It must be late, for Hermon felt the cool breeze, which in this region
rose between midnight and sunrise, on his burned face and, shivering,
drew his mantle closer round him.
Yet it seemed impossible to return to the cabin; the memory of Ledscha
imploring vengeance, and the stern image of the avenging goddess in the
cella of the little Temple of Nemesis, completely mastered him. In
the close cabin these terrible visions, united with the fear of having
reaped undeserved praise, would have crouched upon his breast like
harpies and stifled or driven him mad. After what had happened, to
number the swift granting of the insulted Biamite’s prayer among the
freaks of chance was probably a more arbitrary and foolish proceeding
than, with so many others, to recognise the incomprehensible power of
Nemesis. Ledscha had loosed it against him and his health, perhaps even
his life, and he imagined that she was standing before him with the
bridle and wheel, threatening him afresh.
Shivering, as if chilled to the bone, overwhelmed by intense horror,
he turned his blinded eyes upward to the blackness above and raised his
hand, for the first time since he had joined the pupils of Straton in
the Museum, to pray. He besought Nemesis to be content, and not add to
blindness new tortures to augment the terrible ones which rent his soul,
and he did so with all the ardour of his passionate nature.
The steward Gras had received orders to wake the Lady Thyone if anything
unusual happened to the blind man, and when he heard the unfortunate
artist groan so pitifully that it would have moved a stone, and saw him
raise his hand despairingly to his head, he thought it was time to utter
words of consolation, and a short time after the anxious matron followed
him.
Her low exclamation startled Hermon. To be disturbed in the first
prayer after so long a time, in the midst of the cries of distress of a
despairing soul, is scarcely endurable, and the blind man imposed little
restraint upon himself when his old friend asked what had occurred, and
urged him not to expose himself longer to the damp night air.
At first he resolutely resisted, declaring that he should lose his
senses alone in the close cabin.
Then, in her cordial, simple way, she offered to bear him company in the
cabin. She could not sleep longer, at any rate; she must leave him early
in the morning, and they still had many things to confide to each other.
Touched by so much kindness, he yielded and, leaning on the Bithynian’s
arm, followed her, not into his little cabin, but into the captain’s
spacious sitting room.
Only a single lamp dimly lighted the wainscoting, composed of ebony,
ivory, and tortoise shell, the gay rug carpet, and the giraffe and
panther skins hung on the walls and doors and flung on the couches and
the floor.
Thyone needed no brilliant illumination for this conversation, and the
blinded man was ordered to avoid it.
The matron was glad to be permitted to communicate to Hermon so speedily
all that filled her own heart.
While he remained on deck, she had gone to Daphne’s cabin.
She had already retired, and when Thyone went to the side of the couch
she found the girl, with her cheeks wet with tears, still weeping,
and easily succeeded in leading the motherless maiden to make a frank
confession.
Both cousins had been dear to her from childhood; but while Myrtilus,
though often impeded by his pitiable sufferings, had reached by a smooth
pathway the highest recognition, Hermon’s impetuous toiling and striving
had constantly compelled her to watch his course with anxious solicitude
and, often unobserved, extend a helping hand.
Sympathy, disapproval, and fear, which, however, was always blended with
admiration of his transcendent powers, had merged into love. Though he
had disdained to return it, it had nevertheless been perfectly evident
that he needed her, and valued her and her opinion. Often as their views
differed, the obstinate boy and youth had never allowed any one except
herself a strong influence over his acts and conduct. But, far as he
seemed to wander from the paths which she believed the right ones,
she had always held fast to the conviction that he was a man of noble
nature, and an artist who, if he only once fixed his eyes upon the
true goal, would far surpass by his mighty power the other Alexandrian
sculptors, whatever names they bore, and perhaps even Myrtilus.
To the great vexation of her father who, after her mother’s death, in
an hour when his heart was softened, had promised that he would never
impose any constraint upon her in the choice of a husband, she had
hitherto rejected every suitor. She had showed even the distinguished
Philotas in Pelusium, without the least reserve, that he was seeking her
in vain; for just at that time she thought she had perceived that
Hermon returned her love, and after his abrupt departure it had become
perfectly evident that the happiness of her life depended upon him.
The terrible misfortune which had now befallen him had only bound her
more firmly to the man she loved. She felt that she belonged to him
indissolubly, and the leech’s positive assurance that his blindness
was incurable had only increased the magic of the thought of being and
affording tenfold more to the man bereft of sight than when, possessing
his vision, the world, life, and art belonged to him. To be able to
lavish everything upon the most beloved of mortals, and do whatever her
warm, ever-helpful heart prompted, seemed to her a special favour of the
gods in whom she believed.
That it was Demeter, to the ranks of whose priestesses she belonged, who
was so closely associated with his blinding, also seemed to her no mere
work of chance. The goddess on whom Hermon had bestowed the features of
her own face had deprived him of sight to confer upon her the happiness
of brightening and beautifying the darkness of his life.
If she saw aright, and it was only the fear of obtaining, with herself,
her wealth, that still kept him from her, the path which would finally
unite them must be found at last. She hoped to conquer also her father’s
reluctance to give his only child in marriage to a blind man, especially
as Hermon’s last work promised to give him the right to rank with the
best artists of his age.
The matron had listened to this confession with an agitated heart.
She had transported herself in imagination into the soul of the girl’s
mother, and brought before her mind what objections the dead woman would
have made to her daughter’s union with a man deprived of sight; but
Daphne had firmly insisted upon her wish, and supported it by many
a sensible and surprising answer. She was beyond childhood, and her
three-and-twenty years enabled her to realize the consequences which so
unusual a marriage threatened to entail.
As for Thyone herself, she was always disposed to look on the bright
side, and the thought that this vigorous young man, this artist crowned
with the highest success, must remain in darkness to the end of his
life, was utterly incompatible with her belief in the goodness of the
gods. But if Hermon was cured, a rare wealth of the greatest happiness
awaited him in the union with Daphne.
The mood in which she found the blind man had wounded and troubled her.
Now she renewed the bandage, saying: “How gladly I would continue to
use my old hands for you, but this will be the last time in a long while
that I am permitted to do this for the son of my Erigone; I must leave
you to-morrow.”
Hermon clasped her hand closely, exclaiming with affectionate warmth:
“You must not go, Thyone! Stay here, even if it is only a few days
longer.”
What pleasure these words gave her, and how gladly she would have
fulfilled his wish! But it could not be, and he did not venture to
detain her by fresh entreaties after she had described how her aged
husband was suffering from her absence.
“I often ask myself what he still finds in me,” she said. “True, so long
a period of wedded life is a firm tie. If I am gone and he does not find
me when he returns home from inspections, he wanders about as if lost,
and does not even relish his food, though the same cook has prepared it
for years. And he, who forgets nothing and knows by name a large number
of the many thousand men he commands, would very probably, when I am
away, join the troops with only sandals on his feet. To miss my ugly
old face really can not be so difficult! When he wooed me, of course
I looked very different. And so--he confessed it himself--so he always
sees me, and most plainly when I am absent from his sight. But that,
Hermon, will be your good fortune also. All you now know as young and
beautiful will continue so to you as long as this sorrowful blindness
lasts, and on that very account you must not remain alone, my boy--that
is, if your heart has already decided in favour of any one--and that is
the case, unless these old eyes deceive me.”
“Daphne,” he answered dejectedly, “why should I deny that she is dear to
me? And yet, how dare the blind man take upon himself the sin of binding
her young life--”
“Stop! stop!” Thyone interrupted with eager warmth. “She loves you, and
to be everything to you is the greatest happiness she can imagine.”
“Until repentance awakes, and it is too late,” he answered gravely.
“But even were her love strong enough to share her husband’s misfortune
patiently--nay, perhaps with joyous courage--it would still be
contemptible baseness were I to profit by that love and seek her hand.”
“Hermon!” the matron now exclaimed reproachfully; but he repeated with
strong emphasis: “Yes, it would be baseness so great that even her most
ardent love could not save me from the reproach of having committed it.
I will not speak of her father, to whom I am so greatly indebted. It may
be that it might satisfy Daphne, full of kindness as she is, to devote
herself, body and soul, to the service of her helpless companion. But
I? Far from thinking constantly, like her, solely of others and their
welfare, I should only too often, selfish as I now am, be mindful of
myself. But when I realize who I am, I see before me a blind man who is
poorer than a beggar, because the scorching flames melted even the gold
which was to help him pay his debts.”
“Folly!” cried the matron. “For what did Archias gather his boundless
treasures? And when his daughter is once yours--”
“Then,” Hermon went on bitterly, “the blinded artist’s poverty will be
over. That is your opinion, and the majority of people will share it.
But I have my peculiarities, and the thought of being rescued from
hunger and thirst by the woman I love, and who ought to see in me the
man from whom she receives the best gifts--to be dependent on her as
the recipient of her alms--seems to me worse than if I were once more to
lose my sight. I could not endure it at all! Every mouthful would choke
me. Just because she is so dear to me, I can not seek her hand; for,
in return for her great self-sacrificing love, I could give her nothing
save the keen discontent which seizes the proud soul that is forced
constantly to accept benefits, as surely as the ringing sound follows
the blow upon the brass. My whole future life would become a chain of
humiliations, and do you know whither this unfortunate marriage would
lead? My teacher Straton once said that a man learns to hate no one more
easily than the person from whom he receives benefits which it is out
of his power to repay. That is wise, and before I will see my great love
for Daphne transformed to hate, I will again try the starving which,
while I was a sculptor at Rhodes, I learned tolerably well.”
“But would not a great love,” asked Thyone, “suffice to repay tenfold
the perishable gifts that can be bought with gold and silver?”
“No, and again no!” Hermon answered in an agitated tone. “Something else
would blend with the love I brought to the marriage, something that must
destroy all the compensation it might offer; for I see myself becoming
a resentful misanthrope if I am compelled to relinquish the pleasure of
creating and, condemned to dull inaction, can do nothing except allow
myself to be tended, drink, eat, and sleep. The gloomy mood of her
unfortunate husband would sadden Daphne’s existence even more than my
own; for, Thyone, though I should strive with all my strength to bear
patiently, with her dear aid, the burden imposed upon me, and move on
through the darkness with joyous courage, like many another blind man, I
could not succeed.”
“You are a man,” the matron exclaimed indignantly, “and what thousands
have done before you--”
“There,” he loudly protested, “I should surely fail; for, you dear
woman, who mean so kindly by me, my fate is worse than theirs. Do you
know what just forced from my lips the exclamation of pain which alarmed
you? I, the only child of the devout Erigone, for whose sake you are so
well disposed toward me, am doomed to misfortune as surely as the victim
dragged to the altar is certain of death. Of all the goddesses, there is
only one in whose power I believe, and to whom I just raised my hands in
prayer. It is the terrible one to whom I was delivered by hate and the
deceived love which is now dragging me by the hair, and will rob and
torture me till I despair of life. I mean the gray daughter of Night,
whom no one escapes, dread Nemesis.”
Thyone sank down into the chair by the blind artist’s side, asking
softly, “And what gave you into her avenging hands, hapless boy?”
“My own abominable folly,” he answered mournfully and, with the feeling
that it would relieve his heart to pour out to this true friend what he
would usually have confided only to his Myrtilus, he hurriedly related
how he had recognised in Ledscha the best model for his Arachne, how he
had sought her love, and then, detained by Althea, left her in the lurch
and most deeply offended and insulted her. Lastly, he gave a brief but
vivid description of his meeting with the vengeful barbarian girl in
the Temple of Nemesis, how Ledscha had invoked upon him the wrath of the
terrible goddess, and how the most horrible punishment had fallen upon
him directly after the harsh accusation of the Biamite.
The matron had listened to this confession in breathless suspense. Now
she fixed her eyes on the floor, shook her gray head gently, and said
anxiously: “Is that it? It certainly puts things in a different light.
As the son of your never-to-be-forgotten mother, you are indeed dear to
my heart; but Daphne is not less dear to me, and though in your marriage
I just saw happiness for you both, that is now past. What is poverty,
what is blindness! Eros would reconcile far more difficult problems, but
his arrows are shattered on the armour of Nemesis. Where there is a pair
of lovers, and she raises her scourge against one of them, the other
will also be struck. Until you feel that you are freed from this
persecutor, it would be criminal to bind a loving woman to you and your
destiny. It is not easy to find the right path for you both, for even
Nemesis and her power do not make the slightest change in the fact that
you need faithful care and watching in your blindness. Daylight brings
wisdom, and we will talk further to-morrow.”
She rose as she spoke; but Hermon detained her, while from his lips
escaped the anxious question, “So you will take Daphne away from me, and
leave me alone in my blindness?”
“You in your blindness?” cried Thyone, and the mere reproachful tone of
the question banished the fear. “I would as quickly deprive my own son
of my support as I would you just at this time, my poor boy; but whether
my conscience will permit me to let Daphne remain near you only grant
me, I repeat it, until sunrise to-morrow for reflection. My old heart
will then find the right way.”
“Yet whatever you may decide concerning us,” pleaded the blind man,
“tell Daphne that, on the eve of losing her, I first felt in its full
power how warmly I love her. Even without Nemesis, the joy of making
her mine would have been denied me. Fate will never permit me to possess
her; yet never again to hear her gentle voice, never more to feel her
dear presence, would be blinding me a second time.”
“It need not be imposed upon you long,” said the matron soothingly.
Then she went close to him, laid her hand on his shoulder, and said:
“The power of the goddess who punishes the misdeeds of the reckless is
called irresistible and uncontrollable; but one thing softens even her,
and checks her usually resistless wheel: it is a mother’s prayer. I
heard this from my own mother, and experienced it myself, especially in
my oldest son Eumedes, who from the wildest madcap became an ornament
of his class, and to whom the King--you doubtless know it--intrusted the
command of the fleet which is to open the Ethiopian land of elephants
to the Egyptian power. You, Hermon, are an orphan, but for you, too,
the souls of your parents live on. Only I do not know whether you still
honour and pray to them.”
“I did until a few years ago,” replied Hermon.
“But later you neglected this sacred duty,” added Thyone. “Yet how was
that possible? In our barren Pelusium I could not help thinking hundreds
of times of the grove which Archias planted in your necropolis for the
dead members of his family, and how often, while we were in Alexandria,
it attracted me to think in its shade of your never-to-be-forgotten
mother. There I felt her soul near me; for there was her home, and in
imagination I saw her walking and resting under the trees. And you--her
beloved child--you remained aloof from this hallowed spot! Even at the
festival of the dead you omitted prayers and sacrifices?”
The blind artist assented to this question by a silent bend of the head;
but the matron indignantly exclaimed: “And did not you know, unhappy
man, that you were thus casting away the shield which protects mortals
from the avenging gods? And your glorious mother, who would have given
her life for you? Yet you loved her, I suppose?”
“Thyone!” Hermon cried, deeply wounded, holding out his right hand as if
in defence. “Well, well!” said the matron. “I know that you revere her
memory. But that alone is not sufficient. On memorial festivals, and
especially on the birthdays, a mother’s soul needs a prayer and a gift
from the son, a wreath, a fillet, fragrant ointment, a piece of honey, a
cup of wine or milk--all these things even the poor man spares from his
penury--yet a warm prayer, in pure remembrance and love, would suffice
to rob the wrath of Nemesis, which the enraged barbarian girl let loose
upon you, of its power. Only your mother, Hermon, the soul of the noble
woman who bore you, can restore to you what you have lost. Appeal for
aid to her, son of Erigone, and she will yet make everything right.”
Bending quickly over the artist as she spoke, she kissed his brow and
moved steadily away, though he called her name with yearning entreaty.
A short time after, the steward Gras led Hermon to his cabin, and while
undressing him reported that a messenger from Pelusium had announced
that the commandant Philippus was coming to Tennis the next morning,
before the market place filled, to take his wife with him to Alexandria,
where he was going by the King’s command.
Hermon only half listened, and then ordered the Bithynian to leave him.
After he had reclined on the couch a short time, he softly called the
names of the steward, Thyone, and Daphne. As he received no answer, and
thus learned that he was alone, he rose, drew himself up to his full
height, gazed heavenward with his bandaged eyes, stretched both hands
toward the ceiling of the low cabin, and obeyed his friend’s bidding.
Thoroughly convinced that he was doing right, and ashamed of having
so long neglected what the duty of a son commanded, he implored his
mother’s soul for forgiveness.
While doing so he again found that the figure which he recalled to his
memory appeared before him with marvellous distinctness. Never had she
been so near him since, when a boy of seven, she clasped him for the
last time to her heart. She tenderly held out her arms to him, and he
rushed into her embrace, shouting exultantly while she hugged and kissed
him. Every pet name which he had once been so glad to hear, and during
recent years had forgotten, again fell from her lips. As had often
happened in days long past, he again saw his mother crown him for a
festival. Pleased with the little new garment which she herself had
woven for him and embroidered with a tiny tree with red apples, beneath
which stood a bright-plumaged duckling, she led him by the hand in the
necropolis to the empty tomb dedicated to his father.
It was a building the height of a man, constructed of red Cyprian
marble, on which, cast in bronze, shield, sword, and lance, as well as
a beautiful helmet, lay beside a sleeping lion. It was dedicated to
the memory of the brave hipparch whom he had been permitted to call his
father, and who had been burned beside the battlefield on which he had
found a hero’s death.
Hermon now again beheld himself, with his mother, garlanding, anointing,
and twining with fresh fillets the mausoleum erected by his uncle
Archias to his brave brother. The species of every flower, the colour
of the fillets-nay, even the designs embroidered on his little holiday
robe--again returned to his mind, and, while these pleasant memories
hovered around him, he appealed to his mother in prayer.
She stood before him, young and beautiful, listening without reproach or
censure as he besought her forgiveness and confided to her his sins, and
how severely he was punished by Nemesis.
During this confession he felt as though he was kneeling before the
beloved dead, hiding his face in her lap, while she bent over him and
stroked his thick, black hair. True, he did not hear her speak; but when
he looked up again he could see, by the expression of her faithful blue
eyes, that his manly appearance surprised her, and that she rejoiced in
his return to her arms.
She listened compassionately to his laments, and when he paused
pressed his head to her bosom and gazed into his face with such joyous
confidence that his heart swelled, and he told himself that she could
not look at him thus unless she saw happiness in store for him.
Lastly, he began also to confide that he loved no woman on earth more
ardently than the very Daphne whom, when only a pretty little child, she
had carried in her arms, yet that he could not seek the wealthy heiress
because manly pride forbade this to the blind beggar.
Here the anguish of renunciation seized him with great violence, and
when he wished to appeal again to his mother his exhausted imagination
refused its service, and the vision would not appear.
Then he groped his way back to the bed, and, as he let his head sink
upon the pillows, he fancied that he would soon be again enwrapped in
the sweet slumber of childhood, which had long shunned his couch.
It was years since he had felt so full of peace and hope, and he told
himself, with grateful joy, that every childlike emotion had not yet
died within him, that the stern conflicts and struggles of the last
years had not yet steeled every gentle emotion.