Falcontent rode into Jerusalem near the close of day—the day before Christmas. Awad had proved a faithful, companionable fellow; he had been solicitous concerning Falcontent’s first pains of travel—he had been grim, business-like, vastly determined in respect to the way and the hours of riding. There had been no discussion of Falcontent’s perplexities. There had been entertainment: Awad had told many engaging stories to relieve the monotony of the sand—such Eastern tales as are told, in various forms, names varying, incidents differing somewhat from the Occidental traditions, but the moral unchanged, to while away time and weariness in all the deserts of the East. And Falcontent had indeed matched his sorrow against an exceeding desolation; a land, however, unable to wrench any complaint against Fate from its lean dwellers. Falcontent was himself now lean and brown with weeks of desert travel. His eyes were clean and quick and sure. It had been a short ride that day; he tingled with muscular exaltation. He was toned; it was a physically rehabilitated Falcontent. He was in appetite; he could sleep.... Sell shoes? Well, rather! By Jove—Falcontent would sure show old man Groot that he had “come back!” And he had not yet even seen the Holy Places! It would sure be a laugh on Groot!
Falcontent could laugh—now. But his mirth was hard, a mere reflex, without feeling. It was mirth without sure foundation. There was no spiritual health in it. At the first touch of adversity the laughter might turn to jeering cachinnation. Life was a grim experience: a man was born, lived, died. “To-morrow we die!” Falcontent stood no longer in confusion between Design and Chance. He had settled that question for good and all. And what a fool he had been to trouble about it at all! How shall a man surely know? Falcontent laughed to think of the hurtful folly of his brooding ... God? There was no God. There were many gods: gods of all peoples—a vast variety. There were many superstitions, there was much bowing down.... A flash of agitated uncertainty passed over Falcontent when he reflected that his was the only generation of all the generations of men (as he fancied) by whom the worship of God had been generally abandoned.... But why not? “The old order changeth.” The times were new.... “God of our fathers!” How the old teachings persisted in a man’s imagination! Falcontent could recall the psalm—and the nasal singing. It aggravated him to remember. He concerned his thoughts with the road.... It was crisp weather; it was much like a harvest evening—at home. Light lingered upon the city. It was a city lying soft and half revealed in a mist of twilight.
“Jerusalem!” Falcontent thought. “Well—I’m damned! Jim Falcontent, of Groot & McCarthy—in Jerusalem!”
Falcontent was subconsciously disappointed to find no glory of heavenly light upon the flat roofs, and no glow of peace and beneficence upon the countenances of the sinister-appearing inhabitants. He had, like a child—it was a legacy of childhood—looked for some continued manifestation of the story of the Divine residence.
“Nice town, Awad?” he inquired.
“Ver’ modern city accordin’ Eastern standards,” the dragoman replied, with a flirt of his dainty mustache. “Ver’ human peoples live here. Disappoint’, eh?” he ran on. “Jus’ so. Ver’ much like all tourist’ excep’ ver’ old people. You think to see pearly gates an’ golden streets, eh? Ha, ha! Oh, dear me, no! Ver’ human city of present day. Ver’ up-to-date town. Always was, I take it. Possibly so in time of King Solomon. An’ in days of King David—doubtless so? Why not? Mm-m?”
It occurred to Falcontent for the first time with significant conviction that Jerusalem was a reality; that the city had been real from generation to generation—here situated—near by—and that the happenings recorded were realities like the events of profane history—of the American Revolution.
But——
“Garden of Gethsemane still around here?” he yawned.