“Then Miriam can take her place and try to remedy the mischief which she was the cause of,” said Dorothea.  “Half of your guilt will be atoned for, girl, if Anubis recovers under your care.  I will come presently with Marthana, and show you how to make a bandage.”  The shepherdess cast down her eyes, and passively allowed herself to be conducted to the wounded man.

Meanwhile Marthana had prepared the brown mixture.  Petrus had his staff and felt-hat brought to him, gave Hermas the medicine and desired him to follow him.

Sirona looked after the couple as they went.  “What a pity for such a fine lad!” she exclaimed.  “A purple coat would suit him better than that wretched sheepskin.”

The mistress shrugged her shoulders, and signing to her daughter said:  “Come to work, Marthana, the sun is already high.  How the days fly! the older one grows the quicker the hours hurry away.”

“I must be very young then,” said the centurion’s wife, “for in this wilderness time seems to me to creep along frightfully slow.  One day is the same as another, and I often feel as if life were standing perfectly still, and my heart pulses with it.  What should I be without your house and the children?—­always the same mountain, the same palm-trees, the same faces!—­”

“But the mountain is glorious, the trees are beautiful!” answered Dorothea.  “And if we love the people with whom we are in daily intercourse, even here we may be contented and happy.  At least we ourselves are, so far as the difficulties of life allow.  I have often told you, what you want is work.”

“Work! but for whom?” asked Sirona.  “If indeed I had children like you!  Even in Rome I was not happy, far from it; and yet there was plenty to do and to think about.  Here a procession, there a theatre; but here!  And for whom should I dress even?  My jewels grow dull in my chest, and the moths eat my best clothes.  I am making doll’s clothes now of my colored cloak for your little ones.  If some demon were to transform me into a hedge-hog or a grey owl, it would be all the same to me.”

“Do not be so sinful,” said Dorothea gravely, but looking with kindly admiration at the golden hair and lovely sweet face of the young woman.  “It ought to be a pleasure to you to dress yourself for your husband.”

“For him?” said Sirona.  “He never looks at me, or if he does it is only to abuse me.  The only wonder to me is that I can still be merry at all; nor am I, except in your house, and not there even but when I forget him altogether.”

“I will not hear such things said—­not another word,” interrupted Dorothea severely.  “Take the linen and cooling lotion, Marthana, we will go and bind up Anubis’ wound.”

CHAPTER IV.

Petrus went up the mountain side with Hermas.  The old man followed the youth, who showed him the way, and as he raised his eyes from time to time, he glanced with admiration at his guide’s broad shoulders and elastic limbs.  The road grew broader when it reached a little mountain plateau, and from thence the two men walked on side by side, but for some time without speaking till the senator asked:  “How long now has your father lived up on the mountain?”