Nicanor - Teller of Tales Part 8

There came to him, slowly, a memory, vague and confused, of a weary wandering through endless night, torn by temptation and desire, raging with defiance of the consequences of his rashness, consumed by fever that ran through his veins like fire and dried the very heart within him. What had become of Varia? Of Marcus? How much had been found out?

Sudden blind fury at his impotence in the face of supreme and arrogant power possessed him. The brazen collar about his throat burned like a band of fire. He raised his hands to it, and let them drop. What could he do--a slave? After all, what did it matter? Nothing mattered then, save Varia. He lay devising ways and means of seeing her again, since this he was bound to do, though G.o.ds and men might say him nay. The voices at the table droned on, as from a great distance, and Nicanor lay and listened. They spoke of some woman. No name was mentioned, but the description of her, as it fell from the old man's maudlin lips, sent his heart pounding. So might be described another woman, who for him held life and death and all that lay between. The voice of Valerius at his ear made him start.

"Awake, lad? Art better? So, then; it's time to start."

Nicanor got out of the bunk. Once on his legs, he discovered that he was by no means steady. The three at the table ceased talking as he rose, more from prudence than curiosity, it seemed. The soldier glanced at him, with keen eyes, indifferent at first, lighting to faint professional interest, that noted every point of bearing and physique; the lean flanks, swelling upward to muscular torso and the shoulders of a chariot-racer; the knotted muscle of forearm and back; finally rested on the broad collar circling the brown ma.s.sive throat.

"That fellow would look well in the ranks," he observed casually. His father glanced at Nicanor as one might at a dog whose good points were under discussion, and nodded. Marius added, continuing what had gone before:

"You can't kill a man with hard work if you know how to handle him. I tell Fabian that these brushes with barbarians at least serve the purpose of keeping the men in condition."

His father sighed.

"Always thou wert a hard taskmaster, Marius," he said gently. "It may be that thou drivest the men farther than thou knowest. Men are not brute beasts, that they must be goaded even to the breaking-point."

"Most men are, my father," Marius returned. "Most men will do what they are made to do, no more. As for driving them to breaking-point, I think you need not fear for that. Men need a lot of killing."

He fell into silence, staring into the amber depths of his cup of wine.

His father glanced at him, sighed once more, and turned away. Nicodemus and Myleia hurried in to prepare fresh beds for their lordly guests.

Valerius and Nicanor went out into the night.

The keen air struck Nicanor like a dash of cold water. He drew a deep and grateful breath of it, and felt revived.

"How long have I been from the house?" he asked, with intent to fill in the blank s.p.a.ces of his memory.

"It is the second night," Valerius answered. "When you asked Hito for leave, he gave command that you return last night."

"When I asked Hito--" Nicanor repeated. He had no recollection of having asked the overseer for anything.

"You did not come, so, being angry, he directed me to search for you and bring you back for a flogging. What more was in store, he did not say."

Nicanor shot a glance of swift suspicion at him through the darkness.

"What more should there be?" he demanded.

"Why, how can I tell?" Valerius parried. "Imprisonment, maybe, for a day or so.... Though, in truth, as the offence is repeated by some one or other every day, he can have no excuse for--"

"Well?" Nicanor said impatiently, as Valerius paused.

"Treating you as he would like to do," the latter added soberly. "Hito hates you, my friend."

Nicanor shrugged his shoulders. This tale of an overseer's feelings was not what he had feared.

"Oh, that!" he exclaimed, and snapped his fingers. "If that were all I had to think about.... Valerius, tell me this. Each time I have seen you I have wished to ask. How comes it that you are in the service of the Torturer?"

"I got tired of the church," Valerius answered simply. "The good fathers were very good, but me they singled out as the black sheep of all the fold, and it was more than could be endured. 'What religion have you?'

says Father Ambrose. 'None at all,' says I, 'and want none.' So he nearly wept, and told the others, and they agreed that I was fit food for the fires of h.e.l.l. So they gave me their blessing, and told me Holy Church was better off without me, and there were no more sandals to be repaired. Then I fell in with Hito, and he took me into the service of our lord. How hath it been with you?"

Nicanor told of the manner of his capture, and Valerius laughed.

"Clever!" he chuckled. "But tell me truth, lad. Is not this a long sight better than the work-room of that fish-faced brother Tobias? Are we not hand in glove with the great ones of the earth? Do we not know them, in all their parts, far better than those of their own world could ever do, since we serve them?"

"Ay," said Nicanor. "That is so. And yet, after all--when I was in the workshop, if the bone cut straight, and if there was what I liked for supper, I was happy, and wanted nothing more. Now--"

"Now," said Valerius, dropping into his old familiar tone, with an arm thrust through Nicanor's--"now thou hast found that there are many other things in life which a man may want. Is it not so?"

"Ay," Nicanor said again. "That is so also."

V

In the slaves' quarters, next morning, Nicanor took his flogging without a change of face, while Hito, the fat overseer, looked on and grinned in evil glee. But Nicanor had so much worse than flogging hanging over him that he scarcely felt the blows, and merely grinned back at Hito, with insolent bravado, until the latter was cursing with rage. Then, being set to grind sand for the floors of the kitchens, he made an opportunity to seek out Marcus. But Marcus was nowhere to be found. Nicanor questioned, cautiously; no one had seen him. Apparently, no one cared what had become of him. He might have been rotting in sewer or drain-hole for all his fellow-slaves seemed concerned. To save his life Nicanor could not have told just why he wished to find the old man, since the farther he and Marcus were apart, the better it would be for both.

Foiled in his search, he went back to work again. Many times before his labor was ended, he pa.s.sed the closed door of the garden where Varia dwelt; and each time his heart beat hard and his face flushed and his brown hands trembled. To know her so near, and not to see her; to be conscious of her in every throbbing pulse, and not to seek her; not to know whether she was safe and unharmed, or whether blame for his rashness had fallen, through her father's wrath, on her--

"Last night I could have gone to her had I not chosen to make myself a drunken swine," he said, and caught himself up in fear lest he had spoken the words aloud. "Did she look for me--wait for me?--for I'll warrant she has not forgotten. But to-night--to-night--"

He caught his breath, his eyes lighting.

"I'll make her confess she loves me! I'll have the words from her own lips--words, ay, and kisses also! Ah, lord, n.o.ble lord, mighty lord!

what wouldst say to know that for the lifting of a slave's finger thou standest to lose what all thy gold could never buy thee back?" His pa.s.sion died before it had fairly gathered force. He stood an instant, motionless and shaken, drew a hand across his eyes, and returned to his labor.

All that day Hito worked him mercilessly, in a mean and entirely comprehensible spirit of revenge, until, being not fully recovered from his drinking-bout, his brain was reeling and he could scarcely keep his legs. At sunset he took his share of the rations dealt out nightly to the slaves, but although he was faint from emptiness the sight of the food turned him sick. He went to the cell where he, with others, slept, and dropped like a log, exhausted in mind and body. Here he lay until Hito's whistle summoned the household slaves for emergency service. Not to obey meant punishment, but in his present state Nicanor cared little for that. He lay listening to the sound of hasty feet and voices as slaves pa.s.sed to and fro across the courtyard to the house, expecting momently to be called to account for his delinquency. But no one came to him, and by and by he slept.

Waking, he found the world dark and peopled with restless, moving shadows. There was still much hurrying here and there, and from the kitchens came strident sounds of nervous activity. Thither Nicanor started, across the unlighted court, stopping on the way for a cup of water at the well. As he put down the dipper and turned to go, he ran into some one bound in the same direction, who staggered under the shock with an exclamation, and dropped a dish, which crashed into fragments on the ground. At the same instant Nicanor caught her by the shoulder and steadied her; in the darkness he could not see her face.

"It is broken!" she exclaimed. "I must go quickly and get another."

"It was my fault," said Nicanor. "I will go."

"There is no need," the woman answered.

She started back, Nicanor keeping perversely beside her.

"What is happening?" he wished to know. "Is there a feast made in the house to-night?" He could feel that she was looking at him in surprise.

"You do not know? Two strangers came to-day, with news of importance, men say, for our lord. There be strange things told: they urge that our lord will go back with them to Rome. The old man was indisposed when he arrived; his servant tells that he is not over strong."

She hurried off, and Nicanor stood still, repeating stupidly her words.

"Our lord will go back with them to Rome. Then she will go with him. But that is not possible. His home is here--why should he leave it?" At once he was filled with feverish anxiety to find out what truth there might be in the gossip.

He invented an errand which would take him within the house, to see if by chance Lady Varia might be among the feasters. Since she was kept in strictest seclusion by Eudemius, he was quite sure of not finding her, but his mood of perversity still held. On the way he met a Saxon slave, Wardo, a fair-haired, blue-eyed fellow, hurrying toward the atrium with a pierced copper bowl packed with snow for cooling wines. Him Nicanor stopped with a question.

"Hast seen these strangers, Wardo? Whence come they, and who have been bidden to meet them?"

"They and our lord sup alone," Wardo answered. He shifted his bowl from hand to hand, and blew on his fingers as though it burned instead of freezing him. "The dancing girls have been commanded, and wine is to be brought. Much hath been brought already. And Nicanor, hark 'ee! Egon, who pours the wines, saith that the talk is strange talk for feasting.

They urge that our lord go back with them to Rome--wherefore, think you?

They speak of Rome, and Londinium, and the legions from Gaul, and of losses of ships and money, until one's head rings. What might it be about? Think you that we go to Rome? I should like to go to Rome, if it be anything like Londinium--"