Читать книгу The Darkness and the Dawn - Thomas B. Costain - Страница 11

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At noon each day Attila repaired to the Court of the Royal Wives. Hun women were not subjected to the strict rules of the East which confined women to the harem and turned them into closely swathed wraiths with faces hidden from alien eyes. The wives of Attila’s bowlegged warriors were free to come and go, to gossip, to stand in their doorways and toss insults at passers-by. But these rules had to be amended where the royal household was concerned. The leader of the Hun people had too many wives for that. Infidelity would soon raise its head if this large accumulation of neglected womankind were allowed to mix freely with the world. Accordingly they were kept in a town within a town, a collection of small houses behind a twelve-foot log wall. Behind this wall they were allowed every liberty accorded the wives of general or councilor or bowman.

Usually Attila donned his best attire for this pleasant daily function, a tunic of blue silk which fell to his knees and was elaborately embroidered with gold, and a three-cornered hat centered with a large ruby and an eagle’s feather. But it had been most unseasonably hot and all through his hours of toil that morning the great conqueror had worn nothing to cover his thick torso. He rose slowly to his feet and scowled at the sun.

“I am pressed for time and in any event it is too hot to dress,” he grumbled. “My little lotus blossoms will have to take me as I am.” He looked about him and called in a sharp tone: “Giso!”

His personal attendant, who had not been visible for hours, appeared instantaneously. He was fat and greasy and, even in a race noted for the flatness of its snouts, he had undisputably the ugliest of all human noses. He walked with a stiffness of gait which would have puzzled anyone who did not know that Giso had been born a slave. It was the amiable custom of the Huns to cut the sinews in the heels of their slaves to prevent them from running away.

The attendant stopped short and regarded his master with a questioning eye.

“Has the blue tunic worn out at last?”

“The blue tunic is as good as ever.” Attila was parsimonious to an extreme degree, grudging every coin which had to be spent for anything save the maintenance of his great army. The garment in question was the only one he possessed which had any pretensions to elegance. It had served on all state occasions for many years.

Giso was the only man in the Hun empire who dared to trifle with the white-hot temper of Attila. He grinned broadly. “What a pleasure this is going to be!” he said in a low tone, but one loud enough to carry to the imperial ears. “What a treat for all the little hearts fluttering so furiously behind the high wall.”

Attila eyed him with every evidence of distaste. “I sicken of your stale jokes,” he said. “Someday soon—it may be this very day—a spirit will make its way up into the clouds. The head it carries tucked under its arm will be yours.”

Giso always knew when he had gone too far. He was prompt to make his peace. “I will not care,” he said, “if it is from one of the seven hills of Rome that my spirit takes its departure. But I must see you standing there with all the world at your feet before I die.”

They turned their steps, debating bitterly as they went, to the center of the huge clutter of plain log buildings which made up the capital of Attila. Guards with drawn swords stood outside the gate of the Court of the Royal Wives and they shouted, “The Lord of the Earth, the Mighty Tanjou!” as soon as the half-naked figure of Attila appeared there. The cry could be heard repeated from all parts of the temple of femininity until the loud beating of a brass gong drowned out other sounds.

It had once been the custom for all of the wives to rush out from their small houses on his arrival, dressed in their best, and most shrill and excited in their welcome. Attila had enjoyed this kind of reception at first. He liked to pat and pinch the ones nearest him and to bandy coarse jokes with them. Gradually, however, he had lost his taste for it, finding it easier to select his wife for a day and a night without all of them clamoring for his attention. It happened that he had taken forcible possession of a Grecian city in the course of his quarrels with Constantinople some two years before and one of the prisoners was a Roman official named Genisarius. It was known to Attila, who gleaned every little bit of information which might be useful from the reports of his spies, that Genisarius had been in charge of a royal household and had kept it in ease and quiet. The apprehensive prisoner was placed accordingly in charge of the busy village of the conqueror’s wives, and with the use of systems of his own had brought peace out of chaos.

Attila was conscious that scores of bright eyes were watching him from the corners of windows and by other surreptitious methods. This pleased him and he strutted a little and puffed out his deep chest. He was not well pleased, however, when he saw that a member of his huge establishment had seen fit to disobey the order openly. In a small back yard there was a patch of red which resolved itself on closer scrutiny into the figure of one of his wives. She was leaning on the bark fence and watching him intently.

The fact that this particular wife was the possessor of a dark and lively eye and was moreover of a pleasant plumpness did nothing to diminish Attila’s displeasure. He racked his mind to recall her name and finally succeeded.

“That is Attamina, is it not?”

Giso nodded. “Attamina it is, and if you have any desire for my opinion, she is one of the best of the lot.”

“I seldom desire your opinion, and certainly not in this.”

Not daunted in the least, Giso volunteered some information about the solitary and somewhat pathetic figure in the bare yard. “You got her in one of those towns in Moesia that we sacked so thoroughly. The place had been burned and we thought everyone was dead. The officer you sent to investigate came across this one hunting through the refuse for food. Her face was black and she was nearly naked and she spat like a wolf cub when he dragged her in so you could look her over.” Giso gave his head an admiring nod. “Ah, Mighty Tanjou, what an eye you have for them! You said at once, ‘She will be worth while when she has been cleaned up. Bring her back after she has been washed and fed.’ ”

“She was worth looking at,” declared Attila, with a reminiscent twinkle.

“You have not sent for her,” said Giso, after making a mental calculation, “for more than three years.”

The good humor which had been slowly winning its way to the surface in the royal mind deserted him completely at this. “Oaf and slave!” he cried. “Is it concern of yours what I do about my wives? I will not have you spying and keeping count on me in this way!” He looked in the direction of the disobedient wife and was startled to see her raise her hand in a wave of greeting. “She has never learned to obey,” he said, in a grumble of annoyance. “Still, I must call her in again. I’ve been forgetting how diverting she used to be. She was like a wolf cub.” He frowned at Giso as an indication that his lack of tact had not been forgiven. “Go and warn her that the laws of the household are not to be broken in this way.”

Most of the houses were small, containing not more than one room, but there was one which towered above the others and had rounded pillars at each corner. This was the house of Cerca, who had been the favorite wife for some years because she was the mother of his oldest son, Ellac. There were many rooms in Cerca’s house and the furnishings were quite luxurious. She was not subject to the rules which bound the other wives. This was made evident when she came down the steps to greet him as he passed.

Cerca was no longer young. There were wide streaks of white in her hair (apparently she scorned the use of dye to which most women resorted) but she had kept herself slender. Her richly embroidered dress of scarlet and gold was in good taste. She smiled invitingly.

“I have seen little of you of late, O Great Tanjou,” she said. Her voice was pleasantly modulated.

Attila stopped. “Has it not come to your ears that I am raising the largest army the world has ever seen? That I am on the point of embarking on the greatest war in all history?”

The favorite wife smiled. “I listen eagerly to everything I can hear about your plans. But, O Mighty King, you so seldom see me when you visit us now. Sometimes you notice me and smile. Sometimes you brush past me as though I do not exist.”

“My mind is filled with many things,” muttered Attila. It was clear that he was uneasy. It was no secret to those about him that this fierce and unforgiving man was indecisive in matters which pertained to his wives. He often tried to evade the issues which the size of his household created.

The fine dark eyes of Cerca compelled him to look at her. “I must talk with you,” she said, in a tone half pleading, half insistent. “Have you forgotten the long talks we used to have? There was a time when you thought my opinion worth while and you liked to tell me about yourself. You even told me how much you hated that Roman boy Aetius, and how you became uncomfortable and silent when he was around and displaying his graces. I think perhaps, O Mighty Lord and Master, I was the only one you ever confided in to that extent.”

Attila frowned at her impatiently. “Why are you stopping me to tell me this?” he demanded.

Cerca answered in an eager tone. “I have a reason, O Great Tanjou. It is about Ellac. Our son. Your first son, O Attila. He is afraid of you. When he is with me, or with his young companions, he is gay and full of life. He has the same masterful ways as his father. But when he sits by your couch, he is silent. You will come to think of him, I am afraid, as dull and lacking in spirit. But that would be wrong. Oh, so very wrong! Ellac is a true son and copy of his father.”

“I do not understand the boy,” admitted the Hun leader.

“It may be that you have come to prefer other sons.” The face of this wife, who was still counted the favorite although Attila seldom summoned her now to his own palace, had flushed with resentment. “I hear it is being said.”

Attila had been on the point of brushing by her but at this he stopped. “What is being said?” he demanded to know. “Who is saying it? Have you been listening to those two brothers of yours?” He shook his head angrily. “They have always been dissatisfied. They both thought I should find governorships for them in the provinces. They even thought I should give them high commands in the army. They are nothing but troublemakers!”

“Attila, my lord!” cried the wife. “This has nothing to do with my family. My brothers have said nothing to me. It is a matter between you and me. I want you to pay more attention to Ellac, to find out for yourself how fine he is.” She reached out and grasped one of his arms. “This I ask of you, O Attila. Take your eldest son, take Ellac with you when you ride to this war. He is old enough. And it is his right to be with you.”

Attila paused and proceeded to give this suggestion the fullest consideration. “I am getting old,” he said, finally. “It is time my soldiers saw a son riding with me.” He nodded his head. “Yes, it is his right. He is my first son. He is the only one old enough to go.” He gave Cerca a somewhat grudging look. “There. Does that satisfy you?”

The face of the favorite wife lighted up. “It is all that I ask, O King,” she said. Then she touched his arm again, lightly, pleadingly. “Unless—O My Master, unless you can find it in your heart to take me back into your good favor again! I know it is much to ask because you have so many wives. But I love only you.”

Attila said, “Humph!” and brushed by her. The matter was settled and he wanted no more talk about it.

He made his way to a central building of considerable size and even some pretension to beauty; it had been designed by a Chinese architect. Professing to scorn all culture, the emperor had been known to say that when he reached Constantinople and Rome he would not see this structure’s equal. It had a red tiled roof and the interior was cool and aseptic with marble walls and floors.

Genisarius sat at a table, nervously fingering a pile of parchment sheets. He was a small man with a skin as dead white as a reptile’s eggs in contrast with the wiry blackness of his hair and beard. Beside him sat a plump and attractive woman whose eyes were now a faded gray and whose hair showed traces of white through the inexpertly applied dye. This was Aja, who had once been the favorite wife, many years before, and who now acted in the capacity of a household duenna. There was a third occupant of the room, a slender girl who sat in a corner with her head lowered and did not look up when he entered.

Genisarius and Aja prostrated themselves on the floor immediately, intoning, “O Great Tanjou, we are your unworthy servants.” For perhaps the only time since he had seized the reins of absolute rule this caused him annoyance.

“Get up!” he ordered, irritably. “Do you think I enjoy seeing nothing of my people but the backs of their heads and their big rumps sticking up in the air? It is not edifying.”

The woman rose promptly. “There was a time, Mighty and Unconquerable One,” she said, tartly, “when you couldn’t see enough of mine.”

Attila grinned at her audacity. This was the kind of talk he liked to have with his wives. “It was not any broader then than the spread of my two hands. And now see what you have done to yourself by so much guzzling of these rich sweets from the East and the honey tarts of the Romans.” This proof of his own wit dissolved the vapors of ill humor in the great man’s mind. “I am glad to see you, Aja, my partridge. I am glad to see you standing on your feet and looking at me with those queer eyes of yours. Not,” hastily, “that I want the custom abolished. No word of what I have just said is to go out of this room. It is because I like to relax when I am with you. You know, don’t you, my Aja, that I have always liked you?”

“Yes, O Master. Though you don’t show it often.”

“You held me longer than any of them. It was your uncanny light eyes and the sharpness of your tongue. You could always make me laugh. And you are one of my own people, the daughter of a brave soldier. Ah, if you had only given me a son!”

“I can’t give you a son now, O Master. But I can still make you laugh.”

This was a mistake on her part. Attila fell back into a defensive attitude at once. “You have had your turn,” he said. He took notice for the first time of the girl in the corner. With a frown he motioned in her direction and asked in a whisper, “Which one is that?”

“That is the girl they sent you from Tiflis. Two years ago. Her father was a wealthy Armenian merchant and a Christian. The girl is a Christian too.”

Attila nodded his head. “I recall her now. She is pretty enough but the wind would carry her away if my horsemen tried to toss her from lance to lance. And she could not speak the language. I saw her once only.” He paused and a trace of his earlier irritability returned. “What can you do with a wife who says nothing and stares at you reproachfully with large eyes like raisins in a steamed pudding?”

Aja explained the situation in a whisper, although this was an unnecessary precaution. It was clear that the girl would not understand what they were saying. “She has not picked up one word of the language since. She lives by herself, never saying a word to anyone. She has been very unhappy because the others are beginning to play tricks on her. Last night”—Aja hesitated, fearing that he would not like the information she must now convey to him—“last night she tried to kill herself. She took a knife off her plate and drove it into her side. The knife did not get very far because it struck a rib.”

Attila studied the bent figure of the girl with a puzzled frown. It was clear that he was uncertain what to do about this situation. “What tricks do the others play?” he asked.

“Well, sometimes they pretend to be Christians and they begin to sing hymns when she is with them.”

The master of the household did not seem at all pleased. “One droopy hen like this might infect the whole flock,” he said, in a grumbling tone. “And I have to confess to you, Aja, that I—I feel sorry for her. Those great dark eyes of hers keep coming back to me, now that I think of her again.” He nodded his head in sudden decision. “For the first time I am going to get rid of a wife. But, make no mistake about this, I am going to make my generosity pay me well. We shall make a deal with that rich moneylending father of hers. His daughter will be restored to him if he pays us handsomely enough. I would not be surprised if I got the cost of equipping a whole company of horsemen out of this. Begin the negotiations at once, Genisarius.”

This was the first intimation on his part that he was aware of the presence of Genisarius. The latter had been teetering nervously on his feet and dreading the moment when this would happen. Attila’s eyes seemed to pounce on several piles of papers which, he knew, were there for his attention.

“You pinfeather from a black gander!” he roared. “You have your usual lists, I see. Names, names, names! Complaints about my wives and sly hints. You will drive me mad someday.”

Genisarius said nothing but Aja went to his defense. “You have sixty wives!” she charged. “And nothing will suit you but to know everything that goes on. So, O Lord of All the World, you must have lists with names and accusations and sly hints.” She stepped closer and confronted him, hands on hips. “I have said it before to you and now I say it again. You have too many wives. Get rid of most of them. Keep no more than, say, twenty. No man needs more than twenty wives.”

“Because I am sending one of them away, you think I am ready to get along with as few as a fat thief of a goldsmith or a spindle-shanked bureau clerk?” Attila was now thoroughly angry. He glared at this wife who through all the years had remained his real favorite. “Take care or I will get rid of you. The kind things I said to you have gone to your empty head. It never pays to be kind, particularly to a wife.” His frown became blacker. “Don’t you know by this time, Aja, that I never give up anything that is mine? Not a foot of land, not an inch of shore, not a single little round gold dinar of the tribute they send me.” He turned and barked at the palpitating Genisarius. “I’ll not be bothered with you today. Take all your lists and your reports away, you ugly little mole. All I want of you now is a wife to sit beside me today and share my wine cup. What suggestion have you to offer me?”

Aja took it upon herself to answer. “There is a surprise.” She walked to an inner door and gently tapped on a gong which had been taken from the palace of a Chinese prince. The servant who came in response received whispered instructions and the onetime favorite turned back then to face Attila.

“This one, O Lord of the Earth and the Skies, came this morning. With the prisoners from the north.”

Attila asked suspiciously: “Is she young? Will she amuse me? Is her hair as yellow as the gold that this black spider,” with a contemptuous gesture in the direction of Genisarius, “steals out of the accounts?”

“You must judge for yourself.”

The girl in the corner had not moved. Her head had not been raised once. Attila motioned awkwardly in her direction. “Get that one out before the other comes,” he whispered. “And let her know, if you can find a way, that she is being sent home.”

The girl who was escorted in a few minutes later complied with all his demands. She was quite young and her eyes were blue; and it was clear they had once been accustomed to laughter even though the shadows of sadness gathered about them now. Her hair was not the dead yellow of gold but as vibrant and alive as a daffodil warmed to life under a spring sun. She wore a dress of green with slashings and gores and braidings of yellow to match her hair. It was made of the best silk from the East, for it frothed about her with every step and rustled in a way that was pleasant and exciting.

“She brought the green robe with her,” explained Aja, noting a frown on Attila’s face. But the latter had not been thinking of costs. He had frowned in bemusement over the beauty of the newcomer.

“Does she speak the language?” he asked in a whisper.

“A little. You must talk clearly and not be impatient if she is slow in finding her words.”

Nothing was farther from the great man’s intention than to display impatience. He took the little prisoner by the hand and led her to a corner of the room where he began to whisper.

“What is your name?”

“Swanhilde, O King.”

“It is a pretty name. It is worthy of you. Do you find it hard to understand me?”

“No, O King.”

“It is a good thing you speak the language, my child. We will get along well. It is hard to like a wife who does not know what you are saying and who just sits and stares at you.”

She spoke with some hesitation. “But it is only a few words I know. Not yet many.”

Her way of speaking the Hun language with its staccato and guttural qualities both pleased and amused him. There was a quaintness in her pronunciation of words which made him want to pat her pink cheeks. “I am going to like you very much,” he said. He gave her the benefit of his very best attempt at a smile. His eyes gleamed and his lips formed a perfect sickle under his small nose. “Are you afraid of me?”

“Yes,” answered the girl. “I am much frightened.”

“That is good too. A wife, if she is to be a good wife, must fear her husband.” How cool she looked! How slender and lovely! He took her face in his hands and gave it a playful shake. Then he looked up at the other occupants of the room. “I shall marry her at once. There must be no delay. You will make the arrangements, Genisarius.” The conqueror stepped back and feasted his eyes on the surprise which this day had yielded. “I am well pleased. I am so well pleased that I must think of a suitable present for my new little wife.”

But it was not to be as simple a matter as that. The bride-to-be hesitated and then she said in a low tone, so low that only the ears of the emperor could catch what she was saying, “Have you not been told that I am the daughter of Athalaric, the king of the Southern Thuringians?”

Athalaric of Thuringia! He was one of the ten who had been condemned to a quick death a bare hour before!

“O Master of the World!” pleaded the girl. “If you want me as your wife, I will gladly take the vows. I will follow your custom and hand the whip to you at the same time. I will be a good wife to you. But I understood what you said about a present for me. Please, O Attila, make my present the liberty of my father! He has been a good king, a brave king, and oh, he has been the finest and kindest of fathers. To keep him a prisoner will be a sad thing for the people he rules and a sadder thing for me. It would break my heart.”

Attila took her roughly by the arm and led her into a small adjoining room. “Remain here,” he said. Then he returned to the main apartment and confronted Aja and Genisarius.

“Why did you not tell me she is the daughter of one of the prisoners?”

“I was sure you knew,” answered Aja.

“I was not told that any members of Athalaric’s family had been brought with him.”

“She was brought because the officers who made her a prisoner were sure you would be interested in her.”

Attila’s face now showed the sense of frustration which had taken possession of him. He asked, “Does the girl know her father is to die?”

Aja shook her head. “I think she fears the worst but she has not been told of what is to take place tonight.”

The emperor spoke in a brooding tone. “The girl is beautiful. She is everything I want in a wife. I am sure I would love her more than any wife I ever had. But I cannot change this decision I have made because of—of a domestic consideration. I cannot spare Athalaric and behead the rest of them.”

“I could talk to her,” suggested Aja.

“No! That would do no good. I must talk to her myself.” He looked at the woman who had been the first of his favorite wives and to whom he had given the compensation of a little authority when he relegated her to the shelf. His expression was one of angry puzzlement. “Why does the most desirable of all women have to be the daughter of a traitor!”

“There are other beautiful women in the world,” Aja reminded him.

His manner showed increasing vehemence. “I could never want any other as much as I want this one.”

He returned to the small side room. Swanhilde had been seated but she sprang nervously to her feet when he entered. Her face was pale and her cheeks gave the impression of having grown suddenly thin through the emotional strain she was experiencing.

“My little golden flower!” said Attila. “I want you to know that already I love you very much. But this also I must tell you. Your father and nine other rulers disregarded my orders to provide me with their full share of men and supplies. What am I to do? I cannot allow this disobedience to start in other parts of my dominions. My child, all ten of them must die.”

“No, no!” The girl’s eyes became distended with terror. “You cannot mean it. Oh, Great Attila, you are saying this to frighten me. You said you liked your wives to live in fear of you.”

“I wish I could save you pain by being lenient with your father, traitor though he is. But, my poor little lotus blossom, I cannot change my mind about this. Because of personal feelings I cannot alter decisions of state.” He took her by both hands roughly and possessively. “Listen to me. You are only a child. You will outlive what seems to you a tragedy now. You may even forget in time. All men must die sooner or later, even kings and rulers, even Attila, who is the greatest of them all. Are you listening to me?” He gave her a shake. “Come, listen with the greatest care. I needed no more than one glance at you to know that you will be my real wife, the one to stand beside me and sit near my throne and share in my approaching triumphs and glories. No woman ever has had the chance I am offering you. I shall make you, my lovely Swanhilde, the queen of all the world!”

She sank to her knees before him. “I will be your slave if you will spare my father. My good, my generous, my kind and loving father! If you kill him, I shall perish of grief. If someone must die, let me die in his place. Would it not be as much of a lesson to other rulers who perhaps have daughters too?”

He shook his head. “I cannot change what has been decided.”

“Then let me die with him!” The girl was weeping hysterically now and clinging fiercely to his hands. “If my father cannot live, I will not want to live. O Great Attila, believe me when I say he was loyal to you but that he thought also of the welfare of his own people. Promise me this much: that you will give more thought to it.”

Attila was not accustomed to debating his intentions at such length as this. “Give thought to it yourself,” he declared, in a brusque voice. “I have known you a few minutes only but I have offered you a share in the kingdoms of the earth. I am accustomed to giving orders and not to explaining them, and I have no more to say than this: if you refuse my offer for a sentimental reason, you are not the woman I want beside me.”