"Roads by Seabury Quinn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Quinn Seabury)

my little son, why did they do this thing to thee, thou who
never did them any harm? Oh, woe is me, my God hath left
me comfortless; my firstborn, only son is slain -"
"Thou liest, woman!" Claus's words rang sharp as steel.
"Soldiers do not things like this. They war with men; they
make no war on babes."
The mother rocked her body to and fro and beat her
breast with small clenched fists. "The soldiers did it," she
repeated doggedly. "They came and went from house to
house, and slew our sons -"

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"Romans?" Claus asked incredulously. Cruel the
Romans were at times, but never to his knowledge had they
done a thing like this. Romans were not baby-killers.
"Nay, the soldiers of the King. Romans only in the armor
that they wore. They came marching into town, and -"
"The soldiers of the King? Herod's?"
"Yea, Barbarian. King Herod, may his name be cursed
for evermore! Some days agone came travelers from the East
who declared a king was born among the Jews, and Herod,
fearing that the throne might go to him, dispatched his
soldiery throughout the coasts of Bethlehem to slay the sons
of every house who had not reached their second year."
"Thy husband -"
"Alas, I am a widow."
"And hast thou store of oil and meal?"
"Nay, my lord, here is only death. Ai-ai-ai -"
Claus took some copper from his pouch and dropped it
into the woman's lap beside the little corpse. "Take this," he
ordered, "and have done unto the body of thy babe according
to thy custom."
"The Lord be gracious unto thee, Barbarian. To thee and
all thy house, for that thou takest pity on the widow in her
sorrow. The Lord of Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob -"
"Let be. What is thy name?"
"Rachael, magnificence; and may the Lord of Israel give
favor unto -"


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Claus turned away and left the weeping woman with her
dead.