I
About two and a half miles from Cæsarea in Cappadocia, upon the woody
spurs of Mount Argæus, and close to the great Roman road, bubbled a
certain warm spring, famous for its healing virtues. A granite slab,
adorned with rough sculpture and bearing a Greek inscription, proved
that this spring had of old time been consecrated to the twin sons of
Zeus, Castor and Pollux; but this by no means prevented the unbroken
images of these Pagan demigods from being locally worshipped as St.
Cosmas and St. Damian respectively.
On the other side of the road, opposite the sacred fountain, rose a
little thatched tavern, flanked by a dirty stable, and by a shed where
fowls and geese were dabbling in the mud. In this tavern, owned by one
Syrax, a wily Armenian, could be bought goats'-milk cheese, black
bread, honey, olive oil, and a thin sour wine, grown in neighbouring
vineyards.
A screen divided the tavern into two compartments; one for the use of
common folk, the other for guests of more importance. From the smoked
ceiling hung hams curing, and odorous bunches of mountain herbs,
proving that Fortunata, the wife of Syrax, was a careful housewife; a
fact that did not save the dubious reputation of the establishment.
At night honest travellers dared not halt here, remembering sundry
rumours about dark plots hatched in the cottage; but Syrax, ever
scheming, and knowing whose hand to cross with silver, had never
troubled his head about rumour. The partition was formed by two
slender columns, between which was stretched, in the manner of a
door-curtain, an old chlamys (or outer garment) of faded wool,
belonging to the mistress of the house. The little columns, wrought in
a barefaced attempt at the Doric style, were the pride of the heart of
Syrax and the single ornament of the tavern. Once gilded, they had
long stood creviced and chipped and hopelessly cracked.
The stuff of the chlamys, when new, had been a bright violet; now it
was a dirty blue, eked out by many patches, and stained with
innumerable stains, due to the breakfasts, dinners, and suppers of ten
years of the conjugal life of the hard-working Fortunata.
In the clean half of the tavern, on a single narrow couch, which was
torn in many places, Marcus Scuda, Roman tribune of the ninth cohort
of the sixteenth legion, was lolling before a tankard-strewn table. A
dandy provincial, he had one of those faces at the sight of which
prosperous slaves and second-rate courtesans would inevitably exclaim
with heartfelt admiration: "_What_ a handsome man!"
At his feet, in an uncomfortable but respectful attitude, a red-faced
man sat, panting. His bald head was fringed with grey hair, brushed
towards the temples. He was the centurion of the eighth _centuria_,
Publius Aquila.
Farther off, twelve soldiers, stretched on the floor, were playing at
knuckle-bones.
"By Hercules!" cried Scuda, "I'd rather be the meanest beggar in
Constantinople than the first man in a mouse-trap like this. Can you
call this an existence, Publius? Answer me honestly. Is this living?
To think that outside barracks and camps the future has nothing in
store for one; that one must rot in this sickening marsh without ever
catching a glimpse of the world again!"
"Yes," assented Publius; "it's a fact that life here isn't precisely
gay; but on the other hand, it's peaceful!"
The knuckle-bones pre-occupied the attention of the old captain.
Pretending to listen to the gossipings of his superior officer, and
fully to agree with the drift of his remarks, he followed with an
interested eye the game of the legionaries. He said to himself, "If
the red aims well, he'll certainly win."
However, by way of politeness, Publius asked Scuda, with a show of
attention--
"Why, by the way, have you brought down on yourself the indignation of
the Prefect Helvidius?"
"A woman, a friend of mine, was at the bottom of it, a girl...."
And Marcus Scuda, in a fit of garrulous intimacy, confided to the ear
of the old centurion that the Prefect, "that old goat of a Helvidius,"
had grown jealous on account of the special favours conferred on him,
Marcus, by a certain frail lady, a Lydian.
Now Scuda wanted, by rendering some important service, to win back the
good-will of the Prefect; and he had resolved upon a plan.
Not far from Cæsarea, in the fortress of Macellum, dwelt Julian and
Gallus, the cousins of the reigning Emperor Constantius, and the
nephews of Constantine the Great. These two were the last
representatives of the luckless house of the Flavii. On his accession
to the throne, fearing rivals, Constantius had assassinated his uncle,
the father of Julian and Gallus, Julian Constantius, the brother of
Constantine. But Julian and Gallus themselves had been spared, and
imprisoned in the solitary castle of Macellum, where they lived
oppressed by perpetual fear of death. In great perplexity, knowing
that the new Emperor loathed the two orphans who reminded him of his
crime, Helvidius, Prefect of Cæsarea, desired, but dreaded, to divine
the will of his master.
Scuda, the adroit tribune, possessed by visions of a career at Court,
grasped, from chance words of his superior officer, that the latter
dared not take upon himself the heavy responsibility, and trembled
lest the current rumour about an escape of the heirs of Constantine
should be realised in fact. At this point Scuda made up his mind to go
to Macellum, seize the prisoners, and bring them to Cæsarea under the
safeguard of his legionaries, well assured that he had nothing to fear
from these orphaned minors, abandoned by the world and hated by the
Emperor. By this valiant proceeding, Scuda counted on regaining the
favours of the Prefect Helvidius, so unhappily lost on account of the
auburn-haired lady of Lydia. Nevertheless, being of a suspicious
nature, he only communicated to Publius part of his plan.
"And what do you propose now, Scuda? Have you received instructions
from Constantinople?"
"I have received nothing; nobody knows anything; but there is an
everlasting hawking about of rumours, don't you see? There are endless
veiled hopes and hints, unfinished phrases, threats and warnings,
allusions.... Any idiot can do what he has been told to do. But this
is a matter of guessing the mute will of our master. That's a job that
brings reward. Come, let us make the venture, take the risk. The great
thing is to be speedy and stout-hearted, and to trust in the Holy
Cross!... I confide myself to you, Publius. Perhaps we shall be
drinking at Court, you and I, before many days are over; and, by God,
a better wine than this!"
Through the little barred window filtered the troubled light of a
melancholy dusk. It was raining monotonously. A single clay wall, full
of crevices, separated the room from the stable. The acrid odour of
dung came though, and the clucking of hens, the shrill chirping of
chickens, and the grunting of pigs was audible. There came also the
steady noise of a liquid falling into a sonorous can, as if the good
wife were milking her cow. The soldiers, discussing their winnings,
were quarrelling among themselves in undertones. Close against the
floor, through the frail lath and plaster, a hog had thrust his fat,
pink snout. Caught in too narrow a slit, he could not draw out his
muzzle and was groaning piteously. Publius mused--
"By Jupiter! we're nearer the courtyard of the cattle than the court
of the Emperor!"
His interest in the game had melted away. The tribune after his excess
of confidence himself felt sad. Through the window he looked at the
grey sky, dissolving itself into water, at the muzzle of the pig, the
thick lees of wine in the tankards, the dirty soldiers. Anger mounted
to his brain.
He struck the table, which swayed on its uneven legs, with his fist.
"Hi, rascality! betrayer of Christ, Syrax, come here! What wine do you
call that, you scoundrel?"
The innkeeper ran up. He wore hair and beard frizzled into fine
ringlets, black as ebony, with bluish shadows. Fortunata used to say,
in her hours of conjugal tenderness, that the beard of Syrax was like
a bunch of the grapes of Samos. His eyes were also black and
extraordinarily brilliant, and a honeyed smile never left his purple
lips. He resembled a caricature of Bacchus, and was black and sugary
from every point of view. To appease the wrath of Scuda, the innkeeper
took to witness Moses and Deidamia, Christ and Hercules, that his wine
was superexcellent. But the tribune was obstinate, declaring that he
knew in whose house Glabrio, a rich merchant of Lyrnas, had recently
been assassinated; and that he, Scuda, would denounce Syrax in the
proper quarters. Terrified, the Armenian rushed to the cellars, and
brought back thence in triumph a strange bulky bottle, flat at its
base, narrow-necked, covered with mildew, and grey with age. Through
the mouldiness in places the glass was visible, no longer transparent,
but irised, and upon the label of cypress-wood attached to the neck of
the bottle could be deciphered the initial letters of "_Anthosmium_"
and below "_Annorum Centum_."
But Syrax assured the couple that even in the reign of the Emperor
Diocletian the wine had been more than a hundred years old.
"Black wine?" asked Publius, with respect.
"Black as tar, and sweet smelling as nectar. Ho! Fortunata! for this
wine bring summer glasses, cups of crystal, and bring too the whitest
snow from the ice-tub."
Fortunata brought in two glasses. Her healthy face was of a dull
pallor like thick cream, and with her came in the smell of country
freshness, milk, and manure.
The landlord gazed at the bottle amorously, and kissed its neck; then
with caution he raised the waxen seal. The wine flowed black and
odorous in a thick jet, dissolving the snow, while the crystal of the
cups became dull and cloudy under the action of cold.
Thereupon Scuda, who had pretensions to learning (he was capable of
confusing Hecuba with Hecate), declaimed proudly the only line of
Martial he could remember--
_Candida nigrescant vetulo crystalla Falerno!_
"Wait a moment. Here is something still better," and Syrax plunged his
hand into his pocket, drew thence a minute flask carved out of onyx,
and with a sensual smile poured into the wine a drop of precious
Arabian cinnamon. The drop fell, and, like a creaming pearl, melted
into the black liquor. A strangely heavy perfume filled the room.
While the tribune was slowly drinking, Syrax made a clacking noise
with his tongue, murmuring, "The wines of Biblos, of Lesbos, of Lathea
in Chios, of Icaria ... are less than nothing to this wine!"
Night was falling. Scuda gave the order to get ready to march. The
legionaries began putting on their armour, fastened the greave
protecting the right leg, and took up bucklers and lances. When they
entered the outer hall, the Icarian shepherds, who were brigands
rather than shepherds, seated near the fire, rose respectfully before
the Roman tribune. Scuda, full of a sense of his own rank and valour,
felt the blood burning in his veins and his head buzzing with the
effect of the marvellous liquor.
On the threshold a man approached him. He wore a strange oriental
costume--a white tunic, striped with broad red bands, and on his head
a high headdress of woven camel's hair, and a towering Persian tiara.
Scuda halted. The visage of the Mede was finely cut, lengthy and
meagre, and yellow of hue rather than olive. The narrow and piercing
eyes sparkled maliciously, but all his movements were calm and
majestic. He was one of those wandering magicians who haughtily
declared themselves Chaldeans, seers, and mathematicians. He announced
to the tribune that his name was Nogodarès. Sojourning by chance with
Syrax, he was travelling from the distant Hyrcania towards the coasts
of the Ionian sea, to meet the celebrated warlock philosopher, Maximus
of Ephesus. The magician begged for authority to prove his art and to
divine the happy fortune of the tribune.
The shutters were closed. The Mede was preparing something on the
ground; suddenly a slight crackling was heard; everybody was silent
and a flame rose in a long red tongue amidst wafted flakes of white
smoke, which filled the room. Nogodarès put his pale lips to a double
flute, and played a languid, plaintive air, like the funeral songs of
the Lydians. The flame grew yellow--grew fainter, then sparkled anew
in pale flashes. The sorcerer threw into the fire a handful of dried
herbs. They evaporated in a penetrating aroma which brought on the
senses an indefinable melancholy, like the perfume of half-withered
grasses, on some misty evening, in the arid plains of Arachosia and
Drangiana. Obeying the plaintive call of the flute, a huge serpent
slid out of a black box placed at the feet of the magician, and
slowly, with a sound as of parchments rubbed together, unwound its
glittering and metallic coils. The wizard chanted in a broken voice,
which seemed to come from afar, and several times repeated the same
syllables, "_Mara, mara, mara!_" The serpent coiled itself round his
thin body and caressingly, with a tender hissing, brought its flat
green head and brilliant carbuncled eyes close to the ear of the
enchanter. A whistling, and the forked sting flashed, as if the
reptile had murmured its secret to its master, who now threw the flute
upon the ground. The flame filled anew the room with thick smoke, this
time diffusing an odour choking as if exhaled from the tomb. The flame
went out. Darkness and fear possessed all present; everybody felt it
difficult to breathe. But when the open shutters allowed the leaden
light of the dusk to enter, there remained no trace of the snake or of
the black box. Notwithstanding this, everybody's face was livid.