He was silent a long moment, and when he spoke his voice betrayed profound sorrow. “It is even as I feared. In Damascus, where thy impressionable years were spent, thou hast learned the luxury which belongeth alone to kings’ courts. Thou wouldst not be willing to toil as do the women of Israel, where there is neither man servant nor maid servant. Have I not been in Syria and do I not know how different are the ways there and here?”
She disengaged her hand and faced him earnestly: “Not because of its riches, Eli, must I return to the House of Naaman, but because of its poverty. Except through me they know not Jehovah.”
“And except we of prophetic vision teach him in Israel, the people are altogether turned unto idols,” he answered, in his eyes the fanatical gleam of the zealot.
“Yea, but there be many Sons of the Prophet in Israel. There be none in Syria. Save as tidings of the healing of my master hath been scattered abroad and praise given to the God by whose hand it was performed, none knoweth Jehovah. He is merely the God of Israel, their sometimes-enemies in the south, and Rimmon and Baal and a host of others are more real to them. Come thou with me to Damascus, where thou art needed, and instead of a shepherd, thou shalt be a scribe, and being diligent in the business of Naaman, thou shalt also instruct the household and preach the word of the Lord to those who know it not otherwise. Say thou wilt come,” she pleaded, but he only gazed at her pityingly.
“I pray thee, Miriam, deceive not thyself. For more than a year hast thou waited for a messenger from Syria and grown pale and thin with disappointment. Rachel hath told me, and have I not seen for myself when I came to visit thee? Nay, for if one were coming, there hath been time and to spare.” His brow clouded. “Yet had I hoped to hear from Nathan through that same messenger. Both thou and I didst trust the soldier, and thou more than I.”
The color sprang again to Miriam’s cheek. “My trust will not be in vain,” she declared, quietly. “Something of ill hath happened in Damascus, else my mistress would have sent, but Isaac will yet come.”
The conversation was interrupted by Rachel’s entrance, and Miriam, making an excuse of the linen on the roof, ran quickly up the stairs to a task which consumed a vast amount of time even in the leisurely East, where time counted for little.
CHAPTER XXV
ANTICIPATION
Once again Isaac stood before Adah, mistress of the House of Naaman. He bowed low. “Everything is in readiness for our departure to Israel. The caravan waiteth without the gate and the maid servants thou art sending to attend upon Miriam are at hand, but lest thou shouldst have some last instructions for thy servant—”
Adah briefly acknowledged the courtesy and the courtier. She was thinner than of old, there was more of gray in her hair and the lines were deeper between her eyes. Now she rested her head upon her hand in the languor so becoming and so habitual.