Pentaur looked fixedly at the lad, who stood with no air of bravado
about him, but with an expression of humble trust that the merchant
could not fathom.
"Why shouldest thou risk death?" questioned the merchant. "Death
will defeat a Christian."
"Nay, O master!" exclaimed Timokles eagerly. "Death may be glorious
victory!"
Pentaur smiled.
"Oh!" broke forth Timokles earnestly, "I know a death that was a
glorious victory! Carthage knew of it! Didst thou not hear what was
done last year at Carthage? Didst thou not know of the Christian
lady, Vivia Perpetua, and the Christian slave, Felicitas?"
A shudder ran through Pentaur, as Timokles continued:
"Thinkest thou that what they suffered was nothing? Vivia Perpetua
was the best loved of a heathen father's children. How she suffered
in her heart, when her old father came to the prison and besought
her to give up Christ! 'Daughter,' begged the old man, 'have pity on
my gray hairs. Have compassion on thy father!' He wept at her feet.
He begged her to have pity on her little child. But she could not
give up Christ. Wert thou there, O Pentaur, when the governor
examined the prisoners? Didst thou see Vivia Perpetua's old father
press forward, carrying her babe in his arms, and beg her to recant
for the child's sake? Didst thou hear the judge ask her, 'Art thou
then a Christian?' and didst thou hear her answer, 'I am'?"
Timokles paused. Pentaur had groaned. His face was hidden in his
hands.
"And then," continued Timokles, "the wretched father, hearing his
daughter speak those words that doomed her to death, tried to draw
her from the platform. He was struck with a stick, and the judge
condemned Vivia Perpetua and Felicitas, with the other Christians,
to be exposed to the wild beasts."
Another low groan broke from Pentaur. Timokles hesitated an instant,
then hurried on:
"The Christians were to die in the amphitheatre of Carthage. At the
gate of the amphitheatre, the guards offered the men among the
Christians the red mantle of the priests of Saturn, and offered the
women the fillet worn by the priestesses of Ceres. But the
Christians refused. 'We have come here,' they said, 'of our own free
will, that we might not be deprived of our freedom. We have
forfeited our lives in order to be delivered from doing such
things.' Even the heathen could see the justice of this, and the
Christians were not compelled to wear the things. In the
amphitheatre, Vivia Perpetua and Felicitas were put into a net, and
allowed to be attacked by a wild cow. Then the two martyrs gave each
other the kiss of peace, and a gladiator killed them."
Timokles paused once more. Still no response.
"I remember hearing one thing more concerning Vivia Perpetua,"
ventured Timokles. "In prison she had had a vision. She thought she
saw a golden ladder stretching up to heaven, and on either side of
the ladder were swords, and spears, and knives. At the foot of the
ladder lay a dragon. Perpetua thought in her vision that she was
commanded to mount the ladder. She set her foot on the dragon's
head, saying, 'He will not harm me, in the name of Jesus Christ,'
and went up the ladder. At the top she found a large garden, and the
Good Shepherd met her."
Pentaur sprang to his feet, and put out a shaking hand.
"No more!" he cried. "Oh, no more! No more! O Vivia, Vivia!"
With a groan of anguish, Pentaur looked upward, as if behind the
desert's sky he might see again that youthful face, the face of that
sweet Christian with whom he had been acquainted from childhood and
whom he had last seen dying in Carthage's amphitheatre. Little did
Timokles know how the memory of Vivia Perpetua's death hour had
haunted Pentaur. They had been children together in Carthage, and
the martyrdom that Vivia Perpetua had suffered in her young
womanhood had impressed Pentaur more than all the agony he had seen
other Christians endure. When she gave up her life, he had clinched
his hands, and muttered fierce words against Carthage's gods, words
he afterward trembled to recall. He served those gods now, yet he
revered the memory of the Christian, Vivia Perpetua, as of one of
the holiest of women.
Timokles ventured no further words.
Pentaur summoned a slave, and committed to his care the young
Christian. The memory of Vivia Perpetua might pierce the merchant's
soul, but would not avail for Timokles' release.
Bound to another slave to prevent escape, Timokles traveled with the
company that night, and before morning the oasis of Ammon, "Oasis
Ammonia," was reached. It was a green and shady valley, several
miles long and three broad, in the midst of sand-hills. Here, over
five hundred years before, had come the founder of Alexandria,
Alexander the Great, to visit the oracle of Ammon, the god figured
to be like a man having the head and horns of a ram. The statue of
Amun-Ra had then been loaded with jewels, through the reverence of
the merchants who halted their caravans at this oasis, and who left
their treasures in the strong rooms of the temple, while resting the
camels under the palm trees.
All this Timokles remembered, as he stood beside the steaming
Fountain of the Sun in the oasis, and watched the bubbles that
constantly rose to the surface of that famous body of water.
"O branded-cheeked cutter of dykes, art thou in very truth a
Christian?" contemptuously asked the slave that guarded Timokles.
"I am, O friend," gently answered the lad.
"Ill shalt thou fare in this oasis, then," threatened the slave.
Timokles' eyes wandered over the landscape. The surface of the oasis
was undulating, and on the north it rose into high, limestone hills.
Date palms abounded near by Timokles. He could see the inhabitants
of the village, and the wanderers from farther, more isolated homes.
The oasis was composed of several disconnected tracts, and Timokles
heard that in the western part of the oasis there was a lake.
Suddenly the lad became aware of a number of angrily excited voices.
At a short distance stood Pentaur the merchant, surrounded by a
group of men, but what he said was lost in the confusion of tongues.
At length the merchant made a careless gesture, and walked away.
"Take the Christian!" shouted fierce voices.
A man ran straight from the group to Timokles. Without a word the
man seized the lad. Other hands assisted, and Timokles was hurried
away from the village, past palm trees and resting camels, toward
the north. Breathlessly the men dragged him a long distance over the
rising ground. No word of explanation was uttered. Timokles was
swept along, till at length the silent, determined company came to a
solitary, ruined building.
Timokles was pulled over the fallen stones, across what had once
been the court of the dwelling. Then the company reached a spot
where part of the house was still standing. Here a barred door shut
off further progress, but two of the men with great effort opened
the entrance.
All grasping hands fell from Timokles. The company waited.
"Go in, O Christian," commanded, a man. "Others have gone before
thee!"
Timokles looked fixedly forward. Before him was a hall-way, leading
into the portion of the dwelling-house yet remaining.
Timokles stepped forward. Eager hands pushed him quickly into the
hall and shut the door behind him. He heard the sound of bars that
fastened the door securely at his back. He was alone. What building
was this?
He felt here and there in the dark hall. A peculiar odor floated in
the heavy air. Timokles hesitated, fearing he knew not what. His
eyes could not pierce the deep gloom.
Resolving to see whither the hall led, he groped on, wondering if
this were the place in which the inhabitants of the oasis were wont
to confine prisoners. He came to a door. It opened readily to his
touch, and he passed into what had once been a large dwelling-room.
He stepped softly forward, noting the emptiness and desolation of
the place. The peculiar odor of the air was more noticeable than
before, but it was not till he had reached the middle of the
darkened room, and stood gazing about him, that he perceived at the
farther end, in the shadows, a space of yellowish fawn color, and
then saw manifold dark spots, also, that shaped themselves into a
large, living form.
Timokles drew one quick breath. He softly retreated. Keeping his
eyes fixed on the huge, sleeping leopard, Timokles put out his hand
to take hold of the door through which he had come. His groping
fingers found nothing but the blank wall!
Hastily turning with alarm, Timokles passed his hand over the wall's
surface. Surely the door had been here! There was no handle, no line
in the wall to indicate the existence of a door.
How silently it had swung shut, when he had come through! He
remembered that there had been no noise. He pressed his full force
now against the wall. He tried it softly, cautiously, here and
there, till he had passed over the entire space in which he knew the
door must be, and yet the wall stood apparently blank and whole
before him! The other walls seemed to be solid.
With beating heart, Timokles pushed once more at the partition. It
remained firm. Trembling with the shock of his sudden entrapping,
Timokles looked toward the room's far end. It was as he thought. The
beast was not chained. The sleeping leopard's spotted hide heaved
softly yet, with undisturbed breathing, and as Timokles watched
across the space, he remembered the ominous words spoken to him on
his entrance into this building: "Go in, O Christian! Others have
gone before thee!"
For a time, overcome by the horror of his situation, Timokles leaned
against the partition, the door through which had so mysteriously
disappeared. His eyes, between quick glances at the sleeping
leopard, searched with desperate intensity every part of the room,
for some means of escape.
"Is there no place?" he questioned.
Stealthily he crossed the apartment, and felt of the opposite wall.
It was immovable. Nowhere in it could he discover any opening.
The beautiful beast, the waking of which meant so much to Timokles,
stirred a little. The claws of one foot were drawn up. Then the foot
was relaxed again. The leopard continued to slumber.
High above Timokles were two small windows, closed by wooden
shutters. The half-ruined flat roof showed holes here and there
where the old palm branches of its construction, covered with mats
and plastered with mud, had given way. Had it not been for these
holes in the roof, Timokles would hardly have had light enough to
perceive the leopard, for the wooden shutters of the two windows
prevented their being of much service.
Even with the roof's holes, the room was dark. The rents in the roof
were much too far above Timokles to help him to escape; however, and
he reflected that if the roof had been lower, the place would
hardly have been chosen for the confinement of a wild beast, the
present height of the walls preventing the escape of the leopard, as
well as that of any Christian.
The leopard stirred again!
"He wakes!" thought Timokles, summoning his courage for that waking.
But the great cat only moved his head to a somewhat more comfortable
position, and continued to sleep.
Timokles repassed slowly and silently so much of the walls as was
accessible to him. The wall next to the sleeping beast could not be
safely examined, yet Timokles, looking through the gloom, noted from
his distance no more promising signs than were exhibited by the
other three sides of the room. Most of all did he linger about the
spot where, it seemed to him, he had entered, and more than once as
he touched the surface of the wall, seeking for some hidden spring,
he thought he heard behind him the leopard's soft footsteps, but,
turning hastily, found himself mistaken.
At length, in his search, Timokles slightly stumbled over some lumps
of mud that had fallen from the roof. The crunching sound partly
aroused the leopard. With a long-drawn sigh, the drowsy creature
stirred and rose slowly to his feet, stretching himself. He did not
yet see Timokles.
How beautiful the spotted hide was! Timokles, watching with steady
eyes for the instant when he should be discovered, had a fleeting
memory of that leopard-skin that covered a seat at home in.
Alexandria. He would never sit there again.
Even in these dread moments of suspense, there flashed across
Timokles' mind the memory of the saying of the martyr Ignatius,
bishop of Antioch, who was sent to Rome to fight with wild beasts:
"I am God's wheat; the teeth of the fierce beasts will but bruise
me, that I may be changed into the fine bread of my God."
It was the moment of discovery! The leopard had been standing,
looking around half sleepily. Now his great eyes spied the lad.