CHAPTER XIX
THE DELIVERANCE
There followed time for diverse and earnest meditation for Marsyas: Hecriticized himself sarcastically, for permitting himself to be soeasily entrapped, and cast about him for means of escape. He found bysuccessive trials that the siege was perfect. Half of Alexandria'sgarrison had been posted about the district. The more he consideredhis predicament, the more an atmosphere of impending danger weightedthe air of the Nazarene community.
He did not seek the hospitality of the Nazarenes, because he had notcome to the point of admitting that he was to remain among them. Atnightfall, while the roar of the reveling city without swept over thecommunity, he hoped to find some unguarded spot in the Roman lines, buthis hope was vain. With his attention thus forced upon the peoplepenned in with him, he began to wonder if there might not yet be someprofit in counsel with his fellows, hemmed in for some purpose byFlaccus.
He found the inhabitants gathered in a broad space in one of thestreets, where at one time a statue or a fountain might have stood, butafter a few minutes' listening, he heard only prayers and words ofsubmission to the unknown peril threatening them. Angry anddisappointed he flung himself away from the gathering, to spend thenight in the streets.
But after the first gust of his anger, it was brought home to him verystrongly, that these people were gifted with a new courage, the courageof submission--to him the most mysterious and impossible of powers.Led from this idle conclusion into yet deeper contemplation of theNazarene character, he found himself admitting astonishing evidences intheir favor. He had known not a few of them. Stephen had beenbeatified, the most exalted, yet the sweetest character that he hadever known. Lydia, wavering and hesitating between Judaism and thefaith of Jesus of Nazareth, struggled with fine points of conscience,and persisted, in the face of terror,--the most potent controllingagent, Marsyas had believed, over the spirit of womanhood. TheNazarene body at Ptolemais had displayed before him a humanness insubjection, that, in spite of his own resolute disposition, seemedtriumphant, after all. They had preached peace, and had maintained itin the face of the most trying circumstances. On ship-board, he hadbeen shown that they were long-suffering. About him now, whileAlexandria rioted and reveled in excess, their order and decorum werehighly attractive. These were excellences that he did not willinglysee; circumstances and environment had forced their recognition uponhim.
At a late hour, he was sought and found by their pastor, the tall oldteacher, whom he had come to consider as a man whom, for his ownspiritual welfare, he should shun.
"Young brother," the pastor said, "thou art without shelter here, andimprisoned among us. I respect thy wish to be left to thyself, yet wecan not see thee unhoused. I have a cell in yonder ruined wall; it issolitary and secluded. Do thou take it, and I shall find shelter amongmy people."
Marsyas felt his cheeks grow hot, under the cover of the night.
"I thank thee," he responded, "but I am here only for a little time. Iam young and hardy; I will not turn thee out of thy shelter."
"If thy time with us is stated, thou art fortunate. Alexandria hathnot set her limit upon our imprisonment. Yet, I shall find a niche inthe house of one of my people; be not ashamed to take my place."
Without waiting for the young man to protest, the Nazarene signed himto follow, and led on through the dark to the place indicated--theremnant of an ancient house--a single standing wall of earth,sufficiently thick to be excavated to form a shallow cave. There wasroom enough for a pallet of straw within, and a reed matting hungbefore the opening. The pastor bade the young man enter, blessed himand disappeared.
Marsyas sat down in the cramped burrow, and, resting his head on hishands and his elbows on his knees, said to himself, in discomfiture:
"Beshrew the enemy that permits you to find no fault in him!"
It was not the last time in the memorable three days of imprisonmentthat he frowned and deprecated the excellence of his hosts.
He accepted their simple hospitality in moody helplessness, and spenthis time either hovering on the outskirts of their nightly meetings, orvainly searching for a plan to escape. He noted finally that theystinted themselves food, but gave him his usual share; water appearedless often and less plentiful. The pastor was not less confident, butmore withdrawn within himself: the elders became more grave, thepeople, oppressed and prayerful. At times, when the gradual growth ofdistress became more apparent, Marsyas walked apart and chid himselffor his resourcelessness.
"I am another mouth to feed, among these people," he declared. "And bythe testimony of mine own instinct, I am not the least cause of thatwhich hath thrown this siege about them! I will get out!"
He began at sunset the second day to discover the extent of thebesieged quarter and sound every point for the strength of itsparticular blockade. He found that the Nazarene portion of Rhacotisstretched from the landings of the bay inland to a series of granarieswhere Rhacotis, in its smaller days, had built receptacles for thewheat which the rustics brought for shipping. To the west it endedagainst a stockade for cattle, upon which mounted sentries couldoverlook a great deal of the quarter. To the east, the limit was acompact row of well-built houses, remnants of the Egyptian aristocraticportion in Alexander's time. The streets intersecting the row andleading into pagan Rhacotis were each closed by a sentry. After hisinvestigations, Marsyas felt that here was the weakest spot in thesiege.
Central in the row was a tall structure, with ruined clay pylons, blankof wall and, except for supporting beams, roofless. It had been atemple, but was now a dwelling, a veritable warren since the Nazareneswere all driven to occupy a portion which could shelter only a fifth ofthe number comfortably.
Upon this structure, Marsyas' eye rested. Either it would be closelywatched from without or not at all. It depended upon the features ofthe wall fronting on the street at the rear, in which the sentries wereposted.
For once he blessed a Nazarene night-gathering, when he saw familyafter family emerge from the tunnel-like doors of the temple-house andproceed silently toward the meeting of their brethren in the streetbelow.
A long time after the last emerged and disappeared into the dark,Marsyas crossed to the doors and knocked. For a moment after his firsttrial, he listened lest there be an answer. He knocked more loudly asecond time, and, after the third, he opened the unlocked doors, and,putting in his head, called. The heated interior was totally dark andsilent.
He stepped in and closed the doors behind him. When at last his eyesbecame accustomed to the darkness, he saw that he was in a singleimmense chamber; the entire interior of the old temple was unbroken bypartition of any kind. Above him, he saw the crossing of greatpalm-trunks, bracing the walls, and over them the blue arch of thenight. At the rear, the starlight showed him the wall abutting thestreet of the sentries. It was absolutely blank and fully thirty feetin height.
Marsyas sighed and shook his head. Though he made the leap in safety,he could not alight without noise enough to attract the whole garrisonto the spot. But, determined to make his investigation thorough beforehe surrendered the scheme as hopeless, he felt about the great chamberand stumbled on a rude ladder leaning against a side-wall. He climbedit, to find that it reached to a ledge, where the deeper lower half ofthe wall was surmounted by a clerestory just half its thickness. Hefound here rows of straw pallets where the overflow of Nazarenes tookrefuge by night. He pulled up his ladder, set it on the ledge andclimbed again, finding himself at the uppermost rung within reach ofone of the palm-trunks. He seized it, tried it for solidity and drewhimself up on the top of the wall.
Fearing detection by the sentries more than the return of thehouseholders, he crept with caution to the angle at the rear, andlooked down into the street.
He located two sentries, but no nearer the back of the temple than thetwo streets opening into the other several yards away to the north andsouth. He lay still to note the direction of their post and foundthat, in truth, th
ey turned just under him. At a point half-waybetween either end of their walk, they were more than two hundred pacesapart. But Marsyas looked down the sheer wall. He could not possiblyaccomplish it without injury or discovery or both.
With a heavy heart he retraced his steps, descended into the old templeand made his way toward the doors. Before he reached them, hefrightened himself by stumbling upon a huge light object that rolledaway toward the entrance. He followed cautiously, and touched it againwhile fumbling for the latch. He felt of it, and finally, swinging thedoor open, saw by the starlight that it was a huge hamper of twistedpalm-fiber, tall enough to contain a man and wide enough for two. Heset the thing aside and went out into the night.
To-morrow was the last day of his confinement, but he did not expectliberty. He did not doubt that the city meditated the destruction ofthe Nazarenes, nor that Flaccus would permit him to be overlooked inthe general slaughter. Not the least of his fears was that Lydia mightbe thrust among them at any moment, to share the fate he had striven sohard to avert from her.
He returned to his cave in the ruined wall, and lay down on hismatting, not to sleep, nor even to plan intelligently, but to submit tohis distress.
At high noon the third day, on the summit of the Serapeum in EgyptianRhacotis, there appeared a slender figure in the burnoose of an Arab.
Five hundred feet distant, in the beleaguered Nazarene settlement, awoman stood in her doorway to pray, that the earthen roof might not bebetween her supplication and the Master in Heaven. She saw themicroscopic figure on the pylon of the Temple, but daily a priest camethere to worship the sun. She saw the figure lift and extend its arms,presently, but that was part of the idolatrous ritual, she thought.She dropped her eyes to the crucifix in her hands and her lips movedslowly.
At that instant, at her feet, as a thunderbolt strikes from the clouds,an arrow plunged half its length into the hard sand, and leaned,quivering strongly toward the tiny shape on the summit of the pylon.
The Nazarene woman dropped her crucifix and shrieked.
The slow fisher-husband appeared beside her, and, seeing the fallencross, picked it up with fumbling fingers, muttering an exclamation ofremonstrance.
"Look!" the Nazarene woman cried, pointing to the half-buried bolt,still quivering.
The fisherman gazed at it.
"Whence came it?" he asked.
The trembling woman shook her head and clasped and unclasped her hands.
"An affront from the heathen," the man said. "It was despatched tomurder thee. The Lord's hand stayed it; blessed be His name!"
He plucked the arrow with an effort from the sand, and looked at it.
"It is a witness of the Master's care; let us take it to the pastor,"he suggested.
The trembling woman followed her husband as he stepped into the streetand raised her eyes to give thanks. She saw that the figure on thesummit of the pylon was gone.
The two found the leader of their flock, sitting outside an overcrowdedhouse, bending over a half-finished basket of reeds. Beside him wasone complete; at the other hand were his working materials.
"Greeting, children, in Christ's name," he said.
"Greeting, lord; praise to God in the highest!"
The Nazarene woman dropped to her knees, and her husband, extending thearrow in agitation, stumbled through their story.
"May His name be glorified for ever," the woman murmured at the end.
But the pastor took the arrow and examined it. It was uncommon; thestory was uncommon, and he believed that there was more than a wantonattempt at murder in its coming. The bolt was tipped with a pointedflint, and feathered with three long, delicate papyrus cases, one dark,two white. The pastor felt of one of the white feathers, and presentlyripped it off the shaft. It opened in his hand. Within was lettering.
After a little puzzled study of it, he shook his head and put it down.He loosened the other from the transparent gum and opened it. Writtenin another hand were the following words in Greek:
"To the Nazarene to whom this cometh: "Deliver the arrow unto the young Jew, Marsyas, who dwells among you, but is not of your number."
The pastor took up the arrow and the papyrus and arose at once.
"Verily, a sending, but it is not for us. Abide here until I deliverit to him that expects it."
He turned toward the ruined wall where Marsyas secluded himself.
The pastor knocked on the dried earth wall without the cave, and thematting was thrust aside. The young Jew stood there.
"I bring thee a message from without," the pastor said at once. "Peaceand the love of Christ enter thy heart and uphold thee."
He put the arrow into the young man's hand and saluting him with thesign of the cross, went his way.
"What blind incaution," Marsyas said, after he had stared inastonishment at the things delivered him. "A message! How does heknow that he does not bear to me treachery against his people, and hisundoing!"
But he sat down and undid the white case.
"That is Agrippa's writing!" he declared after he had read it.
He took up the other. The writing was in Sanskrit.
"O white Brother:" it ran; "this by an arrow from the strong bow of thylord Prince. Him I compelled. Come forth from among the Nazarenes!Deliver thyself, by nightfall, in the pure name of her whom thoulovest! Come ere that time, if thou canst, but fail not, otherwise, tobe in the forefront of Flora's followers! Be prepared to possess her!
"Fail not, by all the gods! "Vasti, by the hand of Khosru, priest to Siva."
Marsyas seized the writing with both hands and sprang up; reread itwith straining eyes; walked the two steps permitted him in his caveover and over again; or leaned against the earthen wall to think.
In the pure name of her whom he loved! Lydia? He felt his Essenicself dissolve in a flood of glad confusion, for the moment; instead ofself-reproach, he felt more joy than he ever hoped to know in a lifedevoted to vengeance; instead of guilt, an uplift that separated himfor an instant from even his terror for the rapture of contemplatingLydia.
Then the grave alarm that the bayadere's letter aroused possessed him.A rereading filled him with consternation. The unrevealed peril thathe was to avert, the intimation that Lydia was endangered, thepractically insurmountable obstacles in the way of his escape, shookhim strongly in his self-control. He made no plans, for desperateconditions did not admit of formulated action. To pass outposts ofhalf a cohort of brawny guards offered success only by a miracle, andthe miraculous is not methodical.
Presently, he burst out of his burrow and tramped through the brighthours of the afternoon, cursing the sun for its deadly haste to getunder the rim of the world, and dizzy with the pressure of terror andanxiety.
Near the softening hours of the latter part of the day, while theawakening revel roared louder in the distance, he stopped before theancient temple. The great hamper stood without the heavy entrance withthree little Nazarene children tying ropes to the interstices betweenthe fibers to pull it after them like a wagon. Marsyas looked at thehamper, glanced with intent eyes at the front wall,--a duplicate,except for the entrance, of the rear one,--and then rushed away insearch of Ananias, the pastor.
He found the pastor sitting outside the house that had given himrefuge, cutting soles for sandals from a hide that lay by his side.
The Nazarene raised a face so kindly and interested that the young mandropped down beside him and blundered through his story, in his hasteto lay the plan for escape before the old man.
"At sunset," he hurried on, "or when the night is sufficiently heavy tohide us, I can be let down in the hamper by the rear wall of the oldtemple--if thou wilt bid some of thy congregation to help me! I praythee--let not thy belief deny me this help, for the life of my beloved,or mayhap her sweet womanhood, dependeth upon my escape!"
He clasped his hands, and gazed with beseeching eyes into the pastor'sface. He did not permit himself to think what he would do if the
oldman denied him.
"It is manifest," Ananias said, after a pause for thought, "that onlyNazarenes are to be confined herein. And thou, being a Jew, art hereunder false imprisonment. We shall not be glad to have thee sufferwith us."
"Yes, yes!" Marsyas cried. "I am falsely accused, and thou wilt avertan injustice--nay, by the holy death of the prophets!" he broke off,"if I could bear you all to refuge after me, I would do it!"
"It is the spirit of Christ in thee, my son; nourish it! Yet be notdistressed for our sake; He who holdeth the world in the hollow of Hishand is with us."
Marsyas awaited anxiously the old man's further speech, when he lapsedinto silence after his confident claim of divine protection.
"Give us the plan, my son, and we will help thee," he said at last.
Marsyas took the old man's hand and lifted it impulsively to his lips.
While yet the Serapeum was crowned with pale light, but the moresqualid streets were blackening, Marsyas, led by Ananias, came to theold temple-house, and briefly unfolded his plan to three stalwart youngGentiles, who had turned their backs upon Jove and assumed the grace ofJesus in their hearts. The hamper with which the children had playedall day was brought. Three troll-lines, each forty feet in length andborrowed from the fisher Nazarenes who lived along the bay, weresecurely knotted in three slits about the rim of the basket. Then,waiting only for the rapidly rising dusk, Marsyas, the three youngGentiles and the pastor climbed cautiously to the top of the side-wallof the old structure, and pulled up the hamper after them.
At the angle in the rear, Marsyas, who led the way, stopped. Below itwas already night, and he could hear the steps of the sentries in theechoing passage. He had not planned how he should pass them after hisdescent, but the houses opposite were dark and he did not look forinterference, if he took refuge among them.
He stepped into the hamper, and the three young men laid hold on theropes. The pastor spread his hands in blessing over Marsyas' head, andwhen the sound of the sentries' footsteps was faintest, the hamper,with little sound and at cautious speed, was let down the steep wall.
It touched the sand with a grinding sound. Marsyas leaped out, jerkedone of the ropes in signal and the hamper sprang aloft.
With a muttered blessing on the heads of the apostates, Marsyas leapedacross the narrow street, to the shadows of the other houses. Creepingfrom porch to porch with the sheltering shade of overhanging roofs uponhim, he passed guard after guard, until the row finally ended and theopen space between him and safety on the bay showed up a line ofsoldiers guarding the water-front.
The distance was not great, and success thus far had made Marsyasstrong. With a prayer to the God of those who help themselves, heburst from the passage into the great open of the docking and spedstraight for the bay.
Instantly a howl went up, a pilum launched after him, shot over hisshoulder, the rush of twenty mailed feet came in pursuit, swords,spears and axes flew and fell behind him, but panting and unfalteringhe rushed straight to the edge of the wharf and dropped out of sightinto the bay.
The guards came after him, and hanging over the wharf looked down forhim to come up. They saw the circles of water widen and widen, growstiller and stiller, and finally cease to move, but the head for whichthey looked did not rise.
Meanwhile Marsyas, native of Galilee and lover of her blue sea, arosebetween sleeping boats far out into the bay. He caught a chain andclung while he drew breath and rested. Not a vessel was manned; everyseaman, officer and passenger had gone ashore to follow Flora.
Presently, he looked about and took his bearings. There through adarkening lane of water, a hundred feet long, he made out the ornateaplustre of Agrippa's ship.
He let himself down into the water again, and, swimming around to port,away from land, climbed by her anchor-chains and got upon deck.
The ship was wholly silent and deserted. None was there to ask why hecame so unconventionally aboard.
He went to the cabin prepared for the prince's reception, and withsteward keys still fast to his belt let himself in and prepared toreturn to Alexandria.