Arethusa Part 15

Gorlias looked at her veiled face long.

'Who are you?' he asked at length. 'Who taught you these things?' He glanced suspiciously at Omobono, who, as he had reason to believe, was acquainted with the secret.

Zoe shook her head.

'No,' she answered. 'One greater than he taught me what I know. You may go now, for your message is delivered. What I can do, I will do, and there is no more to say, for it is my own cause as well as his--the cause of justice, and G.o.d is with it.'

Gorlias spoke aloud again, and brought his explanation of the horoscope to a conclusion by informing Zoe that if she wished to know the smaller details of her wonderful future, she must consult him at intervals, as the phases of the moon had a great influence on her fate.

'When the Kokona wishes to see me,' he said, rising, 'Messer Omobono will send for me, and I will come.'

Before Zoe realised that he had not picked up the string of pearls, he had made his obeisance and was at the door with Omobono, who bowed low to her, and ushered him out.

When she was alone she took the necklace from the folds of her dress, where it had lain, and looked at it a moment before she hid it in her bosom. For she would not allow the maids to see it, and was already debating how she should hide it till she could find an opportunity of giving it back. But when the cold pearls touched her flesh they sent a little chill to her heart, and she thought it was somehow like a warning.

She understood well enough what had happened, for she was quick-witted. Rustan, who had shown that he knew the secret, and his wife, who had spoken to him of Gorlias, had told the latter that Carlo Zeno was in love with a beautiful Greek slave, who could, of course, be easily induced by gifts to use her influence with her master. For Zeno's past deeds had already woven a sort of legend about his name, so that even the soldiers talked of him among themselves, and told stories of the desperate bravery and amazing skill with which he had kept a small Turkish army at bay in Greece with a handful of men for nearly a whole year, and many other tales, of which the most fantastic was less strange than much that afterwards happened to him in his life.

It must have seemed easy enough to the astrologer, and even to Omobono perhaps; but it looked strangely impossible to Zoe herself, when she remembered her only interview with the man whom she was now pledged to win over.

The whole situation was known to her. A conspiracy was on foot to take the Emperor Johannes from his prison and restore him to the throne, imprisoning his son Andronicus in the Amena tower in his stead.

Thousands of John's loyal subjects recognised each other by pa.s.swords, and talked secretly of a great rising, in which some foresaw vengeance for the wrongs they had suffered, while others, like the Bokharian Rustan, hoped for fortune, reward, and perhaps honour. But the body of the army was not with them yet, the disaffected men lacked skill or courage to preach the cause of the lawful Emperor to their comrades, and the revolution had no guiding spirit. It is far easier to choose a general among soldiers than to pick out a leader of revolt amongst untried and untrained men.

Before he lost his liberty the Emperor had known Zeno, and though a weak man, had judged him rightly. In his prison he possessed means of communicating occasionally with his friends, and he had instructed them to ask Zeno's help; but so far his message had either not been delivered or Zeno had been deaf to the appeal, perhaps judging that the time was not come for the attempt, or that, after all, the cause was not a good one. Having failed to move him in all other ways, the revolutionaries had seized the unexpected opportunity that now presented itself.

The thought that such a man might turn the tide of history, restore the rightful sovereign to the throne, and avenge the awful death of Michael Rhangabe, had crossed Zoe's mind when she had first seen her purchaser in Rustan's house, for the born leader and fighting man generally has something in his face that is not to be mistaken; but to influence Carlo was another matter, as she had understood when he had supped with her. It would be as hard to induce him to do anything he was not inclined to do of his own accord as it would be impossible to hinder him from attempting whatever he chose to try. As for winning him to the cause by gentler means, the high-born girl blushed at the suggestion. He was certainly not in love with her at first sight; of that she was as sure as that she did not love him either.

Yet while she was thinking, she suddenly wondered whether Gorlias had spoken the truth about Giustina Polo. Was she really thirty, and was her face pitted like a cheese-grater, as Gorlias had told her? If she was ugly, why did Zeno go to Polo's house so often? For Zoe had no doubt but that he went there every time he was rowed up the Golden Horn in his pretty skiff. He was always carefully dressed when he stepped into his boat; it was not for old Polo that he wore such fine clothes.

She was very lonely now. During the first two days she had rested herself in her luxurious surroundings, not without the excitement of expecting another visit from Zeno, and she had thought with satisfaction of all the comfort her sacrifice must have brought to her adopted mother, to the little boys, and to poor old Nectaria. But now she wished she could at least be sure that all was well with them, though she was rather sadly conscious that she did not miss them as she had thought she must. During many months she had nursed Kyria Agatha most tenderly, and had helped the old slave to take care of the children; the last weeks had been spent in abject misery, the last days in the final struggle with starvation and sickness, and still she had bravely done her best. Yet she had long felt that Kyria Agatha had not much real affection for her, and would let her starve herself to death to feed her and the boys. It would have been otherwise if Rhangabe had lived; she would have willingly died of hunger for him, but he was gone, and though she had done and borne the impossible, it had not been for her own blood, but for the sake of the good and brave man's memory. He was in peace, after the agony of his death, his wife and his sons were provided for, so far as Zoe could provide by giving her freedom and her life for them. As far as she could she had paid her debt of grat.i.tude to the dead, and the debt that was not wiped out was due to her; those who had murdered Rhangabe owed her his unspeakable sufferings and every precious drop of his heart's blood.

They should pay. If she lived, they should pay all to the uttermost.

And now, fate had placed within her reach the instrument of vengeance, the bravest, rashest, wisest, most desperate of mankind. Her heart had silently and joyfully drunk in every word that Gorlias had said about the man who owned her as he owned the carpet under her feet, the roof over her head, and the clothes that covered her.

He was within her reach, but he was not within her power. Not yet. Her mood had changed, and for a while, not knowing what she dreamt of, she wished that she were indeed one of those Eastern enchantresses of whom she had often heard, without half understanding, who roused men to frenzy, or lulled their lovers to sleep and ruin, as they would; she wished she were that wicked Antonina, for whom brave, pure-hearted Belisarius had humbled himself in the dust; she wished she were Theodora, shamelessly great and fair, an imperial Vision of Sin, compelling to her heel the church-going, priest-haunted master of half the known world--Justinian. She knew the story of her adopted country. What had either of those women that she had not, wherewith to master a man?

Then the tide of shame came back, and she turned her face away from the empty room, as if it had guessed her thoughts; and then, to get away from them, she called her maids, clapping her hands sharply. They came running in and stood before her.

'Go, Yulia,' she said, 'find the secretary and beg him to come to me.'

While she waited, she made Lucilla arrange her veil again so that it hid her face, and this was scarcely done when Omobono was ushered in by the other girl. He bowed to Zoe and gravely stroked his pointed beard.

'What is the Kokona's pleasure?' he asked, after a pause.

'Do you speak Latin?' Zoe enquired, in that language.

The little man drew himself up proudly, and cleared his throat.

'In my family we have been notaries for five generations,' he answered, in language that was comprehensible but would have filled an average Churchman with vague uneasiness, and would have made Cicero's ashes rattle in their urn.

Zoe was satisfied, however, for though her maids might understand Italian, she was quite sure that Latin was beyond them. She herself spoke it far more correctly than Omobono, though with a rather lisping Greek accent. She could not have helped saying 'vonus' for 'bonus,'

'eyo' for 'ego,' and 'Thominus' for 'Dominus.'

'Where is Thominus Carolus?' she enquired, so suddenly that the secretary was almost taken off his guard.

'He is--he is gone out,' he answered.

'Yes. He is gone to dine with Messer Sebastian Polo. He goes there two or three times a week.'

Zoe watched the secretary's face with amus.e.m.e.nt; his surprise was comical.

'Then the man is really an astrologer,' he said, in a wondering tone, 'and star-gazing is not all nonsense!'

'Sebastian Polo's daughter is young and beautiful,' observed Zoe, who apparently did not place implicit faith in astrology.

Omobono's face and gesture expressed a qualified a.s.sent, but he said nothing.

'Tell me at once,' said Zoe, 'that she is thirty, that her complexion resembles the dust when it is pitted by raindrops after a shower----'

'That would not be true,' cried the secretary. 'Giustina Polo is not supremely beautiful, but she is young and pretty, and as fresh as roses.'

'But she is very poor,' suggested Zoe. 'She has no dowry.'

'Who says so?' asked Omobono indignantly. 'The house of Sebastian Polo is as prosperous as any in Constantinople! He is as rich as any Venetian here except, perhaps, Marin Corner!'

'Then it is true that the master is going to marry his daughter,' Zoe replied, as if stating a fact that could no longer be denied.

She was rapidly working the secretary into a state of excitement in which his Latin grammar went to the winds.

'No, indeed!' he cried. 'It is altogether a lie! Who has told you such things?'

'She is young, pretty, fresh as roses, and very rich,' said Zoe, recapitulating. 'Did you not say so?'

'Yes----'

'And the master goes to dine in her father's house three times a week----'

'Perhaps----'

'Do you suppose that Polo would invite the master so often unless he wanted him for his daughter?'

'Perhaps not----'

'Or that the master would wilfully deceive Polo and the girl?'

'What are you saying?'

'Simply that Thominus Carolus is going to marry Thomna Justina.'

'But I tell you----'