster power of Syria which was crushing, tearing, devouring the nation; the great black sky overhead, like some flying dragon, so vast as to cover and smother the land. How little was she! Only a single fibre in the writhing flesh of the victim! Her life was so insignificant! Doubtless before many days she would lay it down, if she remained in the city; perhaps sooner on this adventure.
Her fingers felt between them a tiny berry. "I am less than this," she thought, "for it may abide when I am gone. Yet if I press this seed down into the dirt, it will breed life in its decay. May I not yield something if I fall? What now if I can bring to Judas a hundred men! That will be worth dying for! He would not allow me to make this venture if he knew it. That is well; then that brave heart cannot bear the blame if it miscarry. So I give my life to God and His cause."
She pressed the berry into the ground, and smoothed the dirt above it with her hand.
The lightning split the heavens with terrific shock. A tower above the eastern gate caught the bolt as a shield would ward a flaming dart. The rain came down in torrents. The sentinels retired closer to the walls, drawing nearer together as their line shortened. In a moment Deborah would be discovered! But while their eyes were dazed by another crash she pushed boldly between them and ran.