The Dancing Girl of Gades/Chapter 9

HLOE had pushed Orwic into a room in a marvelous marble house and left him face to face with Pkauchios, closing the curtains behind him on their noisy rings and rod. Orwic stared at the Egyptian, wondering at the severely splendid furnishings and at the quiet that was accented by lute strings strummed slowly in another room, suggesting the procession of the æons and the utter insignificance of days—months—years.

Pkauchios was dressed as an astrologer—a tall old man, immensely dignified, in flowing black robes and head-dress, with the asp of Egypt on his brow, to which Tros would have at once known he was not entitled. But Orwic knew nothing about Egypt. He had an hypnotic presence, and used his large eyes, as a swordsman should, directing his gaze not at the pupils of the man in front of him but a fraction of an inch lower, so producing the effect of an indomitable stare without wearying himself or giving his opponent a chance to retaliate.

He possessed almost the majesty of a Lord Druid, but that only served to remind Orwic of the Druids' warnings against magic. He had been educated by the Druids, and whatever else they taught, they were succinct and vehement in their instruction as to the danger of any contact with the black arts.

Bridling at the calculated silence, Orwic broke it, asking curt, blunt questions:

"You are Pkauchios? I am Orwic of Britain. You sent for me? You wish to speak to me? What do you wish to say?"

There was no answer, no acknowledgment. Sweet-scented incense of lign-aloes burned on a tripod-table, and its blue smoke curled around the Egyptian until, where he stood in shadow, he began to look unearthly, and the human skull on another table near his right hand appeared to make grimaces, mocking the short-lived dreams of men.

Orwic shrugged his shoulders and strolled to the open window. Down a vista between well tended garden shrubbery he could see Tros' ship at anchor, miles away. The sight encouraged him; he began to think of jumping through the window, measuring with his eyes the height of the wall at the end of the garden and calculating the distance to the beach. But the Egyptian spoke at last—

"Orwic, prince of Britain, fortune favors you!"

The voice was resonant, arresting, but the Gaulish words were ill pronounced. Orwic remembered Druids who had spoken in much the same terms more gently, and yet with infinitely greater majesty.

"I was born lucky," he answered over his shoulder, and then resumed his gaze out of the window.

"Look at me. Look into my eyes," said Pkauchios.

"I admire the view," said Orwic, and continued to admire it.

Pkauchios ignored the snub and went on speaking as if Orwic had obeyed him. He badly mispronounced the Gaulish, but his voice compelled attention, and he was fluent.

"I, who nightly read the stars, have read your destiny! I forewarned Balbus of the great ship with the golden serpent at her bow. The stars in their conjunction said that ship should—shall—must enter Gades harbor, and from out of her shall step one in whose hand is the destiny of Spain and Gaul. I said, because the constellations indicated, that the man will be a prince from a far country, bold in war, young, handsome, destined to be lost in Gades but to be recovered by a stranger. Last night I told Balbus that the prince in the ship with the purple sails will arrive before dawn."

"Well. Here I am, but it is not my ship," said Orwic, and began to whistle softly to himself. When he was a little boy the Druids told him that was the simplest means of avoiding a magician's snares.

But magicians are not easily rebuffed. The business of snaring men in nets made of imagination implies a thick skin and persistence, along with an immeasurable, cynical contempt for the prospective victim's powers of resistance.

"You are indeed the man the stars foretold," said Pkauchios with admiration in his voice. "Indifferent to flattery, not stirred by rumor, iron-willed! It is of such men that the Gods make weapons when the tyrannies shall fall! I see your aura—purple as the sails of yonder ship!"

He struck a bronze gong and the music in the next room ceased. The sound of the gong startled Orwic, for it resembled the clash of weapons. He turned suddenly to face the Egyptian, who was no longer standing but seated on a sort of throne, whose arms were the gilded tusks of elephants. There was a canopy above the throne that threw that corner into deeper shadow, and the Egyptian's eyes appeared to blaze as if there were fire in them. In his lap he held a crystal ball, which he raised in both hands when he was sure that Orwic's gaze was fixed on him.

"Approach me!" he commanded. "Nay, not too close, or your shadow dims the astral light!"

He was staring at the crystal, frowning heavily, brows raised, lips parted, eyes glaring. The effort he was making seemed to tax his powers almost beyond endurance.

"You are the man!" he said at last, and sighing, set the crystal down on the table where the skull stood. His eyes had lost their frenzy suddenly. He leaned back, looking deathly weary, all the lines and winkles on his dark face emphasized by pallor.

"You, who listen, never know what we, who look into the unseen, suffer for your sakes," he said.

Even his voice was aged. Orwic began to feel pity for him, and something akin to shame for his former rudeness.

Pkauchios left the throne and walking forward wearily took Orwic by the arm. His manner was of age that leaned on youth with perfect confidence.

"So, help me to that seat and sit beside me."

They sat down on a bench of carved ebony and Pkauchios leaned his back against the wall.

"Youth! Youth!" he said. "With all the world before you! Age must serve youth. We who have struggled and are old may justify ourselves if we can guide youth through the dangers. Age and responsibility! If I should guide you wrongly, what responsibility were mine! I will say nothing. It is wiser. I will not foreshadow destiny."

Now that was something like the Druids' way of viewing interference with a man's own privilege of living as he sees fit. Orwic began to feel a vague respect for the Egyptian and to wonder whether he had not misjudged him. He might, after all, be a seer. It was hardly reasonable to suppose that all the prophets were in Britain, Chloe had said. But was a slave girl's judgment of her master to be accepted without proof? However, Orwic was still cautious.

"I don't believe in magic," he remarked.

"Rightly! Rightly so!" said Pkauchios. "It is destruction. It will destroy the Romans. It has ruined nations without number. Fools, who know no better, call me a magician. When I tell the truth to them, they weary me with their demands for untruth. It is restful to meet you. Honest unbelief is sweeter to me than the dark credulity of those who seek nothing but their selfish ends. Your incredulity will melt. Their superstition toughens as it feeds on vice. But I must crave your pardon. I am a laggard host, forgetting the body's needs in the absorption of a spiritual moment. You are young, strong, hungry, I have no doubt."

E CLAPPED his hands, and almost on the instant two slave girls appeared bearing trays heaped with refreshment. One of them washed Orwic's hands and combed his hair; the other spread before him milk, fruit, nuts, three sorts of bread, butter, honey and preserves, whose very scent excited appetite.

"I will return when you have refreshed yourself," said Pkauchios. "We who commune with the stars eat little earthly food."

He left the room, but the slave girls stayed and converted Orwic's first meal on foreign soil into an experience that melted his reserve.

He began by being half ashamed to eat while the Egyptian fasted, remembering that the Druids hardly ate at all during their periods of spiritual commune with the universe. He began to be almost sure that fasting was a sign of the Egyptian's purity of purpose. It was incredible that such food as the slave girls set before him should not tempt a man with wordly [sic] motives—such as Orwic's own, for instance.

He began to confess to himself that he was having a glorious time, and he hoped Tros would not come for him too soon. Deeply though he admired Tros, loyal though he felt toward him, he dreaded Tros' abrupt way of dispersing dreams and scattering side issues. He could imagine Tros' contempt, for instance, for the slave girls. Orwic liked them.

Used to slaves and serving-women in his own land, he had never dreamed of such attentions as these two dark-haired women lavished on him. They were beautiful, smiling, silent, exquisitely trained, but that was not the half of it. In Britain guests were made to feel that their comfort was the host's one sole consideration, and the servants vied with one another to that end. But these two slave girls made a man feel that he owned them, that their very souls were his, that they would think his thoughts if he would. only deign to half express them, and be overjoyed to be the mothers of his sons.

It was bewildering at first, embarrassing; then gradually rather pleasant; presently as natural as if all other forms of hospitality were crude, uncivilized and no part of a nobleman's experience. This was the way to live. It was no wonder that foreigners regarded Britons as barbarians, with their crude ideas of courtesy and the servants' air of being members of the family instead of servants in the true sense of the word.

One of the girls was on his knee when Pkauchios returned. She was wiping his mouth and mustache with a napkin. She removed herself in no haste, unembarrassed, curtseying to her master, helping the other girl at once to carry out the tray and dishes. Pkauchios took no notice of either of them, which seemed to Orwic to prove that the man was an aristocrat, if nothing else.

"You are right, you are right," said Pkauchios, taking a seat beside him. "You should have nothing to do with magic. It is safer to avoid true revelation than to listen to the false. But tell me why you came to Gades."

Orwic told him all of it; told him the whole story of how Cæsar had invaded Britain and had been repulsed; and how Tros of Samothrace, for friendship and because his ship was built in Britain, had undertaken to go to Rome and by any means that should present themselves to deter Cæsar from invading a second time.

"Wonderful! Wonderful!" said Pkauchios when the tale was done and Orwic had finished his eulogiums of Tros. "All this and more I have seen written in the stars. You are a man of destiny. And yet—"

He leaned into the corner, frowning. It appeared that the decision between right and wrong, between his own high standard of integrity and a convenient alternative was forming in his brain.

"—if I should tell you what else I have seen—"

"Oh, you may as well tell me," Orwic interrupted. "I am not a child. And besides, I will do nothing without consulting Tros."

"Do you not see," said Pkauchios, "that if Spain were to rebel against the Romans, Cæsar's army would be needed to prevent the Gauls from rising too?"

"Yes, that seems obvious," said Orwic. He was devoting at least half his attention to wondering where those slave girls were. The scent from the one who had sat on his knee still clung to his tunic. No British girls that he had known had ever smelled like that.

"And if Cæsar were to die," said Pkauchios.

He paused, aware that Orwic was only partly listening to him.

"And if Cæsar were to die," he repeated solemnly, then suddenly gripped Orwic's arm and leaning forward, fixing him with penetrating gaze, almost hissed the words:

"Do you not see that you and Tros of Samothrace, with Spain in red rebellion, north, south, east and west, could lead the insurrection into Gaul and stir the Gauls until they, too, rise against the Romans?"

He sat back again and sighed.

"All this," he said, "and more, I have seen written in the stars. Sight must be given us that we may see. And yet—"

"Such a deed would save Britain," remarked Orwic. He was thinking now.

He was still aware of the faint, delicious woman smell, but its effect on him was changing. There were thoughts of women whom a sword could win, quite other thoughts than Orwic was accustomed to, thoughts not exactly chivalrous but blended in with chivalry, suggesting that the rescue of the Gauls from Roman rule might lead to a delightful destiny. He began to wonder what Tros would have to say to the proposal and whether Tros, too, secretly, in the recesses of his heart, would not rather like the prospect of—well—of whatever victory might provide.

"I should not be surprized at anything," he said after a minute's pause. "When I left Britain it was to face my destiny, whatever it might be. Now that girl Chloe—is it true she is your slave?"

Pkauchios' answer was startling:

"Do you covet her? Shall I give her to you?"

T WAS almost too startling; it rearoused suspicion. Orwic eyed the Egyptian narrowly, turning over in his mind vague notions as to how much Chloe might be worth. He was not so stupid as to believe that offer genuine.

"If you should do what the stars indicate you safely may do," Pkauchios said mysteriously, "then by tomorrow's dawn you will be all powerful in Gades. I shall need your friendship then. To flaming youth in the hour of victory, what gift could be more suitable than Chloe? I am an old man. Her beauty means nothing to me."

Orwic's veins began to boil, so, being British, he proceeded to look preternaturally wise.

"What is all this about destiny? What did you read in the stars?" he demanded.

"You would better not let me influence you," Pkauchios suggested. "I have never yet made one mistake in reading others' destiny, but I have no right!"

"Oh, nonsense! Out with it!" said Orwic. "If you can read my destiny, you have no right not to tell me."

"I must have your definite permission."

"You have it."

"Know then, that the stars have indicated for a month that this is the night when Balbus, Governor of Gades, dies! On this night, too, dies Cæsar, imperator of the Roman troops in Gaul! But the conjunction of the stars is such that, if the Governor of Gades dies by the hand of a common murderer, as may be, then anarchy will follow and no good come of it. But should he die by the hand of the prince who stepped out of the red ship and was lost in Gades, then the prince shall wear a red cloak and shall rule a province."

"Strange!" said Orwic. "Strange! I have had peculiar dreams of late."

"And how many men have you on board that ship?" asked Pkauchios. "If I should show you how to smuggle them ashore and where to hide them and how to reach Balbus' house unseen at midnight, and should tell you that in Balbus' treasury is money enough with which to recompense those men of yours and to pay others and to raise an army—"

"I am not a murderer. I am not a thief," said Orwic, his sense of self-restraint returning.

"Did you slay no Romans when they invaded Britain?" Pkauchios asked. "Did the Romans slay none of your friends? According to the stars that prince, who steps out of the red ship, is to be an avenger and shall drive the Romans out of Gaul!"

"Ah, now you are trying to persuade me," Orwic commented.

"Not I! But I will give you Chloe, if you seize your opportunity. She is the richest prize in Gades. She is worth two hundred thousand sesterces."

Orwic had not the slightest notion how much money that was, so he magnified it in his own mind, and the result rearoused his suspicion. He got up and began to pace the floor, to discover whether or not Pkauchios was proposing to detain him forcibly. But Pkauchios made no move; simply leaned against a corner of the wall and watched him. Orwic decided to probe deeper; he desired to justify temptation by proving to himself that Pkauchios was friend, not enemy. He drew back the curtains at the doorway by which he had entered the room. There was nobody there. He passed into a hall all lined with statuary, entered rooms that opened to the right and left of it, found nobody, and tried the house door. It was unlocked; doves were cooing in the garden; fountains splashed; there were no lurkers; only a few old Egyptian slaves who dipped out water from a well a hundred yards away.

Plainly, then, he was not a prisoner. And as he breathed the incense smoke out of his lungs, refilling them with blossom-scented air, he felt the challenge of his youth and strength.

"Off Vectis, the Lord Druid said," he muttered to himself, "there is a man in Gades to whom he could have sent Tros, only that Tros' mind was closed against him. This Pkauchios is probably the man!"

Musing to himself, his hands behind him, he returned along the hall toward the room where he had left the old Egyptian. Chloe had said he should agree to anything the Egyptian might propose. It might do no harm to pretend to agree. But he wondered how he should explain away his rudeness, how he should accept the man's proffered aid now without cheapening his own position and above all, how he should explain to Tros.

"You must help me to convince the Lord Tros," he began, reentering the room.

But Pkauchios was gone. There was no trace of him nor any answer, though he called his name a dozen times.