A distant din caught the ear. A wild scream of a bugle was answered by the blast of scores of trumpets and the shrieks of a multitude from the direction of the great Wady.
"An attack!" cried Dion, leaping to his feet.
"Then you must be gone," said Deborah, but still clinging to him as she pointed. "But see, the Jews are thronging there. They have lined the hills. An ambuscade for the Greeks! God be with His people! Stay, Dion, it is useless to seek your command. Your soldiers are in the Wady, and Judas—the sword of the Lord and of Judas is between them and us!"
Dion's trained eye took in at once the military situation.
Yet under the true soldier's impulse, he would have hastened with single sword to his post of duty, could he have seen any way thither. The hills lining the Wady were now black with the Jews; and small bands were hastening from every direction. He could not rejoin his soldiers if he would.
Deborah readily drew him back to their covert. Now and again he would start forth, but as quickly return, seeing no safe exit. Deborah herself became changed in look and manner. Her lips opened as if giving command to the distant soldiers, yet her hand on Dion's arm held him captive by the spell of its touch.
"List! The cry of the sons of Mattathias—Mi-camo-ca-ba! 'who is like unto thee among the Gods!' Judas is conquering. See! See! Our people are over the hilltops. They are rushing down into the Wady. God be praised! The sword of the Lord and of Judas!"
She seemed to forget the presence of her companion, yet at the slightest movement on his part her hand stayed him.
"I will hasten to the eastward. Surely our troops will cut their way out there upon the open road," cried Dion.
"Nay, but see! Jonathan and the men from Hebron are there."