They shook their heads.

But Mary sat at the window and waited and watched.

CHAPTER XII

A very short time after these events there came two soldiers to the Jordan, not to have the water poured over their heads, but to arrest the desert preacher and take him to Jerusalem to Herod.  Herod received him politely, and said:  “I have summoned you here because I am told that you are the preacher.”

“They call me preacher and Baptist.”

“I want to hear you.  And, indeed, you must refute what your enemies say against you.”

“If it was only my enemies, it would be easy to refute them.”

“They say that you insult my royal house, that you say the prince lives in incest with his brother’s wife.  Did you say that?”

“I do not deny it.”

“You have come to withdraw it?”

“Sire,” said the prophet, “I have come to repeat it.  You are living in incest with your brother’s wife.  Know that the day of reckoning is at hand.  It will come with its mercy, and it will come with its justice.  Put away this woman.”

Herod grew white with rage that a man of the people should dare to speak thus to him.  Royal ears cannot endure such a thing, so he put the preacher in prison.

But the next night the prince had a bad dream.  From the battlements he saw the city fall stone by stone into the abyss; he saw flames break out in the palace and temple, and the sound of infinite wailing rang through the air.  When he awoke the words came into his mind:  You who stone the prophets! and he determined to set the preacher free.

It was now the time when Herod should celebrate his birthday.  Although Oriental wisdom advised that a birthday should be celebrated with mourning, a prince had no reason for so doing.  Herod gave a banquet in honour of the day, and invited all the most important people in the province in order that while enjoying themselves they might have the opportunity of doing homage to him.  He enjoyed himself royally, for Herodias, his brother’s wife, was present, and her daughter, who was as lovely as her mother.  She danced before him a series of dances which showed her beautiful figure, set off by the flowing white gown confined at the waist with a girdle of gold, to every advantage.  Intoxicated by the feast and inflamed by the girl’s beauty, the prince approached her, put his arm, from which the purple cloak had fallen back so that it was bare, round her warm neck, and held a goblet of wine to her lips.  She smiled, did not drink, but said:  “My lord and king!  If I drank now from your goblet, you would drink at my lips.  Those roses belong to my bridegroom.”

“Who is the man who dares to be more fortunate than a king?” asked Herod.

“I do not yet know him,” whispered the girl.  “He is the man who shall give me the rarest bridal gift.”