Was it that doubt, suspicion, had been wakened at last?
Was some sensitive nerve touched, that this Oriental should offer Christian comfort to him in his need--to him who had seen the greater light?
Or was it that some unreality in the words struck a note which excited a new and subconscious understanding?
Perhaps it was a little of all three.

He did not stop to inquire.

In crises such as that through which he was passing, the mind and body act without reason, rather by the primal instinct, the certain call of the things that were before reason was.
"God is with the patient," continued Nahoum; and Lacey set his teeth to bear this insult to all things.

But Nahoum accomplished what he had not anticipated.

David straightened himself up, and clasped his hands behind him.