Thus succumbed to the stolid gaze of the miraculously risen one all things that served to affirm life, its meaning and its joys. And it was said that it would be dangerous to allow him to face the Emperor, that it would be safer to put him to death and burying him secretly to spread the rumor that he had disappeared without leaving a trace. Swords were already sharpened and some youths devoted to the welfare of the nation volunteered to be his slayers, when suddenly Augustus demanded to have Lazarus brought before him on the morrow and upset their cruel plans.
Though it was impossible to remove Lazarus, it was thought best to soften somewhat the dreary impression produced by his appearance. For this reason skilled artists were summoned, also hair arrangers and masters of make-up and they labored all night over the head of Lazarus. They trimmed his beard, curled it and made it appear neat and attractive. The livid coloring of his face and hands was removed by means of paint: his hands were bleached and his cheeks touched up with red. The repulsive wrinkles of suffering that furrowed his senile features were patched up, painted and smoothed over, and lines of goodnatured laughter and pleasant cheerful good humor were skillfully drawn in their place.
Lazarus submitted stolidly to all they did with him and soon was transformed into a naturally corpulent handsome old man, who looked like a harmless grandfather with numerous descendants. One could almost see the trace of a smile on his lips with which he might have related to them laughable stories, one almost detected in the corner of his eyes the calm tenderness of old age,—such was his quiet and reassuring appearance. But they had not dared to take off his wedding attire, nor could they change his eyes,—dark and dreadful glasses through which there peered upon the world the unfathomable Beyond.
The magnificence of the Imperial palace failed to impress Lazarus. There might have been no difference between his ramshackle but at the threshold of the desert and the splendid and massive palace of stone, so stolidly indifferent was his unobserving glance. Under his feet the solid marble slabs seemed to turn to the sinking sand of the desert, and the throngs of gaily attired and haughty Romans might have been thin air. They avoided looking into his face as he passed, fearing to succumb to the baneful spell of his eyes; but when they judged from the sound of his footsteps that he had passed on, they paused and raising their heads with a little fearsome curiosity watched the departing figure of the tall, corpulent, slightly stooping old man who was slowly wending his way into the heart of the Imperial palace. If Death itself had passed by they would not have glanced after it with greater awe. For until then Death had been known unto the dead only and life unto the living and there had been no bridge between the twain. But this strange being knew Death, and awful, ominous, accursed was his knowledge. “He will be the death of our great and divine Augustus”, mused some of them anxiously and muttered curses in his wake as he slowly and stolidly made his way more and more deeply into the palace.