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

It was near midnight. Raphael had been sitting some three hours in Miriam’s inner chamber, waiting in vain for her return. To recover, if possible, his ancestral wealth; to convey it, without a day’s delay, to Cyrene; and, if possible, to persuade the poor old Jewess to accompany him, and there to soothe, to guide, perhaps to convert her, was his next purpose:—at all events, with or without his wealth, to flee from that accursed city. And he counted impatiently the slow hours and minutes which detained him in an atmosphere which seemed reeking with innocent blood, black with the lowering curse of an avenging God. More than once, unable to bear the thought, he rose to depart, and leave his wealth behind: but he was checked again by the thought of his own past life. How had he added his own sin to the great heap of Alexandrian wickedness! How had he tempted others, pampered others in evil! Good God! how had he not only done evil with all his might, but had pleasure in those who did the same! And now, now he was reaping the fruit of his own devices. For years past, merely to please his lust of power, his misanthropic scorn, he had been malting that wicked Orestes wickeder than he was even by his own base will and nature; and his puppet had avenged itself upon him! He, he had prompted him to ask Hypatia’s hand.... He had laid, half in sport, half in envy of her excellence, that foul plot against the only human being whom he loved.... and he had destroyed her! He, and not Peter, was the murderer of Hypatia! True, he had never meant her death.... No; but had he not meant for her worse than death? He had never foreseen.... No; but only because he did not choose to foresee. He had chosen to be a god; to kill and to make alive by his own will and law; and behold, he had become a devil by that very act. Who can—and who dare, even if he could—withdraw the sacred veil from those bitter agonies of inward shame and self-reproach, made all the more intense by his clear and undoubting knowledge that he was forgiven? What dread of punishment, what blank despair, could have pierced that great heart so deeply as did the thought that the God whom he had hated and defied had returned him good for evil, and rewarded him not according to his iniquities? That discovery, as Ezekiel of old had warned his forefathers, filled up the cup of his self-loathing.... To have found at last the hated and dreaded name of God: and found that it was Love!.... To possess Victoria, a living, human likeness, however imperfect, of that God; and to possess in her a home, a duty, a purpose, a fresh clear life of righteous labour, perhaps of final victory.... That was his punishment; that was the brand of Cain upon his forehead; and he felt it greater than he could bear.

But at least there was one thing to be done. Where he had sinned, there he must make amends; not as a propitiation, not even as a restitution; but simply as a confession of the truth which he had found. And as his purpose shaped itself, he longed and prayed that Miriam might return, and make it possible.

And Miriam did return. He heard her pass slowly through the outer room, learn from the girls who was within, order them out of the apartments, close the outer door upon them; at last she entered, and said quietly—

‘Welcome! I have expected you. You could not surprise old Miriam. The teraph told me last night that you would be here....’

Did she see the smile of incredulity upon Raphael’s face, or was it some sudden pang of conscience which made her cry out—

‘.... No! I did not! I never expected you! I am a liar, a miserable old liar, who cannot speak the truth, even if I try! Only look kind! Smile at me, Raphael!—Raphael come back at last to his poor, miserable, villainous old mother! Smile on me but once, my beautiful, my son! my son!’

And springing to him, she clasped him in her arms.

‘Your son?’

‘Yes, my son! Safe at last! Mine at last! I can prove it now! The son of my womb, though not the son of my vows!’ And she laughed hysterically. ‘My child, my heir, for whom I have toiled and hoarded for three-and-thirty years! Quick! here are my keys. In that cabinet are all my papers—all I have is yours. Your jewels are safe—buried with mine. The negro-woman, Eudaimon’s wife, knows where. I made her swear secrecy upon her little wooden idol, and, Christian as she is, she has been honest. Make her rich for life. She hid your poor old mother, and kept her safe to see her boy come home. But give nothing to her little husband: he is a bad fellow, and beats her.—Go, quick! take your riches, and away!.... No; stay one moment just one little moment—that the poor old wretch may feast her eyes with the sight of her darling once more before she dies!’

‘Before you die? Your son? God of my fathers, what is the meaning of all this, Miriam? This morning I was the son of Ezra the merchant of Antioch!’

‘His son and heir, his son and heir! He knew all at last. We told him on his death-bed! I swear that we told him, and he adopted you!’

‘We! Who?’

‘His wife and I. He craved for a child, the old miser, and we gave him one—a better one than ever came of his family. But he loved you, accepted you, though he did know all. He was afraid of being laughed at after he was dead—afraid of having it known that he was childless, the old dotard! No—he was right—true Jew in that, after all!’

‘Who was my father, then?’ interrupted Raphael, in utter bewilderment.

The old woman laughed a laugh so long and wild, that Raphael shuddered.

‘Sit down at your mother’s feet. Sit down.... just to please the poor old thing! Even if you do not believe her, just play at being her child, her darling, for a minute before she dies; and she will tell you all.... perhaps there is time yet!’

And he sat down.... ‘What if this incarnation of all wickedness were really my mother?.... And yet—why should I shrink thus proudly from the notion? Am I so pure myself as