Miriam’s ears had not betrayed her. While she was detained at supper,
Hermas had opened the courtyard-gate; he came to bring the senator
a noble young buck, that he had killed a few hours before, as a
thank-offering for the medicine to which his father owed his recovery.
It would no doubt have been soon enough the next morning, but he could
find no rest up on the mountain, and did not--and indeed did not care
to--conceal from himself the fact, that the wish to give expression to
his gratitude attracted him down into the oasis far less than the hope
of seeing Sirona, and of hearing a word from her lips.
Since their first meeting he had seen her several times, and had even
been into her house, when she had given him the wine for his father,
and when he had taken back the empty flask. Once, as she was filling
the bottle which he held, out of the large jar, her white fingers had
touched his, and her enquiry whether he were afraid of her, or if not,
why his hands which looked so strong should tremble so violently, dwelt
still in his mind. The nearer he approached Petrus’s house the more
vehemently his heart beat; he stood still in front of the gate-way, to
take breath, and to collect himself a little, for he felt that, agitated
as he was, he would find it difficult to utter any coherent words.
At last he laid his hand on the latch and entered the yard. The
watch-dogs already knew him, and only barked once as he stepped over the
threshold.
He brought a gift in his hand, and he wanted to take nothing away, and
yet he appeared to himself just like a thief as he looked round, first
at the main building lighted up by the moon, and then at the Gaul’s
dwelling-house, which, veiled in darkness, stood up as a vague
silhouette, and threw a broad dark shadow on the granite flags of the
pavement, which was trodden to shining smoothness. There was not a soul
to be seen, and the reek of the roast sheep told him that Petrus and his
household were assembled at supper.
“I might come inopportunely on the feasters,” said he to himself, as he
threw the buck over from his left to his right shoulder, and looked up
at Sirona’s window, which he knew only too well.
It was not lighted up, but a whiter and paler something appeared within
its dark stone frame, and this something, attracted his gaze with an
irresistible spell; it moved, and Sirona’s greyhound set up a sharp
barking.
It was she--it must be she! Her form rose before his fancy in all its
brilliant beauty, and the idea flashed through his mind that she must
be alone, for he had met her husband and the old slave woman among the
worshippers of Mithras on their way to the mountain. The pious youth,
who so lately had punished his flesh with the scourge to banish
seductive dream-figures, had in these few days become quite another man.
He would not leave the mountain, for his father’s sake, but he was quite
determined no longer to avoid the way of the world; nay, rather to seek
it. He had abandoned the care of his father to the kindly Paulus, and
had wandered about among the rocks; there he had practised throwing the
discus, he had hunted the wild goats and beasts of prey, and from time
to time--but always with some timidity--he had gone down into the oasis
to wander round the senator’s house, and catch a glimpse of Sirona.
Now that he knew that she was alone, he was irresistibly drawn to her.
What he desired of her, he himself could not have said; and nothing was
clear to his mind beyond the wish to touch her fingers once more.
Whether this were a sin or not, was all the same to him; the most
harmless play was called a sin, and every thought of the world for which
he longed, and he was fully resolved to take the sin upon himself, if
only he might attain his end. Sin after all was nothing but a phantom
terror with which they frighten children, and the worthy Petrus had
assured him that he might be a man capable of great deeds. With a
feeling that he was venturing on an unheard of act he went towards
Sirona’s window, and she at once recognized him as he stood in the
moonlight.
“Hermas!” he heard her say softly. He was seized with such violent
terror that he stood as if spellbound, the goat slipped from his
shoulders, and he felt as if his heart had ceased to beat. And again the
sweet woman’s voice called, “Hermas, is it you? What brings you to us at
such a late hour?”
He stammered an incoherent answer, and “I do not understand; come a
little nearer.” Involuntarily he stepped forward into the shadow of the
house and close up to her window. She wore a white robe with wide, open
sleeves, and her arms shone in the dim light as white as her garment.
The greyhound barked again; she quieted it, and then asked Hermas how
his father was, and whether he needed some more wine. He replied
that she was very kind, angelically kind, but that the sick man was
recovering fast, and that she had already given him far too much.
Neither of them said anything that might not have been heard by
everybody, and yet they whispered as if they were speaking of some
forbidden thing.
“Wait a moment,” said Sirona, and she disappeared within the room, she
soon reappeared, and said solid and sadly, “I would ask you to come into
the house but Phoebicius has locked the door. I am quite alone, hold the
flask so that I may fill it through the open window.”
With these words she leaned over with the large jar--she was strong, but
the wine-jar seemed to her heavier than on other occasions, and she said
with a sigh, “The amphora is too heavy for me.”
He reached up to help her; again his fingers met hers, and again he
felt the ecstatic thrill which had haunted his memory day and night ever
since he first had felt it. At this instant there was a sudden noise in
the house opposite; the slaves were coming out from supper. Sirona knew
what was happening; she started and cried out, pointing to the senator’s
door, “For all the gods’ sake! they are coming out, and if they see you
here I am lost!”
Hermas looked hastily round the court, and listened to the increasing
noise in the other house, then, perceiving that there was no possible
escape from the senator’s people, who were close upon him, he cried
out to Sirona in a commanding tone, “Stand back,” and flung himself up
through the window into the Gaul’s apartment. At the same moment the
door opposite opened, and the slaves streamed out into the yard.
In front of them all was Miriam, who looked all round the wide
space-expectant; seeking something, and disappointed. He was not there,
and yet she had heard him come in; and the gate had not opened and
closed a second time, of that she was perfectly certain. Some of the
slaves went to the stables, others went outside the gate into the street
to enjoy the coolness of the evening; they sat in groups on the ground,
looking up at the stars, chattering or singing. Only the shepherdess
remained in the court-yard seeking him on all sides, as if she were
hunting for some lost trinket. She searched even behind the millstones,
and in the dark sheds in which the stone-workers’ tools were kept.
Then she stood still a moment and clenched her hands; with a few light
bounds she sprang into the shadow of the Gaul’s house. Just in front
of Sirona’s window lay the steinbock; she hastily touched it with her
slender naked toes, but quickly withdrew her foot with a shudder, for
it had touched the beast’s fresh wound, wet with its blood. She rapidly
drew the conclusion that: he had killed it, and had thrown it down
here, and that he could not be far off. Now she knew where he was in
hiding-and she tried to laugh, for the pain she felt seemed too acute
and burning for tears to allay or cool it. But she did not wholly lose
her power of reflection. “They are in the dark,” thought she, “and they
would see me, if I crept under the window to listen; and yet I must know
what they are doing there together.”
She hastily turned her back on Sirona’s house, slipped into the clear
moonlight, and after standing there for a few minutes, went into
the slaves’ quarters. An instant after, she slipped out behind the
millstones, and crept as cleverly and as silently as a snake along the
ground under the darkened base of the centurion’s house, and lay close
under Sirona’s window.
Her loudly beating heart made it difficult for even her sharp ears
to hear, but though she could not gather all that he said, she
distinguished the sound of his voice; he was no longer in Sirona’s room,
but in the room that looked out on the street.
Now she could venture to raise herself, and to look in at the open
window; the door of communication between the two rooms was closed, but
a streak of light showed her that in the farther room, which was the
sitting-room, a lamp was burning.
She had already put up her hand in order to hoist herself up into the
dark room, when a gay laugh from Sirona fell upon her ear. The image of
her enemy rose up before her mind, brilliant and flooded with light as
on that morning, when Hermas had stood just opposite, bewildered by her
fascination. And now--now--he was actually lying at her feet, and saying
sweet flattering words to her, and he would speak to her of love, and
stretch out his arm to clasp her--but she had laughed.
Now she laughed again. Why was all so still again?
Had she offered her rosy lips for a kiss? No doubt, no doubt. And Hermas
did not wrench himself from her white arms, as he had torn himself from
hers that noon by the spring-torn himself away never to return.
Cold drops stood on her brow, she buried her hands in her thick, black
hair, and a loud cry escaped her--a cry like that of a tortured animal.
A few minutes more and she had slipped through the stable and the gate
by which they drove the cattle in; and no longer mistress of herself,
was flying up the mountain to the grotto of Mithras to warn Phoebicius.
The anchorite Gelasius saw from afar the figure of the girl flying up
the mountain in the moonlight, and her shadow flitting from stone to
stone, and he threw himself on the ground, and signed a cross on his
brow, for he thought he saw a goblin-form, one of the myriad gods of
the heathen--an Oread pursued by a Satyr. Sirona had heard the girl’s
shriek.
“What was that?” she asked the youth, who stood before her in the
full-dress uniform of a Roman officer, as handsome as the young god of
war, though awkward and unsoldierly in his movements.
“An owl screamed--” replied Hermas. “My father must at last tell me from
what house we are descended, and I will go to Byzantium, the new Rome,
and say to the emperor, ‘Here am I, and I will fight for you among your
warriors.’”
“I like you so!” exclaimed Sirona.
“If that is the truth,” cried Hermas, “prove it to me! Let me once press
my lips to your shining gold hair. You are beautiful, as sweet as a
flower--as gay and bright as a bird, and yet as hard as our mountain
rock. If you do not grant me one kiss, I shall long till I am sick and
weak before I can get away from here, and prove my strength in battle.”
“And if I yield,” laughed Sirona, “you will be wanting another and
another kiss, and at last not get away at all. No, no, my friend--I am
the wiser of us two. Now go into the dark room, I will look out and see
whether the people are gone in again, and whether you can get off unseen
from the street window, for you have been here much too long already. Do
you hear? I command you.”
Hermas obeyed with a sigh; Sirona opened the shutter and looked out. The
slaves were coming back into the court, and she called out a friendly
word or two, which were answered with equal friendliness, for the
Gaulish lady, who never overlooked even the humblest, was dear to them
all. She took in the night-air with deep-drawn breaths, and looked up
contentedly at the moon, for she was well content with herself.
When Hermas had swung himself up into her room, she had started back in
alarm; he had seized her hand and pressed his burning lips to her arm,
and she let him do it, for she was overcome with strange bewilderment.
Then she heard Dame Dorothea calling out, “Directly, directly, I will
only say good night first to the children.” These simple words,
uttered in Dorothea’s voice, had a magical effect on the warm-hearted
woman--badly used and suspected as she was, and yet so well formed for
happiness, love and peace. When her husband had locked her in, taking
even her slave with him, at first she had raved, wept, meditated revenge
and flight, and at last, quite broken down, had seated herself by
the window in silent thought of her beautiful home, her brothers and
sisters, and the dark olive groves of Arelas.
Then Hermas appeared. It had not escaped her that the young anchorite
passionately admired her, and she was not displeased, for she liked him,
and the confusion with which he had been overcome at the sight of her
flattered her and seemed to her doubly precious because she knew that
the hermit in his sheepskin, on whom she had bestowed a gift of wine,
was in fact a young man of distinguished rank. And how truly to be
pitied was the poor boy, who had had his youth spoilt by a stern father.
A woman easily bestows some tender feeling on the man that she pities;
perhaps because she is grateful to him for the pleasure of feeling
herself the stronger, and because through him and his suffering she
finds gratification for the noblest happiness of a woman’s heart--that
of giving tender and helpful care; women’s hands are softer than ours.
In men’s hearts love is commonly extinguished when pity begins,
while admiration acts like sunshine on the budding plant of a woman’s
inclination, and pity is the glory which radiates from her heart.
Neither admiration nor pity, however, would have been needed to induce
Sirona to call Hermas to her window; she felt so unhappy and lonely,
that any one must have seemed welcome from whom she might look for a
friendly and encouraging word to revive her deeply wounded self-respect.
And there came the young anchorite, who forgot himself and everything
else in her presence, whose looks, whose movement, whose very silence
even seemed to do homage to her. And then his bold spring into her room,
and his eager wooing--“This is love,” said she to herself. Her cheeks
glowed, and when Hermas clasped her hand, and pressed her arm to his
lips, she could not repulse him, till Dorothea’s voice reminded her of
the worthy lady and of the children, and through them of her own far-off
sisters.
The thought of these pure beings flowed over her troubled spirit like a
purifying stream, and the question passed through her mind, “What should
I be without these good folks over there, and is this great love-sick
boy, who stood before Polykarp just lately looking like a school-boy,
is he so worthy that I should for his sake give up the right of looking
them boldly in the face?” And she pushed Hermas roughly away, just as he
was venturing for the first time to apply his lips to her perfumed gold
hair, and desired him to be less forward, and to release her hand.
She spoke in a low voice, but with such decision, that the lad, who was
accustomed to the habit of obedience, unresistingly allowed her to push
him into the sitting-room. There was a lamp burning on the table, and
on a bench by the wall of the room, which was lined with colored stucco,
lay the helmet, the centurion’s staff, and the other portions of the
armor which Phoebicius had taken off before setting out for the feast of
Mithras, in order to assume the vestments of one of the initiated of the
grade of “Lion.”
The lamp-light revealed Sirona’s figure, and as she stood before him in
all her beauty with glowing cheeks, the lad’s heart began to beat high,
and with increased boldness he opened his arms, and endeavored to draw
her to him; but Sirona avoided him and went behind the table, and,
leaning her hands on its polished surface while it protected her like a
shield, she lectured him in wise and almost motherly words against his
rash, intemperate, and unbecoming behavior.
Any one who was learned in the heart of woman might have smiled at such
words from such lips and in such an hour; but Hermas blushed and cast
down his eyes, and knew not what to answer. A great change had come
over the Gaulish lady; she felt a great pride in her virtue, and in the
victory she had won over herself, and while she sunned herself in the
splendor of her own merits, she wished that Hermas too should feel and
recognize them. She began to expatiate on all that she had to forego and
to endure in the oasis, and she discoursed of virtue and the duties of a
wife, and of the wickedness and audacity of men.
Hermas, she said, was no better than the rest, and because she had shown
herself somewhat kind to him, he fancied already that he had a claim on
her liking; but he was greatly mistaken, and if only the courtyard had
been empty, she would long ago have shown him the door.
The young hermit was soon only half listening to all she said, for his
attention had been riveted by the armor which lay before him, and which
gave a new direction to his excited feelings. He involuntarily put
out his hand towards the gleaming helmet, and interrupted the pretty
preacher with the question, “May I try it on?”
Sirona laughed out loud and exclaimed, much amused and altogether
diverted from her train of thought, “To be sure. You ought to be a
soldier. How well it suits you! Take off your nasty sheepskin, and let
us see how the anchorite looks as a centurion.”
Hermas needed no second telling; he decked himself in the Gaul’s armor
with Sirona’s help. We human beings must indeed be in a deplorable
plight; otherwise how is it that from our earliest years we find such
delight in disguising ourselves; that is to say, in sacrificing our
own identity to the tastes of another whose aspect we borrow. The child
shares this inexplicable pleasure with the sage, and the stern man who
should condemn it would not therefore be the wiser, for he who wholly
abjures folly is a fool all the more certainly the less he fancies
himself one. Even dressing others has a peculiar charm, especially for
women; it is often a question which has the greater pleasure, the maid
who dresses her mistress or the lady who wears the costly garment.
Sirona was devoted to every sort of masquerading. If it had been needful
to seek a reason why the senator’s children and grandchildren were so
fond of her, by no means last or least would have been the fact that
she would willingly and cheerfully allow herself to be tricked out in
colored kerchiefs, ribands, and flowers, and on her part could contrive
the most fantastic costumes for them. So soon as she saw Hermas with
the helmet on, the fancy seized her to carry through the travesty he
had begun. She eagerly and in perfect innocence pulled the coat of armor
straight, helped him to buckle the breastplate and to fasten on the
sword, and as she performed the task, at which Hermas proved himself
unskilful enough, her gay and pleasant laugh rang out again and again.
When he sought to seize her hand, as he not seldom did, she hit him
sharply on the fingers, and scolded him.
Hermas’ embarrassment thawed before this pleasant sport, and soon he
began to tell her how hateful the lonely life on the mountain was to
him. He told her that Petrus himself had advised him to try his strength
out in the world, and he confided to her that if his father got well,
he meant to be a soldier, and do great deeds. She quite agreed with him,
praised and encouraged him, then she criticised his slovenly deportment,
showed him with comical gravity how a warrior ought to stand and walk,
called herself his drill-master, and was delighted at the zeal with
which he strove to imitate her.
In such play the hours passed quickly. Hermas was proud of himself in
his soldierly garb, and was happy in her presence and in the hope of
future triumphs; and Sirona was gay, as she had usually been only when
playing with the children, so that even Miriam’s wild cry, which the
youth explained to be the scream of an owl, only for a moment reminded
her of the danger in which she was placing herself. Petrus’ slaves had
long gone to rest before she began to weary of amusing herself with
Hermas, and desired him to lay aside her husband’s equipment, and to
leave her. Hermas obeyed while she warily opened the shutters, and
turning to him, said, “You cannot venture through the court-yard; you
must go through this window into the open street. But there is some one
coming down the road; let him pass first, it will not be long to wait,
for he is walking quickly.”
She carefully drew the shutters to, and laughed to see how clumsily
Hermas set to work to unbuckle the greaves; but the gay laugh died
upon her lips when the gate flew open, the greyhound and the senator’s
watch-dogs barked loudly, and she recognized her husband’s voice as he
ordered the dogs to be quiet.
“Fly-fly-for the gods’ sake!” she cried in a trembling voice. With that
ready presence of mind with which destiny arms the weakest woman in
great and sudden danger, she extinguished the lamp, flung open the
shutter, and pushed Hermas to the window. The boy did not stay to bid
her farewell, but swung himself with a strong leap down into the
road, and, followed by the barking of the dogs, which roused all the
neighboring households, he flew up the street to the little church.
He had not got more than half-way when he saw a man coming towards him;
he sprang into the shadow of a house, but the belated walker accelerated
his steps, and came straight up to him. He set off running again, but
the other pursued him, and kept close at his heels till he had passed
all the houses and began to go up the mountain-path. Hermas felt that he
was outstripping his pursuer, and was making ready for a spring over a
block of stone that encumbered the path, when he heard his name called
behind him, and he stood still, for he recognized the voice of the man
from whom he was flying as that of his good friend Paulus.
“You indeed,” said the Alexandrian, panting for breath. “Yes, you are
swifter than I. Years hang lead on our heels, but do you know what it
is that lends them the swiftest wings? You have just learned it! It is a
bad conscience; and pretty things will be told about you; the dogs have
barked it all out loud enough to the night.”
“And so they may!” replied Hermas defiantly, and trying in vain to free
himself from the strong grasp of the anchorite who held him firmly. “I
have done nothing wrong.”
“Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife!” interrupted Paulus in a tone
of stern severity. “You have been with the centurion’s pretty wife, and
were taken by surprise. Where is your sheepskin?”
Hermas started, felt on his shoulder, and exclaimed, striking his fist
against his forehead, “Merciful Heaven!--I have left it there! The
raging Gaul will find it.”
“He did not actually see you there?” asked Paulus eagerly.
“No, certainly not,” groaned Hermas, “but the skin--”
“Well, well,” muttered Paulus. “Your sin is none the less, but something
may be done in that case. Only think if it came to your father’s ears;
it might cost him his life.”
“And that poor Sirona!” sighed Hermas.
“Leave me to settle that,” exclaimed Paulus. “I will make everything
straight with her. There, take sheepskin. You will not? Well, to be
sure, the man who does not fear to commit adultery would make nothing
of becoming his father’s murderer.--There, that is the way! fasten it
together over your shoulders; you will need it, for you must quit this
spot, and not for to-day and to-morrow only. You wanted to go out into
the world, and now you will have the opportunity of showing whether you
really are capable of walking on your own feet. First go to Raithu and
greet the pious Nikon in my name, and tell him that I remain here on
the mountain, for after long praying in the church I have found myself
unworthy of the office of elder which they offered me. Then get yourself
carried by some ship’s captain across the Red Sea, and wander up and
down the Egyptian coast. The hordes of the Blemmyes have lately shown
themselves there; keep your eye on them, and when the wild bands
are plotting some fresh outbreak you can warn the watch on the
mountain-peaks; how to cross the sea and so outstrip them, it will
be your business to find out. Do you feel bold enough and capable of
accomplishing this task? Yes? So I expected! Now may the Lord guide you.
I will take care of your father, and his blessing and your mother’s will
rest upon you if you sincerely repent, and if you now do your duty.”
“You shall learn that I am a man,” cried Hermas with sparkling eyes. “My
bow and arrows are lying in your cave, I will fetch them and then--aye!
you shall see whether you sent the right man on the errand. Greet my
father, and once more give me your hand.”
Paulus grasped the boy’s right hand, drew him to him, and kissed his
forehead with fatherly tenderness. Then he said, “In my cave, under the
green stone, you will find six gold-pieces; take three of them with you
on your journey. You will probably need them at any rate to pay your
passage. Now be off, and get to Raithu in good time.”
Hermas hurried up the mountain, his head full of the important task that
had been laid upon him; dazzling visions of the great deeds he was
to accomplish eclipsed the image of the fair Sirona, and he was so
accustomed to believe in the superior insight and kindness of Paulus
that he feared no longer for Sirona now that his friend had made her
affair his own.
The Alexandrian looked after him, and breathed a short prayer for him;
then he went down again into the valley.
It was long past midnight, and the moon was sinking; it grew cooler and
cooler, and since he had given his sheepskin to Hermas he had nothing
on, but his thread-bare coat. Nevertheless he went slowly onwards,
stopping every now and then, moving his arms, and speaking incoherent
words in a low tone to himself.
He thought of Hermas and Sirona, of his own youth, and of how in
Alexandria he himself had tapped at the shutters of the dark-haired Aso,
and the fair Simaitha.
“A child--a mere boy,” he murmured. “Who would have thought it? The
Gaulish woman no doubt may be handsome, and as for him, it is a fact,
that as he threw the discus I was myself surprised at his noble figure.
And his eyes--aye, he has Magdalen’s eyes! If the Gaul had found him
with his wife, and had run his sword through his heart, he would have
gone unpunished by the earthly judge--however, his father is spared this
sorrow. In this desert the old man thought that his darling could not be
touched by the world and its pleasures. And now? These brambles I once
thought lay dried up on the earth, and could never get up to the top of
the palm-tree where the dates ripen, but a bird flew by, and picked up
the berries, and carried them into its nest at the highest point of the
tree.
“Who can point out the road that another will take, and say to-day,
‘To-morrow I shall find him thus and not otherwise.’
“We fools flee into the desert in order to forget the world, and the
world pursues us and clings to our skirts. Where are the shears that are
keen enough to cut the shadow from beneath our feet? What is the prayer
that can effectually release us--born of the flesh--from the burden of
the flesh? My Redeemer, Thou Only One, who knowest it, teach it to me,
the basest of the base.”