If
thine insulter asks concerning thy whereabouts I shall not trouble
myself to remember. But what shall keep him from searching for
thee--and are there any like to defend thee, if he find thee, seeing I
am not there? And even if thou art securely hidden, thou hast never
dreamed how heavy is the life of the stone-pits, Rachel."
"Keep Deborah here," the girl besought him, distressed. "She is old
and will perish--"
"Nay, I will not send thee out alone," was the reply. "If thou goest,
so must she. But--hast thou no fear?"
Once again she shook her head.
"I trust to the triumph of the good," she replied earnestly.
The sound of the scribe's approach behind him, moved him on.
"Farewell," he said as he went, and added no more, for his composure
failed him.
"The grace of the Lord God attend thee," she whispered. "Farewell."
All the morning the work went on, and when the Egyptian mid-winter noon
lay warm on the flat country, three hundred Israelites were ready for
the long march to the Nile. They left behind them a camp oppressed
with that heart-soreness, which affliction added to old afflictions
brings,--the numb ache of sorrow, not its lively pain. Only Deborah,
the childless, and Rachel, the motherless, went with lighter
hearts,--if hearts can be light that go forward to meet the unknown
fortunes of bond-people.
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