The younger man looked up into his face wonderingly. Stay with him! What did he mean? He was not going to Egypt. Not now. He was going back to the little maid, and home. He was, however, too weak and too weary to make explanations, so he closed his eyes and when he opened them again the stars were out once more and his master still lingered beside him.
CHAPTER XIX
HOME
In the House of Naaman at Damascus all was anxiety. As soon as the days were accomplished when the caravan might return, a watchman was stationed upon the roof to give tidings of its arrival, but day succeeded day without sight of the party itself or even a messenger. At least twenty times between dawn and sunset did Miriam run lightly up the stone staircase to her own favorite spot. Shading her eyes with her hand she would gaze long into the grayish distances and then, sighing, descend to her mistress, who, weary with waiting and unutterably distressed at the delay, had ceased asking questions with her lips and now asked them only with her eyes. When no gladness appeared in Miriam’s expressive countenance, Adah would sink back upon her silken cushions with one brief exclamation:
“It is as before. We could expect nothing else.”
Not even the little maid’s confident cheerfulness could rouse her to hope. Added to the gloom of her mistress, Miriam experienced other trials. Her position in the household began to be somewhat uncomfortable. She could not fail to be aware of whispered remarks, slighting, scornful, amused. If a visit to the prophet who dwelt in the Land of Israel were all that was needed for her master’s restoration, why had he not returned ere this with the healing predicted? The delay was proof positive of the failure of his mission. And who had doubted that it would fail? Certainly not they. Had they not said all along that if Baal and Rimmon and Chemosh and Tammuz and all the other gods could do nothing, was it not highly improbable that this Jehovah of Israel, of whom the maid was always talking, could do more? And the idea of one in her place offering advice to her master!
It was on a particularly trying day that anticipation was changed to certainty. It needed not the cry of the watchman nor the tense excitement with which the household responded to apprize Miriam, for in her own particular lookout on the roof she had observed for herself. Far in the distance she had noted moving specks which could be no other than a caravan. Fascinated, hopeful, she had watched its approach until assured from appearances that it might be Naaman’s party. She had seen the sudden paralysis of Damascus traffic and had heard the exultant cry of the multitude, two marks of respect accorded only the great and the popular. It must be Naaman’s party! Slowly and with dignity the procession moved through the narrow, crowded streets amid the cheering throngs and came to a halt before the arched gateway. With wildly beating heart Miriam knew that it was Naaman’s party.
Peeping over the parapet surrounding the roof, she noted that the household had hurried into festal garb and gone forth to meet its master in the solemn joy of the dance, accompanied by the music of silver trumpets and cymbals, stringed instruments and timbrels. Her place was with them, but surprise and dismay held her motionless for a long moment, then she bounded down the steps and ran, panting, to the apartments of her mistress. Adah, in excitement scarcely less than Miriam’s but decidedly more controlled, stood by the doorway, trembling and waiting. Miriam, with white face, clutched her garment and her voice sounded strange even to herself.
“My mistress, knowest thou? Knowest thou?”
She could proceed no further. In Adah’s eyes the light of happy expectancy slowly faded—and it had shown there momentarily. In its stead came the old, deep despair. Dropping back a pace she covered her face with her hands.
“I should have known—oh I think I did know—yea, I knew.”