The Gladiators. A Tale of Rome and Judæa

by G. J. Whyte-Melville

The moonbeams shone calm and pleasant on the doomed city, as they shone on the stunted groves of the Mount of Olives, on the distant crest of the hills of Moab, and, far away below these, on the desolate plains that skirt the waters of the Dead Sea. They shone down calm and pleasant, as though all were in peace and safety, and plenty and repose; yet even now the arm of the avenger was up to strike, the eagle’s wing was pruned, his beak whetted; and Mariamne, standing on the terrace by her father’s door, could count the Roman watch-fires already established in the heart of the Lower City, twinkling at regular distances along the summit of Mount Calvary.

The view of the enemy’s camp, the thought of Esca’s danger, spurred her to exertion. She hurried along the terrace, and down into the garden, following the path which she knew was to lead her to the marble basin with its hidden entrance to the secret passage. Her only thought now was one of apprehension that her unassisted strength might be unable to lift the slab. Full but of this care, she advanced swiftly and confidently towards the disused fountain, to stop within ten paces of it, and almost scream aloud in the high state of tension to which her nerves had been strung—so startled was she and scared at what she saw. Sitting with its back to her, a long lean figure stooped and cowered over [pg 394]the empty basin, waving its arms, and rocking its body to and fro with strange unearthly gestures, and broken, muttered sentences, varied by gasps and moans. Her nation are not superstitious, and Mariamne had too many causes for fear in this world to spare much dread for the denizens of another; nevertheless she stood for a space almost paralysed with the suddenness of the alarm, and the unexpected nature of the apparition, quaking in every limb, and unable either to advance or fly.

There are times when the boldest of human minds become peculiarly susceptible to supernatural terrors—when the hardest and least impressionable persons are little stronger than their nervous and susceptible brethren. A little anxiety, a little privation, the omission of a meal or two, nay, even the converse of such abstinence in too great indulgence of the appetites, bring down the boasted reason of mankind to a sad state of weakness and credulity. The young, too, are more subject to such fantastic terrors than the old. Children suffer much from fears of the supernatural, conceiving in their vivid imaginations forms and phantoms and situations, which they can never have previously experienced, and of which it is therefore difficult to account for the origin. But all classes, and all ages, if they speak truth, must acknowledge, that at one time or another, they have felt the blood curdle, the skin creep, the breath come quick, and the heart rise with that desperate courage which springs from intense fear, at the fancied presence or the dreaded proximity of some ghostly object which eludes them after all, leaving a vague uncertainty behind it, that neither satisfies their curiosity nor ensures them against a second visitation of a similar nature.

Mariamne was in a fit state to become the victim of any such supernatural delusion. Her frame was weakened by the want of food; for like the rest of the besieged, she had borne her share of the privations that created such sufferings in the city for many long weeks before it was finally reduced. She had gone through much fatigue of late—the continuous unbroken fatigue that wears the spirits even faster than the bodily powers; and above all she had been harassed for the last few hours by the torture of inaction in a state of protracted suspense. It was no wonder that she should suffer a few moments of intense and inexplicable fear.

The figure, still with its back to her, and rocking to and fro, was gathering handfuls of dust from the disused basin of the fountain, and scattering them with its long lean arms upon its head and shoulders, chanting at the same time, in [pg 395]wild, mournful tones, the words “Wash and be clean,” over and over again. It obviously imagined itself alone, and pursued its monotonous task with that dreary earnestness and endless repetition so peculiar to the actions of the insane.

After a while, Mariamne, perceiving that she was not observed, summoned courage to consider what was best to be done. The secret of the hidden passage was one to be preserved inviolate under any circumstances; and to-night everything she most prized depended on its not being discovered by the besieged. While the figure remained in its present position, she could do nothing towards the furtherance of her scheme. And yet the moments were very precious, and Esca’s life depended on her speed.

There was no doubt, the unfortunate who had thus wandered into her father’s gardens was a maniac; and those who suffered under this severe affliction were held in especial horror among her people. Unlike the Eastern nations of to-day, who believe them to be not only under its special protection, but even directly inspired by Providence, the Jews held that these sufferers were subject to the great principle of evil; that malignant spirits actually entered into the body of the insane, afflicting, mocking, and torturing their victim, goading it in its paroxysms to the exertion of that supernatural strength with which they endowed its body, and leaving the latter prostrate, exhausted, and helpless when they had satiated their malice upon its agonies. To be possessed of a devil was indeed the climax of all mental and corporeal misery. The casting out of devils by a mere word or sign, was perhaps the most convincing proof of miraculous power that could be offered to a people with whom the visitation was as general as it was mysterious and incomprehensible.

Mariamne hovered about the fountain, notwithstanding her great fear, as a bird hovers about the bush under which a snake lies coiled, but which shelters nevertheless her nest and her callow young. Standing there, in long dark robes, beneath a flood of moonlight, her face and hands white as ivory by the contrast, her eyes dilating, her head bent forward, her whole attitude that of painful attention and suspense, she might have been an enchantress composing the spell that should turn the writhing figure before her into stone, cold and senseless as the marble over which it bent. She might have been a fiend, in the form of an angel, directing its convulsions, and gloating over its agonies; or she might have been a pure and trusting saint, exorcising the [pg 396]evil spirit, and bidding it come out of a vexed fellow-creature in that name which fiends and men and angels must alike obey.

Presently the night-breeze coming softly over the Roman camp, brought with it the mellow notes of a trumpet, proclaiming that the watch was changed, and the centurions, each in his quarter, pacing their vigilant rounds. Ere it reached Mariamne’s ears, the maniac had caught the sound, and sprang to his feet, with his head thrown back and his muscles braced for a spring like some beast of chase alarmed by the first challenge of the hound. Gazing wildly about him, he saw the girl’s figure standing clear and distinct in the open moonlight, and raising a howl of fearful mirth, he leaped his own height from the ground, and made towards her with the headlong rush of a madman. Then fear completely overmastered her, and she turned and fled for her life. It was no longer a curdling horror that weighed down the limbs like lead, and relaxed the nerves like a palsy, but the strong and natural instinct of personal safety, that doubled quickness of perception for escape and speed of foot in flight.

Between herself and her father’s house lay a broad and easy range of steps, leading upward to the terrace. Instinctively she dared not trust the ascent, but turned downwards over the level lawn into the gardens, with the maniac in close pursuit. It was a fearful race. She heard his quick-drawn breath, as he panted at her very heels. She could almost fancy that she felt it hot upon her neck. Once the dancing shadow of her pursuer, in the moonlight, actually reached her own! Then she bounded forward again in her agony, and eluded the grasp that had but just missed its prey. Thus she reached a low wall, dividing her father’s from a neighbour’s ground; feeling only that she must go straight on, she bounded over it, she scarce knew how, and made for an open doorway she saw ahead, trusting that it might lead into the street. She heard his yell of triumph as he rose with a vigorous leap into the air, the dull stroke of his feet as he landed on the turf so close behind her, and the horror of that moment was almost beyond endurance. Besides, she felt her strength failing, and knew too well that she could not sustain this rate of speed for many paces farther; but escape was nearer than she hoped, and reaching the door a few yards before the madman, she gained slightly on him as she shot through it, and sped on, with weakening limbs and choking breath, down the street.