A dagger was displayed on the table of cypress-wood at the head of the bed; the sight of the gleaming blade fired her with a sanguinary desire.Mournful voices lingered at a distance in the shade, and like a chorus of geniuses urged her on.She approached it; she seized the steel by the handle.At the rustling of her dress Matho half opened his eyes, putting forth his mouth upon her hands, and the dagger fell.
Shouts arose; a terrible light flashed behind the canvas.Matho raised the latter; they perceived the camp of the Libyans enveloped in great flames.
Their reed huts were burning, and the twisting stems burst in the smoke and flew off like arrows; black shadows ran about distractedly on the red horizon.They could hear the shrieks of those who were in the huts; the elephants, oxen, and horses plunged in the midst of the crowd crushing it together with the stores and baggage that were being rescued from the fire.Trumpets sounded.There were calls of "Matho!
Matho!" Some people at the door tried to get in.
"Come along! Hamilcar is burning the camp of Autaritus!"He made a spring.She found herself quite alone.
Then she examined the zaimph; and when she had viewed it well she was surprised that she had not the happiness which she had once imagined to herself.She stood with melancholy before her accomplished dream.
But the lower part of the tent was raised, and a monstrous form appeared.Salammbo could at first distinguish only the two eyes and a long white beard which hung down to the ground; for the rest of the body, which was cumbered with the rags of a tawny garment, trailed along the earth; and with every forward movement the hands passed into the beard and then fell again.Crawling in this way it reached her feet, and Salammbo recognised the aged Gisco.
In fact, the Mercenaries had broken the legs of the captive Ancients with a brass bar to prevent them from taking to flight; and they were all rotting pell-mell in a pit in the midst of filth.But the sturdiest of them raised themselves and shouted when they heard the noise of platters, and it was in this way that Gisco had seen Salammbo.He had guessed that she was a Carthaginian woman by the little balls of sandastrum flapping against her cothurni; and having a presentiment of an important mystery he had succeeded, with the assistance of his companions, in getting out of the pit; then with elbows and hands he had dragged himself twenty paces further on as far as Matho's tent.Two voices were speaking within it.He had listened outside and had heard everything.
"It is you!" she said at last, almost terrified.
"Yes, it is I!" he replied, raising himself on his wrists."They think me dead, do they not?"She bent her head.He resumed:
"Ah! why have the Baals not granted me this mercy!" He approached so close he was touching her."They would have spared me the pain of cursing you!"Salammbo sprang quickly back, so much afraid was she of this unclean being, who was as hideous as a larva and nearly as terrible as a phantom.
"I am nearly one hundred years old," he said."I have seen Agathocles;I have seen Regulus and the eagles of the Romans passing over the harvests of the Punic fields! I have seen all the terrors of battles and the sea encumbered with the wrecks of our fleets! Barbarians whom I used to command have chained my four limbs like a slave that has committed murder.My companions are dying around me, one after the other; the odour of their corpses awakes me in the night; I drive away the birds that come to peck out their eyes; and yet not for a single day have I despaired of Carthage! Though I had seen all the armies of the earth against her, and the flames of the siege overtop the height of the temples, I should have still believed in her eternity! But now all is over! all is lost! The gods execrate her! A curse upon you who have quickened her ruin by your disgrace!"She opened her lips.
"Ah! I was there!" he cried."I heard you gurgling with love like a prostitute; then he told you of his desire, and you allowed him to kiss your hands! But if the frenzy of your unchastity urged you to it, you should at least have done as do the fallow deer, which hide themselves in their copulations, and not have displayed your shame beneath your father's very eyes!""What?" she said.
"Ah! you did not know that the two entrenchments are sixty cubits from each other and that your Matho, in the excess of his pride, has posted himself just in front of Hamilcar.Your father is there behind you;and could I climb the path which leads to the platform, I should cry to him: 'Come and see your daughter in the Barbarian's arms! She has put on the garment of the goddess to please him; and in yielding her body to him she surrenders with the glory of your name the majesty of the gods, the vengeance of her country, even the safety of Carthage!'"The motion of his toothless mouth moved his beard throughout its length; his eyes were riveted upon her and devoured her; panting in the dust he repeated:
"Ah! sacrilegious one! May you be accursed! accursed! accursed!"Salammbo had drawn back the canvas; she held it raised at arm's length, and without answering him she looked in the direction of Hamilcar.
"It is this way, is it not?" she said.
"What matters it to you? Turn away! Begone! Rather crush your face against the earth! It is a holy spot which would be polluted by your gaze!"She threw the zaimph about her waist, and quickly picked up her veils, mantle, and scarf."I hasten thither!" she cried; and making her escape Salammbo disappeared.
At first she walked through the darkness without meeting any one, for all were betaking themselves to the fire; the uproar was increasing and great flames purpled the sky behind; a long terrace stopped her.
