"The man said that He would rise from the dead on the third day. It is likely that His friends will help Him!"
Joseph drew himself up in front of the Governor and said: "Sir, what ground have you for such a suspicion? Have we Jews proved ourselves so absolutely lawless in our fatherland? Surely not so much so that this best of all men, this Divine Man, should have been condemned to death without a shadow of reason, and His followers, too, treated with contempt as if they were cheats and body-snatchers."
"You have to thank your priests for that," said Pilate, with cold indifference.
"We know the breed," replied Joseph, "and so do you. But you are afraid of it. Our Master would have made an end of it. But you are a broken reed. Many of our great men have been ruined by Roman arrogance, but it was Roman cowardice that cost our Master His life."
The Governor started, but remained impassive.
He signed with his hand: "Let me hear no more of this affair. Do what you like with Him. Sentries can be placed at the grave. I've had more than enough of you and your Jews to-day."
Thus the Arimathean was dismissed, ungraciously, it is true, but with permission to bury the beloved corpse.
Meanwhile the torment of the two desert robbers had ended. And Dismas was at last set free from Barabbas, to whom a demoniacal fate had chained him his whole life long. Jesus had come between them, and had divided the penitent man from the impenitent. It is true that their bodies were thrown into the same grave, but the soul of Dismas had found the appointed trysting-place.
As soon as the Arimathean returned from his interview with the Governor, late as the hour was, Jesus was unfastened from the cross and lowered to the ground with cloths. Then the body was anointed with precious oil, wrapped in white linen, and carried to Joseph's garden. They laid it in the grave in the stillness of the night.
A holy peace breathed o'er the earth, and the stars shone in the heavens like lamps at the repose of the Lord.