As they walked towards the city, over which the moon was hanging, filling the valleys and hills with strange, fantastical shadows, they remembered the black, shaggy eyebrows, the luminous eyes, and the bitter, penetrating voice, and they remembered the gait, the long striding legs as they hastened up the steep path; even the pinched back often started up in their memory.  And the next three or four days they sought him in the crowds that assembled to make the triumphal entry with Jesus into Jerusalem, but he was not to be seen; and if he had been among the people they could not fail to have discovered him.  He is not here to welcome Jesus, Joseph muttered under his breath, and added:  can it be that he has deserted to the other side?

He is a sort of other Jesus, Nicodemus said.  But yonder Jesus comes riding on an ass, on which a crimson cloak has been laid.  As Jesus passed Nicodemus and Joseph he waved his hand, and there was a smile on his lips and a light in his eye.  He seems to have become suddenly young again, Joseph said.  He is exalted, Nicodemus added sadly, by his following.  And they counted about fifty men and women.  Does he think that with these he will drive the Pharisees and Sadducees out of the Temple? he added.  He is happy again, Joseph answered.  See how he lifts up the fringe of the mantle they have laid upon the ass, and admires it.  His face is happier than we have seen it for many a day.  He likes the people to salute him as the Son of David.  Yet he knows, Nicodemus said, that he is the son of Joseph the Carpenter.  Ask him to beg the people not to call him the Son of David, Joseph pleaded.  And, running after the ass, Nicodemus dared to say:  ask the people not to call thee the Son of David, for it will go against thee in the end.  But Jesus’ heart at that moment was swollen with pride, and he answered Nicodemus:  what thou hearest to-day on earth was spoken in heaven before our Father bade the stars give light.  Be not afraid for my sake.  Remember that whomsoever my Father sends on earth to do his business, him will he watch over.  He has no eyes for me, Joseph said sadly, for I left him to attend my father in sickness.  And, taking Nicodemus’ arm, he drew him close, that he might more safely whisper that two men seemed to be searching in their garments as if for daggers.  Nicodemus knew them to be hirelings in the pay of the priests.  Look, he said, how their hands fidget for their daggers; the opportunity seems favourable now to stab him; but no, the crowd closes round his ass again, and the Zealots draw back.  God saved Daniel from the flames and the lions, Joseph answered.  But will he, Nicodemus returned, be able to save him from the priests?

CHAP.  XVIII.