The Golden Hope: A Story of the Time of King Alexander the Great

Azemilcus drew the skirts of his robe around him and stepped carefully across the litter caused by the wreck of the table, with its linen cloth stained in the spilled wine that flowed from the shattered flagon. He walked quietly to the door and vanished between the crimson curtains, leaving the two dead men alone in the room.

CHAPTER XLIV

THE REVOLT OF THE ISRAELITES

While Azemilcus was dealing with his enemies in his own way, the wretched chancellor, shaking in every limb, conducted the Macedonians back through the secret passage by which he had brought them to the presence of the king. Descending the winding stairs, they reached the street level, where the old man opened a hidden door that led into a narrow subterranean gallery. They followed this for what seemed to them a long distance in a stagnant atmosphere, heavy with dampness. It brought them at last to a slab of stone, from which hung a ring of iron.

Chares was forced to exert all his strength to turn this stone upon its pivot. They emerged from the passage into a small room with walls of rough masonry and a door that was closed by a black curtain. At the request of the chancellor, the lamp was extinguished.

"Where are we?" Leonidas demanded.

"In the Temple of Baal," the old man whispered. "This room is little used by the priests. They live on the other side."

The Spartan raised the curtain and looked into the gloomy interior of the temple. It was deserted and silent.

"What shall we do with this man?" he asked, turning to his companions, and indicating the chancellor.

"We have no further use for him," Chares replied, placing his hand suggestively upon his sword-hilt.

"Spare me!" the chancellor cried, falling upon his knees. "I will tell where the rubies are, and a great store of jewels besides. They are under the image of Baal. Do not take my life!"

"He might betray us if we let him go," Leonidas said, paying no attention to his supplications.

"I swear to you on the head of Baal that I will not," the old man cried piteously.

"If he should betray us," Clearchus observed, "his own life would be forfeit, because we should reveal the part he had in bringing us into the city."

"Very well; you have most at stake," the Spartan said. "Let him go."

The chancellor did not wait for further permission. He disappeared into the passage like an old gray rat escaped from a trap.

"I am half sorry we spared him after all," Leonidas said regretfully. "Let us see where we are."

They passed through the curtained door and into the temple. Twilight reigned beneath the lofty dome where the bats were still flitting. This semi-darkness was artfully preserved so that the fire, which was the essential feature of the worship of Baal-Moloch, might be visible and effective during the sacrifices.

The Greeks found themselves in a vast hall of oblong shape. They were standing upon a platform of stone, raised for the height of a man above the main floor, to which a flight of broad and shallow steps descended. A huge dark mass stood before them exactly under the dome, the sides of which were pierced by narrow slits that admitted the light of day. This mass was the misshapen idol of Baal. The God was represented by a hollow statue of iron and bronze, sitting upon a throne. Its long arms terminated in hands that rested with palms upturned beside its knees. Its enormous head was inclined slightly forward, and the expression upon its face was so cruel and malignant that Clearchus felt his blood chilled as he gazed upon it and thought of the hecatombs of innocent victims whose lives had been sacrificed to its ferocity.

There were larger and more splendid images of Baal in other Phœnician cities, but none that was so venerated. It had been brought from the Temple of Baal-Moloch in the Old City on the mainland, where for centuries it had been the guardian of the place, receiving its sacrifices each year. In the old days even the first-born of the royal blood had been lifted in those blackened arms and rolled upon the iron knees to be roasted alive. The terrible face leaned above with distended nostrils, as though to inhale the odor of burning flesh, and thousands of mothers had watched its dreadful smile through the smoke with songs of praise on their lips and death in their hearts, while their babies writhed in agony in the pitiless embrace. Baal would accept no unwilling sacrifice, and the mother whose child was torn from her breast to be given to the God, not only lost her infant but was disgraced forever if she showed emotion while the rite was being performed.

In spite of themselves, the Macedonians were oppressed by a kind of superstitious dread as they looked at the grim visage that seemed to sneer down upon them.

The great portals of the temple, at the other end of the hall, were closed. On either side were rows of dark columns upholding the roof, which was painted to represent the heavens. Dim shapes of monsters, half beast and half human, appeared upon the walls.

The Greeks made a circuit of the temple but found no means of egress. There were several anterooms similar to the one to which the subterranean passage had led them. These contained vestments, the implements used in the ceremonials, and a store of scented wood, dry as tinder, that furnished fuel for the sacrifices. In one of the rooms was a door which Joel believed connected with the building in which the priests were housed. The walls around the platform were draped with heavy hangings of black that formed a background for the image.

"Let us take counsel," Nathan said, casting a look of hatred at the idol. "Jehovah will not permit this monster to triumph over Him."

They withdrew into their recess to consider a plan of action.

"One thing is certain," Leonidas said. "Alone we can never prevent the sacrifice."

"My people will help us," Nathan said. "They will not give up their first-born without fighting."

"How many are they?" Clearchus asked.

"There are ten thousand of them in the city," Joel replied; "but they are not armed, excepting those who have been drafted to the defence of the walls."

"I have more faith in Alexander than I have in your people," Chares said bluntly. "He will be in the city before this day ends, unless the Gods have misled old Aristander."

"But will he come in time?" Leonidas asked. "Let Nathan and Joel go to the Israelites and rouse them to resist. Tell them that Alexander is coming and that he will protect them. We three will stay here and await the result."

To this the others gave their assent. It seemed a desperate chance, but it was all they had. There was a small window in the antechamber, high up in the wall. Nathan climbed up to it on the shoulders of the Greeks and looked through.

"There is nothing on this side but the cypress garden," he said. "Farewell; you may be sure that we shall return, though we come alone."

He slipped through the window and dropped upon the turf outside. Joel followed him. The three Greeks, left alone in the temple, looked into each other's faces and Clearchus grasped his companions by the hand.

"You have placed your lives in peril for me," he said with emotion. "Zeus grant that they be not demanded of you!"

"Pshaw!" Chares exclaimed, "are not our lives always in peril? If we must die, we shall die; and we are not permitted to choose where or how. When the Ferryman calls, we must go. For my part, if thou wouldst repay me, let me sleep, for my head is nodding."

Clearchus smiled, understanding his friend's aversion to any display of feeling. He embraced the Theban, who calmly lay down upon the stone floor; his eyes closed, and he began to snore gently.

Leonidas, whose tough frame defied fatigue, and Clearchus, whose mind was in a torment of doubt and suspense, stationed themselves behind the curtain that hid the door and waited, talking in whispers. They could hear the patter of raindrops and by the rising wind outside they knew that a storm was breaking over the city. Its breath entered through the slits in the dome, causing the dark hangings to sway against the wall. The gloomy temple seemed to be filled with mysterious murmurings. Some drops fell upon the image of Baal and ran glistening down the bronze head and broad, sleek shoulders.

Nathan and Joel made their way through the cypress thickets and scaled the wall of the temple garden. They found themselves in a narrow street which led them to a broader thoroughfare, where men were hurrying to and fro in the rain. Soldiers of the garrison, weary and hollow-eyed, were going to the defences. Citizens whose uneasy rest had been cut short by the tension of dread were early abroad in search of news.

"What of the enemy?" one of them asked of a soldier who was returning from the walls.

"They are coming out to attack," the soldier replied. "Their ships have already left the shore, and the stones will soon be falling about your ears."

"How much longer?" the citizen asked, with a groan.

"Ask that of the Gods," the soldier replied indifferently; "but I think the end will be soon, unless Moloch relents."

Joel and Nathan passed on, their appearance attracting no attention in a city where there were so many of their race.

"Hasten!" Nathan said. "Alexander is coming!"

As they advanced toward the quarter occupied by the Israelites, the streets became filled with people, nearly all of whom seemed to be drawn in the same direction that they themselves were taking. They fell in with a man who strode on with knitted brows and lips compressed. By his appearance he was a Hebrew, and Nathan addressed him in the Hebrew tongue.

"Whither goest thou?" he asked.

"To save the innocent from slaughter," the man replied fiercely. "Come with me if ye are men!"

"We will come with thee," Nathan said.

"There are the priests!" Joel exclaimed.

Half a dozen of the ministers of Baal, surrounded by a guard of soldiers, came down a cross street. They carried in their hands small bundles of short cords with which to bind the limbs of their victims. The crowd gave way before them, gazing at their black robes and stern, fanatical faces with curiosity mingled with dread.

"May the curse of the Most High rest upon them!" the stranger cried, shaking his fist.

He began to run in the direction of the open square used by the Israelites as a market-place. Nathan and Joel raced after him. The clamor of voices raised in bitter lamentation reached them. They found the square choked with a surging mass of men and women who clasped little children to their breasts, seeking to protect them. The rain beat in their faces and the gusty wind tossed their garments. Some called upon their God, raising their hands toward heaven. Others shrieked the names of their offspring who had already been torn from them. Every house in the quarter was filled with weeping and cries of despair. The priests of Baal went hither and thither, seizing their prey in the name of the law wherever they found it.

Nathan and Joel halted at the edge of the square. The priests were searching through the crowd, many of them concealing a tiny burden beneath their robes of office. Feeble wailings betrayed the nature of these bundles. They were the children of the Israelites, bound hand and foot for the sacrifice.

While the young men stood looking, one of the priests discovered a woman who crouched upon the ground with her face hidden in her dishevelled hair. He grasped her roughly by the shoulder and drew her back, disclosing the fact that she had been shielding her baby beneath her bosom. The child raised its dimpled hands and tried to touch its mother's wet cheeks. The priest seized them and tore the infant from her. She clutched the skirt of his robe and followed him on her knees through the mire, begging piteously for the child.

"You have so many already," she said, "and he is all I have! Surely Baal does not require my little one. He will be appeased. Give him back to me!"

The priest turned and struck her upturned face with his clenched hand. She uttered a cry of anguish and released his robe, falling back senseless to the earth.

An inarticulate sound burst from the lips of the man who had guided Nathan and Joel to the market-place.

"O Lord, my God!" he shouted, raising his hands to the leaden sky. "I had two children to be the staff and prop of my old age. Wilt Thou suffer them to be taken from me? We have remained faithful to Thee; is this to be our reward?"

Nathan was about to spring upon the guard that surrounded the priests before him when the tall figure of an old man strode into the square. His gaunt frame was clad in sackcloth, and his long white hair and beard were blown in the wind. He walked erect, without the aid of the staff which he carried in his hand. There was an air of authority and even of majesty in his bearing. The men and women nearest to him fell upon their knees and stretched their hands toward him in supplication. He did not glance at them and he seemed not to hear their prayers. His stern eyes swept the market-place and he spoke in a resonant voice that rose above the tumult and caused it to die away.

"Why do ye lament, men of Israel?" he cried. "Cease now your weeping and rejoice. For Tyre is fallen! Her hour is come!"

"It is Pethuel, chief priest of the synagogue," Joel whispered to Nathan, who was watching the old man with glowing eyes.

"Hearken unto me, O ye of little faith!" Pethuel continued, and the silence spread until his words could be heard throughout the square. "The worshipper of idols is cast down. The day of clouds and thick darkness is at hand. Lo! they waxed a strong and a mighty people. The cities of the world feared them, and their ships followed the trackless wastes of the sea. There was none like to them in their greatness.

"Unto some they said, 'Go!' and unto others they said, 'Come!' Verily, their strength was like that of the lion, and they rejoiced in their vessels of gold and silver. It seemed to them that there would be no ending.

"And lo! the end is upon them. They are cast down; their walls are overthrown, and their city is become a place of desolation. Thus saith the Lord God unto me, His servant, that I may tell it to my people and bid them rejoice!

"He has delivered them out of the hands of their enemies as a bird from the net of the fowler. I said unto the Lord, 'Behold, the city of abominations hath laid her hand upon Thy servants! In the olden time, did she spoil Israel and Juda and the pleasant valleys, wasting them with fire and sword. Then did Thy vengeance fall upon her, until of her strong walls not one stone remained upon another. But now she presseth sore upon Thy people; wherefore help us, O Lord!'

"Hear ye, men of Israel! Out of the darkness came a Voice like the rushing of a mighty wind and the sound of many waters, and it filled mine ears, saying: 'I am the Lord God of Hosts. Inasmuch as ye have been faithful unto Me and have bowed not before the work of man's hands, therefore will I hearken unto you. She has sown the wind, and she shall reap the whirlwind. Her fortresses and her strong places shall be spoiled. The weak shall perish with the strong, and the mighty shall not deliver himself. I will give her daughters to ruin and her children shall be wanderers among the nations. This will I do for My people, that they be not put to scorn. Say to them: "Take each man his sword and let him slay; for who shall withstand the wrath of the Most High?"'"

To Nathan it seemed that the veil that separates the seen from the unseen had been rent away. The voice that rang in his ears was no longer the voice of Pethuel, but that of his Maker. He felt himself lifted up beyond the region of doubt, and a great gladness filled his heart.

Pethuel paused before him and looked at him with a gaze that pierced him through like fire. The old man raised his staff and touched him on the shoulder. It seemed to Nathan an act of consecration.

"Lead thou them!" Pethuel cried in a loud voice. "It is the command of the Lord, thy God."

A compelling Power, greater than himself, seized upon the young Israelite. He no longer had any volition of his own. He became an instrument.

"Follow me, men of Israel!" he shouted, drawing his sword. "Jehovah gives the heathen into our hands!"

The hush was broken, and a great cry went up from the densely packed market-place. With one impulse, the crowd fell upon the soldiers and priests who still remained in the square, the greater part having already retreated toward the Temple of Baal-Moloch. The Phœnicians, greatly outnumbered, were able to make but a brief resistance. Nathan sprang forward and cut down the nearest soldier. In the rush that followed him, the guard was swept away, scattered, and destroyed singly. A score of children were rescued. The priests were trampled to the earth and torn limb from limb. The square resounded with savage cries. The Israelites had been roused to frenzy. The word of God was upon them.

"To the temple!" Nathan shouted. The cry ran through the mob which surged into the narrow streets leading to the shrine of Baal-Moloch, bearing down all before it. The frightened priests heard it coming and sent messengers to the walls, demanding succor. Azemilcus ordered soldiers to be detached to quell the disturbance, and the defence of the city was still further weakened.

The fighting in the streets became desperate. The Israelites scattered and, by circuitous routes, pressed toward the temple. They mounted to the roofs, hurling all kinds of missiles from a great height upon the heads of the guards. The rain fell in blinding sheets. It seemed to the Tyrians that the entire Hebrew population of the city had suddenly gone mad. Ties of association were forgotten, and men who had been friends for years struggled for each other's lives.

The tumult spread in every direction. The soldiers were forced to fall back and form a ring of defence around the temple. Even then, they had much ado to hold the crowd at bay, for the Israelites charged against them without ceasing, recklessly throwing away their lives upon the hedge of steel.

Great stones dropped from the sky continually. Friend and foe were crushed beneath them. When they struck the walls of the houses, they left gaping fissures through which the interior could be seen. They came from the engines upon the Macedonian ships that were renewing the attack upon the city.

CHAPTER XLV

MOLOCH CLAIMS HIS SACRIFICE

Artemisia and Thais looked from their window at the scud of flying clouds and beneath them the Macedonian fleet assembling south of the city. Thais' eyes danced with excitement, and Artemisia's cheeks were flushed.

"This time we shall win!" Thais exclaimed, throwing her arms about her companion. "You are beautiful this morning, Artemisia; Clearchus will be pleased with you."

The color in Artemisia's cheeks deepened and a happy smile parted her lips.

"I shall make him leave the army," she said. "Of course I am proud of his bravery; but, after all, there are better things than to be always killing other men."

She raised her chin with a charming affectation of pride. "He is an Athenian, you know," she added.

Thais frowned. She found in Artemisia's words an implied reflection upon Chares.

"Don't be silly," she replied. "Do you want to make him one of those curled idiots who spend their time in company with philosophers, chasing shadows or trying to find out why crabs walk sidewise? You would wake up some day and find that one of them had proved to him that there is no such thing as love. Or perhaps you would rather have him a dandy, with race-horses and a score of dancing girls to amuse himself with! Let him be a man, Artemisia; let him love you and fight his enemies with all his heart. For my part, if Chares talks of deserting Alexander, he may look elsewhere for some one to love him; for I shall not."

Artemisia listened to this outburst; but she shook her head, and a soft light shone in her eyes.

"You want power and splendor," she said "but I would rather be alone with Clearchus in a desert than sit beside him upon the throne of Darius. I will have no rival in his heart."

"And with half a dozen children around you," Thais said scornfully. "You might as well complete the picture."

"Yes," Artemisia answered bravely, though she blushed as she said it, "if the Gods permit it; and if the first is a boy, he shall be named Chares."

Thais turned swiftly and kissed her, all her anger gone in a moment.

"There, sister, I did not mean it," she said. "May the Gods give us both our hearts' desire!"

She clapped her hands, and the tiring women who had been awaiting the summons entered.

"Give me my saffron chiton," she cried, "and my topaz necklace. We shall have visitors to-day, girls."

She seated herself before a large mirror while the women dressed her hair and robed her as she had directed. They could not hide their admiration when their task was finished and she stood before them like a living image of gold.

But Artemisia chose a linen robe of pure white, unrelieved by color. The spotless purity of her dress set off the delicate flush upon her cheeks and the soft brown of her hair.

So eager were the young women that they were scarcely able to taste the fruit and cakes that the servants set before them. They kept jumping up and running to the window to see what progress the Macedonian fleet was making, and whether the attack had begun.

"What a storm!" Artemisia exclaimed. "I wish it would stop; it hides the ships."

"Zeus is fighting on our side to-day," Thais replied gayly, as a long growl of thunder shook the walls of the house. "Tell me, what is going on in the city?" she added, turning to a Cretan maiden among the women. The girl was beautiful in face and figure, although her expression was one of sadness. She had once ruled as favorite of Phradates, and it was whispered in the household that she still loved him, in spite of the fact that she had had a score of successors since her brief day of ascendency.

"They are preparing a sacrifice to Baal-Moloch," she replied, "in the hope of persuading him to aid them."

"What is this sacrifice? I have never seen one," Thais asked.

"I do not know," the girl said. "There has been none since I came to Tyre."

"I know, mistress," another of the women volunteered. She was a Syrian, with a supple figure and bright black eyes, who had been a slave from her infancy.

"Describe it, then," Thais said.

"Baal-Moloch is the most powerful God in the world," the woman said volubly. "His image is made of iron, and is terrible to look upon." She shivered as she spoke. "I never saw it but once, and that was when the Babylonian king threatened to make war upon us. We offered sacrifice to prevent it, and Moloch would not permit him to come. The priests went about the city and took the children – even the little babies – and carried them away to the temple. When the doors were opened, we could see Baal sitting there in the darkness. There was a fire inside of him, and his eyes glowed at us. He reached his hands down, and the priests gave him the children, one by one, and he lifted them up and devoured them. It was awful to think of those little children!"

Artemisia listened with an expression of horror on her face.

"I do not see where they are going to get the children now," Thais remarked. "They have all been sent away."

"They are taking the children of the Israelites who remained here," the Syrian explained, "and they say – at least, Mena says – they are going to sacrifice a virgin, too. Ugh! I don't want to see it."

"Little good will it do them!" Thais exclaimed. "Not even Baal can save their city now."

"Hush!" the Syrian said, affrighted. "He is a great God."

Sounds of commotion and of hurried footsteps in the lower halls of the house interrupted them. Thais listened.

"Go and see what it is," she commanded.

The Syrian went, and in a moment came flying back into the room with terror on her face.

"Oh, my mistress!" she cried. "Why did you speak so of Moloch? His priests are in the house! Save us!"

"Silence!" Thais exclaimed, rising to her feet. "You shall not be harmed."

She raised her head proudly and faced the doorway, while the slave women huddled behind her with frightened eyes. Artemisia stood beside her, trying to emulate her courage; but a strange sinking laid hold upon her heart, and a mist swam before her eyes.