Читать книгу The Gladiators - George J. Whyte-Melville - Страница 10

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THE dwelling in which the Briton now found himself presented a strange contrast of simplicity and splendour, of wealth and frugality, of obscure poverty and costly refinement. The wall was bare and weather-stained; but a silver lamp, burning perfumed oil, was fixed against its surface on a bracket of common deal. Though the stone floor was damp and broken, it was partially covered by a soft thick carpet of brilliant colours, while shawls from the richest looms of Asia hung over the mutilated wooden seats and the crazy couch, which appeared to be the congenial furniture of the apartment. Esca could not but remark on the same inconsistency throughout all the minor details of the household. A measure of rich wine from the Lebanon was cooling in a pitcher of coarse earthenware, a draught of fair water sparkled in a cup of gold. A bundle of Eastern javelins, inlaid with ivory and of beautiful finish and workmanship, kept guard, as it were, over a plain two-edged sword devoid of ornament, and with a handle frayed and worn as though from constant use, that looked like a weapon born for work not show, some rough soldier's rude but trusty friend. The room of which Esca thus caught a hasty glance as he passed through, opened on an inner apartment, which seemed to have been originally equally bare and dilapidated, but of which the furniture was even more rich and incongruous. It was flooded by a soft warm light, shed from a lamp burning some rare Syrian oil, that was scarcely to be procured for money in Rome. It dazzled Esca's eyes as he followed the girl through the outer apartment into this retreat, and it was a few seconds ere he recovered his sight sufficiently to take note of the objects that surrounded him.

A venerable man with bald head and long silvery beard was sitting at the table when they entered, reading from a roll of parchment filled to the very margin with characters in the Syriac language, then generally spoken over the whole of Asia Minor, and sufficiently familiar at Rome. So immersed was he in his studies, that he did not seem to notice her arrival, till the girl rushed up] to him, and, without unveiling, threw herself into his arms with many expressions of endearment and delight at her own return. The language in which she spoke was unknown to the Briton; but he gathered from her gestures, and the agitation which again overcame her for an instant, that she was relating her own troubles, and the part he had himself borne in the adventures of the night. Presently she turned, and drew him forward, while she said in Latin, with a little sob of agitation between every sentence—

"Behold my preserver—the youth who came in like a lion to save me from those wicked men! Thank him in my father's name, and yours, and all my kindred and all my tribe. Bid him welcome to the best our house affords. It is not every day a daughter of Judah meets with an arm and a heart like his, when she falls into the grasp of the heathen and the oppressor!"

The old man stretched his hand to Esca with cordiality and goodwill; as he did so, the Briton could not but observe how kindly was the smile that mantled over his serene and gentle face.

"My brother will be home ere long," said he. "and will himself thank you for preserving his daughter from insult and worse. Meantime Calchas bids you heartily welcome to Eleazar's house. Mariamne," he added, turning to the girl. "prepare us a morsel of food that we may eat. It is not the custom of our nation to send a stranger fasting from the door."

The girl departed on her hospitable mission, and Esca, making light of his prowess, and of the danger incurred, gave his own version of the night's occurrence, to which Calchas listened with grave interest and approval. When he had concluded, the old man pointed to the scroll he had been reading, which now lay rolled up on the table at his hand.

"The time will come," said he. "when the words that are written here shall be in the mouths of all men on the surface of the known earth. Then shall there be no more strife, nor oppression, nor suffering, nor sorrow. Then shall men love each other like brothers, and live only in kindliness and goodwill. The day may seem far distant, and the means may seem poor and inadequate now, yet so it is written here, and so will it be at last."

"You think that Rome will extend her dominions farther and farther? That she will conquer all known nations, as she has conquered us? That she means to be in fact what she proudly styles herself, the Mistress of the World? In truth, the eagle's wings are wide and strong. His beak is very sharp, and where his talons have once fastened themselves, they never again let go their hold!"

Calchas smiled and shook his head.

"The dove will prevail against the eagle, as love is a stronger power than hate. But it is not of Rome I speak as the future influence that shall establish the great good on earth. The legions are indeed well trained, and brave even to the death; but I know of soldiers in a better service than Caesar's, whose warfare is harder, whose watches are longer, whose adversaries are more numerous, but whose triumph is more certain, and more glorious at the last."

Esca looked as if he understood him not. The Briton's thoughts were wandering back to the tramp of columns and the clash of steel, and the gallant stand made against the invader by the white-robed warriors with their long swords, amongst whom he had been one of the boldest and the best.

"It is hard to strive against Rome," said he, with a glowing cheek and sparkling eye. "Yet I cannot but think, if we had never been provoked to an attack, if we had kept steadily on the defensive, if we had moved inland as he approached, harassing and cutting him off whenever we saw an opportunity, but never suffering him to make one for himself—trusting more to our woods and rivers, and less to our own right hands we might have tamed the eagle and clipped his wings, and beat him back across the sea at last. But what have I to do with such matters now?" he added, while his whole countenance fell in bitter humiliation. "I, a poor barbarian captive, and a slave here in Rome!"

Calchas studied his face with a keen scrutinising glance, then he laid his hand on the young man's shoulder, and said inquiringly

"There is not a grey hair in your clustering locks, nor a wrinkle on your brow, yet you have known sorrow?"

"Who has not?" replied the other cheerfully; "and yet I never thought to have come to this."

"You are a slave, and you would be free?" asked Calchas, slowly and impressively.

"I am a slave," repeated the Briton. "and I shall be free. But not till death."

"And after death?" proceeded the old man, in the same gentle inquiring tone.

"After death," answered the other. "I shall be free as the elements I have been taught to worship, and into which they tell me I shall be resolved. What need I know or care more than that in death there will be neither pleasure nor pain?"

"And is not life with all its changes too sweet to lose on such terms as these?" asked the older man. "Are you content to believe that, like one walking through a quicksand, the footsteps you leave are filled up and obliterated behind you as you pass on? Can you bear to think that yesterday is indeed banished and gone for ever? That a to-morrow must come of black and endless night? Death should be really terrible if this is your conviction and your creed!"

"Death is never terrible to a brave man," answered Esca. "A Briton need not be taught how to die sword in hand."

"You think you are brave," said Calchas, looking wistfully on the other's rising colour and kindling eyes. "Ah! you have not seen my comrades die, or you would know that something better than courage is required for the service to which we belong. What think ye of weak women, tender shrinking maidens, worn with fatigue, emaciated with hunger, fainting with heat and thirst, brought out to be devoured by beasts, or to suffer long and agonising tortures, yet smiling the while in quiet calm contentment, as seeing the home to which they are hastening, the triumph but a few short hours off? What think ye of the captains under whom I served, who here at Rome, in the face of Caesar and his power, vindicated the honour of their Lord and died without a murmur for His cause? I was with Peter, I tell you, Peter the Galilean, of whom men talk to this day, of whom men shall never cease to talk in after ages, when he opposed to Simon's magic arts his simple faith in the Master whom he served, and I saw the magician hurled like a stricken vulture to the ground. I was present when the fiercest and the wickedest of the Caesars, returning from the expedition to Greece, wherein his buffooneries had earned the contempt even of that subtle nation of flatterers, sentenced him to death upon the cross for that he had dared to oppose Nero's vices, and to tell Nero the truth. I heard him petition that he might be crucified with his head downward, as not worthy to suffer in the same posture as his Lord and I can see him now, the pale face, the noble head, the dark keen eye, the slender sinewy form, and, above all, the self-sustaining confidence, the triumphant daring of the man as he walked fearlessly to death. I was with Paul, the noble Pharisee, the naturalised Roman citizen, when he, alone amongst a crowd of passengers and a century of soldiers, quailed not to look on the black waves raging round our broken ship, and bade us all be of good cheer, for that every soul, to the number of two hundred and seventy-five, should come safe to shore. I remember how trustfully we looked on that low spare form, that grave and gracious face with its kindly eyes, its bushy brows and thick beard sprinkled here and there with grey. It was the soul, we knew, that sustained and strengthened the weakly body of the man. The very barbarians where we landed acknowledged its influence, and would fain have worshipped him for a god. Nero might well fear that quiet, humble, trusting, yet energetic nature; and where the imperial monster feared, as where he admired, loved, hated, envied, or despised, the sentiment must be quenched in blood."

"And did he too fall a victim?" inquired Esca, whose interest, notwithstanding occasional glances at the door through which Mariamne had gone out, seemed thoroughly awakened by the old man's narrative.

"They might not crucify him," answered Calchas. "for he was of noble lineage and a Roman citizen born; but they took him from amongst us, and they let him languish in a prison, till they released him at last and brought him out to be beheaded. Ay, Rome was a fearful sight that day; the foot was scorched as it trod the ashes of the devastated city, the eye smarted in the lurid smoke that hung like a pall upon the heavy air and would not pass away. Palaces were crumbling in ruins, the shrivelled spoils of an empire were blackening around, the dead were lying in the choked-up highways half- festering, half-consumed—orphan children were wandering about starved and shivering, with sallow faces and large shining eyes, or, worse still, playing thoughtlessly, unconscious of their doom. They said the Christians had set fire to the city, and many an innocent victim suffered for this foul and groundless slander. The Christians, forsooth! oppressed, persecuted, reviled; whose only desire was to live in brotherhood with all men, whose very creed is peace and goodwill on earth. I counted twenty of them, men, women, and children, neighbours with whom I had held kindly fellowship, friends with whom I had broken bread, lying stiff and cold in the Flaminian Way on the morning Paul was led out to die. But there was peace on the dead faces, and the rigid hands were clasped in prayer; and though the lacerated emaciated body, the mere shell, was grovelling there in the dust, the spirit had gone home to God who made it, to the other world of which you have not so much as heard, yet which you too must some day visit, to remain for ever. Do you understand me? not for ages, but for ever—without end!"

"Where is it?" asked Esca, on whom the idea of a spiritual existence, innate from its very organisation in every intelligent being, did not now dawn for the first time. "Is it here, or there? below, or above? in the stars, or the elements? I know the world in which I live; I can see it, can hear it, can feel it; but that other world, where is it?"

"Where is it?" repeated Calchas. "Where are the dearest wishes of your heart, the noblest thoughts of your mind? Where are your loves, your hopes, your affections, above all, your memories? Where is the whole better part of your nature? your remorse for evil, your aspirations after good, your speculations on the future, your convictions of the reality of the past? Where these are, there is that other world. You cannot see it, you cannot hear it, yet you know that it must be. Is any man's happiness complete? is any man's misery when it reaches him so overwhelming as it seemed at a distance? And why is it not? Because something tells him that the present life is but a small segment in the complete circle of a soul's existence. And the circle, you have not lived in Rome without learning, is the symbol of infinity."

Esca pondered and was silent. There are convictions which men hold unconsciously, and to which they are so accustomed that their attention can only be directed to them from without, just as they wear their skins and scarcely know it, till the familiar covering has been lacerated by injury or disease. At last he looked up with a brightening countenance, and exclaimed. "In that world, surely, all men will be free!"

"All men will be equal," replied Calchas. "but no mortal or immortal ever can be free. Suppose a being totally divested of all necessity for effort, all responsibility to his fellows or himself, all participation in the great scheme of which government is the essential condition in its every part, and you suppose one whose own feelings would be an intolerable burden, whose own wishes would be an unendurable torture. Man is made to bear a yoke; but the Captain whom I serve has told me that His yoke is easy and His burden is light. How easy and how light, I experience every moment of my life."

"And yet you said but now that death and degradation were the lot of those who bore arms by your side in the ranks," observed the Briton, still intently regarding his companion.

A ray of triumphant courage and exultation flashed up into the old man's face. For an instant Esca recognised the fierce daring of a nature essentially bold, reckless, and defiant; but it faded as it came, and was succeeded by an expression of meek, chastened humility, whilst he replied—

"Death welcome and long looked-for! Degradation that confers the highest honours in this world and the next! at least to those who are held worthy of the great glory of martyrdom. Oh! that I might be esteemed one of that noble band! But my work will be laid to my hand, and it is enough for me to be the lowest of the low in the service of my Master."

"And that master? Tell me of that master," exclaimed Esca, whose interest was excited, as his feelings were roused, by converse with one who seemed so thoroughly impressed with the truth of what he spoke, who was at once so earnest, so gentle, and so brave. The old man bowed his head with unspeakable reverence, but in his face shone the deep and fervent joy of one who looks back with intense love and gratitude to the great epoch of his existence.

"I saw Him once," said he. "on the shore of the Sea of Galilee—I that speak to you now saw Him with my own eyes—there were little children at His feet. But we will talk of this again, for you are weary and exhausted. Meat and drink are even now prepared for you. It is good to refresh the body if the mind is to be vigorous and discerning. You have done for us to-night the act of a true friend. You will henceforth be always welcome in Eleazar's house."

While he spoke, the girl whom Esca had rescued so opportunely entered the apartment, bearing in some food on a coarse and common trencher, with a wineskin, of which she poured the contents into a jewelled cup, and presented it to her preserver with an embarrassed but very graceful gesture, and a soft shy smile.

Mariamne had unveiled; and, if Esca's expectations during their homeward walk had been raised by her gentle feminine manners, and the sweet tones of her voice, they were not now disappointed with what he saw. The dark eyes that looked up so timidly into his own, were full and lustrous as those of a deer. They had, moreover, the mournful pleading expression peculiar to that animal, and, through all their softness and intelligence, betrayed the watchful anxiety of one whose life is passed in constant vicissitudes and occasional danger. The girl's face was habitually pale, though the warm blood mantled in her cheek as she drooped beneath Esca's gaze of honest admiration, and her regular features were sharpened, a little more than was natural to them, by daily care and apprehension. This was especially apparent in the delicate aquiline of the nose, and a slight prominency of the cheek-bones. It was a face that in prosperity would have been rich and sparkling as a jewel, that in adversity preserved its charms from the rare and chastened beauty in which it was modelled. Her dress betrayed the same incongruity that was so remarkable in the furniture of her home. Like her veil it was black, and of a coarse and common material, but where it was looped up, the folds were fastened by one single gem of considerable value; and two or three links of a heavy gold chain were visible round her white and well-turned neck.

Moving through the room, busied with the arrangements of the meal which she must herself have prepared, Esca could not but observe the pliant grace of her form, enhanced by a certain modest dignity, very different from the vivacious gestures of the Roman maidens to whom he was accustomed, and especially pleasing to the eye of the Briton.

Calchas seemed to love the girl as a daughter; and his kind face grew kinder and gentler still, while he followed her about in her different movements, with eyes of the deepest and fondest affection.

Esca could not but observe that the board was laid for three persons, and that by one of the wooden platters stood a drinking-cup of great beauty and value. Mariamne's glance followed his as it rested on the spare place. "For my father," said she gently, in answer to the inquiry she read on his face. "He is later than usual to-night, and, I fear—I fear; my father is so bold, so prompt to draw steel when he is angered. To-night he has left his sword at home; and I know not whether to be most frightened or reassured at his being alone in this wicked town, unarmed."

"He is in God's hand, my child," said Calchas reverently. "But I should not fear for Eleazar," he added, with a proud and martial air. "were he surrounded by a score of such as we see prowling nightly in the streets of Rome, though they were armed to the teeth, and he with only a shepherd's staff to keep his head."

"Is he, then, so redoubtable a warrior?" asked Esca, on whom good manhood seldom failed to produce a favourable impression. While he spoke he looked from one to the other with increasing curiosity and interest.

"You shall judge for yourself," answered Calchas, "for it cannot now be long ere he return. Nevertheless, the man who could leap down from the walls of a beleaguered city, as my brother did, naked and unarmed; who could break the head off a Roman battering-ram by main force, and render that engine useless; who could reach the wall again with his prize, covered with wounds, having fought his way through a whole maniple of Roman soldiers, and could ask but for a draught of water, ere he donned his armour, and took his place once more upon the rampart, is not likely to fear aught that can befall him from a few idlers in a common street-broil. Nevertheless, as I said before, you shall judge for yourself."

"And here he is!" exclaimed Mariamne, while the outer door shut to, and a man's step was heard advancing through the adjoining apartment, with a firm and measured footfall.

She had been pale enough all night in the eyes of Esca, who was watching her intently; but he thought now she seemed to turn a shade paler than before.