The Sorceress of Rome. Gallizier Nathan
was yet animated and it would seem, that hope had but a small share in the surmises they ventured on what the days to come held in store for the Saxon dynasty.
Without paying further heed to the motley throng, which surged up and down the hall of audience, seemingly indifferent to the whispered comments upon himself as a mere man of pleasure, Benilo seated himself upon a couch at the western extremity of the hall. With the elaborate deliberation of a man who disdains being hurried by anything whatsoever, he took a piece of vellum from his doublet, on which from time to time he traced a few words. Assuming a reclining position, he appeared absorbed in deep study, seemingly unheedful of his surroundings. Yet a close observer might have remarked that the Chamberlain's gaze roamed unsteadily from one group to another, until some chance passer-by deflected its course and Benilo applied himself to his ostentatious task more studiously than before.
"What does the courtier in the parrot-frock?" Duke Bernhardt of Saxony, stout, burly, asthmatic, addressed a tall, sallow individual, in a rose-coloured frock, who strutted by his side with the air of an inflated peacock.
John of Calabria gave a sigh.
"Alas! He writes poetry and swears by the ancient Gods!"
"By the ancient Gods!" puffed the duke, "a commendable habit! As for his poetry, – the bees sometimes deposit their honey in the mouth of a dead beast."
"And yet the Philistines solved not Samson's riddle," sighed the Greek.
"Ay! And the devil never ceases to cut wood for him, who wishes to keep the kettle boiling," spouted the duke with an irate look at his companion as they lost themselves among the throngs. Suddenly a marked hush, the abrupt cessation of the former all-pervading hum, caused Benilo to glance toward the entrance of the audience hall. As he did so, the vellum rolled from his nerveless hand upon the marble floor.
CHAPTER II
THE PAGEANT IN THE NAVONA
The man, who had entered the hall of audience with the air of one to whom every nook and corner was familiar, looked what he was, a war-worn veteran, bronzed and hardened by the effect of many campaigns in many climes. Yet his robust frame and his physique betrayed but slight evidence of those fatigues and hardships which had been the habits of his life. Only a tinge of gray through the close-cropped hair, and now and then the listless look of one who has grown weary with campaigning, gave token that the prime had passed. In repose his look was stern and pensive, softening at moments into an expression of intense melancholy and gloom. A long black mantle, revealing traces of prolonged and hasty travel, covered his tall and stately form. Beneath it gleamed a dark suit of armour with the dull sheen of dust covered steel. His helmet, fashioned after a dragon with scales, wings, and fins of wrought brass, resembled the headgear of the fabled Vikings.
This personage was Margrave Eckhardt of Meissen, commander-in-chief of the German hosts, Great Warden of the Eastern March, and chief adviser of the imperial youth, who had been entrusted to his care by his mother, the glorious Empress Theophano, the deeply lamented consort of Emperor Otto II of Saracenic renown.
The door through which he entered revealed a company of the imperial body-guard, stationed without, in gilt-mail tunics, armlets and greaves, their weapon the formidable mace, surmounted by a sickle-shaped halberd.
The deep hush, which had fallen upon the assembly on Eckhardt's entrance into the hall, had its significance. If the Romans were inclined to look with favour upon the youthful son of the Greek princess, in whose veins flowed the warm blood of the South, and whose sunny disposition boded little danger to their jealously guarded liberties, their sentiments toward the Saxon general had little in common with their evanescent enthusiasm over the "Wonder-child of the World." But if the Romans loved Eckhardt little, Eckhardt loved the Romans less, and he made no effort to conceal his contempt for the mongrel rabble, who, unable to govern themselves, chafed at every form of government and restraint.
Perhaps in the countenance of none of those assembled in the hall of audience was there reflected such intensity of surprise on beholding the great leader as there was in the face of the Grand Chamberlain, the olive tints of whose cheeks had faded to ashen hues. His trembling hands gripped the carved back of the nearest chair, while from behind the powerful frame of the Patricius Ziazo he gazed upon the countenance of the Margrave.
The latter had approached the group of ecclesiastics, who formed the nucleus round the venerable Archbishop of Cremona.
"What tidings from the king?" queried the patriarch of Christendom.
Eckhardt knelt and kissed Luitprand's proffered hand.
"The Saint has worked a miracle. Within a fortnight Rome will once more greet the King of the Germans."
Sighs of relief and mutterings of gladness drowned the reply of the archbishop. He was seen to raise his hands in silent prayer, and the deep hush returned anew. Other groups pushed eagerly forward to learn the import of the tidings.
The voice of Eckhardt now sounded curt and distinct, as he addressed Archbishop Heribert of Cologne, Chancellor of the Holy Roman Empire.
"If the God to whom you pray or your patron-saint, has endowed you with the divine gift of persuasion, – use it now to prompt your king to leave this accursed land and to return beyond the Alps. Roman wiles and Roman fever had well-nigh claimed another victim. My resignation lies in the hands of the King. My mission here is ended. I place your sovereign in your hands. Keep him safe. I return to the Eastern March."
Exclamations of surprise, chiefly from the German element, the Romans listening in sullen silence, rose round the commander, like a sullen squall.
Eckhardt waved them back with uplifted arm.
"The king requires my services no longer. He refuses to listen to my counsel! He despises his own country. His sun rises and sets in Rome. I no longer have his ear. His counsellors are Romans! The war is ended. My sword has grown rusty. Let another bear the burden! – I return to the Eastern March!"
During Eckhardt's speech, whose curtness barely cloaked the grief of the commander over a step, which he deemed irrevocable, the pallor in the features of the Grand Chamberlain had deepened and a strange light shone in his eyes, as, remote from the general's scrutiny, he watched and listened.
The German contingent, however, was not to be so easily reconciled to Eckhardt's declaration. Bernhardt, the Saxon duke, Duke Burkhardt of Suabia, Count Tassilo of Bavaria and Count Ludeger of the Palatinate united their protests against a step so fatal in its remotest consequences, with the result that the Margrave turned abruptly upon his heels, strode from the hall of audience, and, passing through the rank and file of the imperial guard, found himself on the crest of Mount Aventine.
Evening was falling. A solemn hush held enthralled the pulses of the universe. A dazzling glow of gold swept the western heavens, and the chimes of the Angelus rang out from untold cloisters and convents. To southward, the towering summits of Soracté glowed in sunset gold. The dazzling sheen reflected from the marble city on the Palatine proved almost too blinding for Eckhardt's gaze, and with quick, determined step, he began his descent towards the city.
At the base of the hill his progress suffered a sudden check.
A procession, weird, strange and terrible, hymning dirge-like the words of some solemn chant, with the eternal refrain "Miserere! Miserere!" wound round the shores of the Tiber. Four files of masked, black spectres, their heads engulfed in black hoods, wooden crucifixes dangling from their necks, carrying torches of resin, from which escaped floods of reddish light, at times obscured by thick black smoke, marched solemnly behind a monk, whose features could but vaguely be discerned in the tawny glare of the funereal light. No phantom procession at midnight could have inspired the popular mind with a terror so great as did this brotherhood of Death, more terrifying than the later monks and ascetics of Zurbaran, who so paraded the frightfulness of nocturnal visions in the pure, unobscured light of the sun. In numbers there were approximately four hundred. Their superior, a tall, gaunt and terrible monk, escorted by his acolytes, held aloft a large black crucifix. A fanatic of the iron type, whose austerity had won him a wide ascendency, the monk Cyprianus, his cowl drawn deeply over his face, strode before the brotherhood. The dense smoke of their torches, hanging motionless in the still