The Emperor — Complete

CHAPTER XXI.

The unchained elements had raged that night with equal fury over the Nile city of Besa. The citizens of this ancient town had done all they could to give the Imperial traveller a worthy reception. The chief streets had been decked with ropes of flowers strung from mast to mast and from house to house, and by the harbor, close to the river shore, statues of Hadrian and his wife had been erected. But the storm tore down the masts and the garlands, and the lashed waters of the Nile had beaten with irresistible fury on the bank; had carried away piece after piece of the fertile shore, flung its waves, like liquid wedges into the rifts of the parched land; and excavated the high bank by the landing-quay.

After midnight the storm was still raging with unheard-of fury; it swept the palm thatch from many of the houses, and beat the stream with such violence that it was like a surging sea. The full unbroken force of the flood beat again and again on the promontory on which stood the statues of the Imperial couple. Shortly before the first dawn of light the little tongue of land, which was protected by no river wall, could no longer resist the furious attack of the waters; huge clods of soil slipped and fell with a loud noise into the river and were followed by a large mass of the cliff, with a roar as of thunder the plateau behind sank, and the statue of the Emperor which stood upon it began to totter and lean slowly to its fall. When day broke it was lying with the pedestal still above ground, but the head was buried in the earth.

At break of day the citizens left their houses to inquire of the fishermen and boatmen what had occurred in the harbor during the night. As soon as the storm had abated, hundreds, nay thousands, of men, women and children thronged the landing-place round the fallen statue—they saw the land-slip and knew that the current had torn the land from the bank and caused the mischief. Was it that Hapi, the Nile-god, was angry with the Emperor? At any rate the disaster that had befallen the image of the sovereign boded evil, that was clear.

The Toparch, the chief municipal authority, at once set to work to reinstate the statue which was itself uninjured, for Hadrian might arrive in a few hours. Numerous men, both free and slaves, crowded to undertake the work, and before long the statue of Hadrian, executed in the Egyptian style, once more stood upright and gazing with a fixed countenance towards the harbor. Sabina’s was also put back by the side of her husband’s and the Toparch went home satisfied. With him most of the starers and laborers left the quay, but their place was taken by other curious folks who had missed the statue from its place, where the land had fallen, and now expressed their opinions as to the mode and manner of its fall.

“The wind can never have overturned this heavy mass of limestone,” said a ropemaker: “And see how far it stands from the broken ground.”

“They say it fell on the top of land-slip,” answered a baker.

“That is how it was,” said a sailor.

“Nonsense!” cried the ropemaker. “If the statue had stood on the ground now carried away, it must have fallen at once into the water and have sunk to the bottom—any child can see that other powers have been at work here.”

“Very likely,” said a temple-servant who devoted himself to the interpretation of signs: “The gods may have overset the proud image to give a warning token to Hadrian.”

“The immortals do not mix in the affairs of men in our day,” said the sailor; “but in such a fearful night as this peaceful citizens remain within doors and so leave a fair field for Caesar’s foes.”

“We are all faithful subjects,” said the baker indignantly.

“You are a pack of rebellious rabble,” retorted a Roman soldier, who like the whole cohort quartered in the province of Hermopolis, had formerly served in Judaea under the cruel Tinnius Rufus. “Among you worshippers of beasts squabbles never cease, and as to the Christians, who have made their nests out there on the other side of the valley, say the worst you can of them and still you would be flattering them.”

“Brave Fuscus is quite right!” cried a beggar. “The wretches have brought the plague into our houses; wherever the disease shows itself there are Christian men and women to be seen. They came to my brother’s house; they sat all night by his sick children and of course both died.”

“If only my old governor Tinnius Rufus were here,” growled the soldier, “they would none of them be any better off than their own crucified god.”

“Well, I certainly have nothing in common with them,” replied the baker. “But what is true must continue true. They are quiet, kind folks and punctual in payment, who do no harm and show kindness to many poor creatures.”

“Kindness?” cried the beggar, who had received alms himself from the deacon of the church at Besa, but had also been exhorted to work. “All the five priests of Sekket of the grotto of Artemis have been led away by them and have basely abandoned the sanctuary of the goddess. And is it good and kind that they should have poisoned my brother’s children with their potions?”

“Why should they not have killed the children?” asked the soldier. “I heard of the same things in Syria; and as to this statue, I will never wear my sword again—”

“Hark! listen to the bold Fuscus,” cried the crowd. “He has seen much.”

“I will never wear my sword again if they did not knock over the statue in the dark.”

“No, no,” cried the sailor positively. “It fell with the land that was washed away; I saw it lying there myself.”

“And are you a Christian, too?” asked the soldier, “or do you suppose that I was in jest when I swore by my sword? I have served in Bithynia, in Syria, and in Judaea. I know these villains, good people. There were hundreds of Christians to be seen there who would throw away life like a worn-out shoe because they did not choose to sacrifice to the statues of Caesar and the gods.”

“There, you hear!” cried the beggar. “And did you see a single man of them among the citizens who set to work to restore the statue to its place?”

“There were none of them there,” said the sailor, who was beginning to share the soldier’s views.

“The Christians threw down the Emperor’s statue,” the beggar shouted to the crowd. “It is proved, and they shall suffer for it. Every man who is a friend of the divine Hadrian come with me now and have them out of their houses.”

“No uproar!” interrupted the soldier to the furious man. “There is the tribune, he will hear you.”

The Roman officer, who now came past with a troop of soldiers to receive the Emperor outside the city, was greeted by the crowd with loud shouting. He commanded silence and made the soldier tell him what had so violently excited the people.

“Very possibly,” said the tribune, a sinewy and stern-looking man, who, like Fuscus, had served under Tinnius Rufus, and had risen from a sutler to be an officer, “Very possibly—but where are your proofs?”

“Most of the citizens helped in reerecting the statue, but the Christians held aloof from the work,” cried the beggar. “There was not one to be seen. Ask the sailor, my lord; he was by and he can bear witness to it.”

“That certainly is more than suspicious. This matter must be strictly inquired into. Pay heed, you people.”

“Here comes a Christian girl!” cried the sailor.

“Lame Martha; I know her well,” interrupted the beggar. “She goes into all the plague-stricken houses and poisons the people. She stayed three days and three nights at my brother’s turning the children’s pillows till they were carried out. Wherever she goes death follows.”

Selene, now known as Martha, paid no heed to the crowd, but with her blind brother Helios, now called John, went calmly on her way which led from the raised bank down to the landing-quay. There she wished to hire a boat to take her across the stream, for in a village on the island over against the town dwelt some sick Christians to whom she was carrying medicines and whom she was intending to watch. For months past her whole life had been devoted to the suffering. She had carried help even into heathen homes, and shrunk from neither fever nor plague. Her cheeks had gained no color, but her eyes shone with a gentler and purer light which glorified the severe beauty of her features. As the girl approached the captain he fixed his eyes on her, and called out:

“Hey! pale-face—are you a Christian?”

“Yes, my lord,” replied Selene, and she went on quietly and indifferently with her brother.

The Roman looked after her, and as she passed by Hadrian’s statue, and, as she did so, dropped her head rather lower than before, he roughly ordered her to stop and to tell him why she had averted her face from the statue of Caesar.

“Hadrian is our ruler as well as yours,” answered the young girl. “I am in haste for there are sick people on the island.”

“You will bring them no good!” cried the beggar. “Who knows what is hidden there in the basket?”

“Silence!” interrupted the tribune. “They say, girl that your fellow-believers overthrew the statue of Caesar in the night.”

“How should that be? We honor Caesar no less than you do.”

“I will believe you, and you shall prove it. There stands the statue of the divine Caesar. Come with me and worship it.” Selene looked with horror in the face of the stern man, and could not find a word of reply.

“Well!” asked the captain, “will you come? Yes or no?”

Selene struggled for self-possession, and when the soldier held out his hand to her she said with a trembling voice:

“We honor the Emperor but we pray to no statue—only to our Father in Heaven.”

“There you have it!” laughed the beggar.

“Once more I ask you,” cried the tribune. “Will you worship this statue, or do you refuse to do so?”

A fearful struggle possessed Selene’s soul. If she resisted the Roman her life was in danger, and the fury of the populace would be aroused against her fellow-believers—if, on the other hand, she obeyed him, she would be blaspheming God, breaking her faith to the Saviour who loved her, sinning against the truth and her own conscience. A fearful dread fell upon her, and deprived her of the power to lift her soul in prayer. She could not, she dared not, do what was required of her, and yet the overweening love of life which exists in every mortal led her feet to the base of the idol and there stayed her steps.

“Lift up your hands and worship the divine Caesar,” cried the tribune, who with the rest of the lookers-on had watched her movements with keen excitement.

Trembling, she set her basket on the ground and tried to withdraw her hand from her brother’s; but the blind boy held it fast. He fully understood what was required of his sister, he knew full well, from the history of many martyrs that had been told him, what fate awaited her and him if they resisted the Roman’s demand; but he felt no fear and whispered to her:

“We will not obey his desires Martha; we will not pray to idols, we will cling faithfully to the Redeemer. Turn me away from the image, and I will say ‘Our Father.’”

With a loud voice and his lustreless eyes upraised to Heaven, the boy said the Lord’s prayer. Selene had first set his face towards the river, and then she herself turned her back on the statue; then, lifting her hands, she followed the child’s example.

Helios clung to her closely, her loudly uttered prayer was one with his, and neither of them saw or heard anything more of what befell them.

The blind boy had a vision of a distant but glorious light, the maiden of a blissful life made beautiful by love, as she was flung to the ground in front of the statue of Hadrian, and the excited mob rushed upon her and her faithful little brother. The military tribune tried in vain to hold back the populace, and by the time the soldiers had succeeded in driving the excited mob away from their victims, both the young hearts, in the midst of the triumph of their faith, in the midst of their hopes of an eternal and blissful life, had ceased to beat for ever.

The occurrence disturbed the captain and made him very uneasy. This girl, this beautiful boy, who lay before him pale corpses, had been worthy of a better fate, and he might be made to answer for them; for the law forbade that any Christian should be punished for his faith without a judge’s sentence. He therefore commanded that the dead should be carried at once to the house to which they belonged, and threatened every one, who should that day set foot in the Christian quarter, with the severest punishment.

The beggar went off, shrieking and shouting, to his brother’s house to tell the mistress that lame Martha, who had nursed her daughter to death, was slain; but he gained an evil reward, for the poor woman bewailed Selene as if she had been her own child, and cursed him and her murderers.

Before sundown Hadrian arrived at Besa, where he found magnificent tents pitched to receive him and his escort. The disaster that had befallen his statue was kept a secret from him, but he felt anxious and ill. He wished to be perfectly alone, and desired Antinous to go to see the city before it should be dark. The Bithynian joyfully embraced this permission as a gift of the gods; he hurried through the decorated high streets, and made a boy guide him from thence into the Christian quarter. Here the streets were like a city of the dead; not a door was open, not a man to be seen.

Antinous paid the lad, sent him away, and with a beating heart went from one house to another. Each looked neat and clean, and was surrounded by trees and shrubs, but though the smoke curled up from several of the roofs every house seemed to have been deserted. At last he heard the sound of voices. Guided by these he went through a lane to an open place where hundreds of people, men, women and children, were assembled in front of a small building which stood in the midst of a palm grove.

He asked where dame Hannah lived, and an old man silently pointed to the little house on which the attention of the Christians seemed to be concentrated. The lad’s heart throbbed wildly and yet he felt anxious and embarrassed, and he asked himself whether he had not better turn back and return next morning when he might hope to find Selene alone.

But no! Perhaps he might even now be allowed to see her.

He modestly made his way through the throng, which had set up a song in which he could not determine whether it was intended to express feelings of sadness or of triumph. Now he was standing at the gate of the garden and saw Mary the deformed girl. She was kneeling by a covered bier and weeping bitterly. Was dame Hannah dead? No, she was alive, for at this moment she came out of her house, leaning on an old man, pale, calm and tearless. Both came forward, the old man uttered a short prayer and then stooping down, lifted the sheet which covered the dead.

Antinous pushed a step forward but instantly drew two steps back—then covering his eyes with his hand he stood as if rooted to the spot.

There was no vehement lamentation. The old man began a discourse. All around were sounds of suppressed weeping, singing and praying but Antinous saw and heard nothing. He had dropped his hand and never took his eyes off the white face of the dead till Hannah once more covered it with the sheet. Even then he did not stir.

It was not till six young girls lifted Selene’s modest bier and four matrons took up that of little Helios on their shoulders and the whole assembly moved away after them, that he too turned and followed the mourning procession. He looked on from a distance while the larger and the smaller coffins were carried into a rocktomb, while the entrance was carefully closed, and the procession dispersed some here and some there.

At last he found himself alone and in front of the door of the vault. The sun went down, and darkness spread rapidly over hill and vale. When no one was to be seen who could observe him, he threw up his arms, clasped the pillar at the entrance of the tomb, pressed his lips against the rough wooden door and struck his forehead against it while his whole body trembled with the tearless anguish of his spirit.

For some minutes he stood so and did not hear a light step which came up behind him. It was Mary, who had come once more to pray by the grave of her beloved friend. She at once recognized the youth and softly called him by his name.

“Mary,” he answered, clasping her hand eagerly. “How did she die?”

“Slain,” she said, sadly. “She would not worship Caesar’s image.”

Antinous shuddered at the words, and asked, “And why would she not?”

“Because she was faithful to our belief, and so hoped for the mercy of the Saviour. Now she is a blessed angel.”

“Are you sure of that?”

“As sure as I live in hope of meeting the martyr who rests here, again in Heaven!”

“Mary.”

“Leave go of my hand!”

“Will you do me a service, Mary?”

“Willingly, Antinous—but pray do not touch me.”

“Take this money and buy the loveliest wreath that is to be had here. Hang it on this tomb, and say as you do so—call out—, From Antinous to Selene.’”

The deformed girl took the money he gave her and said:

“She often prayed for you.”

“To her God?”

“To our Redeemer, that he might give you also joy. She died for Christ Jesus; now she is with him, and he will grant her prayers.”

Antinous was silent for a while, then he said:

“Once more give me your hand, Mary, and now farewell. Will you sometimes think of me, and pray for me too, to your Redeemer?”

“Yes, yes, and you will not quite forget me, the poor cripple?”

“Certainly not, you good, kind girl! Perhaps we may some day meet again.” With these words Antinous hurried down the hill and through the town to the Nile.

The moon had risen and was mirrored in the rough water. Just so had its image played upon the waves when Antinous had rescued Selene from the sea. The lad knew that Hadrian would be expecting him, still he did not seek his tent. A violent emotion had overpowered him; he restlessly paced up and down the river-bank rapidly reviewing in his memory the more prominent incidents of his past life. He seemed to hear again every word of the dialogue that had taken place yesterday between Hadrian and himself. Before his inward eye he saw once more his humble home in Bithynia, his mother, his brothers and sisters whom he should never see again. Once more he lived through the dreadful hour when he had deceived his beloved master and had been an incendiary. An overmastering dread fell upon him as he thought of Hadrian’s wish to put him in the place of the man whom the prudent sovereign had chosen as his successor—a choice that was perhaps the direct outcome of his own crime. He, Antinous, who to-day could not think of the morrow, who always kept out of the way of the discourse of grave men because he found it so hard to follow their meaning, he who knew nothing but how to obey, he who was never happy but alone with his master and his dreaming, far from the bustle of the world—he, to be burdened with the purple, with anxiety, with a mountain-load of responsibility!

No, no; the idea was unheard-of—impossible! And yet Hadrian never gave up a wish he had once expressed in words. The future loomed before his soul like some overpowering foe. Suffering, unrest, and misfortune stared him in the face, turn which way he would.

What was the hideous fatality that threatened his sovereign? It was approaching, it must come if no one—aye, if no one should be found to stand between him and the impending blow, and to receive in his own breast—in his own heart, bared to receive the wound—the spear hurled by the vengeful god. And he—he, and he alone was the one who might do this.

The thought flashed into his mind like a sudden blaze of light; and if he should find the courage to devote himself to death for his dear master all his sins against him would be expiated; then—then—oh, how lovely a thought!—then might he not find entrance into the gates of that realm of bliss which Selene’s prayers had opened to him? There he would see his mother again and his father, and by and bye his brothers and sisters—but now, at once in a few minutes Her whom he loved and who had trodden the ways of death before him.

An exquisite sense of hope such as he had never felt before flooded his soul. There lay the Nile—here was a boat. He gave it a strong push into the stream and with a powerful leap, as when hunting he had often sprung from rock to rock, he jumped into the boat. He had just seized an oar when Mastor, who had been desired by the Emperor to seek him, recognized him in the moonlight and desired him to return with him to the tents.

But Antinous did not obey. As he pushed out into the stream he called out:

“Greet my Lord from me—greet him lovingly, a thousand times, and tell him Antinous loved him more than his life. Fate demands a victim. The world cannot dispense with Hadrian, but Antinous is a mere nonentity, whom none will miss but Caesar, and for him Antinous flings himself into the jaws of death.”

“Stay-stop! hapless boy, come back!” shouted the slave, and leaping into a boat he followed that of the Bithynian, which, impelled by strong and steady strokes, flew away into the current.

Mastor rowed with all his might, but he could not gain upon the boat he was pursuing. Thus in a wild race both reached the middle of the stream. There, the slave saw Antinous fling away his oar, and an instant later he heard Antinous call loudly on the name of Selene, and then, in helpless inactivity, he saw the lad glide into the waters, and the Nile swallowed in its flood the noblest and fairest of victims.