So the galley put about and sailed away, and they, to the number of some
sixty souls, began their journey to Jerusalem. A little while later they
came to a village, the same where Nehushta had found the peasant and his
wife, whose inhabitants, at the sight of them, fled, thinking that they
were one of the companies of robbers that hunted the land in packs,
like wolves, plundering or murdering all they met. When they learnt the
truth, however, these people returned and heard their story in silence,
for in those days such tales were common enough. As it came to an end
a withered, sunburned woman advanced to Nehushta, and, laying one hand
upon her arm, pointed with the other at Miriam, saying:
"Tell me, friend, is that the babe I suckled?"
Then Nehushta, knowing her to be the nurse who had travelled with
them to the village of the Essenes, greeted her, and answered "Yea,"
whereupon the woman cast her arms about Miriam and embraced her.
"Day by day," she said, "have I thought of you, little one, and now
that my eyes have seen you grown so sweet and fair, I care not--I whose
husband is dead and who have no children--how soon they close upon the
world." Then she blessed her, and called upon her angel to protect her
yonder in Jerusalem, and found her food and an ass to ride; and so they
parted, to meet no more.
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