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

her, she was reminded of the farewell she had taken, many years ago, of a Christian friend before she was led away by the lictors to martyrdom in the circus. Finally, she whispered something in the philosopher’s ear, and received from him the promise to return with Melissa as soon as possible.

Philostratus was, in fact, quite easy. Just before, Caracalla’s helpless glance had met his sympathizing gaze, and the suffering Caesar had said nothing to him but:

“O Philostratus, I am in such pain!” and these words still rang in the ears of this warm-hearted man.

While he was endeavoring to comfort the emperor, Caesar’s eyes had fallen on the gem, and he asked to see it. He gazed at it attentively for some time, and when he returned it to the philosopher he had ordered him to fetch the prototype of Roxana.

Closely enveloped in the veil which Euryale had placed on her head, Melissa passed from room to room, keeping near to the philosopher.

Wherever she appeared she heard murmuring and whispering that troubled her, and tittering followed her from several of the rooms as she left them; even from the large hall where the emperor’s friends awaited his orders in numbers, she heard a loud laugh that frightened and annoyed her.

She no longer felt as unconstrained as she had been that morning when she had come before Caesar. She knew that she would have to be on her guard; that anything, even the worst, might be expected from him. But as Philostratus described to her, on the way, how terribly the unfortunate man suffered, her tender heart was again drawn to him, to whom—as she now felt—she was bound by an indefinable tie. She, if any one, as she repeated to herself, was able to help him; and her desire to put the truth of this conviction to the proof—for she could only regard it as too amazing to be grounded in fact—was seconded by the less disinterested hope that, while attending on the sufferer, she might find an opportunity of effecting the release of her father and brother.

Philostratus went on to announce her arrival, and she, while waiting, tried to pray to the manes of her mother; but, before she could sufficiently collect her thoughts, the door opened. Philostratus silently beckoned to her, and she stepped into the tablinum, which was but dimly lighted by a few lamps.

Caracalla was still resting here; for every movement increased the pain that tormented him.

How quiet it was! She thought she could hear her own heart beating.

Philostratus remained standing by the door, but she went on tiptoe toward the couch, fearing her light footsteps might disturb the emperor. Yet before she had reached the divan she stopped still, and then she heard the plaintive rattle in the sufferer’s throat, and from the background of the room the easy breathing of the burly physician and of old Adventus, both of whom had fallen asleep; and then a peculiar tapping. The lion beat the floor with his tail with pleasure at recognizing her.

This noise attracted the invalid’s attention, and when he opened his closed eyes and saw Melissa, who was anxiously watching all his movements, he called to her lightly with his hand on his brow:

“The animal has a good memory, and greets you in my name. You were sure to come—, I knew it!”

The young girl stepped nearer to him, and answered, kindly, “Since you needed me, I gladly followed Philostratus.”

“Because I needed you?” asked the emperor.

“Yes,” she replied, “because you require nursing.”

“Then, to keep you, I shall wish to be ill often,” he answered, quickly; but he added, sadly, “only not so dreadfully ill as I have been to-day.”

One could hear how laborious talking was to him, and the few words he had sought and found, in order to say something kind to Melissa, had so hurt his shattered nerves and head that he sank back, gasping, on the cushions.

Then for some time all was quiet, until Caracalla took his hand from his forehead and continued, as if in excuse:

“No one seems to know what it is. And if I talk ever so softly, every word vibrates through my brain.”

“Then you must not speak,” interrupted Melissa, eagerly. “If you want anything, only make signs. I shall understand you without words, and the quieter it is here the better.”

“No, no; you must speak,” begged the invalid. “When the others talk, they make the beating in my head ten times worse, and excite me; but I like to hear your voice.”

“The beating?” interrupted Melissa, in whom this word awoke old memories. “Perhaps you feel as if a hammer was hitting you over the left eye?

“If you move rapidly, does it not pierce your skull, and do you not feel as sick as if you were on the rocking sea?”

“Then you also know this torment?” asked Caracalla, surprised; but she answered, quietly, that her mother had suffered several times from similar headaches, and had described them to her.

Caesar sank back again on the pillows, moved his dry lips, and glanced toward the drink which Galen had prescribed for him; and Melissa, who almost as a child had long nursed a dear invalid, guessed what he wanted, brought him the goblet, and gave him a draught.

Caracalla rewarded her with a grateful look. But the physic only seemed to increase the pain. He lay there panting and motionless, until, trying to find a new position, he groaned, lightly:

“It is as if iron was being hammered here. One would think others might hear it.”

At the same time he seized the girl’s hand and placed it on his burning brow.

Melissa felt the pulse in the sufferer’s temple throbbing hard and short against her fingers, as she had her mother’s when she laid her cool hand on her aching forehead; and then, moved by the wish to comfort and heal, she let her right hand rest over the sick man’s eyes. As soon as she felt one hand was hot, she put the other in its place; and it must have relieved the patient, for his moans ceased by degrees, and he finally said, gratefully:

“What good that does me! You are—I knew you would help me. It is already quite quiet in my brain. Once more your hand, dear girl!”

Melissa willingly obeyed him, and as he breathed more and more easily, she remembered that her mother’s headache had often been relieved when she had placed her hand on her forehead. Caesar, now opening his eyes wide, and looking her full in the face, asked why she had not allowed him sooner to reap the benefit of this remedy.

Melissa slowly withdrew her hand, and with drooping eyes answered gently:

“You are the emperor, a man... and I...” But Caracalla interrupted her eagerly, and with a clear voice:

“Not so, Melissa! Do not you feel, like me, that something else draws us to one another, like what binds a man