From time to time the high priests at Jerusalem, who hated the Essenes as heretics, had made demands upon them that they should pay tithe for the support of the sacrifices in the Temple. This they refused to do, since all sacrifices were hateful to them. So things went on until the day of the high priest Ananos, who sent armed men to the village of the Essenes to take the tithes. These were refused to them, whereon they broke open the granary and helped themselves, destroying a great deal which they could not carry away. As it chanced, on that day Miriam, accompanied by Nehushta, had visited Jericho. Returning in the afternoon they passed through a certain torrent bed in which were many rocks, and among them thickets of thorn trees. Here they were met by Caleb, now a noble-looking youth very strong and active, who carried a bow in his hand and on his back a sheath of six arrows. “Lady Miriam,” he said, “well met. I have come to seek you, and to warn you not to return by the road to-day, since on it you will meet presently those thieves sent by the high priest to plunder the stores of the Order, who, perhaps, will offer you insult or mischief, for they are drunk with wine. Look, one of them has struck me,” and he pointed to a bruise upon his shoulder and scowled. “What then shall we do?” asked Miriam. “Go back to Jericho?” “Nay, for there they will come too. Follow up this gully till you reach the footpath a mile away, and by it walk to the village; so you will miss these robbers.” “That is a good plan,” said Nehushta. “Come, lady.” “Whither are you going, Caleb?” asked Miriam, lingering, since she saw that he did not mean to accompany them. “I? Oh, I shall hide among the rocks near by till the men are passed, and then go to seek that hyena which has been worrying the sheep. I have tracked him down and may catch him as he comes from his hole at sunset. That is why I have brought my bow and arrows.” “Come,” broke in Nehushta impatiently, “come. The lad well knows how to guard himself.” “Be careful, Caleb, that you get no hurt from the hyena,” said Miriam, doubtfully, as Nehushta seized her by the wrist and dragged her away. “It is strange,” she added as they went, “that Caleb should choose this evening to go hunting.” “Unless I mistake, it is a human hyena whom he hunts,” answered Nehushta shortly. “One of those men struck him, and he desires to wash the wound with his blood.” “Oh, surely not! Nou. That would be taking vengeance, and revenge is evil.” Nehushta shrugged her shoulders. “Caleb may think otherwise, as I do at times. Wait, and we shall see.”