JUSTICE THE AVENGER
It was a lovely sunny morning in April as Crispus and Rufus strolled
along the sands in the vicinity of Cæsarea-by-the-sea.
“Have you seen the new coin struck by Titus to commemorate his
conquest?” asked Rufus; and, being answered in the negative, he drew
forth a sesterce, and exhibited it to the gaze of Crispus.
The obverse of the coin bore the laureated head of Titus; the reverse,
a graceful palm-tree, at the foot of which sat the weeping figure of a
woman, emblematic of Judæa; behind the palm stood Titus in a military
uniform, with his foot on a helmet, holding in his right hand a lance,
and in his left a sword. The words JUDÆA CAPTA formed the legend.
“This weeping figure is obviously intended as a portrait of Berenice,”
remarked Crispus in some surprise.
“Just so. ’Tis said that Titus, happening to see Berenice sitting
beneath a palm weeping, or pretending to weep, for her country, was so
struck by the sight that he ordered the Master of the Mint at Cæsarea
to immortalize her figure and attitude in the issue of commemorative
coins.”
“Did Berenice have aught to say on the matter?”
“She was not averse to it.”
No; doubtless it suited her taste for emotional display to see herself
set forth to the Roman world in the character of a devout patriot
weeping for the fall of her country. The hollowness both of her grief
and of her religion, in fact her entire lack of womanly feeling, was
shown by her presence at the games held at Cæsarea Philippi in honor
of Domitian’s birthday, when she could calmly sit in the amphitheater
there and see 2,500 hapless Jews slaughtered, either in combats with
wild beasts, or in fighting with each other as gladiators; for Titus,
prevented from sailing to Rome by reason of the advanced season at
which the war ended--navigation being usually suspended during the
winter months--had spent his time in giving a series of fêtes in
various cities of the East, fêtes that were seldom celebrated without
the butchery of Jews in the arena.
“Berenice has been with Titus at all these festivities,” remarked
Rufus. “She has become his mistress, as I thought she would. So amorous
are they that they all but fondle each other in public. It is Antony
and Cleopatra over again. Will he marry her, I wonder?”
“Not till I have divorced her,” responded Crispus, quietly.
Rufus stared in amazement at this intimation of a secret hitherto
kept from him. Crispus proceeded to tell the story of the wedding at
Beth-tamar, giving his reasons for supposing Berenice to be the veiled
lady.
“The Princess Berenice your wife?” murmured Rufus, scarcely able to
credit the statement. “Humph! and when Cæsar takes a man’s wife, where
shall the man look for redress?”
“He’s welcome to her. She is my wife no longer. I shall repudiate her.”
“No, not yet,” exclaimed Rufus, his face suddenly lighting up with
excitement. “You must not do so just yet. You must delay your purpose
for a while in order to save Vashti.”
“Ha! what mean you? How can the delay serve Vashti?”
Rufus laughed with a sort of good-humored contempt at what he conceived
to be a sad lack of discernment on the part of Crispus.
“Was there any stipulation made at this marriage that the wife was to
retain the separate possession of her property?”
“None.”
“Then Vashti may be set free.”
“How?” asked Crispus eagerly.
“By you, of course. O, dullard! All you have to do now is to walk
into the presence of Titus and Berenice, and to say, ‘Woman, you are
my wife. The law gives you to me, as doth also this document signed
by Vespasian.’ Titus dare not oppose you, if you are determined to
assert your legal rights. Then you lead the proud princess home, by
force if she will not come by persuasion, and you address her thus:
‘You are mine, and all that you have is mine, including your household
slaves. Therefore, in the exercise of my lawful right, I declare this
maiden Vashti to be free.’ That’s the plan you must adopt, Crispus.
Afterwards, repudiate her, if you will; but--liberate Vashti first.”
Crispus, with the fire of hope coursing through his veins, resolved to
follow the daring suggestion of Rufus.
“The sooner this business be done, the better,” said he.
“There I agree with you. What more appropriate time than to-morrow
night when Berenice gives a grand banquet in the Prætorium, that
edifice being graciously lent for the occasion by the new procurator,
Antonius Julianus, who, by the way, talks of writing a history[39] of
the war, thereby entering into rivalry with Josephus. You and I are
invited to this entertainment; in truth, if you are absent, Berenice
will suffer sore disappointment, seeing that she hath prepared a little
mortification for you. She hath decreed that her slave Vashti shall
wait as cup-bearer upon the chief guests.”
“May the intended humiliation fall upon Berenice’s own head!”
“So say I. What hath our pretty Vashti done that she should be thus
shamed? I confess I am beginning to dislike the princess, whom I once
so much admired. You must certainly put your plan into operation
to-morrow night. In the face of all the company claim Berenice as your
wife, and assert your authority over her, to the confusion of Titus.
She is desirous, so ’tis said, of providing her guests with a rare
entertainment; it’s very likely she’ll succeed.”
Crispus, determined to adopt this scheme--he blinked its
difficulties--impatiently awaited the moment for putting it into
execution.
When the time fixed for the banquet drew near, Crispus, assuming his
whitest and handsomest toga, with its broad purple border, went,
accompanied by Rufus, to that palace, still called, though its founder
had been seventy years dead, Herod’s Prætorium.
Upon entering he found that the scene of the feast was the same as that
in which Florus had held _his_ banquet.
It was malice that made Berenice choose this hall; the very place
that had seen Vashti hailed as the queen of beauty was now to see
her degraded to the condition of a slave, compelled to wait upon the
princess whose charms had been slighted by Crispus, while Crispus
himself was invited to look on and behold her humiliation.
He smiled within himself. The sequel would show whose was to be the
humiliation.
The banquet-hall presented a brilliant scene, thronged as it was with
all the brave captains who had taken part in the war, and with fair
ladies whose richly dyed robes afforded a perpetual feast of color.
Crispus and his companion arrived just as the guests were preparing to
take their places at the various triclinia.
Berenice was there, moving with a proud and stately step, and, as
though she were already an empress, wearing an Eastern diadem upon her
dark hair.
By her side walked the laureled Titus, clad in imperial purple, and
seemingly in excellent spirits, though he suddenly started as he caught
sight of Crispus, and over his face came a guilty look which Rufus
interpreted in his own way.
“Ashamed of himself at stealing his friend’s wife. Though he be Cæsar,
and my commander, I shall rejoice if he meet by and by with deserved
discomfiture.”
Crispus and Rufus were allotted places next each other, not, however,
at the chief triclinium where were Titus, Berenice, Agrippa, Alexander,
and others, but at an adjacent triclinium, an arrangement that suited
the two friends, who were thus enabled to talk with more freedom than
they could have enjoyed at Cæsar’s table.
At the same triclinium with Crispus was Josephus, who had his place
next to the Roman.
“Do you know the humiliation intended for Vashti?” asked Crispus.
Josephus signified assent, adding:
“Aware that your presence here will save her, I can await the issue
with a serene mind.”
“Rufus,” whispered Crispus to his friend, “you have been communicating
our plan to Josephus.”
But as Rufus gave an emphatic denial to this, Crispus was not a little
puzzled by the words of Josephus.
By the side of the historian sat a stately and venerable dame.
“My mother,” remarked Josephus, “and her purpose in being here is the
same as mine,” he added with a mysterious smile, “to obtain Vashti’s
freedom.”
It seemed from this that Josephus, too, had some plan for delivering
his ward from Berenice’s hands. What was the nature of the plan, and
was it likely to succeed? But to all questioning Josephus remained
provokingly evasive, so that Crispus was fain to hold his soul in
patience.
It soon became clear, however, from the conversation of Josephus,
that he was animated by a spirit of bitter hostility to Berenice,
caused by her patronage of those amphitheatrical games in which Jews
were pitilessly butchered. Titus, too, came in for a share of his
animadversions.
“He hath ordered that the didrachmas which every adult Jew is
accustomed to pay annually into the temple treasury, shall now be
paid into the temple of the Capitoline Jupiter. You, as a Christian,
can understand the feeling of the Jew in this matter. And the golden
cherubim that overshadowed the mercy seat he hath given to the heathen;
the sacred figures which none but the high priest was permitted to see
are now profanely placed as a trophy over the eastern gate of Antioch,
so that it is beginning to be known as the Gate of the Cherubim. And
nigh to it he hath dedicated a chariot to the Moon, for the help which
she hath given him during the siege. The moon, forsooth!”
The signal for the feast was now given, and richly clad slaves, both
male and female, moved to and fro, attentive to the wants of the guests.
“I do not see Vashti,” whispered Crispus to Josephus.
“She will not enter till the drinking begins.”
Gay conversation went on all around, but Crispus took little or no part
in it. Vashti! Vashti! was the one thought of his mind.
At last repletion came to the guests; both the heavier and the lighter
dishes were removed from the tables to make way for the wines.
“And now, my lords,” cried Berenice, addressing those at her own
triclinium, but speaking sufficiently loud for Crispus to hear, “I have
a rare vintage for you, to be offered by a cup-bearer as graceful as
Hebe herself.”
Among a crowd of wine-bearing slaves that now entered the hall Crispus
distinguished the form of Vashti. Quickly the slaves spread themselves
to right and left, each going to his appointed place.
Of the thousand persons in the banquet-hall Crispus saw but one
only--the fair girl that was moving with a light, graceful step towards
the chief triclinium.
Vashti, but how different from her appearance when last seen by him!
The disfigurement wrought by the famine had vanished; she was her own
sweet self once more.
The charming grace and beauty of her figure were set off by a clinging
robe of pure white silk, richly embroidered with gold, and girt at
the waist with a broad, silver-sparkling zone. A necklace of pearls
encircled her fair throat, and a wreath of violets rested upon her
golden ringlets.
She was the living picture of beauty; from the crown of her head to
her dainty, gold-embroidered sandals there was not a flaw to mar her
radiant loveliness.
The eyes of Josephus’ mother glistened with pleasure at the success of
the toilet for which she was responsible, the good dame having resolved
that Vashti should appear at her fairest before the guests.
As Vashti caught Crispus’ look she gave him a smile that sent the blood
coursing like liquid fire through his veins; it was a smile that showed
she had no fear; a smile that seemed to say she knew that he could and
would save her. Was she aware of his intentions? he wondered, or was
she relying upon the aid of Josephus?
Berenice, with a sudden uneasiness at her heart, began all too late to
wish that she had kept her slave from appearing at this banquet, for
Vashti’s beauty drew murmurs of admiration from the men, if not from
the women.
“Ye gods! who is this?” said Tiberius Alexander. “I did not know,
princess, that you had invited Venus to be a guest.”
“’Tis only one of my slaves,” replied Berenice, outwardly calm,
inwardly thrilling with jealousy.
“A slave!” said Alexander, with the light of amatory desire leaping
into his eyes. “I’ll give you ten thousand aurei for her--fifteen
thousand,” he added, breathlessly.
“I would not take a hundred myriads,” replied Berenice, coldly. “She is
not for sale.”
At this moment the murmur of tongues ceased throughout the hall. The
guests, catching sight of Berenice’s dark face, became suddenly silent,
desirous of discovering what was amiss.
The princess rose to her feet, and angrily faced the slave who was
disobeying her on two points--she was wearing a costume different from
that enjoined her, and she lacked the flagon of wine that it was her
duty to bear.
“By whose leave do you wear that dress?”
“By my own,” replied Vashti, with a sweet smile that maddened the
other. “Why should I consult _you_, princess, as to what manner of
raiment I must wear?”
It was a revelation to Crispus to hear the hitherto submissive and
gentle Vashti taking this bold stand, and he loved her the more for
it. There was no tremor in her voice, nor did she shrink in the least
from the fierce gaze of the princess. Indeed, Vashti, in her proud
fearlessness, looked at that moment far more of a princess than did
Berenice. What wonderful power was it that enabled her thus to brave a
mistress who, if she chose, could order her off to instant scourging?
“You dare speak thus to _me_?” exclaimed Berenice amazedly. “O, I see.
A freewoman all these years, you cannot yet realize that you are a
slave. I will overlook your offense. Go! Bring hither the flagon of
wine that you were bidden to pour out for my guests.”
But Vashti shook her pretty golden tresses, and cast an arch smile at
those reclining at Berenice’s triclinium.
“Nay, verily, if they desire the wine let them wait upon themselves;
or perhaps _you_, princess, will play the part of cup-bearer.”
Berenice stood completely dumfounded at these audacious words from one
who had hitherto behaved as her submissive slave. The men looked on
with smiles of wonder and amusement; the women were more disposed to
side with the princess.
“The slave claims to be a Christian,” sneered Agrippa to a fair lady by
his side.
“That explains her insolence,” replied his partner. “I once had one of
those creatures among my household, and know the trouble they give.
Were I the princess, I would whip the new religion out of her.”
“The girl must be mad,” exclaimed Berenice. “On your knees and cry
pardon, or----”
Vashti turned disdainfully away.
“It has pleased me for a time to abide in your house as a slave,” said
she. “It pleases me now to resume my freedom. Give your commands to
others. There is but one person here who shall have my obedience, and
that is my lord Crispus.”
She walked to where Crispus stood--for he had risen to his feet--laid
an appealing hand upon his arm, and looked with trusting eyes into his.
The supreme moment had come! But how was he to save her? His plan had
melted into thin air. It was all very well to claim Berenice as his
wife, but the cold conviction suddenly struck him that his claim was
based not upon proof, but upon conjecture merely. If Berenice chose to
deny his statement, as she undoubtedly would, how could he make his
word good? He turned his eyes upon Josephus, but that priest made no
movement, uttered no word. “Not yet,” he seemed to be saying.
“Guards!” cried Berenice, addressing some of her own soldiers, who were
stationed at intervals along the wall of the banqueting chamber. “Drag
yon girl away, and bring whips hither. Since her defiance of me is
public, so, too, shall her scourging be.”
Even these words did not disturb Vashti’s serenity. Her pitying smile,
implying as it did that she was secure from the threatened punishment,
lashed Berenice into a secret fury.
During all this time the greatest man at the feast, Titus, had remained
silent, looking on perplexed and uneasy. The redemption of Vashti,
though he had often asked for it, was a favor Berenice would not grant
him. He was sorry for Crispus, and secretly sympathized with the daring
maid who was seeking to assert her liberty, but under the influence of
his passion for Berenice he hesitated to do the right thing, namely, to
declare Vashti free.
As the soldiers came forward to execute Berenice’s command, Vashti
turned to Titus and addressed him.
“Cæsar, bid these men stay their hand till I have spoken. I have that
to say which will show the justice of my cause.”
At a sign from Titus the advancing guards paused.
“Say on,” he commanded, hoping that Vashti might somehow be able to
furnish him with a plausible pretext for delivering her from the power
of Berenice.
Verily, Vashti seemed to be doing the work from which Crispus shrank;
for she began to address Titus with a catechism very similar to what
Crispus himself would have employed had he carried out his plan as
originally intended.
“Have you forgotten, sire, a brief visit made by you and my lord
Crispus to a house called Beth-tamar on a certain night more than four
years ago?”
Titus started; he guessed what was coming, and frowned.
“I have not forgotten it,” said he, with a side glance at Berenice,
whose lip curved with the scornful smile as of one who should say,
“That silly story!”
“You can testify that my lord Crispus wedded at Beth-tamar a woman
unknown to him?--unknown, because she was veiled and spake never a
word.”
This strange and romantic statement caused a murmur of surprise and
wonder to run around the banquet-hall.
“I can testify to that,” said Titus, with the air of one who would fain
deny what he was affirming.
“Do you know the name of the woman?”
“I do not,” replied Titus, with another side glance at Berenice,
which set some of the guests wondering as to whether _she_ were the
mysterious bride.
At this point Berenice, with a gesture of impatience, addressed Titus.
“What hath all this to do with the question of punishing an insolent
slave?”
“Everything, as you will see,” returned Vashti quietly, continuing her
questions to Titus. “Did not Crispus give his bride a ring, saying that
when the unknown lady should come to him with the said ring he would
acknowledge her as his wife?”
“That is so.”
Vashti, with eyes shining with love, and with a tender smile that made
her face the more beautiful, turned to Crispus, and, withdrawing her
hand from a fold of her dress where it had lain concealed, she held it
forth, and there, sparkling on her finger, was the very ring that he
had given to his bride at Beth-tamar!
Scarcely able to grasp the momentous truth Crispus stood like one
enchanted to stone, silently staring at Vashti and her ring. To think
that his marriage with Berenice, the ugly black incubus that had so
long oppressed him, was the mere figment of his own imagination! that
the sweet Christian maiden, whom he had loved from the first hour of
seeing her, should be his wife, was a revelation so astounding that it
was no wonder that at first he could not give it credence.
Vashti gave a low, sweet laugh at his bewilderment.
“I am your wife, Crispus. Won’t you protect me?”
Protect her?
He put his arm about her waist--a dozen men could not have torn her
from his grasp!--and turned to face Berenice, who for the moment was
almost as much bewildered and amazed as Crispus himself.
“Prettily acted!” sneered she. “A scheme, artfully preconcerted, for
the purpose of robbing me of my slave. But it shall not succeed. That
Crispus wedded someone at Beth-tamar we must believe, since Cæsar
himself affirms it; but I require something more than this girl’s word,
ere I shall believe her to be the wife of Crispus.”
“I can confirm her statement,” said Josephus, intervening at this
point, “since it was I who conducted Vashti to Beth-tamar, and from
behind a curtain saw her wedded to the lord Crispus. And the woman who
attended Vashti during the ceremony was my mother, who is here present
to bear her testimony, if need be.”
“And in the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be
established, princess,” remarked Alexander.
Berenice though striving to maintain a calm exterior, was nevertheless
full of a secret rage at finding her intended victim slipping from her
hands.
“What if she be the wife of Crispus? She is none the less my slave.”
“What? Rob a Roman noble of his wife?” interjected Alexander. “O, too
bad!”
“At the time I made the gift I knew not that she was the wife of
Crispus,” remarked Titus, not at all displeased with the turn events
were taking.
“That matters not,” returned Berenice. “The gift, if made in due legal
form, as this was, can be revoked neither by you nor by a court of law.”
Crispus smiled pityingly at the baffled princess.
“I have here,” said he, drawing forth a papyrus-scroll, “a document
that bears a date long anterior to the time when Vashti was made a
slave, a document that threatens death to those who seek to take the
wife of Crispus from him. It bears the autograph signature of one
whose authority not even Titus Cæsar himself will venture to dispute,
for the signature is that of his august sire, Flavius Vespasian.”
“That is so,” observed Tiberius Alexander, who had drawn near, and was
inspecting the document, “and, therefore, it seems to me,” he added,
jocularly, “that both Cæsar and the princess, by enslaving the wife of
Crispus, have made themselves liable to the death penalty. Doubtless
Vespasian will pardon the offenders, as they acted in ignorance. At any
rate, Crispus is entitled to lead away his wife; and may good fortune
attend him! The bravest man in the war has obtained the fairest woman
for his bride; that is what I say, and who will controvert it?” he
added, looking round upon the guests.
“None! None!” was the answer that came from every side. Vashti’s
romantic story appealed to every heart, save _one_; even those ladies
who, a few minutes before, had been most opposed to her, now joined in
the acclamations that greeted the happy pair thus strangely reunited.
“Take me away,” whispered Vashti. “Anywhere, so that it be from here.”
Crispus responded to her appeal. Drawing her arm within his own, he
passed smilingly from the hall amid cries of “Long live the brave
Crispus and his fair bride!”
Miserable Berenice! Her bitterness of spirit at that moment received
but little balm from Titus’ gay whisper, “There is now no obstacle to
our union,” for she had known all along that the obstacle had never
existed save in his own imagination.
* * * * *
In the moonlit gardens of the Prætorium Crispus and Vashti, seated in
the very same spot where they had sat four years before, were holding a
delightful conversation.
Vashti was reclining within his embrace, her little hand resting
within his. The early Christians were very human!
“And to think that during all this time you have been my wife, and I
knew it not. Why did you not reveal the truth earlier?”
“Because, like yourself, I was bound to secrecy for three years.”
“But that time limit had gone by when I rescued you from Jerusalem.”
“True,” replied Vashti, the brightness of her face becoming dimmed for
a moment by that mournful reminiscence, “but was that a time to be
talking love and wedlock? I resolved to keep the secret till the siege
should be over.”
“I am not sure that you were right in doing so. The making it known
would have saved you from the hands of Berenice. Tell me, how has she
used you?”
“Not ill, though she would taunt me at times with your name, and
threaten to whip the Christianity out of me.”
“But why did you not set yourself free earlier, by sending me the ring?”
“Because she was always saying that she would give a grand
entertainment at which I should serve as a slave while you should look
helplessly on; she seemed to take such delight in the notion that I
resolved to await the coming of this feast; it would furnish me with
an excellent opportunity of asserting my freedom and of giving her a
startling surprise.”
“You have certainly succeeded in doing that, my little wife.”
“_Am_ I your wife, Crispus?” said Vashti gravely. “Was not that
ceremony at Beth-tamar somewhat heathenish in character?”
“You speak truth, dearest. We must have the blessing of the Church on
our union. To-morrow we will set out for Jerusalem, where the good
bishop Simeon shall join our hands.”
At this point a centurion made his appearance with a message to the
effect that Titus desired the presence of Crispus and his lady.
Responding, though with considerable reluctance, to this summons, the
two repaired to the Ivory Hall, where they found Titus seated beside
Berenice with Josephus standing near.
“Be seated, noble Crispus and the lady Vashti.”
Titus spoke with genuine affability; as for Berenice her disdainful air
showed that the presence or the absence of the pair was a matter alike
of indifference to her.
“I have asked Josephus,” began Titus, when the centurion had withdrawn,
leaving the five together, “to tell me the meaning of the strange
business at Beth-tamar. He is very urgent that you also should be
present to hear him. Hence my sending for you.”
With that he nodded to the priest as a sign for him to proceed.
“It may be, sire,” began Josephus, “that what I have to say will give
sharp offense to one of my hearers.” Crispus guessed that Berenice was
meant. “Therefore, ere I begin, I must receive assurance from you that
the utterance shall not bring punishment upon the utterer.”
“Say what thou wilt; abuse me, if it please thee; thy tongue shalt have
free license to-night.”
Assured thus, Josephus began.
“I have but lately returned, O Cæsar, from a visit to Pontus, where it
was my fortune to meet with Zeno, the secretary of the royal Polemo,
and seemingly a man well acquainted with the secrets of the late king.
It is partly from this Zeno, and partly from my own knowledge, that I
derive the materials for the story I am about to relate.”
At the mention of the names Polemo and Zeno, Berenice, who had
hitherto betrayed a languid indifference, began to appear as if keenly
interested.
“Many years ago--twenty-three, to give the exact number--the Princess
Berenice, then in her twentieth year, married Polemo, king of Pontus,
who, after two years, repudiated her, for a reason the princess herself
knows.”
Here Josephus ceased speaking, checked by Berenice’s haughty and
indignant stare.
“Is it necessary to bring _my_ name into your narration?”
“Absolutely necessary.”
“Then I will tell you the reason of our separation. He did not
repudiate me; I left him of my own free will, left him because, prior
to our marriage, he, himself a proselyte, promised that he would do all
in his power to bring the people of Pontus over to Judaism. He failed
to redeem his word, however--nay, he actively thwarted my attempts at
proselytism, and so I left him.”
“Was there not a daughter born of this marriage?”
Berenice’s eyes flashed fire.
“I see plainly that your object is to prejudice me in the eyes of Titus
by recalling a deed of long ago. What I did then I do not now regret.”
“That is a strange thing to say of infanticide.”
Berenice gave a cold hard laugh that caused Vashti to shiver.
“The exposure of infants is a custom so common among Romans that Titus
will scarcely regard it as a great crime.”
“But _our_ law, princess, regards it as murder.”
“And I regard my deed as a justifiable one, for in destroying the body
of the infant I saved its soul. Polemo, who had seceded from Judaism,
and had grown to hate both me and my religion, swore that he would
bring up the child in his own Hellenic faith, and would teach it to
hate the religion of its mother. I resolved to save it from such fate,
and took the only possible way--I exposed it one winter’s night among
the snowy crags of Hermon.”
Vashti gave a faint little gasp--inaudible to Berenice--and her heart
almost ceased its beating. Not even when coming home on that dreadful
night to find Arad gone forever did she feel more horror than she
felt at this moment. To learn that she was the daughter of a woman so
unnatural as to expose her own child to death! to learn that it was her
own mother who had been pursuing her with a malignant aim! to learn
that she was a member of that Herodian house that had never ceased
persecuting Christianity from its very beginning! to know that her
mother was at that very moment living in open sin with the destroyer
of her country!--all this rushed with her blood, nearly causing her to
shriek aloud.
Josephus continued his narration.
“The loss of the child--for he had loved it as the apple of his
eye--threw Polemo into a fever, which, so it seems to me, crazed his
brain, for it left him animated by one passion only--a desire to be
revenged upon the woman who had wronged him.”
“Thou liest,” interjected Berenice, “for in due course of time, he and
I, as all men can testify, grew to be great friends.”
“You were deceived, princess. He masked his hatred under a smiling
guise the more effectually to conceal his purpose. Now, mark the result
of your deed! It is true that it was decreed in the councils of the
Most High that the city and the temple should perish, but the Most High
makes use of human instruments to work out His decrees; and yours,
princess, has been the hand that has wrought the ruin of Israel.”
There was in Josephus’ manner something so solemn and convincing, that
all Berenice’s hauteur and defiance vanished, leaving her nearly as
pale and trembling as the daughter that was as yet unknown to her.
“How mean you?” she faltered.
“It was our common religion, so Polemo erroneously argued, that had
destroyed his child; he would therefore destroy our religion.
“Nothing was dearer to you, so you had once said to him, than the holy
city, and the holy temple; he resolved to bring destruction both upon
that city and upon that temple.
“How could he effect it?
“There was but one way; the Jewish people must be goaded into war, a
war in which their capital must sink in flames.
“This is the key to Polemo’s frequent visits to Judæa; to his
friendship with successive procurators--Felix, Festus, Albinus. With
these, however, he failed to effect his purpose, but at last in Florus
he found the tool he wanted. While you, princess, were on one side of
that procurator, winning him to acts of clemency, Polemo was on the
other, urging him to deeds of blood; all the provocative acts of Florus
were due to the secret, the wicked policy of the Pontic king.”
These words caused a deepening of Vashti’s horror. To think that she
was the daughter of a king so coldblooded as deliberately to plan the
extirpation of a whole nation, and all, so it seemed, on her account!
At this point Titus intervened.
“This secret history is doubtless interesting, but what hath it to do
with Beth-tamar?”
“I am coming to it, O Cæsar. It chanced in course of time that the
Princess Berenice met my lord Crispus at a banquet at Antioch and
became enamored of him.”
Berenice gave a scornful laugh; but the statement was true, and her
laugh deceived no one. “Polemo suspected this. Now, he had already in
mind selected the son of his friend, Cestius the Legate, to be his
successor in the sovereignty of Pontus, and it did not suit his policy
that Berenice should marry Crispus, and thus again wear the crown that
she had once despised. He therefore resolved to thwart her aim. While
thinking how he might best succeed in this matter, he happened to
pay a visit to Jerusalem, and there, by a singular turn of destiny,
he saw one day in the temple-courts a maiden who immediately arrested
his attention from the marvelous resemblance she bore to his mother
Pythodoris in her youthful days. Avoiding the maiden herself, he made
inquiries of others, and learned that her name was Vashti, and that she
was the ward of him who now addresses you. He sought me out with eager
questionings, and I was forced to admit that the supposed daughter
of Hyrcanus was in reality a foundling, nor were proofs wanting to
convince him beyond all doubt that in Vashti he had found his daughter
Athenaïs, long supposed by him to be dead.”
A strange sound broke from Berenice; amazement caused her figure
to stiffen into a rigid attitude; for a few moments she sat thus,
motionless and wordless; then slowly, mechanically, she turned her
head and looked at Vashti. And of all the looks that Vashti had ever
received none frightened her more than this; it was a look without a
trace of maternal love--cold, disdainful, cruel; a look that said,
as plainly as words could say, that she would never acknowledge the
Nazarene apostate as a daughter of hers.
“Polemo, for reasons of his own, did not make himself known to his
daughter. Whether he now had any affection for her whom, as a babe,
he had idolized, it is hard to say; one thing became clear to him; he
saw in the daughter an instrument for the humiliation of the mother.
If he could persuade Crispus to marry Vashti, and to keep the matter
hidden from the world, the fond, enamored Berenice would be pursuing
Crispus for months in the vain endeavor to win him to her arms, while
he--Polemo--could look on in malicious enjoyment, as knowing that her
wiles were foredoomed to failure.
“Such was Polemo’s reason for keeping the wedding a secret--a reason
unknown to me at the time; I have learned it since from Zeno. Vashti,
too, was required to keep the matter hidden, even from her adopted
mother, Miriam. Vashti, being my ward, was compelled to take for
her husband the man of my choice, and though she long resisted the
notion of wedding a heathen Roman, I overcame her scruples at last by
persuading her that her intended bridegroom was far more virtuous than
many a Jew. She therefore accompanied me by night to Beth-tamar, not
knowing that he who presided over these nuptials was her father, not
knowing his name even, nor that she had been destined by him to wear
the crown of a queen.
“All this was to come upon her later as a delightful surprise.
“My story is all but finished. It was Polemo’s intention to stand
beside Berenice either upon Mount Olivet when the temple was burning,
or at some palace window in Rome when the triumphal procession was
sweeping past, carrying the sacred spoils of the temple--to stand
beside her and to tell her in fierce, exultant tones that all this was
_his_ work; he would watch her agony; she was to be the victim of his
laughter, of his mockery, of his scorn!
“But this supreme and thrilling moment of revenge--this triumph that he
had so long worked for, was not to be his; he died ere the day of his
vengeance came.
“Cæsar, my tale is said.”
There was a long silence in that chamber after Josephus had finished
his narration.
Titus looked at Berenice as if desiring her to say something.
The breast of that princess was the seat of a wild tumult of contending
passions, but among them there was neither pity nor love for her newly
found daughter.
“It seems,” said she, with a superbly disdainful air, “it seems, if the
story of Josephus be true, that I am to be presented with a daughter,
but I care not for the gift. I should be a hypocrite were I to feign
love where love is not. No; I cast her away in infancy that thereby I
might save her soul; by becoming a Nazarene she has chosen to destroy
her soul; let her still remain a castaway. Let her keep to her own path
as I shall keep to mine. I have no daughter; that is my answer to her.”
Vashti was willing for reconcilement, but this cold repudiation kept
her dumb. With divine pity in her eyes, she looked at her mother, and
sighed.
Crispus made reply for her.
“Since such is your decision,” said he, “we will not seek to change it.
Cæsar, I salute you. Come, Vashti, let us be going.”
As the two arose to depart, Titus walked over to them, as if not
willing that Berenice should hear what he had to say.
“My sire, Vespasian, knowing that you have been disappointed in the
expectation of the crown of Pontus, has offered you the thing that is
most like it--namely, the governorship of that province. Its people
will be delighted when they know that the wife of the new governor is
the granddaughter of the good queen Pythodoris.”
But Crispus had little desire for the honor; he would be more happy
with Vashti in his beautiful villa among the Sabine hills than in
presiding over the destinies of the Pontic people. While thinking thus,
however, he received from Vashti a wistful glance which seemed to be
urging him to accept the post.
“What, Vashti? Ambitious that I should sit in a curule chair?”
“Yes,” whispered she, “for if Crispus be ruler of Pontus there will
always be _one_ safe asylum for Christians.”
“You speak wisely, little woman,” replied he; and, turning to Titus, he
said, “Cæsar, I accept the post with all thankfulness.”
Berenice watched the two as they quitted the Ivory Hall.
She never saw them again!
After a brief visit to Jerusalem, where bishop Simeon joined the
hands of the pair, Crispus, accompanied by his bride, set out for his
province of Pontus, there to begin a long administration, whose wisdom
and justice were to win golden opinions from all men.
* * * * *
And Berenice?
The Roman senate and the Roman people soon made short work of her dream
of an imperial throne! Their anger at the thought of a Jewish empress
was so fiercely expressed that Titus, albeit with all reluctance, was
compelled to banish her from his presence.[40]
Scorned by the Romans because she came of the Jewish people; scorned by
the Jewish people because she had allied herself with a Roman; branded
with deserved infamy by the poet Juvenal;[41] eating out her heart over
the ignominious ending of her splendid ambition, Berenice passed into
a state of obscurity and oblivion, History failing to record the time,
the place, or the manner of her death.
NOTES
1 The Talmud.
2 Told by the heathen Plutarch in his _Cessation of Oracles_.
3 Josephus.--_Vita_ 2.
4 Acts xxv. 16.
5 Greek Anthology.--I. 77.
6 Acts xxiii. 14.
7 Flaccus, pro-Consul of Asia, for example.--CICERO. _Pro Flacco._
8 The ancient usage in the Jerusalem synagogues of anathematizing
Christ and the Christians is said by some to have originated,
not with Simeon, but with his father Gamaliel, a statement
scarcely reconcilable with Acts v. 38.
9 A saying of Simeon’s, according to the Talmud.
10 The Talmud.
11 Jos.--_Bell. Jud._ vi. 5, 3. Tac.--_Hist._ v. 13. Luke xxi. 11.
12 Zech. xi. 1 was, according to the Talmud, referred by Johanan
ben Zacchai to this mysterious opening of the temple doors.
13 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ ii. 15.
14 At this point Florus disappears from history, and therefore from
these pages. It is not known what became of him.
15 Acts xxiii. 3.
16 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ ii. 17, 9.
17 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ v. 9, 4.
18 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ ii. 19, 7.
19 So writes Hegesippus, an historian almost contemporary with
Bishop Simeon.
20 Josephus actually applies the Messianic prophecies to
Vespasian!--_Bell. Jud._ vi. 5, 4.
21 Tacitus.--_Hist._ ii. 78.
22 Tacitus.--_Hist._ iv. 81.
23 _Lucem caliganti reddidit mundo_--“he restored light to a dark
world,” was said of Vespasian.--Jortin--_Eccles. Hist._ i. 4.
24 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ vi. 5, 3.
25 It is singular that Josephus, who has described the siege in such
detail, should have omitted the ceremony of the Evocation, which
must have taken place, unless the Romans departed from all
precedent.
26 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ v. 9, 4.
27 Eusebius.--_Hist. Eccles._ iii. 12.
28 More than £5,000 in English currency.
29 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ v. 12.
30 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ v. 13, 7.
31 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ v. 31, 1.
32 Sulpicius Severus (Chron. xxx. 11), who is believed by competent
critics to be quoting from a lost portion of the History of Tacitus.
33 Josephus.--_Bell. Jud._ vi. 4, 3.
34 Dean Milman.--_Hist. of Jews._ Book xvi.
35 The Talmud.
36 Such is the statement of Epiphanius.
37 Such appears to be the belief of Renan.--_Antichrist_, xix.
38 Unfortunately for Crispus’ hopes, Domitian, on his accession, put
Flavius Clemens to death. The fate of the two sons is unknown.
39 This history, _De Judæis_, has unfortunately, not come down to us.
40 “Berenicem ab urbe dimisit invitus invitam.”--_Suet. in Tit._ vii.
41 _Satire_ vi. 156.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE:
Punctuation errors and printing mistakes such as obviously missing
letters have been silently fixed.
The following alterations have been made:
Chapter III: women to woman
Chapter IV: Jersusalem to Jerusalem
Chapter VI: Sicarri to Sicarii
Chapter XVIII: _enciente_ to _enceinte_
In the following passage the two *indicated* words were illegible,
transcriber’s best judgment has been applied:
Chapter V: (...) A Roman basilica presented an appearance very
similar to that of a modern parish church, consisting as it did of
a nave, and two aisles divided from it by a row of columns. At one
end a portion, elevated like a daïs and railed off like a chancel,
formed the _bema_ (the word had passed from the Greek into *the*
Syro-Chaldaic) or tribunal, where the judges sat *and* orators
pleaded.