The City of Delight

"Amaryllis may be frail," the Maccabee admitted, "but she is

sufficiently manly to have all that you and I demand of a man to put

faith in him. She is a good companion and she will not lie."

"Impossible! She is a woman!" Julian exclaimed.

"Even then," the Maccabee returned patiently, "her own ambition

safeguards me. She can not succeed except as I am successful, and her

purposes are of another kind than mine. She helps herself when she

helps me. Therefore I am depending on her selfishness. It is usually a

dependable thing."

"What does she want?"

"The old classic times of the heterae in Greece. She wants to be the

pioneer of art in Jerusalem. It is a fertile and a neglected field.

She had rather be known as the mother of refinement in Judea than as

the queen of kings over the world."

"A modest ambition!"

"A great one. How many monarchs are forgotten while Aspasia is

remembered! Who were the reigning kings during Sappho's time?"

"But go on. You repose much on her influence. Perhaps she has the will

but not the power to help you."

"Power! She is the mistress of John of Gischala and actual potentate

over Jerusalem at this hour."

"Unless Simon bar Gioras hath taken the upper hand within the last few

days. Remember the fortunes of factionists are ephemeral."

Philadelphus jingled his harness. He was sorry that he had permitted

this discussion. Now its continuance was particularly irritating, when

he had rather think of something else. He was near Jerusalem; but he

was not going forward, now, with the same eagerness, nor with the same

enthusiasm for his cause. The incident in the hills had marked the

change in him. It was not, then, with a patient tongue that he

defended his intentions, which had grown less inviting in the last

hour.

"How little your wife will enjoy her," Julian's smooth voice broke in

once more, "seeing that the frail one is lovely."

"I do not know that she is lovely."

"What!" Julian exclaimed in genuine amazement. "You do not know that

she is lovely! Years of correspondence with a woman whom you do not

know to be lovely! Reposing kingdoms on a woman's influence whom you

do not know to be beautiful!"

"Beauty is no tie," the Maccabee retorted. "Have you forgotten Salome,

the Jewish actress who could play Aphrodite in the theaters of

Ephesus, to the confusion of the goddess herself? They said she snared

three procurators and an emperor at one performance and lost them in a

day!"

"Have you seen her?" Julian asked with a sidelong glance. "Till your

own eyes prove it, you should not accept that she is so bewitching."

"There is no need that I should see her; Aquila swears it! And I would

take his word against the testimony of even mine own eyes."