CHAPTER XV.
The governor's palace, the pride and glory of Memphis, the magnificenthome of the oldest and noblest family of the land--the last house thathad given birth to a race of native Egyptians held worthy, even by theGreeks, to represent the emperor and uphold the highest dignity in theworld--the very citadel of native life, lay in ashes; and just as agiant of the woods crushes and destroys in its fall many plants ofhumbler growth, so the burning of the great house destroyed hundreds ofsmaller dwellings.
This night's work had torn the mast and rudder, and many a plankbesides, from that foundering vessel, the town of Memphis. It seemedindeed a miracle that had saved the whole from being reduced to cinders;and for this, next to God's providence, they might thank the blackincendiary himself and his Arabs. The crime was committed with cool andshrewd foresight, and carried through to the end. During his visitationthroughout the rambling buildings Obada had looked out for spots thatmight suit his purpose, and two hours after sunset he had lighted fireafter fire with his own hand, in secret and undetected. The troops heintended to employ later were waiting under arms at Fostat, and whenthe fire broke out, first in the treasury and afterwards in three otherplaces in the palace, they were immediately marched across and veryjudiciously employed.
All that was precious in this ancient home of a wealthy race, wasconveyed to a place of safety, even the numerous fine horses in thestables; and the title-deeds of the estate, slaves, and so forth werealready secured at Fostat; still, the flames consumed vast quantitiesof treasures that could never be replaced. Beautiful works of art,manuscripts and books such as were only preserved here, old and splendidplants from every zone, vessels and woven stuffs that had been thedelight of connoisseurs--all perished in heaps. But the incendiaryregretted none of them, for all possibility of proving how much that wasprecious had fallen into his hands was buried under their ashes.
The worst that could happen to him now was to be deposed from officefor his too audacious proceedings. Of all the towns he had seen in thecourse of the triumphant incursions of Islam none had attracted him sogreatly as Damascus, and he now had the means of spending the latterhalf of his life there in luxurious enjoyment.
At the same time it was desirable to rescue as much as possible from theflames; for it would have given his enemies a fatal hold upon him, ifthe famous old city of Memphis should perish by his neglect. And he wasa man to give battle to the awful element.
Not another building fell a prey to it on the Nile quay; but a lightsoutherly breeze carried burning fragments to the northwest, and severalhouses in the poorer quarter on the edge of the desert caught fire.Thither the larger portion of those who could combat the flames andrescue the inhabitants were at once directed; and here, as at thepalace, he acted on the principle of sacrificing whatever could not besaved entire. Thus a whole quarter of the town was destroyed, hundredsof beggared families lost all they possessed; and yet he, whose ruthlessavarice had cast so many into misery, was admired and lauded; for he waseverywhere at once: now by the river and now by the desert, always wherethe danger was greatest, and where the presence of the leader was mostneeded. Here he was seen in the very midst of the fire, there he swungthe axe with his own hand; now, mounted on horseback, he rode down theline where the dry grass was to be torn up by the roots and soaked withwater; now, on foot, he directed the scanty jet from the pipes or, withHerculean strength, flung back into the flames a beam which had fallenbeyond the limits he had set. His shrill voice sounded, as his hugeheight towered, above all others; every eye was fixed on his black faceand flashing eyes and teeth, while his example carried away all hisfollowers to imitate it. His shouts of command made the scene of thefire like a battle-field; the Moslems, so ably led, regardless of lifeas they were and ready to strain and exert their strength to the utmost,wrought wonders in the name of their God and His Prophet.
The Egyptians, too, did their best; but they felt themselves impotent bycomparison with what these Arabs did, and they hardly felt anything butthe disgrace of being over-mastered by them.
The light shone far across the country; even he whose splendidinheritance was feeding the flames perceived, between midnight and dawn,a glow on the distant western horizon which he was unable to accountfor.
He had been riding towards it for about half an hour when the caravanhalted at the last station but one, on the high road between Kolzum andBabylon.
[Suez, and the Greek citadel near which Amru founded Fostat and Cairo subsequently grew up.]
A considerable troop of horse soldiers dismounted at the same time, butOrion had not summoned these to protect him; on the contrary, he wasin their charge and they were taking him, a prisoner, to Fostat. He hadquitted the chariot in which he had set out and had been made to mount adromedary; two horsemen armed to the teeth rode constantly at his side.His fellow-travellers were allowed to remain in their chariot.
At the inn which they had now reached Justinus got out and desired hiscompanion, a pale-faced man who sat sunk into a heap, to do the same;but with a weary shake of the head he declined to move.
"Are you in pain, Narses?" asked Justinus affectionately, and Narsesbriefly replied in a husky voice: "All over," and settled himselfagainst the cushion at the back of the chariot. He even refusedthe refreshments brought out to him by the Senator's servant andinterpreter. He seemed sunk in apathy and to crave nothing but peace.
This was the senator's nephew.
With Orion's help, and armed with letters of protection andrecommendation from Amru, the senator had gained his purpose. He hadransomed Narses, but not before the wretched man had toiled for sometime as a prisoner, first at the canal on the line of the old oneconstructed by the Pharaohs, which was being restored under the KhaliffOmar, to secure the speediest way of transporting grain from Egypt toArabia and afterwards in the rock-bound harbor of Aila. On the burningshores of the Red Sea, under the fearful sun of those latitudes, Narseswas condemned to drag blocks of stone; many days had elapsed beforehis uncle could trace him--and in what a state did Justinus find him atlast!
A week before he could reach him, the ex-officer of cavalry had laidhimself down in the wretched sheds for the sick provided for thelaborers; his back still bore the scars of the blows by which theoverseer had spurred the waning strength of his exhausted and sufferingvictim. The fine young soldier was a wreck, broken alike in heartand body and sunk in melancholy. Justinus had hoped to take him homejubilant to Martina, and he had only this ruin to show her, doomed tothe grave.
The senator was glad, nevertheless, to have saved this much at any rate.The sight of the sufferer touched him deeply, and the less Narses wouldtake or give, the more thankful was Justinus when he gave the faintestsign of reviving interest.
In the course of this journey by land and water--and latterly as sharingthe senator's care of his nephew--Orion had become very dear to hisold friend; and at the risk of incurring his displeasure he had evenconfessed the reasons that had prompted him to leave Memphis.
He never could cease to feel that everything good or lofty in himselfwas Paula's alone; that her love ennobled and strengthened him; that todesert her was to abandon himself. His trifling with Heliodora could butdivert him from the high aim he had set before himself. This aim he keptconstantly in view; his spirit hungered for peaceful days in which hemight act on the resolution he had formed in church and fulfil the taskset before him by the Arab governor.
The knowledge that he had inherited an enormous fortune now affordedhim no joy, for he was forced to confess to himself that but for thissuperabundant wealth he might have been a very different man; andmore than once a vehement wish came over him to fling away all hispossessions and wrestle for peace of mind and the esteem of the best menby his own unaided powers.
The senator had taken his confession as it was meant: if Thomas'daughter was indeed what Orion described her there could be but smallhope for his beautiful favorite. He and Martina must e'en make their wayhome again with two adopted dear ones, and it must
be the care of theold folks to comfort the young ones instead of the young succoring theold as was natural. And in spite of everything Orion had won on hisaffections, for every day, every hour he was struck by some new quality,some greater trait than he had looked for in the young man.
Torches were flaring in the inn-yard where, under a palm-thatched roofsupported on poles and covering a square space in the middle, benchesstood for the guests to rest. Here Justinus and Orion again met for afew minutes' conversation.
His warders were also seated near them; they did not let Orion out oftheir sight even while they ate their meal of mutton, bread, onions, anddates. The senator's servants brought some food from the chariot, andjust as Justinus and Orion had begun their attack on it, a tall mancame into the yard and made his way to the benches. This was Philippus,pausing on his road to Djidda. He had learnt, even before coming in,whom he would find here, a prisoner; and the Arabs, to whom the leechwas known, allowed him to join the pair, though at the same time theycame a little nearer, and their leader understood Greek.
Philippus was anything rather than cordially disposed towards Orion;still, he knew what peril hung over the youth, and how sad a loss he hadsuffered. His conscience bid him do all he could to prove helpful in thetrial that awaited him in the matter of the expedition in which Rufinushad perished. He was the bearer, too, of sad news which the Arabs mustnecessarily hear. Orion was indeed furious when he heard of the seizureand occupation of the governor's residence; still, he believed that Amruwould insist on restitution; but on hearing of his mother's death hebroke down completely. Even the Arabs, seeing the strong man shaken withsobs and learning the cause of his grief, respectfully withdrew; forthe anguish of a son at the loss of his mother was sacred in their eyes.They regard the man who mourns for one he loves as stricken by thehand of the Almighty and hallowed by his touch and treat him with thereverence of pious awe.
Orion had not observed their absence, but Philippus at once tookadvantage of it to tell him, as briefly as possible, all that relatedto the escape of the nuns. He himself knew not yet of the burning of thepalace, or of Paula's imprisonment; but he could tell the senator wherehe would find his wife and niece. So by the time he was bidden to mountand start once more Orion was informed of all that had happened.
It was with a drooping head, and sunk in melancholy thought that he rodeon his way.
As for the residence!--whether the Arabs gave it back to him or not,what did he care?--but his mother, his mother! All she had been to himfrom his earliest years rose before his mind; in the deep woe of thisparting he forgot the imminent danger and the dungeon that awaited him,and the intolerable insult to his rights; nay, even the image of thewoman he loved paled by the side of that of the beloved dead. Perhaps hemight not even gain permission to bury her!
The way lay through a parched tract of rocky desert, and the furtherthey went the more intense was that wonderful flush in the west, tillday broke behind the travellers and the glory of the sunrise quenchedthe vividness of its glow.
Another scorching day! The rocks by the wayside still threw long shadowson the sandy desert-road, when a party of Arab horsemen came from Fostatto meet the travellers, shouting the latest news to the prisoner'sescort. It was evidently important; but Orion did not understand a wordof what they said. Evil tidings fly fast, however; while the men weretalking together, the dragoman rode up to him and told him that hishome was burnt to the ground and half Memphis still in flames. Thencame other newsbearers, on horseback and on dromedaries; and they metchariots and files of camels loaded with corn and Egyptian merchandise;and each and all shouted to the Arab escort reports of what was going onin Memphis, hoping to be the first to tell the homeward bound party.
How many times did Orion hear the story--and each time that a travellerbegan with: "Have you heard?" pointing westward, the wounds the firstnews had inflicted bled anew.
What lay beneath that mass of ashes? How much had the flames consumedthat never could be replaced! Much that he had silently wished werepossible had in fact been fulfilled--and so soon! Where now was theburthen of great wealth which had hung about his heels and hindered hisrunning freely? And yet he did not, even now, feel free; the way was notyet open before him; he secretly mourned over the ruined house of hisfathers and the wrecked home; a miserable sense of insecurity weighedhim down. No father--no mother-no parental roof! For years he had been,in fact, perfectly independent, and yet he felt now like a pilot whoseboat had lost its rudder.
Before him lay a prison, and the closing act of the great tragedy ofwhich he himself had been the hero. Fate had fallen on his house, hadmarked it for destruction as erewhile that of Tantalus. It lay in ashes,and the victims were already many: two brothers, father, mother--and,far away from home, Rufinus too.
But whose was the guilt?
It was not his ancestors who had sinned; it could only be his ownthat had called down this ruin. But was there then such a power as theDestiny of the ancients--inexorable, iron Fate? Had he not repented andsuffered, been reconciled to his Redeemer, and prepared himself to fightthe hard fight? Perhaps he was indeed to be the hero of a tragedy; thenhe would show that it was not the blind Inevitable, but what a man canmake of himself, and what he can do by the aid of the God of might,which determines his fate. If he must still succumb, it should only beafter a valiant struggle and defense. He would battle fearlessly againstevery foe, would press onward in the path he had laid down for himself.His heart beat high once more; he felt as though he could see hisfather's example as a guiding star in the sky, so that he must be trueto that whether to live or to die. And when he turned his eye earthwardsagain, still, even there, he had that which made it seem worth the costof enduring the pangs of living and the brunt of the hardest battle:Paula and her love.
The nearer he approached Fostat, the more ardently his heart swelledwith longing. Heaven must grant him to see her once more, once more toclasp her in his arms, before--the end!
It seemed to him that what he had gone through in these few hours musthave removed and set aside everything that could part them. Now, hefelt, he had strength to remain worthy of her; if Heliodora were to comein his way again he would now certainly, positively, regard and treather only as a sister.
He was conducted at once to the house of the Kadi; but this official wasat the Divan--the council, which his arch-foe, that black monster Obada,had called together.
After the labors of the past night the Negro had allowed himself only afew hours rest, and then had met the council, where he had not been slowto discover that he had as many enemies as there were members present.
His most determined opponents were the Kadi Othman, the head of theCourts of justice and administration, and Khalid the governor of theexchequer. Neither of them hesitated to express his opinion; and indeed,no one present at this meeting would have suspected for a moment thatmost of the members had, in their peaceful youth, guarded flocks asshepherds on the mountains, led caravans across the desert, or managedsome small trade. In the contests of tribe against tribe they had foundopportunities for practice in the use of weapons, and for steeling theircourage; but where had they learnt to choose their words with so muchcare, and emphasize them with gestures of such natural grace that anyGreek orator would have admired them? It was only when the indignantorator "thundered and lightened" and was carried away by the heat ofpassion that he forgot his dignified moderation, and then how grandlyvoice, eye, and action helped each other! And never, even under thehighest excitement, was purity of language overlooked. These men, ofwhom very few could read and write, had at their command all the mosteffective verses of their poets having thousands of lines stored intheir minds.
The discussion to-day dealt with the social aspects of an ancientcivilization, unknown but a few years since to the warlike children ofthe desert, and yet how ably had the four overseers of public buildingsthe comptrollers of the markets, of the irrigation works, and of themills, achieved their ends. These bright and untarnished spirits wereequal to t
he hardest task and capable of carrying it through withenergy, acumen, and success.
And the sons of these men who had passed through no school were alreadywell-fitted and invited to give new splendor to cities in theirdecline, and new life to the learning of the countries they had subdued.Everything in this council revealed talent, vitality, and ardor; andObada, who had been a slave, found it by no means easy to uphold hispre-eminence among these assertive scions of free and respectablefamilies.
The Kadi spoke frankly and fearlessly against his recent proceedings,declaring in the name of every member of the Divan, that they disclaimedall responsibility for what had been done, and that it rested on theVekeel alone. Obada was very ready to accept it; and he announced withsuch fiery eloquence his determination to give shelter at Fostat to thenatives whom the conflagration had left roofless, he was so fair-spoken,and he had shown his great qualities in so clear a light during the pastnight, that they agreed to postpone their attainder and await the replyfrom Medina to the complaints they had forwarded. Discipline, indeed,required that they should submit; and many a man who would have flownto meet death on the field as a bride, quailed before the terribleadventurer who would not shrink from the most hideous deeds.
Obada had won by hard fighting. No one could prove a theft against himof so much as a single drachma; but he nevertheless had to take many arough word, and with one consent the assembly refused him the deferencejustly due to the governor's representative.
Bitterly indignant, he remained till the very last in thecouncil-chamber, no one staying with him, not even his own subalterns,to speak a soothing word in praise of the power and eloquence ofhis address, while the same cursed wretches would, under similarcircumstances, have buzzed round Amru like swarming bees, and haveescorted him home like curs wagging their tails. He ascribed thecontumely and opposition he met with to their prejudice, as haughty,free-born men against his birth, and not to any fault of his own, andyet he looked down on them all, feeling himself the superior of each byhimself; if the blow in Medina were successful, he would pick out hisvictims, and then....
His dreams of vengeance were abruptly broken by a messenger, coveredwith dust from head to foot; he brought good news: Orion was taken andsafely bestowed in the Kadi's house.
"And why not in mine?" asked Obada in peremptory tones. "Who is thegovernor's representative here. Othman or I? Take the prisoner to myhouse."
And he forthwith went home. But instead of the prisoner there presentlyappeared before him an official of the Kadi's household, who informedhim, from his master, that as the Khaliff had constituted Othman supremejudge in Egypt this matter was in his hands; if Obada wished to see theprisoner he might go to the Kadi's residence, or visit him later in thetown prison of Memphis, whither Orion would presently be transferred.
He rushed off, raging, to his enemy's house, but his stormy fury was metby the placidity of a calm and judicial mind. Othman was a man betweenforty and fifty years old, but his soft, black beard was already turninggrey; his noble dark face bore the stamp of a lofty, high-bred soul,and a keen but temperate spirit shone in his eyes. There was somethingserene and clear in his whole person; he was a man to bear the burthenof life's vicissitudes with dignity, while he had set himself the taskof saving others from them so far as in him lay.
The patriarch's complaints had come also to the Kadi's knowledge, andhe, too, was minded to exact retribution for the massacre of the Moslemsoldiers; but the punishment should fall on none but the guilty. Hewould have been sorry to believe that Orion was one of them, for he hadesteemed his father as a brave man and a just judge, and had taken manya word of good advice from the experienced Egyptian.
The scene between him and the infuriated Vekeel was a painful one evenfor the attendants who stood round; and Orion, who heard Obada'sraging from the adjoining room, could gather from it some idea of therelentless hatred with which his negro enemy would persecute him.
However, as after the wildest storm the sea ebbs in ripples so even thistempest came to a more peaceful conclusion. The Kadi represented to theVekeel what an unheard-of thing it would be, and in what a disgracefullight it would set Moslem justice if one of the noblest families inthe country--to whose head, too, the cause of Islam owed so much--wererobbed of its possessions on mere suspicion. To this the Vekeel repliedthat there were definite accusations brought by the head of the nativeChurch, and that nothing had been robbed, but merely confiscated andplaced in security. As to what Allah had thought fit to destroy by fire,no one could be held answerable for that. There was no "mere suspicion"in the case, for he himself had in his possession a document which amplyproved that Paula, Orion's beloved, had been the instigator of the crimewhich had cost the lives of twelve of the true believers.--The girlherself had been taken into custody yesterday. He would cross-examineher himself, too, in spite of all the Kadis in the world; for thoughOthman might choose to let any number of Moslems be murdered by thesedogs of Christians he, Obada, would not overlook it; and if he did, bytomorrow morning the thousand Egyptians who were digging the canal wouldhave killed with their shovels the three Moslems who kept guard overthem.
At this, Othman assured the Vekeel that he was no less anxious to punishthe miscreants, but that he must first make sure of their identity,and that, in accordance with the law, justly and without fear of man orblind hatred, with due caution and justice. He, as judge, was no lessaverse to letting off the guilty than he was to punishing the innocent;so the enquiry must be allowed to proceed quietly. If Obada wished toexamine Paula he, the Kadi, had no objection; to preside over the courtand to direct the trial was his business, and that he would not abdicateeven for the Khaliff himself so long as Omar thought him worthy to holdhis office.
To all this Obada had no choice but to agree, though with an ill-grace;and as the Vekeel wished to see Orion, the young man was called in. Thehuge negro looked at him from head to foot like a slave he proposedto buy; and, when Othman went to the door and so could not see him, hecould not resist the malicious impulse: he glanced significantly at theprisoner, and drew his forefinger sharply and quickly across hisblack throat as though to divide the head from the trunk. Then hecontemptuously turned his back on the youth.