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Who was this woman here who stepped between death and me and stood looking a wounded lion in the face? Was this Judith again incarnate? Or was this something more than Judith? Was it the Priestess and the Prophetess Miriam, back once more to the banks of the Nile? Was it the old and forgotten mastery of all things animate which Moses and his sister knew that gave her dominion over the king of the desert? Or was her name Mary? “That other Mary,” if you will, who won all things to her side, God in heaven, God upon earth, by the sad, sweet pity of her face, and the story of holy love that was written there? The lion’s head for a moment forgot its lofty defiance as she leaned a little forward. Then the tossed and troubled mane rose up and rolled forward like an inflowing sea. It never seemed so terrible. He was surely about to spring! And she, too! Her right foot settled solidly back, her left knee bent like a bow, her shapely and snowy shoulders, under their glory of black hair, bowed low. Her dauntless and defiant spirit had already precipitated itself forward and was smiting the imperious beast full in his blazing eyes. I knew that her body would follow her spirit in an instant more.

Face to face! Spirit to spirit! Soul to soul! A second only the combat lasted. The awful ferocity and force of the brute was beaten down, melted like lofty battlements of snow before the burning arrows of the sun, and he slowly, surlily, shrank in size, in spirit, in space. A paw drew back from the edge of the block, the eyes drooped, the head dropped a little, and the terrible mane seemed terrible no more, as slowly, doggedly, mightily, aye doggedly and majestically, too, at the same time, this noble creature forced himself sidewise and back a little.

Then he hesitated. Rebellion was in his mighty heart. He turned suddenly and looked her full in the face once more. All the beast that was in him rose up. The terrible mane now seemed more terrible than before. With great head tossed, tail whipped back, and teeth in the air, talons unsheathed and legs gathered under him, he was about to bound forward.

But the woman was before him! With eyes still fastened on his face, she with one long leap forward drove not only her shining soul but her snowy body right against his teeth. Or rather, she had surely done so had not the lion, half turned about, shrank back as she leaped forward. Then slowly, looking back with his blazing but cowering eyes, feeling back with his spirit still defiant, if but to see whether her courage failed her in the least or her mighty spirit was still in battle armor; and then he passed. His companions had drawn back and into a depression in the desert where he slowly and sullenly joined them.

One, two, three, four dim yet distinct black silhouettes against the yellow east; then but a single confused black etching; away, away, smaller and smaller, gone!

I gathered up her robe, crossed over, and letting it fall on her shoulders where she still stood, looking down and after the beast. I picked up my pistol from where it had fallen, a few feet below, and as she turned about, carefully reloaded it from cartridges by chance in my vest pocket.

Returning to the summit, I found her again resting on her couch at the corner of the huge slab, tranquilly as if we had not been disturbed. I did not speak. Not a single word had been uttered all this time.

I sat down at the feet of this woman–not at her side, as before–and let my own feet dangle down over the edge on the side farthest away from the isolated columns. Neither of us spoke; nor did she move hand or foot till morning.