The Coming of the King | Page 2

from the court.
"Fill the bottles and hang them under the vine where the night breeze

will cool them for the morrow."
When the child had done her bidding he stepped to the door. "Mother,"
he said, "hear thou? There is weeping in the home of Jael's father!
Listen! Hear thou--the children calling--calling?"
The woman went to the door. She listened a moment and as the wail of
a child sounded over the court she said, "Aye, sore weeping. Why,
Jesu?"
"Jael's father went away yester morning and hath not come again. A
man saw him with many others driven in chains like cattle. A stain of
blood was on his face--and he will not come again. Why did the
soldiers take Jael's father?"
"Hist, child. Talk not of Jael's father. Run and play."
* * * * * *
The next morning before the rising sun had climbed above Mount
Tabor, little Jesu with his peasant mother left Nazareth, carrying
between them a new-made yoke. They had not yet reached the end of
the footpath around the slope of the hill to the highway, when they
heard a heart-sickening moan.
The child stopped suddenly saying, "Something doth suffer?"
The woman took a few steps forward and looked out into the roadway.
Then she too stopped, and with a sharp cry threw her hand across her
eyes. Having received no answer to his inquiry the child pushed past
her to the highroad. Then he too gave a cry, half fear, half pain, saying,
"It is the father of Jael--and, mother--mother--there is a dog." And with
a scream he dashed into the roadway. As he did so an animal slunk
across his path and disappeared behind a cactus thicket hedging a
barley field.
The moan gave way to a feeble call as the child appeared. "Jesu! Jesu, I
thirst!" were the words the parched lips uttered.

Helpless, the man hung crucified. The cross was not more than four
feet high, all in this wholesale crucifixion being purposely low that
wild dogs and jackals might tear the vitals, the bodies thus exposed
emphasizing the power and cruelty of Rome. Naked the crucified one
hung, his palms clotted with blood where spikes held them on the green
cross-beam, and the wood behind the body stained dark from
thong-cuts on the back. His legs lay on the ground. Flies swarmed
wherever there was blood and the gray face of the victim was yet
grayer from dust cast up by travelers on the roadway.
"Jesu! Jesu! Water for my burning tongue!" the man moaned.
"Give him to drink," the woman said in low tones to the child, who
stood before the cross, his large dark eyes fixed on the helpless one in
horror and in pity. "Give him water and I will watch that none spy you
at the deed. Hasten!"
The child opened his water-bottle and held it toward the lips of the man.
Pinioned hands, stiffened shoulders and weakened muscles made the
effort to drink difficult. Pulling his kerchief from his neck, the child
sopped it with water and held it to the dry lips.
In wavering tones the man, refreshed, said, "Since yester noon have I
hung here. With the morning came the dog; thrice came he sniffing.
Once, before weakness overcame me, with kicking and fierce screams I
frightened the brute. Again, a herdsman drove him far across the field.
And now you come, Jesu. Ah, that you might tarry until the numbness
creeping over my back where the flies swarm, and into my hands that
have burned, reached my brain, that you might stay until the darkness
of death hides from me the skulking form waiting to rend my flesh."
"Woman," said the child, raising his dark eyes to his mother's face,
"dost fear to leave me?"
"Yea, my little one, lest seeing thee minister to a malefactor some spy
or guard might take thee."
"And would they take one young like me, who never did Rome harm?"

"All do Rome harm who cry beneath her heel."
"I fear not. I can hide in the bushes and keep the evil beast away. And
when the road is clear I can wet the dry lips of Jael's father."
The woman hesitated.
"Canst carry the burden alone, woman?" and there was concern in the
child's voice. "The way is long, the road rough and the yoke a heavy
one."
"The burden is naught save the burden of fear on my heart lest thou
meet harm, my beloved one--my little Jesu!"
"Be not afraid. Will not the God of our fathers save me from the
soldier's spear as once our father David was saved from the spear of
Saul? Find me but a stout club with which to keep the bristled dog from
Jael's father."
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