"No, mother, Mary's garden has been long ago exhausted of all that it produced. These grapes I gathered from the vines which last summer you trained over the entrance to our own garden by the brook."
"What can you mean, Naomi! Have you ventured beyond the walls? You could not have been so rash?"
"I saw your feverish cheek and parched lip, my mother, and I saw these clustering grapes and ripe figs hanging in our own beautiful garden. Can you wonder that I should make an effort to obtain them for you?"
"Bless thee, my dearest Naomi. But the risk was too great, and you must not venture again. Did you meet no one by the way? I heard a noise of shouting and violence in the street beneath the wall."
"It was a party of Javan's soldiers," replied Naomi. "They did alarm me greatly; but the Lord preserved me, and sent my brother to deliver me out of their hands."
"Then you have indeed been exposed to danger, and for my sake, Naomi. Never, never again let your anxiety for my comfort lead you to take such a step. Rather would I bear the extremity of suffering and want, than that you should encounter the risk of meeting those lawless ruffians who are the scourge of our unhappy city. Promise me, my child, that you will not again set your foot beyond these walls, which by God's blessing have hitherto protected us from their violence."
"I shall not again be tempted by the fruitfulness of that beloved spot yonder," answered Naomi with a sigh. "Look, mother, the spoilers are there. I see them cutting down and wantonly destroying all the plants and flowers, in which we used to take so much delight. There, there they fall beneath the strokes of their swords, and the fertile garden is becoming a desert."
Naomi turned away, unwilling any longer to witness the havoc and destruction of the trees beneath whose shade she had passed the happiest hours of her childhood and youth. Just then the little David came bounding along the terrace towards her, and called away her attention by his playful caresses. He came for the daily supply of food which Naomi denied to herself that she might bestow it on him. She could not bear to see his little dimpled cheek grow pale and wan, and his bright laughing eye look dim with pining want; and to supply the deficiency of nourishment which his mother was now unable to prevent, she every day laid by a portion for her little favourite.
The house of Mary was at a very short distance from that of Zadok, and when the street was empty, the little boy used to come day by day for his accustomed meal. How joyfully he smiled when Salome beckoned him to the side of her couch, and placed in his hands a bunch of grapes that they could hardly hold! The little fellow eagerly swallowed a few of the delicious fruit, and then pausing, he exclaimed,
"I will take them to my mother; she said she was very hungry, and her cheek looked very pale when I kissed her and came away. These grapes will do her good."