Under the Witches' Moon: A Romantic Tale of Mediaeval Rome
perfection, which was a match for Theodora's in every point.
This desire on Roxana's part was precipitated by the strange demeanor
of young Fabio of the Cavalli. From the moment Theodora had entered
the banquet hall his fevered gaze had devoured her wonderful beauty.
A feverish restlessness had taken possession of the youth and he had
rudely repelled Roxana when she tried to soothe his wine-besotten brain.
"Perchance," she turned to Theodora, "remembering how Circé of old
changed her lovers into swine, the sainted pilgrim no longer worships
at Santa Maria of the Aventine."
Theodora started at the sound of her rival's hated voice as if an asp
had stung her.
"Perchance the well-known blandishments of our fair Roxana might
accomplish as much, if report speaks true," she replied, returning the
smouldering challenge in the other woman's eyes.
"And why not?" came the purring response. "Am I not your match in body
and soul?"
Every vestige of color had faded from Theodora's cheeks. For a moment
the two women seemed to search each other's souls, their bosoms
heaving, their eyes alight with the desire for the conflict.
Roxana slowly arose and strode toward the vacant seat at Theodora's
left.
"When you circled the Rosary on yesternight, fairest Theodora," she
purred, "was he not there--waiting for you?"
Instead of Theodora, it was Basil who made reply.
"Of whom do you speak?"
Again the silvery ripple of Roxana's laughter floated above the din.
"Perchance, my Lord Basil, our fair Theodora should be able to
enlighten you on that point--"
"Of whom do you speak?" Basil turned to the woman.
There was something ominous in his eyes. His face was pale.
Theodora regarded him contemptuously, her dark slumbrous eyes turning
from him to the woman.
"Beware lest I be tempted to strangle you," she spoke in a low tone,
her white hands opening and closing convulsively.
"Like Persephoné, your Circassian,--in the Emperor's Tomb?" came the
taunting reply.
Theodora's face was white as lightning.
"I should not leave the work undone!"
"Neither should I," came the purring reply, as Roxana extended her
wonderful hands and arms. "Meanwhile--will you not inform your guests
of the story of the pilgrim, who wellnigh caused Marozia's sister to
enter a nunnery?"
A group of listeners had gathered about.
Basil was swaying to and fro in his seat with suppressed fury.
"One convent at least would be damned from gable to refectory," he
muttered, emptying the tankard which one of the Africans had just
replenished.
Theodora regarded him icily. Her inscrutable countenance gave no hint
of her thoughts. She did not even seem to hear the questions which fell
thick and fast about her, but there was something in the velvet depths
of her eyes that would have caused even the boldest to tremble in the
consciousness of having incurred her anger.
The Lord of Norba reeled towards the couch, where Roxana had taken her
seat, blinking out of small watery eyes and flirting with his lordly
buskins.
"How came it about?"
"What was he like?"
Theodora turned slowly from the one to the other. Then with a voice
vibrant with contempt she said:
"A man!"
"And you were counting your beads?" shouted the Lord Atenulf in so
amazed a tone, that the guests broke out into peals of laughter.
"It was then it happened," Roxana related, without relating.
"How mysterious," shivered some one.
"Will you not tell us?" Roxana challenged Theodora anew.
Their eyes met. Roxana turned to her auditors.
"Our fair Theodora had been suddenly touched by the spirit," she began
in her low musical voice. "Withdrawing from the eyes of man she gave
herself up to holy meditations. In this mood she nightly circled the
Penitent's Rosary at Santa Maria of the Aventine, praying that the
saint might take compassion upon her and deliver unto her keeping a
perfect, saintly man, pure and undefiled. And to add weight to her
own prayers, we, too, circled the Rosary; Gisla, Adelhita, Pamela and
myself. And we prayed very earnestly."
She paused for a moment and looked about, as if to gauge the impression
her tale was producing on the assembled guests. Her smiling eyes swept
the face of Theodora who was listening as intently as if the incident
about to be related had happened to another, her sphinx-like face
betraying not a sign of emotion.
"And then?"
It was Basil's voice, hoarse and constrained.
"Then," Roxana continued, "the miracle came to pass before our very
eyes. Behind one of the monolith pillars there stood one in a pilgrim's
garb, young and tall of stature. His gaze followed our rotations, and
each time we circled about him our fair Theodora offered thanks to the
saint for granting her prayer--"
She paused and again her gaze mockingly swept Theodora's sphinx-like
face.
"And then?" spoke the voice of Basil.
"When our devotions had come to a close," Roxana turned to the speaker,
"Theodora sent Persephoné to conduct the saintly stranger to her
bowers. And then the unlooked for happened. The saintly stranger fled,
like Joseph of old. He did not even leave his garb."
There was an outburst of uproarious mirth.
"But do these things ever happen?" fluted the Poet Bembo.
"In the realms of fable," shouted the Lord of Norba.
"Now men have become wiser."
"And women more circumspect."
Theodora turned to the speaker.
"Perchance traditions have been merely reversed."
"Some recent events do not seem to support the theory," drawled the
Grand Chamberlain.
Theodora regarded him with her strange inscrutable smile.
"Who knows,--if all were told?"
"The fact remains," Roxana persisted in her taunts, "that our fair
Theodora's power has its limits; that there is one man at least whom
she may not drug with the poison sweetness of her song."
In Theodora's eyes gleamed a smouldering fire, as she met the
insufferable taunts of the other woman.
"Why do you not try your own charms upon him, fairest Roxana?" she
turned to her tormentor. "Charms which, I grant you, are second not
even to mine."
Roxana's bosom heaved. A strange fire smouldered in her eyes.
"And deem you I could not take him from you, if I choose?" she replied,
the pupils of her eyes strangely dilated.
"Not if I choose to make him mine!" flashed Theodora.
Roxana's contemptuous mirth cut her to the quick.
"You have tried and failed!"
"I have neither tried nor have I failed."
"Then you mean to try again, fairest Theodora?" came the insidious,
purring reply.
"That is as I choose!"
"It shall be as I choose."
"What do you mean, fairest Roxana?"
"I mean to conquer him--to make him mine--to steep his senses in so
wild a delirium that he shall forget his God, his garb, his honor. And,
when I have done with him, I shall send him to the devil--or to you,
fairest Theodora--to finish, what I began. This to prove you a vain
boaster, who has failed to make good every claim you have put forth--"
Theodora was very pale. In her voice there was an unnatural calm as she
turned to the other woman.
"You have boasted, you will make this austere pilgrim your own, body
and soul--you will cast the tatters of his soiled virtue at my feet.
I did not desire him. But now"--her eyes sank into those of the other
woman, "I mean to have him,--and I shall--with you, fairest Roxana, and
all your power of seduction against me! I shall have him--and when I
have done with him, not even you shall desire him--nor that other, whom
you serve--"
Both women had risen to their feet and challenged each other with their
eyes.
"By the powers of darkness, you shall not!" Roxana returned, pale to
the lips.
"Take him from me--if you can!" Theodora flashed. "I shall conquer
you--and him!"
At this point the Grand Chamberlain interposed.
"Were it not wise," he drawled, looking from the one to the other, "to
acquaint this holy man with the perils that beset his soul, since the
two most beautiful and virtuous ladies in Rome seem resolved to guide
him on his Way of the Cross?"
There was a moment of silence, then he continued in the same drawl,
which veiled emotions he dared not reveal in this assembly.
"Deem you, the man who journeyed hundreds of leagues to obtain
absolution for having kissed a woman in wedlock has aught to fear from
such as you?"
Ere Theodora could make reply the tantalizing purring voice of Roxana
struck her ear.
"Surely this is no man--"
"A man he is, nevertheless," Basil retorted hotly. "One night I
wandered out upon the silent Aventine. Losing myself among the ruins,
I heard voices in the abode of the Monk of Cluny. Fearing, lest some
one should attempt to harm this holy friar," he continued, with a side
glance at Theodora, "I entered unseen. I overheard his confession."
There was profound silence.
It seemed too monstrously absurd. Absolution for a kiss!
Roxana spoke at last, and her veiled mockery strained her rival's
temper to the breaking point. Her words stung, as needles would the
naked flesh.
"Then," she said with deliberate slowness, "if our fair Theodora
persist in her unholy desire, what else is there for me to do but to
take him from her just to save the poor man's soul?"
Theodora's white hands yearned for the other woman's throat.
"Deem you, your charms would snare the good pilgrim, should I will to
make him mine?" she flashed.
"Why not?" Roxana purred. "Shall we try? Are you afraid?"--
"Of you?" Theodora shrilled.
A strange fire burnt in Roxana's eyes.
"Of the ordeal! Once upon a time you took from me the boy I loved. Now
I shall take from you the man you desire!"
"I challenge you!"
"To the death!" Roxana flashed, appraising her rival's charms against
her own. Her further utterance was checked by the sudden entrance of
one of the Africans, who prostrated himself before Theodora, muttering
some incoherent words at which both the woman and Basil gave a start.
"Have him thrown into the street," Basil turned to Theodora.
"Have him brought in," Theodora commanded.
For the space of a few moments intense silence reigned throughout the
pavilion. Then the curtains at the farther end parted, admitting two
huge Africans, who carried between them the seemingly lifeless form of
a man.
An imperious gesture of Theodora directed them to approach with their
burden, and a cry of surprise and dismay broke from her lips as she
gazed into the white, still features of Tristan.
He was unconscious, but faintly breathing, and upon his garb were
strange stains, that looked like blood. The Africans placed their
burden on the couch from which Roxana had arisen, and Theodora summoned
the Moorish physician Bahram from the lower end of the table, where he
had indulged in a learned dispute with a Persian sage. The other guests
thronged about, curious to see and to hear.
The Grand Chamberlain changed color when his gaze first lighted on
the prostrate form and he felt inclined to make light of the matter
hinting at the effect of Italian wines upon strangers unaccustomed
to the vintage. The ashen pallor of Tristan's cheeks had not remained
unremarked by Theodora, as she turned from the unconscious victim of a
villainy to the man beside her, whom in some way she connected with the
deed.
Basil's comment elicited but a glance of contempt as, approaching the
couch whereon he lay, Theodora eagerly watched the Moorish physician
in his efforts to revive the unconscious man. Tristan's teeth were so
tightly set that it required the insertion of a steel bar to pry them
apart.
Bahram poured some strong wine down the throat of the still unconscious
man, then placed him in a sitting position and continued his efforts
until, with a violent fit of coughing, Tristan opened his eyes.