Arachne (Historical Novel). Georg Ebers

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      CHAPTER III.

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      When Ledscha heard the strokes of the oars she stopped again and, with glowing cheeks, gazed after the boat and the glimmering silver furrow which it left upon the calm surface of the moonlit water.

      Her heart was heavy. The doubts of her lover’s sincerity which the slave had awakened tortured her proud soul.

      Was Hermon really only trifling mischievously with her affection?

      Surely it was impossible.

      She would rather endure everything, everything, than this torturing uncertainty.

      Yet she was here on the Owl’s Nest to seek the aid of old Tabus’s magic arts. If any one could give her satisfaction, it was she and the demons who obeyed her will, and the old woman was glad to oblige Ledscha; she was bound to her by closer ties than most people in Tennis knew.

      Ledscha had no cause to be ashamed of her frequent visits to the Owl’s Nest, for old Tabus had no equal as a leech and a prophetess, and the corsair family, of which she was the female head, stood in high repute among the Biamites. People bore them no ill-will because they practised piracy; many of their race pursued the same calling, and the sailors made common cause with them.

      Ledscha’s father, too, was on good terms with the pirates, and when Abus, a handsome fellow who commanded his father’s second ship and had won a certain degree of renown by many a bold deed, sought the hand of his oldest daughter, he did not refuse him, and only imposed the condition that when he had gained riches enough and made Ledscha his wife, he would cease his piratical pursuits and, in partnership with him, take goods and slaves from Pontus to the Syrian and Egyptian harbours, and grain and textiles from the Nile to the coasts of the Black Sea.

      Young Abus had yielded to this demand, since his grandmother on the Owl’s Nest thought it wise to delay for a time the girl’s marriage to him, the best beloved of her grandsons; she was then scarcely beyond childhood.

      Yet Ledscha had felt a strong affection for the young pirate, in whom she saw the embodiment of heroic manhood. She accompanied him in imagination through all his perilous expeditions; but she had been permitted to enjoy his society only after long intervals for a few days.

      Once he remained absent longer than usual, and this very voyage was to have been his last on a pirate craft—the peaceful seafaring life was to begin, after his landing, with the marriage.

      Ledscha had expected her lover’s return with eager longing, but week after week elapsed, yet nothing was seen or heard of the ships owned by the Owl’s Nest family; then a rumour spread that this time the corsairs were defeated in a battle with the Syrian war-galleys.

      The first person who received sure tidings was old Tabus. Her grandson Hanno, who escaped with his life, at the bidding of his father Satabus, who revered his mother, had made his way to her amid great perils to convey the sorrowful news. Two of the best ships in the family had been sunk, and on one the brave Abus, Ledscha’s betrothed husband, who commanded it, had lost his life; on the other the aged dame’s oldest son and three of her grandchildren.

      Tabus fell as if struck by lightning when she heard the tidings, and since that time her tongue had lost its power of fluent speech, her ear its sharpness; but Ledscha did not leave her side, and saved her life by tireless, faithful nursing.

      Neither Satabus, the old woman’s second son, who now commanded the little pirate fleet, nor his sons, Hanno and Labaja, had been seen in the neighbourhood of Tennis since the disaster, but after Tabus had recovered sufficiently to provide for herself, Ledscha returned to Tennis to manage her father’s great household and supply the mother’s place to her younger sister, Taus.

      She had not recovered the careless cheerfulness of earlier years, but, graver than the companions of her own age, she absented herself from the gaieties of the Biamite maidens. Meanwhile her beauty had increased wonderfully, and, attracting attention far and wide, drew many suitors from neighbouring towns to Tennis. Only a few, however, had made offers of marriage to her father; the beautiful girl’s cold, repellent manner disheartened them. She herself desired nothing better; yet it secretly incensed her and pierced her soul with pain to see herself at twenty unwedded, while far less attractive companions of her own age had long been wives and mothers.

      The arduous task which she had performed a short time before for her widowed sister had increased the seriousness of her disposition to sullen moroseness.

      After her return home she often rowed to the Owl’s Nest, for Ledscha felt bound to old Tabus, and, so far as lay in her power, under obligation to atone for the injury which the horror of her lover’s sudden death had inflicted upon his grandmother.

      Now she had at last been subjugated by a new passion—love for the Greek sculptor Hermon, who did his best to win the heart of the Biamite girl, whose austere, extremely singular beauty attracted his artist eyes.

      To-day Ledscha had come to the sorceress СКАЧАТЬ