Hypatia — or New Foes with an Old Face, Charles Kingsley [thriller novels to read TXT] 📗

‘What better thing can happen to a fool, than that God should teach that he is one, when he fancied himself the wisest of the wise? Listen to me, sir. Four mouths ago I was blessed with health, honour, lands, friends—all for which the heart of man could wish. And if, for an insane ambition, I have chosen to risk all those, against the solemn warnings of the truest friend, and the wisest saint who treads this earth of God’s—should I not rejoice to have it proved to me, even by such a lesson as this, that the friend who never deceived me before was right in this case too; and that the God who has checked and turned me for forty years of wild toil and warfare, whenever I dared to do what was right in the sight of my own eyes, has not forgotten me yet, or given up the thankless task of my education?’

‘And who, pray, is this peerless friend?’

‘Augustine of Hippo.’

‘Humph! It had been better for the world in general, if the great dialectician had exerted his powers of persuasion on Heraclian himself.’

‘He did so, but in vain.’

‘I don’t doubt it. I know the sleek Count well enough to judge what effect a sermon would have upon that smooth vulpine determination of his.... “An instrument in the hands of God, my dear brother.... We must obey His call, even to the death,” etc. etc.’ And Raphael laughed bitterly.

‘You know the Count?’

‘As well, sir, as I care to know any man.’

‘I am sorry for your eyesight, then, sir,’ said the Prefect severely, ‘if it has been able to discern no more than that in so august a character.’

‘My dear sir, I do not doubt his excellence—nay, his inspiration. How well he divined the perfectly fit moment for stabbing his old comrade Stilicho! But really, as two men of the world, we must be aware by this time that every man has his price.’....

‘Oh, hush! hush!’ whispered the girl. ‘You cannot guess how you pain him. He worships the Count. It was not ambition, as he pretends, but merely loyalty to him, which brought here against his will.’

‘My dear madam, forgive me. For your sake I am silent.’....

‘For her sake! A pretty speech for me! What next?’ said he to himself. ‘Ah, Bran, Bran, this is all your fault!’

‘For my sake! Oh, why not for your own sake? How sad to hear one—one like you, only sneering and speaking evil!’

‘Why then? If fools are fools, and one can safely call them so, why not do it?’

‘Ah,—if God was merciful enough to send down His own Son to die for them, should we not be merciful enough not to judge their failings harshly!’

‘My dear young lady, spare a worn-out philosopher any new anthropologic theories. We really must push on a little faster, if we intend to reach Ostia to-night.’

But, for some reason or other, Raphael sneered no more for a full half-hour.

Long, however, ere they reached Ostia, the night had fallen; and their situation began to be more than questionably safe. Now and then a wolf, slinking across the road towards his ghastly feast, glided like a lank ghost out of the darkness, and into it again, answering Bran’s growl by a gleam of his white teeth. Then the voices of some marauding party rang coarse and loud through the still night, and made them hesitate and stop a while. And at last, worst of all, the measured tramp of an imperial column began to roll like distant thunder along the plain below. They were advancing upon Ostia! What if they arrived there before the routed army could rally, and defend themselves long enough to re-embark!.... What if—a thousand ugly possibilities began to crowd up.

‘Suppose we found the gates of Ostia shut, and the Imperialists bivouacked outside?’ said Raphael half to himself.

‘God would protect His own,’ answered the girl; and Raphael had no heart to rob her of her hope, though he looked upon their chances of escape as growing smaller and smaller every moment. The poor girl was weary; the mule weary also; and as they crawled along, at a pace which made it certain that the fast passing column would be at Ostia an hour before them, to join the vanguard of the pursuers, and aid them in investing the town, she had to lean again and again on Raphael’s arm. Her shoes, unfitted for so rough a journey, bad been long since torn off, and her tender feet were marking every step with blood. Raphael knew it by her faltering gait; and remarked, too, that neither sigh nor murmur passed her lips. But as for helping her, he could not; and began to curse the fancy which had led to eschew even sandals as unworthy the self-dependence of a Cynic.

And so they crawled along, while Raphael and the Prefect, each guessing the terrible thoughts of the other, were thankful for the darkness which hid their despairing countenances from the young girl; she, on the other hand, chatting cheerfully, almost laughingly, to her silent father.

At last the poor girl stepped on some stone more sharp than usual—and, with a sudden writhe and shriek, sank to the ground. Raphael lifted her up, and she tried to proceed, but sank down again.... What was to be done?

‘I expected this,’ said the Prefect, in a slow stately voice. ‘Hear me, sir! Jew, Christian, or philosopher, God seems to have bestowed on you a heart which I can trust. To your care I commit this girl—your property, like me, by right of war. Mount her upon this mule. Hasten with her—where you will—for God will be there also. And may He so deal with you as you deal with her henceforth. An old and disgraced soldier can do no more than die.’

And he made an effort to dismount; but fainting from his wounds, sank upon the neck of the mule. Raphael and his daughter caught in their arms.

‘Father! Father! Impossible! Cruel! Oh—do you think that I would have followed you hither from Africa, against your own entreaties, to desert you now?’

‘My daughter, I command!’

The girl remained firm and sound.

‘How long have you learned to disobey me? Lift the old disgraced man down, sir, and leave to die in the right place—on the battlefield where his general sent him.’

The girl sank down on the road in an agony of weeping. ‘I must help myself, I see,’ said her father, dropping to the ground. ‘Authority vanishes before old age and humiliation. Victoria! has your father no sins to answer for already, that you will send before his God with your blood too upon his head?’

Still the girl sat weeping on the ground; while Raphael, utterly at his wits end, tried hard to persuade himself that it was no concern of his.

‘I am at the service of either or of both, for life or death; only be so good as to settle it quickly.... Hell! here it is settled for us, with a