IX.
THE BAIT.
Marcia crouched, huddled in the farthest corner of the cell, andlistened to the receding footsteps of the visitors. Then she heard newsounds echoing through the house: the rushing feet of slaves descendingfrom their quarters, striving to gain their stations unobserved; thesharp tongue of Calavius now loosed from the bonds of terror, andrating them soundly for their unfaithfulness and cowardice; the patterof excuses and protestations. In a few moments the quarters aboveresounded with the shrieks and groans of those condemned to the lash;for the wrath and indignation of Calavius, generally the mildest ofmasters, were spurred to vindictive bitterness by a consciousness ofhis late terror and abasement. "They were guilty of all crimes, and,worst of all, of the rankest ingratitude. Let them learn that theirmaster was still strong enough to punish." So the scourges fell, andthe victims screamed and writhed.
All these things Marcia heard, but they meant little to a mind so fullof internal conflict as was hers. What was she to believe of herself?Had she not marked out a course of self-devotion and sacrifice whichwas to gain respite and safety for her country, revenge upon itsenemies? Had not others, notably Decius Magius, been forcedunwillingly to admit the possible efficiency of her plan? Yet now,when the gods had shown her favour beyond all anticipation--had broughtthe chosen quarry into her net--she had thrown all aside and yielded toher womanly weakness, her instinct of modesty, her sense of personalrepulsion. What right had she to think of herself as a woman! He, forwhose love her sex had been dear to her, was gone--a pallid shade whocould no longer be sensitive to her beauty, a vague being sent farhence into the land of the four rivers by these very men whom she haddevoted to destruction. What though the virtues that had beaten downher resolves had been good once--good for Marcia the woman? They wereevil for that Marcia who had resolved to be a heroine, and who was nowlearning how hard it is for the female to seek the latter crown withoutlosing the former. Again and again she struggled with herself, swayedback and forth by the counter-currents of conflicting shames, until thethought of death, as a final possibility, revived to steel her purpose.The sacrifice and the shame would be short, and, in the consciousnessof her work accomplished, she could die, going before the ladyProserpine with a pure heart that need not fear to meet the eyes ofSergius when they should ask its secret.
Rising quickly, she hastened to her chamber by passages where she wouldnot be likely to meet her host. Whatever intentions he might haveentertained toward her had been effectually suspended, if notobliterated, by the course of events, and now he was much too busysetting in order his demoralized household to think of her presence.Therefore, she reached her apartment unnoticed, and, summoning hertirewomen, surrendered herself to the tedious process of adornmentaccording to the accepted taste of Magna Graecia.
The afternoon was spent, ere all had been finished. Then she atehurriedly and with little appetite, drinking deeply of the Lesbian winetill her cheeks flushed through the rouge, and her eyes sparkled.Calavius had gone out, busy about affairs of state, and eager tocollect the strained threads of his influence--threads that might bestrengthened by their very straining, in the hands of a politician whorealized how men were ready to grant every complaisance to one whomthey had deserved ill of and whose vengeance they feared. Marcia foundherself wondering whether Iddilcar would indeed return as he had said.Perhaps her attitude had seemed to him so unfavourable that he wouldstrike first;--but when and how? Perhaps affairs of state detained himalso. Perhaps, even, this man, Hannibal, whose eye pierced through allsubterfuges, had already divined the danger and set himself to nullifyit. Perhaps--and then, as she was reclining in the larger dining hall,one of the slaves entered and whispered in her ear. She rose quickly.
"Tell my lord that she whom he favours awaits him at the hemicycle inthe garden, and guide him to me."
She spoke, marvelling at her steady tones, and, turning, walked, withdrooping head, to the semicircular, marble seat;--not the single seat,back amongst the foliage, where she had met Perolla; "the philosopher'schair," as Calavius had called it laughingly, where his son retired tocommune with thoughts too great for men. Sinking down at one end ofthe hemicycle, she studied the carved lion's head that ornamented thearm-rest, and the paw, thrusting out from the side-support, upon thepavement beneath. It troubled her that such wonderful handicraft hadnot considered that the head was entirely out of proportion with thepaw; and yet, if the former were larger or the latter smaller, surelythey would not fit well in the places they were intended to ornament.What a provoking dilemma, to be sure--and at such a time, for, glancingsuddenly up, she saw Iddilcar's dark, repulsive features bent upon herwith a terrible intentness. All her former loathing surged back overher heart with tenfold force, sickening her with its suffocating weight.
"Light of the two eyes of Baal," he murmured softly. "Look kindly uponthy servant. Smile upon his love, that thy light and his worship maybe eternal. Behold! for thee I cast aside the worship of the lordMelkarth!"
He tore apart his long, violet tunic, showing his throat and bosom hungwith necklaces. His arms, bare to the shoulders, glittered with heavybracelets.
"Lo! the spoils of Italy assigned to my Lord I give to thee,"; and,taking off necklace and bracelet, he knelt and piled them at her feet,raising and parting his arms in the attitude of oblation.
Charmed as by a serpent, Marcia watched him with horrible disgust, yetunable to turn her eyes aside.
"What is Tanis to thee!" he went on. "What, Ceres! What, Proserpine!Ashera! Derceto!--goddesses afar from men--goddesses whom, not seeing,we worship faintly with sacrifice and ceremony. But thou--thou shaltdwell forever in the temple upon the Square of Melkarth. Come!"
Again, and in spite of every resolve, Marcia felt the overmasteringsense of woman's loathing that stood so obstinately between herself andthe role she had marked out. It was too much. She could not--couldnot suffer this man for a moment, even with the release of swiftlyhastening death before her eyes. She struggled to her feet, gropingabout, turning, and, with a stifled scream, she sought to fly; but herstrength refused her even this service.
In an instant, he was up and beside her; his hand had roughly graspedher shoulder, half tearing away the cyclas; his little eyes blazed withvindictive fury; his nostrils dilated; his coarse lips writhed inhungry passion.
"Ah, slave! You would escape? Where? where? In this house? Ah,fool! Could you not measure the comedy of this morning? Do you thinkthis old imbecile, this man condemned to follow his mouse-killing son,can protect you from the meanest Nubian in the army? Do youthink--ah!" and he raised his hand, as if to strike.
Wrenching herself loose by a quick movement, Marcia turned and facedhim with all the blood of the Torquati flushing in her cheeks, alltheir fire blazing in her eyes.
"Dog of a pulse-eater!" she cried, and he shrank back before thevehemence of her tone. "Do I care what you do? Break your alliancewith these people if you wish--an alliance of fools with fools, knaveswith knaves! Break it, before it be cloven asunder for you by thesword of Rome. Doubtless your chief will sacrifice all his plans toyour cowardly lust. Kill my protector, tear down his house, and--killme!--me, for whom there is neither sowing nor reaping in this matter."
All his arrogance and violence had vanished, cowed and crushed by heroutbreak; but, even as he cringed before her, the gleam of Orientalcunning had taken its place.
"Ah! now, indeed, art thou more beautiful than the lady Tanis," hemuttered, clasping and unclasping his hands, as if in ecstasy. "Now,indeed, do I love thee." His voice sank to a whisper, and he glancedabout timorously. "And so it is neither sowing nor reaping with you,my pretty?" he went on. "Fools we may be, but not the fools to beblind to your sowing--not the fools who shall not root up your seedbefore the day of reaping. Did not you, a Roman, counsel Mago todelay? Did you not, foolish one, even give such counsel at the banquetof welcome to the schalischim, until I laughed in my cup to see a sillygirl who would cajole men o
f government and of war?"
Marcia stood, rigid and pale. All her plans seemed shivering abouther. She was doomed to fail then--fail after all, through the cunningof these vermin. Still she struggled to retain her composure.
"Liar!" she said. "Do I not know that if you spoke truth I wouldalready be buried under hurdles weighted with stones?"
He laughed softly. "Why?" he asked. "What can you avail, coining leadfor us who perceive its falseness? Nay, you are even of use toHannibal, for, by your very eagerness, he has come to Maharbal'sthinking, that all must be done speedily, if we would take Rome. Evennow Capuans work night and day building our engines. Soon they willset them up before your gates. We shall winter in Rome, as the guestsof the lady Marcia who has invited us. Therefore Hannibal grants youlife and to be a comfort to his friend and father, Pacuvius Calavius,in his declining years;" and he laughed again, but harshly andsneeringly.
Marcia could scarcely keep her feet under the crushing force of theseblows. In what vain manner had she, an inexperienced girl, blind toall but a noble purpose, contended with men whose cunning had sufficedto snare the chiefs of her people! Worse even, she had herself forgedthe weapons for the destruction of all she had hoped to save. Iddilcarwatched her from under half-closed lids, noting every line of her face,and reading its struggle and its despair.
"And so it is wisdom for us to march north at once?" he said softly.
"How do I know?--a woman?"
He smiled subtly and ignored the change of front he had wrested fromher.
"Love me, and I swear by the crown of Melkarth that Hannibal shallwinter in Capua."
She started, as if from the touch of fire. Had her ears heard words ofhis, or was it only a belated thought coursing from her brain to herheart?
He stepped nearer and spoke again:--
"Love me, pretty one, and Hannibal shall winter in Capua,--yea, thoughhe hangs on the cross for it,--though all the armies of Carthage becomefood for dogs."
At first she had been dreaming of new snares; but these last words andthe vehemence of his tone brought her to an intuitive realization thatthis man was indeed prepared to give up god, country, general,friends,--all, so only that he might gratify his overmastering passion.The gods were indeed with her, after all,--were guiding her aright; andthe knowledge steadied her self-control and strengthened her resolve.What omen of favour could be more potent than this snatching of victoryout of the very hands of ruin--this moulding of ruin into a source ofvictory?
So she spoke, calmly and evenly:--
"Perhaps you tell the truth, perhaps folly. How shall I know, any morethan I know of this power to command commanders, of which you make suchsilly boast?"
"Not I---not I, lady," he protested eagerly. "Listen! It is the lordMelkarth that has always loved the colonies of Phoenicia, first amongwhich is Carthage. It is he that has guided and guarded us through theperils of the deep and of the desert, of the skies and of the earth, ofhunger and thirst, of beasts and men. What god equals him in our city!What god receives such gifts, such incense, such sacrifices! Whatthough we fear Baal Moloch! Is it not the lord Melkarth whom we love?It is he who goes before our armies, that he may tell them when toattack, when to await the foe. I am his priest. Do you understand? Ihave spoken his words many times. Now he shall speak mine."
Marcia could hardly fail to understand the nature of the power whichthis man now proposed to lay at her feet; yet it all seemed horriblyimpossible that he, a priest, could dare such sacrilege for such end.Had she been Fabius, Paullus, or even Sergius,--men who were alreadygroping amid the Greek schools of doubt, and were coming to regard thereligion of the state more as an invaluable means of curbing the vicesof the low and ignorant than as a divine light for the learned,--hadshe been such as these, this proposal of Iddilcar would have seemedincredible only on account of its treason to his country. And yet, inone sense, she was better fitted than they to understand theCarthaginian. True scepticism had found little room under the mantleof the gloomy, the terrible cult that swayed the destinies of theChanaanitish races. Even the priests, while they were ready enough touse the people's faith to minister to their own ends, trembled beforetheir savage gods. Low, brutish, full of inconsistent wiles theirfaith might be, but such faith it was as an educated Roman could withdifficulty comprehend. On the other hand, the minds of the women ofRome had not as yet swerved from unquestioning belief in the godsconsulting and the gods apart, and the Torquati were most conservativeamong all the great houses. From childhood up--and in years she wasscarcely more than a child--all these had been very real to her.Pomona wandered through every orchard beside her beloved Vertumnus; Panand his sylvan brood sported behind the foliage of every copse. Shewould as soon have thought of questioning their presence as of doubtingher own being. Marcia believed; the average Roman patrician affectedto believe and indulged in his polite, Hellenic doubts; theCarthaginian priest, while he believed, with all Marcia's fervour, in atheology to which Marcia's was tender as the divine fellowship of thePhaeacians, yet conceived that it was entirely legitimate to playtricks upon his fiend-gods--to pit his cunning against theirs. If theycaught him, perhaps they would laugh, perhaps consume him in the flamesof their wrath. It depended on their mood--whether they had dinedwell, perhaps; and he would take his chances. He stood, now, towardhis deities, just where the heroes of Homer had stood centuries before.He was a living evidence of the Asiatic birth of Greek theology--only,in the Asian races, religious feeling was not religious thought, didnot arise from the mind or change, like the cults of Europe, as themind that evolved or adopted them developed and outgrew its offspring.
So it was that, while Marcia, but for her instinctive realization ofthe truth, might have been utterly unable to credit the sincerity ofsuch prodigious wickedness, yet, armed with this intuition as astarting-point, she sought for and found reasons to support it. Thepurity of her own faith came to her aid. Perhaps the Punic gods weremere demons, as they seemed to be, and Iddilcar knew it and relied forprotection upon the mightier gods of Rome. In a sense, she reasoned onfalse premises, but her conclusion was, none the less, more accuratethan would have been that of either Paullus or Sergius. For the time,at least, Iddilcar was entirely sincere. To be sure, if he could gainhis end by mere promises, he preferred to deceive Marcia rather thanMelkarth, but his plotting had not gotten so far as that yet. Now, hisfierce, Oriental nature was consuming with that passion which, in it,took the place of all love. This Roman woman had aroused desires thathe had never known in the gardens of Ashera; her face was to the facesof the courtesans who thronged the sacred woods on feast days, as theglory of the crescent moon was to the sputter of the rancid oil in thelamp that illumined the cell of Fancula Cluvia. Cunning beyond hisrace, learned in the strange learning of the East that had come to afew in Egypt and to fewer yet in Phoenicia, Iddilcar read the strugglethat was taking place in the girl's mind.
"What do I care for Hannibal!" he cried; "for the Great Council! forCarthage! I would give them all to you for one kiss. To him who haslearned all secret knowledge, the mind alone is God and city and homeand friends,--everything, everything save love," and his voice, harsh,and strident, sank to a whisper in which was compassed all thefierceness of ungoverned and ungovernable desire.
Marcia knew, now, that he was speaking the truth; that he would indeedstop at nothing; and, with the certainty, there came to her a strangemingling of exultation, terror, and calm. She saw this man, powerfulwith the power of the conqueror, learned with the learning of thestudent and of the ascetic, grovelling here at her feet--slave to aforce against which no power, no philosophy could avail. She saw himcrawl to her and press her robe to his lips; she heard him mumbling andwhining like some animal, and she despised him and grew stronger in thelight of her growing self-esteem. At last she spoke.
"It is well. I have listened and determined. Yes, you are right. Ihave wished that the army should not march north; I have wished that itshould winter in Campani
a. I am a Roman; why should I not wish it?You say you can accomplish this. Do so, and you shall have yourreward."
Iddilcar sprang to his feet and threw out his arms to draw her to him;the breath came from his chest in short gasps; his eyes were suffusedwith tears through which he saw something glitter; and his hands,clutching and unclutching, caught only air. Then his arms fell to hissides; he paused and looked stupidly at her. She had sprung back andwas facing him defiantly with a short dagger raised to strike.
"Not so soon, slave," she said, and her voice rang in his ears likesteel. "He who would reap must first sow."
"You do not love me," he said sheepishly, gnashing his teeth because heknew the foolishness of his words, and yet could say no others.
She laughed; then her face grew sober.
"No," she said; "I do not love you. Why should I? We love those whoserve us well--"
"Ah! but I have promised," he broke in. "I am giving you everything."
"I want but one thing," she said, while the lines of her mouthhardened; "and, for that, I take no promise."
He lowered his head to avoid the straight flash of her eyes.
"It is I, then, who must trust--always I," he muttered. "How do I knowyou will give yourself when I earn you?--how do I know you will notkill yourself with that dagger? for you hate me," and then, with suddenfierceness; "why should I not take my own? What hinders me?"
"This," said Marcia, touching the point with her finger.
Iddilcar shuddered.
"Listen now," she began, "and be reasonable. I have named my price,and you have said it is not too much. Why speak of love or hate? Earnme and take me."
"Yes," he echoed; for he was braver when his eyes studied the pavement;"why speak of love or hate? It is you I want--your kisses, yourembraces. Who shall say that hatred may not flavour them better eventhan love?" and he sneered. "Ah! but how shall I know?"
"I am a Roman, and I have promised. Fulfil your Punic word as well,and I swear you shall have your pay, so surely,"--and then the memoryof another day, happier, but oh! so bitterly regretted, came to hermind,--"so surely as Orcus sends not the dead back from Acheron. Nowgo."
He drew back, step by step, still facing her, longing to rebel, yet notdaring, cringing, skulking like a whipped cur. He reached the end ofthe path; the entrance to the garden was behind him. He raised hisclenched hand to the heavens. "Ah, Melkarth!" burst from his lips,and, turning, he plunged into the house, running.
Marcia listened eagerly to the fall of his sandals. They died away,and the distant door creaked. Tears filled her eyes, and, shivering inevery muscle, she sank down upon the seat and buried her face in herhands.