The mother’s face flushed hotly. "The lad was innocent!" she cried. "He was sinned against most foully, but he himself sinned not. He is in Paradise, for he hath the word of the Lord."
"What meanest thou? Who told thee concerning the thing?" said Caiaphas, raising himself up and fixing his burning eyes upon her face.
"I had it from a lad named Stephen, who was even as a brother to him who was our son--Titus, he was called. As he hung upon the cross in agony, the Lord spake to him and said, ’This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise.’"
"Who is this Stephen?" said Caiaphas, in a low, terrible voice. "And whom dost thou call Lord?"
Anna trembled with terror, she tried to speak, but the words died upon her lips.
"Stephen is--the son of the Greek who took our child. The man hath been punished for his sin. He also perished with the Lord."
There was an awful silence. Then Caiaphas again spoke, and his voice was as the voice of a stranger in the ears of Anna. "This Stephen, the son of the malefactor, doth he still live?"
"He--lives; but, oh my husband, I beseech thee--do not harm him, so innocent, so heavenly a one!"
But through the words of her entreaty sounded the inexorable tones of the High Priest’s voice.
"Blood for blood! The iniquities of the fathers shall be visited upon the children, even unto the third and fourth generations. It is the law."
"What and if while we wait for the fulfilment of the promise, the same men who have slain our Lord shall also turn their hand against us? We be few in number and there is naught to shield us from their fury. Thou didst see when we praised God in the temple even this day, how the chief priests and the elders cast upon us looks which were as sharp arrows in the hands of mighty men of valor. Shall the wolves which slew the Shepherd spare the flock?"
"Hadst thou faith even as a grain of mustard seed thou wouldst not doubt the word of the Lord, ’Ye shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days hence; depart not from Jerusalem till that the promise is fulfilled to you!’ And how sayest thou that there is naught to shield us. God, the Almighty One, even the Father of our Lord Jesus, whom we saw received up into heaven, he shall protect us from the wrath of the Jews."