CHAPTER IV.
THE TRIAL.
The next morning Caesar, accompanied by his generals, set out for thebank which commanded the mouth of the Loire, where a tent had been setup for him. From this place the sea and its dangerous shores, strewnwith sand-bars and rocks level with the water, could be seen in thedistance. The wind was blowing a gale. Moored to the bank was afisherman's boat, at once solid and light, rigged Gallic fashion, withone square sail with flaps cut in its lower edge. To this craft Albinikand Meroe were forthwith conducted.
"It is stormy, the sea is menacing," said the interpreter to them. "Willyou dare to venture it alone with your wife? There are some fishermenhere who have been taken prisoners--do you want their help?"
"My wife and I have before now braved tempests alone in our boat, whenwe made for my ship, anchored far out from shore on account of badweather."
"But now you are maimed," answered the interpreter. "How will you beable to manage!"
"One hand is enough for the tiller. My companion will raise thesail--the woman's business, since it is a sort of cloth," gaily addedthe mariner to give the Romans faith in him.
"Go ahead then," said the interpreter. "May the gods direct you."
The bark, pushed into the waves by several soldiers, rocked a minuteunder the flappings of the sail, which had not yet caught the wind. Butsoon, held by Meroe, while her husband managed the tiller, the sailfilled, and bellied out to the blast. The boat leaned gently, and seemedto fly over the crests of the waves like a sea-bird. Meroe, dressed inher mariner's costume, stayed at the prow, her black hair streaming inthe wind. Occasionally the white foam of the ocean, bursting from theprow of the boat, flung its stinging froth in the young woman's nobleface. Albinik knew these coasts as the ferryman of the solitary moors ofBrittany knows their least detours. The bark seemed to play with thehigh waves. From time to time the couple saw in the distance the tent ofCaesar, recognizable by its purple flaps, and saw gleaming in the sunthe gold and silver which decked the armor of his generals.
"Oh, Caesar!--scourge of Gaul--the most cruel, the most debauched ofmen!" exclaimed Meroe. "You do not know that this frail bark, which atthis moment you are following in the distance with your eyes, bears twoof your most desperate enemies. You do not know that they havebeforehand given over their lives to Hesus in the hope of making toTeutates, god of journeys by land and by sea, an offering worthy ofhim--an offering of several thousand Romans, sinking in the depths ofthe sea. It is with hands raised to you, thankful and happy, O, Hesus,that we shall disappear in the bottom of the deep, with the enemies ofour sacred Gaul!"
The bark of Albinik and Meroe, almost grazing the rocks and glancingover the surges along the dangerous ashore, sometimes drew away from,sometimes approached the bank. The mariner's companion, seeing him sadand thoughtful, said:
"Still brooding, Albinik! Everything favors our projects. The Romangeneral is no longer suspicious; your skill this morning will decide himto accept your services; and to-morrow, mayhap, you will pilot thegalleys of our enemies----"
"Yes, I will pilot them to the bottom, where they will be swallowed up,and we with them."
"What a magnificent offering to the gods! Ten thousand Romans, perhaps!"
"Meroe," answered Albinik with a sigh, "then, after ending our liveshere, even as the soldiers, brave warriors after all, we shall beresurrected elsewhere with them. They will say to me: 'It was notthrough bravery, with the lance and the sword, that you overcame us. No,you slew us without a combat, by treason. You watched at the rudder, weslept in peace and confidence. You steered us on the rocks--in aninstant the sea swallowed us. You are like a cowardly poisoner, whowould send us to our death by putting poison in our food. Is that an actof valor? No, no longer do you know the open boldness of your fathers,those proud Gauls who fought us half naked, who railed at us in our ironarmor, asking why we fought if we were afraid of wounds or death.'"
"Ah!" exclaimed Meroe, sadly and bitterly, "Why did the druidesses teachme that a woman ought to escape the last outrage by death! Why did yourmother Margarid tell us so often, as a noble example to follow, thedeed of your grandmother Syomara, who cut off the head of the Roman whoravished her, and carrying the head under the skirt of her robe to herhusband, said to him these proud and chaste words: 'No two men livingcan boast of having possessed me!' Why did I not yield to Caesar?"
"Meroe!"
"Perhaps you would then have been avenged! faint heart! weak spirit!Must then the outrage be completed, the ignominy swallowed, before youranger is kindled?"
"Meroe, Meroe!"
"It is not enough for you, then, that the Roman has proposed to yourwife to sell herself, to deliver herself to him for gifts? It is to yourwife--do you hear!--to your wife, that Caesar made that offer of shame!"
"You speak true," answered the mariner, feeling anger fire his heart atthe memory of these outrages, "I was a spiritless fellow----"
But his companion went on with redoubled bitterness:
"No, I see it now. This is not enough. I should have died. Then perhapsyou would have sworn vengeance over my body. Oh, they arouse pity inyou, these Romans, of whom we wish to make an offering to the gods! Theyare not accomplices to the crime which Caesar attempted, say you?Answer! Would they have come to my aid, these soldiers, these bravewarriors, if, instead of relying on my own courage and drawing mystrength from my love for you, I had cried, implored, supplicated,'Romans, in the name of your mothers, defend me from the lust of yourgeneral'? Answer! Would they have come at my call? Would they haveforgotten that I was a Gaul--that Caesar was Caesar? Would the 'generoushearts' of these brave fellows have revolted? After rape, do not theythemselves drown the infants in the blood of their mothers?----"
Albinik did not allow his companion to finish. He blushed at his lack ofheart. He blushed at having an instant forgotten the horrible deedsperpetrated by the Romans in their impious war. He blushed at havingforgotten that the sacrifice of the enemies of Gaul was above all elsepleasing to Hesus. In his anger, he rang out, for answer, the war songof the Breton seamen, as if the wind could carry his words of defianceand death to Caesar where he stood on the bank:
Tor-e-benn! Tor-e-benn![4] As I was lying in my vessel I heard The sea-eagle calling, in the dead of night. He called his eaglets and all the birds of the shore. He said to them as he called: 'Arise ye, all--come--come. It is no longer the putrid flesh of the dog or sheep we must have-- It is Roman flesh.'
"Tor-e-benn! Tor-e-benn! Old sea-raven, tell me, what have you there? The head of the Roman leader I clutch; I want his eyes--his two red eyes!' And you, sea-wolf, what have you there?
'The heart of the Roman leader I hold-- I am devouring it.' And you, sea-serpent, what are you doing there, Coiled 'round that neck, your flat head so close To that mouth, already cold and blue? 'To hear the soul of the Roman leader Take its departure am I here!' Tor-e-benn! Tor-e-benn!"
Stirred up, like her husband, by the song of war, Meroe repeated withhim, seeming to defy Caesar, whose tent they discerned in the distance:
"Tor-e-benn! Tor-e-benn! Tor-e-benn!"
Still the bark of Albinik and Meroe played with the rocks and surges ofthose dangerous roads, sometimes drawing off shore, sometimes in.
"You are the best and most courageous pilot I have ever met with, I, whohave in my life traveled so much on the sea," said Caesar to Albinikwhen he had regained dry land, and, with Meroe, had left the boat."To-morrow, if the weather is fair, you will guide an expedition, thedestination of which you will know at the moment of setting sail."