That night, when his queen and his courtiers were sleeping, Sabbataï wrestled sore with himself in his lonely audience-chamber. The spectre of self-doubt--long laid to rest by music and pageantry--was raised afresh by this new and unexpected development. It was a rude reminder that this pompous and voluptuous existence was, after all, premature, that the Kingdom had yet to be won. "O my Father in Heaven!" he prayed, falling upon his face. "Thou hast not deceived me. Tell me that this Prophet is false, I beseech Thee, that it is through me that Thy Kingdom is to be established on earth. I await the miracle. The days of the great year are nigh gone, and lo! I languish here in mock majesty. A sign! A sign!" "Sabbataï!" A ravishing voice called his name. He looked up. Melisselda stood in the doorway, come from her chamber as lightly clad as on that far-off morning in the cemetery. There was a strange rapt expression in her face, and, looking closer, he saw that her laughing eyes were veiled in sleep. "It is the sign," he muttered in awe. He sprang to his feet and took her white hand, that burnt his own, and she led him back to her chamber, walking unerringly. "It is the sign," he murmured, "the sign that Melisselda hath truly led me to the Kingdom of Joy." But in the morning he awoke still troubled. The meaning of the sign seemed less clear than in the silence of the night; the figure of the new Prophet loomed ominous. When the Poles went back they bore a royal letter, promising the Polish Jews vengeance on the Cossacks, and commanding Nehemiah to come to the Messiah with all speed. The way was long, but by the beginning of September Nehemiah arrived in Abydos. He was immediately received in private audience. He bore himself independently. "Peace to thee, Sabbataï." "Peace to thee, Nehemiah. I desired to have speech with thee; men say thou deniest me." "That do I. How should Messiah--Messiah of the House of David, appear and not his forerunner, Messiah of the House of Ephraim, as our holy books foretell?" Sabbataï answered that the Ben Ephraim had already appeared, but he could not convince Nehemiah, who proved highly learned in the Hebrew, the Syriac, and the Chaldean, and argued point by point and text by text. The first Messiah was to be a preacher of the Law, poor, despised, a servant of the second. Where was he to be found? Three days they argued, but Nehemiah still went about repeating his rival prophecies. The more zealous of the Sabbatians, angry at the pertinacious and pugnacious casuist, would have done him a mischief, but the Prophet of Lemberg thought it prudent to escape to Adrianople. Here in revenge he sought audience with the Kaimacon. "Treason, O Mustapha, treason!" he announced. He betrayed the fantastic designs upon the Sultan's crown, still cherished by Sabbataï and known to all but the Divan; the Castellan of Abydos, for the sake of his pocket, having made no report of the extraordinary doings at the Castle.