front of Jesus, sustained by the hope that the good fortune that attended him so far would attend him to the end.  And they rode on through the grey moonlight till a wolf howled in the distance.  Joseph bent over and whispered in Jesus’ ear:  hold thy puppies close to thy bosom, Jesus, for if one be dropped and start running back to Bethany he will be overtaken easily by that wolf and thou’lt never hear of him again.  Jesus held the puppies tighter, but there was no need to do so, for they seemed to know that the howl was not of their kin.  The wolf howled again, and was answered by another wolf.  The twain have missed our trail, Joseph said, and had there been more we might have had to abandon our asses.  If we hasten we shall reach the inn without molestation from robbers or wolves.  How far are we from the inn, Jesus?  About two hours, Jesus answered, and Joseph fell to gazing on the hills, trying to remember them, but unable to do so, so transformed were they in the haze of the moonlight beyond their natural seeming.  They attracted him strangely, the hills, dim, shadowy, phantasmal, rising out of their loneliness towards the bright sky, a white cliff showing sometimes through the greyness; the shadow of a rock falling sometimes across a track faintly seen winding round the hills, every hill being, as it were, a stage in the ascent.

As the hills fell back behind the wayfarers the inn began to take shape in the pearl-coloured haze, and the day Joseph rested for the first time in this inn rose up in his memory with the long-forgotten wanderers whom he had succoured on the occasion:  the wizened woman in her black rags and the wizened child in hers.  They came up from the great desert and for the last fifteen days had only a little camel’s milk, so they had said, and like rats they huddled together to eat the figs he distributed.

He had seen the inn many times since then and the thought came into his mind that he would never see it again.  But men are always haunted by thoughts of an impending fate, he said to himself, which never befalls.  But it has befallen mine ass to tire under my weight, he cried.  He must be very tired, Jesus answered, for mine is tired, and I’ve not much more than half thy weight; and the puppies are tired, tired of running alongside of the asses, and tired of being carried, and ourselves are tired and thirsty; shall we knock at the door and cry to the innkeeper that he rouse out of his bed and give us milk for the puppies if he have any?  I wouldn’t have him know that I journeyed hither with thee, Joseph replied, for stories are soon set rolling.  Esora has put a bottle of water into the wallet; the puppies will have to lap a little.  We can spare them a little though we are thirstier than they.  She had put bread and figs into the wallet, so they were not as badly off as they thought for; and eating and drinking and talking to the puppies and feeding them the while, the twain stood looking through the blue, limpid, Syrian night.