THE BANKRUPT
Somewhat subdued, the man in scarlet walked through the night in the
City of David. After his first sensations he was discomfited.
"Now this is what comes of the irregular barbarity in Judean
executions," he ruminated. "In Rome this Nazarene would have been
despatched in order and his body borne away to the puticuli and no
opportunity given for that painful scene outside. Doubtless I should
have convinced the young man and borrowed his gold of him, by this
time. Certainly, Fortune is a haughty jade when once offended. But I
shall be fortunate again; by all the gods, Jewish or Gentile, I will
compel her smiles!
"It would be my luck never to see him again; he will probably linger
only to see this dead man buried, and go on to En-Gadi, as he said he
would. It would hardly be seemly to approach him about his gold, in
his unhappiness, or I would waylay him, yet. A pest on the zealots!
Why did they not hold off this stoning for a day?"
Moodily occupied by his thoughts, he passed unconscious of the careless
people about him. The huge tower of Antonia set on the brink of Mount
Moriah frowned blackly over the street and in its shadow the idle life
of the night laughed and reveled and sauntered. The woman of the city
was there, the Roman soldier in armor, the alien that bowed to Brahm or
Bel, the son of the slow Nile, of the Orontes and of the yellow Tiber.
It was not the resort of the lowest classes, but of those that were at
variance with the spirit of the city, or the times and their
philosophies. Light streamed from open doorways, the wail of lyres and
the jingle of castanets resounded within and without. Now and then
belated carters, driving slow donkeys, would plod through the
revelry--a note of relentless duty which would not be forgotten.
Again, humbler folk would retreat into wagon-ways or hug the walls to
permit the passage of a Sadducee and his retinue, or a decurion and his
squad--rank and power asserting their inexorable prerogative.
Presently there approached the click of hoofs upon flagging. A
soldier, passing through a broad shaft of light from a booth, stopped
short, drew himself up and swung his short sword at present. Up the
street, from lip to lip of every arms-bearing man, ran his abrupt call
to attention.
A body of legionaries appeared suddenly in the ray of light--brassy
shapes in burnished armor, picked for stature and bearing. Not even
the plunge into blackness again broke the precision and confidence of
that tread before which the world had fled as did now the mule-riders
and the pedestrians of Jerusalem.
After them, the beam of light projected two horsemen into sudden view.
There was the rattle and ring of saluting soldiers by the way. The
radiance showed up a typical Roman in the armor of a general, but in
deference to Israelitish prejudice against images, the eagle was
removed from his helmet, the bosses of Titan heads from breastplate and
harness. This was Vitellius, Proconsul of Syria and the shrewdest
general on Caesar's list. By his side rode Herrenius Capito, Caesar's
debt-collector, a thin-faced Roman in civilian dress, and with the
ashes of age sprinkled on his hair.
The man in scarlet took one glance at the gray old countenance frowning
under the sudden light of the lamp and slid into the obscurity of an
open alley at hand. He did not emerge till the hoof-beats had died
away.
"So thou comest in search of me, sweet Capito," he muttered, "and I am
penniless. But it is comforting to know that thou hast no more hope of
getting the three hundred thousand drachmae which I owe to Caesar, than I
have of paying it!"
After a little silence, he said further to himself, with added regret:
"Now, had I that young Essene's gold, Capito would not find me in
Jerusalem! O Alexandria! I must reach thee, though I turn dolphin and
swim!"
He continued on his way to the north wall, where he found exit
presently into Bezetha, the unwalled suburb of Jerusalem. Here the
houses were comparatively new, less historic, less pretentious than
those in the old city. Here were inns in plenty, relaxed order and a
general absence of the racial characteristics and the influence of
religion. The middle classes of Jerusalem dwelt here.
It was dark, poorly paved, and the man in scarlet laid his hand on his
purse under his tunic and walked with circumspection toward a khan. It
was no surprise to him to hear the sounds of struggle and outcry. He
stopped to catch the direction of the conflict that he might avoid it.
It came out of a street so narrow, in a district so squalid, that
happiness seemed to have fled the spot. If ever the wealthy entered
the place, it was to seek out human beings hungry enough to sell
themselves as slaves.
The commotion centered before a hovel, a tragedy in sounds, ghastly
because the night made it unembodied. The man in scarlet located it as
out of his path and would have continued but for the insistent screams
of a woman in the struggle. Harsh shouts attempted to cry her down,
but desperation lent her strength and the suburb shuddered with her mad
cries.
The man in scarlet lagged, shook his shoulders as if to throw off the
influence of the appeal and finally stopped. At that moment several
torches of pitch, lighted at once, threw a smoky light over the scene.
The passage was obstructed by a group of men uniformly dressed, and
several spectators attracted by the commotion. Assured that this was
arrest and not violence, the curiosity of the man in scarlet drew him
that way. At a nearer view, he saw that the aggressors were Shoterim
or Temple lictors, under command of a Pharisee wearing the habiliments
of a rabbi. The man in scarlet identified him as the referee in the
center of the ring about the stoning. The sudden lighting of the
torches convinced him that the attack had its inception in secret.
In the center of the fight was a middle-aged woman clinging desperately
about the bodies of a young man and a young woman. It was the efforts
of the Shoterim to tear her away and her resistance that had made the
arrest violent.
Shouts and revilings told the man in scarlet the meaning of the
disturbance. The ferrets of the High Priest, Jonathan, had discovered
a house of Nazarenes and were taking them.
"More ill-timed zeal!" he muttered to himself. "Or let me be exact:
more bloody politics!"
He had turned to leave when a figure in white, directed from the city,
drove past him and through to the center of the crowd, with the
irresistible force of a hurled stone. Spectators fell to the right and
left before it and the man in scarlet drawing in a breath of amazement
turned to see what the light had to disclose.
It was the young Essene, hardly recognizable for the distortion of
deadly hate and passion on his face. There were dark stains on his
garments and dust on his black hair. Every drop of blood had left his
cheeks, but his eyes blazed with a light that was not good to see.
He went straight at the Pharisee. His grasp fell upon Saul's shoulder,
drove in and seized upon its sinews. The startled Tarsian turned and
the young Essene with bent head gazed grimly down at him. An
interested silence fell over both captor and captive. The blaze in the
young man's eyes reddened and flickered.
"I have been seeking thee, Saul of Tarsus," he said in a voice of
deadly silkiness. "Thou hast been most zealous for the Law in
Stephen's case. Look to it that thou fail not in the Law, for I shall
profit by thy precept! And even as Stephen fell, so shalt thou fall;
even as Stephen came unto death, so shalt thou come! Mark me, and
remember!"
The words were menace made audible; it was more than a threat: it was
prophecy and doom.
A tingle of admiration ran over the man in scarlet. He who could leave
the bier of a murdered friend to visit vengeance on the head of the
murderer was no weakling.
"A Roman, by the gods!" he exclaimed to himself. "A noble adversary! a
man, by Bacchus!"
A threatening murmur arose from the spectators. But there was no
responsive fury kindled in Saul's eyes. Instead he looked at Marsyas
with unutterable sorrow on his face. Presently his shoulders lifted
with a sigh.
"The city festereth with Nazarenes as a wound with thorns," he said to
himself; aloud he called, "Joel."
The Levite materialized out of obscurity and bowed jerkily.
"Bear witness to this young man's behavior. Lictors, take him. We
shall hold him for examination as a Nazarene and an apostate."
Marsyas started and his hand dropped. Plainly, he had not expected to
be accused of apostasy. But the old mood asserted itself.
"This for thy slander of Stephen in the college," he said with
premonitory calm when the Levite approached him, and struck with
terrific force. The Levite's body shot backward and dropped heavily on
the earth. The rest of the lictors precipitated themselves upon the
young man, and, in desperation and in fury, the one man and the numbers
fought.
Meanwhile the man in scarlet thought fast. His Roman love of defiance
and war had roused in him a most compelling respect for the young
Essene, but cupidity put forth swift and convincing argument even
beyond the indorsement of admiration. If the Shoterim took the young
man in ward, he would be executed and the treasure come into the hands
of the state for disposition. In view of the fact that Herrenius
Capito had traced the bankrupt to Jerusalem, Jerusalem was no longer
tenantable for the bankrupt. He had to have money to escape to
Alexandria and the Essene was too profitable a chance to be lost to the
murdering hands of fanatics.
Excited and bent only on preventing the arrest, the man sprang into the
crowd and forced his way to the Essene's side. But the next instant he
also was sent reeling by a blow delivered by Marsyas in his blind
resolution not to be taken without difficulty. Before the bankrupt
could recover, the united force of spectators and lictors flung itself
upon Marsyas.
Steadying himself, the man in scarlet urged his bruised brain to think.
Half of his life for a ruse! for nothing but a ruse could save the
young man, now.
Then, with a half-suppressed cry of eagerness, the bankrupt took to his
heels and ran toward the city as only an Arab trained in Roman gymnasia
could run.
The sentry at the gate passed him and he entered on the marble
pavements of the streets for the finest exhibition of speed he had
shown since he had carried off the laurel in Rome. He knew the city as
a hare knows its runways. He cut through private passages, circled
watchful constabulary, eluded congestions, and took the quick slopes of
Jerusalem's hills as though the deep lungs of a youth supplied him.
When the broad, marble-paved street, which let in some glimpse of the
starry sky upon the passer, opened between the rich residences of the
Sadducees, the white luster of many burning torches lighted an area on
a distant slope at its head. The running man sped on, taking the rise
of Mount Zion without slackening, until he rushed upon a sentry
obscured under the brooding shadow of a heavy wall.
"Halt!" The challenge of the sentry brought him up.
"Without the password, comrade," he panted. "Call the officer of the
guard. And by our common quarrels in Rome do thou haste, for if I see
not Vitellius and Herrenius Capito this instant I expire!"
The cry of the sentry passed from post to post until the centurion of
the guard emerged from a small gate.
"One cometh without the countersign," the sentry said.
"A visitor for Vitellius and Herrenius Capito," the bankrupt explained.
"The general and his guest have retired," was the blunt reply.
"Hip! but thou art the same glib liar thou always wast, Aulus," the
bankrupt laughed. "Take me into the light, and slap me with thy sword
if I am frank beyond the privileges of mine acquaintance with thee!"
The gate-keeper, in response to a short word from the dubious Aulus,
let down the chains with a rattle and a small side portal swung in,
revealing an interior of semi-dusk.
The centurion conducted his visitor within. Torches stuck in sconces
high up in the walls lighted a quadrangle of tessellated pavement,
terminating distantly in banks of marble stairs of such breadth and
stature that their limits were lost in the unilluminated night.
After a quick glance, the centurion started and slapped his helmet in
salute to the bankrupt. The other responded with a skill and grace
that could not have been assumed for the moment. The dexterity of the
camp was written in the movement.
"I am expected of Capito," the bankrupt said, which was true only in a
very limited sense.
"I know, and do thou follow. Thou shalt see him. Were he dead and
inurned he would arise to thee."
The man in scarlet smiled a little grimly and followed his conductor
out of the light up the marble heights of stairs duly set with
sentinels, to a porch that even the Royal Colonnade of the Temple could
not shame. A huge cresset with a jeweled hood, depending from a
groining so high that its light was feeble, showed dimly the giant
compound arch of the portal. An orderly, a veritable pygmy within the
outline of the dark entrance, appeared and saluted.
"A visitor for the proconsul and his guest," the centurion said,
passing the man in scarlet to the orderly.
He was led through a valve groaning on its granite hinges into the
vestibule of Herod the Great's palace.
It was a lofty hall, nobly vaulted, lined with costly Indian onyx and
florid with pagan friezes, arabesques and frescoes. Yet, though its
jeweled lamps were dark and cold, its fountains still, its hangings and
its carpets gone, its bloody genius held despotic sway from a shadowy
throne, over the note of brute force which the Roman garrison had
infused into it.
At the far end was a small carven table at which two Romans sat, a lamp
and a crater of wine at their elbows, the tesserae of a dice-game
between them.
Without waiting for the orderly to speak, the man in scarlet stepped
forward.
"Greeting, Vitellius. Capito, I salute you," he said. His voice was
that of a composed man speaking with equals.
Vitellius turned his head toward the speaker; Capito drew up his lids
and his lower jaw relaxed. Slowly then both men got upon their feet.
"By the bats of Hades--" Vitellius began.
"By the nymphs of Delphi!" Capito's aged falsetto broke in. "It is the
Herod himself!"
"Herod Agrippa!" Vitellius exclaimed.
"From the faces of you," Agrippa declared, "I might have been the shade
of my grandsire. But I have been hunting you. I need help. And as
thou hopest to return three hundred thousand drachmae to Caesar from my
purse, do thou aid me in urging Vitellius to yield it, Capito."
"Help," Capito repeated.
"What manner of help?" Vitellius demanded, fixing Agrippa with a
suspicious eye.
"Arrest me an Essene from the hands of Jonathan."
"Jonathan!" the proconsul exclaimed darkly.
"The High Priest, the Nasi, thy sweet and valued friend!" the Agrippa
explained with amiable provoke. "He has arrested an Essene on a
trifling charge of apostasy and he is my voucher before the Essenic
brotherhood for a loan to repay Caesar. I left him in the hands of the
Shoterim, in Bezetha. If he be not speedily rescued, they will stone
him without the walls to-morrow and my debt to Caesar--" he drew up his
shoulders and spread out his hands in a gesture highly Jewish.
Capito frowned and Vitellius glowered under his grizzled brow at
Agrippa.
"It is one to me," Agrippa continued coolly, as he noted signs of
dissent in the contemplation. "I am just as happy and as like to
escape Caesar's displeasure by failing to pay it, as thou wilt be,
Capito, if thou failest to collect it."
Capito nervously fingered the tesserae at his hand.
"Meanwhile," added the Herod, perching himself on the edge of the
table, "the youth proceeds to Jonathan's stronghold."
Vitellius looked at Caesar's debt-collector. "Dost thou see anything
more in this than appears on the face of it?" he asked.
Capito scratched his white head. He had learned to look for ulterior
motives in every move of this slippery Herod, but he was too little
informed in the matter to see more than the surface.
"We--can look into it, first," he opined.
"Jonathan will not await your pleasure," Agrippa put in. "He is
hurried now with the responsibility of executing enough blasphemers to
save himself popular favor. The Sanhedrim may sit to-morrow, the
prisoner come for trial and be executed--even more expeditiously
because the Nasi expects thee to interfere, Vitellius."
The proconsul bit through an expletive. Jonathan was a thorn in his
side.
"What is it you wish me to do?" he demanded.
"Arrest me this youth. The claim of the proconsul's charge will take
precedence over the hieratic."
"But he has not offended--"
"Save the protest; he has; he struck me, a Roman citizen. But draw up
the warrant, good Vitellius, and send a centurion after the young man.
Thou canst make no error by so doing and thou canst save Capito the
favor of his emperor."
Vitellius summoned a clerk and while the warrant for Marsyas' arrest
was written, despatched an orderly for an officer. One of the
contubernalis to Vitellius, or one of the sons of a noble family
serving his apprenticeship in warfare, appeared.
"Take four," Vitellius said grimly, in compliance with Herod's demand,
when the young centurion approached, "and go with this man. Arrest by
superior claim the High Priest's prisoner, who shall be pointed out.
Fetch him and this man back to me!"
The young centurion saluted and Agrippa assented with a nod.
"Thanks," he added nonchalantly. "Come, brother," he said to the young
officer, "if we be late it may take the whole machinery of Rome to undo
the work of Jonathan."
Agrippa and the Roman legionaries passed out of the Praetorium and
turned directly up the slanting street toward the palace of Jonathan,
which stood a little above the camp.
The Herod had lost little time and the progress of the arresting party
toward the stronghold would not have been rapid with the resistance of
Marsyas and the friends of the Nazarenes to retard the movement. After
a quick walk of a short distance, the Roman group came upon the
Temple's emissaries, entering from an intersecting street.
Saul and Joel walked a little ahead of the broken-spirited prisoners
who were centered in a group of armed lictors and a hooting escort of
half a hundred vagrants. The flaring torch-light shone down on bowed
heads and disordered garments, and showed fugitive glints of manacles
and knives.
Among them, unbroken and silent, was Marsyas, heavily shackled. He was
marked with blows, but several besides the Levite Joel staggered as
they walked, and Agrippa, lifting himself on tiptoe to point out his
prisoner to the centurion, eyed the young man with approval.
The officer nodded abruptly and broke through the crowd. The light
dropping on his shining armor instantly displayed his authority to halt
the group. His command to stop elicited almost precipitate obedience.
The hooting vagrants scattered.
The centurion laid his hand on Marsyas' shoulder.
"Thou art a prisoner of the proconsul," he said.
The halt and the dismayed silence caught Saul's attention. He turned
back and pushed his way into the center of the circle.
"Unhand him," he said to the centurion. "He is wanted of the
Sanhedrim."
The young officer smiled derisively and thrust off the hold of the
apprehensive lictors. The four made way through the crowd and the
officer passed Marsyas into their hands.
"Make my excuses to the Sanhedrim," the officer said sarcastically.
The Pharisee glanced over the Roman's party. Then he stepped without
ostentation in the centurion's way--a weak, small figure in fringes and
phylactery, living up to his nature as he fronted brassy Rome.
"Show me thy warrant," he said quietly.
The centurion drew forth the parchment and flourished it. Saul took it
with a murmured courtesy, and, holding it near a torch, read it
carefully. Then he passed it back.
"After the proconsul hath done with this young man," he observed, "the
Sanhedrim will claim him. Say this much to the proconsul. We shall
wait. Peace!"
He motioned his party to proceed and the crowd moved on, leaving
Marsyas in the hands of new captors.
"Back to the Praetorium," the centurion said to Agrippa.