The G.A. Henty

by G. A. Henty

  “Yes, for men like you Britons that would do, for a straight blow from any one of you would well nigh break in the bones of the face of an ordinary man, and, as you say, you could strike much more quickly without the weight on your hands, but with smaller men a contest might last for hours without the caestus, and the spectators would get tired of it; but I will try the experiment some day, and put up one of the Britons against Asthor the Gaul, hands against the caestus, and see what comes of it. At present he is more skilful than any of your people, but they are getting on fast, and when one of them is fairly his match in point of skill I will try it. If the Briton wins, I will, when they first go into the arena, match them against the champions of the other schools with bare hands against armed ones, and they will get great credit if they win under those conditions. Both at that and at wrestling you Britons are likely to carry all before you. I should like to train you all only for that.”

  “I wish you would,” Beric said earnestly.

  “There is less honour in winning at wrestling and boxing than in the other contests,” Scopus said.

  “For that I care nothing whatever, Scopus; besides, you would get more credit from my winning in those games than from my being killed in the others. Strength and height count for much in them, while against an active retiarius strength goes for very little.”

  “But you are active as well as strong, Beric, and so is Boduoc. Moreover, when Caesar sent you to me to be prepared for the ring, he meant that you should take part in the principal contests, and he would be furious if, on some great occasion, when he expected to see you stand up against a famous champion, it turned out that you were only a wrestler.”

  “I am ready and willing to learn all the exercises, Scopus—I should like to excel in them all—but you might put me up as a wrestler and boxer; then if Nero insisted on my betaking myself to other weapons, I could do so without discredit to you. But my opinion is that every man should do what he can do best. Were we to fight with clubs, I think that we need have no fear of any antagonists; but our strength is for the most part thrown away at sword play, at which any active man with but half our strength is our match. You have told me that Nero often looks in at your school, and doubtless he will do so when he comes back from Greece. You could then tell him that you had found that all the Britons were likely to excel rather in wrestling and boxing, where their strength and height came into play, than in the other exercises, and that you therefore were instructing them chiefly in them.”

  “I will see what I can do,” Scopus said. “I like you Britons, you are good tempered, and give me no trouble. I will tell you what I will do, I will send to Greece for the best instructor in wrestling I can get hold of, they are better at that than we are, and wrestling has always ranked very high in their sports. Most of you already are nearly a match for Decius; but you are all worth taking pains about, for there are rich prizes to be won in the provincial arenas, as well as at Rome; and in Greece, where they do not care for the serious contests, there is high honour paid to the winners in the wrestling games.”

  As time went on Beric had little leisure to spend in libraries, for the exercises increased in severity, and as, instead of confining himself, as most of the others did, to one particular branch, he worked at them all, the day was almost entirely given up to exercises of one kind or another. His muscles, and those of his companions, had increased vastly under the training they received. All had been accustomed to active exercise, but under their steady training every ounce of superfluous flesh disappeared, their limbs became more firmly knit, and the muscles showed out through the clear skin in massive ridges.

  “We should astonish them at home, Beric,” Boduoc said one day. “It is strange that people like the Romans, who compared to us are weakly by nature, should have so studied the art of training men in exercises requiring strength. I used to wonder that the Roman soldiers could wield such heavy spears and swords. Now I quite understand it. We were just as nature made us, they are men built up by art. Why, when we began, my arms used to ache in a short time with those heavy clubs, now I feel them no more than if they were willow wands.”

  Pollio had remained but two months in Rome, and had then gone out with a newly appointed general to Syria. Beric had missed his light hearted friend much, but he was not sorry to give up the visits with him to the houses of his friends. He felt that in these houses he was regarded as a sort of show, and that the captured British chief, who was acquainted with the Latin tongue and with Roman manners, was regarded with something of the same curiosity and interest as a tamed tiger might be. Besides, however much gladiators might be the fashion in Rome, he felt a degradation in the calling, although he quite appreciated the advantage that the training would be to him should he ever return to Britain. He was pleased to learn from Pollio, on the day before he started, that he had heard that his uncle would ere long return to Rome.

  “I believe,” he said, “that it is entirely my aunt’s doing. You know how she hates what she calls her exile, and I hear that she has been quietly using all her family influence to obtain his recall and his appointment as a magistrate here. I learn she is likely to succeed, and that my uncle will be one of these fine days astounded at receiving the news that he is appointed a magistrate here. I don’t suppose he will ever learn my aunt’s share in the matter, and will regard what others would take as a piece of supreme good luck as a cruel blow of fortune. However, if he did discover it, my aunt would maintain stoutly that she did it for the sake of the girls, whom she did not wish to see married to some provincial officer, and condemned, as she had been, to perpetual exile; and as she would have the support of all her relations, and even of my father, who is also convinced that it is the greatest of all earthly happiness for a Roman to reside at Rome, my uncle for once will have to give in. Aemilia, too, will be glad to return to Rome, though I know that Ennia is of a different opinion. I believe, from what she let drop one day, that she has a leaning towards the new sect, of which she has heard from the old slave who was her nurse. It will be a great misfortune if she has, for it would cause terrible trouble at home, and if any fresh persecution breaks out, she might be involved. I am sure my aunt has no suspicion of it, for if she had the slave would be flogged to death or thrown to the fishes, and Ennia’s life would be made a burden to her till she consented to abandon the absurd ideas she had taken up.”

  But if Norbanus had returned with his family to Rome, Beric had heard nothing of it. Had Pollio been at Rome he would at once have taken him to see them on their return, but now that he had gone there was no one from whom he would hear of their movements, and Norbanus himself would be so much occupied with his new duties, and with the society with which Lesbia would fill the house, that he would have no time to inquire about the British captive he had received as his guest at Massilia.

  One evening, when the rest of the gladiators were engaged in a hot discussion as to the merits of some of those who were to appear at the games given in celebration of the funeral obsequies of a wealthy senator, Beric asked Boduoc to accompany him for a walk.

  “One gets sick of all that talk about fighting,” he said as they went out. “How men can sit indoors in a hot room heavy with the smoke of the lamps, when they can go out on such a lovely night as this, I cannot understand. We do not have such nights as this at home, Boduoc.”

  “No,” Boduoc assented reluctantly, for it was seldom that he would allow anything Roman to be superior to what he was accustomed to in Britain; “the nights are certainly fine here, and so they need be when it is so hot all day that one can scarcely breathe outside the house. It seems to me that the heat takes all the strength out of my limbs.”

  Beric laughed. “It did not seem so, Boduoc, when today you threw Borthon, who is as heavy and well nigh as strong as yourself, full five yards through the air. Let us turn out from these busy streets and get among the hills—not those on which the palaces stand, but away from houses and people.”

  “What a night it wo
uld be for wolf hunting!” Boduoc said suddenly, when they had walked along for some distance in silence.

  “Yes, that was fine sport, Boduoc; and when we slew we knew we were ridding the land of fierce beasts.”

  “Well, many of the gladiators are not much better, Beric. There is Porus, who may be likened to a panther; there is Chresimus, who is like a savage bull; Gripus, who, when not at work, is for ever trying to stir up strife. Truly, I used to think, Beric, that I could not slay a man unless he was an enemy, but I scarce feel that now. The captives in war are like ourselves, and I would not, if I could help it, lift sword against them. But many of the men are malefactors, who have been sentenced to death as gladiators rather than to death by the executioner, and who, by the terms of the sentence, must be killed within the course of a year. Well, there is no objection to killing these; if you do not do it, someone else will. Then there are the Romans, these are the roughest and most brutal of all; they are men who have been the bullies of their quarters, who fight for money only, and boast that it is a disappointment to them when, by the vote of the spectators, they have to spare an antagonist they have conquered. It is at least as good a work to kill one of these men as to slay a wolf at home. Then there are the patricians, who fight to gain popular applause, and kill as a matter of fashion; for them I have assuredly no pity.

  “No, I hope I shall never have to stand up against a captive like myself but against all others I can draw my sword without any of the scruples I used to feel. I hear that if one of us can but hold his own for three years, in most cases he is given his liberty. I do not mean that he would be allowed to go home, but he is free from the arena.”

  They were now near the summit of one of the hills, where a clear sweep had been made of all the houses standing there in order that a stately temple should be erected on the site. Suddenly they heard a scream in a female voice.

  “There is some villainy going on, Boduoc, let us break in upon the game.” They ran at the top of their speed in the direction from which they had heard the cry, and came upon a group of seven or eight men, belonging, as they could see by the light of the moon, to the dregs of the city. A female was lying on the ground, another was clinging to her, and two men with coarse jeers and laughter were dragging her from her hold when the two Britons ran up.

  Beric struck one of the men to the ground with a terrible blow, while Boduoc seizing the other hurled him through the air, and he fell head foremost among a heap of the masonry of a demolished building. The other men drew their knives, but as Beric and his companion turned upon them there was a cry, “They are gladiators,” and the whole of them without a moment’s hesitation took to their heels.

  Beric then turned towards the females, and as the light of the moon fell full on his face the one with whom the men had been struggling exclaimed, “Why, it is surely Beric!”

  Beric looked at her in surprise. “It is the lady Ennia!” he exclaimed. “Why, what are you doing at this time of night in so lonely a place, and without other attendants than this woman?”

  “It is my nurse,” Ennia said; “I was on my way with her, Beric, to a secret meeting of Christians held in an underground room of one of the villas that stood here. I have been there several times before and we have not been molested, but, as I gathered from what the men said, they noticed the light fall upon my necklace and bracelet as I passed by a lamp, and so followed us. Happily they overtook us before we reached the place of meeting. Had they followed us farther they might have come upon us there, and then much more harm would have been done. They came up and roughly demanded who we were, and bade me hand over my jewels. Lycoris answered them, and they struck her down. I threw myself down on her and clung to her, but they would soon have plundered and perhaps killed me had not you arrived.”

  “Do not you think, Ennia, that it is foolish and wrong of you thus to go out unprotected at night to such a place as this, and, as I suppose, without the knowledge of your father and mother?”

  “They do not know,” she said, “but it is my duty to go. It is the only opportunity I have for hearing the Word preached.”

  “I cannot think, Ennia, that it is your duty,” Beric said gravely. “The first duty of a young woman is to obey her parents, and I think that you, being as yet scarce a woman, are not able to judge between one religion and another. I know nothing of the doctrines of this sect save what your father told me; but he said that they were good and pure, and, being so, I am sure that they cannot countenance disobedience to parents.”

  “The words are ‘Forsake all, and follow Me,’ “ Ennia said firmly.

  “That could not have been said to one of your age, Ennia. I was reading the Jewish sacred book the other day, and one of the chief commandments is to honour your father and mother. Well, I think, at any rate, that it were best not to go there tonight. These men may return, and at any rate I will not allow you thus to wander about at night unprotected. Boduoc and I will escort you to your house. When you get there I trust that you will think this over, and that you will see that such midnight excursions are altogether wrong, whatever the motive may be; but at any rate, if you must go, I must obtain your promise that you will write to me at the school of Scopus the gladiator, to tell me at what hour you start. I shall not intrude my presence upon you, nor accompany you, for this would be to make myself an accomplice in what I consider your folly; but I shall always be near you, and if you are again disturbed on your way Boduoc and I will be at hand to punish those who meddle with you.”

  The old nurse by this time had regained her feet.

  “You are the nurse of this young lady,” Beric said to her sternly, “and should know better than to bring her into danger. If Norbanus knew what you have done he would have you cut in pieces.”

  “It is not the fault of Lycoris. She begged and entreated me not to come, but I would not listen to her. You are angry with me, Beric, but you would not be angry if you knew what it was to me. Younger than I have died for the Faith, and I would die too if it were necessary.”

  Beric made no reply, he was indeed deeply vexed at what he considered an act of mad folly. The daughters of Norbanus had been very friendly and kind to him at Massilia, and he felt a debt of gratitude to their father; and this escapade on the part of Ennia, who was as yet scarce sixteen, vexed him exceedingly. He was not sure, indeed, but that he ought to go straight to Norbanus and tell him what had happened, yet he feared that in such a case the anger of the magistrate would be so great that Ennia would be forced by him into becoming one of the vestal virgins, or be shut up in strict imprisonment. Scarce a word was spoken as they passed down the hill and into the streets, now almost deserted. At last Ennia stopped at the entrance used by the slaves to her father’s house.

  “Will you give me your promise,” he asked, “about going out at night again? I implore you, I beseech you do not again leave the house of your father at night unknown to him. You cannot tell the dangers you run by so doing, or the misery you may bring, not only on yourself, but on your parents.”

  “I promise you,” Ennia said. “I owe you so great a debt of gratitude that even your harsh words do not anger me. I will think over what you have said, and try to do what may seem to me my duty.”

  “That is all I ask,” Beric said more gently; and then turning walked away with Boduoc, who had but faintly understood what was being said, but was surprised at the recognition between Beric and this girl, whom he had not particularly noticed when at Massilia.

  “That is Pollio’s cousin, the younger daughter of the magistrate I stayed with at Massilia. It was well for her that it was not Pollio who came to her rescue instead of us.”

  “I should say so,” Boduoc said dryly. “Pollio would scarcely be a match for eight cutthroats.”

  “I did not mean that, Boduoc. I meant that he would have rated her soundly.”

  “It seemed to me that you were rating her somewhat soundly, Beric. I scarce ever heard you speak so harshly before, and I wondered the more as you
are neither kith nor kin to her, while by the heartiness with which you scolded her you might have been her own brother.”

  “I did not think whether I had a right to scold her or not, Boduoc. I liked both the maiden and her sister, and their father was very kind to me. Moreover, after all Pollio has done for us, the least I could do was to look after his cousin. But even if I had known nothing whatever of her or her friends, I should have spoken just as I did. The idea of a young girl like that wandering about at night with no one but an old slave to protect her in an unfrequented quarter of Rome! It is unheard of.”

  “But what were they doing there, Beric?”

  “They were going to a meeting place of a new religion there is in Rome. The people who belong to it are persecuted and obliged to meet in secret. The old woman belongs to it, and has, I suppose, taught Ennia. I have heard that the sect is spreading, and that although most of those who adhere to it are slaves, or belong to the poorer class, there are many of good family who have also joined it.”

  “Well, I should have thought,” Boduoc said, “that the Romans had no cause to be dissatisfied with their gods. They have given them victory, and dominion, and power, and wealth. What more could they want of them? I could understand that we, whose god did nothing to assist us in our fight against the Romans, should seek other gods who might do more for us. But that a Roman should have been discontented with his gods is more than I can understand. But what is that sudden flash of light?”

  “It is a fire, and in these narrow streets, with a brisk wind blowing, it may well spread. There, do you hear the watchmen’s trumpets giving the alarm? Let us get back quickly, Boduoc. It may be that we shall be all turned out to fight the fire if it spreads.”