Domnei: A Comedy of Woman-Worship by James Branch Cabell (read my book TXT) 📖

"I must endure discomfort and, it may be, torture for a little longer," said Melicent, and laughed whole-heartedly. "Oh, but to-day I find a cure for every ill," said Melicent; and thereupon she left Orestes as a princess should.

But first she knelt by that which yesterday had been her master.

"I have no word of praise or blame to give you in farewell. You were not admirable, Demetrios. But you depart upon a fearful journey, and in my heart there is just memory of the long years wherein according to your fashion you were kind to me. A bargain is a bargain. I sold with open eyes that which you purchased. I may not reproach you."

Then Melicent lifted the dead face between her hands, as mothers caress their boys in questioning them.

"I would I had done this when you were living," said Melicent, "because I understand now that you loved me in your fashion. And I pray that you may know I am the happiest woman in the world, because I think this knowledge would now gladden you. I go to slavery, Demetrios, where I was queen, I go to hardship, and it may be that I go to death. But I have learned this assuredly—that love endures, that the strong knot which unites my heart and Perion's heart can never be untied. Oh, living is a higher thing than you or I had dreamed! And I have in my heart just pity, poor Demetrios, for you who never found the love of which I must endeavour to be worthy. A curse was I to you unwillingly, as you—I now believe—have been to me against your will. So at the last I turn anew to bargaining, and cry—in your deaf ears—Pardon for pardon, O Demetrios!"

Then Melicent kissed pitiable lips which would not ever sneer again, and, rising, passed into the Women's Garden, proudly and unafraid.

Ahasuerus shrugged so patiently that she was half afraid. Then, as a cloud passes, she saw that all further buffetings would of necessity be trivial.

For Perion, as she now knew, was very near to her—single of purpose, clean of hands, and filled with such a love as thrilled her with delicious fears of her own poor unworthiness.

25.

How Women Talked Together

Dame Melicent walked proudly through the Women's Garden, and presently entered a grove of orange trees, the most of which were at this season about their flowering. In this place was an artificial pool by which the trees were nourished. On its embankment sprawled the body of young Diophantus, a child of some ten years of age, Demetrios' son by Tryphera. Orestes had strangled Diophantus in order that there might be no rival to Orestes' claims. The lad lay on his back, and his left arm hung elbow-deep in the water, which swayed it gently.

Callistion sat beside the corpse and stroked its limp right hand. She had hated the boy throughout his brief and merry life. She thought now of his likeness to Demetrios.

She raised toward Melicent the dilated eyes of one who has just come from a dark place. Callistion said:

"And so Demetrios is dead. I thought I would be glad when I said that.
Hah, it is strange I am not glad."

She rose, as though with hard effort, as a decrepit person might have done. You saw that she was dressed in a long gown of black, pleated to the knees, having no clasp or girdle, and bare of any ornamentation except a gold star on each breast.

Callistion said:

"Now, through my son, I reign in Nacumera. There is no person who dares disobey me. Therefore, come close to me that I may see the beauty which besotted this Demetrios, whom, I think now, I must have loved."

"Oh, gaze your fill," said Melicent, "and know that had you possessed a tithe of my beauty you might have held the heart of Demetrios." For it was in Melicent's mind to provoke the woman into killing her before worse befell.

But Callistion only studied the proud face for a long while, and knew there was no lovelier person between two seas. For time here had pillaged very sparingly; and if Dame Melicent had not any longer the first beauty of her girlhood, Callistion had nowhere seen a woman more handsome than this hated Frankish thief.

Callistion said:

"No, I was not ever so beautiful as you. Yet this Demetrios loved me when I, too, was lovely. You never saw the man in battle. I saw him, single-handed, fight with Abradas and three other knaves who stole me from my mother's home—oh, very long ago! He killed all four of them. He was like a horrible unconquerable god when he turned from that finished fight to me. He kissed me then—blood-smeared, just as he was…. I like to think of how he laughed and of how strong he was."

The woman turned and crouched by the dead boy, and seemed painstakingly to appraise her own reflection on the water's surface.

"It is gone now, the comeliness Demetrios was pleased to like. I would have waded Acheron—singing—rather than let his little finger ache. He knew as much. Only it seemed a trifle, because your eyes were bright and your fair skin was unwrinkled. In consequence the man is dead. Oh, Melicent, I wonder why I am so sad!"

Callistion's meditative eyes were dry, but those of Melicent were not. And Melicent came to the Dacian woman, and put one arm about her in that dim, sweet-scented place, saying, "I never meant to wrong you."

Callistion did not seem to heed. Then Callistion said:

"See now! Do you not see the difference between us!" These two were kneeling side by side, and each looked into the water.

Callistion said:

"I do not wonder that Demetrios loved you. He loved at odd times many women. He loved the mother of this carrion here. But afterward he would come back to me, and lie asprawl at my feet with his big crafty head between my knees; and I would stroke his hair, and we would talk of the old days when we were young. He never spoke of you. I cannot pardon that."

"I know," said Melicent. Their cheeks touched now.

"There is only one master who could teach you that drear knowledge—"

"There is but one, Callistion."

"The man would be tall, I think. He would, I know, have thick, brown, curling hair—"

"He has black hair, Callistion. It glistens like a raven's wing."

"His face would be all pink and white, like yours—"

"No, tanned like yours, Callistion. Oh, he is like an eagle, very resolute. His glance bedwarfs you. I used to be afraid to look at him, even when I saw how foolishly he loved me—"

"I know," Callistion said. "All women know. Ah, we know many things—"

She reached with her free arm across the body of Diophantus and presently dropped a stone into the pool. She said:

"See how the water ripples. There is now not any reflection of my poor face or of your beauty. All is as wavering as a man's heart…. And now your beauty is regathering like coloured mists. Yet I have other stones."

"Oh, and the will to use them!" said Dame Melicent.

"For this bright thieving beauty is not any longer yours. It is mine now, to do with as I may elect—as yesterday it was the plaything of Demetrios…. Why, no! I think I shall not kill you. I have at hand three very cunning Cheylas—the men who carve and reshape children into such droll monsters. They cannot change your eyes, they tell me. That is a pity, but I can have one plucked out. Then I shall watch my Cheylas as they widen your mouth from ear to ear, take out the cartilage from your nose, wither your hair till it will always be like rotted hay, and turn your skin—which is like velvet now—the colour of baked mud. They will as deftly strip you of that beauty which has robbed me as I pluck up this blade of grass…. Oh, they will make you the most hideous of living things, they assure me. Otherwise, as they agree, I shall kill them. This done, you may go freely to your lover. I fear, though, lest you may not love him as I loved Demetrios."

And Melicent said nothing.

"For all we women know, my sister, our appointed curse. To love the man, and to know the man loves just the lips and eyes Youth lends to us—oho, for such a little while! Yes, it is cruel. And therefore we are cruel—always in thought and, when occasion offers, in the deed."

And Melicent said nothing. For of that mutual love she shared with Perion, so high and splendid that it made of grief a music, and wrung a new sustainment out of every cross, as men get cordials of bitter herbs, she knew there was no comprehension here.

26.

How Men Ordered Matters

Orestes came into the garden with Ahasuerus and nine other attendants. The master of Nacumera did not speak a syllable while his retainers seized Callistion, gagged her, and tied her hands with cords. They silently removed her. One among them bore on his shoulders the slim corpse of Diophantus, which was interred the same afternoon (with every appropriate ceremony) in company with that of his father. Orestes had the nicest sense of etiquette.

This series of swift deeds was performed with such a glib precipitancy that if was as though the action had been rehearsed a score of times. The garden was all drowsy peace now that Orestes spread his palms in a gesture of deprecation. A little distance from him, Ahasuerus with his forefinger drew upon the water's surface designs which appeared to amuse the Jew.

"She would have killed you, Melicent," Orestes said, "though all Olympos had marshalled in interdiction. That would have been irreligious. Moreover, by Hercules! I have not time to choose sides between snarling women. He who hunts with cats will catch mice. I aim more highly. And besides, by an incredible forced march, this Comte de la Forêt and all his Free Companions are battering at the gates of Nacumera—"

Hope blazed. "You know that were I harmed he would spare no one. Your troops are all at Calonak. Oh, God is very good!" said Melicent.

"I do not asperse the deities of any nation. It is unlucky. None the less, your desires outpace your reason. Grant that I had not more than fifty men to defend the garrison, yet Nacumera is impregnable except by starvation. We can sit snug a month. Meanwhile our main force is at Calonak, undoubtedly. Yet my infatuated father had already recalled these troops, in order that they might escort you into Messire de la Forêt's camp. Now I shall use these knaves quite otherwise. They will arrive within two days, and to the rear of Messire de la Forêt, who is encamped before an impregnable fortress. To the front unscalable walls, and behind him, at a moderate computation, three swords to his one. All this in a valley from which Daedalos might possibly escape, but certainly no other man. I count this Perion of the Forest as already dead."

It was a lumbering Orestes who proclaimed each step in his enchained deductions by the descent of a blunt forefinger upon the palm of his left hand. Demetrios had left a son but not an heir.

Yet the chain held. Melicent tested every link and found each obdurate. She foresaw it all. Perion would be surrounded and overpowered. "And these troops come from Calonak because of me!"

"Things fall about with an odd patness, as you say. It should teach you not to talk about divinities lightly. Also, by this Jew's advice, I mean to further the gods' indisputable work. You will appear upon the walls of Nacumera at dawn to-morrow, in such a garb as you wore in your native country when the Comte de la Forêt first saw you. Ahasuerus estimates this Perion will not readily leave pursuit of you in that event, whatever his lieutenants urge, for you are very beautiful."

Melicent cried aloud, "A bitter curse this beauty has been to me, and to all men who have desired it."

"But I do not desire it," said Orestes. "Else I would not have sold it to Ahasuerus. I desire only the governorship of some province on the frontier where I may fight daily with stalwart adversaries, and ride past the homes of conquered persons who hate me. Ahasuerus here assures me that the Emperor will