Chapter VIII

Seen in the distance the great Monastery of Tabenna was not unlike an Egyptian temple set between the mountain's rocky knees. So great was it that the sight of its fortress-like exterior inspired astonishment. Without the house were fields, gardens and orchards, and the Monastery, built four-square, contained a cruciform Church, a huge refectory where all the monks ate together; a school, a library, and a vast warren of cells where the monks dwelt, illuminated by little windows looking on the inner courtyard. Seats were their beds, for their Rule prevented them from taking their rest lying down: they wore sandals of hemp, coarse habits of black wool with leather cinctures, and skull-caps without nap, worked with a purple cross. The Abbot Pachomius was so bowed with the weight of years, that the upper part of his body was bent into a half-circle, and his face looked out from the middle of his breast. So many and so deep were the furrows upon that countenance--Time might have used it as a sailing-chart. Yet so kindly a smile beautified its ugliness, that the boy went to the Abbot without fear. The faithfulness of Hazaël in carrying out so strictly the commands of his dead master, while he would not even permit himself to enter the Monastery filled Pachomius of Tabenna, as it had Paule of Scete, with admiration of the man.

He said, having received the message of the martyred Prætor from the Jew,--whom he received in the inner courtyard, under a giant baobab that towered above the lofty walls of the building:

"It shall be said of you, O Hazaël, son of Hazaël, paraphrasing the saying of the Master: '_You entered not in yourself, but him who would enter you hindered not!_' Verily to one who hath proved himself so faithful in this matter, much shall be given by Him one day."

"All that I require," replied Hazaël, "is a writing acknowledging the delivery of the boy to your safe keeping, and the receipt of these valuable jewels which I now place in your hands. They are to defray the cost of Florens' living and instruction, and the accounts of the rent of the vineyards of Kir Saba, the boy's inheritance, I will render when once in every third year I visit him in this place."

"If it be the will of God, friend," interposed the Abbot gently, "for death spares not even the just."

"Should the Holy One, blessed be He! sever my cord and cause the vessel of my life to be shivered on the well-stones," returned Hazaël imperturbably, "a kinsman will discharge the duty in my stead. Or my son Levi when he attains the years of discretion. Or the son of Levi, possibly."

"By the time thy Levi's son was ripe enough to undertake the business," said Pachomius smiling, as he seated himself on a stone bench beneath the shadow of the great baobab, and stroked the fair hair of the boy who stood beside him; "this little Roman might be a father also!"

"He is to follow his desire, whether he wishes to become a monk or a soldier," returned the Jew, who had declined the Abbot's previous invitation to be seated on the stone bench under the towering baobab. He delivered his master's message concerning the black onyx, and continued: "And now give me this writing of acknowledgment, for I must go upon my way."

The Abbot drew from a leathern wallet at his girdle some squares of papyrus, and said as he took a writing-reed and an inkhorn from a shabby palm-wood case:

"Of eating meat I say to thee nothing. But wouldst thou depart without breaking bread or tasting wine in the house of the Master?"

Hazaël answered, drawing down his black brows and scowling at the Abbot:

"A Christian is a Christian, and a Jew is a Jew!"

Pachomius returned the smouldering fire of the glance with a look of mildness.

"The First of all the Christians was the greatest of all the Jews."

The dark face sneered, and the whites of the black eyes glittered as the strong teeth flashed under Hazaël's tangled beard. Pachomius added:

"Yet in the days of your youth, were you not nourished by a Christian?"

"In those days my master worshipped Jupiter and the other gods of the Romans," said the deep voice out of the thicket of tangled black curls. "If the camel that bore the beam that killed my father, Rab Shemuel, had belonged to a Pagan idolater, I would, in revenge of the mockery wherewith that camel-driver mocked my father, have hated the Pagans, as I hate Christians to this day!"

"So that is the bitter reason of thy virulence!"

Pachomius, seated on the stone bench, had finished the receipt in rounded Coptic writing, and scattered upon it a pinch of sand. He was now waving the square of papyrus gently in the air to dry it. Hazaël went on, standing upright in the sun-blaze, with his shortened shadow squatting like a negro at his feet:

"The reason! And from the cup of my bitterness since manhood came to me, many Christians have drunk death! Now it is clear to you why I accept no seat under a Christian roof, O Pachomius!"

The Abbot's mild eyes looked out of the midst of the many wrinkles, without resentment, only seeing the indomitable honesty of this man. The quiet voice said:

"You were Chief Secretary to Philoremus the Prætor of Taxes. It was easy for you ... I understand! Had you acquaintance with Arius the Heretic?" ...

The deep answer came:

"Monk, I know Arius the Presbyter. And I have aided that treacherous and ambitious priest to encompass his ends,--for the serving of my own, that were righteous in the eyes of Israel!"

"Was it then your aim to destroy your benefactor?"

The question shot like an arrow to the mark. A dark flush rose beneath the swarthy skin, and the mouth under the forest of black tangled hair underwent a grim convulsion.

"The Lord on High knoweth that it was not! For though I was well aware my master went secretly forth in a habit like that of the Parabolani, yet to mingle with the people in various disguises had ever been his secret whim. It was not until I returned from a journey into Palestine that--" he choked--"that I learned the Accusers had testified against him--that I found him a prisoner under guard beneath his own roof--with the seal of the Military Governor upon his door!"

Pachomius regarded the speaker with compassion. He said:

"It may not then be known to you that Arius accused the Prætor in a letter sent to the Prefect of Alexandria purporting to plead on behalf of Christians outlawed by Maximianus. '_For,_' said he, '_O Mettius Rufus! if Christianity be a crime, first banish it from your public tribunals. How long is it since your Prætor of Taxes has administered oaths to the public without burning incense, and invoking the Sabine deity? The Prætor's Chief Secretary, Aben Hazaël, the Jew, might be able to throw light upon this question. Indeed, it was from him I gathered these interesting facts!_'"

A strange sound issued from the twisted mouth of the hearer.

"O poisonous serpent! Unclean, slavering hound! ... And my master knew of this?"

"Knew, but would not believe that you could be guilty of treachery. Did not Philoremus receive you as cordially as of old?"

The blazing eyes under the fierce black brows were suddenly veiled with water. Hazaël stammered as the heavy drops fell and glittered on his beard:

"He opened his arms to me as a father! ... He trusted me with his flesh and blood, and all the State had left to him.... He never gave me to suspect by a word or even a sign.... Give me that paper you have in your hand, for I am in haste to begone from here. I have yet another errand to carry out for him!"

He struck his staff deep into the sand, took the papyrus, cleared his bleared vision with a sweep of his hairy wrist, and read the monk's receipt. Then he stowed it in a wallet hidden within the bosom of his robe, grasped his staff and looked round as though seeking for something. The boy, who had strayed some distance away during the conversation, was standing before a row of pens containing the pets of the Monastery. Some guinea-fowls, with knobs of horn upon their beaks, and blue fleshy lappets upon the sides of their heads; a large brown-and-white eagle, chained to a perch, who observed his surroundings with half-veiled, ruby-coloured eyes, and a pair of graceful gazelles, brought from the Arabian Desert, enraptured Florens:

"Can they be mine? ... Shall one of them be mine?" he asked breathlessly. Then as the shadow of Hazaël darkened the enclosure, and the Jew's hand closed upon his arm: "You took away the other," the child said with a quivering lip, "and told Ephraim to kill it for supper. But you cannot take away either of these, because they belong to the monks!"

"Even as you do, from this time forth," said Hazaël, with an attempt at pleasantry. "So send a kiss by me to my wife, whom you wept so much to part with--and another to the playmate Levi--and another to little Leah--whom you love best of all!"

Then as the boy hung shyly back, estranged by recent harshness, he caught him roughly to his breast, kissed him, pricking his soft cheeks with the rough beard, and set him down again. The gazelles instantly absorbed him: Hazaël was completely forgotten: or else with the mimetic instinct of the child, Florens feigned forgetfulness.

Then the Jew looked round from his great height for the crooked little figure of the Abbot. Pachomius was standing under the wide-spreading branches of the baobab, with his crossed arms hidden by his wide, loose black sleeves, and his eyes closed as though in prayer. He opened them as suddenly as though he had been touched, and said, as though replying to a question of Hazaël's:

"He whom you design to seek out is in the inner fastness of Mount Attaka, below the dome called Derhor. Take a swift camel with bread, dates and water and a Saracen to guide thee and lead the beast. Follow the Desert to the North for the space of three days.... Climb the path over the Mountains and traverse the Great Valley of the Chariots of Pharaoh towards the rising of the sun. Cross the torrent-beds, and follow the pilgrim-way that leads north over the skirts of the mountains, the Gulf of Heroöpolis being upon thy right. Then pursue the pass that ascends to the west. This summit is the gate of the Outer Mountain, where thou wilt find a spring, with palms, a corn-patch and a garden-plot. This is the garden of the Athlete of Christ, who first broke the ground and tilled it, sowing lentils and vegetables. And though at first wild animals destroyed the crops when they came to drink water, he bade them cease from doing harm in the Name of the Lord! and the creatures obeyed the voice of His Saint. Take what you need of the growing things, they are there for the use of the Blessed One--and the comfort of those pilgrims who from near and far resort to him."

Hazaël saluted Pachomius and said:

"Of the water I shall drink, for the Most High caused it to spring in the midst of the wilderness. But of the vegetables I will not take, for the reason that you know. Farewell!"

"Stay!" said Pachomius with sudden, unexpected energy, "for I have more to say to thee, who art just and unjust, generous and revengeful, savage as a leopard, and faithful as a hound. Hear, thou that consumest the children of Christ in the flame of thy hatred for the man that killed thy father! If thou wouldst pierce the fastnesses of the Holy Mountain and attain speech with its Saint,--be not tempted to turn aside by the sight of gold or beauty! And forget not that to him who endures all things in patience, the Gate of Hope will open at last!"

"'The Gate of Hope!' Who spoke to thee--who has told thee?" Hazaël stammered, growing livid beneath his swarthy skin.

But the Abbot made no reply. His eyes were closed and his lips were moving, as in fervent but inaudible prayer. Some time had elapsed after the tall gaunt figure of the Jew had crossed the courtyard threshold, when the eyes of radiant light reopened in the brown mask of wrinkles, and the Abbot of Tabenna sighed, and rose upon his feet.

"O Keeper of the Secrets of Heaven, and Conqueror of Satan!" he said. "How clearly thy voice came to me but now, speaking at the inner ear. And Thou, O Lord my God! how marvellous are Thy dispensations! Thy Wisdom, how measureless, like the Eternity that sprang from It...."

He made the Sign of the Cross upon his brow, lips and breast, as the board was beaten that called the brethren to the church for recitation of the Second Office. Later he ascended the wall that made a fortress of the Monastery; and looked upon the wide Nile, flowing north-westwards between its borders of fertile land and the sterile sands of the desert, studded with perishing cities and the crumbling ruins of temples; mysterious labyrinths, petrified forests; banks of shells and seaweed, coral and bleached bones of monstrous creatures that bred in the primæval slime before the sea was separated from the land, and their Maker created Man.

The sun of early noon beat down relentlessly. Pulling his cowl over his bald skull and shading his eyes, the monk looked searchingly to the north. In the distance a mirage created a marvellous effect of blue lake, bordered by palaces embosomed in groves that were reflected in the shining depths. The broad stripe of yellow desert lying between the mirage and the habitations, monasteries, gardens and fields that lay about the ruins of the town and the Holy House of Tabenna showed some caravans approaching, but the monk paid no heed to them.

A moving speck, rapidly lessening in size upon the glaring yellow distance, he knew to be the camel ridden by Hazaël. A speck much smaller would be the camel-driver and guide. In three days, travelling at that rate of speed, they would reach the eastward-going track over the mountains, and descend into the valley of the Chariots of Pharaoh. Four days more would bring them to the Gate of the Outer Mountain and the spring of the Athlete of Christ.

"I obeyed," Pachomius thought, "the word of the Saint without question, the message coming to me from him who is the chosen messenger of God. Yet sinful as I am, I question now, and wonder. Why, O Holy One, didst thou but now command me to warn this relentless Jew--who like another Saul of Tarsus digs pits and traps for the destruction of Christians!--as though the stubborn enemy of Christ were to be tempted like a Christian Saint? Surely the Calumniator, knowing this man Hazaël for his own--will not trouble to ensnare him? Never have I encountered a soul more upright--or more remote from grace!"

A thrill Pachomius knew well, passed through his breast into his inner being. Not for the first time by many, a voice well-known, reduced by distance to a gossamer thread of infinite tenuity, spoke at the Abbot's inner ear.

"And if, even as that Saul who slew the Prophets, the Lord hath chosen such a man to be His servant, shall not the Judge of all the world do righteously? And if this man, blinded by pride and wrath, reject the offered grace--turn from the Light, and quit the threshold ere the Gate be opened--shall He Who planted in the human breast the soul--that is a spark of His Divinity--and dowered Man with Free Will that Man might choose Him!--shall He be blamed because His creature hurls back the gift into the Giver's Face?"

"I have erred!" said the Abbot, striking his breast--"O Lord, do Thou forgive thy silly servant!"

And all through the rest of that burning day, Pachomius knelt upon the wall of the Monastery of Tabenna, purging himself of sin by penance, and praying for Hazaël the Jew.