CHAPTER XLVI
THE PASSING OF A GOD
Inside the Temple of Baal-Moloch the chant of the priests swelled to atriumphant hymn of praise. The throbbing of drums and the droning ofstrange musical instruments increased the volume of sound. It drownedthe uproar of the conflict between the guards and the Israelites, whohad reached the gardens of the temple, and it rose above the wailing ofthe infants destined for the sacrifice. The children were held by thepriests, who formed in a deep semicircle before the idol. The throngof devotees filled the body of the temple beyond their line and the dimreaches of the arcades behind the rows of columns.
The pungent smell of smoke from the sacrificial fire was mingled withthe odor of incense that floated from censors swung by neophytes cladin robes of scarlet.
Amid the crowd that burst into the temple in such numbers as to forbidall semblance of the usual ceremonial order, rose the image of theGiver of Life and its Destroyer, gigantic and terrible. Its broadbreast glowed dull red, and a spurt of flame issued from its sneeringlips like a fiery tongue. The terror that had driven the people intothe temple gave way to awe when they found themselves in the presenceof the God. Many of the votaries fell upon their faces before thecolossal figure; others stretched their hands toward it in an agony ofsupplication. Sharp cries pierced the maddening pulsations of themusic. The gusts of the storm, entering through the opening in thetemple roof, drove the smoke in eddies through the obscurity.
Hiram walked straight to the idol and prostrated himself upon thelowest of the steps that rose to the platform on which it stood. Heremained for a moment in silent prayer, and then, rising, he stretchedforth his arms and repeated the ancient formula that always precededthe sacrifice, calling upon the God by the numerous titles thatsignified his manifold attributes.
Artemisia stood behind him, within the half-circle of priests who heldback the eager crowd. Her white garments gleamed pure and spotlessagainst the background of their sombre official robes. Her head wasslightly bowed, and her hands were clasped lightly before her. Sheseemed utterly oblivious of her surroundings and the terrible fate thatawaited her. Thais, firmly held by the priests who had brought her tothe temple, was stationed by her captors on the left hand of Baal, in aposition that prevented her eyes from meeting Artemisia's gaze. Theangry color had faded from her cheeks. She realized at last thatArtemisia was lost and that she herself must endure the agony of seeingher perish. Her face had grown haggard and drawn.
"Spare her, priest of Moloch!" she cried desperately, as Hiram endedhis invocation. "Her death cannot save thy city. Give her back to me,and I promise thee thy safety and the safety of thy order. If thouneeds must sacrifice a woman, let me be the victim. I am fairer thanshe, and I will be more acceptable to thy God. See, I beg her life atthy hands!"
She would have thrown herself upon her knees, but the priestsrestrained her. Hiram made no reply and paid no heed to her appeal.Ascending the steps with a firm tread, he stood between the feet of theidol and turned to the multitude, extending his hands over Artemisia'shead with the palms downward. The chant ceased and the music diedaway. Only the frightened sobbing of the infants, whom the assistantssought in vain to quiet, broke the silence within the temple. Hirambegan to speak in a solemn and impressive voice.
"We bring thee, O Lord, a maiden, pure in heart," he said. "We havesinned against thee in our pride; upon her head we place our sins; takethou her and forgive!"
He paused, and a wailing cry of supplication rose throughout the temple.
"We have neglected thy worship," Hiram went on. "Upon her head be ourneglect; take her and forgive! We have done those things that areforbidden; upon her head be our disobedience to thy law; take her andaccept our atonement! We have disregarded our oaths; upon her head beour perfidy; receive her in quittance of our debt to thee. Pardon us,O Lord, in this our sacrifice to thee, all our many sins against thee,and protect us out of thy mercy in this hour of our great peril!"
At the conclusion of the recital, he turned again to the God. The armsof the idol slowly sank and extended themselves until the outstretchedpalms were brought together before the iron knees a few feet from thefloor.
"Artemisia!" the chief priest called imperatively.
With faltering steps she obeyed his command, advancing slowly until shestood before the broad palms that seemed to tremble with impatience toclasp her form. In the deadly hush of expectancy, the fierce cries ofthe Israelites, struggling with the soldiers outside the temple, couldbe distinctly heard. Hiram saw that haste was necessary if thesacrifice was to be accomplished.
"Dost thou give thyself willingly for the sins of Tyre?" he demanded,confident of his power.
Before she could answer a shriek rang through the temple.
"Deny him, Artemisia, my sister!" Thais cried. "He is a sorcerer. Donot--"
Her voice was roughly stifled by the priests, her captors, but aquestioning murmur rose from the crowd.
"Answer!" Hiram said sternly, bending all the strength of his mercilesswill upon her.
"Artemisia! Do not answer!" cried another voice. It was the voice ofa man, and it rang strong and clear, though it vibrated with anxiety.It seemed to issue from the dark recesses behind the idol. A stir ofastonishment broke the spell that had imposed silence upon theworshippers. Every eye strove to pierce the gloom of the sanctuary.Hiram started, and his pallid face grew a shade paler.
"Artemisia!" came the clear voice again. "Dost thou not hear me?"
Artemisia's eyes left those of the chief priest and looked beyond himeagerly into the darkness. The mask of impassiveness faded from herface. Her lips parted.
"Clearchus!" she cried. "Where art thou? Save me! Save me!"
She threw up her arms with a despairing gesture, and sank upon theplatform beneath the terrible hands that were stretched to seize her.
"Alexander! Alexander!" shouted Chares out of the darkness. "Downwith the dogs!"
The words were followed by a cry of mortal agony from one of thepriests whose duty it was to feed the fire that roared inside the idol.The Tyrians heard the sound of a brief commotion in the rear of thetemple, they saw the gleam of armor and of weapons, and the darkhangings that veiled the innermost shrine were rent from the walls.Armed men rushed across the platform and leaped down among the priests,hewing at the holy ministers with flashing swords.
In the obscurity, the Tyrians fancied that an entire company ofMacedonians was upon them. Those who had sought refuge there from theHebrew mob forgot the dangers that awaited them outside and surgedtoward the entrance. But the Israelites had scattered the soldiers inthe gardens, and they charged the doors just as the assemblageattempted to force its way out. The fugitives from the terrors of thetemple were struck down in heaps upon the threshold.
Hiram alone retained his presence of mind. He had implicit faith inthe power of the terrible deity, in whose service he had spent thegreater part of his life, and absolute confidence in the efficacy ofsacrifice. When he saw Artemisia fall and heard Chares' battle-cry, heknew that all was lost unless the offering could be consummated.
Unmindful of his own danger, he bounded forward and raised the slim,unconscious form in his arms. Quickly he laid it upon the iron palms,with a muttered prayer. There was a sound of creaking chains, and thehands ascended slowly, bearing upward the slender figure. One bare,white arm hung inertly between the iron fingers, and the snowy chitonshone through the smoke against the dark bulk of the monstrous image.
Clearchus sprang out of the darkness and saw Artemisia raised aloft inthat pitiless grasp. She was already beyond his reach. A cold sweatbroke out upon his body. He stood for an instant transfixed withdread, unable even to cry out. Every heart-beat brought her nearer tothat glowing metal surface, whose terrible heat he could feel upon hisface where he stood.
Hiram stepped forward to the edge of the platform and stretched out hisarms. The glare of religious madness shone in his eyes.
"Pe
ace, peace!" he cried to the struggling and shrieking mob, franticwith fear. "Baal-Moloch accepts the sacrifice. Peace! Profane nothis temple!"
His voice was drowned in a crash of thunder that seemed to rend the skyacross from mountain to sea. Before it died, a huge mass of rock,hurled from an engine of the Macedonian fleet, crashed through one ofthe openings in the dome of the temple. The ponderous missile struckthe masonry and bounded backward and downward in a shower of dislodgedstones upon the inclined head of the idol.
Moloch seemed to rise from his throne, as though about to stride fromthe platform. His iron arms flew apart, and the grim colossus lurchedforward down the steps, and fell with a clang of metal upon the marblefloor.
A sharp cry rose from the struggling crowd. Those who witnessed thedownfall of the sacred image stood in doubt, unable to believe theireyes. The Israelites, unaware of what had happened, took advantage ofthe moment to overcome the slight opposition of the Tyrians who stillfaced them. They rushed into the temple, crying aloud for therestoration of their children.
In the wild confusion of their onslaught, many of the infants weretrampled to death. Others were killed by the priests, who seemedcrazed by the fall of their idol. At first they stood stupefied.Hiram's voice was no longer heard. They called upon him in vain.Finally one of them ran to the fragments of the prostrate image.Bending above it, he saw the distorted face of the chief priest gazingup into his own. The unfortunate man had been caught beneath thebreast of the God to whom he had offered so many innocents, and hiscrushed body was being slowly roasted under the red-hot metal.
"Moloch has taken him!" the priest shouted, tossing his arms in the air.
He ran into the crowd, and, seizing one of the infants by the heels,dashed out its brains against a pillar. His example was followed byothers no less frantic than himself.
"Strike, brothers!" he cried. "Baal has fallen! The end is at--"
Before he could finish the sentence, Leonidas' sword pierced histhroat, and he fell upon the body of the child that he had slain.
Down the dim arcade, behind the pillars, strode the Spartan and Chares,hacking and thrusting at the black-robed minions of Moloch. Theyshowed no mercy. Neither prayer nor entreaty availed. They sought thepriests through the terrified crowd, and dragged them from every placeof concealment, until of all who had been in the temple not oneremained alive.
With the crash of the stone as it smote the idol, Clearchus realizedwhat had happened. He saw the iron arms drop, and he leaped forward intime to snatch Artemisia from their embrace. The hot iron grazed hisbody as the image fell. Artemisia's pale, sweet face lay upon hisshoulder, and he clasped her close to his breast. In the revulsionfrom his despair he felt his muscles endowed with strength.
He smiled to see his friends dash past him, and he looked smilinglyupon the clamorous crowd in which every man fought for his life. Oneof the priests, whose face had been gashed to the bone, rushed uponhim, with hands extended, and tried to tear Artemisia from his arms.The man was unarmed, and Clearchus thrust him through the breast. Hesank and died without a moan.
Amid the fragments of Moloch's image, the fire that had been kindled inthe iron bosom flickered with blue and crimson tongues of flame.
Suddenly the crowd was split by a rush from the great doorway, andClearchus saw Nathan leading the Israelites into the temple. With thename of Jehovah upon their lips, the swarthy, black-eyed Hebrews pouredin, smiting the Tyrians and beating them down with merciless strokes inthe delirium of their exaltation. They swept through the temple likewolves through a sheepfold. The floor was heaped with the dead, andthe stones were slippery with blood. Nathan recognized the Athenianand sprang to his side, shouting to his followers to strike and sparenot.
Into the midst of the confusion rushed the Hebrew women, seeking thechildren who had been taken from them. The uproar of conflict gave wayto the lamentations of mothers whose infants had been slaughtered.Others, more fortunate, sat with their babes in their arms, kissingthem and feeling them over to discover whether they had been hurt. Oneyoung wife sat upon the steps at Clearchus' feet with her first-bornand only child. Nathan recognized her as the woman who had been struckdown by the priest in the market-place. The baby had been strangledand was dead.
"Hush!" she said, in a crooning voice, and, covering the child's headwith her garment, she pressed its lips to her breast. For an instantshe sat there, but the chill of the waxen mouth struck through herheart. She gave a startled glance at the baby's face, and then sprangup with a scream of despair and rushed out of the temple into thetempest, with the poor little body clasped in her arms.
Nathan called to Chares and Leonidas. "Alexander is on the wall," hesaid. "The streets are filled with the Tyrians. We must escape as wecame. Listen!"
He held up his hand, and the Greeks became aware of a dull roaring thatfilled the city like the humming of a gigantic hive of bees.
"Even here we shall not be safe," Nathan continued. "Let us seek thesecret passage."
"Chares!" cried one from among the women, and Thais ran forward, withher saffron robe torn so that half her perfect breast was exposed. Shecarried a dagger in her hand, and its blade was red; but her face shonewith joy. The weapon fell from her grasp as she sprang to the Theban,who lifted her like a child in his arms and kissed her.
"Come," he said, as he set her down, "let us go."
Turning their backs upon the throng of the living and the dead, theydescended into the secret passage and closed the entrance behind them.