From the Arian basilica Julian returned to Macellum, and got out his little galley which he had prepared for this special occasion; and learning that Eutropius, after the Mass, had gone a journey of several days, the boy slipped through the barred gates of the fortress, and ran to the temple of Aphrodite, close to the church of St. Maurice. The sacred wood of the goddess bordered the Christian cemetery. Endless hostilities, debates, wranglings, and even lawsuits, were kept up between these two temples. The Christians begged for the destruction of the Pagan shrine; Olympiodorus, the sacrificing priest, on the other hand, complained that the custodians of the basilica by night would secretly cut down ancient cypresses in the sacred wood, and dig graves for Christians in the soil belonging to Aphrodite.
Into the wood Julian wound his way; a warm breeze blew softly on his cheek. In the afternoon heat the grey and fibrous bark of the cypresses trickled with thick resinous tears. To Julian the dusk seemed perfumed by the very breath of the goddess.
The white bodies of statues stood up in sharp relief against the rich shadow of trees. An Eros there had been maimed by some custodian of the basilica, who had rudely smashed off its marble bow. The weapon of the little winged Love-god, together with his hands, lay in deep grass at the foot of the pedestal. But although one-armed, the mischievous boy continued totake aim, and a mad smile of malice still fluttered on his lips.
Julian entered the house of the priest, Olympiodorus. Its rooms were small but comfortable, and rather bare than luxurious. There was neither carpet nor silver dish to be seen; the floors and furniture were of wood, and the vessels of clay. But everything bore the stamp of taste. The handle of the kitchen lamp was a marvellous little work of art representing Neptune with his trident; the bold outlines of earthen jars, full of olive oil, won the admiration of Julian; and along the walls ran light frescoes, water nymphs mounted on sea-unicorns; and dancing women, clothed in the long robe of votaries of Pallas Athene, hovered along in graceful scroll-work.
The little house stood all smiling in its bath of sunshine. Nereids, dancers, sea-unicorns, the Neptune on the lamp, and the inmates of the house, all seemed folk cheerful by nature, guiltless of ugliness, of malice or spleen. A couple of dozen olives, some white bread, a bunch of grapes, some wine and water, these were enough to turn the little meal into a feast, and Diophane, the wife of Olympiodorus, had in fact tied a wreath of laurel to the door to mark that very day a feast-day.
Julian went into the little garden of the atrium. Under the blue sky a jet of water pulsed into the air, and in the midst of narcissus, acanthus-blossom, tulips, and myrrh, rose a bronze Hermes, winged and smiling like the rest of the cottage, and poised in the act of taking flight. Above the flowers, butterflies and bees playing in the sunshine chased each other, and in the shade of the porch Olympiodorus and his daughter Amaryllis, a pretty girl of some seventeen springs,were playing the Greek game ofkottabos. On a slender column fixed in the earth, and oscillating like the scale of a balance, lay a little beam, which bore, slung from each end, a cup; under each cup stood an amphora full of water, crowned by a statuette in metal. The game consisted in throwing from a certain distance a few drops of wine, in as high a curve as possible, into one of the little cups, which, thus suddenly weighted, would descend and strike the statuette.
"Play, play; it is your turn!" cried Amaryllis.
"One, two, three!" Olympiodorus threw the contents of his goblet, and missed.
He burst out into a boyish laugh. It was strange to see the tall grey-headed man so wholly absorbed in his game.
The young girl, with a charming movement of her bare arm, threw back her mauve tunic and in her turn flung the liquid. The little cup of thekottabosrang upon the statuette. Amaryllis began laughing and clapping her hands. Suddenly, on the threshold they saw Julian, and both rushed to welcome him. Amaryllis cried—
"Diophane! where art thou? Come and see what guest we've got to-day. Quick, quick!"
Diophane ran from the kitchen.
"Julian, my darling child!... Don't you think he is grown thinner? How long it is since we have seen you!..."
And she added, radiant with good humour—
"You may well be merry, children, for this evening we shall have a real feast. I'm going to prepare crowns of fresh roses; I shall fry three perch, and make you cakes of gingerbread!"
At this moment a young slave accosted Olympiodorusand whispered in his ear that a rich patrician lady of Cæsarea wished to see him, having something to discuss with the priest of Aphrodite.
Olympiodorus followed the slave. Julian and Amaryllis went on with the game ofkottabos. Presently a little twelve-year-old girl came shyly up to them. It was Psyche, the pale fair-haired and youngest child of Olympiodorus. She had great sad blue eyes, and, alone in the house, seemed a stranger to the cult of Aphrodite, and apart from the general gaiety. Keeping aloof from the rest, she would remain musing while others were laughing, and nobody knew what made her sad, or what gave her pleasure. Her father pitied her as one incurably sick, ruined by the evil eye or by the witchcrafts of his eternal enemies the Galileans, who had carried off the soul of his child in revenge.
The dark Amaryllis was the favourite daughter of Olympiodorus: but the mother secretly spoiled Psyche, and loved with jealous passion the delicate child whose inner life was hidden from her. Psyche, unknown to her father, and in despite of the caresses, prayers, and even the threats of her mother, used to attend the basilican church of St. Maurice. Anguished on discovering this, the priest of Venus had renounced Psyche; and when her name was mentioned, his brow would cloud over with a bitter expression. He was sure that it was by reason of the impiety of his child that the vine, once blessed by Aphrodite, produced fewer fruits than of yore; he believed that the little golden crucifix worn on the child's neck had profaned the temple of the indignant goddess.
"Why do you go to that church?" Julian asked her one day.
"I don't know; it is comfortable there. Have you seen the Good Shepherd?"
"Yes, the Galilean! How did you know about Him?"
"Old Theodula told me. Ever since then I have gone to church; and, tell me, Julian, why do they all hate the Good Shepherd?"
At this moment Olympiodorus returned in triumph and narrated his interview with the patrician lady, a young girl whom her betrothed had abandoned. She believed him bewitched by the amulets of a rival. Many a time had she gone to the Christian church and besought St. Mamas with an aching heart, but neither fasts nor prostrations had snapped the evil charm.
"As if the Christians could console her!" Olympiodorus contemptuously concluded, throwing a keen glance at the attentive Psyche. "This Christian girl has now sought my help, and Aphrodite will heal her!"
He produced the two white pigeons, bound together, which the Christian had begged him to offer as a sacrifice to the goddess of love. Amaryllis took the little creatures in her hand, and kissed their rosy beaks, declaring that it would be a thousand pities to kill them.
"Father, we will offer them to the goddess without spilling a drop of blood!"
"How? There can be no sacrifice without bloodshed."
"We will give them liberty. They shall fly away clean into heaven, straight to the footstool of Aphrodite. Is she not in the sky? She will accept them. Let me do this, darling father, I beg of you!"
Olympiodorus had not the heart to deny this entreaty; and the young girl, unbinding the pigeonstossed them back to liberty. They fled away into the sky with a delirious beating of white wings, making for the footstool of Aphrodite. Shading his eyes with his hands the priest watched the offering of the convert disappear into the clouds, while Amaryllis danced with joy, crying—
"Aphrodite, Aphrodite, receive the gift!"
Olympiodorus went out. Julian, solemn-faced and timorous, approached Amaryllis; his cheeks grew red, and his voice trembled as he pronounced the name of the young girl.
"Amaryllis, I have brought you——"
"Ah! I have long been going to ask you what it could be."
"It is a galley with three banks of oars!"
"A galley! What do you mean?"
"A real Liburnian galley."
He immediately began to unroll his present, but suddenly aware that Amaryllis was watching him, he felt ineffable shame, became confused, and with an imploring look at the damsel, slid the ship into the basin of the fountain.
"You see, Amaryllis ... it is a trireme ... a real trireme, with—with—sails ... and ... its rudder.... Look how well it gets under way!"
But Amaryllis laughed heartily.
"What an odd boy you are! What in the world should I do with your trireme? I fear it wouldn't take me very far. It's a ship for mice and flies. Make a present of it to Psyche; she will be delighted with it."
Julian, though deeply hurt, assumed indifference, while tears choked his speech. Controlling himself, he said disdainfully, but with trembling lips—
"I see that you don't understand anything ... about art."
Amaryllis laughed yet more heartily. To add insult to injury, a summons came for her to receive her betrothed, a rich merchant from Samos, who dressed badly, perfumed his person, and spoke vile grammar. Julian hated him, and when he learnt of the arrival of the Samian, the charm of the house vanished so far as he was concerned.
From the neighbouring room he could hear the distracting chatter of Amaryllis and the voice of her lover.
Without uttering a word, and filled with cold hatred, Julian seized his cherished trireme—the real Liburnian trireme which had cost him such endless pains—and before the startled eyes of Psyche, snapped the mast, tore down the sails, tangled the rigging, and stamped the toy into atoms with his feet.
Amaryllis returned. Her face bore traces of a strange happiness, of that superfluity of life and love-joy which awakens in young girls an imperious need to embrace and to kiss those near them.
"Julian ... forgive me ... I have pained you. Forgive me, dear! you know well that I love you."
And before he had time to make up his mind, Amaryllis, throwing back her tunic, imprisoned his head in her fresh bare arms. A delightful dread stopped the beating of Julian's heart; he saw her great dark dewy eyes so close to him, the sweet odour of her body so overwhelmed him, and she locked him so close against her breast, that the boy grew giddy. He closed his eyes and felt a kiss long, too long, pressed upon his lips.
The voice of the Samian broke the enchantment—
"Amaryllis, Amaryllis! where art thou?"
Julian putting forth all his strength pushed the girl away, his heart overflowed with pain and hatred, and crying, "Let me go, let me go!" snatched himself free and fled.
Deaf and heedless he escaped from the house through the vineyards and the cypress wood; nor halted till he reached the temple of Aphrodite. Now and again he heard his name called, and the gay voice of Diophane, announcing that the cakes of gingerbread were ready; but he made no reply. Search was made for him. He lay in hiding in the thicket of laurels at the feet of Eros. Accustomed to his fits of moroseness, they gave up the search, satisfied that he had returned to Macellum.
When all around was restored again to silence, Julian came out from his hiding-place and gazed at the temple of the goddess of love, lodged upon a gentle hill, and bare to view on all sides. The Ionic marble columns, flooded with sunshine, were softly steeped in the warmth of azure, receiving its ardent embraces with the cold purity of snow.
Each corner of the façade was surmounted by pedestalled griffins, with lifted talons, beaks gaping, and woman-shaped breasts, standing out, proud and austere, against the deep blue of the sky.
Julian went up the steps into the portico, pushed open the bronze doors and penetrated the interior of the temple up to the very shrine, thenaos.
Silence and coolness surrounded him. The setting sun overhead still fell on the capitals of the columns, and their fine illumined scroll-work, contrasted with the penumbral shadow on the floor of the temple, seemed soft and bright as tresses of gold. A tripod, still burning, diffused the odour of myrrh.
Julian, leaning against the wall, lifted his eyes in fear, restraining his breath till it almost died upon his lips.
She, the goddess herself, was before him. Under the open sky, in the midst of the temple, stood, cold and white, new-born of the sea-foam, Aphrodite Anadyomene. With a smile she contemplated the heavens and the sea, wondering at their charm; as if unwitting still that their beauty was her own beauty, glassed in the eternal mirrors of the azure and the waters. No raiment profaned her divine body. Naked and chaste she rose, as the clear sky soaring above her.
Julian gazed on with an insatiate gaze, and felt quick thrills of adoration sweep over his frame. The child, in his black monkish habit, knelt before Aphrodite, his face upturned, his hands pressed to his palpitating little heart.
Then still aloof, still timorous, he sat at the foot of the column. He leant his cheek against the marble. Peace sank slowly into his soul. He fell asleep.
But, even through that slumber, he was conscious of her presence.
She came down towards him, nearer, nearer.... Her delicate white hands stole round his neck. The boy with a smile submitted to these passionless endearments; the cold of the marble chilled his very heart. That divine embrace bore no likeness to the wild clasp of Amaryllis. The soul of Julian, freeing itself from earthly love, entered depths of repose, as into some ambrosial night of Homer, or the sweet rest of the dead.
When Julian awoke it was night. Over the roofless quadrilateral stars were shining, and the crescent moonshedding her silver upon the head of the statue. Julian arose. Olympiodorus must have meanwhile been tending the temple, although he had either not observed or had refrained from waking the child; for now, on the bronze tripod, fresh charcoal was glowing, and a fillet of odorous smoke arising towards the goddess.
Julian smiling approached, and from the chrysolite cup, between the feet of the tripod, took a few grains of incense and flung them on the coals. Smoke rose more thickly, and the ruddy glow of the fire, like a pale flush of life, came over the face of the statue, contending with the soft new-born shine of the moon.
Julian bowed down and kissed the marble feet, and watered them with his tears, exclaiming—
"Aphrodite! Aphrodite! thou shalt be my everlasting love!"