by Talbot Mundy
It was after midnight—the shadows shortening—so he had to make haste. He wasted no time avoiding Egyptian huts that looked, and stank, like hogpens, where the peasantry lay silent, quaking in dread of forced porterage and all other incidences to the march of armed men.
No stragglers. The weird moonlight stirred superstition. They marched in terror, in close order, wondering that Tros should dare to lead toward such monstrous, mysterious things as pyramids, from which they expected to see devils come forth. Word went down the line in whispers that the column they could see in the distance on their left front was fleeing from the ghosts of the ancient dead. They had heard Conops’ tale of the mummies lying stripped and desecrated. So they crowded one another’s heels.
It was cool, so the weight of their armor was impediment. They marched swiftly. But though they marched in shadow, in the lee of a long ridge, on dusty earth that smothered sound, the moon shone on their helmets, and Tros did not know whether they had been seen or not when, at the end of an hour and a half, he halted them within the awful shadow of the Great Pyramid’s western side.
He advanced alone, forth from the shadow, until he could see past the pyramid in the direction of the Nile, and twice he almost fell into an open tomb. The horizon blazed smoky crimson. Conops had succeeded; a whole fleet of boats was burning. Tros returned to his men, but he couldn’t get volunteers to cross the moonlit waste of sand and set fire to the soldiers’ barracks; they were overawed by the monstrous pyramid that loomed and seemed to lean against the starry sky. He had to pick a dozen men and lead them himself.
He fired the roof-thatch with his own hand. Then, as the dry stuff caught and roared skyward, all the laborers stampeded from the other barrack—fled like ghosts, scattering. He had to go alone to fire those other roofs; his men were willing to fight lions, or even dragons, but not phantoms.
But when they saw him stand alone in the glare of the blazing thatch they were ashamed and approached him. He pointed up-Nile to the glare of the burning boats, where Conops had done his duty.
“So now! I have served my challenge on the Lord Alexis! He can march on Memphis if he pleases, but I think he will first come here to slay me, and perhaps to try to win you to his side against the Queen of Egypt.”
“We are few, Lord Captain. We are very few indeed to fight a battle,” said some one.
“Shall I fight alone?” Tros answered
“Nay, nay.”
“Then obey me.”
Whether or not Alexis was a traitor to the queen—and Tros had small doubt on that point; whether or not Alexis was in control, or could make his advice prevail, it was an absolute certainty that the rebels now knew they had Tros and a hundred men to deal with, at their rear, before they could dare to attack Memphis. If Conops had burned all their boats, their retreat, as an organized force, toward Upper Egypt, was out of the question, at least for the time being.
Irresolution might encourage Memphis to attack them, whereas, if they should act swiftly and defeat Tros, that would discourage Memphis; it might even cause the immediate surrender of the city—an initial success that would probably bring over to their side whole regiments of the queen’s corrupt and discontented army, from the Red Sea ports, and Pelusium, and from places higher up the Nile.
THERE was almost no doubt what the enemy would do, there being almost nothing else that they could do. But there was plenty of time now. It would be hours before they could unite and attack. They might wait until daylight. They probably would.
No sign of Arsinoe. No sign of the Northmen. The great wooden gate in the mud-brick wall between the pyramids that Conops had described stood wide open. So did the gate in the inner wall. No guards, no sentries. Half in moonlight, half in shadows, the great enclosure lay forlorn and silent.
“Too late!” Tros muttered, cursing himself for having let the flotilla rest too often on the way, for the sake of arriving fit for action. For a moment he was almost irresolute—almost ready to retreat to the boats. Then he began to consider a plan of battle, and his eye fell again on the long, high, mud-brick wall that enclosed the space between the two great pyramids.
If there was water in there, it would do; and for the moment, in any event, it would do to give his scared men a sense of security. He decided to return to them and lead them into the enclosure through the open gate. With his frightened squad behind him he crossed the moonlit open ground and strode into the gloom.
He almost jumped out of his armor. It took every scrap of iron self-control he owned to stand still and not show himself stunned with astonishment. “Hail! Hail! Hail!”
“Tros! Tros! Tros!”
Eight-and-thirty battle-axes swung aloft and trembled to the thrill of their owner’s welcome. Seven-and-thirty Northmen, bearded, unkempt, lean, stood in line behind Sigurdsen, their leader. All Tros’ other men had broken ranks; they had become an almost invisible audience that crowded to see what would happen. They could see Tros’ face; his feet were in shadow, his head in moonlight.
During six full seconds he stood rigid with his hand at the salute.
“I am glad,” he said then, holding his voice to the gruff, unemotional note that carries home the full weight of a man’s good faith and will.
Then he went and shook hands with Sigurdsen, who had ruled a tiny Baltic kingdom until the day when Tros met him in single combat and beat him to his knees. He was older than Tros and a full head taller. He was sobbing.
Tros punched him, friendly fashion, and then walked along the line to shake hands with each in turn, until, at the end of the line, he came to Angsgar the skald, a shorter, thick-set, thoughtful looking man. Tros laughed then.
“Gold-beater!” he said. “Bracelet maker!”
“Aye, Lord Captain. A heavy bracelet is a better weapon than a dagger on a dark night.”
“It was dark until I set eyes on it,” Tros answered. “That was good work, Angsgar.”
He returned to his place in front of them and stood staring. There was some one else in armor, out in front, beside Sigurdsen, about six paces from him, on his right hand—perhaps even slightly in front of Sigurdsen—small as compared to those Northmen, and slight, but very straight in armor.
Whoever it was—and Tros knew who it was—had stood there from the first, but Tros had chosen not to see. He knew what courtesy demanded, even common kindness. But his quick wit failed him. He stood silent until the moon’s rim rose above the pyramid and moonlight shone on the crestless helmet and the pale, girl’s face beneath. Then he spoke:
“Who are you?”
It seemed a senseless question, but he had chosen it from half a hundred others that he might have asked—that he would have liked to ask.
She answered in a good round fearless voice:
“Arsinoe, the captain of your Northmen!”
“In the Queen of Egypt’s name, I left you in Salamis, Queen of Cyprus!”
“I prefer to command your Northmen!”
“You are my prisoner!”
“Very well. I have done as I pleased. You will do as you please.”
Kill her? Not if he knew it! Since his Baltic wife died on a beach in Gaul he had never seen a woman whom he liked as he did this one. But what could he do with her? How save her from Cleopatra’s malice?
“I gave you one chance,” he said, “to die in battle.”
She laughed. “Did I refuse it—noticeably? Then try me again—Lord Captain!”
CHAPTER IX
“DID YOU THINK TO WIN EGYPT WITH TWO DOZEN MEN?”
CLIMAX had broken the spell of superstitious fear. The men rallied. They obeyed. None needed to be told they were in deadly danger, but now it was tangible and they understood it. There were no supplies. No archer had more than fifty arrows. Their line of retreat to the boats could be cut, and the boats couid be seized or scuttled easily, by a mere raiding party.
They followed Tros—first the Northmen, then Arsinoe’s four-and-twenty pirates, then the flotilla’s crew—in co
lumn of fours into the walled enclosure. But there was no water in there; even if they could carry enough water, the wall would not be easy to defend.
Every last man knew the case was desperate. Some of them went to the well and began hauling water into earthern jars that the Egyptians had left behind.
Tros selected ten seamen for outpost duty and told all the others to lie down and sleep. He had decided to wait for Conops, who might bring reliable information. He posted his sentries, stationed the men with the sharpest eyes a hundred feet up the flank of the pyramid that Conops had climbed, and returned for the inevitable drum head council. He would have preferred to postpone it, but there was no avoiding a talk with Arsinoe. As he knew from the experience in Cyprus, she was capable of day-long silences; but she was also capable of forcing issues. And he didn’t know what to say to her.
He wanted information from her without being forced to reveal his own thoughts, or his own predicament. He could think of no other way than to gain time, and perhaps exhaust her patience, by making her wait until he had the Northmen’s story.
Most of the men were already sprawling on the sand, but the Northmen had built a fire of broken baskets, straw and splinters chopped from the gate. They were squatting around it, two deep. They had left a space for Tros, and a box to sit on, so he sat and faced Sigurdsen.
Sigurdsen and Angsgar the skald were the only two who could talk Greek fluently, and it was useless to expect a plain tale from Angsgar; runes were already running in his mind; he would presently sing a story, in which facts would merely be the seeds of splendid fiction.
Angsgar was an artist—Sigurdsen a pessimist, who battle-axed the truth to lay bare gloom, on which to base a mood of melancholy discontent: a loyal man, unhappy unless he had something to grumble about.
It was a long box that they had laid bottom upward. Arsinoe came and sat beside Tros. She laid her helmet on the box between them and her coppery-golden hair fell loose on her shoulders. She sat with a sword between her knees and said nothing to Tros, who did his best to pretend she was not there.
“And so now we all die,” said Sigurdsen. “It is a bad end, to be buried among these mummies, in a land where no man’s word is worth the breath he uses. But it is good that you came, Tros. We had given up hope of ever seeing you, until she came. They told us you had gone to sea and left us to our fate. We had to dig, or die of hunger. And at night they chained us. But because we were chained the guards grew careless, and we were making a plan for escape to the Nile, when her man came from over-river, and stole through the dark, spying.
“He had word with us; and when he had learned whose men we are, he told of the fight off Salamis, and how you had given your prisoners, of whom he was one, to her. And he said she needs men who will fight to the death. And much more also he said. We bade him take back word to her that if we can we will escape across the Nile. And he went, and we made a new plan.
“So tonight, when it was time to cease work in the tomb, and the commander of the guards came and offered us freedom if we will march under his command in an assault on Memphis, we drove him forth with our picks and shovels. So he summoned men and they tried to kill us all, but we were hard to come at. So they tried to bury us alive. But they let in not enough sand, and we dug our way out, in darkness. They were marching away, so we lay still.
“Then she came. And she said she has news of you, and of your coming. And at that, we became like men who are drunk with strong drink. So we appointed her captain, being, as I say, as men drunk.
“But we hid, because you came so soon that we doubted it could be you. We crept near in the darkness. And while you were burning the barracks we called some of the seamen by name, and they knew us. And now you know all, saving what she told us. Let her tell it.”
“Though I die for it, I will not,” said Arsinoe, “unless Lord Captain Tros himself asks.”
“If it pleases you,” he said, “be silent.” For the space of at least a minute there was no other sound than bated breathing. Then Arsinoe spoke:
“Very well. Here is my sword. Do you want my armor? If you propose to silence me forever, cut my throat now!” She stood up. So did Tros. He was raging with emotion that felt like anger, and as such he used it.
“Princess, I left you in Cyprus, well provided. Is it your idea of gratitude to come and raise this—”
Quite suddenly he realized he was not angry. It was another emotion, less familiar, less easy to govern.
“But since you have come,” he said, “be seated. Tell me.”
She laughed. They sat down again, side by side. Her laugh was rather disconcerting; she had Cleopatra’s gift of seeing through a man and of understanding his motives.
“Lord Captain Tros,” she said quietly, “do you wish to be King of Egypt?”
“No,” he answered.
“Neither do I wish to be Queen of Cyprus, so perhaps we can understand each other.”
“Did you think to win Egypt with two dozen men?” he asked her.
“I was Queen of Egypt once,” she answered. “I am no longer a queen of anywhere. I do not wish to be one, and I will not. Even as you, I am here to prove my spirit and to die if need be. You have heard of Boidion?”
Tros nodded. She seemed to wish to be questioned, but he waited, and presently she continued:
She is at that temple, up-river. She has called herself Arsinoe, or has let them call her so. She believes me dead —or did believe it. That Etruscan jackal Lars Tarquinius. whom you left to command my bodyguard—”
Tros interrupted. “Ahenobarbus did it.”
She laughed again, delighted to have Tros on the defensive. But he made no further comment, so she continued:
“Lars Tarquinius, who is such a jackal that he would betray himself, if there were no one else to betray, began to speak to me of Boidion before you were gone an hour from Salamis. He suggested to me that we should encourage Boidion to make a raid on Egypt, calling herself Arsinoe; and it was clear that the plot had long been cooking. I was to lie low, in hiding.
“Then, should Boidion succeed in raising a real rebellion, I should hasten to Egypt, and they would murder Boidion, and set me on the throne. But if Boidion should fail, then I should come out of hiding in Cyprus and denounce her, and all would be well.
“It was a very intelligent plot, and he proved to me that Herod, and even Cassius, would lend aid. But I said no to it. I care nothing for Boidion. Why should I? But I would not trust Tarquinius. And since you and I talked in Salamis I had lost my craving to be Queen of Egypt.
“I should have died that night, I suppose, because the plot was well forward and Tarquinius not to be balked. But his avarice saved me. He believed he could sell me to Herod; and the men whom you had given me were all captured pirates, who understood that business. So he told them they might have me, to take to Delos, where the slave-merchant Hipponax would know how to get in communication with Herod. And he furnished a boat, in which they put me at night with two women. And we set sail.
“But they were my men. It was my task to prove it. I did, and it was not so difficult, for they had seen me fight against them, on your ship. And they were as weary of being pirates as I was weary of being used as a pawn in a game by scoundrels and cowards. I made them promise, and I said I would bring them to you if I could do it. But, of course, I did not dare to go to Alexandria; nor did I dare to write to you any more than I did write, for fear Cleopatra might lay her hands on the letter, and suspect you, and have you put to death. I know my sister!
“Words you had said to me burned in my mind. I might have sent a letter to expose the plot, and thus I might even have bought Cleopatra’s friendship. But I had made up my mind what I want, and I knew it might not be had by betrayals and writing letters. It was my name they were misusing. It was me they should deal with. It was I who should do as you would do and play my own hand against whatever odds destiny sends. I would deal face to face with Boidion and her masters, who she probably supposes a
re her servants.
“So we came to Pelusium, pretending to be a slave ship, because the slavers can come and go where it is unsafe for any one else. Old Esias was at Pelusium.”
TROS whistled softly to himself. Careful Esias had played safe, had he? Always on the winning side, Esias, and yet never to be caught in an intrigue, because he never did too much, nor too soon.
“Esias was awfully afraid. But I sold him the vessel and borrowed money from him—quite a lot of money. I was almost caught in Pelusium, because I paid my men and they got drunk. But Esias hid me, and sent his slaves to round them up. And it was from Esias that I learned how Boidion had crossed the desert, and how the border patrol had been bribed to know nothing about it. She had gone up the eastern branch of the Nile, she and her party, in a number of vessels that belong to the priests and are not subject to search.
“I bought equipment in Pelusium— black Arabian tents and many other things. I, and my two women, and my four-and-twenty men went up the Nile in laden barges to Heliopolis. It was easy for my men to pretend they were travelers on the way to Arabia. No one questioned them. And as for me and my women, we were wives of Memphis merchants on our way home. I had bought two men-slaves in Pelusium, at a very high price, because Esias recommended them; so that we looked like respectable women. They are very good slaves. They have been spying for me. They brought me news of the arrival of Alexis and Aristobolus; and I knew then it would not be long before they would march on Memphis.”
“Do you know Alexis?” Tros asked.
“No. But Tarquinius told me his name, as one who is in Cleopatra’s confidence but who is the actual first inventor of the plot to make use of Boidion.
“I was camped on the far bank, as I daresay Conops told you. I bought camels. They are there now. Conops came to steal my boats. I didn’t know it was Conops—not then. But, as Sigurdsen has told you, one of my men came spying here and brought back word; so I decided to come here, at all risks, and to try to rescue these Northmen, and perhaps also to win over some of the soldiers. I found Conops’ boat on this side of the river, and the men whom he had left to guard it talked like children, because they had seen me in battle on your ship. So I knew you were coming. And then Conops nearly killed me by accident. And where the faithful dog is, his master is not far distant.”