Married. For a long time John has felt that she was married. Well,
well, it was to be. His sovereign lady, his dear Princess, a wife,
and soon, perhaps, a mother. God bless her and her husband. He is
glad, glad, because of their happiness.... Holding the pencilled
scrawl with the seal of the Hercules, his shapeless hand drops
heavily back upon his knees.
"O John, my Cousin, answer me!"--Esther is eagerly speaking--"The
Sign that thou hast waited for so long, was it not this? ..."
"Nay, Sweet!" He shakes his head. "This is a token from a friend
beloved, but not the Sign I look for.... Now undo the Ring of Hazaël
from the cord about my neck. Carry it to her at the Khân where she
waits with her brother. Render it back to them both from me. Giving
with the Ring, the Message I have taught thee!--I need not to repeat
the words, they are written in thy heart...."
"But, dearest one--it was a message from the Dead, and thou art yet
living...."
She looks anxiously in the speaker's face. Save that the black eyes
have a strange glaze, and the puffed lips are lead-colour--and the
beating of his damaged heart shakes the flowing draperies that cover
him--there is nothing to rouse her fears.
"Take Katharine," there is a clang of masterful authority in the deep
voice, "take Katharine the Message--from the departing Guardian of
the Ashes. Return in an hour. Leave the child here to sit by me.
One thing remains!--" He calls her back as she is turning meekly to
obey him: "Kiss me, my Little Cousin, before thou dost depart."
She goes, and presently the hoot of a car testifies to her
departure.... It nears the hour of sunset on this Vigil of the
Nativity. There was a tang of frost early in the morning. But the
rosy air is warm and still, the sky serenely splendid, the
orange-breasted blackbirds pipe and trill, and clouds of little
ash-coloured, grasshopper-like insects rise at the brush of footsteps
through the short dun-coloured grass....
He sits there for a long time or a short time, he is not certain. To
the soul upon the edge of Timelessness, many hours are as one....
The tiny donkey, hobbled, grazes at a little distance. The Arab
child who drives the beast, plays the game that the soldiers of the
Roman Guard played in the days of Herod, and then, grown weary,
steals off to play elsewhere....
The sick man dozes heavily now, with jaw a little fallen, and black
eyes that show glazed and dim between their parted lids.... The
breaths that shake the puffed lips come slower and fainter. The Arab
_jerd_ that swathes him ceases to tremble with the irregular beating
of his heart....
Suddenly, his eyes stare wide and a strange cold thrill goes through
him. He has been touched.... By whose hand? ... No messenger stands
near.... Can it be that so strange a shock heralds the Sign that he
has waited? ...
Midnight!--yet when he closed his eyes it was not yet sunset, the
blind muezzin of the Mosque of the Throne of Solomon had not given
the Call to Prayer.... And now, the Hosts of Heaven blaze from
zenith to horizon. The full Moon stands over Bethlehem and the flood
of radiant pale light makes Jerusalem a silver city, inlaid with jet
and ebony....
Solemn black clouds heap over Moab. The Valley of the Kedron and the
Vale of Our Lady Mary are swallowed in a gulf of shade. But Olivet
is glorious in the brilliance that pours down on her, making a prone
black giant under every lonely cypress, and a black cat crouching
under every bush and stone.
Bells ring from all the convents, and churches in Jerusalem. All
over Palestine bells ring for Christmas Day. From Bethlehem where He
was born, comes the sound of joyful chiming. On the north wind the
sound of bells is brought from Nazareth....
"Peace on earth!" ... John Hazel stands and listens, as from north,
east, west and south the bells of Christmas ring.... A great cry
breaks from him, of wild despair and anguish:
"O Christ, there is no peace for me while yet Thou art withholden. O
Shepherd of all broken hearts! send me Thy promised Sign! Speak to
me at least, you Big Old Men," he cries, "for I am lonely! ... Say to
this John, the littlest and least of all the Hazaëls--that I have
done my duty, and ye are content with me!"
The shuddering cry dies on the breeze. And a terrible voice answers:
"Not the least, but the greatest of all art thou.... For thou art
our leader. Hear, now! The choice has fallen to thee. Worthy art
thou to rule us, who canst so well obey! ..."
Wonderful sight.... On his left hand, on his right and before him.
From the skirts of the Mount of Olives, to the Mohammedan Cemetery,
and across the road of the Damascus Gate, to the site of the Unknown
Tombs.... Rank upon rank of Big Old Men--stately as Kings, in
flowing robes and high jewelled tiaras, and others in less ancient
garb, and others in more modern garments--even down to the style of
the present day. He sees his grandfather, Eli, and his own father,
and his brother Maurice, and stretches his hands to them, crying, as
they smile and wave to him:
"Tell me, is this the Sign that I was promised when I was chained to
the bed in the Turkish hut and the Voice spoke to me? ..."
And all the Hazaëls answer in deep, tremendous voices, and then the
turmoil quietens down, and the Biggest of all the Big Old Men stands
forth and gives reply:
"We know not of any Sign, O John! Thou calledst, and we answered.
Now hear Hazaël Aben Hazaël, who made the Oath of old.... Lead and
we follow.... Command, and we obey thee. Speak, and deliver
counsels--thou greatest of us all!"
John hesitates a moment, and then words come to him:
"O all ye Big Old Men, listen to me, the littlest! This is the lore
I have gathered in the thirty-five years of my life. Human Love is a
passing Breath--a rosy, flying Shadow. Happiness, Wealth, Honour,
Fame--are cobwebs on the wind. Rank and Power are gilded stools,
worm-eaten and rotten. Nothing is Real--nothing is true--but the
Truths ye would not see! There is no gain save Sacrifice--no good
save Renunciation!--no Way except the Way of the Cross--no Hope but
in the Blood of CHRIST! He is our King! ... Now follow me, and we
will do Him homage. Or cast me out from among you, and let me be
forgotten. I, John, the littlest of all the Hazaëls, have said my
say! ..."
"We hear!" The deep chorus of answering voices rose and rolled down
on him.... "We hear. Lead on--we follow thee!"
"It is well. Wheel and face southwards, O ye Hazaëls! and form four
men abreast in columns of companies."
He gives the order loud and clear, and the extended ranks of towering
figures shift and change, and close in--and all the faces are turned
from him, except the face of the very Biggest of all the Big Old Men.
He says to John, in a voice that is very like John's own:
"I am the Captain of thy host. Give me the route of march."
"First to Bethlehem, the Place of His Birth, and then to His Death
Place on Calvary," John answers, though his knees seem melting under
him, and he has hardly any breath.
"And then? ... Whither go we? ... For the Gate of the Place where we
abode is now shut behind us.... Is there not entrance for thee and
me and these, by the Gate of Hope? ... The Gate that opened for
Philoremus Fabius--that I saw when the Blemmyes gave me death! ..."
"But I do not know the Gate of Hope! ..." John falters, rather
weakly, and the Biggest of all his Big Old Men answers him sternly
now:
"The Crucified promised thee a Sign--and He deceives not. Ask now
His Father in His Name--to open His Gate of Hope!"
* * * * * * *
And John hears his own voice blundering in the petition:
"O Christ, Who art the Very Truth, show now the Sign Thou promised!
Lead us into the Land of Peace by Thine Own Gate of Hope! O look!
... Look, ye Hazaëls!--in the sky, over the Holy City! ..."
Obedient to the voice and the arm that is uplifted, the faces of the
mighty host, are upturned to the sky. Faces that are dark and
fierce, noble and mild, harsh and stern or gentle.... Faces of Kings
and prophets and sages, leaders of hosts and seers of visions; men of
the sceptre, men of the sword, men of the crucible, men of the
scalpel; men of the pen, men of the spade and pickaxe--men of all
ages and all climes--but Hebrew every one....
Over the ancient City that stoned her prophets, and cast out her
Saints, having slain the Son of God--is another City, shining-walled,
with radiant domes and towers. Figures more radiant walk upon her
walls and crowd her housetops. John knows the City. Of it he spoke
to Esther a little while ago.
A Gate is opened in Her walls between two shining towers. A Man
stands on the threshold more glorious than the Sun. Majesty and
meekness radiate from Him, with Love and Compassion and Mercy....
His Hands are stretched in welcome. They are Wounded, like His Feet.
He speaks, touching His naked Side, where the gash of the Roman spear
is:
"Come unto Me, My people! Here is the Gate of Hope! ..."
* * * * * * *
An earthly voice John Hazel used to think the loveliest of women's
voices, calls him with eager breathlessness. Now a tall figure in a
felt hat, with the Red Cross badge and ribbon, and a flowing cape of
red-lined blue, comes swiftly down the road. A gallant, womanly
creature with beautiful and tender eyes that John has often dreamed
of.... They lighten as they fall on the great shapeless bulk of the
man, who--dressed like an Arab--is sitting in an old bath-chair....
The little donkey grazes near, the Arab boy is not visible. It is
just upon the flush of sunset, and the voice of the blind _muezzin_
at the Mosque of the Throne of Solomon comes faintly out of the
distance, giving the Call to Prayer. Other voices take it up and die
out in distance; and Katharine would speak now, but pauses as the
Angelus rings its mellow triples from the Dominican Monastery behind
the Tombs of the Kings, and the Chapel in the garden of the Syrian
Patriarch....
She ends the little Latin prayer with the Sign of the Cross, and
comes forward. Clouds of little dun insects like grasshoppers rise
under her footsteps as she comes.... A tiny bird no bigger than a
tit that is perched on the sick man's shoulder takes wing with a
fluttering, silken sound. And a creature like a biggish mouse, with
kangaroo-like hind legs, leaps away as Katharine comes to the side of
the rickety bath-chair....
She calls the man who sits in it, and he does not answer, but leans
back against his pillow, staring fixedly before him with his hands
upon his knees. The Arab _kuffiyeh_ partly hides his face, so
changed since she last saw it. But she catches the jut of the great
hooked nose, and the glitter of the stern black eyes....
A cocksure woman is Katharine, who always thinks she is wanted. He
does not speak, but she is quite sure he is glad that she has come....
"John Hazel! Are you vexed with me for thrusting myself upon you? I
had to come! ... I simply couldn't stay away! ... You do know why,
truest of friends! ... To thank you--to bless you! For Edward and
for me, and Julian!" The eager words come pouring out as she kneels
beside the chair. "Dearest, best, bravest one--come back with us to
England! ... I will nurse you,--you will,--you shall get well! There
MUST be happiness and health for you--it couldn't be otherwise! ...
Say you'll come, or I shall kiss you. My husband told me to! ..."
She rises to her feet now and leans over him smiling, with a
womanly-tender impulse to hug him to her breast. Her warm, sweet arm
goes round the man's great neck, her pure breath fans his forehead.
Her lips touch the scarred cheek--and the truth comes home to her.
That longed-for kiss has come too late for the last of the Hazaëls.
He leaves it as his legacy to a new Keeper of the Shrine. The little
boy who is to be, with eyes like his mother's.... The son of Yaill
and Katharine--whose Christian name is John.