"Truly, friend, I know not how to respond to that. Do you count my life to be in danger, that you ask me?" "Not if the morning light come to you in Aylesbury or Cricklade--at least, perchance not. But if it dawn on you where you can hear the bell from yon tower--ay, I do." "I perceive your meaning. You would have me to fly." In the evening twilight, now fast darkening, Gerhardt could see a nod of Rubi's black head. "`Should such a man as I flee?' Friend, I am the leader of this band of my countrymen--" "Just so. That's the reason." "Were I to flee, would they stand firm?" said Gerhardt thoughtfully, rather to himself than to the young Jew. "Firm--to what?" "To God," replied Gerhardt reverently, "and to His truth." "What does a Gentile care for truth? They want you to worship one dead man, and you prefer to worship another dead man. What's the odds to you? Can't you mutter your Latin, and play with your beads, before both, and have done with it?" "I worship no saints, and have no beads." "Father Jacob! You must be a new sort of a Gentile. Never came across a reptile of your pattern before. Is that why Countess took to you?" "I cannot say. It was the child, I think, that attracted her. Well, friend, I am thankful for your warning. But how come you to know?" A smothered laugh, as hoarse as the voice, replied-- "Folks have ways and means, sometimes, that other folks can't always guess." "If you know more than others," said Gerhardt boldly, "suffer me to question you a moment." "Question away. I don't promise to answer." "Are we all to be taken and examined?" "All." "Before the King?" "And the creeping creatures called Bishops." "Will any thing be done to the women and children?" "Does the lion discriminate between a kid and a goat? `Let your little ones also go with you.' Even Pharaoh could say that--when he could not help allowing it." "I think I understand you, Friend Rubi, and I thank you." "You are not so badly off for brains," said Rubi approvingly. "But how far to act upon your warning I know not, until I lay it before the Lord, and receive His guidance." "You--a Gentile--receive guidance from the Holy One (blessed be He)!" Rubi's tone was not precisely scornful; it seemed rather a mixture of surprise, curiosity, and perplexity. "Ay, friend, I assure you, however strange it may seem to you, the good Lord deigns to guide even us Gentiles. And why not? Is it not written, `Even them will I bring to My holy mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer'? and, `O Thou that hearest prayer, unto Thee shall all flesh come'?" "Those promises belong to the reign of the Messiah. He is not come yet. Do you new sort of Gentiles believe He is?" It was a most difficult question to answer. "Yes" would probably drive Rubi away in anger--perhaps with a torrent of blasphemy on his lips. "No" would be false and cowardly.