Pearl-Maiden Part 43

"Why so, lord? Your money is as good as his, and perhaps you will pay more."

"I will pay to my last piece, but will that free me from the rage and hate of Domitian?"

"Why need he knew that you were the rival bidder?"

"Why? Oh! in Rome everything is known--even the truth sometimes."

"Time enough to trouble when trouble comes. First let us wait and see whether this maid be Miriam."

"Aye," he answered, "let us wait--since we must."

So they waited and with anxious eyes watched the great show roll by them. They saw the cars painted with scenes of the taking of Jerusalem and the statues of the G.o.ds fashioned in ivory and gold. They saw the purple hangings of the Babylonian broidered pictures, the wild beasts, and the ships mounted upon wheels. They saw the treasures of the temple and the images of victory, and many other things, for that pageant seemed to be endless, and still the captives and the Emperors did not come.

One sight there was also that caused Marcus to shrink as though fire had burned him, for yonder, set in the midst of a company of jugglers and buffoons that gibed and mocked at them, were the two unhappy men who had been taken prisoners by the Jews. On they tramped, their hands bound behind them, clad in full armour, but wearing a woman's distaff where the sword should have been, and round their necks the placards which proclaimed their shame. The brutal Roman mob hooted them also, that mob which ever loved spectacles of cruelty and degradation, calling them cowards. One of the men, a bull-necked, black-haired fellow, suffered it patiently, remembering that at even he must be set free to vanish where he would. The other, who was blue-eyed and finer-featured, having gentle blood in his veins, seemed to be maddened by their talk, for he glared about him, gnashing his teeth like a wild beast in a cage. Opposite to the house of Marcus came the climax.

"Cur," yelled a woman in the mob, casting a pebble that struck him on the cheek. "Cur! Coward!"

The blue-eyed man stopped, and, wheeling round, shouted in answer:

"I am no coward, I who have slain ten men with my own hand, five of them in single combat. You are the cowards who taunt me. I was overwhelmed, that is all, and afterwards in the prison I thought of my wife and children and lived on. Now I die and my blood be on you."

Behind him, drawn by eight white oxen, was the model of a ship with the crew standing on its deck. Avoiding his guard, the man ran down the line of oxen and suddenly cast himself upon the ground before the wooden-wheeled car, which pa.s.sed over his neck, crushing the life out of him.

"Well done! Well done!" shouted the crowd, rejoicing at this unexpected sight. "Well done! He was brave after all."

Then the body was carried away and the procession moved forward. But Marcus, who watched, hid his face in his hands, and Nehushta, lifting hers, uttered a prayer for the pa.s.sing soul of the victim.

Now the prisoners began to go past, marching eight by eight, hundreds upon hundreds of them, and once more the mob shouted and rejoiced over these unfortunates, whose crime was that they had fought for their country to the end. The last files pa.s.sed, then at a little distance from them, tramping forward wearily, appeared the slight figure of a girl dressed in a robe of white silk blazoned at its breast with gold.

Her bowed head, from which the curling tresses fell almost to her waist, was bared to the fierce rays of the sun, and on her naked bosom lay a necklace of great pearls.

"Pearl-Maiden, Pearl-Maiden!" shouted the crowd.

"Look!" said Nehushta, gripping the shoulder of Marcus with her hand.

He looked, and after long years once more beheld Miriam, for though he had heard her voice in the Old Tower at Jerusalem, then her face was hidden from him by the darkness. There was the maid from whom he had parted in the desert village by Jordan, the same, and yet changed.

Then she had been a lovely girl, now she was a woman on whom sorrow and suffering had left their stamp. The features were finer, the deep, patient eyes were frightened and reproachful; her beauty was such as we see in dreams, not altogether that of earth.

"Oh! my darling, my darling," murmured Nehushta, stretching out her arms towards her. "Christ be thanked, that I have found you, my darling."

Then she turned to Marcus, who was devouring Miriam with his eyes, and said in a fierce voice:

"Roman, now that you see her again, do you still love her as much as of old time?"

He took no note and she repeated the question. Then he answered:

"Why do you trouble me with such idle words. Once she was a woman to be won, now she is a spirit to be worshipped."

"Woman or spirit, or woman and spirit, beware how you deal with her, Roman," snarled Nehushta still more fiercely, "or----" and she left her hand fall upon the knife that was hidden in her robe.

"Peace, peace!" said Marcus, and as he spoke the procession came to a halt before his windows. "How weary she is, and sad," he went on speaking to himself. "Her heart seems crushed. Oh! that I must stay here and see her thus, who dare not show myself! If she could but know! If she could but know!"

Nehushta thrust him aside and took his place. Fixing her eyes upon Miriam she made some effort of the will, so fierce and concentrated that beneath the strain her body shook and quivered. See! Her thought reached the captive, for she looked up.

"Stand to one side," she whispered to Marcus, then unlatched the shutters and slowly pushed them open. Now between her and the air was nothing but the silken curtains. Very gently she parted these with her hands, for some few seconds suffering her face to be seen between them.

Then laying her fingers on her lips she drew back and they closed again.

"It is well," she said, "she knows."

"Let her see me also," said Marcus.

"Nay, she can bear no more. Look, look, she faints."

Groaning in bitterness of spirit they watched Miriam, who seemed about to fall. Now a woman gave her the cup of wine, and drinking she recovered herself.

"Note that woman," muttered Marcus, "that I may reward her."

"It is needless," answered Nehushta, "she seeks no reward."

"She is more than a Roman, she is a Christian. As she pa.s.sed it she made a sign of the cross with the cup."

The waggons creaked; the officers shouted; the procession moved forward.

From behind the curtain the pair kept their eyes fixed upon Miriam until she vanished in the dust and crowd. When she had gone they seemed to see little else; even the sight of the glorious Caesars could not hold their eyes.

Marcus summoned the steward, Stepha.n.u.s.

"Go forth," he said, "and discover when and where the captive Pearl-Maiden is to be sold. Then return to me swiftly. Be secret and silent, and let none suspect whence you come or what you seek. Your life hangs upon it. Go."

The sun was sinking fast, staining the marble temples and colonnades of the Forum blood-red with its level beams. For the most part the glorious place was deserted now, since, the Triumph over at length, the hundreds of thousands of the Roman populace, wearied out with pleasure and excitement, had gone home to spend the night in feasting. About one of the public slave-markets, however, a round of marble enclosed with a rope and set in front of a small building, where the slaves were sheltered until the moment of their sale, a mixed crowd was gathered, some of them bidders, some idlers drawn thither by curiosity. Others were in the house behind examining the wares before they came to the hammer. Presently an old woman, meanly clad with her face veiled to the eyes, and bearing on her back a heavy basket such as was used to carry fruit to market, presented herself at the door of the house.

"What do you want?" asked the gatekeeper.

"To inspect the slaves," she answered in Greek.

"Go away," he said roughly, "you are not a buyer."

"I may be if the stuff is good enough," she replied, slipping a gold coin into his hand.

"Pa.s.s in, old lady, pa.s.s in," and in another second the door had closed behind her, and Nehushta found herself among the slaves.

In this building the light was already so low that torches were burning for the convenience of visitors. By the flare of them Nehushta saw the unfortunate captives--there were but fifteen--seated upon marble benches, while slave women moved from the one to the other, washing their hands and feet and faces in scented water, brushing and tying their hair and removing the dust of the procession from their robes, so that they might look more comely to the eyes of the purchasers. Also there were present a fair number of bidders, twenty or thirty of them, who strolled from girl to girl discussing the points of each and at times asking them to stand up, or turn round, or show their arms and ankles, that they might judge of them better. At the moment when Nehushta entered one of these, a fat man with greasy curls who looked like an Eastern, was endeavouring to persuade a dark and splendid Jewess to let him see her foot. Pretending not to understand she sat still and sullen, till at length he stooped down and lifted her robe. Then in an instant the girl dealt him such a kick in the face that amidst the laughter of the spectators he rolled backwards on the floor, whence he rose with a cut and b.l.o.o.d.y forehead.

"Very good, my beauty, very good," he muttered in a savage voice, "before twelve hours are over you shall pay for that."

But again the girl sat sullen and motionless, pretending not to understand.

Most of the public, however, were gathered about Miriam, who sat upon a chair by herself, her hands folded, her head bent down, a very picture of pitiful, outraged modesty. One by one as their turns came and the attendant suffered them to approach, the men advanced and examined her closely, though Nehushta noted that none of them were allowed to touch her with their hands. Placing herself at the end of the line she watched with all her eyes and listened with all her ears. Soon she had her reward. A tall man, dressed like a merchant of Egypt, went up to Miriam and bent over her.