A Thorny Path — Complete by Georg Ebers (howl and other poems txt) 📖

As Melissa bent respectfully before him, he gazed delighted into her glowing face, saying, as he turned half to her and half to Philostratus: “How she blushes! She is ashamed that, though I could get no sleep during the night, and was tortured by an indescribable restlessness, she refused to obey my call, although she very well knows that the one remedy for her sleepless friend lies in her beautiful little hand. Hush, hush! The high-priest has told me that you did not sleep beneath the same roof as I. But that only turned my thoughts in the right direction. Child, child!—See now, Philostratus—the red rose has become a white one. And how timid she is! Not that it offends me, far from it—it delights me.—Those flowers, Philostratus! Take them, Melissa; they add less to your beauty than you to theirs.” He seized the splendid roses he had ordered for her early that morning and fastened the finest in her girdle himself. She did not forbid him, and stammered a few-low words of thanks.

How his face glowed! His eyes rested in ecstatic delight upon his chosen one. In this past night, after he had called for her and waited in vain with feverish longing for her coming, it had dawned on him with convincing force that this gentle child had awakened a new, intense passion in him. He loved her, and he was glad of it—he who till now had taken but a passing pleasure in beautiful women. Longing for her till it became torture, he swore to himself to make her his, and share his all with her, even to the purple.

It was not his habit to hesitate, and at daybreak he had sent for his mother’s messengers that they might inform her of his resolve. No one dared to gainsay him, and he expected it least of all from her whom he designed to raise so high. But she felt utterly estranged from him, and would gladly have told him to his face what she felt.

Still, it was absolutely necessary that she should restrain herself and endure his insufferable endearments, and even force herself to speak. And yet her tongue seemed tied, and it was only by the utmost effort of her will that she could bring herself to express her astonishment at his rapid return to health.

“It is like magic,” she concluded, and he heartily agreed. Attacks of that kind generally left their effects for four days or more. But the most astonishing thing was that in spite of being in the best of health, he was suffering from the gravest illness in the world. “I have fallen a victim to the fever of love, my Philostratus,” he cried, with a tender glance at Melissa.

“Nay, Caesar,” interrupted the philosopher, “love is not a disease, but rather not loving.”

“Prove this new assertion,” laughed the emperor; and the philosopher rejoined, with a meaning look at the maiden, “If love is born in the eyes, then those who do not love are blind.”

“But,” answered Caracalla, gayly, “they say that love comes not only from what delights the eye, but the soul and the mind as well.”

“And have not the mind and the spirit eyes also?” was the reply, to which the emperor heartily assented.

Then he turned to Melissa, and asked with gentle reproach why she, who had proved herself so ready of wit yesterday, should be so reserved today; but she excused her taciturnity on the score of the violent emotions that had stormed in upon her since the morning.

Her voice broke at the end of this explanation, and Caracalla, concluding that it was the thought of the grandeur that awaited her through his favor which confused her and brought the delicate color to her cheeks, seized her hand, and, obedient to an impulse of his better nature, said:

“I understand you, child. Things are befalling you that would make a stouter heart tremble. You have only heard hints of what must effect such a decisive change in your future life. You know how I feel toward you. I acknowledged to you yesterday what you already knew without words. We both feel the mysterious power that draws us to one another. We belong to each other. In the future, neither time nor space nor any other thing may part us. Where I am there you must be also. You shall be my equal in every respect. Every honor paid to me shall be offered to you likewise. I have shown the malcontents what they have to expect. The fate which awaits the consul Claudius Vindex and his nephew, who by their want of respect to you offended me, will teach the others to have a care.”

“O my lord, that aged man!” cried Melissa, clasping her hands, imploringly.

“He shall die, and his nephew,” was the inexorable answer. “During my conference with my mother’s messengers they had the presumption to raise objections against you and the ardent desire of my heart in a manner which came very near to being treason. And they must suffer for it.”

“You would punish them for my sake?” exclaimed Melissa. “But I forgive them willingly. Grant them pardon! I beg, I entreat you.”

“Impossible! Unless I make an example, it will be long before the slanderous tongues would hold their peace. Their sentence stands.”

But Melissa would not be appeased. With passionate eagerness she entreated the emperor to grant a pardon, but he cut her short with the request not to interfere in matters which he alone had to decide and answer for.

“I owe it to you as well as to myself,” he continued, “to remove every obstacle from the path. Were I to spare Vindex, they would never again believe in my strength of purpose. He shall die, and his nephew with him! To raise a structure without first securing a solid foundation would be an act of rashness and folly. Besides, I undertake nothing without consulting the omens. The horoscope which the priest of this temple has drawn up for you only confirms me in my purpose. The examination of the sacrifices this morning was favorable. It now only remains to be seen what the stars say to my resolve. I had not yet taken it when I last questioned the fortune-tellers of the sky. This night we shall learn what future the planets promise to our union. From the signs on yonder tablet it is scarcely possible that their answer should be otherwise than favorable. But even should they warn me of misfortune at your side, I could not let you go now. It is too late for that. I should merely take advantage of the warning, and continue with redoubled severity to sweep away every obstacle that threatens our union. And one thing more—”

But he did not finish, for Epagathos here reminded him of the deputation of Alexandrian citizens who had come to speak about the games in the Circus. They had been waiting several hours, and had still many arrangements to make.

“Did they send you to me?” inquired Caracalla, with irritation, and the freedman answering in the affirmative, he cried: “The princes who wait in my antechamber do not stir until their turn comes. These tradesmen’s senses are confused by the dazzle of their gold! Tell them they shall be called when we find time to attend to them.”

“The head of the night-watch too is waiting,” said the freedman; and to the emperor’s question whether he had seen him, and if he had anything of consequence to report, the other replied that the man was much disquieted, but seemed to