“We are east of the Jordan now, little maid,” explained the young captain. “Seest thou how much easier it is to travel? It will be fairly level all the way into Damascus. Thou wilt see continual passing to and fro; much cattle and many camels and asses, and people that will look strange to thee, but fear not.”
He smiled at her reassuringly, but her eyes held a far-away look of inexpressible sadness, at sight of which he became silent.
On the sixth night of the encampment, Isaac was decidedly out of sorts. Several things had gone wrong and the party was much overdue. There had first been trouble among the pack-animals. This adjusted, it had been found that one of the soldiers, whose wounds had been thought of little consequence, had grown rapidly worse, and, lastly, their boy-captive had escaped. The veiled woman was gone likewise, but that mattered little.
In a retired spot, somewhat removed from the noises of the camp, they had spread a goat’s-hair tent and built a fire at a little distance so that its light would not play unpleasantly upon the features so soon to be relaxed in death. Isaac, who had taken the care of the sick man upon himself, watched alone save for Miriam, who lay asleep in one corner of the tent. For six days now he had been solicitous for her comfort, not from any personal interest but as a matter of war economics. It would be awkward if fright or cold or hardship should result in her illness and they so far from Damascus. On her part, the little maid was losing her fear of this young man, who treated her with no unkindness or lack of gentle consideration.
Lost in thought, he sat gazing moodily into the fire. Odd about the woman! Doubtless she had now joined herself to some one of the caravans they were constantly passing. Lemuel had described her as a camp hanger-on, and her veil was evidence of her loose moral character, since neither matron nor maid of good repute at that period went veiled save at marriage or while journeying, yet for six days she had shown every sign of shrinking timidity, and he had seen to it that she was treated with respect. He had asked Nathan if he knew her, but the boy had replied sullenly in the negative without turning his head. He had asked the little maid, but her eyes had been full of tears. For several reasons it had not seemed best to allow speech between the captives, and so the mystery had remained.
He had not himself questioned her, being irritated that she rode the horse he had brought for the maiden whose face had been in his memory ever since that day he saw her feeding pigeons in the gorge. He had meant to show special leniency to her family and thus secure their consent to a marriage, scorning to take her an unwilling captive; to force her into an alliance she would abhor, a sin of which certain other captains he could name had been guilty. However, the maid could not be found and he bothered his brain with a thousand conjectures.
That very day a puzzling circumstance had occurred. While searching for the fugitive lad, Isaac had caught the flutter of a garment and followed it straight to its hiding place. He had not found the boy, but this woman had knelt before him, clasping her hands—wondrously pretty hands, he had noticed—and in a voice remarkably soft and sweet had besought him to leave her. He had hesitated, and then Chivalry had gone out to succor Distress. Planting himself in front of her retreat until the last of his men had passed, he had followed them without one backward glance.
Thinking about it now, a doubt of Lemuel’s tale came to his mind for the first time. The veil might be explained away, but not that refinement of voice, not—a movement by the fire attracted his attention. He stared incredulously, for there, hovering over the blaze, was the girl of his dreams. It could be no other than the face he had carried in his memory all these months. Stranger even than the apparition, she had been the veiled woman, for the garment’s tatters were even now drawn tightly about her shivering form. Behind the girl somebody appeared and clutched her by the arm. It was a boy—the boy—but Isaac did not move. Nathan’s alarm exhibited itself in his voice.
“I awoke and missed thee. Rachel, knowest thou not that whosoever hath kindled this fire is not far off?” He scanned the darkness anxiously, but the outlines of the tent were not visible where it lay, outside the pale of the firelight. “Come, Rachel. Hast thou no fear?”