THE VISION OF THE SCAPEGOAT
Israel's instinct had been sure: the coming of Katrina proved to be
the beginning of his end. He kept his office, but he lost his power. No
longer did he work his own will in Tetuan; he was required to work the
will of the woman. Katrina's will was an evil one, and Israel got the
blame of it, for still he seemed to stand in all matters of tribute and
taxation between the people and the Governor. It galled him to take the
woman's wages, but it vexed him yet more to do her work. Her work was to
burden the people with taxes beyond all their power of paying; her wages
was to be hated as the bane of the bashalic, to be clamoured against
as the tyrant of Tetuan, and to be ridiculed by the very offal of the
streets.
One day a gang of dirty Arabs in the market-place dressed up a blind
beggar in clothes such as Israel wore, and sent him abroad through the
town to beg as one that was destitute and in a miserable condition. But
nothing seemed to move Israel to pity. Men were cast into prison for no
reason save that they were rich, and the relations of such as were there
already were allowed to redeem them for money, so that no felon suffered
punishment except such as could pay nothing. People took fright and fled
to other cities. Israel's name became a curse and a reproach throughout
Barbary.
Yet all this time the man's soul was yearning with pity for the people.
Since the death of Ruth his heart had grown merciful. The care of the
child had softened him. It had brought him to look on other children
with tenderness, and looking tenderly on other children had led him to
think of other fathers with compassion. Young or old, powerful or weak,
mighty or mean, they were all as little children--helpless children who
would sleep together in the same bed soon.
Thinking so, Israel would have undone the evil work of earlier years;
but that was impossible now. Many of them that had suffered were
dead; some that had been cast into prison had got their last and long
discharge. At least Israel would have relaxed the rigour whereby his
master ruled, but that was impossible also. Katrina had come, and she
was a vain woman and a lover of all luxury, and she commanded Israel to
tax the people afresh. He obeyed her through three bad years; but many
a time his heart reproached him that he dealt corruptly by the poor
people, and when he saw them borrowing money for the Governor's tributes
on their lands and houses, and when he stood by while they and their
sons were cast into prison for the bonds which they could not pay to the
usurers Abraham or Judah or Reuben, then his soul cried out against him
that he ate the bread of such a mistress.
But out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth
sweetness, and out of this coming of the Spanish wife of Ben Aboo came
deliverance for Israel from the torment of his false position.
There was an aged and pious Moor in Tetuan, called Abd Allah, who was
rumoured to have made savings from his business as a gunsmith. Going to
mosque one evening, with fifteen dollars in his waistband, he unstrapped
his belt and laid it on the edge of the fountain while he washed his
feet before entering, for his back was no longer supple. Then a younger
Moor, coming to pray at the same time, saw the dollars, and snatched
them up and ran. Abd Allah could not follow the thief, so he went to the
Kasbah and told his story to the Governor.
Just at that time Ben Aboo had the Kaid of Fez on a visit to him. “Ask
him how much more he has got,” whispered the brother Kaid to Ben Aboo.
Abd Allah answered that he did not know.
“I'll give you two hundred dollars for the chance of all he has,” the
Kaid whispered again.
“Five bees are better than a pannier of flies--done!” said Ben Aboo.
So Abd Allah was sold like a sheep and carried to Fez, and there cast
into prison on a penalty of two hundred and fifty dollars imposed upon
him on the pretence of a false accusation.
Israel sat by the Governor that day at the gate of the hall of justice,
and many poor people of the town stood huddled together in the court
outside while the evil work was done. No one heard the Kaid of Fez when
he whispered to Ben Aboo, but every one saw when Israel drew the warrant
that consigned the gunsmith to prison, and when he sealed it with the
Governor's seal.
Abd Allah had made no savings, and, being too old for work, he had lived
on the earnings of his son. The son's name was Absalam (Abd es-Salem),
and he had a wife whom he loved very tenderly, and one child, a boy of
six years of age. Absalam followed his father to Fez, and visited him in
prison. The old man had been ordered a hundred lashes, and the flesh was
hanging from his limbs. Absalam was great of heart, and, in pity of his
father's miserable condition he went to the Governor and begged that the
old man might be liberated, and that he might be imprisoned instead.
His petition was heard. Abd Allah was set free, Absalam was cast into
prison, and the penalty was raised from two hundred and fifty dollars to
three hundred.
Israel heard of what had happened, and he hastened to Ben Aboo, in great
agitation, intending to say “Pay back this man's ransom, in God's name,
and his children and his children's children will live to bless you.”
But when he got to the Kasbah, Katrina was sitting with her husband, and
at sight of the woman's face Israel's tongue was frozen.
Absalam had been the favourite of his neighbours among all the gunsmiths
of the market-place, and after he had been three months at Fez they
made common cause of his calamities, sold their goods at a sacrifice,
collected the three hundred dollars of his fine, bought him out of
prison, and went in a body through the gate to meet him upon his return
to Tetuan. But his wife had died in the meantime of fear and privation,
and only his aged father and his little son were there to welcome him.
“Friends,” he said to his neighbours standing outside the walls, “what
is the use of sowing if you know not who will reap?”
“No use, no use!” answered several voices.
“If God gives you anything, this man Israel takes it away,” said
Absalam.
“True, true! Curse him! Curse his relations!” cried the others.
“Then why go back into Tetuan?” said Absalam.
“Tangier is no better,” said one. “Fez is worse,” said another. “Where
is there to go?” said a third.
“Into the plains,” said Absalam--“into the plains and into the
mountains, for they belong to God alone.”
That word was like the flint to the tinder.
“They who have least are richest, and they that have nothing are best
off of all,” said Absalam, and his neighbours shouted that it was so.
“God will clothe us as He clothes the fields,” said Absalam, “and feed
our children as He feeds the birds.”
In three days' time ten shops in the market-place, on the side of the
Mosque, were sold up and closed, and the men who had kept them were gone
away with their wives and children to live in tents with Absalam on the
barren plains beyond the town.
When Israel heard of what had been done he secretly rejoiced; but Ben
Aboo was in a commotion of fear, and Katrina was fierce with anger, for
the doctrine which Absalam had preached to his neighbours outside the
walls was not his own doctrine merely, but that of a great man lately
risen among the people, called Mohammed of Mequinez, nicknamed by his
enemies Mohammed the Third.
“This madness is spreading,” said Ben Aboo.
“Yes,” said Katrina; “and if all men follow where these men lead, who
will supply the tables of Kaids and Sultans?”
“What can I do with them?” said Ben Aboo.
“Eat them up,” said Katrina.
Ben Aboo proceeded to put a literal interpretation upon his wife's
counsel. With a company of cavalry he prepared to follow Absalam and his
little fellowship, taking Israel along with him to reckon their taxes,
that he might compel them to return to Tetuan, and be town-dwellers
and house-dwellers and buy and sell and pay tribute as before, or else
deliver themselves to prison.
But Absalam and his people had secret word that the Governor was coming
after them, and Israel with him. So they rolled their tents, and fled to
the mountains that are midway between Tetuan and the Reef country, and
took refuge in the gullies of that rugged land, living in caves of the
rock, with only the table-land of mountain behind them, and nothing but
a rugged precipice in front. This place they selected for its safety,
intending to push forward, as occasion offered, to the sanctuaries of
Shawan, trusting rather to the humanity of the wild people, called the
Shawanis, than to the mercy of their late cruel masters. But the valley
wherein they had hidden is thick with trees, and Ben Aboo tracked them
and came up with them before they were aware. Then, sending soldiers
to the mountain at the back of the caves, with instructions that they
should come down to the precipice steadily, and kill none that they
could take alive, Ben Aboo himself drew up at the foot of it, and
Israel with him, and there called on the people to come out and deliver
themselves to his will.
When the poor people came from their hiding-places and saw that they
were surrounded, and that escape was not left to them on any side, they
thought their death was sure. But without a shout or a cry they knelt,
as with one accord, at the mouth of the precipice, with their backs
to it, men and women and children, knee to knee in a line, and joined
hands, and looked towards the soldiers, who were coming steadily down on
them. On and on the soldiers came, eye to eye with the people, and their
swords were drawn.
Israel gasped for his breath, and waited to see the people cut in pieces
at the next instant, when suddenly they began to sing where they knelt
at the edge of the precipice, “God is our refuge and our strength, a
very present help in trouble.”
In another moment the soldiers had drawn up as if swords from heaven
had fallen on them, and Israel was crying out of his dry throat, “Fear
nothing! Only deliver your bodies to the Governor, and none shall harm
you.”
Absalam rose up from his knees and called to his father and his son.
And standing between them to be seen by all, and first looking upon both
with eyes of pity, he drew from the folds of his selham a long knife
such as the Reefians wear, and taking his father by his white hair he
slew him and cast his body down the rocks. After that he turned towards
his son, and the boy was golden-haired and his face was like the
morning, and Israel's heart bled to see him.
“Absalam!” he cried in a moving voice; “Absalam, wait, wait!”
But Absalam killed his son also, and cast him down after his father.
Then, looking around on his people with eyes of compassion, as seeming
to pity them that they must fall again into the hands of Israel and his
master, he stretched out his knife and sheathed it in his own breast,
and fell towards the precipice.
Israel covered his face and groaned in his heart, and said, “It is the
end, O Lord God, it is the end--polluted wretch that I am, with the
blood of these people upon me!”
The companions of Absalam delivered themselves to the soldiers, who
committed them to the prison at Shawan, and Ben Aboo went home in
content.
Rumour of what had come to pass was not long in reaching Tetuan, and
Israel was charged with the guilt of it. In passing through the streets
the next day on his way to his house the people hissed him openly.
“Allah had not written it!” a Moor shouted as he passed. “Take care!”
cried an Arab, “Mohammed of Mequinez is coming!”
It chanced that night, after sundown, when Naomi, according to her wont,
led her father to the upper room, and fetched the Book of the Law from
the cupboard of the wall and laid it upon his knees, that he read the
passage whereon the page opened of itself, scarce knowing what he read
when he began to read it, for his spirit was heavy with the bad doings
of those days. And the passage whereon the book opened was this--
“_Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats: one lot for the Lord, and
the other lot for the scapegoat. . . . Then shall he kill the goat of
the sin-offering that is for the people, and bring his blood within the
vail. And he shall make an atonement for the holy place, because of
the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their
transgressions in all their sins. . . . And when he hath, made an end of
reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and
the altar, he shall bring the live goat: and Aaron shall lay both his
hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the
iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in
all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send
him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness. And the goat
shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited._”
That same night Israel dreamt a dream. He had been asleep, and
had awakened in a place which he did not know. It was a great arid
wilderness. Ashen sand lay on every side; a scorching sun beat down on
it, and nowhere was there a glint of water. Israel gazed, and slowly
through the blazing sunlight he discerned white roofless walls like the
ruins of little sheepfolds. “They are tombs,” he told himself, “and this
is a Mukabar--an Arab graveyard--the most desolate place in the world
of God.” But, looking again, he saw that the roofless walls covered the
ground as far as the eye could see, and the thought came to him that
this ashen desert was the earth itself, and that all the world of
life and man was dead. Then, suddenly, in the motionless wilderness, a
solitary creature moved. It was a goat, and it toiled over the hot sand
with its head hung down and its tongue lolled out. “Water!” it seemed
to cry, though it made no voice, and its eyes traversed the plain as if
they would pierce the ground for a spring. Fever and delirium fell upon
Israel. The goat came near to him and lifted up its eyes, and he saw its
face. Then he shrieked and awoke. The face of the goat had been the face
of Naomi.
Now Israel knew that this was no more than a dream, coming of the
passage which he had read out of the book at sundown, but so vivid was
the sense of it that he could not rest in his bed until he had first
seen Naomi with his waking eyes, that he might laugh in his heart to
think how the eye of his sleep had fooled him. So he lit his lamp, and
walked through the silent house to where Naomi's room was on the lower
floor of it.
There she lay, sleeping so peacefully, with her sunny hair flowing over
the pillow on either side of her beautiful face, and rippling in little
curls about her neck. How sweet she looked! How like a dear bud of
womanhood just opening to the eye!
Israel sat down beside her for a moment. Many a time before, at such
hours, he had sat in that same place, and then gone his ways, and she
had known nothing of it. She was like any other maiden now. Her eyes
were closed, and who should see that they were blind? Her breath came
gently, and who should say that it gave forth no speech? Her face was
quiet, and who should think that it was not the face of a homely-hearted
girl? Israel loved these moments when he was alone with Naomi while she
slept, for then only did she seem to be entirely his own, and he was not
so lonely while he was sitting there. Though men thought he was strong,
yet he was very weak. He had no one in the world to talk to save Naomi,
and she was dumb in the daytime, but in the night he could hold little
conversations with her. His love! his dove! his darling! How easily he
could trick and deceive himself and think, She will awake presently, and
speak to me! Yes; her eyes will open and see me here again, and I
shall hear her voice, for I love it! “Father!” she will say.
“Father--father--”
Only the moment of undeceiving was so cruel!
Naomi stirred, and Israel rose and left her. As he went back to his bed,
through the corridor of the patio, he heard a night-cry behind him that
made his hair to rise. It was Naomi laughing in her sleep.
Israel dreamt again that night, and he believed his second dream to be a
vision. It was only a dream, like the first; but what his dream would be
to us is nought, and what it was to him is everything. The vision as he
thought he saw it was this, and these were the words of it as he thought
he heard them--
It was the middle of the night, and he was lying in his own room, when
a dull red light as of dying flame crossed the foot of the bed, and a
voice that was as the voice of the Lord came out of it, crying “Israel!”
And Israel was sorely afraid, and answered, “Speak, Lord, Thy servant
heareth.”
Then the Lord said, “Thou has read of the goats whereon the high priest
cast lots, one lot for the sin offering and one lot for the scapegoat.”
And Israel answered trembling, “I have read.”
Then the Lord said to Israel, “Look now upon Naomi, thy child, for
she is as the sin-offering for thy sins, to make atonement for thy
transgressions, for thee and for thy household, and therefore she is
dumb to all uses of speech, and blind to all service of sight, a soul
in chains and a spirit in prison, for behold, she is as the lot that is
cast for justice and for the Lord.”
And Israel groaned in his agony and cried, “Would that the lot had
fallen upon me, O Lord, that Thou mightest be justified when thou
speakest, and be clear when Thou judgest, for I alone am guilty before
Thee.”
Then said the Lord to Israel, “On thee, also, hath the lot fallen, even
the lot of the scapegoat of the enemies of the people of God.”
And Israel quaked with fear, and the Lord called to him again, and said,
“Israel, even as the scapegoat carries the iniquities of the people, so
cost thou carry the iniquities of thy master, Ben Aboo, and of his wife,
Katrina; and even as the goat bears the sins of the people into the
wilderness, so, in the resurrection, shalt thou bear the sins of this
man and of this woman into a land that no man knoweth.”
Then Israel wrestled no longer with the Lord, but sweated as it were
drops of blood, and cried, “What shall I do, O Lord?”
And the Lord said, “Lie unto the morning, and then arise, get thee to
the country by Mequinez and to the man there whereof thou hast heard
tidings, and he shall show thee what thou shalt do.”
Then Israel wept with gladness, and cried, saying, “Shall my soul live?
Shall the lot be lifted from off me, and from off Naomi, my daughter?”
But the Lord left him, the red light died out from across the bed, and
all around was darkness.
Now to the last day and hour of his life Israel would have taken oath on
the Scriptures that he saw this vision, and he heard this voice, not in
his sleep and as in a dream, but awake, and having plain sight of all
common things about him--his room and his bed; and the canopy that
covered it. And on rising in the morning, at daydawn, so actual was the
sense of what he had seen and heard, and so powerful the impression of
it, that he straightway set himself to carry out the injunction it had
made, without question of its reality or doubt of its authority.
Therefore, committing his household to the care of Ali, who was now
grown to be a stalwart black lad his constant right hand and helpmate,
Israel first sent to the Governor, saying he should be ten days absent
from Tetuan, and then to the Kasbah for a soldier and guide, and to the
market-place for mules.
Before the sun was high everything was in readiness, and the caravan was
waiting at the door. Then Israel remembered Naomi. Where was the girl,
that he had not seen her that morning? They answered him that she had
not yet left her room, and he sent the black woman Fatimah to fetch
her. And when she came and he had kissed her, bidding her farewell in
silence, his heart misgave him concerning her, and, after raising his
foot to the stirrup, he returned to where she stood in the patio with
the two bondwomen beside her.
“Is she well?” he asked.
“Oh yes, well--very well,” said Fatimah, and Habeebah echoed her.
Nevertheless, Israel remembered that he had not heard the only language
of her lips, her laugh, and, looking at her again, he saw that her face,
which had used to be cheerful, was now sad. At that he almost repented
of his purpose, and but for shame in his own eyes he might have gone
no farther, for it smote him with terror that, though she were sick,
nothing could she say to stay him, and even if she were dying she must
let him go his ways without warning.
He kissed her again, and she clung to him, so that at last, with many
words of tender protest which she did not hear, he had to break away
from the beautiful arms that held him.
Ali was waiting by the mules in the streets, and the soldier and guide
and muleteers and tentmen were already mounted, amid a chattering throng
of idle people looking on.
“Ali, my lad,” said Israel, “if anything should befall Naomi while I am
away, will you watch over her and guard her with all your strength?”
“With all my life,” said Ali stoutly. He was Naomi's playfellow no
longer, but her devoted slave.
Then Israel set off on his journey.