Mariamne, listening intently to every sound, was aware of a light step passing to and fro, within the room, and perceived besides a savoury smell as of roasted flesh, which pervaded the whole house. She knew by the quiet footfall and the rustle of drapery, that it was a woman whose motions she overheard, and for an instant the desire crossed her mind to beg for a mouthful of strengthening food, ere she departed on her way—a request she had reason to believe [pg 400]would be refused with anger. She blushed as she thought how a morsel of bread was now grudged, even at her own father’s gate; and she remembered the time when scores of poor neighbours thronged it every morning for their daily meal; when sheep and oxen were slain and roasted at a moment’s notice, on the arrival of some chance guest with his train of followers.
“It is a judgment!” thought the girl, regarding the afflictions of her people in the light of her new faith. “It may be, we must be purified by suffering, and so escape the final doom. Woe is me for my kindred and for my father’s house! What am I, that I should not take my share in the sorrows of the rest?”
Then in a pure and holy spirit of self-sacrifice, she turned wearily away, resolving rather to seek the enemy weak and fasting, than shift from her own shoulders one particle of the burden borne by her wretched fellow-citizens; and ere long the time came when she was thankful she had not partaken, even in thought, of the food that was then being prepared.
Seeking the street once more, she found, to her dismay, that the armed party had halted immediately before the door. She was forced again to shrink back into the gloom of the lower court, and wait in fear and trembling for the result. These, too, had been arrested before the house by the smell of food. Wandering up and down the devoted city, such hungry and desperate men scrupled not to take with the strong hand anything of which they had need. By gold and silver, and soft raiment, they set now but little store—of wine they could procure enough to inflame and madden them, but food was the one passionate desire of their senses. Besides his own party, John of Gischala had now attached to his faction numbers of the Sicarii—a band of paid assassins who had sprung up in the late troubles to make a trade of murder—and had also seduced into his ranks such of the Zealots as were weary of Eleazar’s rigid though fervent patriotism, finding the anarchy within the walls produced by the siege more to their taste than the disciplined efforts of their chief to resist the enemy. The party that now prevented Mariamne’s egress consisted of a few fierce pitiless spirits from these three factions, united in a common bond of recklessness and crime. It was no troop for a maiden to meet by night in the house of a lone woman, or on the stones of a deserted street, and the girl, trembling at the conversation she was forced to overhear, needed all her [pg 401]courage to seize the first opportunity for escape. The clang of their arms made her heart leap, as they halted together at the door; but it was less suggestive of evil and violence than their words.
“I have it!” exclaimed one, striking his mailed hand against the post, with a blow that vibrated through the building. “Not a bloodhound of Molossis hath a truer nose than mine, or hunts his game more steadily to its lair. I could bury my muzzle, I warrant ye, in the very entrails of my prey, had I but the chance. There is food here, comrades, I tell ye, cooking on purpose for us. ’Tis strange if we go fasting to the wall to-night!”
“Well said, old dog!” laughed another voice. “Small scruple hast thou, Sosas, what the prey may be, so long as it hath but the blood in it. Come on; up to the highest seat with thee! No doubt we are expected, though the doors be closed and we meet with a cold welcome!”
“Welcome!” repeated Sosas; “who talks of welcome? I bid ye all welcome, comrades. Take what you please, and call for more. Every man what he likes best, be it sheep or lamb, or delicate young kid, or tender sweet-mouthed heifer. My guests ye are, and I bid you again walk up and welcome!”
“’Twere strange to find a morsel of food here, too,” interposed one of the band. “Say, Gyron, is not this the house thou and I have already stripped these three times? By the beard of old Matthias, there was but half a barley-cake left when we made our last visit!”
“True,” replied Gyron, with a brutal laugh, “and the woman held on to it like a wild-cat. I was forced to lend her a wipe over the wrist with my dagger, ere she let go, and then the she-wolf sucked her own blood from the wound, and shrieked out that we would not even leave her that. We might let her alone this time, I think, and go elsewhere!”
“Go to!” interrupted Sosas. “Thou speakest like one for whom the banquet is spread at every street corner. Art turning tender, and delicate even as a weaned child, with that grizzled beard on thy chin? Go to! I say. The supper is getting cold. Follow me!”