and led him away. The
two climbed a long flight of stairs and made hastily across a broad
roof. At a railed opening they came to other stairs, and, descending,
entered a passage, dark as had been the chamber. At its end the Roman
received a password. Then a door swung and again he was on the
pavements of Jerusalem, and, far away, could see the lights of Temple
Hill.

His conductor, returning, announced the departure of "the new voice."

"We will now hear from the keeper of records," said one.

A voice quickly answered: "He secured a lock of his hair."

"And what says the keeper of the hidden light?"

Then said another voice: "He now sees but one obstacle."

"And what says the Angel of Death?"

A low, deep tone broke the silence in which all waited. "The sixth day
before the kalends, he shall claim his own," so it answered.

"Enough," said the questioner. "The ways lead to safety. I bid you
go."

One by one the councillors began to leave. There was no treading upon
heels, for one was well out of the way before another was allowed to
go. So cunningly was their room devised that half the exits led to one
thoroughfare and half to another; and so many were they, it was said,
no more than two councillors came or went by the same door. And of all
who came, so say the records, not one knew another to be sure of him.

CHAPTER 16

For the king there were three great perils: the people, Caesar, and his
own family. The descendant of old John Hyrcanus of Idumaea--a Jew only
by compulsion--had no understanding of the children of Moses. He
tripped every day on the barriers of ancient law, and often his
generosity was taken for defiance. Caesar was not so hard to please.
He had vanity and laws not wholly inflexible. Herod's family, with its
evil sister, its profligate sons, its voluptuous daughters, its wives,
of whom it is enough to say they were nine, its intrigues and
jealousies, gave him greater trouble than either the kingdom or the
emperor. He built a city near Jerusalem, on the sea. Magnificent in
marble and gold, Caesarea stood for a monument of Herodian troubles.
Therein he sought to amuse the people, to pacify his kindred, and to
flatter Caesar. Its vast breakwater; its great arches through which
the sea came gently in all weather; its mosaic pavements washed daily
by the salt tide; its palaces of white marble; its great, glowing
amphitheatre--these were unique in their barbaric splendor,