Who but— ”
“God!” said Balthasar, reverently.
Ben-Hur bowed.
“O wise Egyptian!
I may not refuse the name you lend me.
What would you— or you, Simonides— what would you either or both have said had you seen as I did, a man, with few words and no ceremony, without effort more than a mother’s when she speaks to wake her child asleep, undo the work of Death?
It was down at Nain.
We were about going into the gate, when a company came out bearing a dead man.
The Nazarene stopped to let the train pass.
There was a woman among them crying.
I saw his face soften with pity.
He spoke to her, then went and touched the bier, and said to him who lay upon it dressed for burial,
‘Young man, I say unto thee, Arise!’
And instantly the dead sat up and talked.”
“God only is so great,” said Balthasar to Simonides.
“Mark you,” Ben-Hur proceeded, “I do but tell you things of which I was a witness, together with a cloud of other men.
On the way hither I saw another act still more mighty.
In Bethany there was a man named Lazarus, who died and was buried; and after he had lain four days in a tomb, shut in by a great stone, the Nazarene was shown to the place.
Upon rolling the stone away, we beheld the man lying inside bound and rotting.
There were many people standing by, and we all heard what the Nazarene said, for he spoke in a loud voice:
‘Lazarus, come forth!’
I cannot tell you my feelings when in answer, as it were, the man arose and came out to us with all his cerements about him.
‘Loose him,’ said the Nazarene next, ‘loose him, and let him go.’
And when the napkin was taken from the face of the resurrected, lo, my friends! the blood ran anew through the wasted body, and he was exactly as he had been in life before the sickness that took him off.
He lives yet, and is hourly seen and spoken to.
You may go see him to-morrow.
And now, as nothing more is needed for the purpose, I ask you that which I came to ask, it being but a repetition of what you asked me, O Simonides, What more than a man is this Nazarene?”
The question was put solemnly, and long after midnight the company sat and debated it; Simonides being yet unwilling to give up his understanding of the sayings of the prophets, and Ben-Hur contending that the elder disputants were both right— that the Nazarene was the Redeemer, as claimed by Balthasar, and also the destined king the merchant would have.
“To-morrow we will see.
Peace to you all.”
So saying, Ben-Hur took his leave, intending to return to Bethany.
Chapter 3
The first person to go out of the city upon the opening of the Sheep’s Gate next morning was Amrah, basket on arm.
No questions were asked her by the keepers, since the morning itself had not been more regular in coming than she; they knew her somebody’s faithful servant, and that was enough for them.
Down the eastern valley she took her way.
The side of Olivet, darkly green, was spotted with white tents recently put up by people attending the feasts; the hour, however, was too early for the strangers to be abroad; still, had it not been so, no one would have troubled her.
Past Gethsemane; past the tombs at the meeting of the Bethany roads; past the sepulchral village of Siloam she went.
Occasionally the decrepit little body staggered; once she sat down to get her breath; rising shortly, she struggled on with renewed haste.
The great rocks on either hand, if they had had ears, might have heard her mutter to herself; could they have seen, it would have been to observe how frequently she looked up over the Mount, reproving the dawn for its promptness; if it had been possible for them to gossip, not improbably they would have said to each other,
“Our friend is in a hurry this morning; the mouths she goes to feed must be very hungry.”
When at last she reached the King’s Garden she slackened her gait; for then the grim city of the lepers was in view, extending far round the pitted south hill of Hinnom.
As the reader must by this time have surmised, she was going to her mistress, whose tomb, it will be remembered, overlooked the well En-Rogel.
Early as it was, the unhappy woman was up and sitting outside, leaving Tirzah asleep within.
The course of the malady had been terribly swift in the three years.
Conscious of her appearance, with the refined instincts of her nature, she kept her whole person habitually covered. Seldom as possible she permitted even Tirzah to see her.
This morning she was taking the air with bared head, knowing there was no one to be shocked by the exposure.
The light was not full, but enough to show the ravages to which she had been subject.
Her hair was snow-white and unmanageably coarse, falling over her back and shoulders like so much silver wire.
The eyelids, the lips, the nostrils, the flesh of the cheeks, were either gone or reduced to fetid rawness.
The neck was a mass of ash-colored scales.