g to wait. Gesius, the keeper,
told his tale methodically, but finished it at last. The tribune
was prompt.

"Within there!" he shouted through the trap.

"Here!" said the mother, rising.

Directly she heard another sound in another place, as of blows
on the wall--blows quick, ringing, and delivered with iron tools.
She did not speak, nor did Tirzah, but they listened, well knowing
the meaning of it all--that a way to liberty was being made for
them. So men a long time buried in deep mines hear the coming of
rescuers, heralded by thrust of bar and beat of pick, and answer
gratefully with heart-throbs, their eyes fixed upon the spot whence
the sounds proceed; and they cannot look away, lest the work should
cease, and they be returned to despair.

The arms outside were strong, the hands skillful, the will good.
Each instant the blows sounded more plainly; now and then a piece
fell with a crash; and liberty came nearer and nearer. Presently
the workmen could be heard speaking. Then--O happiness!--through
a crevice flashed a red ray of torches. Into the darkness it cut
incisive as diamond brilliance, beautiful as if from a spear of
the morning.

"It is he, mother, it is he! He has found us at last!" cried Tirzah,
with the quickened fancy of youth.

But the mother answered meekly, "God is good!"

A block fell inside, and another--then a great mass, and the door
was open. A man grimed with mortar and stone-dust stepped in,
and stopped, holding a torch over his head. Two or three others
followed with torches, and stood aside for the tribune to enter.

Respect for women is not all a conventionality, for it is the best
proof of their proper nature. The tribune stopped, because they fled
from him--not with fear, be it said, but shame; nor yet, O reader,
from shame alone! From the obscurity of their partial hiding he heard
these words, the saddest, most dreadful, most utterly despairing of
the human tongue:

"Come not near us--unclean, unclean!"

The men flared their torches while they stared at each other.

"Unclean, unclean!" came from the corner again, a slow tremulous
wail exceedingly sorrowful. With such a cry we can imagine a
spirit vanishing from the gates of Paradise, looking back the
while.

So the widow and mother performed her duty, and in the moment
realized that the freedom she had prayed for and dreamed of,
fruit of scarlet and gold seen afar, was but an apple of Sodom
in the hand.

SHE AND TIRZAH