Though the place held a great number of refugees, the footstep of the
Maccabee wakened resounding emptiness. At the threshold he slackened
his step and looked with pathetic anxiety at whatever light on
Laodice's face would show her opinion of her refuge. But the uncertain
torch revealed nothing and he led her in and across to a solitary
place where rugs from some looted house had been folded up for a
pallet and spread about for carpets. She sat down and awaited his
speech.
He motioned to the spacious barrenness about him.
"Canst thou content thyself in this place?" he asked, hesitating.
She nodded, but feeling that her reply had not shown all that words
might, she lifted her face that he might see therein that which she
could not trust her lips to say.
It was her undoing. Her weakness overwhelmed her and burying her face
in the folds of her mantle, she wept.
After a dismayed silence, he bent over her and said with a quiver of
distress in his voice:
"I--I have work, here, to do, but I shall take thee out of the city
for better refuge--"
That she should seem to be grieving over the nature of the shelter
given her, stirred her deeply. She half rose and with the light
shining on her face, filled with gratitude in spite of her tears, took
his hand in both of hers and pressed it with pathetic insistence.
He understood her.
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