and a great lump rose at his throat to choke him, he fell to the floor

and prayed, and Ali and the black women knelt beside him.
The negro's prayer was simple to childishness. It told God everything;

it recited the facts to the heavenly Father as to one who was far away
and might not know. The maiden was sick unto death. She had been

three days and nights knowing no one, and eating and drinking nothing.
She was blind and dumb and deaf. Her father loved her and was wrapped up

in her. She was his only child, and his wife was dead, and he was
a lonely man. He was away from his home now, and if, when he returned,

the girl were gone and lost--if she were dead and buried--his strong heart
would be broken and his very soul in peril.

Such was the Taleb's prayer, and such was the scene of it--the dumb angel
of white and crimson turning and tossing on the bed in an aureole

of her streaming yellow hair, and the four black faces about her,
eager and hot and aflame, with closed eyelids and open lips,

calling down mercy out of heaven from the God that might be seen
by the soul alone.

And so it was, but whether by chance or Providence let no man dare
to tell, that even while the four black people were yet on their knees

by the bed, the turning and tossing of the white face stopped suddenly
and Naomi lay still on her pillow. The hot flush faded from her cheeks;

her features, which had twitched, were quiet; and her hands,
which had been restless, lay at peace on the counterpane.

The good old Taleb took this for an answer to his prayer, and he shouted
"El hamdu l'Illah!" (Praise be to God), while the big drops coursed

down the deep furrows of his streaming face. And then, as if
to complete the miracle, and to establish the old man's faith in it,

a strange and wondrous thing befell. First, a thin wateryhumour
flowed from one of Naomi's ears, and after that she raised herself

on her elbow. Her eyes were open as if they saw; her lips were parted
as though they were breaking into a smile; she made a long sigh

like one who has slept softly through the night and has just awakened
in the morning.

Then, while the black people held their breath in their first moment
of surprise and gladness, her parted lips gave forth a sound.

It was a laugh--a faint, broken, bankrupt echo of her old happy laughter.
And then instantly" target="_blank" title="ad.立即，立刻">instantly, almost before the others had heard the sound,

and while the notes of it were yet coming from her tongue,
she lifted her idle hand and covered her ear, and over her face

there passed a look of dread.
So swift had this change been that the bondwomen had not seen it,

and they were shouting "Hallelujah!" with one voice, thinking only
that she who had been dead to them was alive again. But the old Taleb

cried eagerly, "Hush! my children, hush! What is coming is
a marvellous thing! I know what it is--who knows so well as I?

Once I was deaf, my children, but now I hear. Listen!
The maiden has had fever--fever of the brain. Listen!

A wateryhumour had gathered in her head. It has gone,
it has flowed away. Now she will hear. Listen, for it is I

that know it--who knows it so well as I? Yes; she will be no longer deaf.
Her ears will be opened. She will hear. Once she was living

in a land of silence; now she is coming into the land of sound.
Blessed be God, for He has wrought this wondrous work. God is great!

God is mighty! Praise the merciful God for ever! El hamdu l'Illah!"
And marvellous and passing belief as the old Taleb's story seemed to be,

it appeared to be coming to pass, for even while he spoke, beginning
in a slow whisper and going on with quicker and louder breath,

Naomi turned her face full upon him; and when the black women
in their ready faith, joined in his shouts of praise, she turned her face

towards them also; and wherever a voice sounded in the room
she inclined her head towards it as one who knew the direction

of the sounds, and also as one who was in fear of them.
But, seeing nothing of her look of pain, and knowing nothing

but one thing only, and that was the wondrous and mighty change
that she who had been deaf could now hear, that she who had never

before heard speech now heard their voices as they spoke around her,
Ali, in his frantic delight laughing and crying together,

his white teeth aglitter, and his round black face shining with tears,
began to shout and to sing, and to dance around the bed in wild joy

at the miracle which God had wrought in answer to his old Taleb's prayer.
No heed did he pay to the Taleb's cries of warning, but danced on and on,

and neither did the bondwomen see the old man's uplifted arms
or his big lips pursed out in hushes, so overpowered were they

with their delight, so startled and so joy drunken. But over their tumult
there came a wild outburst of piercing shrieks. They were the cries

of Naomi in her blind and sudden terror at the first sounds
that had reached her of human voices. Her face was blanched,

her eyelids were trembling, her lips were restless, her nostrils quivered,
her whole being seemed to be overcome by a vertigo of dread, and,

in the horrible disarray of all her sensations her brain,
on its wakening from its dolorous sleep of three delirious days,

was tottering and reeling at its welcome in this world of noise.
Then Ali ended suddenly his frantic dance, the bondwomen held their peace

in an instant, and blank silence in the chamber followed the clamour
of tongues.

It was at this great moment that Israel, returning from his journey
in the jellab of a Moor, knocked like a stranger at his outer door.

When he entered the chamber, still clad as a torn and ragged man,
too eager to remove the sorry garments which had been given to him

on the way, Naomi was resting against the pillar of the bed.
He saw that her countenance was changed, and that every feature

of her face seemed to listen. No longer was it as the face of a lamb
that is simple and content, neither was it as the face of a child

that is peaceful and happy; but it was hot and perplexed. Fear sat
on her face, and wonder and questioning; and as Fatimah stood

by her side, speaking tender words to comfort her, no cheer did she seem
to get from them, but only dread, for she drew away from her

when she spoke, as though the sound of the voice smote her ears
with terror of trouble. All this Israel saw on the instant,

and then his sight grew dim, his heart beat as if it would kill him,
a thick mist seemed to cover everything, and through the dense waves

of semi-consciousness he heard the dull hum of Fatimah's muffled voice
coming to him as from far away.

"My pretty Naomi! My little heart! My sweet jewel of gold and silver!
It is nothing! Nothing! Look! See! Her father has come back!

Her dear father has come back to her!"
Presently the room ceased to go round and round, and Israel knew

that Naomi's arms surrounded him, that his own arms enlaced her,
and that her head was pressed hard against his bosom. Yes, it was she!

It was Naomi! Ali had told him truth. She lived! She was well!
She could hear! The old hope that had chirped in his soul was justified,

and the dear delicious dream was come true. Oh! God was great,
God was good, God had given him more than he had asked or deserved!

Thus for some minutes he stood motionless, blessing the God of Jacob,
yet uttering no words, for his heart was too full for speech,

only holding Naomi closely to him, while his tears fell on her blind face.
And the black people in the chamber wept to see it, that not more dumb

in that great hour of gladness was she who was born so than he
to whose house had come the wonderful work that God had wrought.

No heed had Israel given yet to the bodeful signs in Naomi's face,
in joy over such as were joyful. When he had taken her in his arms

she had known him, and she had clung to him in her glad surprise.
But when she continued to lie on his bosom it was not only because

he was her father and she loved him, and because he had been lost
to her and was found, it was also because he alone was silent

of all that were about her.