The hours passed away slowly, slowly, marked only by the coming up of the white stars from behind the eastern hills; while the long minutes were told by the dead plash of the water against the beach.
There were feasting and drinking and singing in the tent of Barabbas. This was kept up until long after midnight. Then there was silence, and the loud snoring as of some one in a drunken sleep.
It became very dark. The voices of man and nature were hushed. The hours passed, and all things seemed to sleep except the stars which continued to climb the heavenly dome, and the sad, gray sea which pushed feebly against the desert beach, and myself cruelly orphaned and betrayed, thinking alternately of home and death.
“Death at sunrise!” I exclaimed, thinking aloud to myself.
“The sun has not risen,” whispered the Persian.
And Hope, the undying consoler within us, took courage at the words of the old man and at the slow-footed pace of the night; and thought it was long, long till the morning, and that the angel of Life might still come, and relieve from his awful watch the angel of Death.
An hour more of silence that could be felt, and of unutterable suspense—and a hand was laid softly upon my shoulder. The rope that bound me was disengaged, and my deliverer drew me stealthily along the beach, and away from the tent where Barabbas lay dreaming of plundered caravans and cruel uncles who enriched him for the murder of their nephews.
The guide did not speak until we stood on the mound at the mouth of the great ravine, where the Dead Sea first broke upon my sight.
“You are free,” he said. “You are a child, abused and betrayed. You shall not be murdered. Robber as I am, there is something in my heart which is touched by your sorrows. Go back to life, if not to happiness. God perhaps will deliver you from Magistus, as He has through me delivered you from Barabbas.”
“Come with me,” said I; “leave this wretched and dangerous life in the wilderness. Share our fate and fortune in Bethany.”