A Struggle For Rome Volume Ii Part 2

"Dismount!" he ordered, "every man of you!"

But the Huns did not like to part with their horses.

"What, sir? Dismount?" asked one of the nearest.

Johannes struck him in the face. The man did not move.

"Dismount!" thundered Johannes again. "Would you go into that mouse-hole on horseback!" and he flung himself out of the saddle. "Six climb the trees and shoot from above. Six lie down and creep forward on each side of this road, shooting as they lie. Ten shoot standing; breast high. Ten guard the horses. You others follow me with the spear as soon as the strings tw.a.n.g. Forwards!"

He handed his torch to one of the men and took a lance.

While the Huns were carrying out his orders, Johannes again examined the pa.s.s as well as he could.

"Yield!" he cried.

"Come on!" shouted the Goths.

Johannes gave a sign and twenty arrows whistled at once.

A cry, and the foremost Goth on the right fell. He had been struck in the forehead by one of the men on the trees. Valerius, under shelter of his s.h.i.+eld, sprang into his place. He came just at the right moment to repulse the furious attack of Johannes, who ran at the gap with his lance in rest. Valerius received the thrust on his s.h.i.+eld, and struck at the Byzantine, who stumbled and fell, close to the entrance. The Huns behind him fell back.

The Goth who stood at Valerius's side could not resist the temptation to render the leader harmless. He sprang a step forward out of the pa.s.s with up-lifted spear. But this was just what Johannes wanted. Up he started with lightning swiftness, thrust the surprised Goth over the low wall of the road on the right of the pa.s.s, and the next moment he stood on the exposed side of Valerius--who was defending himself against the renewed attack of the Huns--and stabbed him with all his might in the groin with his long Persian knife.

Valerius fell; but the three Goths who stood behind him succeeded in pus.h.i.+ng Johannes--who had already pressed forward into the middle of the pa.s.s--back and out with the beaks of their s.h.i.+elds.

Johannes retired to his men, in order to command a new salvo of arrows.

Two of the Goths silently placed themselves in the entrance of the pa.s.s; the third held the bleeding Valerius in his arms.

Just then the guard at the rear of the pa.s.s rushed in: "The s.h.i.+p, sir!

the s.h.i.+p! They have landed! they take us in the rear! Fly! we will carry you--a hiding-place in the rocks----"

"No," said Valerius, raising himself, "I will die here; rest my sword against the wall and----"

But a loud flourish of Gothic horns was heard in the rear. Torches shone, and a troop of thirty Goths hurried into the pa.s.s, Totila at their head. His first glance fell upon Valerius.

"Too late! too late!" he cried in deep grief. "Revenge! Follow me!

Forwards!" And he rushed furiously through the pa.s.s, followed by his spear-bearing foot-soldiers.

Fearful was the shock of meeting upon the narrow road between sea and rocks. The torches were extinguished in the skirmish; and the dawning day gave but a faint grey light.

The Huns, although superior in numbers to their bold adversaries, were completely taken by surprise. They thought that a whole army of Goths was on the march. They hastened to join their horses and fly. But the Goths reached the place where the animals stood at the same moment as their owners, and, in confused heaps, men and horses were driven off the road into the sea. In vain Johannes himself struck at his flying people; their rush threw him to the ground; he sprang up immediately and attacked the nearest Goth. But he had fallen into bad hands. It was Totila; he recognised him.

"Cursed Flax-head!" he cried, "so you are not drowned?"

"No, as you see!" cried Totila, and struck a blow at the other's helm, which cleft it through and entered slightly into his skull, so that he staggered and fell.

With this all resistance was at an end. The nearest of the hors.e.m.e.n just managed to lift Johannes into a saddle, and galloped off with him.

The scene of action was deserted.

Totila hurried back to the pa.s.s. He found Valerius, pale, with closed eyes, his head resting on his s.h.i.+eld. He threw himself on his knees beside him, and pressed his stiffening hand to his heart.

"Valerius!" he cried, "father! do not, do not leave me so. Speak to me once more!"

The dying man faintly opened his eyes.

"Where are they?" he asked.

"Beaten and fled!"

"Ah! victory!" cried Valerius, breathing anew. "I die happy! And Valeria--my child--is she saved?"

"She is. Escaped from the naval combat, and from the sea itself, I hastened to warn Neapolis and save you. I had landed near the high-road between your house and Neapolis; there I met Valeria and learned your danger. One of my boats received her and her companions on board to take them to Neapolis; with the other I came here to save you--oh! only to revenge you!" and he laid his head upon the breast of the dying man.

"Do not weep for me; I die victorious! And to you, my son, I owe it."

He stroked the long fair locks of the sorrowing youth.

"And Valeria's safety too! Oh! to you also, I hope, I shall owe the salvation of Italy. You are hero enough to save this country--in spite of Belisarius and Na.r.s.es! You can--and you will--and your reward is the hand of my beloved child."

"Valerius! my father!"

"She is yours! But swear to me"--and Valerius raised himself with an effort and looked into Totila's eyes--"swear to me by the genius of Valeria that she shall not become your wife until Italy is free, and not a sod of her sacred soil is pressed by the foot of a Byzantine."

"I swear it," cried Totila, enthusiastically pressing Valerius's hand, "by the genius of Valeria I swear it!"

"Thanks, thanks, my son. Now I can die in peace--greet Valeria--in your hand is her fate--and that of Italia!"

He laid his head back upon his s.h.i.+eld, crossed his arms over his breast, and expired.

Totila silently laid his hand upon the dead man's heart, and remained in this position for some time.

A dazzling light suddenly roused him from his sad reverie; it was the sun, whose golden disk rose gloriously over the summit of the rocks.

Totila stood up, and looked at the rising luminary. The sea glittered in the bright rays, and a golden light spread over the land.

"By the genius of Valeria!" repeated Totila in a low voice, and stretched out his hand towards the glorious sun.

Like the dead man he felt strengthened and comforted by his weighty oath; the sense of having a n.o.ble duty to perform elevated his feelings. He turned back, and ordered that the corpse should be carried to his s.h.i.+p, that it might be taken and deposited in the tomb of the Valerians at Neapolis.

CHAPTER XI.

During these portentous events the Goths had been by no means idle. But all measures of vigorous defence were paralysed, and, indeed, intentionally frustrated, by the cowardly treachery of the King.

Theodahad had soon recovered from his consternation at the declaration of war on the part of Petros, for he could not and would not part with the conviction that it had only been made in order to keep up appearances and save the honour of the imperial government.