tnesses, in this hideous Anti-christ time, for, as witnesses,
they must be slain in the streets of the city of Jerusalem--"_where
also their Lord was crucified_."

There was much angry talk, and savage swearing among the enraged,
mystified, disappointed multitude, at the loss of their vengeance upon
the witnesses, but, had they known it, they had come off very lightly
in being only disappointed, for God's witnesses had the power "_when
any one willed to injure them, to send forth fire out of their mouths,
and to devour their enemies_," and in the days that were to follow this
first encounter with them, the multitude would learn this to their cost.

CHAPTER X.

A LEBANON ROSE.

With the disappearance of the two witnesses there came a gradual
darkening of the heavens, until in the space of a couple of minutes,
the whole district became as dark as it had been when the sacrifice in
the Temple courtyard had finished.

Thunder and lightning accompanied the darkness, and this time heavy
rain. Baffled by the darkness, the multitude ran hither and thither,
aimlessly, wildly, in search of their homes. Presently the vivid
lightning flashes gave them fitful direction, and gradually the crowds
melted away.

George Bullen had swerved from his homeward way, to reach the crowd
about the "two witnesses." The gleaming lightning gave him his
direction now. He was already drenched to the skin, for the rain was a
deluge.

As he moved on through the black darkness, (illumined only with the
occasional lightning flashes) he stumbled over something. Some
instinct told him it was a human form. Stooping in the blackness, and
groping with his hands, he made out that the form was that of a slender
woman. There was no movement, and in response to his question, "are
you hurt?" there came no reply.

The face, the lips which he touched with his groping fingers, were
warm, so that he knew it was not death, though the form was as still as
death.

"Whoever she is," he mused, "she will die in this storm if she is left
here." So he stooped and gathered the drenched form up in his arms.
Her head fell upon his breast, her limbs were nerveless in his clasp.

Another, a longer, a more vivid flash of lightning, came at this
instant, and showed him his path clearly, he was close to his lodgings.

Two minutes later he had reached the door of the house. It was on the
latch, and he entered with his burden. He found his way to his room,