to us of the fruit of the vine which Jesus would drink with us in the Kingdom of his Father; and he broke bread and shared it with us, as it was meet that the head of the house should, and the gesture with which he broke it is one of our memories of Jesus.  We fell to dreaming ourselves back in Galilee, and the intonations of Jesus’ voice and the faces of the apostles were all remembered by us.  We don’t know for how long we dreamed, but when our eyes were opened to reality again we saw that our friend, who was anxious to continue his journey, had risen and gone away without bidding us good-bye, belike not wishing to disturb the current of our recollections.  Did we not feel something strange while he was with us? my friend asked me, so to my friend here I put the question:  did not our hearts burn while he spoke to us on the road hither? and I cited prophecies that were testimony that the Messiah must suffer before he entered into glory.  And Khuza answered:  did you not recognise him, Cleophas, by the way in which he broke bread?  Now you speak of it, I replied—­

Our eyes that had not seen saw, and we knew that Jesus had been with us, and hurried to Jerusalem to tell the apostles that we had seen him.  But their hearts are hard and narrow and dry, as Jesus himself well knew, and as he said would be evinced at the striking of the hour, and when we told Peter that Martha and Mary had been to the sepulchre and found the stone rolled away he answered:  I too have visited the sepulchre and saw nothing.  It was open, but I saw no young man sitting in white raiment, nor did an angel greet me.  John said:  three days have now passed away since he was put on the cross, and in three days he was to have returned in a chariot of fire by the side of his Father and made a great Kingdom of happiness and peace in this country.  But he hasn’t come; he has deceived us and put our lives in jeopardy, for if the Pharisees find us here they’ll bring us before Pilate, who is a man without mercy, and eleven more will hang on crosses.

Salome, mother of John and James, too, got in her word and railed against Jesus for having brought them all from Galilee for naught.  John and James, he promised me, were to sit on either side of him in Kingdom Come.  Whereupon Peter said:  thou liest, woman.  I was to sit on his right hand.  And while these disciples disputed on Jesus’ words Bartholomew praised Judas, who had withdrawn as soon as Jesus began to talk of the angels that would surround the chariot.  Thomas reproved Bartholomew, saying that Jesus never said that there would be angels; and they all began to wrangle, asking each other how many angels would be required to match a Roman legion.  Nor were they sure that Jesus said he was God’s own son, and equal to God; at which many were scandalised and turned away their faces; nor could they say that they had not desired to find a god in him on account of the chairs.  I’m not speaking of James and John.  And then the ugly twain turned upon