The Silver Cross; Or, The Carpenter of Nazareth

'Listen again, this is what Jane said to me to-night: "It was whilst repairing to your house, dear Aurelia, that my husband informed me, with a cruel joy, of the evil with which Jesus is threatened. Knowing that, watched as I am, I have no means of warning him, for our servants so much fear the Seigneur Chusa, that despite my prayers and offers of gold, none dared leave the house to find Jesus and apprise him of the danger; besides, the night advances, an idea struck me; your slave Genevieve appears to have as much courage as devotedness. Could she not serve us on this occasion?"

'I immediately informed Jane of the cruel vengeance that my husband had exercised towards you; but Jane, far from renouncing her project, asked me where Gremion placed the key of the prison: "Under his pillow," I answered her.'

'Endeavor to take it whilst he sleeps,' said Jane to me. 'If you succeed in getting possession of it, go and release Genevieve; it will be easy for you afterwards to get her out of the house; she will soon arrive at the tavern of the 'Wild Ass,' and there, perhaps, they will tell her where the young man may be found.'

'Oh! dear mistress!' exclaimed Genevieve, 'I shall never forget the confidence you and your friend place in me; try at once to open the door of the prison.'

'Wait a moment, for before deciding we must think of the rage of my husband. It is not for myself I fear, but for you. When you return here, poor Genevieve, judge from what you have suffered what you will still have to suffer!'

'Think not of me!'

'We have thought of it, on the contrary. Listen again: the nurse of my friend lives near the Judicial gate; she sells woolen cloths and her name is Veronica, the wife of Samuel: shall you remember these names?'

'Yes, yes, Veronica, wife of Samuel, cloth vendor, near the Judicial gate. But, dear mistress, let us haste, the hour advances; every hour lost might be fatal to the young man. Oh! I entreat you, try to open the street door.'

'No, not at least until I have told you where you may find refuge; it will be impossible for you to return here, for I tremble at the treatment to which my husband would subject you.'

'What! quit you forever?'

'Would you rather submit to an infamous punishment again, and perhaps worse tortures?'

'I would much rather prefer death to such disgrace!'

'My husband will not kill you because you are worth money. This separation is therefore indispensable; it costs me dear, because never, perhaps, shall I find a slave in whom I have such confidence as you; but what would you? Since I have listened to the words of this young man, I share the enthusiasm he has inspired in Jane; and will try to save him…'

'Can you doubt it, dear mistress?'

'No, I know your devotedness and your courage. This, then, is what you must do; if you succeed in finding the young man of Nazareth, you will apprise him that he is betrayed by Judas, one of his disciples, and that he has only to fly from Jerusalem to escape the pharisees; they have sworn his death! Jane thinks that by retiring to Galilee, his native country, Mary's son will be saved, for his cowardly enemies would not dare to follow him there.'

'But, dear mistress, even here, at Jerusalem, he has only to-night to call the people to his defence, his disciples, by whom he is adored, will put themselves at the head of the revolt, and all the pharisees in the world would not be able to arrest him!'

'Jane had also thought of this plan; but that he might raise the people in his favor, either Jesus or his disciples must be apprised of the danger which menaces him.'

'Consequently, dear mistress, we have not a moment to lose.'

'Listen once more, poor Genevieve: you forget the perils that surround you! When, therefore, you have warned the young man, or one of his disciples, you will repair to Veronica's, Samuel's wife; you will tell her that you came from Jane, and as a proof of the truth you will give her this ring, which my friend drew from her finger; you will beg Veronica to conceal you in her house, and go immediately to Jane's, who will instruct her as to what she and I intend doing for you.

'Veronica,' said my friend to me, 'is kind and obliging; to the young Nazarene she and her husband owe a debt of gratitude, because he cured one of their children; you will therefore be safely concealed in their house until Jane and I have decided upon something respecting you. This is not all, in this packet I have brought your disguise as a young man, which I have just taken from the room in which you sleep; it will be more prudent to put on these garments of a man. It will be safer whilst running about the streets of Jerusalem at night and entering the tavern of the Wild Ass.'

'Dear, dear mistress, always kind, you think of all.'

'Hasten to dress yourself. In the mean time, I will go and see if it is possible to open the street door.'

CHAPTER V

Aurelia, having quitted the low room, returned in a few minutes and found Genevieve dressed as a young man and buckling the leather belt of her tunic.

'It is impossible to open the door!' said Aurelia in despair to her slave; 'the key is not within the lock where it is usually left.'

'Dear mistress, come,' said Genevieve, 'let us try again. Come, quick.'

And the two, after crossing the court, arrived at the street door. The efforts of Genevieve were as vain as those of her mistress had been to open it. She had surmounted one of the half arches, but without a ladder it was impossible to reach the opening. Suddenly Genevieve remarked to Aurelia:

'I have read in the family narratives left by Fergan, that one of his ancestresses, named Meroe, the wife of a sailor, had, by the help of her husband, been enabled to mount a high tree.'

'By what means?'

'Just lean your back against this door, dear mistress; now, enlace your two hands in such a way that I can place my foot in their hollow; I will next place the other on your shoulder, and perhaps thus I shall be enabled to reach the arch, and from thence I will endeavor to descend into the street.'

Suddenly the slave heard at a distance the voice of Seigneur Gremion from the upper story, call out in an angry tone:

'Aurelia! Aurelia!'

'My husband,' exclaimed the young wife trembling.

'Oh! Genevieve, you are lost!'

'Your hands! your hands! dear mistress; if I can only reach to this opening, I am saved.'

Aurelia obeyed almost mechanically, for the menacing voice of the Seigneur Gremion drew nearer and nearer.

The slave, after having placed one of her feet in the hollow of the two hands of her mistress, rested her other foot lightly on her shoulder, thus reached the opening, contrived to place herself on the thickness of the wall, and rested for a few moments kneeling under the half arch.

'But in jumping into the street,' suddenly exclaimed Aurelia in fear, 'you will hurt yourself, poor Genevieve.'

At this moment arrived the Seigneur Gremion, pale, enraged, and holding a lamp in his hand.

'What are you doing there?' he cried, addressing his wife; 'reply! reply!'

Then perceiving the slave kneeling above the door, he added:

'Ah! wretch! you would escape, and ‘tis my wife who favors your flight?'

'Yes,' replied Aurelia courageously, 'yes; and should you kill me on the spot, she shall escape your ill treatment.'

Genevieve, after looking down into the street from the elevation where she had crept, saw that she would have to jump twice her own length; she hesitated a moment, but hearing the Seigneur Gremion say to his wife, whom he had brutally shook by the arm to make her abandon the chain of the door to which she had clung:

'By Hercules! will you let me pass? oh! I will get outside and wait for your miserable slave, and if she does not break her limbs in jumping into the street, I will break her bones!'

'Try to get down and save yourself, Genevieve,' cried Aurelia; 'fear nothing, they shall trample me under foot before I open the door – '

Genevieve raised her eyes to heaven to invoke the gods, jumped from the arch above the door and was lucky enough to reach the ground without hurting herself. She remained however for a moment, stunned by the fall; she then rose up hastily and took to flight, her heart beating at the cries she heard proceeding from her mistress, who was being ill treated by her husband.

The slave, after running some way to get beyond her master's house, stopped, breathless, to consider in what direction was situated the tavern of the Wild Ass, where she hoped to hear of the young man of Nazareth, whom she wished to warn of the danger that menaced him. At this tavern she learnt that some hours before he had gone, with several of his disciples, towards the river Cedron, to a garden planted with olive trees, where he often repaired at night to meditate and pray.

Genevieve ran hastily to this place. The moment she had passed the gate of the city, she saw in the distance the light of several torches reflected on the helmets and armor of a great number of soldiers; they marched in disorder and uttered confused clamors.

The slave, fearing that they were sent by the pharisees to seize the Nazarene, commenced running in the hope of getting before them, perhaps, and in time to give the alarm to Jesus, or to his disciples. She was but a short distance from these armed men, whom she recognized as the Jerusalem militia, but little renowned for their courage, when by the glare of the torches they carried she noticed, away from the road but following the same direction, a narrow path bordered with firs. She took this road that she might not be seen by the soldiers, at the head of whom she observed Judas, the disciple of the young man whom she had seen at the tavern of the Wild Ass one of the preceding nights. He was then saying to the officer of the men, who commanded the escort: