Read Ebook: The Chaldean Magician An Adventure in Rome in the Reign of the Emperor Diocletian by Eckstein Ernst Safford Mary J Translator

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Ebook has 305 lines and 22321 words, and 7 pages

"What do you mean by that?" asked Rutilius.

"Afterwards, my dear fellow! Let me first hear the end of your adventure! True, I scarcely need an explanation of the result of the affair. What reply did you make when the young girls had shown you the page from the book of Amun?"

"I tried to doubt--but the spectral letters and my sorrowful Hero's troubled eyes spoke only too distinctly. The fact that this was some strange marvel, an inexplicable miracle, apparently sent by the gods themselves--never wavered. At first I was painfully moved, but in the course of our conversation, as Hero seemed to grow calmer, I regained a certain degree of confidence, and when in the middle of the first vigil I entered my house, was disposed, spite of the still unsolved enigma, to regard the whole matter rather as a strange adventure than a misfortune.

"The next day was to undeceive me bitterly. Going into the street at the time of the second breakfast, I saw two large travelling-carriages before the door of the next house. As I was about to ask one of the slaves who held the horses the object of these preparations, Heliodorus and the two young girls crossed the threshold. The Sicilian greeted me and said that he was on his way, with Hero and Lydia, to bid me farewell. Hero, who, as I knew, was a little tyrant, had suddenly declared that she detested Tibur from the very bottom of her soul and longed to go back to Rome, so as it was now so late in the season that he, Heliodorus, had no real reason for opposing this wish, he had decided with his usual promptness.

"Of course I knew that Hero's suddenly awakened longing was connected with Olbasanus. She wanted to seek him, learn farther particulars about the strange prophecy, and if possible appease by prayers and sacrifices the hostile powers that opposed our happiness.

"Ere fifteen minutes had passed the whole party, including old Septimia and some of the household slaves, were seated among the cushions, and preceded by three horsemen, rolling along the road to Rome.

"You will not be surprised, dear Bononius, when I tell you that I, too, left Tibur that very day and returned to the seven-hilled city. With a heavy heart I approached the next morning the superb Hellenic dwelling on the northern side of the Caelian Hill, occupied by Heliodorus. The Sicilian received me cordially and kindly, though with a somewhat anxious air. Seating myself by his side, I learned that Hero seemed to be ill. Shortly after her arrival she had entered her litter, accompanied by Lydia, returning at a late hour with every sign of agitation. Since then she had lain dejectedly on her couch, scarcely answering a question, but gazing fixedly, with a pallid face, into vacancy. Once she had burst into violent sobs, her whole frame shaken by emotion; then increased depression and exhaustion followed until at last, long after midnight, she fell asleep.

"Of course I guessed what had happened. Hero had been to Olbasanus and had heard from the soothsayer's lips the same thing the inscription had predicted. Nay, it seemed as if the manner of this confirmation had been far more terrible and demoniac than the first warning by the page from the book of the god Amun. I was utterly at a loss and, stammering my regret in incoherent words, left the house, begging the Sicilian to inform me when his daughter's health was so far restored that I might repeat my visit without being intrusive.

"On the next evening," continued Rutilius,--"it was the very Friday we had chosen for the disclosure of our secret, but in my excitement I had entirely forgotten Heliodorus' birthday--I received a few lines from Hero that almost drove me to despair.

"'We must part,' she wrote, 'part forever. I had hoped the cruel warning that terrified me at Tibur was only the expression of some hidden resentment which might be appeased. But now I know that the gods themselves bar our way with their destroying curse. I have visited Olbasanus twice: day before yesterday at the dinner hour and yesterday at the commencement of the first vigil. This man--do not doubt it--holds intercourse with the gods, demons, and the dead; he has been given power over all the realms of spirits! I have heard it with these ears, seen it with these eyes! When, after manifold proofs of his omnipotence, I still doubted--alas, only because I shrank from despair--at a sign from the terrible man the goddess of death, Hecate herself, appeared to me in the clouds of the night heavens, and in a voice like the roaring of the storm, repeated the awful words I had read on the page of Amun. We must part, Lucius, not for my sake--oh! how gladly would I bear the curse of blindness, if I might win in you a higher, purer light--but for yours, to whom cruel Hecate predicts death, and for love of my dear father, whose mind is threatened with darkness. Farewell, dear Lucius! May you learn to forget more easily than I!'

"These were the words engraved upon my heart in indelible, torturing characters, as if written by a red-hot stylus. I now learned from my slave Gaipor, that Olbasanus was really considered by thousands of people the most powerful conjurer among all the Chaldeans of the seven-hilled city. Gaipor himself, before I bought him, had been sent to the magician by his mistress, a lady from Neapolis, to enquire about the future, and had beheld with his own eyes, like Hero, the terrible apparition of Hecate, who, surrounded by flames, soared across the starry sky. You know, Caius, I am not very credulous. I've often laughed at our augurs and soothsayers, and paid the homage of my sincere respect to that general in the time of the Republic, who when the sacred chickens would not eat, flung them into the sea. But here conviction pressed upon me with such power that I succumbed to its force...."

"Hecate!" murmured Caius Bononius. "This marvel was attested to me also, not by one or two persons who had beheld it, but by twenty. Know, Rutilius, that for months I have been reckoning what this Olbasanus accomplishes by means of his league with gods and demons.... But you had not finished your story. Go on, Lucius; but make haste!"

"I have finished," replied the youth. "There's only one thing more to add. Amid the dull, heart-corroding grief that mastered me, the desire to visit in the hall of his incantations, the man who had destroyed my future--though with kind intentions--daily became more uncontrollable. I, too, wished to ask the terrible queen of the underworld a question. Every effort to see my beloved Hero again was unavailing. Heliodorus, too, seemed completely transformed--his frank bearing had become so timid and constrained. The impossibility of speaking to Hero, or even Lydia, drove me to carry my desire into execution. Nay, I conquered my repugnance to any contact with the supernatural--and now, oh! Caius, you behold me on my way to Olbasanus, firmly resolved to see with my own eyes what the gods have allotted and at least to bear away the one consolation that lies in the consciousness of immutability and eternally predestined fate."

"On your way to Olbasanus!" cried Caius Bononius passionately. "Well, then, let us not delay! I, too, am about to seek him. I sent my Glabrio yesterday, and Olbasanus appointed the second hour after sunset...."

"You, too?" asked Lucius in surprise.

"Yes, I, too--though from different motives, my dear Rutilius. I am a philosopher, you know. For years I have searched and investigated; I am acquainted with the manifold appearances of animate and inanimate nature; I don't believe in this conjuror's wonderful phantasmagoria. No matter, the testimony of many truthful men lies before us, I cannot doubt that they have faithfully and honestly related what they heard and saw. So a torturing contradiction results. Either I am mistaken in denying, with Pliny and Lucretius, the interference of demons in the affairs of men, or all these truthful people deceive themselves and are the victims of base, unprincipled fraud. Impelled by my curiosity, I am determined, so far as possible, to decide this question one way or another. So come, that I may not miss the hour Olbasanus has appointed."

Lucius Rutilius felt a thrill of joyful fear. A gleam of hope flashed through his soul, for his friend's words, spite of their measured reserve, expressed strong confidence.

"Let us hurry!" he said, trembling with impatience.

So the two friends went back into the house, and passing around the Viminal Hill by the side of the Tullian wall, turned towards Olbasanus' dwelling.

FOOTNOTES:

The Romans wore the toga on occasions of ceremony.

The Romans divided the time from sunset to sunrise into four night-watches .

Priests paid by the government, who predicted future events.

Not far from the enormous Baths which the Emperor Diocletian,--as if to atone for preferring to reside in Nicomedia or Salona rather than in Rome,--had had built on the northeastern slope of the Viminal as far as the spot where the height merges into the Quirinal, there stood near the Collina Gate a singular structure, almost recalling in the ponderous splendor of its brilliantly-painted fa?ade the royal palaces of Assyria and Persia, yet as fresh and new as if it had just emerged from the hands of architect and workmen, an architectural embodiment of the taste of an age which had a fancy for cleverly imitating the style of by-gone times, not only in the weak creations of a degenerate literature, but in other departments of human activity.

True, in this instance it had not been the architect's whim or his employer's taste, but a definite, practical purpose that had replaced the simple fa?ade of the Roman dwelling by this fantastic luxury of the East. Behind the ponderous pillars adorned with heads of animals, Olbasanus, the Chaldean enchanter and conjuror of evil spirits, the declared favorite of the Roman ladies, practised his mysterious arts,--and thus the exterior of the spacious structure harmonized with the strange events that occurred within. The foreign aspect of the front might be regarded as a preparation for the chosen ones whom Olbasanus permitted to cross the threshold of his secret sanctuary.

Lucius Rutilius and Caius Bononius reached the door at the very moment it was opened from within, allowing a tall, thin figure, wrapped in a thick paenula, to pass into the street. Spite of the mild weather, the stranger had drawn over his head the hood worn as a protection from the rain.

Stepping a little aside, the two youths made room for the disguised figure.

"I ought to know that gait and bearing," said Lucius Rutilius, looking after the hurrying form; but he vainly strove to recollect. Meantime the porter had not closed the door, but holding a lantern of chased silver with panes of oiled papyrus, admitted the two visitors.

Caius Bononius gave him a silver coin and asked if the Chaldean could be seen, according to his appointment.

The porter beckoned to one of the seven bearded Ethiopians who, clad in long robes confined around the hips by wide girdles inscribed with strange characters, stood waiting at the entrance of the corridor, and the man thus summoned silently led the new arrivals through the wainscoted ante-room. As he moved forward almost without a sound, the train of his cowl-like robe rustling softly over the floor, holding in his right hand a torch that cast spectral shadows on the countless joints and projections of the masonry, he himself seemed a supernatural being, well calculated to make a mysterious, agitating impression upon sensitive souls. The way led through a double row of short, heavy columns to a staircase whose basalt steps extended downward to a subterranean passage, just high enough to permit a tall man to walk upright under the ragged arch cut in the forms of stalactites. The smoke from the torch floated in horrible shapes along the roof. A heavy, oppressive atmosphere prevailed. On the right and left, in black cavities, lay an endless number of skulls. After a time the corridor turned; a second gallery opened, from which branched a third and fourth. At last the young men lost all idea of the direction in which they were going. Lucius Rutilius thought they must have long since reached the other side of the hill; Caius Bononius, on the contrary, was disposed to believe that the staircase which now led them into a spacious, dimly-lighted room, was not very far from the entrance flight at the end of the pillared corridor.

The ceiling of the room was slightly arched, but its construction, owing to the extreme height, could not be distinguished. At the end of the apartment, in front of the candelabrum, was a large square altar, also hung with dark cloth. Tripods, brazen monopodia covered with all kinds of strange utensils, low stools, and various unrecognizable articles were arranged in symmetrical order on both sides. In the centre of the floor lay a rug about thirty feet square, painted or interwoven with mysterious figures; on each corner stood a candlestick even taller than the candelabrum at the end.

The young men had about five minutes' time in which to examine their surroundings by the dim light of the livid flame, then there was a sound like the distant notes of an Aeolian harp and, without their knowing how and whence he came, Olbasanus stood behind the cloth-draped altar.

"You do not come alone, Caius Bononius!" he said, in a musical voice. "No matter--I know. Most mortals cherish scruples about approaching, relying solely on their own strength, the rooms where the gods are to reveal themselves directly and indirectly. Let your companion, whoever he may be, also draw near; his quiet, devout presence will not disturb the Chaldean's work."

"You are mistaken, Olbasanus," replied Caius Bononius, "the person accompanying me is the one who longs to address a question to the goddess. I, Caius Bononius, only sent my messenger to you in behalf of this youth; for, I confess, I never felt a desire to lift the veil from the future."

"I am mistaken," replied Olbasanus. "That is the lot of all human beings, and mine also, so long as I speak to you only as a feeble and perishable man. The favor of the gods, when I appeal to them, first casts into my soul the light that renders any error impossible. Well! Olbasanus is disposed to grant your wish, though as a man he cannot understand what could induce you to use this evasion."

"The reasons are of small importance," replied Bononius.

"Then you probably desire to have your companion's name remain concealed from the prophet?"

Caius Bononius exchanged a hasty glance with his friend, then turning to Olbasanus, replied:

"If it is agreeable to you, yes!"

The Chaldean seemed to hesitate a few seconds.

"Greater power is required of the magician's art when the questioner conceals his name," he said slowly; "but since you earnestly desire...."

"We beseech it!" replied Bononius.

The Chaldean now came with measured pace from behind the altar.

"Granted!" he said solemnly.

Then he stretched out his hand, in which gleamed a small ivory wand. Instantly the spacious room glowed with a light as bright as that of day. Lamps not only burned in all the candelabra--but even between the pillars flames seemed to spring from the ground; shallow vessels appeared in which jets of light blazed steadily.

The two youths were almost blinded by the spectacle of this transformation. Lucius pressed his hand to his brow as if bewildered; Caius stood motionless, apparently scrutinizing, considering, examining. At last a smile of satisfaction flitted over his face. He seemed to have found the solution of this enigma, while Rutilius was still enthralled by the impression the miracle produced.

"Approach," said the Chaldean in sonorous tones. "Stranger, what do you desire to know?"

Again the youths exchanged a glance; then Rutilius said:

"I would fain learn what the gods have allotted to me, in case I fulfil the most momentous and important design of my life."

Olbasanus delayed his answer as before. At last he replied:

"I fear that is more vague than the gods permit. Can you not put your question more clearly; mention, without reserve, the design of which you speak?"

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