"Be quiet, Moloch!" he said to the leopard. "Hush, Beelzebub," he whispered to the snake. "This is a friend and fellow-servant."
The poor black prostrated himself in the dust before this mysterious night-visitor and his bestial attendants. He signified his total submission by raising the man's foot and placing it on his head as he groveled on the ground. When he released it, he kissed it with the most abject servility. His abasement was extreme.
"That is right, Ethopus!" said his master, "that is right. I rejoice to find you in such a becoming frame of mind. Conduct me promptly to the secret chamber of magic. Then return to my servant and give him suitable accommodations. Inform Magistus of my arrival early in the morning. I have come on a grand errand to this village of Bethany."
Ethopus obeyed these orders without noise. All was at length silent. Perhaps all slept: the drunken proprietor, the wicked priest, the remorseful Magdalen, the frightened eunuch, the strange guest, and Mary and Martha locked in each other's arms, their beautiful faces bathed in tears, and their sweet souls dreaming that their angel-mother was watching them from heaven.
There are few sights more touching than that of a man struck speechless in the course of disease, yet retaining his mental faculties. Death perhaps approaches; weighty business presses on his mind; solemn secrets demand revelation; confessions of soul struggle for utterance. He makes inarticulate sounds, incomprehensible gestures. He writhes; he moans with the burden of thoughts he cannot express. His eyes speak and plead with a mute eloquence. His ideas play upon his countenance like lambent lightning, but die away, voiceless, indefinite, unrevealed.
Such was the state of Ethopus, the dumb eunuch, the day after the treacherous banquet. There was a great solitude about the house; for Magistus, Caiaphas, and Simon Magus the magician, made an early and prolonged visit to Jerusalem. Mary Magdalen took the sisters over the beautiful and extensive grounds, and paid another visit to the tomb of our mother, carrying some exquisite flowers in her own hand as a little offering to the maternal shade. Ethopus flitted about here and there in a state of unaccountable excitement. He followed the sisters all day at a respectful distance; and when his duties called him off imperatively, he went precipitately about everything until he could assure himself again that they were free and out of danger.