Читать книгу The Gladiators - George J. Whyte-Melville - Страница 9

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IT was the cool and calming hour of sunset. Esca was strolling quietly homewards after the pursuits of the day. He had emptied a wineskin with Hirpinus; and, resisting that worthy's entreaties to mark so auspicious a meeting by a debauch, had accompanied him to the gymnasium, where the Briton's magnificent strength and prowess raised him higher than ever in the opinion of the experienced athlete. Untiring as were the trained muscles of the professional, he found himself unable to cope with the barbarian in such exercises as demanded chiefly untaught physical power and length of limb. In running, leaping, and wrestling, Esca was more than a match for the gladiator. In hurling the quoit, and fencing with wooden foils, the latter's constant practice gave him the advantage, and when he fastened round his wrists and hands the leathern thong or cestus, used for the same purpose as our modern boxing-glove, and proposed a round or two of that manly exercise to conclude with, he little doubted that his own science and experience would afford him an easy victory. The result, however, was far different from his expectations. His antagonist's powers were especially adapted to this particular kind of contest; his length of limb, his quickness of eye, hand, and foot, his youthful elasticity of muscle, and his unfailing wind, rendered him an invincible combatant, and it was with something like pique that Hirpinus was compelled to confess as much to himself.

At the end of the first round he was satisfied of his mistake in underrating so formidable an opponent. Ere the second was half through, he had exhausted all the resources of his own skill without gaining the slightest advantage over his antagonist; and with the conclusion of a third, he flung away the cestus in well-feigned disgust at the heat of the weather, and proposed one more skin of wine before parting, to drink success to the profession, and speedy employment for the gladiators at the approaching games in the amphitheatre.

"Join us, man!" said Hirpinus, dropping something of the patronising air he had before affected. "Thou wert born to be a swordsman. Hippias would teach thee in a week to hold thine own against the best fencers in Rome. I myself will look to thy food, thy training, and thy private practice. Thou wouldst gain thy liberty easily, after a few victories. Think it over, man! and when thou hast decided, come to the fencing-school yonder, and ask for old Hirpinus. The steel may have a speck of rust on it, but it's tough and true still; so fare thee well, lad. I count to hear from thee again before long!"

The gladiator accordingly rolled off with more than his usual assumption of manly independence, attributable to the measure of rough Sabine wine of which he had drunk his full share, whilst the Briton walked quietly away in the direction of his home, enjoying the cool breeze that fanned his brow, and following out a train of vague and complicated reflections, originating in the advice of his late companion.

The crimson glow of a summer evening had faded into the serene beauty of a summer night. Stars were flashing out, one by one, with mellow lustre, not glimmering faintly, as in our northern climate, but hanging like silver lamps, in the infinity of the sky. The busy turmoil of the streets had subsided to a low and drowsy hum; the few chance passengers who still paced them, went softly and at leisure, as though enjoying the soothing influence of the hour. Even here, in the great city, everything seemed to breathe of peace, and contentment, and repose. Esca walked slowly on, lost in meditation.

Suddenly, the clash of cymbals and the sound of voices struck upon his ear. A wild and fitful melody, rising and falling with strange thrilling cadence, was borne upon the breeze. Even while he stopped to listen, it swelled into a full harmonious chorus, and he recognised the chant of the worshippers of Isis, returning from the unholy celebration of her rites. Soon the glare of torches heralded its approach, and the tumultuous procession wound round the corner of the street with all the strange grotesque ceremonies of their order. Clashing their cymbals, dashing their torches together till the sparks flew up in showers, tossing their bare arms aloft with frantic gestures, the smooth-faced priests, having girt their linen garments tightly round their loins, were dancing to and fro before the image of the goddess with bacchanalian energy.

Some were bareheaded, some crowned with garlands of the lotus-leaf, and some wore masks representing the heads of dogs and other animals; but all, though leaping wildly here and there, danced in the same step, all used the same mysterious gestures of which the meaning was only known to the initiated. The figure of the goddess herself was borne aloft on the shoulders of two sturdy priests, fat, oily, smooth, and sensual, with the odious look of their kind. It represented a stately woman crowned with the lotus, holding a four-barred lyre in her hand. Gold and silver tinsel was freely scattered over her flowing garments, and jewels of considerable value, the gifts of unusually fervent devotees, might be observed upon her bosom and around her neck and arms. Behind her were carried the different symbols by which her qualities were supposed to be typified; amongst these an image of the sacred cow, wrought in frosted silver with horns and hoofs of gold, showed the most conspicuous, borne aloft as it was by an acolyte in the wildest stage of inebriety, and wavering, with the uncertain movements of its bearer, over the heads of the throng. In the van moved the priests, bloated eunuchs clad in white; behind these came the sacred images carried by younger votaries, who, aspiring to the sacerdotal office, and already prepared for its functions, devoted themselves assiduously in the meantime to the orgies with which it was their custom to celebrate the worship of their deity. Maddened with wine, bare-limbed and with dishevelled locks, they danced frantically to and fro, darting at intervals from their ranks, and compelling the passengers whom they met to turn behind them, and help to swell the rear of the procession. This was formed of a motley crew. Rich and poor, old and young, the proud patrician and the squalid slave, were mingled together in turbulent confusion; it was difficult to distinguish those who formed a part of the original pageant from the idlers who had attached themselves to it, and, having caught the contagious excitement, vociferated as loudly, and leaped about as wildly, as the initiated themselves. Amongst these might be seen some of the fairest and proudest faces in Rome. Noble matrons reared in luxury, under the very busts of those illustrious ancestors who had been counsellors of kings, defenders of the commonwealth, senators of the empire, thought it no shame to be seen reeling about the public streets, unveiled and flushed with wine, in the company of the most notorious and profligate of their sex. A multitude of torches shed their glare on the upturned faces of the throng, and on one that looked, with its scornful lips and defiant brow, to have no business there.

Amongst the wildest of these revellers, Valeria's haughty head moved on, towering above the companions, with whom she seemed to have nothing in common, save a fierce determination to set modesty and propriety at defiance. Esca caught her glance as she swept by. She blushed crimson, he observed even in the torchlight, and seemed for an instant to shrink behind the portly form of a priest who marched at her side; but, immediately recovering herself, moved on with a gradually paling cheek, and a haughtier step than before.

He had little leisure, however, to observe the scornful beauty, whose charms, to tell the truth, had made no slight impression on his imagination; for a disturbance at its head, which had now passed him some distance, had stopped the progress of the whole procession, and no small confusion was the result. The torch-bearers were hurrying to the front. The silver cow had fallen and been replaced in an upright position more than once. The goddess herself had nearly shared the same fate. The sacred chant had ceased, and instead a hundred tongues were vociferating at once, some in anger, some in expostulation, some in maudlin ribaldry and mirth. "Let her go!" cried one. "Hold her fast!" shouted another. "Bring her along with you!" reasoned a drunken acolyte. "If she be worthy she will conform to the worship of the goddess. If she be unworthy she shall experience the divine wrath of Isis!" " Mind what you are about," interposed a more cautious votary. "She is a Roman maiden," said one. "She's a barbarian!" shrieked another. "A Mede!" "A Spaniard!" "A Persian!" "A Jewess! A Jewess!"

In the meantime the unfortunate cause of all this turmoil, a young girl closely veiled and dressed in black, was struggling in the arms of a large unwieldy eunuch, who had seized her as a hawk pounces on a pigeon, and despite her agonised entreaties, for the poor thing was in mortal fear, held her ruthlessly in his grasp. She had been surrounded by the lawless band, ere she was aware, as she glided quietly round the street corner, on her homeward way, had shrunk up against the wall in the desperate hope that she might remain unobserved or unmolested, and found herself, as was to be expected, an immediate object of insult to the dissolute and licentious crew. Though her dress was torn and her arms bruised from the unmanly violence to which she was subjected, with true feminine modesty she kept her veil closely drawn round her face, and resisted every effort for its removal, with a firm strength of which those slender wrists seemed hardly capable. As the eunuch grasped her with drunken violence, bending his huge body and bloated face over the shrinking figure of the girl, she could not suppress one piercing shriek for help, though, even while it left her lips, she felt how futile it must be, and how utterly hopeless was her situation. It was echoed by a hundred voices in tones of mockery and derision.

Little did Spado, for such was the eunuch's name, little did Spado think how near was the aid for which his victim called; how sudden would be the reprisals that should astonish himself with their prompt and complete redress, reminding him of what he had long forgotten, the strength of a man's blow, and the weight of a man's arm. At the first sound of the girl's voice, Esca had forced his way through the crowd to her assistance. In three strides he had come up with her assailant, and laid his heavy grasp on Spado's fat shoulder, while he bade him in low determined accents to release his prey. The eunuch smiled insolently, and replied with a brutal jest.

Valeria, interested in spite of herself, could not resist an impulse to press forward and see what was going on. Long afterwards she delighted to recall the scene she now beheld with far more of exultation and excitement than alarm. It had, indeed, especial attraction for an imagination like hers. Standing out in the red glare of the torches, like the bronze statue of some demigod starting into life, towered the tall figure of Esca, defiance in his attitude, anger on his brow, and resistless strength in the quivering outline of each sculptured limb. Within arm's length of him, the obese, ungraceful shape of Spado, with his broad fat face, expressive chiefly of gluttony and sensual enjoyment, but wearing now an ugly look of malice and apprehension. Starting back from his odious embrace to the utmost length of her outstretched arms, the veiled form of the frightened girl, her head turned from the eunuch, her hands pressed against his chest, every line of her figure denoting the extreme of horror, and aversion, and disgust. Round the three, a shifting mass of grinning faces, and tossing arms, and wild bacchanalian gestures; the whole rendered more grotesque and unnatural by the lurid, flickering light. With an unaccountable fascination Valeria watched for the result.

"Let her go!" repeated Esca, in the distinct accents with which a man speaks who is about to strike, tightening at the same time a gripe which went into the eunuch's soft flesh like iron.

Spado howled in mingled rage and fear, but released the girl nevertheless, who cowered instinctively close to her protector.

"Help!" shouted the eunuch, looking round for assistance from his comrades. "Help! I say. Will ye see the priest mishandled and the goddess reviled? Down with him! down with him, comrades, and keep him down!"

There is little doubt that had Esca's head once touched the ground it had never risen again, for the priests were crowding about him with wild yells and savage eyes, and the fierce revelry of a while ago was fast warming into a thirst for blood. Valeria thrust her way into the circle, though she never feared for the Briton—not for an instant.

It was getting dangerous, though, to remain any longer amongst this frantic crew. Esca wound one arm round the girl's waist and opposed the other shoulder to the throng. Spado, encouraged by his comrades, struck wildly at the Briton, and made a furious effort to recover his prey. Esca drew himself together like a panther about to spring, then his long sinewy arm flew out with the force and impulse of a catapult, and the eunuch, reeling backwards, fell heavily to the ground, with a gash upon his cheek like the wound inflicted by a sword.

"Euge!" exclaimed Valeria, in a thrill of admiration and delight. "Well struck, by Hercules! Ah! these barbarians have at least the free use of their limbs. Why, the priest went down like a white ox at the Mucian Gate. Is he much hurt, think ye? Will he rise again?"

The last sentence was addressed to the throng who now crowded round the prostrate Spado, and was but the result of that pity which is never quite dormant in a woman's breast. The fallen eunuch seemed indeed in no hurry to get upon his legs again. He rolled about in hideous discomfiture, and gave vent to his feelings in loud and pitiful moans and lamentations.

After such an example of the Briton's prowess, none of her other votaries seemed to think it incumbent on them to vindicate the majesty of the goddess by further interference with the maiden and her protector. Supporting and almost carrying her drooping form, Esca hurried her away with swift firm strides, pausing and looking back at intervals, as though loth to leave his work half finished, and by no means unwilling to renew the contest. The last Valeria saw of him was the turn of his noble head bending down with a courteous and protecting gesture, to console and reassure his frightened charge. All her womanly instincts revolted at that moment from the odious throng with whom she was involved. She could have found it in her heart to envy that obscure and unknown girl hurrying away yonder through the darkening streets on the arm of her powerful protector—could have wished herself a peasant or a slave, with some one being in the world to look up to, and to love.

Valeria's life had been that of a spoiled child from the day she left her cradle—that gilded cradle over which the nurses had repeated their customary Roman blessing with an emphasis that in her case seemed to be prophetic—

"May monarchs woo thee, darling! to their bed,

And roses blossom where thy footsteps tread!"

The metaphorical flowers of wealth, prosperity, and admiration, did indeed seem to spring up beneath her feet, and her stately beauty would have done no discredit to an imperial bride; but it must have been something more than outward pomp and show—something nobler than the purple and the diadem —that could have won its way to Valeria's heart.

She was habituated to the beautiful, the costly, the refined, till she had learned to consider such qualities as the mere essentials of life. It seemed to her a simple matter of course that houses should be noble, and chariots luxurious, and horses swift, and men brave. The nil admirari was the maxim of the class in which she lived; and whilst their standard was thus placed at the superlative, that which came up to it received no credit for excellence, that which fell short was treated with disapproval and contempt. Valeria's life had been one constant round of pleasure and amusement; yet she was not happy, not even contented. Day by day she felt the want of some fresh interest, some fresh excitement; and it was this craving probably, more than innate depravity, which drove her, in common with many of her companions, into such disgraceful scenes as were enacted at the worship of Juno, Isis, and the other gods and goddesses of mythology.

Lovers, it is needless to say, Valeria had won in plenty. Each new face possessed for her but the attraction of its novelty. The favourite of the hour had small cause to plume himself on his position. For the first week he interested her curiosity, for the second he pleased her fancy, after which, if he was wise, he took his leave gracefully, ere he was bidden to do so with a frankness that admitted of no misconception. Perhaps the only person in the world whom she respected was her kinsman Licinius; and this, none the less, that she possessed no kind of influence over his feelings or his opinions; that she well knew he viewed her proceedings often with disapprobation, and entertained for her character a kindly pity not far removed from contempt. Even Julius Placidus, who was the most persevering, as he was the craftiest, of her adorers, had made no impression on her heart. She appreciated his intellect, she was amused with his conversation, she approved of his deep schemes, his lavish extravagance, his unprincipled recklessness; but she never thought of him for an instant after he was out of her sight, and there was something in the cold-blooded ferocity of his character from which, even in his presence, she unconsciously recoiled. Perhaps she admired the person of Hippias, her fencing-master, a retired gladiator, who combined handsome regularity of features with a certain worn and warlike air, not without its charm, more than that of any man whom she had yet seen, and with all her pride and her cold exterior, Valeria was a woman to be captivated by the eye; but Hippias, from his professional reputation, was the darling of half the matrons in Rome, and it may be that she only followed the example of her friends, with whom, at this period of the Empire, it was considered a proof of the highest fashion, and the best taste, to be in love with a gladiator.

Strong in her passions, as in her physical organisation, the former were only bridled by an unbending pride, and an intensity of will more than masculine in its resolution. As under that smooth skin the muscles of the round white arm were firm and hard like marble, so beneath that fair and tranquil bosom there beat a heart that for good or evil could dare, endure, and defy the worst. Valeria was a woman whom none but a very bold or very ignorant suitor would have taken to his breast; yet it may be that the right man could have tamed, and made her gentle and patient as the dove. And now something seemed to tell her that the void in her heart was filled at last. Esca's manly beauty had made a strong impression on her senses; the anomaly of his position had captivated her imagination; there was something very attractive in the mystery that surrounded him; there was even a wild thrill of pleasure in the shame of loving a slave. Then, when he stood forth, the champion of that poor helpless girl, brave, handsome, and victorious, the charm was complete; and Valeria's eyes followed him as he disappeared with a longing loving look, that had never glistened in them in her life before.

The Briton hurried away with his arm round the drooping figure of his companion, and for a time forbore to speak a word even of encouragement or consolation. At first the reaction of her feelings turned her sick and faint, then a burst of weeping came to her relief; ere long the tears were flowing silently; and the girl, who indeed showed no lack of courage, had recovered herself sufficiently to look up in her protector's face, and pour out her thanks with a quiet earnestness that showed they came direct from the heart.

"I can trust you," she said, in a voice of peculiar sweetness, though her Latin, like his own, was touched with a slightly foreign accent. "I can read a brave man's face—none better. We have not far to go now. You will take me safe home?"

"I will guard you to your very door," said he, in tones of the deepest respect. "But you need fear nothing now; the drunken priests and their mysterious deity are far enough off by this time. 'Tis a noble worship, truly, for such a city as this—the mistress of the world!"

"False gods! false gods!" replied the girl, very earnestly. "Oh! how can men be so blind, so degraded?" Here she stopped suddenly, and clung closer to her companion's arm, drawing her veil tighter round her face the while. Her quick ear had caught the sound of hurrying footsteps, and she dreaded pursuit.

"'Tis nothing," said Esca, encouraging her; "the most we have to dread now is some drunken freedman or client reeling home from his patron's supper- table. They are a weakly race, these Roman citizens," he added good-humouredly; "I think I can promise to stave them off if they come not more than a dozen at a time."

The cheerful tone reassured her no less than the strong arm to which she clung. It was delightful to feel so safe after the fright she had undergone. The footsteps were indeed those of a few dissolute idlers loitering home after a debauch. They had hastened forward on espying a female figure; but there was something in the air of her protector that forbade a near approach, and they shrank to the other side of the way rather than come in contact with so powerful an opponent. The girl felt proud of her escort, and safer every minute. By this time she had guided him into a dark and narrow street, at the end of which the Tiber might be seen gleaming under the starlit sky. She stopped at a mean-looking door, let into a dead-wall, and applying her hand to a secret spring, it opened noiselessly to her touch. Then she turned to face her companion, and said frankly, "I have not thanked you half enough. Will you not enter our poor dwelling, and share with us a morsel of food and a cup of wine, ere you depart upon your way?"

Esca was neither hungry nor thirsty, yet he bowed his head, and followed her into the house.