The quenchless light

by Agnes C. Laut

First, an impostor, who followed the Christus of the Jews, had been whipped from the city at day dawn for contempt towards the gods of Rome and Greece. The mob had given over pursuing when he fell senseless outside the walls of the city. Then, an overland caravan from Rome had come along the road headed for Antioch; and in the caravan was the famous and rich lady Trefina, cousin of the Emperor of Rome, bound to spend the winter season in the pleasure gardens of Daphne; and the merchant princes of Iconium were planning a great fête to entertain these visitors and unlock their fat purses. It was bruited about that a Greek girl, a convert to the Christian disturber, was to be thrown to the wild beasts in the theater that night. Some said her crime was sacrilege. Others said she was a woman of the streets, who refused to wear the red cord that was badge of her calling, and had bribed the guards of the prison to go in and corrupt the very prisoners under the magistrate’s nose. Others again averred she had refused to obey her mother and run away from the husband, who had bought her. And all Iconium, high and low, was agog to see the great fête in the theater that night for the Lady Trefina, cousin of the Emperor, who had but lost her daughter and was in such dejection that the citizens were determined to win her favor by an exhibition that would dispel her weariness of all living.

Again the fat Greek merchant, Thamyris, knocked on the door of the house in the city square; and again the middle-aged woman opened the door and drew him hurriedly in.

The man threw himself on the stone bench with a groan.

“You have heard the magistrate’s sentence for to-night?” he asked; and the tears streamed down his cheeks. “I have tried to see her all day. I have offered an emperor’s ransom to save her; but the coming of the Lady Trefina from Rome has fixed the Roman Commander in his purpose and he will not budge. They blame my slaves for fomenting the riot last night. They despise us Greeks! They will tear us to pieces with bloody hands and throw us to the beasts if we but stir to save her. My slaves have betrayed me! They say I have been caught in my own trick—” the merchant broke in heavy heart-shattering sobs.

The mother stood surveying him with unutterable hard scorn.

“Unmanly fool!” she taunted. “I thank the gods you are to be no son of mine! Why did you not seize her and force her to your will, when she passed through the door as we planned? Blunderer! Bungler! To let a wisp of a maid slip through your fumble fingers like a jewel to mud! Not thus did my Lord win me! He stole me from the hills of Phrygia, and broke me to his will; and if I were a man, would I pause for this little fool’s tears?”

“Aye; and you poisoned your Lord for a night’s pastime, and took his fortune and would sell your daughter to me to play wanton again for another rich husband! Think you I would love Thecla if she had been such as you?” and the wretched man broke again into terrible sobbing.

For a second, the incarnate fury standing above the unguarded man could not speak; and when she spoke, it was in the hiss of a serpent about to strike.

“Say you—that—to me?” she demanded. “Know you not I could denounce you to the Romans to-night as the corrupter of my daughter and the cause of all this riot to gain your ends? Say—you—that—to me? Take back what you said—fool!”

“Say—that—to you!” The man sprang to his feet and seized her by the throat. “Yes—that—and that—and that,” he stabbed her at each word, flung her on the tessellated pavement, and not pausing to see whether she were living or dead, dashed through the doorway to the street and ran through the deserted city for the theater, where all Iconium had thronged. He did not notice his sky-blue jacket was spattered with blood. He had flung his bloody dagger from him as he ran. He was a madman. He knew not whether the roar he heard were in his own bursting brain, or from the tier on tier of stone seats in the open theater, where all Iconium was stamping their impatience and shouting for the performance to begin. He tossed the guard at the gate a gold coin; and the Roman laughed.