“By Hercules!” he shouted, “the paper lies, and the Jew is a liar.
Who but C?sar hath fifty talents at order?
Down with the insolent white!”
The cry was angry, and it was angrily repeated; yet Sanballat kept his seat, and his smile grew more exasperating the longer he waited.
At length Messala spoke.
“Hush!
One to one, my countrymen— one to one, for love of our ancient Roman name.”
The timely action recovered him his ascendancy.
“O thou circumcised dog!” he continued, to Sanballat, “I gave thee six to one, did I not?”
“Yes,” said the Jew, quietly.
“Well, give me now the fixing of the amount.”
“With reserve, if the amount be trifling, have thy will,” answered Sanballat.
“Write, then, five in place of twenty.”
“Hast thou so much?”
“By the mother of the gods, I will show you receipts.”
“Nay, the word of so brave a Roman must pass.
Only make the sum even— six make it, and I will write.”
“Write it so.”
And forthwith they exchanged writings.
Sanballat immediately arose and looked around him, a sneer in place of his smile.
No man better than he knew those with whom he was dealing.
“Romans,” he said, “another wager, if you dare!
Five talents against five talents that the white will win.
I challenge you collectively.”
They were again surprised.
“What!” he cried, louder. “Shall it be said in the Circus to-morrow that a dog of Israel went into the saloon of the palace full of Roman nobles— among them the scion of a C?sar— and laid five talents before them in challenge, and they had not the courage to take it up?”
The sting was unendurable.
“Have done, O insolent!” said Drusus, “write the challenge, and leave it on the table; and to-morrow, if we find thou hast indeed so much money to put at such hopeless hazard, I, Drusus, promise it shall be taken.”
Sanballat wrote again, and, rising, said, unmoved as ever,
“See, Drusus, I leave the offer with you.
When it is signed, send it to me any time before the race begins.
I will be found with the consul in a seat over the Porta Pompae.
Peace to you; peace to all.”
He bowed, and departed, careless of the shout of derision with which they pursued him out of the door.
In the night the story of the prodigious wager flew along the streets and over the city; and Ben-Hur, lying with his four, was told of it, and also that Messala’s whole fortune was on the hazard.
And he slept never so soundly.
Chapter 12
The Circus at Antioch stood on the south bank of the river, nearly opposite the island, differing in no respect from the plan of such buildings in general.
In the purest sense, the games were a gift to the public; consequently, everybody was free to attend; and, vast as the holding capacity of the structure was, so fearful were the people, on this occasion, lest there should not be room for them, that, early the day before the opening of the exhibition, they took up all the vacant spaces in the vicinity, where their temporary shelter suggested an army in waiting.
At midnight the entrances were thrown wide, and the rabble, surging in, occupied the quarters assigned to them, from which nothing less than an earthquake or an army with spears could have dislodged them.
They dozed the night away on the benches, and breakfasted there; and there the close of the exercises found them, patient and sight-hungry as in the beginning.
The better people, their seats secured, began moving towards the Circus about the first hour of the morning, the noble and very rich among them distinguished by litters and retinues of liveried servants.
By the second hour, the efflux from the city was a stream unbroken and innumerable.
Exactly as the gnomon of the official dial up in the citadel pointed the second hour half gone, the legion, in full panoply, and with all its standards on exhibit, descended from Mount Sulpius; and when the rear of the last cohort disappeared in the bridge, Antioch was literally abandoned— not that the Circus could hold the multitude, but that the multitude was gone out to it, nevertheless.
A great concourse on the river shore witnessed the consul come over from the island in a barge of state.
As the great man landed, and was received by the legion, the martial show for one brief moment transcended the attraction of the Circus.
At the third hour, the audience, if such it may be termed, was assembled; at last, a flourish of trumpets called for silence, and instantly the gaze of over a hundred thousand persons was directed towards a pile forming the eastern section of the building.
There was a basement first, broken in the middle by a broad arched passage, called the Porta Pompae, over which, on an elevated tribunal magnificently decorated with insignia and legionary standards, the consul sat in the place of honor.
On both sides of the passage the basement was divided into stalls termed carceres, each protected in front by massive gates swung to statuesque pilasters.
Over the stalls next was a cornice crowned by a low balustrade; back of which the seats arose in theatre arrangement, all occupied by a throng of dignitaries superbly attired.