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Let Jannes and Jambres 'do the same with their enchantments. We may answer the question, 'Art Thou He that should come? as Christ did, 'The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear. The perfect Restoration will be in heaven.
"I acknowledge that Squire Hathorne and myself have been grossly deceived by an unprincipled adventurer but that proves nothing. Because Jannes and Jambres imitated with their sorceries the miracles of Moses, did it prove that Moses was an impostor? There was one Judas among the twelve apostles, but does that invalidate the credibility of the eleven others, who were not liars and cheats?
"Egypt! But it shall not be wholly overthrown through mine incautious trust of a messenger." The young man still retained his hold on the sorcerer's hand. "Thou dost impugn my fidelity. Now, consider this. I could have defeated thee and accomplished the Pharaoh's undoing by refusing to carry the message, by keeping silence in yonder shed of image-makers. Is it not so?" Jambres assented. "Even so.
But no one ever imagined that Saint Paul is here asserting the authority of the writing, if it was a written account which he quoted, or making himself answerable for the authenticity of the tradition; much less that he so involves himself with either of these questions as that the credit of his own history and mission should depend upon the fact whether Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses or not.
Jambres beheld him recede into the dusk and wavered. "Stay!" he called. Kenkenes stopped. "Wilt thou swear fidelity by the holy Name?" "Aye, and by that holier Name of Jehovah, also." He returned and faced the priest. "Thou art mystic, Father Jambres," he said persuasively; "what does thy heart tell thee of me?" "The supplication of the need indorses thee, as it indorses any desperate chance.
And, indeed, they succeeded for the moment; they escaped out of the sea. But immediately the sea said to itself, "How can I allow the pledge entrusted to me by God to be taken from me?" And the water rushed after the Egyptians, and dragged back every man of them. Among the Egyptians were the two arch-magicians Jannes and Jambres. They made wings for themselves, with which they flew up to heaven.
Jambres looked at Kenkenes with profound admiration, not unmixed with apprehension. "Let not thy youthful zeal undo thee," he cautioned. "Perchance thou dost mistake the man." "The gods did not bestow all the art upon the mystics when they endowed thee with divining powers. They gifted every man with a little of it, and it speaketh no less truthfully because it is small.
He knew that his God had acknowledged him. When his thoughts returned to earth, he found the glittering eyes of the sorcerer fixed upon him. "Seeing that thou dost live, tell me what sheltered thee in this harvest of death?" Jambres repeated. "The Lord God of Israel, who reaped it." The answer was direct and fearless. To the astonished priest who heard it, it seemed triumphant.
"Jambres, hidden in the fringe of bushes behind, heard them. "They laid a snare. And thou, O Prince, wast to be trapped therein." Seti's eyes were veiled and his face showed a heightening of color. "Thou wast to come to the temple in the village of image-makers with treasure to give into the hands of Moses. Thy message to my brother was to be delivered by the Princess Ta-user.
"Who art thou?" he demanded. "How may I know thou art not mine enemy?" "Not so," Kenkenes protested. "Give me ear, I pray thee. Would I have brought thee thy warning, knowing it such, were I thine enemy? And further, did not Jambres, the mystic, who readeth men's souls, trust me?" "Aye, so it seems," the king admitted, glad to be won by such physical magnificence. "But who art thou?"
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