9. CHAPTER IX.
ESTHER AND BEN-HUR.
NEXT night, about the fourth hour, Ben-Hur stood on the terrace of
the great warehouse with Esther. Below them, on the landing, there was
much running about, and shifting of packages and boxes, and shouting
of men, whose figures, stooping, heaving, hauling, looked, in the
light of the crackling torches kindled in their aid, like the
labouring genii of the fantastic Eastern tales. A galley was being
laden for instant departure. Simonides had not yet come from his
office, in which, at the last moment, he would deliver to the
captain of the vessel instructions to proceed without stop to Ostia,
the seaport of Rome, and, after landing a passenger there, continue
more leisurely to Valentia, on the coast of Spain.
The passenger is the agent going to dispose of the estate derived
from Arrius the duumvir. When the lines of the vessel are cast off,
and she is put about, and her voyage begun, Ben-Hur will be
committed irrevocably to the work undertaken the night before. If he
is disposed to repent the agreement with Ilderim, a little time is
allowed him to give notice and break it off. He is master, and has
only to say the word.
Such may have been the thought at the moment in his mind. He was
standing with folded arms, looking upon the scene in the manner of a
man debating with himself. Young, handsome, rich, but recently from
the patrician circles of Roman society, it is easy to think of the
world besetting him with appeals not to give more to onerous duty or
ambition attended with outlawry and danger. We can even imagine the
arguments with which he was pressed; the hopelessness of contention
with Caesar; the uncertainty veiling everything connected with the
King and his coming; the ease, honours, state, purchaseable like goods
in market; and strongest of all, the sense newly acquired of home,
with friends to make it delightful. Only those who have been wanderers
long desolate can know the power there was in the latter appeal.
Let us add, now, the world-always cunning enough of itself;
always whispering to the weak, Stay, take thine ease; always
presenting the sunny side of life-the world was in this instance
helped by Ben-Hur's companion.
"Were you ever at Rome?" he asked.
"No," Esther replied.
"Would you like to go?"
"I think not."
"Why?"
"I am afraid of Rome," she answered, with a perceptible tremor of
the voice.
He looked at her then-or rather down upon her, for at his side
she appeared little more than a child. In the dim light he could not
see her face distinctly; even the form was shadowy. But again he was
reminded of Tirzah, and a sudden tenderness fell upon him-just so the
lost sister stood with him on the house-top the calamitous morning
of the accident to Gratus. Poor Tirzah! Where was she now? Esther
had the benefit of the feeling evoked. If not his sister, he could
never look upon her as his servant; and that she was his servant in
fact would make him always the more considerate and gentle towards
her.
"I cannot think of Rome," she continued, recovering her voice, and
speaking in her quiet, womanly way-"I cannot think of Rome as a
city of palaces and temples, and crowded with people; she is to me a
monster which has possession of one of the beautiful lands, and lies
there luring men to ruin and death-a monster which it is not possible
to resist-a ravenous beast gorging with blood. Why-"
She faltered, looked down, stopped.
"Go on," said Ben-Hur, reassuringly.
She drew closer to him, looked up again, and said-"Why trust you
make her your enemy? Why not rather make peace with her, and be at
rest? You have had many ills, and borne them; you have survived the
snares laid for you by foes. Sorrow has consumed your youth; is it
well to give it the remainder of your days?"
The girlish face under his eyes seemed to come nearer and get whiter
as the pleading went on; he stooped towards it, and asked, softly,
"What would you have me do, Esther?"
She hesitated a moment, then asked, in return, "Is the property near
Rome a residence?"
"Yes."
"And pretty?"
"It is beautiful-a palace in the midst of gardens and
shell-strewn walks; fountains without and within; statuary in the
shady nooks; hills around covered with vines, and so high that
Neapolis and Vesuvius are in sight, and the sea an expanse of purpling
blue dotted with restless sails. Caesar has a country-seat near-by,
but in Rome they say the old Arrian villa is the prettiest."
"And the life there, is it quiet?"
"There was never a summer day, never a moonlit night, more quiet,
save when visitors come. Now that the old owner is gone, and I am
here, there is nothing to break its silence-nothing, unless it be the
whispering of servants, or the whistling of happy birds, or the
noise of fountains at play; it is changeless, except as day by day old
flowers fade and fall, and new ones bud and bloom, and the sunlight
gives place to the shadow of a passing cloud. The life, Esther, was
all too quiet for me. It made me restless by keeping always present
a feeling that I, who have so much to do, was dropping into idle
habits, and tying myself with silken chains, and after a while-and
not a long while either-would end with nothing done."
She looked off over the river.
"Why did you ask?" he said.
"Good, my master-"
"No, no, Esther-not that. Call me friend-brother, if you will; I
am not your master, and will not be. Call me brother."
He could not see the flush of pleasure which reddened her face,
and the glow of the eyes that went out lost in the void above the
river.
"I cannot understand," she said, "the nature which prefers the
life you are going to-a life of-"
"Of violence, and it may be of blood," he said, completing the
sentence.
"Yes," she added, "the nature which could prefer that life to such
as might be in the beautiful villa."
"Esther, you mistake. There is no preference. Alas! the Roman is not
so kind. I am going of necessity. To stay here is to die; and if I
go there, the end will be the same-a poisoned cup, a bravo's blow, or
a Judge's sentence obtained by perjury. Messala and the procurator
Gratus are rich with plunder of my father's estate, and it is more
important to them to keep their gains now than was their getting in
the first instance. A peaceable settlement is out of reach, because of
the confession it would imply. And then-then-Ah, Esther, if I
could buy them, I do not know that I would. I do not believe peace
possible to me; no, not even in the sleepy shade and sweet air of
the marble porches of the old villa-no matter who might be there to
help me bear the burden of the days nor by what patience of love she
made the effort. Peace is not possible to me while my people are lost,
for I must be watchful to find them. If I find them, and they have
suffered wrong, shall not the guilty suffer for it? If they are dead
by violence, shall the murderers escape? Oh, I could not sleep for
dreams! Nor could the holiest love, by any stratagem, lull me to a
rest which conscience would not strangle."
"Is it so bad then?" she asked, her voice tremulous with feeling.
"Can nothing, nothing be done?"
Ben-Hur took her hand.
"Do you care so much for me?"
"Yes," she answered, simply.
The hand was warm, and in the palm of his it was lost. He felt it
tremble. Then the Egyptian came, so the opposite of this little one;
so tall, so audacious, with a flattery so cunning, a wit so ready, a
beauty so wonderful, a manner so bewitching. He carried the hand to
his lips, and gave it back.
"You shall be another Tirzah to me, Esther."
"Who is Tirzah."
"The little sister the Roman stole from me, and whom I must find
before I can rest or be happy."
Just then a gleam of light flashed athwart the terrace and fell upon
the two; and, looking round, they saw a servant roll Simonides in
his chair out of the door. They went to the merchant, and in the
after-talk he was principal.
Immediately the lines of the galley were cast off, and she swung
round, and, midst the flashing of torches and the shouting of joyous
sailors, hurried off to the sea-leaving Ben-Hur committed to the
cause of the KING WHO WAS TO COME.