Hypatia — or New Foes with an Old Face by Charles Kingsley (e book reader TXT) 📗

He was about two-thirds down, when he shook the rope, and called in a stifled voice, to those above—

‘Haul up. I have seen enough.’

Breathless with curiosity and fear, they hauled him up. He stood among them for a few moments, silent, as if stunned by the weight of some enormous woe.

‘Is he dead?’

‘Odin has taken his son home, wolves of the Goths!’ And he held out his right hand to the awe-struck ring, and burst into an agony of weeping.... A clotted tress of long fair hair lay in his palm.

It was snatched; handed from man to man.... One after another recognised the beloved golden locks. And then, to the utter astonishment of the girls who stood round, the great simple hearts, too brave to be ashamed of tears, broke out and wailed like children .... Their Amal! Their heavenly man! Odin’s own son, their joy and pride, and glory! Their ‘Kingdom of heaven,’ as his name declared him, who was all that each wished to be, and more, and yet belonged to them, bone of their bone, flesh of their flesh! Ah, it is bitter to all true human hearts to be robbed of their ideal, even though that ideal be that of a mere wild bull, and soulless gladiator....

At last Smid spoke—

‘Heroes, this is Odin’s doom; and the All-father is just. Had we listened to Prince Wulf four months ago, this had never been. We have been cowards and sluggards, and Odin is angry with his children. Let us swear to be Prince Wulf’s men and follow him to-morrow where he will!’

Wulf grasped his outstretched hand lovingly— ‘No, Smid, son of Troll! These words are not yours to speak. Agilmund son of Cniva, Goderic son of Ermenric, you are Balts, and to you the succession appertains. Draw lots here, which of you shall be our chieftain.’

‘No! no! Wulf!’ cried both the youths at once. ‘You are the hero! you are the Sagaman! We are not worthy; we have been cowards and sluggards, like the rest. Wolves of the Goths, follow the Wolf, even though he lead you to the land of the giants!’

A roar of applause followed.

‘Lift him on the shield,’ cried Goderic, tearing off his buckler. ‘Lift him on the shield! Hail, Wulf king! Wulf, king of Egypt!’

And the rest of the Goths, attracted by the noise, rushed up the tower-stairs in time to join in the mighty shout of ‘Wulf, king of Egypt!’—as careless of the vast multitude which yelled and surged without, as boys are of the snow against the window-pane.

‘No!’ said Wulf solemnly, as he stood on the uplifted shield. ‘If I be indeed your king, and ye my men, wolves of the Goths, to-morrow we will go forth of this place, hated of Odin, rank with the innocent blood of the Alruna maid. Back to Adolf; back to our own people! Will you go?’

‘Back to Adolf!’ shouted the men.

‘You will not leave us to be murdered?’ cried one of the girls. ‘The mob are breaking the gates already!’

‘Silence, silly one! Men—we have one thing to do. The Amal must not go to the Valhalla without fair attendance.’

‘Not the poor girls?’ said Agilmund, who took for granted that Wulf would wish to celebrate the Amal’s funeral in true Gothic fashion by a slaughter of slaves.

‘No.... One of them I saw behave this very afternoon worthy of a Vala. And they, too—they may make heroes’ wives after all, yet .... Women are better than I fancied, even the worst of them. No. Go down, heroes, and throw the gates open; and call in the Greek hounds to the funeral supper of a son of Odin.’

‘Throw the gates open?’

‘Yes. Goderic, take a dozen men, and be ready in the east hall. Agilmund, go with a dozen to the west side of the court—there in the kitchen; and wait till you hear my war-cry. Smid and the rest of you, come with me through the stables close to the gate—as silent as Hela.’

And they went down—to meet, full on the stairs below, old Miriam.

Breathless and exhausted by her exertion, she had fallen heavily before Philammon’s strong arm; and lying half stunned for a while, recovered just in time to meet her doom.

She knew that it was come, and faced it like herself.

‘Take the witch!’ said Wulf slowly—‘Take the corrupter of heroes—the cause of all our sorrows!’

Miriam looked at him with a quiet smile.

‘The witch is accustomed long ago to hear fools lay on her the consequences of their own lust and laziness.’

‘Hew her down, Smid, son of Troll, that she may pass the Amal’s soul and gladden it on her way to Niflheim.’

Smid did it: but so terrible were the eyes which glared upon him from those sunken sockets, that his sight was dazzled. The axe turned aside, and struck her shoulder. She reeled, but did not fall.

‘It is enough,’ she said quietly.

‘The accursed Grendel’s daughter numbed my arm!’ said Smid. ‘Let her go! No man shall say that I struck a woman twice.’

‘Nidhogg waits for her, soon or late,’ answered Wulf.

And Miriam, coolly folding her shawl around her, turned and walked steadily down the stair; while all men breathed more freely, as if delivered from some accursed and supernatural spell.

‘And now,’ said Wulf, ‘to your posts, and vengeance!’

The mob had weltered and howled ineffectually around the house for some half-hour. But the lofty walls, opening on the street only by a few narrow windows in the higher stories, rendered it an impregnable fortress. Suddenly, the iron gates were drawn back, disclosing to the front rank the court, glaring empty and silent and ghastly in the moonlight. For an instant they recoiled, with a vague horror, and dread of treachery: but the mass behind pressed them onward, and in swept the murderers of Hypatia, till the court was full of choking wretches, surging against the walls and pillars in aimless fury. And then, from under the archway on each side, rushed a body of tall armed men, driving back all incomers more; the gates slid together again upon their grooves and the wild beasts of Alexandria were trapped at last.

And then began a murder grim and great. From three different doors issued a line of Goths, whose helmets and mail-shirts made them invulnerable to the clumsy weapons of the mob, and began hewing their way right through the living mass, helpless from their close-packed array. True, they were but as one to ten; but what are ten curs before one lion?.... And the moon rose higher and higher, staring down ghastly and unmoved upon that doomed court of the furies, and still the bills and swords hewed on and on, and the Goths drew the corpses, as they found room, towards a dark pile in