THE DAUGHTER OF DERKETO
A coppery sun climbed upward on his hill of cloud; the south-wind
ceased, and the lake drowsed lazily in the morning sun. The Assyrian
still reclined with his head upon the lap of Semiramis, for in the
beginning she would not suffer him to tax his strength with speech. She
urged that he rest, while she told her name and the story of her birth;
and he, content, asked nothing more than to look and listen, while his
heart grew hungry and his pulses sang to a tune of joy. So the maiden
babbled on of gods and men, of the shepherd's home with Simmas, her
foster-father, and of her simple life with sheep that browsed upon the
hills and the fishes swam in the waters of Ascalon.
Her mother, Derketo, had been a goddess whom the Syrians worshipped in
her temple beside the lake, till she drew the fatal wrath of Dagon down,
because of her beauty and her foolish vanities. She lured the hearts of
mortals from their level paths, consuming them with mad desires which
were barren and unfulfilled; playing with passion, yet drinking not its
flame--a reckless sprite who mocked at hell, while she danced on a
thread that stretched across its throat.
Then Dagon, troubled at her wickedness, brought forth from some far
eastern land a warrior youth who sighed and sang before Derketo's
shrine. Slender was he and shapely, with deep blue eyes and locks that
shone as a flame of golden red; so the goddess came out to him and was
pleased because of the sweetness of his song. Through the long blue
night he sang and whispered in her ear, till by his arts and a subtle
tongue he wrought her fall, then straightway disappeared.
A babe was born, and Derketo, in her shame and grief, stole out by night
upon the hills and left her child among the rocks to die; then, weeping,
she crept into her temple, hiding behind its altar's shadow from the
sight of men. By day she slept; by night she crouched beside the
water's edge, to fling shrill curses at Dagon across the lake.
Then Dagon in wrath waxed terrible, and sent a lightning bolt which
destroyed the goddess and her temple utterly, so that Syria knew her
beauty and her wiles no more.
Now a farmer who dwelt in Ascalon was sorely vexed because of theft, yet
never could he lay his hands upon the pilferer, albeit he watched
together with his wife and sons. The goats' milk left in crocks outside
his door would disappear in the broad of day, and after a space his
cheeses began to suffer likewise. Marveling, he set himself to watch
again, and at dawn a flock of doves dropped down before his door. They
pecked at his cheeses, or filled their beaks with milk, then winged
their flight to a distant point on the hillside over against the lake.
The farmer and his sons marked out the spot and journeyed thither, to
find a babe that was sheltered among the stones--the same which Derketo
left to perish, and now was nurtured by these sacred birds.[#]
[#] This is the accepted legend of the origin of Semiramis.
The farmers bore her tenderly to the house of Simmas, chief warden of
the royal flocks, a kindly man who reared her as his own; and they
called her Shammuramat, which name, in the Syrian tongue, means Dove.
Thus the offspring of a goddess, and adopted child of doves and mortal
man, grew swiftly to a strength and beauty of the gods themselves. From
early childhood she loved the lake, where she sported among the waves
till none might match her in speed or grace of stroke; yet, truly, born
of Derketo, goddess of the fishes, what marvel, then? Again, as her
mystic father hunted through far off eastern lands, so the girl soon
turned to hunting through the hills of Syria, with a passion which made
her bow and spear a wonder among the simple shepherd folk.
"And now," said Semiramis, as she toyed with Menon's hand, "and now am I
a woman grown, with lovers who come in droves as the cattle come, yet
daring not to voice the yearnings of their hearts. Great, stupid youths
are they, the sons of farmers and tenders of our herds, who stare at me
in tongue-tied wonderment; aye, like unto the yearling calves whose
thoughts we may not fathom because of their foolishness."
The Assyrian laughed and drew her down till her lips met his and clung;
and she joined his merriment, in that he seemed so unakin to the
yearlings of which she spoke. Then, presently, she thought to ask his
name.
"Menon," he answered simply, whereat she started, pushed his head from
out her lap and edged away.
"Menon--_thou_!" she cried. "Ah, no, my lord! A jest! That man is but
a devil's leech who clingeth to the throat of Syria, taxing, taxing,
till its very blood is sucked in tax! _Thou_--!" She paused to laugh.
"The Governor is ugly, fat--and thou--"
Again she stopped, with suddenness, and blushed.
"Nay, harken," said Menon, "of a truth I am the Governor; and it cometh
to me that I would tax thy country further still--tax it till I snatch
from thy foster-father, Simmas, his choicest store of all."
"Eh--what!" she demanded, angered at his words. "My father--that kind
old man? Shame! Shame, my lord!"
Menon pursed his lips and ridged his brow with his sternest frown.
"I fain would rob him as I say; yea, even thy sacred doves and the very
gods themselves, of Syria's Pearl--Shammuramat."
The girl said naught, but gazed in silence out across the lake, while a
smile played softly at the corners of her mouth. She was not ill
pleased to be called the Pearl of Syria, albeit she herself had long
been conscious of the pretty truth. Moreover, t'was most unseemly in a
maid to gainsay a mighty Governor; and in her heart she could find no
dread of this weighty tax on Syria's birds and gods. Therefore she
waited for his further speech, which came at length with earnestness:
"Now as to these taxes, concerning which I am called a devil's leech, it
grieveth me sorely to oppress a simple folk, and it causeth my soul's
unrest by night and day."
Again the maiden laughed.
"Aye, truly," she answered, spreading out her locks for the sun to dry;
"I well can believe thy words, for never have I looked upon a youth so
melancholy, or one on whom his sorrows ride with a tighter knee. Yet
tell me, O Prince of Woe, what in truth may chance to be thy station and
thy name?"
Menon spread his hands, though he could not help but smile at the
maiden's doubt of him.
"Nay, believe me," he urged, "I speak the truth. I swear it on thy
fish-god's altar. I am indeed the Governor, sent hither at the King's
command, to do his bidding, not my will alone. King Ninus buildeth a
city for himself on a far off river bank, a city which is like unto a
huge, devouring monster, swallowing up the stores of men, the fruits of
the earth, and the children of every land. This, then, is why I come to
tax thine honest neighbors of their wealth."
He told her of the city's walls and of how they rose from out the waste
of sand; of the temples, palaces, the towers and the soaring citadel.
He told of millions toiling through the nights and days, and of an army
which girt the walls around, while Semiramis sat listening, drinking in
his words.
"Ah!" she breathed. "Ah, now I understand! And what is this city
called?"
"Nineveh--the Opal of the East."
Again Semiramis came close to Menon's side, and, at his pleading, once
more took his head into her lap.
"This monarch of thine," said she, as she nodded thoughtfully, "is
right. He is wise and strong. My people are fools to murmur against the
justice of his tax. For listen! I, too, will some day build a city,
more grand, more vast in its reach and splendour, aye, even than this
Opal of the East. Its walls shall top thine highest towers--its gardens
shall hang between the earth and sky. Ah, laugh if thou wilt, yet
Schelah hath seen it all--as I have seen--as it rises on her kettle's
smoke."
At Menon's look of wonder, she told him that Schelah was a witch who
dwelt in a cave among the hills, who wrought strange spells, told
fortunes, and healed disease with her arts and herbs.
"A withered crone is she," the maiden said, "ugly and of crooked limbs,
whose very name the farmers fear; and yet she is not an evil witch, but
kind and gentle to those who understand. Why, I fear her no more
than--than--"
"Than me?" asked Menon, with a smile.
"Than thou," she nodded happily, "and I fear _thee_ none at all. Yet
tell me more."
He told her of the battles he had seen; of the siege of Zariaspa, where
Ninus, baffled of desire, needs turn away till a mightier army could be
raised, and engines devised to batter down the walls. He told her of
other wars, long, fierce, triumphant in the end; and as he spoke
Semiramis saw it all, even as she once had seen a dim and ghostly
Babylon which rose from out old Schelah's kettle-smoke.
She saw vast, rolling plains, where armies met with a rending crash and
roar; where warriors, locked in a grip of rage, fought desperately and
died; where chariots charged as against a cliff, to totter and overturn,
and the sands ran red with blood. She heard the cries of men and the
clang of blows, exultant shouts of victory and the shrieks of those who
fled--the rumble of wheels and hoofs that shook the earth--the clamour
of ranks that reeled through tossing clouds of dust. Her bosom heaved;
her cheeks, her lips, grew crimson with the rush of blood; her dark eyes
kindled, and she trembled as in a chill.
"Ishtar!" she cried, as she raised her head and clenched her outflung
hands. "Oh, if I but once might sing a battle-song! To struggle--to
fight--!"
Menon checked her with a rich, full-throated laugh that echoed to the
temple's dome.
"Fight?" he asked. "In the name of all the gods, fight whom?"
She gave no heed to his merry tone, for the spark had caught, the flames
were lit, and the fuel needs must burn.
"_Poof_! I care not, so it be a foe--a foe who will stand and scorns to
fly!" Again she raised her arms, her rich voice shrill in its pitch of
feverish desire: "To drive a chariot and lash its steeds through hedges
of swords and spears! To drink of the wine of war! To conquer and to
reign--a queen! And see!" she cried, as she caught her flame-hued hair,
"this will I cut away, that none may know me for a maid. Then, then
wilt thou suffer me to follow as a youth who is in thy train. Speak,
lord, I wait."
Menon smiled and shook his head, for a maiden's path, he told her, was
not amidst the perils of the field; but she took his cheeks in both her
palms and bent till her breath was mingled with his own.
"Nay, once," she pleaded, in her haunting, liquid tone, "one _little_
war--no more! Ah, Menon, sweet, thou will let me go?" Lower she bent
and leaned upon his lips, while her strange eyes burned their passion
into his, her fair arms clinging in a love caress. "Menon! Menon!"
He trembled, for his heart cried out aloud and longed to give this maid
whatever she asked; and she held him closer still, murmuring into his
ear as her mother, Derketo, might have whispered when she lured the
steps of men from their level paths.
"Heed me," she pleaded low, and brushed his cheek with the velvet of a
softer curve, "didst thou not will to tax my father of the Pearl of
Syria? What then? Wouldst leave me in thy home--alone--to yearn for a
loved one far afield, to weep, to listen for his footstep through the
weary night? Nay, Menon, that were cruelty, and thou art kind."
A shadow settled on the Governor's brow. He arose and paced the
temple's floor, his hands locked tight behind his back. Grim duty
called his name, and it came to him that the scepter of Assyria was
thrust between his heart and the woman for whom it beat alone.
"What troubleth thee, my lord?"
For a space he answered naught, but kept to his thoughtful pacing to and
fro.
"Maiden," he began at last, "there are matters of state which come to
pass, and a woman may not understand, by reason of their strange
complexities."
The girl looked up, with a sparkle in her eye which warred with a sense
of vague misgiving in her heart.
"Perchance, my lord, the tongue of a learned Governor is happily of that
turn which maketh such matters simple, even to a woman's foolish mind.
I pray thee try."
Menon laughed, then began to tell his trouble as best he might, though
the task now seemed more weighty than the sealing of a truce; and rather
far would he have faced Boabdul's scimitar than the eyes of this
red-haired girl who watched him, hanging on his utterance.
"King Ninus," said he, "hath sent me messengers who on yesterday were
come. They bear me a scroll wherein my master is pleased to laud my
deeds with flatteries and praise. At his command have I taxed thy
people till the very grass blades wilt, and thereby won the enmity of
all the land; yet the King is glad, for because of me he receiveth vast
stores for the building of his city. In reward"--here Menon faltered,
turned away his eyes and looked upon the floor--"in reward he offereth
me his daughter's hand--Sozana--when the walls and palaces of Nineveh
shall be."
"Ah!" breathed Semiramis. "Ah! I see!" She crouched upon the temple
steps, one knee clasped tight within her arms, her pink chin resting on
it thoughtfully. "Go on, my lord."
"This offer," continued Menon, scowling as he spoke, "is a fruit of
bitterness upon my tongue, for the maid is loved by my best of
friends--Memetis--an Egyptian Prince whom Ninus holdeth hostage at his
court lest his nation rise to--"
He stopped, for Semiramis had checked his speech with a cold command.
"Nay, let Memetis rest! What manner of maid may this Sozana chance to
be?"
"She is dark and slight," the Governor answered slowly, "of a trustful
nature, gentle in her ways, and kind." The girl beside him laughed, yet
merriment was not its tone; and Menon blundered on: "As children we
played together, she and I--a saucy little rogue of mirth and song--a
child, for whom I'd cut away my hand rather than bring a pang of
suffering."
"So," said Semiramis, in a whispered drawl, "so the Princess is fair to
look upon. I did divine as much. Well? Well, my lord?"
"And now," sighed Menon, "the King would cause this pretty child to
stifle love and wed where she hath no will."
"Not so," declared Semiramis, with a snap of her firm white teeth. "Be
warranted, my lord, the jade hath put him up to it. What! Hath she not
seen thee? Hast thou not beguiled her with thy, craftful wiles? How
should it, then, be otherwise?"
Again the lake-nymph laughed, ungently, and with a shrill, derisive
ring.
"Nay!" said Menon. "Nay! She yearneth not for me, nor do I yearn for
her. In secret is she betrothed unto Memetis whom she loveth utterly;
and should I bow to the King's desire, t'would bring a hurt to her whom
I took to wife, and to him whose happiness I hold more dearly than mine
own."
Once more the Assyrian paused and gazed in trouble through the temple's
door. In the waters of the lake he seemed to see the faces of his
monarch and his friends, the King, with a smile upon his bearded lips;
Memetis, sad and silent in reproach, and sweet Sozana, wondering at a
grief too deep for tears.
"Then why," asked Semiramis, quivering as she spoke, "then why, in the
name of Bel and Moloch, wouldst thou do this wicked thing?"
The Governor stood before her, cast in gloom, and answered sullenly:
"The offer of the King is the King's command, and once, once only, may a
subject thwart his will."
"Ah!" breathed Semiramis once again. "Ah, I see! Moreover, I do
perceive that Menon hath a mighty leaning to this maid of Nineveh, who
is dark and slight, of a trustful nature, gentle in her ways, and kind.
Nay, shake not thy head, deceitful one. Shammuramat is not a fool.
What, then, remaineth for my lord to choose?"
Menon sighed, but answered naught, while she sat and watched him pacing
in his deep unrest. Presently she spoke again, slowly, softly, yet the
tone was cold:
"I have marked, my lord, that those of smallest mind demand the longest
span of time in making up the same. The wise man acteth! His love and
greed he weigheth not in the selfsame scale. What! Hath the mighty
Governor still to choose?"
The Assyrian leaned against a pillar of the temple, gazed gloomily
before him, and brooded on the mandate of the King. The warrior within
him whispered at his ear, calling, pleading, as with a trumpet's blast.
Another voice there was, that told of a love of power--of the joy in
ruling over weaker men--and Menon's place was beside the King. They
dragged him, these voices, as with a chain of bronze, yet his heart
cried out Shammuramat! With her he could dwell in peace for all time,
an outcast from his land, a wanderer, in want and poverty--a worshipper
who died content in the glory of her smile. And yet--
"Is my lord still praying to his gods of guile, or doth he slumber
because of weariness--and me?"
The troubled Governor did not note a certain purring in her tone, nor
the gleam of her eye, while she crouched as the leopard crouches,
noiseless, ready for its spring.
"By the great lord Asshur," Menon muttered between his teeth, "my wits
are tried and grievously." He shook himself and turned with his winning
smile. "Can the friend of the good witch Schelah lend aid to one who is
vexed in spirit and in mind?"
"Yea!" cried Semiramis, springing to her feet in a gust of fury. "Yea!"
Her eyes flamed hotly, and her fingers clenched till the nails bit deep
into her palms. "_Go_, thief of kisses! Go, when thou hast scorched my
country bare with tax! Go back to thy maid of Nineveh--this whining
jade whose sire is but a savage and a fool! Yet tell her this--thou
hast looked on the Pearl of Syria! _Tell her--and she will
understand!_"
For an instant stood Semiramis, a queen of consuming rage and scorn;
then she laughed--laughed hoarsely--in the mockery of mirth, sprang down
the temple steps, and was gone.
Menon followed after, shouting, begging her return, as he sought her
among the trees and tangled undergrowth.
"Shammuramat! Shammuramat!" he called aloud, and only the echoes of his
yearning voice came back to taunt him. For a weary space he searched,
yet his search was vain; and when hope had departed utterly, he turned
him homeward, skirting the lake shore with a lagging step.
Then a girl crept out from the shadows among the trees and sat on the
temple steps. She rested her arms upon her knees, her chin upon her
arms, and watched till Menon's drooping figure passed from sight.
Once more she cast her robe aside, tore off her sandals and flung them
down; and then, in the wondrous beauty of her form unveiled, she stood
in wrath before the fish-god Dagon, her eyes aflame, her red hair
tumbling in disorder on her neck.
"What!" she stormed. "Did I--Shammuramat--drag out this liar from the
lake, to save him for a minx at Nineveh?"
She snapped her fingers scornfully and turned upon her heel; then she
dived for her string of pearls.