They had ridden up a slight eminence and below them was a disorder of fallen or decrepit Syrian huts in the hollow place in the hills.

It had been the history of Emmaus for centuries to be known.  The feet of the Crucified One had pressed its ruined streets and His devoted chroniclers had not failed to set it down in their illuminated gospels.  Army after army in endless procession had thundered through it since the first invader humbled the glory of Canaan, and few of the historians had forgotten to record the unimportant incident.  Warfare had hurtled about it for centuries; the Roman army had come upon it and would continue to come.  It had not the spirit to resist; it was not worthy of conquest.  It simply stood in the path of events.

A single citizen appeared at the doorway of the most habitable house and looked absently over the heads of the new-comers.  As they approached, the villager did not observe them.  Instead, he looked at the near horizon lifted on the shoulder of the hills and meditated on the signs of the weather.  It was Emmaus’ habit to find strangers at its door.

Julian, with natural desire to be first on this perilous ground and away from the side of the man who had defeated him and laughed at him, rode up to the door.  The villager, seeing the traveler stop, gazed at him.

Julian had about him an air of blood and breeding first to be remarked even before his features.  The grace of his bearing and the excellence of his bodily condition were highly aristocratic.  His height was good, his figure modestly athletic as an observance of fine form rather than a preparation for the arena.  He was simply dressed in a light blue woolen tunic.  A handkerchief was bound about his head.  His forehead was very white and half hidden by loose, curling black locks that escaped with boyish negligence from his head-dress.  His eyes were black, his cheeks tanned but colorless, his mouth mirthful and red but hard in its outlines.  Clean-shaven, lithe, supple, he did not appear to be more than twenty-two.  But there was an even-tempered cynicism and sophistication in the half-droop of his level lids, indifference, hauteur and self-reliance in the uplift of his chin.  His soul was therefore older, more seasoned and set than the frame that housed it.  Now there was considerable agitation in his manner, enough to make him sharp in his speech to the villager.

“Is there a khan in Emmaus?” he demanded.

“There is,” the villager responded calmly.

“Where?”

The citizen motioned toward a low-roofed rambling structure of stone picked up on the native hills.

“Ask there,” he said and passing out of his door went his way.

Julian touched his horse and rode through the worn passage and into the court of the decrepit khan of Emmaus.  The Maccabee followed.

The Syrian host who was both waiter and hostler met Julian entering first.