第55章

They were the soldiers and muleteers whom Israel had hired when he set out on his pilgrimage to that enemy of all Kaids and Bashas, Mohammed of Mequinez.By-and-by they were to betray him to Ben Aboo.

But no one saw either Rabbis or Moors.The people were twisting and turning like worms on an upturned turf."Why sack his house?"cried some."Why drive him out?" cried others."A poor revenge!""Kill him!" "Kill him!"

At the sound of that word, never before spoken, though every ear had waited for it, the shouts of the crowd rose to madness.

But suddenly in the midst of the wild vociferations there was a shrill cry of "He is there!" and then there was a great silence.

It was Israel himself.He was coming afoot down the lane under the town walls from the gate called the Bab Toot, where the road comes in from Shawan.At fifty paces behind him Ali, the black boy, was riding one mule and leading another.

He was returning from the prison, and thinking how the poor followers of Absalam, after he had fed them of his poverty, had blest him out of their dry throats, saying, "May the God of Jacob bless you also, brother!" and "May the child of your wife be blessed!"Ah! those blessings, he could hear them still! They followed him as he walked.He did not fly from them any longer, for they sang in his ears and were like music in his melted soul.Once before he had heard such music.It was in England.The organ swelled and the voices rose, and he was a lonely boy, for his mother lay in her grave at his feet.His mother! How strangely his heart was softened towards himself and-all the world And Ruth!

He could think of nothing without tenderness.And Naomi!

Ah! the sun was nigh two hours down, and Naomi would be waiting for him at home, for she was as one that had no life without his presence.

What would befall if he were taken from her? That thought was like the sweeping of a dead hand across his face.So his body stooped as he walked with his staff, and his head was held down, and his step was heavy.

Thus the old lion came on to the market-place, where the people were gathered together as wolves to devour him.On he came, seeing nothing and hearing nothing and fearing nothing, and in the silence of the first surprise at sight of him his footsteps were heard on the stones.

Naomi heard them.

Then it seemed to Naomi's ears that a voice fell, as it were, out of the air, crying, "God has given him into our hands!"After that all sounds seemed to Naomi to fade far-away, and to come to her muffled and stifled by the distance.

But with a loud shout, as if it had been a shout out of one great throat, the crowd encompassed Israel crying, "Kill him!" Israel stopped, and lifted his heavy face upon the people; but neither did he cry out nor make any struggle for his life.He stood erect and silent in their midst, and massive and square.His brave bearing did not break their fury.They fell upon him, a hundred hands together.

One struck at his face, another tore at his long grey hair, and a third thrust him down on to his knees.

No one had yet observed on the outer rim of the crowd the pale slight girl that stood there--blind, dumb, powerless, frail, and so softly beautiful--a waif on the margin of a tempestuous sea.

Through the thick barriers of Naomi's senses everything was coming to her ugly and terrible.Her father was there! They were tearing him to pieces!

Suddenly she was gone from the side of the two black women.

Like a flash of light she had passed through the bellowing throng.

She had thrust herself between the people and her father, who was on the ground: she was standing over him with both arms upraised, and at that instant God loosed her tongue, for she was crying, "Mercy! Mercy!"Then the crowd fell back in great fear.The dumb had spoken.

No man dared to touch Israel any more.The hands that had been lifted against him dropped back useless, and a wide circle formed around him.

In the midst of it stood Naomi.Her blind face quivered;she seemed to glow like a spirit.And like a spirit she had driven back the people from their deed of blood as with the voice of God--she, the blind, the frail, the helpless.

Israel rose to his feet, for no man touched him again, and the procession of judges, which had now come up, was silent.

And, seeing how it was that in the hour of his great need the gift of speech had come upon Naomi, his heart rose big within him, and he tried to triumph over his enemies and say, "You thought God's arm was against me, but behold how God has saved me out of your hands."But he could not speak.The dumbness that had fallen from his daughter seemed to have dropped upon him.

At that moment Naomi turned to him and said, "Father!"Then the cup of Israel's heart was full.His throat choked him.

So he took her by the hand in silence and down a long alley of the people they passed through the Mellah gate and went home to their house.Her eyes were to the earth, and she wept as she walked;but his face was lifted up, and his tears and his blood ran down his cheeks together.