Bram was much moved.  Within the last twenty-four hours he had begun to understand the temptation in which Katherine had been; begun to understand that love never asks, ’What is thy name?  Of what country art thou?  Who is thy father?’ He felt that so long as he lived he must remember Miriam Cohen as she stood talking to him in the shadowy store.  Beauty like hers was strange and wonderful to the young Dutchman.  He could not forget her large eyes, soft and brown as gazelle’s; the warm pallor and brilliant carnation of her complexion; her rosy, tender mouth; her abundant black hair, fastened with large golden pins, studded with jewels.  He could not forget the grace of her figure, straight and slim as a young palm-tree, clad in a plain dark garment, and a neckerchief of white India silk falling away from her exquisite throat.  He did not yet know that he was in love; he only felt how sweet it was to sit still and dream of the dim place, and the splendidly beautiful girl standing among its piled-up furniture and its hanging draperies.  And this memory of Miriam made him very pitiful to Katherine.

“Every one is angry at me, Bram, even my father; and Batavius will not sit on the chair at my side; and Joanna says a great disgrace I have made for her.  And thou?  Wilt thou also scold me?  I think I shall die of grief.”

“Scold thee, thou little one?  That I will not.  And those that are angry with thee may be angry with me also.  And if there is any comfort I can get thee, tell thy brother Bram.  He will count thee first, before all others.  How could they make thee weep?  Cruel are they to do so.  And as for Batavius, mind him not.  Not much I think of Batavius!  If he says this or that to thee, I will answer him.”

“Bram! my Bram! my brother!  There is one comfort for me,—­if I knew that he still lived; if one hope thou could give me!”

“What hope there is, I will go and see.  Before they are back from kirk, I will be back; and, if there is good news, I will be glad for thee.”

Not half an hour was Bram away; and yet, to the miserable girl, how grief and fear lengthened out the moments!  She tried to prepare herself for the worst; she tried to strengthen her soul even for the message of death.  But very rarely is any grief as bad as our own terror of it.  When Bram came back, it was with a word of hope on his lips.

“I have seen,” he said, “who dost thou think?—­the Jew Cohen.  He of all men, he has sat by Captain Hyde’s side all night; and he has dressed the wound the English surgeon declared ‘beyond mortal skill.’  And he said to me, ’Three times, in the Persian desert, I have cured wounds still worse, and the Holy One hath given me the power of healing; and, if He wills, the young man shall recover.’  That is what he said, Katherine.”

“Forever I will love the Jew.  Though he fail, I will love him.  So kind he is, even to those who have not spoken well, nor done well, to him.”