The woman stood erect now. She asked, "What of the day, Ahasuerus?"
"It has been much like other days that I have seen. The sun rose without any perturbation. And now it sinks as usual. Oh, true, there has been fighting. The sky has been clouded with arrows, and horses, nicer than their masters, have screamed because these soulless beasts were appalled by so much blood. Many women have become widows, and divers children are made orphans, because of two huge eyes they never saw. Puf! it is an old tale."
She said, "Is Perion hurt?"
"Is the dog hurt that has driven a cat into a tree? Such I estimate to be the position of Orestes and Perion. Ah, no, this Perion who was my captain once is as yet a lord without any peer in the fields where men contend in battle. But love has thrust him into a bag"s end, and his fate is certain."
She spoke her steadfast resolution. "And my fate, too. For when Perion is trapped and slain I mean to kill myself."
"I am aware of that," he said. "Oh, women have these notions! Yet when the hour came, I think, you would not dare. For I know your beliefs concerning h.e.l.l"s geography, and which particular gulf of h.e.l.l is reserved for all self-murderers."
Then Melicent waited for a while. She spoke later without any apparent emotion. "And how should I fear h.e.l.l who crave a bitterer fate! Listen, Ahasuerus! I know that you desire me as a plaything very greatly. The infamy in which you wade attests as much. Yet you have schemed to no purpose if Perion dies, because the ways of death are always open. I would die many times rather than endure the touch of your finger.
Ahasuerus, I have not any words wherewith to tell you of my loathing--"
"Turn then to bargaining," he said, and seemed aware of all her thoughts. "Oh, to a hideous bargain. Let Perion be warned of those troops that will to-morrow outflank him. Let him escape. There is yet time. Do this, dark hungry man, and I will live." She shuddered here.
"Yes, I will live and be obedient in all things to you, my purchaser, until you shall have wearied of me, or, at the least, until G.o.d has remembered."
His careful eyes were narrowed. "You would bribe me as you once bribed Demetrios? And to the same purpose? I think that fate excels less in invention than in cruelty."
She bitterly said, "Heaven help me, and what other wares have I to vend!"
He answered:
"None. No woman has in this black age; and therefore comfort you, my girl."
She hurried on. "Therefore anew I offer Melicent, who was a princess once. I cry a price for red lips and bright eyes and a fair woman"s tender body without any blemish. I have no longer youth and happiness and honour to afford you as your toys. These three have long been strangers to me. Oh, very long! Yet all I have I offer for one charitable deed. See now how near you are to victory. Think now how gloriously one honest act would show in you who have betrayed each overlord you ever served."
He said:
"I am suspicious of strange paths, I shrink from practising unfamiliar virtues. My plan is fixed. I think I shall not alter it."
"Ah, no, Ahasuerus! think instead how beautiful I am. There is no comelier animal in all this big lewd world. Indeed I cannot count how many men have died because I am a comely animal--" She smiled as one who is too tired to weep. "That, too, is an old tale. Now I abate in value, it appears, very lamentably. For I am purchasable now just by one honest deed, and there is none who will barter with me."
He returned:
"You forget that a freed Perion would always have a sonorous word or two to say in regard to your bargainings. Demetrios bargained, you may remember. Demetrios was a dread lord. It cost him daily warfare to retain you. Now I lack swords and castles--I who dare love you much as Demetrios did--and I would be able to retain neither Melicent nor tranquil existence for an unconscionable while. Ah, no! I bear my former general no grudge. I merely recognise that while Perion lives he will not ever leave pursuit of you. I would readily concede the potency of his spurs, even were there need to look on you a second time--It happens that there is no need! Meanwhile I am a quiet man, and I abhor dissension. For the rest, I do not think that you will kill yourself, and so I think I shall not alter my fixed plan."
He left her, and Melicent prayed no more. To what end, she reflected, need she pray, when there was no hope for Perion?
30.
_How Melicent Conquered_
Into Melicent"s bedroom, about two o"clock in the morning, came Ahasuerus the Jew. She sat erect in bed and saw him cowering over a lamp which his long glistening fingers shielded, so that the lean face of the man floated upon a little golden pool in the darkness. She marvelled that this detestable countenance had not aged at all since her first sight of it.
He smoothly said:
"Now let us talk. I have loved you for some while, fair Melicent."
"You have desired me," she replied.
"Faith, I am but as all men, whatever their age. Why, what the devil!
man may have Javeh"s breath in him, but even Scripture proves that man was made of clay." The Jew now puffed out his jaws as if in recollection. "_You are a handsome piece of flesh_, I thought when I came to you at Bellegarde, telling of Perion"s captivity. I thought no more than this, because in my time I have seen a greater number of handsome women than you would suppose. Thereafter, on account of an odd reason which I had, I served Demetrios willingly enough. This son of Miramon Lluagor was able to pay me well, in a curious coinage. So I arranged the bungling snare Demetrios proposed--too gross, I thought it, to trap any woman living. Ohe, and why should I not lay an open and frank springe for you? Who else was a king"s bride-to-be, young, beautiful, and blessed with wealth and honour and every other comfort which the world affords?" Now the Jew made as if to fling away a robe from his gaunt person. "And you cast this, all this, aside as nothing.
I saw it done."
"Ah, but I did it to save Perion," she wisely said.
"Unfathomable liar," he returned, "you boldly and unscrupulously bought of life the thing which you most earnestly desired. Nor Solomon nor Periander has won more. And thus I saw that which no other man has seen. I saw the shrewd and dauntless soul of Melicent. And so I loved you, and I laid my plan--"
She said, "You do not know of love--"
"Yet I have builded him a temple," the Jew considered. He continued, with that old abhorrent acquiescence, "Now, a temple is admirable, but it is not builded until many labourers have dug and toiled waist-deep in dirt. Here, too, such spatterment seemed necessary. So I played, in fine, I played a cunning music. The pride of Demetrios, the jealousy of Callistion, and the greed of Orestes--these were as so many stops of that flute on which I played a cunning deadly music. Who forbids it?"
She motioned him, "Go on." Now she was not afraid.
"Come then to the last note of my music! You offer to bargain, saying, _Save Perion and have my body as your chattel_. I answer _Click_! The turning of a key solves all. Accordingly I have betrayed the castle of Nac.u.mera, I have this night admitted Perion and his broad-shouldered men. They are killing Orestes yonder in the Court of Stars even while I talk with you." Ahasuerus laughed noiselessly. "Such vanity does not become a Jew, but I needs must do the thing with some magnificence.
Therefore I do not give Sire Perion only his life. I give him also victory and much throat-cutting and an impregnable rich castle. Have I not paid the price, fair Melicent? Have I not won G.o.d"s masterpiece through a small wire, a purse, and a big key?"
She answered, "You have paid."
He said:
"You will hold to your bargain? Ah, you have but to cry aloud, and you are rid of me. For this is Perion"s castle."
She said, "Christ help me! You have paid my price."
Now the Jew raised his two hands in very horrible mirth. Said he:
"Oh, I am almost tempted to praise Javeh, who created the invincible soul of Melicent. For you have conquered: you have gained, as always, and at whatever price, exactly that which you most desired, and you do not greatly care about anything else. So, because of a word said you would arise and follow me on my dark ways if I commanded it. You will not weight the dice, not even at this pinch, when it would be so easy!
For Perion is safe; and nothing matters in comparison with that, and you will not break faith, not even with me. You are inexplicable, you are stupid, and you are resistless. Again I see my Melicent, who is not just a pair of purple eyes and so much lovely flesh."
His face was as she had not ever known it now, and very tender.
Ahasuerus said:
"My way to victory is plain enough. And yet there is an obstacle. For my fancy is taken by the soul of Melicent, and not by that handsome piece of flesh which all men--even Perion, madame!--have loved so long with remarkable infatuation. Accordingly I had not ever designed that the edifice on which I laboured should be the stable of my l.u.s.ts.
Accordingly I played my cunning music--and accordingly I give you Perion. I that am Ahasuerus win for you all which righteousness and honour could not win. At the last it is I who give you Perion, and it is I who bring you to his embrace. He must still be about his magnanimous butchery, I think, in the Court of Stars."
Ahasuerus knelt, kissing her hand.
"Fair Melicent, such abominable persons as Demetrios and I are fatally alike. We may deny, deride, deplore, or even hate, the sanct.i.ty of any n.o.ble lady accordingly as we elect; but there is for us no possible escape from worshipping it. Your wind-fed Ferions, who will not ever acknowledge what sort of world we live in, are less quick to recognise the soul of Melicent. Such is our sorry consolation. Oh, you do not believe me yet. You will believe in the oncoming years. Meanwhile, O all-enduring and all-conquering! go now to your last labour; and--if my Brother dare concede as much--do you now conquer Perion."
Then he vanished. She never saw him any more.
She lifted the Jew"s lamp. She bore it through the Women"s Garden, wherein were many discomfortable shadows and no living being. She came to its outer entrance. Men were fighting there. She skirted a hideous conflict, and descended the Queen"s Stairway, which led (as you have heard) toward the balcony about the Court of Stars. She found this balcony vacant.