He was perplexed and distressed. Stooping, he caressed her; took her in his arms and attempted to soothe her in quite a big-brother fashion; told her about his debt to Benjamin, which he should repay to her; reassured her about the kindness of those among whom he had brought her; promised to come every day; tried to divert her attention to the fountain in the peaceful courtyard and the other beauties around them; sought to arouse her courage and inspire hope. After a time she became calm and suffered him to leave, but before going he had a few sharp words with his sister, Milcah, who had looked on coldly, impatiently, at these proceedings.
“As if I had naught to do but act as child’s nurse! Assuredly she will be well treated. Hath anything else ever been known in the House of Naaman?”
With this ungracious promise he had to be content, but never before had he taken his way to the barracks with such a heavy heart. He paused two or three times and looked back, as if debating whether or not to return, but finally went on. Meanwhile, with expedition and no waste of sympathy, Miriam was bathed, under Milcah’s direction, and dressed in garments hastily adapted for the purpose out of those intended for a much larger maid. The rest of the afternoon time dragged. Miriam, very forlorn indeed, was yet very brave, as she had promised Isaac to be. She expected to be put to work immediately, to be given tasks that would try her strength and patience to the utmost, but, apparently, there was nothing for her to do.
Venturing into the courtyard, she observed that if the dwelling looked large on the outside, it was immense within and sheltered a household so numerous that the arrival of one more made no difference whatever. Somewhat later she had her supper, a bounteous meal that she could not swallow for the lump in her throat, and then Milcah sent her to bed in a large room with several of the maid servants. It was a softer bed than any she had ever known, but not one of ease. She lay there thinking, thinking until the intolerable pain in her throat was at last relieved by tears, but she was careful to smother the sobs lest she disturb those whose regular breathing told her they were asleep. She could reach out her hand and touch them, they were so near, yet she was alone, quite, quite alone! No one cared about her except, strangely enough, the soldier who had brought her hither! If she could only cuddle down in her mother’s arms, or her father’s! Oh, the sobs would not be stifled! What if the Lady of the Hidden Heart should hear?
As if in answer to this despairing cry, Milcah stood, looking down upon her. “Exactly what I feared,” she commented, “and to-morrow no work will be done because the sound of thy weeping to-night will go forth to disturb the household. Thus is mischief wrought by a brother’s thoughtlessness. Do thou come into the room with me, and if thou must weep, none will be distressed, for much care maketh me always wakeful.”
Not unkindly though entirely without tenderness, Miriam was assisted to make the change, but the fountain of tears seemed frozen. For the rest of the night she lay with wide-open eyes, staring but unseeing, sick to the very soul. Yet did she not suffer alone. From his comparatively hard couch over in the barracks, Isaac all at once sprang up, alert, listening. Noiselessly he crossed the room, opened a door, and stepped out into the starlight. Still were the voices of traffic and people which had so terrified Miriam that day. The city slumbered. He looked across roof after roof to two which towered above the others, ghostlike in the whiteness of their plastered exteriors. One was the palace, the other the House of Naaman.
A long, long while he stood there, then he returned to his bed, laughing softly. “I grow fanciful,” he said to himself. “I dreamed I heard the sobbing of the little maid. As if I could at this distance, or as if she were weeping when she hath doubtless been asleep these many hours!”
Yet for some reason the soldier slept but fitfully the remainder of the night. Into his passive brain swarmed long-forgotten tales he had heard at his mother’s knee: tales of her captivity; of her loneliness and home-sickness; but because he had known her only in days of contentment and prosperity, they had seemed to him but as tales. Now he understood. With features drawn as if in pain he groaned: “If only, ah, if only!”
In the morning he went home very early, only to find that the little maid was too weak and ill to rise.
His sister spoke her mind without reserve. “I am not pleased, Isaac, that thou shouldst have brought this child hither. She will be much trouble and little help. We can do nothing now except endure it, but I hope thou wilt never take captive another maid.”