"The offer is kind. Whether there be room for us or not in the house, we will go see your people. Let me speak to the gate-keeper myself. I will return quickly."
And, putting the leading-strap in the stranger's hand, he pushed into the stirring crowd.
The keeper sat on a great cedar block outside the gate. Against the wall behind him leaned a javelin. A dog squatted on the block by his side.
"The peace of Jehovah be with you," said Joseph, at last confronting the keeper.
"What you give, may you find again; and, when found, be it many times multiplied to you and yours," returned the watchman, gravely, though without moving.
"I am a Bethlehemite," said Joseph, in his most deliberate way. "Is there not room for--"
"There is not."
"You may have heard of me--Joseph of Nazareth. This is the house of my fathers. I am of the line of David."
These words held the Nazarene's hope. If they failed him, further appeal was idle, even that of the offer of many shekels. To be a son of Judah was one thing--in the tribal opinion a great thing; to be of the house of David was yet another; on the tongue of a Hebrew there could be no higher boast. A thousand years and more had passed since the boyish shepherd became the successor of Saul and founded a royal family. Wars, calamities, other kings, and the countless obscuring processes of time had, as respects fortune, lowered his descendants to the common Jewish level; the bread they ate came to them of toil never more humble; yet they had the benefit of history sacredly kept, of which genealogy was the first chapter and the last; they could not become unknown, while, wherever they went In Israel, acquaintance drew after it a respect amounting to reverence.
If this were so in Jerusalem and elsewhere, certainly one of the sacred line might reasonably rely upon it at the door of the khan of Bethlehem. To say, as Joseph said, "This is the house of my fathers," was to say the truth most simply and literally; for it was the very house Ruth ruled as the wife of Boaz, the very house in which Jesse and his ten sons, David the youngest, were born, the very house in which Samuel came seeking a king, and found him; the very house which David gave to the son of Barzillai, the friendly Gileadite; the very house in which Jeremiah, by prayer, rescued the remnant of his race flying before the Babylonians.
"But now."
The keeper smiled.
"'The stranger that dwelleth with you shall be as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself.' Is not that the law, Rabbi?"
Joseph was silent.
"If it be the law, can I say to one a long time come, 'Go thy way; another is here to take thy place?'"
Yet Joseph held his peace.
"And, if I said so, to whom would the place belong? See the many that have been waiting, some of them since noon."
"Who are all these people?" asked Joseph, turning to the crowd. "And why are they here at this time?"
Still Joseph persisted.
"The court is large," he said.
"Yes, but it is heaped with cargoes--with bales of silk, and pockets of spices, and goods of every kind."
Then for a moment the face of the applicant lost its stolidity; the lustreless, staring eyes dropped. With some warmth he next said, "I do not care for myself, but I have with me my wife, and the night is cold--colder on these heights than in Nazareth. She cannot live in the open air. Is there not room in the town?"
"These people"--the keeper waved his hand to the throng before the door--"have all besought the town, and they report its accommodations all engaged."
Again Joseph studied the ground, saying, half to himself, "She is so young! if I make her bed on the hill, the frosts will kill her."
Then he spoke to the keeper again.
"It may be you knew her parents, Joachim and Anna, once of Bethlehem, and, like myself, of the line of David."
"Yes, I knew them. They were good people. That was in my youth."
This time the keeper's eyes sought the ground in thought. Suddenly he raised his head.
"If I cannot make room for you," he said, "I cannot turn you away. Rabbi, I will do the best I can for you. How many are of your party?"
Joseph reflected, then replied, "My wife and a friend with his family, from Beth-Dagon, a little town over by Joppa; in all, six of us."
"Very well. You shall not lie out on the ridge. Bring your people, and hasten; for, when the sun goes down behind the mountain, you know the night comes quickly, and it is nearly there now."
"I give you the blessing of the houseless traveller; that of the sojourner will follow."
So saying, the Nazarene went back joyfully to Mary and the Beth-Dagonite. In a little while the latter brought up his family, the women mounted on donkeys. The wife was matronly, the daughters were images of what she must have been in youth; and as they drew nigh the door, the keeper knew them to be of the humble class.
"This is she of whom I spoke," said the Nazarene; "and these are our friends."
Mary's veil was raised.
"Blue eyes and hair of gold," muttered the steward to himself, seeing but her. "So looked the young king when he went to sing before Saul."
Then he took the leading-strap from Joseph, and said to Mary, "Peace to you, O daughter of David!" Then to the others, "Peace to you all!" Then to Joseph, "Rabbi, follow me."
