A Struggle For Rome Volume Ii Part 39

Never even when he had wooed her, had he spoken with such pa.s.sion as now, when he was asked to leave her. Overpowered, she sank upon his breast.

"Thanks, thanks, O G.o.d, for this hour of pain," she whispered. "Yes, now I know that thy heart and soul are mine for ever!"

"And will remain thine," said Teja in a low tone, "even if another is called his Queen. She would only share his crown, never his heart!"

These words penetrated Rauthgundis's soul. She looked at Teja, moved by his words, with wide eyes.

Hildebrand saw it, and now considered how he should strike his final blow.

"Who would, who could, tamper with your hearts!" he said. "A shadow without fortune or strength! That thou wilt only become if thou refusest to listen to my words, or break thy sacred, solemn oath. For a _perjurer_ is more hollow than a shadow!"

"His oath?" asked Rauthgundis hastily. "What hast thou sworn?"

But Witichis sank down upon his seat and buried his face in his hands.

"What has he sworn?" repeated Rauthgundis.

Then Hildebrand, aiming every word at the hearts of the husband and wife, spoke:

"A few years ago a man concluded a mighty bond with four friends at the midnight hour. The sod was raised under a sacred oak, and they swore by the ancient earth and welling water, by the flickering flame and ethereal air. They mixed their living blood and swore a solemn oath; to sacrifice all that they possessed, son and kindred, life, weapons and wives and glory, to the welfare of the Goths! And if any one of them should refuse to keep the oath, when reminded by a brother in time of necessity, his red blood should run unavenged, like the water under the wood-sod. Upon his head heaven should fall and crush him, and he should be for ever subject to all the dark powers under the earth. His soul should be condemned to eternal torture; good men should trample over his grave, and his memory be dishonoured and covered with curses wherever Christians ring bells or heathens offer sacrifices; wherever the wind blows over the wide world, and mothers caress their children.

This oath was sworn by five men: by Hildebrand and Hildebad, by Teja and Totila. But who was the fifth? Witichis, son of Waltaris."

And he suddenly drew back Witichis's left-hand sleeve.

"Look here, Rauthgundis, the scar has not yet vanished. But the oath has vanished from his soul. Thus he swore before he was made King. And when the thousands of Goths, on the field of Regeta, lifted him on the shield, he swore a second oath: 'My life, my happiness, all that I have, do I dedicate to you, the people of the Goths. I swear it by the G.o.d of heaven and by my faith.' Well, Witichis, son of Waltaris, King of the Goths, I now remind thee of that double oath. I ask thee whether thou wilt sacrifice, as thou hast sworn to do, thy wife and thy happiness to the people of the Goths? See, I too have lost three sons for this people, and, without shrinking, I have sacrificed and condemned my grandchild, the last scion of my race. Speak, wilt thou do the like? Wilt thou keep thine oath? or wilt thou break it and live accursed? cursed by the living and cursed amongst the dead?"

Witichis was convulsed with pain at the words of the old man.

Then Rauthgundis rose. She laid her left hand on her husband's breast, and stretched forth her right as if to protect him from Hildebrand.

"Cease," she said, "leave, him alone. It is enough! He will do what thou desirest. He will not dishonour and perjure himself for the sake of his wife."

But Witichis sprang up, and held her fast in both his arms as if they were about to tear her from him at once.

"Now go," she said to the two men; "leave me alone with him."

Teja turned to go; Hildebrand hesitated.

"Go, go!" she cried, laying her hand upon the marble urn; "I swear to thee by the ashes of my child, that at sunrise he shall be free!"

"No," cried Witichis, "I will not put away my wife! never!"

"Thou shalt not. It is not thou who sendest me away--I turn away from thee. Rauthgundis goes to save her people and her husband's honour.

Thou canst never tear away thy heart from me; I know that mine it will remain, now more than ever! Go, Hildebrand and Teja, what we two have now to go through, will admit of no witness."

The two men silently left the place; silently they went together down the lane of tents; at the corner the old man stopped.

"Good-night, Teja," he said; "it is now done!"

"Yes; who knows if well done? A n.o.ble, n.o.ble sacrifice! Many more will follow, and, meseems there, in the stars, it stands written--in vain!

But for honour then, if not for victory! Farewell."

He drew his dark mantle closely round his shoulders, and disappeared like a shadow into the night.

CHAPTER XVII.

The next morning, before c.o.c.kcrow, a veiled woman rode out of the camp.

A man in a brown war-mantle walked beside her, holding her horse's bridle, and ever and again looking into her veiled face.

At an arrow's length behind them rode a servant, with a bundle at his back, where hung a heavy club.

They went on their way for some time in silence.

At last they reached a woody eminence; behind them lay the broad plain where stood the Gothic camp and the city of Ravenna; before them, to the north-west, the road which led to the Via aemilia.

The woman checked her horse.

"The sun is just rising. I have sworn that it shall find thee free.

Farewell, my Witichis!"

"Hurry not so away from me," he said, pressing her hand.

"I must keep my word if my heart breaks! It must be!"

"Thou goest more easily than I remain!"

She smiled painfully.

"I leave my life behind me; thou hast yet a life before thee."

"And what a life!"

"The life of a King for his people, as thine oath demands."

"Fatal oath!"

"It was right to swear it; it is a duty to keep it. And thou wilt think of me in the gilded halls of Rome, as I of thee in my hut, deep in the ravine. Thou wilt not forget thy wife, nor the ten years of our faith and love, nor our sweet boy."

"Oh, my wife, my wife!" cried the tortured man, pressing his face against the saddle-bow, and putting both arms around her.

She bent over him and laid her hand upon his head.

Meanwhile Wachis had overtaken them; he looked at the group for a short time, and then he could bear it no longer.

He pulled his master gently by the mantle.

"Master, listen; I can give you good advice. Do you not hear me?"