"No, no; I did it gladly," he answered, noiselessly retreating.
The exhausted woman closed her eyes and rested a few minutes from the torture she had endured. The chorus entered, and opened the drama again, a tableau followed, then the High Priest and Annas appeared in the balcony of his house, Judas soon entered, but everything passed before her like a dream. She could not see what was occurring on her side of the stage.
Thus lost in thought, she leaned back in her dark corner, forgetting the present in what the next hours would bring, failing to hear even the hosannas. But now a voice startled her from her torpor.--"I spake openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogue and in the temple--"
Merciful Heaven, it was he! She could not see him, the side scenes concealed him; but what a feeling! His voice, which had so often spoken to her words of love, entreaty, warning, lastly of wrath and despair--without heed from her, without waking an echo in her cold heart, now pealed like an angel's message into the dark corner where she sat concealed like a lost soul that had forfeited the sight of the Redeemer! She listened eagerly to the marvellous tones of the words no longer addressed to her while the speaker's face remained concealed--the face on which, in mortal dread, she might have read the runes engraved by pain, and learned whether they meant life or death? And yet, at least she was near him; so near that she thought he must hear the throbbing of her own heart.
"Bear patiently; do not disturb him in his sacred fulfillment of duty. It will soon be over!"
The play seemed endlessly long to her impatient heart. Christ was dragged from trial to trial. The mockery, the scourging, the condemnation--the tortured woman shared them all with him as she had done the first time, but to-day it was like a blind person. She had not yet succeeded in seeing him, he always stood so that she could never catch a glimpse of his face. Would he hold out? She fancied that his voice grew weaker hour by hour. And she dared not tend him, dared not offer him any strengthening drink, dared not wipe the moisture from his brow. She heard the audience weeping and sobbing--the scene of bearing the cross was at hand!
The sky had darkened, and heavy sultry clouds hung low, forming natural soffits to the open front stage, as if Heaven desired to conceal it from the curious gods, that they might not see what was passing to-day.
Mary and John--the women of Jerusalem and Simon of Cyrene assembled, waiting in anxious suspense for the coming of the Christ. Anastasia was again personating Mary, the countess instantly recognized her pure, clear tones, and the meeting in the fields ten years before came back to her mind--not without a throb of jealous emotion. Now a movement among the audience announced the approach of the procession--of the cross! This time the actors came from the opposite direction and upon the front stage. Every vein in her body was throbbing, her brain whirled, she struggled to maintain her composure; at last she was to see him for the first time!
"It is he, oh God!--it is my son!" cried Mary. Christ stepped upon the stage, laden with the cross. It was acting no longer, it was reality.
His feet could scarcely support him under the burden, panting for breath, he dragged himself to the proscenium. The countess uttered a low cry of alarm; she fancied that she was looking into the eyes of a dying man, so ghastly was his appearance. But he had heard the exclamation and, raising his head, looked at her, his emaciated face quivered--he tottered, fell--he was obliged to fall; it was in his part.