CHAPTER XVII

Up a little way from the dower there was a cluster of palms, which

threw its shade half in the water, half on the land. A bulbul sang from

the branches a song of invitation. Ben-Hur stopped beneath to listen.

At any other time the notes of the bird would have driven thought away;

but the story of the Egyptian was a burden of wonder, and he was a

laborer carrying it, and, like other laborers, there was to him no

music in the sweetest music until mind and body were happily attuned by

rest.

The night was quiet. Not a ripple broke upon the shore. The old stars

of the old East were all out, each in its accustomed place; and there

was summer everywhere—on land, on lake, in the sky.

Ben-Hur’s imagination was heated, his feelings aroused, his will all

unsettled.

So the palms, the sky, the air, seemed to him of the far south zone

into which Balthasar had been driven by despair for men; the lake, with

its motionless surface, was a suggestion of the Nilotic mother by which

the good man stood praying when the Spirit made its radiant appearance.

Had all these accessories of the miracle come to Ben-Hur? or had he

been transferred to them? And what if the miracle should be

repeated—and to him? He feared, yet wished, and even waited for the

vision. When at last his feverish mood was cooled, permitting him to

become himself, he was able to think.

His scheme of life has been explained. In all reflection about it

heretofore there had been one hiatus which he had not been able to

bridge or fill up—one so broad he could see but vaguely to the other

side of it. When, finally, he was graduated a captain as well as a

soldier, to what object should he address his efforts? Revolution he

contemplated, of course; but the processes of revolution have always

been the same, and to lead men into them there have always been

required, first, a cause or presence to enlist adherents; second, an

end, or something as a practical achievement. As a rule he fights well

who has wrongs to redress; but vastly better fights he who, with wrongs

as a spur, has also steadily before him a glorious result in prospect—a

result in which he can discern balm for wounds, compensation for valor,

remembrance and gratitude in the event of death.

To determine the sufficiency of either the cause or the end, it was

needful that Ben-Hur should study the adherents to whom he looked when

all was ready for action. Very naturally, they were his countrymen. The

wrongs of Israel were to every son of Abraham, and each one was a cause

vastly holy, vastly inspiring.

Ay, the cause was there; but the end—what should it be?

The hours and days he had given this branch of his scheme were past

calculation—all with the same conclusion—a dim, uncertain, general idea

of national liberty. Was it sufficient? He could not say no, for that

would have been the death of his hope; he shrank from saying yes,

because his judgment taught him better. He could not assure himself

even that Israel was able single-handed to successfully combat Rome. He

knew the resources of that great enemy; he knew her art was superior to

her resources. A universal alliance might suffice, but, alas! that was

impossible, except—and upon the exception how long and earnestly he had

dwelt!—except a hero would come from one of the suffering nations, and

by martial successes accomplish a renown to fill the whole earth. What

glory to Judea could she prove the Macedonia of the new Alexander!

Alas, again! Under the rabbis valor was possible, but not discipline.

And then the taunt of Messala in the garden of Herod—“All you conquer

in the six days, you lose on the seventh.”

So it happened he never approached the chasm thinking to surmount it,

but he was beaten back; and so incessantly had he failed in the object

that he had about given it over, except as a thing of chance. The hero

might be discovered in his day, or he might not. God only knew. Such

his state of mind, there need be no lingering upon the effect of

Malluch’s skeleton recital of the story of Balthasar. He heard it with

a bewildering satisfaction—a feeling that here was the solution of the

trouble—here was the requisite hero found at last; and he a son of the

Lion tribe, and King of the Jews! Behind the hero, lo! the world in

arms.

The king implied a kingdom; he was to be a warrior glorious as David, a

ruler wise and magnificent as Solomon; the kingdom was to be a power

against which Rome was to dash itself to pieces. There would be

colossal war, and the agonies of death and birth—then peace, meaning,

of course, Judean dominion forever.

Ben-Hur’s heart beat hard as for an instant he had a vision of

Jerusalem the capital of the world, and Zion, the site of the throne of

the Universal Master.

It seemed to the enthusiast rare fortune that the man who had seen the

king was at the tent to which he was going. He could see him there, and

hear him, and learn of him what all he knew of the coming change,

especially all he knew of the time of its happening. If it were at

hand, the campaign with Maxentius should be abandoned; and he would go

and set about organizing and arming the tribes, that Israel might be

ready when the great day of the restoration began to break.

Now, as we have seen, from Balthasar himself Ben-Hur had the marvelous

story. Was he satisfied?

There was a shadow upon him deeper than that of the cluster of

palms—the shadow of a great uncertainty, which—take note, O reader!

which pertained more to the kingdom than the king.

“What of this kingdom? And what is it to be?” Ben-Hur asked himself in

thought.

Thus early arose the questions which were to follow the Child to his

end, and survive him on earth—incomprehensible in his day, a dispute in

this—an enigma to all who do not or cannot understand that every man is

two in one—a deathless Soul and a mortal Body.

“What is it to be?” he asked.

For us, O reader, the Child himself has answered; but for Ben-Hur there

were only the words of Balthasar, “On the earth, yet not of it—not for

men, but for their souls—a dominion, nevertheless, of unimaginable

glory.”

What wonder the hapless youth found the phrases but the darkening of a

riddle?

“The hand of man is not in it,” he said, despairingly. “Nor has the

king of such a kingdom use for men; neither toilers, nor councillors,

nor soldiers. The earth must die or be made anew, and for government

new principles must be discovered—something besides armed

hands—something in place of Force. But what?”

Again, O reader!

That which we will not see, he could not. The power there is in Love

had not yet occurred to any man; much less had one come saying directly

that for government and its objects—peace and order—Love is better and

mightier than Force.

In the midst of his reverie a hand was laid upon his shoulder.

“I have a word to say, O son of Arrius,” said Ilderim, stopping by his

side—“a word, and then I must return, for the night is going.”

“I give you welcome, sheik.”

“As to the things you have heard but now,” said Ilderim, almost without

pause, “take in belief all save that relating to the kind of kingdom

the Child will set up when he comes; as to so much keep virgin mind

until you hear Simonides the merchant—a good man here in Antioch, to

whom I will make you known. The Egyptian gives you coinage of his

dreams which are too good for the earth; Simonides is wiser; he will

ring you the sayings of your prophets, giving book and page, so you

cannot deny that the Child will be King of the Jews in fact—ay, by the

splendor of God! a king as Herod was, only better and far more

magnificent. And then, see you, we will taste the sweetness of

vengeance. I have said. Peace to you!”

“Stay—sheik!”

If Ilderim heard his call, he did not stay.

“Simonides again!” said Ben-Hur, bitterly. “Simonides here, Simonides

there; from this one now, then from that! I am like to be well ridden

by my father’s servant, who knows at least to hold fast that which is

mine; wherefore he is richer, if indeed he be not wiser, than the

Egyptian. By the covenant! it is not to the faithless a man should go

to find a faith to keep—and I will not. But, hark! singing—and the

voice a woman’s—or an angel’s! It comes this way.”

Down the lake towards the dower came a woman singing. Her voice floated

along the hushed water melodious as a flute, and louder growing each

instant. Directly the dipping of oars was heard in slow measure; a

little later the words were distinguishable—words in purest Greek, best

fitted of all the tongues of the day for the expression of passionate

grief.

THE LAMENT.

(Egyptian.)

I sigh as I sing for the story land

Across the Syrian sea.

The odorous winds from the musky sand

Were breaths of life to me.

They play with the plumes of the whispering palm

For me, alas! no more;

Nor more does the Nile in the moonlit calm

Moan past the Memphian shore.

O Nilus! thou god of my fainting soul!

In dreams thou comest to me;

And, dreaming, I play with the lotus bowl,

And sing old songs to thee;

And hear from afar the Memnonian strain,

And calls from dear Simbel;

And wake to a passion of grief and pain

That e’er I said—Farewell!

At the conclusion of the song the singer was past the cluster of palms.

The last word—farewell—floated past Ben-Hur weighted with all the sweet

sorrow of parting. The passing of the boat was as the passing of a

deeper shadow into the deeper night.

Ben-Hur drew a long breath hardly distinguishable from a sigh.

“I know her by the song—the daughter of Balthasar. How beautiful it

was! And how beautiful is she!”

He recalled her large eyes curtained slightly by the drooping lids, the

cheeks oval and rosy rich, the lips full and deep with dimpling in the

corners, and all the grace of the tall lithe figure.

“How beautiful she is!” he repeated.

And his heart made answer by a quickening of its movement.

Then, almost the same instant, another face, younger and quite as

beautiful—more childlike and tender, if not so passionate—appeared as

if held up to him out of the lake.

“Esther!” he said, smiling. “As I wished, a star has been sent to me.”

He turned, and passed slowly back to the tent.

His life had been crowded with griefs and with vengeful

preparations—too much crowded for love. Was this the beginning of a

happy change?

And if the influence went with him into the tent, whose was it? Esther

had given him a cup. So had the Egyptian. And both had come to him at

the same time under the palms.

Which?

BOOK FIFTH

“Only the actions of the just

Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.”

SHIRLEY.

“And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law,

In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw.”

WORDSWORTH.

CHAPTER I

The morning after the bacchanalia in the saloon of the palace, the

divan was covered with young patricians. Maxentius might come, and the

city throng to receive him; the legion might descend from Mount Sulpius

in glory of arms and armor; from Nymphaeum to Omphalus there might be

ceremonial splendors to shame the most notable ever before seen or

heard of in the gorgeous East; yet would the many continue to sleep

ignominiously on the divan where they had fallen or been carelessly

tumbled by the indifferent slaves; that they would be able to take part

in the reception that day was about as possible as for the lay-figures

in the studio of a modern artist to rise and go bonneted and plumed

through the one, two, three of a waltz.

Not all, however, who participated in the orgy were in the shameful

condition. When dawn began to peer through the skylights of the saloon,

Messala arose, and took the chaplet from his head, in sign that the

revel was at end; then he gathered his robe about him, gave a last look

at the scene, and, without a word, departed for his quarters. Cicero

could not have retired with more gravity from a night-long senatorial

debate.

Three hours afterwards two couriers entered his room, and from his own

hand received each a despatch, sealed and in duplicate, and consisting

chiefly of a letter to Valerius Gratus, the procurator, still resident

in Cæsarea. The importance attached to the speedy and certain delivery

of the paper may be inferred. One courier was to proceed overland, the

other by sea; both were to make the utmost haste.

It is of great concern now that the reader should be fully informed of

the contents of the letter thus forwarded, and it is accordingly given:

“ANTIOCH, XII. Kal. Jul.

“Messala to Gratus.

“O my Midas!

“I pray thou take no offense at the address, seeing it is one of love

and gratitude, and an admission that thou art most fortunate among men;

seeing, also, that thy ears are as they were derived from thy mother,

only proportionate to thy matured condition.

“O my Midas!

“I have to relate to thee an astonishing event, which, though as yet

somewhat in the field of conjecture, will, I doubt not, justify thy

instant consideration.

“Allow me first to revive thy recollection. Remember, a good many years

ago, a family of a prince of Jerusalem, incredibly ancient and vastly

rich—by name Ben-Hur. If thy memory have a limp or ailment of any kind,

there is, if I mistake not, a wound on thy head which may help thee to

a revival of the circumstance.

“Next, to arouse thy interest. In punishment of the attempt upon thy

life—for dear repose of conscience, may all the gods forbid it should

ever prove to have been an accident!—the family were seized and

summarily disposed of, and their property confiscated. And inasmuch, O

my Midas! as the action had the approval of our Cæsar, who was as just

as he was wise—be there flowers upon his altars forever!—there should

be no shame in referring to the sums which were realized to us

respectively from that source, for which it is not possible I can ever

cease to be grateful to thee, certainly not while I continue, as at

present, in the uninterrupted enjoyment of the part which fell to me.

“In vindication of thy wisdom—a quality for which, as I am now advised,

the son of Gordius, to whom I have boldly likened thee, was never

distinguished among men or gods—I recall further that thou didst make

disposition of the family of Hur, both of us at the time supposing the

plan hit upon to be the most effective possible for the purposes in

view, which were silence and delivery over to inevitable but natural

death. Thou wilt remember what thou didst with the mother and sister of

the malefactor; yet, if now I yield to a desire to learn whether they

be living or dead, I know, from knowing the amiability of thy nature, O

my Gratus, that thou wilt pardon me as one scarcely less amiable than

thyself.

“As more immediately essential to the present business, however, I take

the liberty of inviting to thy remembrance that the actual criminal was

sent to the galleys a slave for life—so the precept ran; and it may

serve to make the event which I am about to relate the more astonishing

by saying here that I saw and read the receipt for his body delivered

in course to the tribune commanding a galley.

“Thou mayst begin now to give me more especial heed, O my most

excellent Phrygian!

“Referring to the limit of life at the oar, the outlaw thus justly

disposed of should be dead, or, better speaking, some one of the three

thousand Oceanides should have taken him to husband at least five years

ago. And if thou wilt excuse a momentary weakness, O most virtuous and

tender of men! inasmuch as I loved him in childhood, and also because

he was very handsome—I used in much admiration to call him my

Ganymede—he ought in right to have fallen into the arms of the most

beautiful daughter of the family. Of opinion, however, that he was

certainly dead, I have lived quite five years in calm and innocent

enjoyment of the fortune for which I am in a degree indebted to him. I

make the admission of indebtedness without intending it to diminish my

obligation to thee.

“Now I am at the very point of interest.

“Last night, while acting as master of the feast for a party just from

Rome—their extreme youth and inexperience appealed to my compassion—I

heard a singular story. Maxentius, the consul, as you know, comes

to-day to conduct a campaign against the Parthians. Of the ambitious

who are to accompany him there is one, a son of the late duumvir

Quintus Arrius. I had occasion to inquire about him particularly. When

Arrius set out in pursuit of the pirates, whose defeat gained him his

final honors, he had no family; when he returned from the expedition,

he brought back with him an heir. Now be thou composed as becomes the

owner of so many talents in ready sestertii! The son and heir of whom I

speak is he whom thou didst send to the galleys—the very Ben-Hur who

should have died at his oar five years ago—returned now with fortune

and rank, and possibly as a Roman citizen, to— Well, thou art too

firmly seated to be alarmed, but I, O my Midas! I am in danger—no need

to tell thee of what. Who should know, if thou dost not?

“Sayst thou to all this, tut-tut?

“When Arrius, the father, by adoption, of this apparition from the arms

of the most beautiful of the Oceanides (see above my opinion of what

she should be), joined battle with the pirates, his vessel was sunk,

and but two of all her crew escaped drowning—Arrius himself and this

one, his heir.

“The officers who took them from the plank on which they were floating

say the associate of the fortunate tribune was a young man who, when

lifted to the deck, was in the dress of a galley slave.

“This should be convincing, to say least; but lest thou say tut-tut

again, I tell thee, O my Midas! that yesterday, by good chance—I have a

vow to Fortune in consequence—I met the mysterious son of Arrius face

to face; and I declare now that, though I did not then recognize him,

he is the very Ben-Hur who was for years my playmate; the very Ben-Hur

who, if he be a man, though of the commonest grade, must this very

moment of my writing be thinking of vengeance—for so would I were I

he—vengeance not to be satisfied short of life; vengeance for country,

mother, sister, self, and—I say it last, though thou mayst think it

would be first—for fortune lost.

“By this time, O good my benefactor and friend! my Gratus! in

consideration of thy sestertii in peril, their loss being the worst

which could befall one of thy high estate—I quit calling thee after the

foolish old King of Phrygia—by this time, I say (meaning after having

read me so far), I have faith to believe thou hast ceased saying

tut-tut, and art ready to think what ought to be done in such

emergency.

“It were vulgar to ask thee now what shall be done. Rather let me say I

am thy client; or, better yet, thou art my Ulysses whose part it is to

give me sound direction.

“And I please myself thinking I see thee when this letter is put into

thy hand. I see thee read it once; thy countenance all gravity, and

then again with a smile; then, hesitation ended, and thy judgment

formed, it is this, or it is that; wisdom like Mercury’s, promptitude

like Cæsar’s.

“The sun is now fairly risen. An hour hence two messengers will depart

from my door, each with a sealed copy hereof; one of them will go by

land, the other by sea, so important do I regard it that thou shouldst

be early and particularly informed of the appearance of our enemy in

this part of our Roman world.

“I will await thy answer here.

“Ben-Hur’s going and coming will of course be regulated by his master,

the consul, who, though he exert himself without rest day and night,

cannot get away under a month. Thou knowest what work it is to assemble

and provide for an army destined to operate in a desolate, townless

country.

“I saw the Jew yesterday in the Grove of Daphne; and if he be not there

now, he is certainly in the neighborhood, making it easy for me to keep

him in eye. Indeed, wert thou to ask me where he is now, I should say,

with the most positive assurance, he is to be found at the old Orchard

of Palms, under the tent of the traitor Sheik Ilderim, who cannot long

escape our strong hand. Be not surprised if Maxentius, as his first

measure, places the Arab on ship for forwarding to Rome.

“I am so particular about the whereabouts of the Jew because it will be

important to thee, O illustrious! when thou comest to consider what is

to be done; for already I know, and by the knowledge I flatter myself I

am growing in wisdom, that in every scheme involving human action there

are three elements always to be taken into account—time, place, and

agency.

“If thou sayest this is the place, have thou then no hesitancy in

trusting the business to thy most loving friend, who would be thy

aptest scholar as well.

MESSALA.”

CHAPTER II

About the time the couriers departed from Messala’s door with the

despatches (it being yet the early morning hour), Ben-Hur entered

Ilderim’s tent. He had taken a plunge into the lake, and breakfasted,

and appeared now in an under-tunic, sleeveless, and with skirt scarcely

reaching to the knee.

The sheik saluted him from the divan.

“I give thee peace, son of Arrius,” he said, with admiration, for, in

truth, he had never seen a more perfect illustration of glowing,

powerful, confident manhood. “I give thee peace and good-will. The

horses are ready, I am ready. And thou?”

“The peace thou givest me, good sheik, I give thee in return. I thank

thee for so much good-will. I am ready.”

Ilderim clapped his hands.

“I will have the horses brought. Be seated.”

“Are they yoked?”

“No.”

“Then suffer me to serve myself,” said Ben-Hur. “It is needful that I

make the acquaintance of thy Arabs. I must know them by name, O sheik,

that I may speak to them singly; nor less must I know their temper, for

they are like men: if bold, the better of scolding; if timid, the

better of praise and flattery. Let the servants bring me the harness.”

“And the chariot?” asked the sheik.

“I will let the chariot alone to-day. In its place, let them bring me a

fifth horse, if thou hast it; he should be barebacked, and fleet as the

others.”

Ilderim’s wonder was aroused, and he summoned a servant immediately.

“Bid them bring the harness for the four,” he said—“the harness for the

four, and the bridle for Sirius.”

Ilderim then arose.

“Sirius is my love, and I am his, O son of Arrius. We have been

comrades for twenty years—in tent, in battle, in all stages of the

desert we have been comrades. I will show him to you.”

Going to the division curtain, he held it, while Ben-Hur passed under.

The horses came to him in a body. One with a small head, luminous eyes,

neck like the segment of a bended bow, and mighty chest, curtained

thickly by a profusion of mane soft and wavy as a damsel’s locks,

nickered low and gladly at sight of him.

“Good horse,” said the sheik, patting the dark-brown cheek. “Good

horse, good-morning.” Turning then to Ben-Hur, he added, “This is

Sirius, father of the four here. Mira, the mother, awaits our return,

being too precious to be hazarded in a region where there is a stronger

hand than mine. And much I doubt,” he laughed as he spoke—“much I

doubt, O son of Arrius, if the tribe could endure her absence. She is

their glory; they worship her; did she gallop over them, they would

laugh. Ten thousand horsemen, sons of the desert, will ask to-day,

‘Have you heard of Mira?’ And to the answer, ‘She is well,’ they will

say, ‘God is good! blessed be God!’”

“Mira—Sirius—names of stars, are they not, O sheik?” asked Ben-Hur,

going to each of the four, and to the sire, offering his hand.

“And why not?” replied Ilderim. “Wert thou ever abroad on the desert at

night?”

“No.”

“Then thou canst not know how much we Arabs depend upon the stars. We

borrow their names in gratitude, and give them in love. My fathers all

had their Miras, as I have mine; and these children are stars no less.

There, see thou, is Rigel, and there Antares; that one is Atair, and he

whom thou goest to now is Aldebaran, the youngest of the brood, but

none the worse of that—no, not he! Against the wind he will carry thee

till it roar in thy ears like Akaba; and he will go where thou sayest,

son of Arrius—ay, by the glory of Solomon! he will take thee to the

lion’s jaws, if thou darest so much.”

The harness was brought. With his own hands Ben-Hur equipped the

horses; with his own hands he led them out of the tent, and there

attached the reins.

“Bring me Sirius,” he said.

An Arab could not have better sprung to seat on the courser’s back.

“And now the reins.”

They were given him, and carefully separated.

“Good sheik,” he said, “I am ready. Let a guide go before me to the

field, and send some of thy men with water.”

There was no trouble at starting. The horses were not afraid. Already

there seemed a tacit understanding between them and the new driver, who

had performed his part calmly, and with the confidence which always

begets confidence. The order of going was precisely that of driving,

except that Ben-Hur sat upon Sirius instead of standing in the chariot.

Ilderim’s spirit arose. He combed his beard, and smiled with

satisfaction as he muttered, “He is not a Roman, no, by the splendor of

God!” He followed on foot, the entire tenantry of the dowar—men, women,

and children—pouring after him, participants all in his solicitude, if

not in his confidence.

The field, when reached, proved ample and well fitted for the training,

which Ben-Hur began immediately by driving the four at first slowly,

and in perpendicular lines, and then in wide circles. Advancing a step

in the course, he put them next into a trot; again progressing, he

pushed into a gallop; at length he contracted the circles, and yet

later drove eccentrically here and there, right, left, forward, and

without a break. An hour was thus occupied. Slowing the gait to a walk,

he drove up to Ilderim.

“The work is done, nothing now but practice,” he said. “I give you joy,

Sheik Ilderim, that you have such servants as these. See,” he

continued, dismounting and going to the horses, “see, the gloss of

their red coats is without spot; they breathe lightly as when I began.

I give thee great joy, and it will go hard if”—he turned his flashing

eyes upon the old man’s face—“if we have not the victory and our—”

He stopped, colored, bowed. At the sheik’s side he observed, for the

first time, Balthasar, leaning upon his staff, and two women closely

veiled. At one of the latter he looked a second time, saying to

himself, with a flutter about his heart, “’Tis she—’tis the Egyptian!”

Ilderim picked up his broken sentence—

“The victory, and our revenge!” Then he said aloud, “I am not afraid; I

am glad. Son of Arrius, thou art the man. Be the end like the

beginning, and thou shalt see of what stuff is the lining of the hand

of an Arab who is able to give.”

“I thank thee, good sheik,” Ben-Hur returned, modestly. “Let the

servants bring drink for the horses.”

With his own hands he gave the water.

Remounting Sirius, he renewed the training, going as before from walk

to trot, from trot to gallop; finally, he pushed the steady racers into

the run, gradually quickening it to full speed. The performance then

became exciting; and there were applause for the dainty handling of the

reins, and admiration for the four, which were the same, whether they

flew forward or wheeled in varying curvature. In their action there

were unity, power, grace, pleasure, all without effort or sign of

labor. The admiration was unmixed with pity or reproach, which would

have been as well bestowed upon swallows in their evening flight.

In the midst of the exercises, and the attention they received from all

the bystanders, Malluch came upon the ground, seeking the sheik.

“I have a message for you, O sheik,” he said, availing himself of a

moment he supposed favorable for the speech—“a message from Simonides,

the merchant.”

“Simonides!” ejaculated the Arab. “Ah! ’tis well. May Abaddon take all

his enemies!”

“He bade me give thee first the holy peace of God,” Malluch continued;

“and then this despatch, with prayer that thou read it the instant of

receipt.”

Ilderim, standing in his place, broke the sealing of the package

delivered to him, and from a wrapping of fine linen took two letters,

which he proceeded to read.

[No. 1.]

“Simonides to Sheik Ilderim.

“O friend!

“Assure thyself first of a place in my inner heart.

“Then—

“There is in thy dowar a youth of fair presence, calling himself the

son of Arrius; and such he is by adoption.

“He is very dear to me.

“He hath a wonderful history, which I will tell thee; come thou to-day

or to-morrow, that I may tell thee the history, and have thy counsel.

“Meantime, favor all his requests, so they be not against honor. Should

there be need of reparation, I am bound to thee for it.

“That I have interest in this youth, keep thou private.

“Remember me to thy other guest. He, his daughter, thyself, and all

whom thou mayst choose to be of thy company, must depend upon me at the

Circus the day of the games. I have seats already engaged.

“To thee and all thine, peace.

“What should I be, O my friend, but thy friend?

“SIMONIDES.”

[No. 2.]

“Simonides to Sheik Ilderim.

“O friend!

“Out of the abundance of my experience, I send you a word.

“There is a sign which all persons not Romans, and who have moneys or

goods subject to despoilment, accept as warning—that is, the arrival at

a seat of power of some high Roman official charged with authority.

“To-day comes the Consul Maxentius.

“Be thou warned!

“Another word of advice.

“A conspiracy, to be of effect against thee, O friend, must include the

Herods as parties; thou hast great properties in their dominions.

“Wherefore keep thou watch.

“Send this morning to thy trusty keepers of the roads leading south

from Antioch, and bid them search every courier going and coming; if

they find private despatches relating to thee or thine affairs, THOU

SHOULDST SEE THEM.

“You should have received this yesterday, though it is not too late, if

you act promptly.

“If couriers left Antioch this morning, your messengers know the

byways, and can get before them with your orders.

“Do not hesitate.

“Burn this after reading.

“O my friend! thy friend,

“SIMONIDES.”

Ilderim read the letters a second time, and refolded them in the linen

wrap, and put the package under his girdle.

The exercises in the field continued but a little longer—in all about

two hours. At their conclusion, Ben-Hur brought the four to a walk, and

drove to Ilderim.

“With leave, O sheik,” he said, “I will return thy Arabs to the tent,

and bring them out again this afternoon.”

Ilderim walked to him as he sat on Sirius, and said, “I give them to

you, son of Arrius, to do with as you will until after the games. You

have done with them in two hours what the Roman—may jackals gnaw his

bones fleshless!—could not in as many weeks. We will win—by the

splendor of God, we will win!”

At the tent Ben-Hur remained with the horses while they were being

cared for; then, after a plunge in the lake and a cup of arrack with

the sheik, whose flow of spirits was royally exuberant, he dressed

himself in his Jewish garb again, and walked with Malluch on into the

Orchard.

There was much conversation between the two, not all of it important.

One part, however, must not be overlooked. Ben-Hur was speaking.

“I will give you,” he said, “an order for my property stored in the

khan this side the river by the Seleucian Bridge. Bring it to me

to-day, if you can. And, good Malluch—if I do not overtask you—”

Malluch protested heartily his willingness to be of service.

“Thank you, Malluch, thank you,” said Ben-Hur. “I will take you at your

word, remembering that we are brethren of the old tribe, and that the

enemy is a Roman. First, then—as you are a man of business, which I

much fear Sheik Ilderim is not—”

“Arabs seldom are,” said Malluch, gravely.

“Nay, I do not impeach their shrewdness, Malluch. It is well, however,

to look after them. To save all forfeit or hindrance in connection with

the race, you would put me perfectly at rest by going to the office of

the Circus, and seeing that he has complied with every preliminary

rule; and if you can get a copy of the rules, the service may be of

great avail to me. I would like to know the colors I am to wear, and

particularly the number of the crypt I am to occupy at the starting; if

it be next Messala’s on the right or left, it is well; if not, and you

can have it changed so as to bring me next the Roman, do so. Have you

good memory, Malluch?”

“It has failed me, but never, son of Arrius, where the heart helped it

as now.”

“I will venture, then, to charge you with one further service. I saw

yesterday that Messala was proud of his chariot, as he might be, for

the best of Cæsar’s scarcely surpass it. Can you not make its display

an excuse which will enable you to find if it be light or heavy? I

would like to have its exact weight and measurements—and, Malluch,

though you fail in all else, bring me exactly the height his axle

stands above the ground. You understand, Malluch? I do not wish him to

have any actual advantage of me. I do not care for his splendor; if I

beat him, it will make his fall the harder, and my triumph the more

complete. If there are advantages really important, I want them.”

“I see, I see!” said Malluch. “A line dropped from the centre of the

axle is what you want.”

“Thou hast it; and be glad, Malluch—it is the last of my commissions.

Let us return to the dowar.”

At the door of the tent they found a servant replenishing the

smoke-stained bottles of leben freshly made, and stopped to refresh

themselves. Shortly afterwards Malluch returned to the city.

During their absence, a messenger well mounted had been despatched with

orders as suggested by Simonides. He was an Arab, and carried nothing

written.

CHAPTER III

“Iras, the daughter of Balthasar, sends me with salutation and a

message,” said a servant to Ben-Hur, who was taking his ease in the

tent.

“Give me the message.”

“Would it please you to accompany her upon the lake?”

“I will carry the answer myself. Tell her so.”

His shoes were brought him, and in a few minutes Ben-Hur sallied out to

find the fair Egyptian. The shadow of the mountains was creeping over

the Orchard of Palms in advance of night. Afar through the trees came

the tinkling of sheep bells, the lowing of cattle, and the voices of

the herdsmen bringing their charges home. Life at the Orchard, it

should be remembered, was in all respects as pastoral as life on the

scantier meadows of the desert.

Sheik Ilderim had witnessed the exercises of the afternoon, being a

repetition of those of the morning; after which he had gone to the city

in answer to the invitation of Simonides; he might return in the night;

but, considering the immensity of the field to be talked over with his

friend, it was hardly possible. Ben-Hur, thus left alone, had seen his

horses cared for; cooled and purified himself in the lake; exchanged

the field garb for his customary vestments, all white, as became a

Sadducean of the pure blood; supped early; and, thanks to the strength

of youth, was well recovered from the violent exertion he had

undergone.

It is neither wise nor honest to detract from beauty as a quality.

There cannot be a refined soul insensible to its influence. The story

of Pygmalion and his statue is as natural as it is poetical. Beauty is

of itself a power; and it was now drawing Ben-Hur.

The Egyptian was to him a wonderfully beautiful woman—beautiful of

face, beautiful of form. In his thought she always appeared to him as

he saw her at the fountain; and he felt the influence of her voice,

sweeter because in tearful expression of gratitude to him, and of her

eyes—the large, soft, black, almond-shaped eyes declarative of her

race—eyes which looked more than lies in the supremest wealth of words

to utter; and recurrences of the thought of her were returns just so

frequent of a figure tall, slender, graceful, refined, wrapped in rich

and floating drapery, wanting nothing but a fitting mind to make her,

like the Shulamite, and in the same sense, terrible as an army with

banners. In other words, as she returned to his fancy, the whole

passionate Song of Solomon came with her, inspired by her presence.

With this sentiment and that feeling, he was going to see if she

actually justified them. It was not love that was taking him, but

admiration and curiosity, which might be the heralds of love.

The landing was a simple affair, consisting of a short stairway, and a

platform garnished by some lamp-posts; yet at the top of the steps he

paused, arrested by what he beheld.

There was a shallop resting upon the clear water lightly as an

egg-shell. An Ethiop—the camel-driver at the Castalian fount—occupied

the rower’s place, his blackness intensified by a livery of shining

white. All the boat aft was cushioned and carpeted with stuffs

brilliant with Tyrian red. On the rudder seat sat the Egyptian herself,

sunk in Indian shawls and a very vapor of most delicate veils and

scarfs. Her arms were bare to the shoulders; and, not merely faultless

in shape, they had the effect of compelling attention to them—their

pose, their action, their expression; the hands, the fingers even,

seemed endowed with graces and meaning; each was an object of beauty.

The shoulders and neck were protected from the evening air by an ample

scarf, which yet did not hide them.

In the glance he gave her, Ben-Hur paid no attention to these details.

There was simply an impression made upon him; and, like strong light,

it was a sensation, not a thing of sight or enumeration. Thy lips are

like a thread of scarlet; thy temples are like a piece of pomegranate

within thy locks. Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away; for,

lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear

on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice

of the turtle is heard in the land—such was the impression she made

upon him translated into words.

“Come,” she said, observing him stop, “come, or I shall think you a

poor sailor.”

The red of his cheek deepened. Did she know anything of his life upon

the sea? He descended to the platform at once.

“I was afraid,” he said, as he took the vacant seat before her.

“Of what?”

“Of sinking the boat,” he replied, smiling.

“Wait until we are in deeper water,” she said, giving a signal to the

black, who dipped the oars, and they were off.

If love and Ben-Hur were enemies, the latter was never more at mercy.

The Egyptian sat where he could not but see her; she, whom he had

already engrossed in memory as his ideal of the Shulamite. With her

eyes giving light to his, the stars might come out, and he not see

them; and so they did. The night might fall with unrelieved darkness

everywhere else; her look would make illumination for him. And then, as

everybody knows, given youth and such companionship, there is no

situation in which the fancy takes such complete control as upon

tranquil waters under a calm night sky, warm with summer. It is so easy

at such time to glide imperceptibly out of the commonplace into the

ideal.

“Give me the rudder,” he said.

“No,” she replied, “that were to reverse the relation. Did I not ask

you to ride with me? I am indebted to you, and would begin payment. You

may talk and I will listen, or I will talk and you will listen: that

choice is yours; but it shall be mine to choose where we go, and the

way thither.”

“And where may that be?”

“You are alarmed again.”

“O fair Egyptian, I but asked you the first question of every captive.”

“Call me Egypt.”

“I would rather call you Iras.”

“You may think of me by that name, but call me Egypt.”

“Egypt is a country, and means many people.”

“Yes, yes! And such a country!”

“I see; it is to Egypt we are going.”

“Would we were! I would be so glad.”

She sighed as she spoke.

“You have no care for me, then,” he said.

“Ah, by that I know you were never there.”

“I never was.”

“Oh, it is the land where there are no unhappy people, the desired of

all the rest of the earth, the mother of all the gods, and therefore

supremely blest. There, O son of Arrius, there the happy find increase

of happiness, and the wretched, going, drink once of the sweet water of

the sacred river, and laugh and sing, rejoicing like children.”

“Are not the very poor with you there as elsewhere?”

“The very poor in Egypt are the very simple in wants and ways,” she

replied. “They have no wish beyond enough, and how little that is, a

Greek or a Roman cannot know.”

“But I am neither Greek nor Roman.”

She laughed.

“I have a garden of roses, and in the midst of it is a tree, and its

bloom is the richest of all. Whence came it, think you?”

“From Persia, the home of the rose.”

“No.”

“From India, then.”

“No.”

“Ah! one of the isles of Greece.”

“I will tell you,” she said: “a traveller found it perishing by the

roadside on the plain of Rephaim.”

“Oh, in Judea!”

“I put it in the earth left bare by the receding Nile, and the soft

south wind blew over the desert and nursed it, and the sun kissed it in

pity; after which it could not else than grow and flourish. I stand in

its shade now, and it thanks me with much perfume. As with the roses,

so with the men of Israel. Where shall they reach perfection but in

Egypt?”

“Moses was but one of millions.”

“Nay, there was a reader of dreams. Will you forget him?”

“The friendly Pharaohs are dead.”

“Ah, yes! The river by which they dwelt sings to them in their tombs;

yet the same sun tempers the same air to the same people.”

“Alexandria is but a Roman town.”

“She has but exchanged sceptres. Cæsar took from her that of the

sword, and in its place left that of learning. Go with me to the

Brucheium, and I will show you the college of nations; to the

Serapeion, and see the perfection of architecture; to the Library, and

read the immortals; to the theatre, and hear the heroics of the Greeks

and Hindoos; to the quay, and count the triumphs of commerce; descend

with me into the streets, O son of Arrius, and, when the philosophers

have dispersed, and taken with them the masters of all the arts, and

all the gods have home their votaries, and nothing remains of the day

but its pleasures, you shall hear the stories that have amused men from

the beginning, and the songs which will never, never die.”

As he listened, Ben-Hur was carried back to the night when, in the

summer-house in Jerusalem, his mother, in much the same poetry of

patriotism, declaimed the departed glories of Israel.

“I see now why you wish to be called Egypt. Will you sing me a song if

I call you by that name? I heard you last night.”

“That was a hymn of the Nile,” she answered, “a lament which I sing

when I would fancy I smell the breath of the desert, and hear the surge

of the dear old river; let me rather give you a piece of the Indian

mind. When we get to Alexandria, I will take you to the corner of the

street where you can hear it from the daughter of the Ganga, who taught

it to me. Kapila, you should know, was one of the most revered of the

Hindoo sages.”

Then, as if it were a natural mode of expression, she began the song.

KAPILA.

I.

“Kapila, Kapila, so young and true,

I yearn for a glory like thine,

And hail thee from battle to ask anew,

Can ever thy Valor be mine?

“Kapila sat on his charger dun,

A hero never so grave:

‘Who loveth all things hath fear of none,

’Tis love that maketh me brave.

A woman gave me her soul one day,

The soul of my soul to be alway;

Thence came my Valor to me,

Go try it—try it—and see.’

II.

“Kapila, Kapila, so old and gray,

The queen is calling for me;

But ere I go hence, I wish thou wouldst say,

How Wisdom first came to thee.

“Kapila stood in his temple door,

A priest in eremite guise:

‘It did not come as men get their lore,

’Tis faith that maketh me wise.

A woman gave me her heart one day,

The heart of my heart to be alway;

Thence came my Wisdom to me,

Go try it—try it—and see.’”

Ben-Hur had not time to express his thanks for the song before the keel

of the boat grated upon the underlying sand, and, next moment, the bow

ran upon the shore.

“A quick voyage, O Egypt!” he cried.

“And a briefer stay!” she replied, as, with a strong push, the black

sent them shooting into the open water again.

“You will give me the rudder now.”

“Oh no,” said she, laughing. “To you, the chariot; to me, the boat. We

are merely at the lake’s end, and the lesson is that I must not sing

any more. Having been to Egypt, let us now to the Grove of Daphne.”

“Without a song on the way?” he said, in deprecation.

“Tell me something of the Roman from whom you saved us to-day,” she

asked.

The request struck Ben-Hur unpleasantly.

“I wish this were the Nile,” he said, evasively. “The kings and queens,

having slept so long, might come down from their tombs, and ride with

us.”

“They were of the colossi, and would sink our boat. The pygmies would

be preferable. But tell me of the Roman. He is very wicked, is he not?”

“I cannot say.”

“Is he of noble family, and rich?”

“I cannot speak of his riches.”

“How beautiful his horses were! and the bed of his chariot was gold,

and the wheels ivory. And his audacity! The bystanders laughed as he

rode away; they, who were so nearly under his wheels!”

She laughed at the recollection.

“They were rabble,” said Ben-Hur, bitterly.

“He must be one of the monsters who are said to be growing up in

Rome—Apollos ravenous as Cerberus. Does he reside in Antioch?”

“He is of the East somewhere.”

“Egypt would suit him better than Syria.”

“Hardly,” Ben-Hur replied. “Cleopatra is dead.”

That instant the lamps burning before the door of the tent came into

view.

“The dowar!” she cried.

“Ah, then, we have not been to Egypt. I have not seen Karnak or Philae

or Abydos. This is not the Nile. I have but heard a song of India, and

been boating in a dream.”

“Philae—Karnak. Mourn rather that you have not seen the Rameses at Aboo

Simbel, looking at which makes it so easy to think of God, the maker of

the heavens and earth. Or why should you mourn at all? Let us go on to

the river; and if I cannot sing”—she laughed—“because I have said I

would not, yet I can tell you stories of Egypt.”

“Go on! Ay, till morning comes, and the evening, and the next morning!”

he said, vehemently.

“Of what shall my stories be? Of the mathematicians?”

“Oh no.”

“Of the philosophers?”

“No, no.”

“Of the magicians and genii?”

“If you will.”

“Of war?”

“Yes.”

“Of love?”

“Yes.”

“I will tell you a cure for love. It is the story of a queen. Listen

reverently. The papyrus from which it was taken by the priests of

Philae was wrested from the hand of the heroine herself. It is correct

in form, and must be true:

NE-NE-HOFRA.

I.

“There is no parallelism in human lives.

“No life runs a straight line.

“The most perfect life develops as a circle, and terminates in its

beginning, making it impossible to say, This is the commencement, that

the end.

“Perfect lives are the treasures of God; of great days he wears them on

the ring-finger of his heart hand.”

II.

“Ne-ne-hofra dwelt in a house close by Essouan, yet closer to the first

cataract—so close, indeed, that the sound of the eternal battle waged

there between river and rocks was of the place a part.

“She grew in beauty day by day, so that it was said of her, as of the

poppies in her father’s garden, What will she not be in the time of

blooming?

“Each year of her life was the beginning of a new song more delightful

than any of those which went before.

“Child was she of a marriage between the North, bounded by the sea, and

the South, bounded by the desert beyond the Luna mountains; and one

gave her its passion, the other its genius; so when they beheld her,

both laughed, saying, not meanly, ‘She is mine,’ but generously, ‘Ha,

ha! she is ours.’

“All excellences in nature contributed to her perfection and rejoiced

in her presence. Did she come or go, the birds ruffled their wings in

greeting; the unruly winds sank to cooling zephyrs; the white lotus

rose from the water’s depth to look at her; the solemn river loitered

on its way; the palm-trees, nodding, shook all their plumes; and they

seemed to say, this one, I gave her of my grace; that, I gave her of my

brightness; the other, I gave her of my purity: and so each as it had a

virtue to give.

“At twelve, Ne-ne-hofra was the delight of Essouan; at sixteen, the

fame of her beauty was universal; at twenty, there was never a day

which did not bring to her door princes of the desert on swift camels,

and lords of Egypt in gilded barges; and, going away disconsolate, they

reported everywhere, ‘I have seen her, and she is not a woman, but

Athor herself.’”

III.

“Now of the three hundred and thirty successors of good King Menes,

eighteen were Ethiopians, of whom Oraetes was one hundred and ten years

old. He had reigned seventy-six years. Under him the people thrived,

and the land groaned with fatness of plenty. He practised wisdom

because, having seen so much, he knew what it was. He dwelt in Memphis,

having there his principal palace, his arsenals, and his

treasure-house. Frequently he went down to Butos to talk with Latona.

“The wife of the good king died. Too old was she for perfect

embalmment; yet he loved her, and mourned as the inconsolable; seeing

which, a colchyte presumed one day to speak to him.

“‘O Oraetes, I am astonished that one so wise and great should not know

how to cure a sorrow like this.’

“‘Tell me a cure,’ said the king.

“Three times the colchyte kissed the floor, and then he replied,

knowing the dead could not hear him, ‘At Essouan lives Ne-ne-hofra,

beautiful as Athor the beautiful. Send for her. She has refused all the

lords and princes, and I know not how many kings; but who can say no to

Oraetes?’”

IV.

“Ne-ne-hofra descended the Nile in a barge richer than any ever before

seen, attended by an army in barges each but a little less fine. All

Nubia and Egypt, and a myriad from Libya, and a host of Troglodytes,

and not a few Macrobii from beyond the Mountains of the Moon, lined the

tented shores to see the cortege pass, wafted by perfumed winds and

golden oars.

“Through a dromos of sphinxes and couchant double-winged lions she was

borne, and set down before Oraetes sitting on a throne specially

erected at the sculptured pylon of the palace. He raised her up, gave

her place by his side, clasped the uraeus upon her arm, kissed her, and

Ne-ne-hofra was queen of all queens.

“That was not enough for the wise Oraetes; he wanted love, and a queen

happy in his love. So he dealt with her tenderly, showing her his

possessions, cities, palaces, people; his armies, his ships: and with

his own hand he led her through his treasure-house, saying, ‘O.

Ne-ne-hofra! but kiss me in love, and they are all thine.’

“And, thinking she could be happy, if she was not then, she kissed him

once, twice, thrice—kissed him thrice, his hundred and ten years

notwithstanding.

“The first year she was happy, and it was very short; the third year

she was wretched, and it was very long; then she was enlightened: that

which she thought love of Oraetes was only daze of his power. Well for

her had the daze endured! Her spirits deserted her; she had long spells

of tears, and her women could not remember when they heard her laugh;

of the roses on her cheeks only ashes remained; she languished and

faded gradually, but certainly. Some said she was haunted by the

Erinnyes for cruelty to a lover; others, that she was stricken by some

god envious of Oraetes. Whatever the cause of her decline, the charms

of the magicians availed not to restore her, and the prescript of the

doctor was equally without virtue. Ne-ne-hofra was given over to die.

“Oraetes chose a crypt for her up in the tombs of the queens; and,

calling the master sculptors and painters to Memphis, he set them to

work upon designs more elaborate than any even in the great galleries

of the dead kings.

“‘O thou beautiful as Athor herself, my queen!’ said the king, whose

hundred and thirteen years did not lessen his ardor as a lover, ‘Tell

me, I pray, the ailment of which, alas! thou art so certainly perishing

before my eyes.’

“‘You will not love me any more if I tell you,’ she said, in doubt and

fear.

“‘Not love you! I will love you the more. I swear it, by the genii of

Amente! by the eye of Osiris, I swear it! Speak!’ he cried, passionate

as a lover, authoritative as a king.

“‘Hear, then,’ she said. ‘There is an anchorite, the oldest and holiest

of his class, in a cave near Essouan. His name is Menopha. He was my

teacher and guardian. Send for him, O Oraetes, and he will tell you

that you seek to know; he will also help you find the cure for my

affliction.’

“Oraetes arose rejoicing. He went away in spirit a hundred years

younger than when he came.”

V.

“‘Speak!’ said Oraetes to Menopha, in the palace at Memphis.

“And Menopha replied, ‘Most mighty king, if you were young, I should

not answer, because I am yet pleased with life; as it is, I will say

the queen, like any other mortal, is paying the penalty of a crime.’

“‘A crime!’ exclaimed Oraetes, angrily.

“Menopha bowed very low.

“‘Yes; to herself.’

“‘I am not in mood for riddles,’ said the king.

“‘What I say is not a riddle, as you shall hear. Ne-ne-hofra grew up

under my eyes, and confided every incident of her life to me; among

others, that she loved the son of her father’s gardener, Barbec by

name.’

“Oraetes’s frown, strangely enough, began to dissipate.

“‘With that love in her heart, O king, she came to you; of that love

she is dying.’

“‘Where is the gardener’s son now?’ asked Oraetes.

“‘In Essouan.’

“The king went out and gave two orders. To one oeris he said, ‘Go to

Essouan and bring hither a youth named Barbec. You will find him in the

garden of the queen’s father;’ to another, ‘Assemble workmen and cattle

and tools, and construct for me in Lake Chemmis an island, which,

though laden with a temple, a palace, and a garden, and all manner of

trees bearing fruit, and all manner of vines, shall nevertheless float

about as the winds may blow it. Make the island, and let it be fully

furnished by the time the moon begins to wane.’

“Then to the queen he said,

“‘Be of cheer. I know all, and have sent for Barbec.’

“Ne-ne-hofra kissed his hands.

“‘You shall have him to yourself, and he you to himself; nor shall any

disturb your loves for a year.’

“She kissed his feet; he raised her, and kissed her in return; and the

rose came back to her cheek, the scarlet to her lips, and the laughter

to her heart.”

VI.

“For one year Ne-ne-hofra and Barbec the gardener floated as the winds

blew on the island of Chemmis, which became one of the wonders of the

world; never a home of love more beautiful; one year, seeing no one and

existing for no one but themselves. Then she returned in state to the

palace in Memphis.

“‘Now whom lovest thou best?’ asked the king.

“She kissed his cheek and said, ‘Take me back, O good king, for I am

cured.’

“Oraetes laughed, none the worse, that moment, of his hundred and

fourteen years.

“‘Then it is true, as Menopha said: ha, ha, ha! it is true, the cure of

love is love.’

“‘Even so,’ she replied.

“Suddenly his manner changed, and his look became terrible.

“‘I did not find it so,’ he said.

“She shrank affrighted.

“‘Thou guilty!’ he continued. ‘Thy offense to Oraetes the man he

forgives; but thy offence to Oraetes the king remains to be punished.’

“She cast herself at his feet.

“‘Hush!’ he cried. ‘Thou art dead!’

“He clapped his hands, and a terrible procession came in—a procession

of parachistes, or embalmers, each with some implement or material of

his loathsome art.

“The King pointed to Ne-ne-hofra.

“‘She is dead. Do thy work well.’”

VII.

“Ne-ne-hofra the beautiful, after seventy-two days, was carried to the

crypt chosen for her the year before, and laid with her queenly

predecessors; yet there was no funeral procession in her honor across

the sacred lake.”

At the conclusion of the story, Ben-Hur was sitting at the Egyptian’s

feet, and her hand upon the tiller was covered by his hand.

“Menopha was wrong,” he said.

“How?”

“Love lives by loving.”

“Then there is no cure for it?”

“Yes. Oraetes found the cure.”

“What was it?”

“Death.”

“You are a good listener, O son of Arrius.”

And so with conversation and stories, they whiled the hours away. As

they stepped ashore, she said,

“To-morrow we go to the city.”

“But you will be at the games?” he asked.

“Oh yes.”

“I will send you my colors.”

With that they separated.

CHAPTER IV

Ilderim returned to the dowar next day about the third hour. As he

dismounted, a man whom he recognized as of his own tribe came to him

and said, “O sheik, I was bidden give thee this package, with request

that thou read it at once. If there be answer, I was to wait thy

pleasure.”

Ilderim gave the package immediate attention. The seal was already

broken. The address ran, _To Valerius Gratus at Cæsarea_.

“Abaddon take him!” growled the sheik, at discovering a letter in

Latin.

Had the missive been in Greek or Arabic, he could have read it; as it

was, the utmost he could make out was the signature in bold Roman

letters—MESSALA—whereat his eyes twinkled.

“Where is the young Jew?” he asked.

“In the field with the horses,” a servant replied.

The sheik replaced the papyrus in its envelopes, and, tucking the

package under his girdle, remounted the horse. That moment a stranger

made his appearance, coming, apparently, from the city.

“I am looking for Sheik Ilderim, surnamed the Generous,” the stranger

said.

His language and attire bespoke him a Roman.

What he could not read, he yet could speak; so the old Arab answered,

with dignity, “I am Sheik Ilderim.”

The man’s eyes fell; he raised them again, and said, with forced

composure, “I heard you had need of a driver for the games.”

Ilderim’s lip under the white mustache curled contemptuously.

“Go thy way,” he said. “I have a driver.”

He turned to ride away, but the man, lingering, spoke again.

“Sheik, I am a lover of horses, and they say you have the most

beautiful in the world.”

The old man was touched; he drew rein, as if on the point of yielding

to the flattery, but finally replied, “Not to-day, not to-day; some

other time I will show them to you. I am too busy just now.”

He rode to the field, while the stranger betook himself to town again

with a smiling countenance. He had accomplished his mission.

And every day thereafter, down to the great day of the games, a

man—sometimes two or three men—came to the sheik at the Orchard,

pretending to seek an engagement as driver.

In such manner Messala kept watch over Ben-Hur.

CHAPTER V

The sheik waited, well satisfied, until Ben-Hur drew his horses off the

field for the forenoon—well satisfied, for he had seen them, after

being put through all the other paces, run full speed in such manner

that it did not seem there were one the slowest and another the

fastest—run in other words, as if the four were one.

“This afternoon, O sheik, I will give Sirius back to you.” Ben-Hur

patted the neck of the old horse as he spoke. “I will give him back,

and take to the chariot.”

“So soon?” Ilderim asked.

“With such as these, good sheik, one day suffices. They are not afraid;

they have a man’s intelligence, and they love the exercise. This one,”

he shook a rein over the back of the youngest of the four—“you called

him Aldebaran, I believe—is the swiftest; in once round a stadium he

would lead the others thrice his length.”

Ilderim pulled his beard, and said, with twinkling eyes, “Aldebaran is

the swiftest; but what of the slowest?”

“This is he.” Ben-Hur shook the rein over Antares. “This is he: but he

will win, for, look you, sheik, he will run his utmost all day—all day;

and, as the sun goes down, he will reach his swiftest.”

“Right again,” said Ilderim.

“I have but one fear, O sheik.”

The sheik became doubly serious.

“In his greed of triumph, a Roman cannot keep honor pure. In the

games—all of them, mark you—their tricks are infinite; in chariot

racing their knavery extends to everything—from horse to driver, from

driver to master. Wherefore, good sheik, look well to all thou hast;

from this till the trial is over, let no stranger so much as see the

horses. Would you be perfectly safe, do more—keep watch over them with

armed hand as well as sleepless eye; then I will have no fear of the

end.”

At the door of the tent they dismounted.

“What you say shall be attended to. By the splendor of God, no hand

shall come near them except it belong to one of the faithful. To-night

I will set watches. But, son of Arrius”—Ilderim drew forth the package,

and opened it slowly, while they walked to the divan and seated

themselves—“son of Arrius, see thou here, and help me with thy Latin.”

He passed the despatch to Ben-Hur.

“There; read—and read aloud, rendering what thou findest into the

tongue of thy fathers. Latin is an abomination.”

Ben-Hur was in good spirits, and began the reading carelessly.

“‘MESSALA TO GRATUS!’” He paused. A premonition drove the blood to his

heart. Ilderim observed his agitation.

“Well; I am waiting.”

Ben-Hur prayed pardon, and recommenced the paper, which, it is

sufficient to say, was one of the duplicates of the letter despatched

so carefully to Gratus by Messala the morning after the revel in the

palace.

The paragraphs in the beginning were remarkable only as proof that the

writer had not outgrown his habit of mockery; when they were passed,

and the reader came to the parts intended to refresh the memory of

Gratus, his voice trembled, and twice he stopped to regain his

self-control. By a strong effort he continued. “‘I recall further,’” he

read, “‘that thou didst make disposition of the family of Hur’”—there

the reader again paused and drew a long breath—“‘both of us at the time

supposing the plan hit upon to be the most effective possible for the

purposes in view, which were silence and delivery over to inevitable

but natural death.’”

Here Ben-Hur broke down utterly. The paper fell from his hands, and he

covered his face.

“They are dead—dead. I alone am left.”

The sheik had been a silent, but not unsympathetic, witness of the

young man’s suffering; now he arose and said, “Son of Arrius, it is for

me to beg thy pardon. Read the paper by thyself. When thou art strong

enough to give the rest of it to me, send word, and I will return.”

He went out of the tent, and nothing in all his life became him better.

Ben-Hur flung himself on the divan and gave way to his feelings. When

somewhat recovered, he recollected that a portion of the letter

remained unread, and, taking it up, he resumed the reading. “Thou wilt

remember,” the missive ran, “what thou didst with the mother and sister

of the malefactor; yet, if now I yield to a desire to learn if they be

living or dead”—Ben-Hur started, and read again, and then again, and at

last broke into exclamation. “He does not know they are dead; he does

not know it! Blessed be the name of the Lord! there is yet hope.” He

finished the sentence, and was strengthened by it, and went on bravely

to the end of the letter.

“They are not dead,” he said, after reflection; “they are not dead, or

he would have heard of it.”

A second reading, more careful than the first, confirmed him in the

opinion. Then he sent for the sheik.

“In coming to your hospitable tent, O sheik,” he said, calmly, when the

Arab was seated and they were alone, “it was not in my mind to speak of

myself further than to assure you I had sufficient training to be

intrusted with your horses. I declined to tell you my history. But the

chances which have sent this paper to my hand and given it to me to be

read are so strange that I feel bidden to trust you with everything.

And I am the more inclined to do so by knowledge here conveyed that we

are both of us threatened by the same enemy, against whom it is needful

that we make common cause. I will read the letter and give you

explanation; after which you will not wonder I was so moved. If you

thought me weak or childish, you will then excuse me.”

The sheik held his peace, listening closely, until Ben-Hur came to the

paragraph in which he was particularly mentioned: “‘I saw the Jew

yesterday in the Grove of Daphne;’” so ran the part, “‘and if he be not

there now, he is certainly in the neighborhood, making it easy for me

to keep him in eye. Indeed, wert thou to ask me where he is now, I

should say, with the most positive assurance, he is to be found at the

old Orchard of Palms.’”

“A—h!” exclaimed Ilderim, in such a tone one might hardly say he was

more surprised than angry; at the same time, he clutched his beard.

“‘At the old Orchard of Palms,’” Ben-Hur repeated, “‘under the tent of

the traitor Shiek Ilderim.’”

“Traitor!—I?” the old man cried, in his shrillest tone, while lip and

beard curled with ire, and on his forehead and neck the veins swelled

and beat as they would burst.

“Yet a moment, sheik,” said Ben-Hur, with a deprecatory gesture. “Such

is Messala’s opinion of you. Hear his threat.” And he read on—“‘under

the tent of the traitor Sheik Ilderim, who cannot long escape our

strong hand. Be not surprised if Maxentius, as his first measure,

places the Arab on ship for forwarding to Rome.’”

“To Rome! Me—Ilderim—sheik of ten thousand horsemen with spears—me to

Rome!”

He leaped rather than rose to his feet, his arms outstretched, his

fingers spread and curved like claws, his eyes glittering like a

serpent’s.

“O God!—nay, by all the gods except of Rome!—when shall this insolence

end? A freeman am I; free are my people. Must we die slaves? Or, worse,

must I live a dog, crawling to a master’s feet? Must I lick his hand,

lest he lash me? What is mine is not mine; I am not my own; for breath

of body I must be beholden to a Roman. Oh, if I were young again! Oh,

could I shake off twenty years—or ten—or five!”

He ground his teeth and shook his hands overhead; then, under the

impulse of another idea, he walked away and back again to Ben-Hur

swiftly, and caught his shoulder with a strong grasp.

“If I were as thou, son of Arrius—as young, as strong, as practised in

arms; if I had a motive hissing me to revenge—a motive, like thine,

great enough to make hate holy— Away with disguise on thy part and on

mine! Son of Hur, son of Hur, I say—”

At that name all the currents of Ben-Hur’s blood stopped; surprised,

bewildered, he gazed into the Arab’s eyes, now close to his, and

fiercely bright.

“Son of Hur, I say, were I as thou, with half thy wrongs, bearing about

with me memories like thine, I would not, I could not, rest.” Never

pausing, his words following each other torrent-like, the old man swept

on. “To all my grievances, I would add those of the world, and devote

myself to vengeance. From land to land I would go firing all mankind.

No war for freedom but should find me engaged; no battle against Rome

in which I would not bear a part. I would turn Parthian, if I could not

better. If men failed me, still I would not give over the effort—ha,

ha, ha! By the splendor of God! I would herd with wolves, and make

friends of lions and tigers, in hope of marshalling them against the

common enemy. I would use every weapon. So my victims were Romans, I

would rejoice in slaughter. Quarter I would not ask; quarter I would

not give. To the flames everything Roman; to the sword every Roman

born. Of nights I would pray the gods, the good and the bad alike, to

lend me their special terrors—tempests, drought, heat, cold, and all

the nameless poisons they let loose in air, all the thousand things of

which men die on sea and on land. Oh, I could not sleep. I—I—”

The sheik stopped for want of breath, panting, wringing his hands. And,

sooth to say, of all the passionate burst Ben-Hur retained but a vague

impression wrought by fiery eyes, a piercing voice, and a rage too

intense for coherent expression.

For the first time in years, the desolate youth heard himself addressed

by his proper name. One man at least knew him, and acknowledged it

without demand of identity; and he an Arab fresh from the desert!

How came the man by his knowledge? The letter? No. It told the

cruelties from which his family had suffered; it told the story of his

own misfortunes, but it did not say he was the very victim whose escape

from doom was the theme of the heartless narrative. That was the point

of explanation he had notified the sheik would follow the reading of

the letter. He was pleased, and thrilled with hope restored, yet kept

an air of calmness.

“Good sheik, tell me how you came by this letter.”

“My people keep the roads between cities,” Ilderim answered, bluntly.

“They took it from a courier.”

“Are they known to be thy people?”

“No. To the world they are robbers, whom it is mine to catch and slay.”

“Again, sheik. You call me son of Hur—my father’s name. I did not think

myself known to a person on earth. How came you by the knowledge?”

Ilderim hesitated; but, rallying, he answered, “I know you, yet I am

not free to tell you more.”

“Some one holds you in restraint?”

The sheik closed his mouth, and walked away; but, observing Ben-Hur’s

disappointment, he came back, and said, “Let us say no more about the

matter now. I will go to town; when I return, I may talk to you fully.

Give me the letter.”

Ilderim rolled the papyrus carefully, restored it to its envelopes, and

became once more all energy.

“What sayest thou?” he asked, while waiting for his horse and retinue.

“I told what I would do, were I thou, and thou hast made no answer.”

“I intended to answer, sheik, and I will.” Ben-Hur’s countenance and

voice changed with the feeling invoked. “All thou hast said, I will

do—all at least in the power of a man. I devoted myself to vengeance

long ago. Every hour of the five years passed, I have lived with no

other thought. I have taken no respite. I have had no pleasures of

youth. The blandishments of Rome were not for me. I wanted her to

educate me for revenge. I resorted to her most famous masters and

professors—not those of rhetoric or philosophy: alas! I had no time for

them. The arts essential to a fighting-man were my desire. I associated

with gladiators, and with winners of prizes in the Circus; and they

were my teachers. The drill-masters in the great camp accepted me as a

scholar, and were proud of my attainments in their line. O sheik, I am

a soldier; but the things of which I dream require me to be a captain.

With that thought, I have taken part in the campaign against the

Parthians; when it is over, then, if the Lord spare my life and

strength—then”—he raised his clenched hands, and spoke vehemently—“then

I will be an enemy Roman-taught in all things; then Rome shall account

to me in Roman lives for her ills. You have my answer, sheik.”

Ilderim put an arm over his shoulder, and kissed him, saying,

passionately, “If thy God favor thee not, son of Hur, it is because he

is dead. Take thou this from me—sworn to, if so thy preference run:

thou shalt have my hands, and their fulness—men, horses, camels, and

the desert for preparation. I swear it! For the present, enough. Thou

shalt see or hear from me before night.”

Turning abruptly off, the sheik was speedily on the road to the city.

CHAPTER VI

The intercepted letter was conclusive upon a number of points of great

interest to Ben-Hur. It had all the effect of a confession that the

writer was a party to the putting-away of the family with murderous

intent; that he had sanctioned the plan adopted for the purpose; that

he had received a portion of the proceeds of the confiscation, and was

yet in enjoyment of his part; that he dreaded the unexpected appearance

of what he was pleased to call the chief malefactor, and accepted it as

a menace; that he contemplated such further action as would secure him

in the future, and was ready to do whatever his accomplice in Cæsarea

might advise.

And, now that the letter had reached the hand of him really its

subject, it was notice of danger to come, as well as a confession of

guilt. So when Ilderim left the tent, Ben-Hur had much to think about,

requiring immediate action. His enemies were as adroit and powerful as

any in the East. If they were afraid of him, he had greater reason to

be afraid of them. He strove earnestly to reflect upon the situation,

but could not; his feelings constantly overwhelmed him. There was a

certain qualified pleasure in the assurance that his mother and sister

were alive; and it mattered little that the foundation of the assurance

was a mere inference. That there was one person who could tell him

where they were seemed to his hope so long deferred as if discovery

were now close at hand. These were mere causes of feeling; underlying

them, it must be confessed he had a superstitious fancy that God was

about to make ordination in his behalf, in which event faith whispered

him to stand still.

Occasionally, referring to the words of Ilderim, he wondered whence the

Arab derived his information about him; not from Malluch certainly; nor

from Simonides, whose interests, all adverse, would hold him dumb.

Could Messala have been the informant? No, no: disclosure might be

dangerous in that quarter. Conjecture was vain; at the same time, often

as Ben-Hur was beaten back from the solution, he was consoled with the

thought that whoever the person with the knowledge might be, he was a

friend, and, being such, would reveal himself in good time. A little

more waiting—a little more patience. Possibly the errand of the sheik

was to see the worthy; possibly the letter might precipitate a full

disclosure.

And patient he would have been if only he could have believed Tirzah

and his mother were waiting for him under circumstances permitting hope

on their part strong as his; if, in other words, conscience had not

stung him with accusations respecting them.

To escape such accusations, he wandered far through the Orchard,

pausing now where the date-gatherers were busy, yet not too busy to

offer him of their fruit and talk with him; then, under the great

trees, to watch the nesting birds, or hear the bees swarming about the

berries bursting with honeyed sweetness, and filling all the green and

golden spaces with the music of their beating wings.

By the lake, however, he lingered longest. He might not look upon the

water and its sparkling ripples, so like sensuous life, without

thinking of the Egyptian and her marvellous beauty, and of floating

with her here and there through the night, made brilliant by her songs

and stories; he might not forget the charm of her manner, the lightness

of her laugh, the flattery of her attention, the warmth of her little

hand under his upon the tiller of the boat. From her it was for his

thought but a short way to Balthasar, and the strange things of which

he had been witness, unaccountable by any law of nature; and from him,

again, to the King of the Jews, whom the good man, with such pathos of

patience, was holding in holy promise, the distance was even nearer.

And there his mind stayed, finding in the mysteries of that personage a

satisfaction answering well for the rest he was seeking. Because, it

may have been, nothing is so easy as denial of an idea not agreeable to

our wishes, he rejected the definition given by Balthasar of the

kingdom the king was coming to establish. A kingdom of souls, if not

intolerable to his Sadducean faith, seemed to him but an abstraction

drawn from the depths of a devotion too fond and dreamy. A kingdom of

Judea, on the other hand, was more than comprehensible: such had been,

and, if only for that reason, might be again. And it suited his pride

to think of a new kingdom broader of domain, richer in power, and of a

more unapproachable splendor than the old one; of a new king wiser and

mightier than Solomon—a new king under whom, especially, he could find

both service and revenge. In that mood he resumed to the dowar.

The mid-day meal disposed of, still further to occupy himself, Ben-Hur

had the chariot rolled out into the sunlight for inspection. The word

but poorly conveys the careful study the vehicle underwent. No point or

part of it escaped him. With a pleasure which will be better understood

hereafter, he saw the pattern was Greek, in his judgment preferable to

the Roman in many respects; it was wider between the wheels, and lower

and stronger, and the disadvantage of greater weight would be more than

compensated by the greater endurance of his Arabs. Speaking generally,

the carriage-makers of Rome built for the games almost solely,

sacrificing safety to beauty, and durability to grace; while the

chariots of Achilles and “the king of men,” designed for war and all

its extreme tests, still ruled the tastes of those who met and

struggled for the crowns Isthmian and Olympic.

Next he brought the horses, and, hitching them to the chariot, drove to

the field of exercise, where, hour after hour, he practised them in

movement under the yoke. When he came away in the evening, it was with

restored spirit, and a fixed purpose to defer action in the matter of

Messala until the race was won or lost. He could not forego the

pleasure of meeting his adversary under the eyes of the East; that

there might be other competitors seemed not to enter his thought. His

confidence in the result was absolute; no doubt of his own skill; and

as to the four, they were his full partners in the glorious game.

“Let him look to it, let him look to it! Ha, Antares—Aldebaran! Shall

he not, O honest Rigel? and thou, Atair, king among coursers, shall he

not beware of us? Ha, ha! good hearts!”

So in rests he passed from horse to horse, speaking, not as a master,

but the senior of as many brethren.

After nightfall, Ben-Hur sat by the door of the tent waiting for

Ilderim, not yet returned from the city. He was not impatient, or

vexed, or doubtful. The sheik would be heard from, at least. Indeed,

whether it was from satisfaction with the performance of the four, or

the refreshment there is in cold water succeeding bodily exercise, or

supper partaken with royal appetite, or the reaction which, as a kindly

provision of nature, always follows depression, the young man was in

good-humor verging upon elation. He felt himself in the hands of

Providence no longer his enemy. At last there was a sound of horse’s

feet coming rapidly, and Malluch rode up.

“Son of Arrius,” he said, cheerily, after salutation, “I salute you for

Sheik Ilderim, who requests you to mount and go to the city. He is

waiting for you.”

Ben-Hur asked no questions, but went in where the horses were feeding.

Aldebaran came to him, as if offering his service. He played with him

lovingly, but passed on, and chose another, not of the four—they were

sacred to the race. Very shortly the two were on the road, going

swiftly and in silence.

Some distance below the Seleucian Bridge, they crossed the river by a

ferry, and, riding far round on the right bank, and recrossing by

another ferry, entered the city from the west. The detour was long, but

Ben-Hur accepted it as a precaution for which there was good reason.

Down to Simonides’ landing they rode, and in front of the great

warehouse, under the bridge, Malluch drew rein.

“We are come,” he said. “Dismount.”

Ben-Hur recognized the place.

“Where is the sheik?” he asked.

“Come with me. I will show you.”

A watchman took the horses, and almost before he realized it Ben-Hur

stood once more at the door of the house up on the greater one,

listening to the response from within—“In God’s name, enter.”

CHAPTER VII

Malluch stopped at the door; Ben-Hur entered alone.

The room was the same in which he had formerly interviewed Simonides,

and it had been in nowise changed, except now, close by the arm-chair,

a polished brazen rod, set on a broad wooden pedestal, arose higher

than a tall man, holding lamps of silver on sliding arms, half-a-dozen

or more in number, and all burning. The light was clear, bringing into

view the panelling on the walls, the cornice with its row of gilded

balls, and the dome dully tinted with violet mica.

Within a few steps, Ben-Hur stopped.

Three persons were present, looking at him—Simonides, Ilderim, and

Esther.

He glanced hurriedly from one to another, as if to find answer to the

question half formed in his mind, What business can these have with me?

He became calm, with every sense on the alert, for the question was

succeeded by another, Are they friends or enemies?

At length, his eyes rested upon Esther.

The men returned his look kindly; in her face there was something more

than kindness—something too _spirituel_ for definition, which yet went

to his inner consciousness without definition.

Shall it be said, good reader? Back of his gaze there was a comparison

in which the Egyptian arose and set herself over against the gentle

Jewess; but it lived an instant, and, as is the habit of such

comparisons, passed away without a conclusion.

“Son of Hur—”

The guest turned to the speaker.

“Son of Hur,” said Simonides, repeating the address slowly, and with

distinct emphasis, as if to impress all its meaning upon him most

interested in understanding it, “take thou the peace of the Lord God of

our fathers—take it from me.” He paused, then added, “From me and

mine.”

The speaker sat in his chair; there were the royal head, the bloodless

face, the masterful air, under the influence of which visitors forgot

the broken limbs and distorted body of the man. The full black eyes

gazed out under the white brows steadily, but not sternly. A moment

thus, then he crossed his hands upon his breast.

The action, taken with the salutation, could not be misunderstood, and

was not.

“Simonides,” Ben-Hur answered, much moved, “the holy peace you tender

is accepted. As son to father, I return it to you. Only let there be

perfect understanding between us.”

Thus delicately he sought to put aside the submission of the merchant,

and, in place of the relation of master and servant, substitute one

higher and holier.

Simonides let fall his hands, and, turning to Esther, said, “A seat for

the master, daughter.”

She hastened, and brought a stool, and stood, with suffused face,

looking from one to the other—from Ben-Hur to Simonides, from Simonides

to Ben-Hur; and they waited, each declining the superiority direction

would imply. When at length the pause began to be embarrassing, Ben-Hur

advanced, and gently took the stool from her, and, going to the chair,

placed it at the merchant’s feet.

“I will sit here,” he said.

His eyes met hers—an instant only; but both were better of the look. He

recognized her gratitude, she his generosity and forbearance.

Simonides bowed his acknowledgment.

“Esther, child, bring me the paper,” he said, with a breath of relief.

She went to a panel in the wall, opened it, took out a roll of papyri,

and brought and gave it to him.

“Thou saidst well, son of Hur,” Simonides began, while unrolling the

sheets. “Let us understand each other. In anticipation of the

demand—which I would have made hadst thou waived it—I have here a

statement covering everything necessary to the understanding required.

I could see but two points involved—the property first, and then our

relation. The statement is explicit as to both. Will it please thee to

read it now?”

Ben-Hur received the papers, but glanced at Ilderim.

“Nay,” said Simonides, “the sheik shall not deter thee from reading.

The account—such thou wilt find it—is of a nature requiring a witness.

In the attesting place at the end thou wilt find, when thou comest to

it, the name—Ilderim, Sheik. He knows all. He is thy friend. All he has

been to me, that will he be to thee also.”

Simonides looked at the Arab, nodding pleasantly, and the latter

gravely returned the nod, saying, “Thou hast said.”

Ben-Hur replied, “I know already the excellence of his friendship, and

have yet to prove myself worthy of it.” Immediately he continued,

“Later, O Simonides, I will read the papers carefully; for the present,

do thou take them, and if thou be not too weary, give me their

substance.”

Simonides took back the roll.

“Here, Esther, stand by me and receive the sheets, lest they fall into

confusion.”

She took place by his chair, letting her right arm fall lightly across

his shoulder, so, when he spoke, the account seemed to have rendition

from both of them jointly.

“This,” said Simonides, drawing out the first leaf, “shows the money I

had of thy father’s, being the amount saved from the Romans; there was

no property saved, only money, and that the robbers would have secured

but for our Jewish custom of bills of exchange. The amount saved, being

sums I drew from Rome, Alexandria, Damascus, Carthage, Valentia, and

elsewhere within the circle of trade, was one hundred and twenty

talents Jewish money.”

He gave the sheet to Esther, and took the next one.

“With that amount—one hundred and twenty talents—I charged myself. Hear

now my credits. I use the word, as thou wilt see, with reference rather

to the proceeds gained from the use of the money.”

From separate sheets he then read footings, which, fractions omitted,

were as follows:

By ships 60 talents ” goods in store 110 ” ” cargoes in

transit 75 ” ” camels, horses, etc. 20 ” ” warehouses 10

” ” bills due 54 ” ” money on hand and subject to draft 224 ”

—— Total 553 ”

“To these now, to the five hundred and fifty-three talents gained, add

the original capital I had from thy father, and thou hast SIX HUNDRED

AND SEVENTY THREE TALENTS!—and all thine—making thee, O son of Hur, the

richest subject in the world.”

He took the papyri from Esther, and, reserving one, rolled them and

offered them to Ben-Hur. The pride perceptible in his manner was not

offensive; it might have been from a sense of duty well done; it might

have been for Ben-Hur without reference to himself.

“And there is nothing,” he added, dropping his voice, but not his

eyes—“there is nothing now thou mayst not do.”

The moment was one of absorbing interest to all present. Simonides

crossed his hands upon his breast again; Esther was anxious; Ilderim

nervous. A man is never so on trial as in the moment of excessive

good-fortune.

Taking the roll, Ben-Hur arose, struggling with emotion.

“All this is to me as a light from heaven, sent to drive away a night

which has been so long I feared it would never end, and so dark I had

lost the hope of seeing,” he said, with a husky voice. “I give first

thanks to the Lord, who has not abandoned me, and my next to thee, O

Simonides. Thy faithfulness outweighs the cruelty of others, and

redeems our human nature. ‘There is nothing I cannot do:’ be it so.

Shall any man in this my hour of such mighty privilege be more generous

than I? Serve me as a witness now, Sheik Ilderim. Hear thou my words as

I shall speak them—hear and remember. And thou, Esther, good angel of

this good man! hear thou also.”

He stretched his hand with the roll to Simonides.

“The things these papers take into account—all of them: ships, houses,

goods, camels, horses, money; the least as well as the greatest—give I

back to thee, O Simonides, making them all thine, and sealing them to

thee and thine forever.”

Esther smiled through her tears; Ilderim pulled his beard with rapid

motion, his eyes glistening like beads of jet. Simonides alone was

calm.

“Sealing them to thee and thine forever,” Ben-Hur continued, with

better control of himself, “with one exception, and upon one

condition.”

The breath of the listeners waited upon his words.

“The hundred and twenty talents which were my father’s thou shalt

return to me.”

Ilderim’s countenance brightened.

“And thou shalt join me in search of my mother and sister, holding all

thine subject to the expense of discovery, even as I will hold mine.”

Simonides was much affected. Stretching out his hand, he said, “I see

thy spirit, son of Hur, and I am grateful to the Lord that he hath sent

thee to me such as thou art. If I served well thy father in life, and

his memory afterwards, be not afraid of default to thee; yet must I say

the exception cannot stand.”

Exhibiting, then, the reserved sheet, he continued,

“Thou hast not all the account. Take this and read—read aloud.”

Ben-Hur took the supplement, and read it.

“Statement of the servants of Hur, rendered by Simonides, steward of

the estate.

1. Amrah, Egyptian, keeping the palace in Jerusalem.

2. Simonides, the steward, in Antioch.

3. Esther, daughter of Simonides.”

Now, in all his thoughts of Simonides, not once had it entered

Ben-Hur’s mind that, by the law, a daughter followed the parent’s

condition. In all his visions of her, the sweet-faced Esther had

figured as the rival of the Egyptian, and an object of possible love.

He shrank from the revelation so suddenly brought him, and looked at

her blushing; and, blushing, she dropped her eyes before him. Then he

said, while the papyrus rolled itself together,

“A man with six hundred talents is indeed rich, and may do what he

pleases; but, rarer than the money, more priceless than the property,

is the mind which amassed the wealth, and the heart it could not

corrupt when amassed. O Simonides—and thou, fair Esther—fear not. Sheik

Ilderim here shall be witness that in the same moment ye were declared

my servants, that moment I declared ye free; and what I declare, that

will I put in writing. Is it not enough? Can I do more?”

“Son of Hur,” said Simonides, “verily thou dost make servitude

lightsome. I was wrong; there are some things thou canst not do; thou

canst not make us free in law. I am thy servant forever, because I went

to the door with thy father one day, and in my ear the awl-marks yet

abide.”

“Did my father that?”

“Judge him not,” cried Simonides, quickly. “He accepted me a servant of

that class because I prayed him to do so. I never repented the step. It

was the price I paid for Rachel, the mother of my child here; for

Rachel, who would not be my wife unless I became what she was.”

“Was she a servant forever?”

“Even so.”

Ben-Hur walked the floor in pain of impotent wish.

“I was rich before,” he said, stopping suddenly. “I was rich with the

gifts of the generous Arrius; now comes this greater fortune, and the

mind which achieved it. Is there not a purpose of God in it all?

Counsel me, O Simonides! Help me to see the right and do it. Help me to

be worthy my name, and what thou art in law to me, that will I be to

thee in fact and deed. I will be thy servant forever.”

Simonides’ face actually glowed.

“O son of my dead master! I will do better than help; I will serve thee

with all my might of mind and heart. Body, I have not; it perished in

thy cause; but with mind and heart I will serve thee. I swear it, by

the altar of our God, and the gifts upon the altar! Only make me

formally what I have assumed to be.”

“Name it,” said Ben-Hur, eagerly.

“As steward the care of the property will be mine.”

“Count thyself steward now; or wilt thou have it in writing?”

“Thy word simply is enough; it was so with the father, and I will not

more from the son. And now, if the understanding be perfect”—Simonides

paused.

“It is with me,” said Ben-Hur.

“And thou, daughter of Rachel, speak!” said Simonides, lifting her arm

from his shoulder.

Esther, left thus alone, stood a moment abashed, her color coming and

going; then she went to Ben-Hur, and said, with a womanliness

singularly sweet, “I am not better than my mother was; and, as she is

gone, I pray you, O my master, let me care for my father.”

Ben-Hur took her hand, and led her back to the chair, saying, “Thou art

a good child. Have thy will.”

Simonides replaced her arm upon his neck, and there was silence for a

time in the room.

CHAPTER VIII

Simonides looked up, none the less a master.

“Esther,” he said, quietly, “the night is going fast; and, lest we

become too weary for that which is before us, let the refreshments be

brought.”

She rang a bell. A servant answered with wine and bread, which she bore

round.

“The understanding, good my master,” continued Simonides, when all were

served, “is not perfect in my sight. Henceforth our lives will run on

together like rivers which have met and joined their waters. I think

their flowing will be better if every cloud is blown from the sky above

them. You left my door the other day with what seemed a denial of the

claims which I have just allowed in the broadest terms; but it was not

so, indeed it was not. Esther is witness that I recognized you; and

that I did not abandon you, let Malluch say.”

“Malluch!” exclaimed Ben-Hur.

“One bound to a chair, like me, must have many hands far-reaching, if

he would move the world from which he is so cruelly barred. I have many

such, and Malluch is one of the best of them. And, sometimes”—he cast a

grateful glance at the sheik—“sometimes I borrow from others good of

heart, like Ilderim the Generous—good and brave. Let him say if I

either denied or forgot you.”

Ben-Hur looked at the Arab.

“This is he, good Ilderim, this is he who told you of me?”

Ilderim’s eyes twinkled as he nodded his answer.

“How, O my master,” said Simonides, “may we without trial tell what a

man is? I knew you; I saw your father in you; but the kind of man you

were I did not know. There are people to whom fortune is a curse in

disguise. Were you of them? I sent Malluch to find out for me, and in

the service he was my eyes and ears. Do not blame him. He brought me

report of you which was all good.”

“I do not,” said Ben-Hur, heartily. “There was wisdom in your

goodness.”

“The words are very pleasant to me,” said the merchant, with feeling,

“very pleasant. My fear of misunderstanding is laid. Let the rivers run

on now as God may give them direction.”

After an interval he continued:

“I am compelled now by truth. The weaver sits weaving, and, as the

shuttle flies, the cloth increases, and the figures grow, and he dreams

dreams meanwhile; so to my hands the fortune grew, and I wondered at

the increase, and asked myself about it many times. I could see a care

not my own went with the enterprises I set going. The simooms which

smote others on the desert jumped over the things which were mine. The

storms which heaped the seashore with wrecks did but blow my ships the

sooner into port. Strangest of all, I, so dependent upon others, fixed

to a place like a dead thing, had never a loss by an agent—never. The

elements stooped to serve me, and all my servants, in fact, were

faithful.”

“It is very strange,” said Ben-Hur.

“So I said, and kept saying. Finally, O my master, finally I came to be

of your opinion—God was in it—and, like you, I asked, What can his

purpose be? Intelligence is never wasted; intelligence like God’s never

stirs except with design. I have held the question in heart, lo! these

many years, watching for an answer. I felt sure, if God were in it,

some day, in his own good time, in his own way, he would show me his

purpose, making it clear as a whited house upon a hill. And I believe

he has done so.”

Ben-Hur listened with every faculty intent.

“Many years ago, with my people—thy mother was with me, Esther,

beautiful as morning over old Olivet—I sat by the wayside out north of

Jerusalem, near the Tombs of the Kings, when three men passed by riding

great white camels, such as had never been seen in the Holy City. The

men were strangers, and from far countries. The first one stopped and

asked me a question. ‘Where is he that is born King of the Jews?’ As if

to allay my wonder, he went on to say, ‘We have seen his star in the

east, and have come to worship him.’ I could not understand, but

followed them to the Damascus Gate; and of every person they met on the

way—of the guard at the Gate, even—they asked the question. All who

heard it were amazed like me. In time I forgot the circumstance, though

there was much talk of it as a presage of the Messiah. Alas, alas! What

children we are, even the wisest! When God walks the earth, his steps

are often centuries apart. You have seen Balthasar?”

“And heard him tell his story,” said Ben-Hur.

“A miracle!—a very miracle!” cried Simonides. “As he told it to me,

good my master, I seemed to hear the answer I had so long waited; God’s

purpose burst upon me. Poor will the King be when he comes—poor and

friendless; without following, without armies, without cities or

castles; a kingdom to be set up, and Rome reduced and blotted out. See,

see, O my master! thou flushed with strength, thou trained to arms,

thou burdened with riches; behold the opportunity the Lord hath sent

thee! Shall not his purpose be thine? Could a man be born to a more

perfect glory?”

Simonides put his whole force in the appeal.

“But the kingdom, the kingdom!” Ben-Hur answered, eagerly. “Balthasar

says it is to be of souls.”

The pride of the Jew was strong in Simonides, and therefore the

slightly contemptuous curl of the lip with which he began his reply:

“Balthasar has been a witness of wonderful things—of miracles, O my

master; and when he speaks of them, I bow with belief, for they are of

sight and sound personal to him. But he is a son of Mizraim, and not

even a proselyte. Hardly may he be supposed to have special knowledge

by virtue of which we must bow to him in a matter of God’s dealing with

our Israel. The prophets had their light from Heaven directly, even as

he had his—many to one, and Jehovah the same forever. I must believe

the prophets.—Bring me the Torah, Esther.”

He proceeded without waiting for her.

“May the testimony of a whole people be slighted, my master? Though you

travel from Tyre, which is by the sea in the north, to the capital of

Edom, which is in the desert south, you will not find a lisper of the

Shema, an alms-giver in the Temple, or any one who has ever eaten of

the lamb of the Passover, to tell you the kingdom the King is coming to

build for us, the children of the covenant, is other than of this

world, like our father David’s. Now where got they the faith, ask you!

We will see presently.”

Esther here returned, bringing a number of rolls carefully enveloped in

dark-brown linen lettered quaintly in gold.

“Keep them, daughter, to give to me as I call for them,” the father

said, in the tender voice he always used in speaking to her, and

continued his argument:

“It were long, good my master—too long, indeed—for me to repeat to you

the names of the holy men who, in the providence of God, succeeded the

prophets, only a little less favored than they—the seers who have

written and the preachers who have taught since the Captivity; the very

wise who borrowed their lights from the lamp of Malachi, the last of

his line, and whose great names Hillel and Shammai never tired of

repeating in the colleges. Will you ask them of the kingdom? Thus, the

Lord of the sheep in the Book of Enoch—who is he? Who but the King of

whom we are speaking? A throne is set up for him; he smites the earth,

and the other kings are shaken from their thrones, and the scourges of

Israel flung into a cavern of fire flaming with pillars of fire. So

also the singer of the Psalms of Solomon—‘Behold, O Lord, and raise up

to Israel their king, the son of David, at the time thou knowest, O

God, to rule Israel, thy children.... And he will bring the peoples of

the heathen under his yoke to serve him.... And he shall be a righteous

king taught of God, ... for he shall rule all the earth by the word of

his mouth forever.’ And last, though not least, hear Ezra, the second

Moses, in his visions of the night, and ask him who is the lion with

human voice that says to the eagle—which is Rome—‘Thou hast loved

liars, and overthrown the cities of the industrious, and razed their

walls, though they did thee no harm. Therefore, begone, that the earth

may be refreshed, and recover itself, and hope in the justice and piety

of him who made her.’ Whereat the eagle was seen no more. Surely, O my

master, the testimony of these should be enough! But the way to the

fountain’s head is open. Let us go up to it at once.—Some wine, Esther,

and then the Torah.”

“Dost thou believe the prophets, master?” he asked, after drinking. “I

know thou dost, for of such was the faith of all thy kindred.—Give me,

Esther, the book which hath in it the visions of Isaiah.”

He took one of the rolls which she had unwrapped for him, and read,

“‘The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that

dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light

shined.... For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the

government shall be upon his shoulder.... Of the increase of his

government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David,

and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment

and with justice from henceforth even forever.’—Believest thou the

prophets, O my master?—Now, Esther, the word of the Lord that came to

Micah.”

She gave him the roll he asked.

“‘But thou,’” he began reading—“‘but thou, Bethlehem Ephrath, though

thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he

come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel.’—This was he, the

very child Balthasar saw and worshipped in the cave. Believest thou the

prophets, O my master?—Give me, Esther, the words of Jeremiah.”

Receiving that roll, he read as before, “‘Behold, the days come, saith

the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, and a king

shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the

earth. In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell

safely.’ As a king he shall reign—as a king, O my master! Believest

thou the prophets?—Now, daughter, the roll of the sayings of that son

of Judah in whom there was no blemish.”

She gave him the Book of Daniel.

“Hear, my master,” he said: “‘I saw in the night visions, and behold,

one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven.... And there

was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people,

nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting

dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall

not be destroyed.’—Believest thou the prophets, O my master?”

“It is enough. I believe,” cried Ben-Hur.

“What then?” asked Simonides. “If the King come poor, will not my

master, of his abundance, give him help?”

“Help him? To the last shekel and the last breath. But why speak of his

coming poor?”

“Give me, Esther, the word of the Lord as it came to Zechariah,” said

Simonides.

She gave him one of the rolls.

“Hear how the King will enter Jerusalem.” Then he read, “‘Rejoice

greatly, O daughter of Zion.... Behold, thy King cometh unto thee with

justice and salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt,

the foal of an ass.’”

Ben-Hur looked away.

“What see you, O my master?”

“Rome!” he answered, gloomily—“Rome, and her legions. I have dwelt with

them in their camps. I know them.”