Judas somehow or other happened to glance sideward at him, and Thomas became, for the first time, indistinctly aware that he had two faces.  But before he could thoroughly grasp the fact, Judas said in his ordinary tone, at once fawning and mocking—­

“There is surely none stronger than Peter?  When he shouts, all the asses in Jerusalem think that their Messiah has arrived, and lift up their voices too.  You have heard them before now, have you not, Thomas?”

Smiling politely; and modestly wrapping his garment round his chest, which was overgrown with red curly hairs, Judas stepped into the circle of players.

And since they were all in high good humour, they met him with mirth and loud jokes, and even John condescended to vouchsafe a smile, when Judas, pretending to groan with the exertion, laid hold of an immense stone.  But lo! he lifted it with ease, and threw it, and his blind, wide-open eye gave a jerk, and then fixed itself immovably on Peter; while the other eye, cunning and merry, was overflowing with quiet laughter.

“No! you throw again!” said Peter in an offended tone.

And lo! one after the other they kept lifting and throwing gigantic stones, while the disciples looked on in amazement.  Peter threw a great stone, and then Judas a still bigger one.  Peter, frowning and concentrated, angrily wielded a fragment of rock, and struggling as he lifted it, hurled it down; then Judas, without ceasing to smile, searched for a still larger fragment, and digging his long fingers into it, grasped it, and swinging himself together with it, and paling, sent it into the gulf.  When he had thrown his stone, Peter would recoil and so watch its fall; but Judas always bent himself forward, stretched out his long vibrant arms, as though he were going to fly after the stone.  Eventually both of them, first Peter, then Judas, seized hold of an old grey stone, but neither one nor the other could move it.  All red with his exertion, Peter resolutely approached Jesus, and said aloud—­

“Lord!  I do not wish to be beaten by Judas.  Help me to throw this stone.”

Jesus made answer in a low voice, and Peter, shrugging his broad shoulders in dissatisfaction, but not daring to make any rejoinder, came back with the words—­

“He says:  ‘But who will help Iscariot?’”

Then glancing at Judas, who, panting with clenched teeth, was still embracing the stubborn stone, he laughed cheerfully—­

“Look what an invalid he is!  See what our poor sick Judas is doing!”

And even Judas laughed at being so unexpectedly exposed in his deception, and all the others laughed too, and even Thomas allowed his pointed, grey, overhanging moustache to relax into a smile.

And so in friendly chat and laughter, they all set out again on the way, and Peter, quite reconciled to his victor, kept from time to time digging him in the ribs, and loudly guffawed—­