Ben Hur (25 page)

Judah strove to be composed, yet his heart beat quicker.

"The prince was a merchant, with a genius for business. He set
on foot many enterprises, some reaching far East, others West.
In the great cities he had branch houses. The one in Antioch
was in charge of a man said by some to have been a family servant
called Simonides, Greek in name, yet an Israelite. The master was
drowned at sea. His business, however, went on, and was scarcely
less prosperous. After a while misfortune overtook the family.
The prince's only son, nearly grown, tried to kill the procurator
Gratus in one of the streets of Jerusalem. He failed by a narrow
chance, and has not since been heard of. In fact, the Roman's rage
took in the whole house—not one of the name was left alive. Their
palace was sealed up, and is now a rookery for pigeons; the estate
was confiscated; everything that could be traced to the ownership
of the Hurs was confiscated. The procurator cured his hurt with a
golden salve."

The passengers laughed.

"You mean he kept the property," said one of them.

"They say so," the Hebrew replied; "I am only telling a story
as I received it. And, to go on, Simonides, who had been the
prince's agent here in Antioch, opened trade in a short time on
his own account, and in a space incredibly brief became the master
merchant of the city. In imitation of his master, he sent caravans
to India; and on the sea at present he has galleys enough to make
a royal fleet. They say nothing goes amiss with him. His camels do
not die, except of old age; his ships never founder; if he throw a
chip into the river, it will come back to him gold."

"How long has he been going on thus?"

"Not ten years."

"He must have had a good start."

"Yes, they say the procurator took only the prince's property ready
at hand—his horses, cattle, houses, land, vessels, goods. The money
could not be found, though there must have been vast sums of it.
What became of it has been an unsolved mystery."

"Not to me," said a passenger, with a sneer.

"I understand you," the Hebrew answered. "Others have had your
idea. That it furnished old Simonides his start is a common belief.
The procurator is of that opinion—or he has been—for twice in
five years he has caught the merchant, and put him to torture."

Judah griped the rope he was holding with crushing force.

"It is said," the narrator continued, "that there is not a sound
bone in the man's body. The last time I saw him he sat in a chair,
a shapeless cripple, propped against cushions."

"So tortured!" exclaimed several listeners in a breath.

"Disease could not have produced such a deformity. Still the
suffering made no impression upon him. All he had was his lawfully,
and he was making lawful use of it—that was the most they wrung
from him. Now, however, he is past persecution. He has a license
to trade signed by Tiberius himself."

"He paid roundly for it, I warrant."

"These ships are his," the Hebrew continued, passing the remark.
"It is a custom among his sailors to salute each other upon meeting
by throwing out yellow flags, sight of which is as much as to say,
'We have had a fortunate voyage.'"

The story ended there.

When the transport was fairly in the channel of the river, Judah
spoke to the Hebrew.

"What was the name of the merchant's master?"

"Ben-Hur, Prince of Jerusalem."

"What became of the prince's family?"

"The boy was sent to the galleys. I may say he is dead. One year
is the ordinary limit of life under that sentence. The widow and
daughter have not been heard of; those who know what became of
them will not speak. They died doubtless in the cells of one of
the castles which spot the waysides of Judea."

Judah walked to the pilot's quarter. So absorbed was he in thought
that he scarcely noticed the shores of the river, which from sea
to city were surpassingly beautiful with orchards of all the
Syrian fruits and vines, clustered about villas rich as those
of Neapolis. No more did he observe the vessels passing in an
endless fleet, nor hear the singing and shouting of the sailors,
some in labor, some in merriment. The sky was full of sunlight,
lying in hazy warmth upon the land and the water; nowhere except
over his life was there a shadow.

Once only he awoke to a momentary interest, and that was when some
one pointed out the Grove of Daphne, discernible from a bend in
the river.

When the city came into view, the passengers were on deck, eager that
nothing of the scene might escape them. The respectable Jew already
introduced to the reader was the principal spokesman.

"The river here runs to the west," he said, in the way of general
answer. "I remember when it washed the base of the walls; but as
Roman subjects we have lived in peace, and, as always happens
in such times, trade has had its will; now the whole river front
is taken up with wharves and docks. Yonder"—the speaker pointed
southward—"is Mount Casius, or, as these people love to call it,
the Mountains of Orontes, looking across to its brother Amnus in
the north; and between them lies the Plain of Antioch. Farther on
are the Black Mountains, whence the Ducts of the Kings bring the
purest water to wash the thirsty streets and people; yet they are
forests in wilderness state, dense, and full of birds and beasts."

"Where is the lake?" one asked.

"Over north there. You can take horse, if you wish to see it—or,
better, a boat, for a tributary connects it with the river."

"The Grove of Daphne!" he said, to a third inquirer. "Nobody can
describe it; only beware! It was begun by Apollo, and completed
by him. He prefers it to Olympus. People go there for one look—
just one—and never come away. They have a saying which tells it
all—'Better be a worm and feed on the mulberries of Daphne than
a king's guest.'"

"Then you advise me to stay away from it?"

"Not I! Go you will. Everybody goes, cynic philosopher, virile boy,
women, and priests—all go. So sure am I of what you will do that I
assume to advise you. Do not take quarters in the city— that will
be loss of time; but go at once to the village in the edge of the
grove. The way is through a garden, under the spray of fountains.
The lovers of the god and his Penaean maid built the town; and in
its porticos and paths and thousand retreats you will find characters
and habits and sweets and kinds elsewhere impossible. But the wall
of the city! there it is, the masterpiece of Xeraeus, the master
of mural architecture."

All eyes followed his pointing finger.

"This part was raised by order of the first of the Seleucidae.
Three hundred years have made it part of the rock it rests upon."

The defense justified the encomium. High, solid, and with many
bold angles, it curved southwardly out of view.

"On the top there are four hundred towers, each a reservoir of
water," the Hebrew continued. "Look now! Over the wall, tall as
it is, see in the distance two hills, which you may know as the
rival crests of Sulpius. The structure on the farthest one is
the citadel, garrisoned all the year round by a Roman legion.
Opposite it this way rises the Temple of Jupiter, and under that
the front of the legate's residence—a palace full of offices,
and yet a fortress against which a mob would dash harmlessly as
a south wind."

At this point the sailors began taking in sail, whereupon the
Hebrew exclaimed, heartily, "See! you who hate the sea, and you
who have vows, get ready your curses and your prayers. The bridge
yonder, over which the road to Seleucia is carried, marks the
limit of navigation. What the ship unloads for further transit,
the camel takes up there. Above the bridge begins the island upon
which Calinicus built his new city, connecting it with five great
viaducts so solid time has made no impression upon them, nor floods
nor earthquakes. Of the main town, my friends, I have only to say you
will be happier all your lives for having seen it."

As he concluded, the ship turned and made slowly for her wharf under
the wall, bringing even more fairly to view the life with which the
river at that point was possessed. Finally, the lines were thrown,
the oars shipped, and the voyage was done. Then Ben-Hur sought the
respectable Hebrew.

"Let me trouble you a moment before saying farewell."

The man bowed assent.

"Your story of the merchant has made me curious to see him.
You called him Simonides?"

"Yes. He is a Jew with a Greek name."

"Where is he to be found?"

The acquaintance gave a sharp look before he answered,

"I may save you mortification. He is not a money-lender."

"Nor am I a money-borrower," said Ben-Hur, smiling at the other's
shrewdness.

The man raised his head and considered an instant.

"One would think," he then replied, "that the richest merchant
in Antioch would have a house for business corresponding to his
wealth; but if you would find him in the day, follow the river to
yon bridge, under which he quarters in a building that looks like a
buttress of the wall. Before the door there is an immense landing,
always covered with cargoes come and to go. The fleet that lies
moored there is his. You cannot fail to find him."

"I give you thanks."

"The peace of our fathers go with you."

"And with you."

With that they separated.

Two street-porters, loaded with his baggage, received Ben-Hur's
orders upon the wharf.

"To the citadel," he said; a direction which implied an official
military connection.

Two great streets, cutting each other at right angles, divided the
city into quarters. A curious and immense structure, called the
Nymphaeum, arose at the foot of the one running north and south.
When the porters turned south there, the new-comer, though fresh
from Rome, was amazed at the magnificence of the avenue. On the
right and left there were palaces, and between them extended
indefinitely double colonnades of marble, leaving separate
ways for footmen, beasts, and chariots; the whole under shade,
and cooled by fountains of incessant flow.

Ben-Hur was not in mood to enjoy the spectacle. The story of
Simonides haunted him. Arrived at the Omphalus—a monument of
four arches wide as the streets, superbly illustrated, and erected
to himself by Epiphanes, the eighth of the Seleucidae—he suddenly
changed his mind.

"I will not go to the citadel to-night," he said to the porters.
"Take me to the khan nearest the bridge on the road to Seleucia."

The party faced about, and in good time he was deposited in a public
house of primitive but ample construction, within stone's-throw of
the bridge under which old Simonides had his quarters. He lay upon
the house-top through the night. In his inner mind lived the thought,
"Now—now I will hear of home—and mother—and the dear little Tirzah.
If they are on earth, I will find them."

Next day early, to the neglect of the city, Ben-Hur sought the
house of Simonides. Through an embattled gateway he passed to a
continuity of wharves; thence up the river midst a busy press,
to the Seleucian Bridge, under which he paused to take in the
scene.

There, directly under the bridge, was the merchant's house, a mass
of gray stone, unhewn, referable to no style, looking, as the
voyager had described it, like a buttress of the wall against
which it leaned. Two immense doors in front communicated with
the wharf. Some holes near the top, heavily barred, served as
windows. Weeds waved from the crevices, and in places black moss
splotched the otherwise bald stones.

The doors were open. Through one of them business went in;
through the other it came out; and there was hurry, hurry in
all its movements.

On the wharf there were piles of goods in every kind of package,
and groups of slaves, stripped to the waist, going about in the
abandon of labor.

Below the bridge lay a fleet of galleys, some loading, others
unloading. A yellow flag blew out from each masthead. From fleet
and wharf, and from ship to ship, the bondmen of traffic passed
in clamorous counter-currents.

Above the bridge, across the river, a wall rose from the water's
edge, over which towered the fanciful cornices and turrets of an
imperial palace, covering every foot of the island spoken of in the
Hebrew's description. But, with all its suggestions, Ben-Hur scarcely
noticed it. Now, at last, he thought to hear of his people—this,
certainly, if Simonides had indeed been his father's slave. But
would the man acknowledge the relation? That would be to give up
his riches and the sovereignty of trade so royally witnessed on
the wharf and river. And what was of still greater consequence
to the merchant, it would be to forego his career in the midst
of amazing success, and yield himself voluntarily once more a
slave. Simple thought of the demand seemed a monstrous audacity.
Stripped of diplomatic address, it was to say, You are my slave;
give me all you have, and—yourself.

Yet Ben-Hur derived strength for the interview from faith in his
rights and the hope uppermost in his heart. If the story to which he
was yielding were true, Simonides belonged to him, with all he had.
For the wealth, be it said in justice, he cared nothing. When he
started to the door determined in mind, it was with a promise to
himself—"Let him tell me of mother and Tirzah, and I will give
him his freedom without account."

He passed boldly into the house.

The interior was that of a vast depot where, in ordered spaces,
and under careful arrangement, goods of every kind were heaped and
pent. Though the light was murky and the air stifling, men moved
about briskly; and in places he saw workmen with saws and hammers
making packages for shipments. Down a path between the piles he
walked slowly, wondering if the man of whose genius there were
here such abounding proofs could have been his father's slave?
If so, to what class had he belonged? If a Jew, was he the son
of a servant? Or was he a debtor or a debtor's son? Or had he
been sentenced and sold for theft? These thoughts, as they passed,
in nowise disturbed the growing respect for the merchant of which
he was each instant more and more conscious. A peculiarity of our
admiration for another is that it is always looking for circumstances
to justify itself.