s for plenty."

"And the populace, doth it not mutter even as our own?"

"Into the feast halls comes no mention of the populace. Yet it hath
been said they stand about trembling lest they starve because of the
delay of an Alexandrian corn ship. But what of the populace? Whether
her hordes be corn fed or not corn fed, Rome careth not. What souls
have these?"

"It is the naked virgins that possess souls," and Antipas showed his
pointed teeth a little more.

"Nay, it is the naked virgins that set souls on fire," Zador Ben Amon
corrected.

"Rome hath not all the naked virgins that do dance. Antipas hath had a
dance for his wife's sake." With this remark his sharp-toothed smile
gave way to laughter.

"Which wife?" Zador asked.

"Herodias, sister of Agrippa the Great. Her Salome danced until like
fire my blood chased itself into a fever. Then did I tell her to name
her price. And the price was none other than the head of John--John
Baptist, who for defiling the name of Antipas' wife had been put in a
dungeon under the castle of Machaerus. Antipas is not cursed with
poverty. Yet are there prices too great, for since the head of the
brawler came blinking on a platter, do the people declare he were
Elias, and that he is not dead but walks the dungeon by day and whither
he will by night."

"Thou shouldst be a Sadducee and declare against a hereafter. They
eat, drink and be merry while the Pharisees speak darkly of a hereafter
of which they know nothing, and beget fear of ghosts."

"Yea, but in the hearts of the people great hope of a hereafter is ever
alive. This do the Pharisees know and teach."

"The Pharisees are hypocrites. But let us to business for it meaneth
more stores of gold to Antipas and Zador."

The Idumean leaned forward with his eyes on the Jew. "Speak on," he
said.

"There is a reason Rome ruleth the world. She knoweth how. In the
Senate are the laws made. By the sword of her vast army are they
enforced. And lest insurrection be plotted against the throne of the
Caesars, Rome hath a system of spies sufficient to hear a whisper in
the bowels of the earth. It hath not been so determined, but it is
suspected that there is some sort of a union of toilers. Such
societies would be like a worm in the heart to our profits, Antipas."

"Fear not such worms. Some wild dream is this--that those who toil
bind themselves together. Ever do cattle contend among themselves and
not unite."