Bit-Yakin and the high-priest arrived at the foot of the ziggurat side

by side, with the foremost of the company ten feet behind. Here, once

more, Amraphel turned to them, raising his right hand majestically as he

spoke: "Wait here for her whom I shall drive unto you; but see that, on

penalty of the wrath of the gods, ye ascend not to the shrine."

Then, hearing the low murmur that told the acquiescence of the obedient

flock, Amraphel and his shadow began their ascent. From below, the

people watched them in growing wonder, in growing uneasiness. They had

seen the ox-goad in the high-priest's hand, and they were thrilled with

strange terrors as they considered what its use might be. Istar--their

Istar--Istar, the great goddess--flogged! Impossible! Yet--yet--the

curiosity was upon them, and they waited to see.

And now the two priests stood at the door-way of the shrine. The

leathern curtain was closed before them. Nothing could be seen. There

was a little pause, and, for the shadow of an instant, Amraphel wavered.

Vul-Ramân, closely watching him, felt his heart sink.

"Shall I lift the curtain?" he whispered, devoutly hoping for a negative

reply.

But Amraphel had gone too far now to falter. He nodded.

The heart of the priest of Nebo gave a throb of fear. He made no move to

obey the command. Amraphel glanced at him sharply, took one step

forward, and dragged the curtain from the door.

There was a low, frightened cry, supplemented by a weak wail from a

faint and tender voice. The high-priest shaded his eyes with his hand

till he could see into the interior of the room; and then, indeed, his

heart beat high.

In that room, sitting now upon the great golden chair, was Istar of

Babylon. She was clothed in the long, white, woollen tunic, that was

scarcely so pale as her face. She was unveiled, and her silken hair,

unbound and tangled, fell over her whole form and down to the floor on

either side. Upon her knees, wrapped in a square of sacrificial muslin,

its little form bathed in a dim, effulgent light that radiated from its

body, lay the babe--her child.

Upon the entrance of the two priests, after the one startled cry, Istar

sat perfectly quiet, her drawn face no whiter than before, her great,

dark eyes staring wonderingly at the intruders, her breath coming and

going rapidly between her parted lips.

Amraphel, whose self-composure had returned to him doubled in strength

now that he was sure of his position, stood surveying her leisurely,

with undisguised triumph. Vul-Ramân, on the other side, had also lost

his fear. His delight at the turn of affairs was hardly less than his

amazement; for, since the morning at Erech, Istar had had, in all

Babylonia, no firmer believer in her divinity than Vul-Ramân of

Bit-Yakin. Yet now, human, mortal, weak, she certainly was. Fitting,

indeed, was it that she should leave the temple of the great goddess.

And as he thought upon the manner of her expulsion, his lips curled in

an involuntary smile.

At that moment Istar's eyes were resting on his face. She saw his

expression, and she read all the cruelty of it; for suddenly, raising

the infant in her arms, she rose to her feet.

"Why have you come hither?" she whispered, hoarsely, her eyes moving

from one to the other.

"Thou deceiver! Thou blasphemer! Thou thing of evil, of unholiness! We

are come in the name of her whose abode thou hast so long profaned, to

drive thee forth from Ê-Âna to thy true dwelling--the temple of the

false Istar!"

Istar's nostrils quivered with scorn. She lifted her head in a final

proud defiance of the words of the high-priest. At the same instant

Amraphel's left hand was raised. The goad whirred through the air, and

the thongs came stinging across the face of the woman.

A sharp scream, that could be heard by the multitude below, rang out

from the shrine on the ziggurat. The woman caught her baby close to her

breast, shielding it as well as she could with both arms. The cut of the

whip had left a bright crimson weal across both cheeks and just over her

mouth. The goad was lifted over her again, and this time she shrank

backward from it.

"Get you forth, false creature, from the heavenly house!" cried

Vul-Ramân, in raucous tones.

Amraphel moved out of her path, and Istar, blind and dumb with terror

and amazement, started towards the door. As she went the whip fell

again, this time on her shoulders, and again the scream followed it.

Hugging the babe yet closer to her breast, she ran out upon the ziggurat

platform in the blaze of the sunlight, and, with Amraphel and Vul-Ramân

close at her heels, began an ever-hastening descent, round and round the

tower, towards the square below. Up to her ears, from that square, came

a long-drawn, minor groan. The people below were waiting for her,

waiting for her as vultures wait. Behind her, driving her on to them,

were their priests. She herself, helpless, bewildered, numb with the

pain of exertion, beside herself with a desperate, fierce sense of

mother-protection, knew scarcely what she did, was unmindful of what

must come to her.

Since the priests had left them, the numbers of the crowd were

considerably swelled. Istar's temple-servants, eunuchs and women both,

had come pouring from the temple and the dwelling to witness the issue

of this undreamed-of struggle. Also every one that entered the square of

Istar, whether on foot or in chariot, had either been directly summoned

by the mob or had joined it voluntarily from curiosity. These people, by

now two hundred strong, were awaiting the development of the affair in

an undecisive humor. More of them believed in the divinity of Istar than

in the word of Amraphel, powerful as he was. But now, suddenly, there

was to be seen, circling towards them from above, a woman's figure,

utterly dishevelled, with long hair flying about her and straight

woollen tunic impeding her progress, clasping in both arms a tiny

bundle, and fleeing, in very evident terror, from those that followed

her, one of whom held the goad uplifted in his hand. And as her

weakness, her mortality, her too evident confusion, became apparent, the

people felt all the old, inherent savagery of their race rise over the

lately acquired civilization, and they watched with delight the approach

of their helpless prey.

Istar, as she came nearer the ground, could see the crowd there close up

its ranks and draw nearer the foot of the tower. She realized its

attitude instantly, and her heart palpitated fast with excitement. Go

back she could not. Keep on she must. And soon she reached the last few

feet of the inclined plane, and felt the very breath, hot and hostile,

of her one-time worshippers rise about her. She stopped, faltering. Her

shoulders quivered in expectation of a blow; for Amraphel was close upon

her. The blow was struck--fiercely--and it cut through her garment like

a knife, blackening the white skin beneath it. At the same time

Amraphel's voice thundered out to all the crowd:

"I bring ye the false witch out of the holy temple of Istar. Do with her

as ye think fitting and meet, in reverence to the outraged goddess."

There was a deep, universal cry, a cry of hatred, of triumph, of the

purest brutality, from the throng. Istar, looking down upon the massed

faces before her, reeled slightly. Then, for her child's sake, with a

mighty effort she straightened up again. Knowing not what else to do,

she stepped forward to the crowd. A great hand was quickly thrust into

her face. Another struck her on the shoulder--but not so cruelly as the

whip could strike. A dozen men seized her about the body. Then she lost

every feeling save only one, that was more an instinct than a definite

idea. She must protect her child. She must save it, while she lived,

from the hands of her assailants. She was in the very midst of the mob.

Heads, arms, hands, all struggled around and towards her, striking,

bumping, pushing her. Her hair and her tunic were torn. No one as yet

had threatened her with a weapon; but this, she felt, was only a matter

of time; and then vaguely she commended herself to the God whose will

had been hers also.

All at once, however, she felt more room around her. She was in the

middle of a small, empty space, about which her own eunuchs stood in a

circle, their backs to her, fighting with the men of the mob that sought

to reach her. With a gleam of hope, she saw that all were not hostile.

Her head swam and the world grew misty around her, yet still she clung

to her shred of consciousness, that she might keep the baby safe. And,

while she still controlled herself, some one appeared out of the tangle

of struggling forms. Some one came close to her side, saying to her, in

a once familiar voice:

"Belit Istar, keep to my side, and I will make a way for you through

these men."

Istar turned her half-blinded eyes upon the defender, and smiled at

him--the golden-haired, the silver-voiced, whom long ago she had

sheltered in her shrine.

"I will keep to thy side--Char-mides. Or--I die here. Yet I fear not

death. Life--only--is--terrible," she muttered, faintly.

The Greek did not answer her. Seeing an opening in the throng, he threw

one arm around her, and, holding his right hand out in front of them

both, hurried quickly forward. Istar never remembered how it happened.

She saw her eunuchs all around her. She knew little of the angry people

beyond. Presently she and her rescuer stood together beyond the mob on

the edge of the platform steps.

"Thy eunuchs, I think, will keep the crowd from pursuit. They have been

bravely true to thee. Now, canst reach my dwelling, lady? The way is

far."

"To thy dwelling I cannot go. May the Almighty God make thee forever

happy! Leave me now. I follow my path alone."

Charmides regarded her as slightly crazy. As she started quickly forward

he kept close at her side. "Come with me--a little to the right," he

suggested, gently.

She shook her head. "Nay, Charmides, I know the way. It is to the house

of my lord that I go. Haste! Haste! They follow me!"

She started forward as she spoke, running in terror down the steps into

the square, and turning unhesitatingly into the Â-Ibur-Sabû. Charmides

kept to her and supported her as she went, knowing not what else to do,

not daring to take the child, to which she clung with such a

mother-clasp that none could have presumed to ask her to relinquish it.

And in this wise they proceeded together up the great road, finally

turning into the street of Palaces leading towards the river. As they

passed, no man or woman failed to turn and stare at the couple, for

surely such a sight as this had never before been seen in Babylon. How

long the walk lasted, minutes, hours, or days, or how it was that Istar

kept from losing consciousness after the terrible hour she had been

through, Charmides never knew. Some of the agony, mental and physical,

that the woman was enduring he could read in her face. The greater part

of it no mortal could have known or borne, for it was the death of her

immortal existence and the beginning of her real earth-life, her life as

a human being, a woman without power, without strength, without

knowledge of what was to come.

Noon glared over the city as the two of them reached the border of the

hunting-park that surrounded Nabu-Nahid's palace. A little farther along

was the palace gate-way, with its group of guards in their magnificent

liveries. Charmides looked at them in despair, for surely the poor woman

at his side would meet with no courtesy here. Such fears did not trouble

Istar. Advancing to the first soldier, she said at once:

"Admit me, now, to"--she faltered over the name--"to my Lord

Belshazzar."

For a moment the man stared into her haggard and colorless face, crossed

with the red weal of the whip, looked into the wild eyes, saw the burden

that she bore, and laughed.

Istar heard him, saw him, was still and silent for a moment, and then

turned dully to Charmides. The Greek's eyes brimmed with tears--tears of

rage at his helplessness and unutterable pity for Istar.

"Belit, come away with me. I will keep you till my lord receives you

here," he whispered to her imploringly.

Istar shook her head and turned hurriedly to the second man. "I will be

taken to my Lord Belshazzar! Admit me to him!" she cried, querulously.

"There is he, then, if you would speak to him," was the jeering answer,

as the man, with a grin, swept his thumb in the direction of the first

court, just inside the gate.

Istar darted forward to look.

"Thou fool! Now she will scream!" said the first soldier to his comrade.

Truly enough, Belshazzar was in the court, walking slowly towards the

gate of his wing of the palace. Istar's eyes fell on him instantly. She

smiled a little. Then--she called:

"Belshazzar! Belshazzar--my lord!"

At the first syllable Belshazzar stopped, lifted his bowed head, and

listened. At the repetition of the cry he turned towards the gate and

came running--running as never before, towards it. The guards, watching

him in something like consternation, opened the gate at his approach.

"Istar! Istar! Thou--here!" came in a great cry of love, of anger, of

ineffable pity, from the lips of the prince royal.

Istar tremulously smiled, and held out her infant to her husband.

"I--have--come," she whispered, vaguely. Then, as Belshazzar took the

child from her, she gave a gasping sob, and fell forward upon the hot

bricks at his feet.

XII

ÊGIBI & SONS

By noon that day Babylon was ringing with the story of Istar's fall and

her miraculous escape from the hands of the mob of priests and the

people. The tale, from the first appearance of Amraphel and Vul-Ramân in

their chariot on the Â-Ibur-Sabû at so early an hour, down to the

arrival of Charmides and Istar at the edge of the royal park on the

street of Palaces, was in the mouth of every man. But, strangely enough,

the beginning and the end of it all, Beltishazzar the Jew and Belshazzar

the prince, were never once mentioned by any one. Amraphel in the temple

and Daniel in the street listened, each with his own ears, in his own

way, to learn how much was known; and possibly both were relieved that

the beginning was unguessed; but certainly both were annoyed to find

that they could learn no more of the close of the drama than any one.

Istar had simply disappeared. Her Greek guide was known, had even been

seen in the afternoon walking from the temple of Sin towards the canal

of the New Year. But no move was made towards his apprehension, for he

was highly valued by the priesthood of his temple, and no amount of

questioning on the part of any one drew from him a single satisfactory

reply as to the final disposal of Istar and her child.

Nevertheless, Charmides' mind and heart were full. Not until the

afternoon had he an opportunity, or, indeed, the wish, to review the

great event in which he had played so important a part that morning. All

the circumstances had been shoved into the background and forced to lie

still in his subconsciousness throughout the morning, while he performed

his regular duties at the temple. And only now was he free to let them

come once more to the surface and quietly consider them in his homeward

walk. First, there was the errand that had taken him to the temple of

Istar at that hour of the morning--a message concerning two oracles that

must be identical, to be delivered at the same hour at two temples.

Charmides had been more likely than any of the priests to win Istar's

consent to the arrangement and to the deceit that it involved. And it

was thus that he arrived at the temple of the goddess at the hour of the

close of sacrifice, to find an unusual and excited throng assembled

round the foot of the ziggurat, upon which, Charmides learned, Istar had

slept on the previous night. Entirely ignorant of the portent of this

mob, the Greek had joined them--hearing only that Istar was still above.

From there, in such wise, he watched her expulsion from the sanctuary;

saw her struck by the whip of the high-priest; perceived the burden that

she bore; and, finally, knew that she was swallowed up in the mob that

had been threatening her life. Then, at last, a furious desire for

action came over the Greek. He looked around eagerly. On his right hand

stood a company of men that were taking no part in the turmoil,

regarding it rather with an expression of anxiety in their faces. These

were the eunuchs of Istar's household, wearing her livery: servitors

that had been willing slaves. Charmides saw that in them lay his

goddess' only chance. He rallied them and brought them together by means

of a few sharp words of encouragement and explanation; and with them

close-pressed around him, he made an onslaught on the disordered throng.

It was thus that Istar's rescue had been effected. There was little in

it that was remarkable; but Istar's endurance in the long walk that

followed was certainly little less than miraculous. It was, however, the

scene at the end of this walk that had affected Charmides most

powerfully. In Belshazzar's reception of her, Charmides had not failed

to read something of the history that had made that reception possible.

Love for her, this wonderfully fallen woman, helpless, weary, and

persecuted as she was, the prince unquestionably bore. She had come to

him in her hour of sorest need, and he had not failed her. Could she

then, always, in her former glory, have rejected him? It seemed

impossible. And at this thought Charmides grew troubled. He could not

bear that Istar should be tainted by contact with any mortal. Yet now,

alas! he knew that she must be so tainted. With this thought the world

grew human again, and Charmides turned his mind to Ramûa, his wife, her

who had first made Babylon beautiful to him. In another two or three

minutes now he would be with her, for he had nearly finished his

homeward walk. Directly opposite him were the palace and gardens of Lord

Ribâta, behind whose walls dwelt Baba, that other being whose life had

for a moment touched his, and had then flown off again at a tangent that

could not but separate them more and more as time went on. For Baba,

Charmides felt a lurking tenderness, that had developed since he won his

happiness through her; and as he rounded the corner of the tenement of

Ut and hastened his pace towards his own door-way, he was not sorry to

find three women watching for him in that space--Ramûa, Beltani, and,

lastly, Baba herself.

It was evident that news of the great happening of the morning had

already reached this remote corner of the city; for the instant that he

was within speaking distance of his family, the Greek was assailed with

such a volley of questions as only women could have marshalled under a

single breath. It must be confessed that Charmides heard them with

something like despair. Yet he knew also that he would do best to submit

to the inevitable without protest. Therefore, seating himself upon a new

stool in the living-room, he proceeded to utilize the moments unoccupied

by women's voices in explaining as lucidly as possible the morning's

adventure. Baba alone was silent during his recital. She stood perfectly

still, her hands folded in front of her, her large eyes fixed solemnly

on his face, listening, with an eagerness that he could not but

perceive, to his every syllable. Immediately upon the end she turned,

with a rustle of silk and a jingle of golden chains, towards the door.

Then, beckoning Charmides to come with her, she led him along for a few

yards, and, fixing her gaze upon him, said, seriously:

"Charmides, you must know that you have incurred danger by this act. The

eyes of all the priesthood, of Amraphel, of Vul-Ramân, of Beltishazzar

the Jew, will from this time forth be upon you. Take care that, though

you have won the love of every woman in Babylon by your act, you do not

also receive some mortal injury from these others. I warn you as one

that loves you. Remember it."

And with these words, and a nod to her sister behind, Baba let Charmides

go, and went on alone towards her pleasant prison-house.

There was no reluctance in Baba's gait as she approached the palace of

Ribâta; for the unhappiness of the first months of her new life was

gone. In its place had come a contentment that was as near akin to

happiness as anything she had ever known. By her own tact and wisdom she

had made for herself an enviable place in Lord Ribâta's household. Every

one in it, from the first wife to the newest dancing-girl and the

humblest slave, liked her. She had never been known to do one of them an

unkindness; and none of them had ever borne a complaint of her to their

lord. For this, if for nothing else, Bit-Shumukin would have regarded

her as a paragon. But my lord had other cause for keeping a close

companionship with her after her novelty had worn off. Baba was no fool;

and, young as she was, began, under Ribâta's experimental tuition, to

develop no mean abilities in the way of politics and political

diplomacy. She had begun by having explained to her the unimportant

things--dark secrets known to everybody in the state world, and to

anybody else that cared to go into them. Finding from these that she

possessed that unheard-of thing in woman, a bridled tongue, Ribâta

trusted her further, began to make some little use of her in a

statesman's way, and found that she had unusual talent in that unusual

line. Finally, she had ended by becoming an unfailing necessity to him

in his broad outer life. Baba went to houses, knew people, heard things

repeated, received confidences that no other woman in Babylon dreamed

of. In many cases she was able to save her lord's dignity in a pleasant

way. She formed friendships with certain people whom he suggested to

her, and obtained from them a world of amusement for herself, and an

unfathomable fund of information for her master. She found Babylon to be

a seething mass of plots and counterplots, little and great, honorable,

ignoble, loyal and traitorous. The government was fighting its enemies

with their own weapons, and intrigued vigorously, sometimes in the light

of knowledge, far more often in hopeless darkness. Ribâta, as

Belshazzar's closest friend, dwelt in the very midst of this world of

craft, and how valuable to him and to his prince so versatile and so

truthful an agent as Baba was, none but Ribâta himself knew. But it was

in this way that life had grown interesting again to the little

creature; and it was in this way that she gained a satisfaction in her

existence, knowing that she was worthy, that she was serving a great

cause well. Indeed, from her heart, in the light of all her knowledge,

Baba was body and soul loyal to the king and to the prince-governor of

the city. Autocratic as they were and wished to be, it took little

understanding to perceive how infinitely more selfish, how infinitely

more tyrannical would be the other side, that great opposing element of

which Amraphel was the recognized head, and Daniel the Jew the

unrecognized but not less important right hand.

Knowing this religious body as she did, Baba's warning to Charmides had

been no idle one; and on her way home she was occupied in reviewing the

position of the man whom she revered as well as loved. It caused her no

little anxiety, this plight of his; for, though no definite result of

his generous action could be foretold, that there would be some result

the little diplomatist was very sure. It was her intention, on reaching

the palace, to demand audience of Ribâta at once. But when she came to

the outer gate of the zenana she found a eunuch watching for her coming,

and he hurried forward to her with the command that she repair instantly

to the presence of her lord.

Ribâta was alone at table when Baba came to him. He greeted her arrival

with extreme satisfaction, and, before dismissing the slaves, had a

place made for her beside him, and food and wine brought for her

refreshment. Baba watched the arrangements placidly. She was accustomed

to such consideration, though no other woman of Ribâta's household had

ever been treated in this way. And when the two of them were finally

left alone, she began quietly to eat, asking no questions, forbearing to

introduce the topic near her own heart, waiting, without the least

appearance of curiosity, for Ribâta to begin the conversation.

On the instant of their being left alone, Ribâta's face lost its

expression of cheerful nonchalance and took on the look of one that

labors wearily in a hopeless cause. He ceased to eat and drink, and lay

back on his couch with a deep sigh. It was many minutes before he spoke,

and during that time Baba played steadily at eating, never once noticing

his languor or commenting on his mood; for she knew her lord, and she

took the only possible method of pleasing him.

"Baba," he said at last, "we have lost what should be reckoned as an

army this day."

Baba slowly lifted her eyes to his. "Istar?" she said, quietly.

Ribâta nodded. There was a little pause, and then he asked again: "You

know, do you not, the man that saved her from the mob?"

"Why--thou knowest, my lord, he is--"

"Charmides, thy Greek. Say it, Baba."

"He is the husband of my sister."

"But once beloved of thee?"

Baba looked at him.

"Warn thy Greek, then, that Amraphel and the Jew will not again let any

act of his pass unnoticed. His life is endangered, I think."

Still Baba was silent. At Ribâta's words she merely bowed her head.

"And now, my Baba, now hear the rest of the day's happenings. The Great

City is coming into the evening of her day. That thing that was

Nabu-Nahid's greatest safeguard, because it alone was feared by the

priesthood, is taken from us. In the days when Istar of Babylon shone

like Shamash in her temple, Amraphel himself laid his face in the dust

before her. But now, for many months, yea, since that journey to Erech,

her glory has departed from her. I have looked on her long and

despairingly of late weeks. This is the end that from the first I have

feared. She is become no more than any woman; and with her going our

power fails. Yet, Baba, this Istar is wonderfully beloved. This day, in

the palace of the king, she was united in marriage with Belshazzar by

word of the priest of Sin, who thereby, to all Babylonia, proclaimed her

a woman."

"Wife of Belshazzar!" gasped Baba.

"Yes, verily. And I have not marvelled less than thou. Yet Belshazzar

loves her with a love that is beyond approach: holding her dearer than

half the kingdom--nay, then, than the whole, I think. I spake out before

him of the danger of her fall to our cause, and his answer frightened

me; and after that, through the whole day, he spoke to me no more.

"But by the blood of my father that flows in my veins, neither for Istar

nor for any other shall Belshazzar lose his kingdom to Amraphel,

Beltishazzar, and Kurush the Elamite, till my spirit is fled to

Ninkigal, and my blood waters the streets of the city. And till the time

when the madness of the prince my brother shall be ended, I alone will

uphold the state against her enemies."

He came to an abrupt and thoughtful pause, which Baba softly filled.

"My lord knows that his will is also mine."

Ribâta drew a quick sigh and then smiled at her words. Afterwards he

rose from his couch and seated himself on the great pile of rugs and

cushions in a corner, at the same time motioning Baba to join him. She

went, obediently, and seated herself at his feet, her eyes resting

inquiringly on his face, her chin on her hands. Before he began to

speak, he placed one hand caressingly on her hair, much as one would

have patted the head of a little child, for, in spite of her precocious

discretion and level-headedness, Baba always impressed one first with

her childlike personality.

"Now, Baba, there is something for thee to do, whereby we may gain much

for our king. Thou knowest the woman Bunanitû, and the great house of

Êgibi, of which she is mistress?"

Baba smiled. "Hast thou not many times bidden me go to her? And hath she

not come here to visit me? Ugh! My lord knows that I do not love her and

her race."

Ribâta smiled. "My Baba, the king's treasury has never in its richest

time held half the wealth of the house of Êgibi. With them is that power

of gold without which Amraphel himself would soon be helpless. There,

Baba, in that house of Jews, is where more than half the secret meetings

of the traitors are held. It is from there, and from the house of

Zicarû, near the temple of Marduk, that Babylon may look for its doom to

come forth. Listen, then, to me. If any meeting ever hath been held by

our enemies--and, by thy goat, there have been a hundred of them!--there

will be one to-morrow, either in the monastery or in this house of

Êgibi: and I think 'twill be in the last. Their best time is noon, after

sacrifice and before mercy, when business ceases and the city dines.

Now, there will be a eunuch temple servant that is in my pay in the

house of Zicarû, waiting, at the same hour that I would have you go to

the house of Êgibi. You must enter it, Baba, as a female visitor to

Bunanitû, veiled and on foot, carrying embroidery, or a lute, or

something that womankind fancies, creating no suspicion that you come

from me or my house. Only greet Bunanitû, and tell her you are come to

pay a visit and to gossip with her for an hour. Then, being in that

house, keep thou watch. Tell me the men that are to be seen about the

place, or, if there is none to see, look for any chance event that may

befall to give a clew to the traitors' workings. If you be shut away

from the men's rooms, cry out for faintness or with heat, and so run out

into the shop where moneys are changed. Or make you any excuse to look

and learn--I care not what it may be, or what you do. But, my Baba, for

every fact you bring me, there shall be a golden hairpin for your hair

on your return."

Baba looked up at him quickly. "My lord will learn in time that I love

not gold. I do my lord's bidding for love of his work. Let him not pay

me like a servant."

Ribâta smiled and took up her two hands. "Baba is good, and also wise.

Let her bear always in mind that the Achæmenian threatens the Great

City; and that before him, if there works treachery inside the walls, I

and thou, Belshazzar and the king, Istar of Babylon and thy pale-eyed

Greek, must surely fall. I shall not see thee again ere thou go; but the

household is at thy command, to do with as thou wilt in preparation for

thy adventure."

Then Ribâta tapped her forehead in token of dismissal, and watched her

as she jumped to her feet, made her reverence, and went away with her

hands folded on her breast.

Though the evening was young, Baba retired straightway, but without any

intention of sleeping. Once in her bed she was not liable to

interruptions of women or children, who clamored lustily round her in

her waking hours. Now she was eager to think out her plans for the

morrow, and how best to accomplish the most important mission ever

intrusted to her. It was full three hours, and the whole zenana had

grown sleepy-still, before at last she turned upon her side and closed

her eyes in the satisfaction of knowing that, of all the plans she could

think of, the one she had finally decided on held out the greatest

chance of success.

Next morning, the twenty-second of the fair month, found the city still

wrought up over the strange happenings of the day before. Istar's fall

was not a matter of rejoicing to Babylon in general. Many a woman had

wept, and many a workman turned silent and solemn on hearing of her

expulsion from the temple. In one quarter of the city only was there a

universal sense of delight. This was in the extreme southwest, south of

the canal of the Prophet, and accessible from the outside only by the

gate of the Maskim. This little spot was a settlement of an alien race,

and its inhabitants enjoyed a mode of life peculiarly their own. It was

the quarter that had been assigned, fifty years before, to the Jewish

people, when Nebuchadrezzar had brought them, ten thousand strong, from

their far, barren country, to be a menace and a curse unto his

descendant.

So entirely distinctive a life did these captives live, that their

quarter was not greatly frequented by Babylonians. But there was one

house, standing near the traders' square, covering a large plot of

ground, and much more richly tiled than any of its neighbors, that had

been and was frequented by the greatest men in Babylon--prince and

priest, judge and minister--and the business of which was on a greater

scale than that of any similar native house, and which was in the end

destined to become famous in the annals of Babylonish history. This was

the great banking-firm of Êgibi & Sons; and it was managed at the

present time by three generations of the family: Bunanitû, a remarkable

old woman of more than sixty years of age; Kalnea, her son, a man

something over forty; and Kabtiya, her grandson, a youth in his

twentieth year and still unmarried. The establishment that was run by

these three to tremendous advantage to themselves, and not a little to

that of some others, had become, through the influence of Daniel, the

rendezvous for the priestly traitors of the city. Both Kalnea and his

son were dangerously implicated in the schemes of Amraphel; and, though

Bunanitû had always shrunk a little from the councils held within her

walls, her racial prejudices against the reigning family were too strong

for her not to be wholly in sympathy with their enemies.

An hour after its accomplishment the news of the fall of Istar had

reached this household, through a message from Amraphel himself, who

commanded them to prepare for a meeting at noon on the following

day--the very obvious consequence that Ribâta had foreseen. The message

made no difference in the usual business of the morning; and at noon, as

a matter of course, trade was relaxed for the dinner-hour. Few people

were in the streets, and no customers haunted the various small shops in

the quarter. The house of Êgibi, however, was more fortunate than its

neighbors. Between twelve and half-past no fewer than seven men passed

in the door of the bank; and, more unusual still, when the last one of

them went in, the first had not yet come out. A little peculiar,

certainly; but to the single person who witnessed the arrivals from a

safe retreat behind a great pile of porous water-jars displayed for sale

in the street near by, the event appeared to have less of the strange

than of the satisfactory in it. This watcher was a small, half-robed

letter-carrier, who had loitered about the neighborhood for half an

hour, unseen by a single soul. He waited for five or ten minutes after

the entrance of the last of the seven, made his way round the corner

behind the house, and was presently to be seen dashing round it at

break-neck speed, up to the open door of the establishment.

Bunanitû was alone in the large room, and she came to the door, looking

out with some anxiety at the small, black creature that stood panting

before her.

"Thy business, boy?" she demanded, sharply.

The boy peered up at her, giving her eye for eye suspiciously. "Who are

you?" he croaked.

"Bunanitûm Bit-Êgibi."

"Mother of Kalnea?"

"Yea."

"Oho! Then I give thee this, to be"--the boy put a mysterious finger to

one side of his nose and whispered so softly that the woman bent over to

catch his words--"to be delivered to Amraphel, my lord, in council--if

thou knowest the place." And he held up a neat little brick, covered

with exquisitely minute writing and elaborately sealed.

Bunanitûm, growing rather large over the affair, took the epistle with a

nod. "I know," she whispered, in return, and the boy, with an answering

look, turned as if to go away.

The woman, hasty with her new importance, did not stay to watch his

departure. She turned about and started for the back part of the house,

leaving the outer room quite empty for the space of three minutes. And

during that three minutes Baba brought her plan to a successful issue.

No one saw the little letter-carrier enter the shop. Still less did any

one know when he darted out of it and back into the maze of corridors

and rooms behind. Here, in a well-chosen corner, very dimly lighted,

Baba huddled herself up, to await the return of Bunanitû to her post of

duty, which would leave the whole rear of the house open to inspection.

Shortly the Jewess could be seen passing quickly along an adjoining

hall-way, on her way back to the shop, whither she had been hastily sent

by her son. And when she was gone, Baba, with a long breath, left her

hiding-place. The most uncertain and perhaps the most dangerous part of

her work was over; but the important half of it remained still to be

done. She was confident of the efficacy of her disguise; and she was

free to move rapidly in her scant tunic with her black-stained, bare

limbs, and her flowing hair crammed under a woolly, black wig.

Nevertheless her heart beat violently as she left her corner and began

to search for the room where the secret council would sit, or for some

hiding-place where the sound of voices would come to her ears. She had

proceeded nearly to the back wall of the house, and was beginning to

fear that the council-room was too well concealed for discovery, when a

faint murmur of talking reached her ears. It came, apparently, from

somewhere below, and, with the first murmurous sound, Baba stopped short

to look about.

The room where she stood was large, almost dark, and scantily furnished.

Its walls, however, were hung with elaborate draperies, and its floors

covered with costly rugs. Save for two or three inlaid chairs, with

embroidered cushions and carven feet, the room was empty of furniture.

But from somewhere, and somewhere below, came that unceasing murmur of

conversation. The intruder examined her surroundings from floor to

ceiling. Then she looked all round the walls, and finally back again to

the floor. Here, on a certain spot, her eyes stopped. It was where the

corner of a great crimson rug was turned up, as if it had been hastily

laid. And by this upturned corner was a black spot that was not shadow.

In the dim light Baba could distinguish nothing very clearly; but she

moved noiselessly across to this place, and found when she came to it

that the voices had become definite, and she could hear what was being

said. There was a square opening in the floor, all but four or five

inches of which was quite concealed by the rug.

Without any hesitation Baba threw herself flat down, and then, realizing

to the full the risk that she ran, pushed the rug yet farther away from

the opening, put her face close to it, and looked down.

Below was a good-sized vault, made, probably, in the brick platform on

which the house stood. It was well lighted with torches and lamps, hung

with richly embroidered tapestry, and ceiled with glazed bricks of

bright colors. Its furniture consisted of piles of rugs and cushions on

which, seated in an orderly circle, sat, not nine, but fourteen men, all

but four of whom wore the goat-skin. Baba did not know them all, even by

sight; but half were familiar figures, and the other half--well, Ribâta

should tell her their names to-night, after her description. Those that

she knew were Amraphel, Vul-Ramân of Nebo and Nergal, Larissib-Sin of

Marduk, Zir-Iddin of Shamash at Sippar, Siatû-Sin, Itti-Bel, and

Gûla-Zir, together with Beltishazzar the Jew and his fellows Kalnea and

young Kabtiya of the house of Êgibi; and the rest were one more

hawk-eyed fellow of the tribe of Judah, and five priests, none of them

above the rank of elder.

In her first downward glance Baba perceived that Amraphel had in his

hand the brick letter that she herself had sent him; and evidently its

contents had been surprising enough to displace the former topic of

discussion and to raise a storm of talk. Amraphel and Beltishazzar were

silent, waiting, with more or less patience, for a chance of being

heard. After a little time this opportunity came, for the majority of

those present were too ignorant of their subject to be particularly

instructive; and at last they quieted, one by one, and turned to the

place where their leaders sat.

Amraphel spoke the first words that Baba was able to catch definitely,

and from that time on there was nothing that she did not hear and

remember.

"Now that ye take council with silence, men of emptiness, learn of me

that there is little enough danger in the fact, even if it be true, that

Belshazzar has taken the woman of Babylon to wife. Answer me severally

one by one, if there has been in any of your temples a rumor of such a

marriage made by any of its priests. Siatû-Sin--dost thou remember?"

"Nay, Lord Amraphel."

This answer was repeated by every priest present. Then, in the little

pause that followed before Amraphel went on, Daniel, with a faint smile,

observed:

"Yesterday, at four hours after noon, Kasmani, second sacrificial priest

of the temple of Sin, entered the gates of Nabu-Nahid's palace, and

drove away again in an hour in the golden chariot of Prince Belshazzar."

Every one looked to Amraphel for his idea of this information. The

high-priest only smiled, in slow indifference, and continued: "The woman

of Babylon desires, then, to be queen in the Great City. A queen is not

a goddess; and yet I say unto you that she shall never be queen. She

whom I drove forth yesterday from the temple is fallen ill under her

disgrace. This morning at dawn came to me Nergal-Yukin, rab-mag of the

king's household, for a charm to ward off a fever from a divine lady."

Here Amraphel hesitated for the fraction of a second, while a thin smile

spread over Daniel's keen face. "That charm--" he urged.

"That charm," said Amraphel, carefully, "was what the great Elamite

would have desired."

"The sword?" demanded Vul-Ramân, bluntly.

"Ten drops of the liquor from an adder's fang, to be rubbed upon a prick

in the left wrist at sunset to-day."

Baba gasped; but from the men assembled below there was only a quick

round of applause.

"By dawn to-morrow there will be no more of 'Istar of Babylon,'"

observed Daniel, satisfaction oiling his tone.

"And the Great City is open to its savior," concluded Siatû-Sin.

Now Baba was in a sudden agony to escape, for she felt that the life of

Istar rested in her hands. Yet sunset was still many hours away, and the

talk that was beginning gave signs of proving exactly what Ribâta had

told her to hear. Therefore from minute to minute she lingered on in her

place, while the story of treachery and blood-guiltiness was made clear

to her, and it seemed as if, with the evidence in her hands, it must

soon be possible to have these men put to death without imprisonment and

with a mere form of trial. And had it been two centuries earlier this

might perhaps have been arranged. But Babylon was not Nineveh, and the

power of Nabonidus was not that of the old monarchs of Chaldea; neither

was the king by nature a tyrant, or even a strict ruler. And possibly

because of these things, and only because of them, these councils were

ventured at all.

"What is the last word from Kurush?" demanded Salathiel the Jew, of

Amraphel.

There was a general little murmur of interest, and a settling down upon

the cushions as if for a lengthy talk.

"Kurush," said Amraphel, with all the authority of Cyrus himself, "is

now in the marsh country south of Teredou, and from there he despatches

a letter to us. Ye shall hear it."

Amraphel drew from the pocket of his broad girdle a clay tablet,

slightly larger than those in general use for letters, and covered with

neatly pressed cuneiform characters. This, with the aid of a small,

round magnifying-glass, always used in correspondence, he read aloud to

those assembled--and to Baba above:

"'Unto Amraphel, high servant of the ancient gods of Babylon, and to

those that are with him, thus saith Kurush the Achæmenian: With me it is

well. With thee and thy houses may it be exceeding well. Now I, the

king, lie secretly in the country to the south of the city of Teredou,

not far from the gulf of the setting sun. And here, from the east and

from the north, the army will assemble about me. The people in the land

are poor and ill-content. Little grain have they to eat, and short

measure of milk to drink. The king their lord knows them not. To me they

turn, in their extremity. Soon shall ye learn of revolts among the

dwellers in the lowlands: know, then, that it will be by my hand. After

this we will march northward, towards the gates of the Great City.

"'Gobryas, my general, the governor of Gutium, is in the north. Before

him, in the month of Duzu (June), Sippar and its works shall fall.

"'Look to it only that ye hold Babylon estranged from its king. She whom

we have feared--doth she bear herself yet divinely? The captive Jews

that are in the city, greet them well for me. Tell them that, after my

coming, those that open to me the Great City shall know again the land

of their fathers and their fathers' fathers. And those of the

Babylonians that shall acclaim me master, to each of these shall be

given out of the public moneys thirty shekels of silver; but to the

great that bow before shall be given high offices, honor, and much

wealth. And in the month of Ab, Queen of the Bow, shall Babylon know

me.'"

The seal of Cyrus was affixed to the end of the epistle; and the brick

was passed round the circle, that each man present might be sure that it

was genuine.

Now began a discussion that proved tedious and scarcely comprehensible

to Baba. It was about numbers and divisions of men, and was accompanied

by the reading of endless lists of names, and the checking of each as

true or untrue to the cause of rebellion. And after listening to this

talk until she found that it would be utterly hopeless for her to

attempt to remember anything valuable in it, Baba rose, pulled the rug

carefully back to its original place, listened for a moment to make sure

that she was undiscovered, and then, with the utmost caution, made her

way to the rear door of the house, which she unfastened, and through

which she safely passed. Once outside, in the glare of day, her heart

afire with anxiety for Istar, she started away, in a light-running pace,

up through the city that she knew so well. Through the Traders' square,

across the canal of the Prophet, along the river-bank for an endless

distance she ran, till she came to the great bridge, across which loomed

the high, blue walls of the new palace.

The sun was swinging down towards the horizon now, and the life of Istar

swung with it in its balance, when the dishevelled figure of Ribâta's

slave halted at the palace gates and demanded the admission that her

disguise gained for her.

XIII

THE RAB-MAG

Through the whole of the day following her expulsion from the temple,

Istar, wife of Belshazzar the prince royal, lay in her newly assigned

bedroom in the far wing of the palace, in a profound stupor. She was

unconscious, apparently, of everything around her--of Belshazzar,

sitting at her bedside; of the child that lay wailing on her arm; of the

peace and the orderly quiet of this new home. The spell of her mighty

shame and woe was over her. She had broken under it like the reed in the

storm. Everything that had passed since she was driven by the blows of

the ox-goad out into the day-glare on top of the ziggurat, had been but

a dim vision to her. Physically, she was very ill. This was not

wonderful. But Belshazzar, mad with rage at the whole of the priesthood,

and overwhelmed with pity for the woman he loved as only he would have

dared to love, was beside himself with anxiety. All night the rab-mag of

his father's household, the most renowned charm-doctor in Babylonia, had

watched beside him in her room; had repeated prayers and formulæ

without number; and had burned beans, leeks, barley, cakes, butter,

frankincense, and liquor, till the room smelled indescribably, and

Belshazzar himself, resorting to common-sense, ordered a dozen slaves to

clear the atmosphere with fans and with pungent strong-waters. In the

new air Istar seemed to breathe more easily, and had even moved her

lips, though no sound issued from them. Then Belshazzar commanded the

rab-mag to depart until daylight, when he should return with new wisdom.

Thereupon Nergal-Yukin, half angry, half ashamed, wholly chagrined, went

forth through the silent streets to the house of Amraphel. Here he was

made to undergo a change of feeling. The priest recognized an

opportunity in the first three sentences that the doctor spoke, and

instantly took advantage of it. He set to work to play upon the

alchemist's feelings, and such was his success that presently, by means

of sympathy for the insults he had endured and promises of dazzling

wealth, coupled with righteous denunciations of Istar as the queen of

darkness, of wickedness, of all the vices, the learned man found his

price, bent the knee before his preceptor, and hied him back to his den

of charms, where, kept in a convenient cage, was an adder, dwelling

effectively among the other insignia of this awe-inspiring profession.

Nergal-Yukin did not re-enter Belshazzar's presence that morning; but he

sent a slave to say that he was preparing a new and infallible charm,

that could not, to be most efficacious, be applied before the hour of

sunset. Belshazzar was pleased with the message; perhaps not less

pleased because it gave him the chance of being alone at Istar's side

all through the day. Not for one moment did he leave or even turn his

thoughts from her. Councillors and courtiers, officials and judges,

tax-collectors, officers of his regiment, treasurer and usurers, were

kept from his presence by peremptory command. He refused food for

himself; but he made an effort to force something between Istar's pallid

lips--and in the attempt succeeded in rousing her for a moment from her

stupor. As he knelt by her side, supporting her head upon his arm, his

hand, unsteady with an emotion that none would have believed possible to

him, holding the cup of warm milk to her mouth, Istar's great eyes

opened and she looked at him. There was a fulness in Belshazzar's throat

that presently broke into a sob. Blindly he groped in the realm of

prayer for some words into which he could put his heart. And his will

rose up in him, till he would have pitted himself against all the powers

of hell for the sake of saving the life of this woman who was lawfully

and spiritually his own.

"You shall not die--you shall not die--not die!" he muttered, over and

over again.

Then Istar sank back upon her many pillows. The heavy lids once more

shut off her wonderful eyes from his sight. Her face was colorless and

drawn. He could trace with ease the course of each tiny blue vein in her

fair temples. He looked at her hands--so white, so transparent, so

frailly beautiful; and over them he bent his head, touching them with

his lips. As he kissed them there came a wail from the baby.

Instinctively, half conscious as she was, Istar gathered the child to

her side, while he, the man, looked on, wondering and helpless.

Noon, with its breathless, stifling heat, came and went again. An hour

after it a slave tiptoed into the room and whispered a name to

Belshazzar. The prince's expression brightened a little. "Let him come

in to me," he said, softly.

A moment or two afterwards Ribâta noiselessly entered the room.

Belshazzar held out both hands, greeting his friend with such an air of

weary helplessness that Ribâta stared at him uncomfortably.

"Name of the great Marduk, Belshazzar, what is come to thee?" he asked,

holding his friend at arm's-length and looking into his face with a

mixture of sympathy and perplexity.

"Hush! Curb thy voice! She will be disturbed."

Ribâta looked about him with intense curiosity. "Belshazzar, art thou

gone mad? What is this thing that absents thee from thy duties? Thou art

needed to-day--in council--at the review--"

"Nay--let others look to these things; let my father look to his own,"

whispered Belshazzar, in reply, drawing his friend down on the cushions

beside him.

Ribâta found no answer to the words. Here was a Belshazzar whom he did

not know. He ventured no further remarks, but remained sitting quietly

beside his friend--waiting. By degrees, as the silence continued without

much prospect of abating, Bit-Shumukin's eyes began to study the passive

face of Istar. The nobleman had never before been so near her; and never

before, even in the old days when he had seen her, towering in a cloud

of silver above the multitude in her triumphal car, had he been so

impressed with her divine purity. There was that in her face, marked and

mortalized by suffering as it was, that put mortal things far away from

her. His wonder at Belshazzar's boldness grew greater. The spirit which

could have moved any man to look upon that face with a feeling of

equality, daring the hope of making her his own, was enough, in Ribâta's

eyes, to raise that man above the level of humanity. He turned to look

upon the prince. Belshazzar lay back on the divan, lost in some

unfathomable reverie. Ribâta hesitated to bring him back into the

present, yet felt a kind of discomfort in the presence of these two

strange beings. Unable to contain himself, he suddenly started up, with

the idea of leaving the apartment. Belshazzar, however, was instantly

roused by his move.

"Ribâta," he said, quietly, "do not go from us."

The friend turned to him, answering: "My lord knows there is much to be

done. I go to thy work."

Belshazzar rose and laid both hands tenderly on the shoulders of his

friend. "My brother," he said, "for my father, and for the sake of the

crown that will one day be mine, I have labored long; and for them I

will labor again, even unto the end. But now, for a little while, I

tarry here, beside the bed of my beloved, for whose coming I have waited

many weary months. Then wilt thou not watch here with me through one

little hour? I ask it for the love I bear thee, Bit-Shumukin; and be

sure that there is no other in Babylon, nay, or in all the world, that

could hold thy place in my heart."

A wave of emotion that was half wonder swept over Ribâta. Never before

had Belshazzar spoken like this to him--never before like it to any man

or to any woman. Bit-Shumukin made no reply in words, but he yielded

instantly to the gentle pressure of the prince's hand and sank back

again on the cushions. Once more he turned his gaze upon the white,

passive features of Istar, and, without looking away from her, he asked:

"Dost thou leave her like this, with neither medicines nor prayers?

Where is the rab-mag, that he attends not on her sickness?"

"All through the night he has worked over her with charms and

incantations. At sunset to-day he will come again, bringing with him a

new charm more powerful than any ever used before. The hour of sunset is

not far away. Then if she--"

The speech was interrupted by the appearance of a eunuch, who, making

his prostration in the door-way, stood silently waiting permission to

speak.

"What is thy business? Say it softly," whispered the prince, with a

frown.

"May the ears of my lord incline themselves kindly! There is at the gate

a letter-carrier that bears a message for the Lady Istar. He bade me

seek thee, saying: 'For divine Istar my word bears life. If she heed me

not, death seizes her in his arms.'"

"Bring the fellow here, guarded by two eunuchs and bound about the arms

that he may make no dangerous move."

The slave bowed and disappeared. When he was gone, Ribâta observed,

thoughtfully: "It is well that he be bound. Day by day thy life is

growing more precious to Babylon, more desired by the priesthood. By day

and night, if thou wert mine to care for, I would have thee guarded."

Belshazzar smiled a little, shaking his head; and they spoke no more

till Baba, fast bound and also gagged, was thrust into the room by two

soldiers that moved behind her. The little creature was dizzy with the

heat, covered from head to foot with dust, and half fainting from

weariness. At sight of Ribâta she gave a gurgling, choked cry behind her

gag, and, twisting herself suddenly from the soldiers' grasp, fell in a

little heap at the feet of her lord.

"Baba!" he cried, gazing in bewilderment at the unrecognizable figure,

but knowing her posture and her smothered voice.

"Thou knowest this fellow, Ribâta?" queried Belshazzar, curiously.

"'Tis a woman, lord prince, though her name is a man's. I will answer

with my life for her fidelity to thee and to the Lady Istar. Let thy

soldiers depart--then she will speak," he said, imperatively, beginning

to unloose the rope that bound her arms.

Belshazzar, as always, accepted his friend's word, dismissed the

guardsmen with a nod, and turned to examine, with some interest, the

panting heap of humanity at Ribâta's feet. Bit-Shumukin had removed the

gag, and was still struggling with the stiff knots in the cactus-rope.

Belshazzar finally cut them with his knife and set Baba free. She rose

uncertainly to her feet, stretching her arms above her head. Then,

suddenly, she grasped her hair, gave a great tug, and pulled the wig

from her head, leaving her own long, black locks to float freely around

her shoulders.

"Where didst thou get the stain for thy skin? Thou'rt black as a

Nubian," said her lord, smiling at her uncouth appearance. Then he

added, hastily: "Nay, child, let us not play. What hast thou learned in

the house of Êgibi; and what is thy matter of life or death with the

divine Istar?"

Before she had uttered the first word of her answer, Baba's eyes fell on

the form that lay stretched out on the bed. She gave a little cry of

astonishment and reverent admiration. Then she cast herself on her knees

before Belshazzar.

"May it please the prince my lord to heed my words, for I speak those

that fell an hour agone from the lips of Amraphel of Bel. At sunset of

this day will come Nergal-Yukin, rab-mag of the great king, to the side

of the Lady Istar. He will bring with him a new charm that shall purport

to be for Istar to make her well, and that will bring her to her death.

Amraphel hath promised the man honor and riches when he shall make a cut

upon the Lady Istar's wrist, rubbing into it ten drops of the poison

drawn from an adder's fangs."

"By all the gods--!" Belshazzar leaped to his feet. "Nergal-Yukin dies

this day!"

"Where hast thou heard this story, Baba?"

"At the council of priests, in the house of Êgibi."

"Say on--all thou hast heard!" commanded Belshazzar, sharply.

Thereupon Baba, seating herself on the floor, recounted to the two men

her adventure of the afternoon. The whole council, as she had overheard

it, the names or the faces of the men that took part in it, and the

letter from Cyrus the Elamite, word for word, she unravelled from the

warp and woof of her memory. Her auditors listened in silence, staring

into each other's faces, neither of them wholly amazed, yet both

strongly moved by this confirmation of their worst suspicions--the

suspicions that Nabonidus would not entertain. Baba gave the story in

detail, and took some time over it. She had barely finished, and there

had been no time for question or comment, when the attendant eunuch

reappeared at the door, saying:

"It is the hour of sunset. Nergal-Yukin craves admittance to my lord and

to the divine Lady Istar."

"Come thou hither," said Belshazzar, beckoning the eunuch to his side.

"Let Nergal-Yukin come hither to this room," he said, softly, "and as

soon as he shall be within, summon thou six soldiers of the guard and

command them to wait my call outside in the hall. Let them bring ropes

of stout cactus and a gag of wood, and cause them to keep silence there

without until I shall summon them. Now, behold, I have spoken. Go thy

way and obey my word."

The eunuch departed obediently, and a moment later Nergal-Yukin entered

the bedchamber of the lady of Babylon. He was a tall fellow, this

rab-mag of the king; lean and withered in body, black-robed, and wearing

the peaked hat that belonged to the livery of the royal household.

Around his waist was a golden cord, at the end of which dangled a

narrow-bladed knife of Indian steel, its handle inlaid with lapis-lazuli

and gold. In his hand he bore a golden phial of rare workmanship. His

salute to the prince was markedly obsequious, but he regarded the two

others in the room with great disfavor.

"Let the prince my lord command every one to be dismissed from his

presence. Otherwise my spell must lose its potency."

"These are my friends. Let them remain here," returned Belshazzar,

shortly.

"Then let my lord give me leave to depart out of his presence. The work

will be useless," said the old man, with something like a sneer,

beginning to back towards the door.

But Belshazzar was master of himself and of the situation. He lifted his

hand, and the physician halted. "Nergal-Yukin, on pain of death, get

thee to thy work. Pronounce the spell; and may the gods take heed of

it."

The words were spoken quietly enough; and yet there could be no

disobeying that tone. Nergal-Yukin's face darkened; but, however

unwillingly, he advanced to Istar's side. Lifting over her both his

long, withered hands, he began to pray in the Accadian tongue to Nergal,

the god of health. Belshazzar, Ribâta, and Baba stood listening

stolidly, while the high-pitched voice went on and on, from prayers to

exorcisms, and finally into mystic exclamations and phrases. Here the

man's manner changed, and he gave symptoms of a working into religious

frenzy. His auditors, however, remained painfully unresponsive, and the

final "Amanû" was succeeded by a biting silence. It was then, with a

resentful satisfaction, that the rab-mag began the consummation of his

work. He commanded a basin of water and a fine towel. These provided, he

lifted Istar's right hand from the coverlet, and proceeded to wash and

dry it during the repetition of further prayers. Then he turned to

Belshazzar.

"May it please the prince my lord to learn that this remedy which I am

about to apply to the lady of Babylon is the most powerful and the most

dangerous of any known to mankind, or to the gods above. To them that

are pure in heart it cannot fail to restore perfect health. By it,

indeed, the very dead may sometimes be lifted up from Ninkigal and given

once more to the light of Shamash. But if the person to whom the magic

liquid be applied is guilty of great sin, then is it true that death may

perhaps come upon that one. Now wills the prince my lord that I finish

the spell?"

"How shall it be finished?" inquired Belshazzar, phlegmatically.

Nergal-Yukin grinned with displeasure and disappointment at having

failed to arouse any feeling by his words. "O high and powerful one,

with this knife that hangs at my girdle I cut the flesh of the right

wrist till a drop of red blood flows therefrom. Then into the wound I

pour the dazzling stream from this precious phial; and when they have

mingled well with the blood of the lady, you shall behold her rise up

and call thee to her arms." He concluded this explanatory speech with an

obeisance, and had already turned to the couch again when Belshazzar

gave a low call.

Instantly there was an influx of armed men into the apartment.

Nergal-Yukin turned in time to see the entrance of the last one. The

next instant he was violently seized by two stalwart men. His cries of

amazement were stifled with a gag; he was bound about from head to foot

with the unbreakable cactus-rope, and then, at a nod from Belshazzar,

borne out of the unconscious presence of Istar into the hall beyond.

Thither Belshazzar and Ribâta followed him; but Baba, at a sign from her

lord, remained where she was.

Belshazzar's face was a thing to fear as he bade the guardsmen stand the

rab-mag up before him. Nergal-Yukin could speak only with his eyes, but

these were eloquent indeed. Terror and agonized pleading were the

dominant expressions on the face of the wretched creature. Belshazzar

heeded neither one. In three words he commanded his men to free the

right arm of the magician. Then, while Ribâta and the soldiers were

clustered round, watching the scene in silent fascination, and a scream

of terror was about to break through the gag, Belshazzar took the

doctor's right hand in his own, holding it in an iron grasp; and with

the other he seized the knife that still hung at Nergal-Yukin's side.

The eyes of the doomed man were starting from their sockets. Ribâta came

forward a little, that he might obtain a better view of the affair. The

soldiers crowded close around. Belshazzar lifted the knife and made a

long, delicate slit in the back of the physician's wrist. Then, when the

blood had begun to flow thinly forth, Ribâta handed his master the

golden bottle that had been left on the foot of Istar's couch.

Belshazzar nodded his thanks, and, without a second's hesitation, opened

it. The liquid that rolled out was thick and rather brown in color. The

prince did his work deftly. With one finger he rubbed the stuff all

about and around the wound, mixing it with the fresh blood, and allowing

none of it to drip off the wrist. With the other hand he helped two of

his soldiers to hold the rab-mag still; for the fellow was now

struggling so violently that this was not a task for a single arm. There

was no escape, however. When the poison had been made to enter the wound

thoroughly, Belshazzar tore a strip of embroidered linen from the bottom

of his tunic and bound it round the arm, fastening it with a pin from

Ribâta's apparel. Then he stood back from his victim.

"Take this man away, and bring me only the message of his death."

Obediently the soldiers lifted their burden, now rigid and stiff with

terror, and bore him like a log of wood out of the presence of the

prince and across the court-yard, back into some little-known rooms used

only for the most obscure servants of the palace.

Belshazzar drew a long breath of relief. His rage had passed. Only, as

he turned to smile at Ribâta, he was slightly pale. Ribâta nodded at him

in approval.

"That was well done," he said. "Those that live like dogs, like dogs let

them die."

"And now, Ribâta--"

"Now, O prince, I return with Baba to my house. Thou hast heard all that

my slave learned of the treachery lurking in the Great City. It is to

you that Babylon looks for her defence. Her people are yours. Do with us

all as you will. We are in your hands." Ribâta made the lowest

obeisance, something not due from his rank to any one except a god; and

Belshazzar hastily raised him up.

"It is to thy loyalty, O faithful one, that Babylon will owe her

freedom. Baba likewise shall receive her reward. She hath saved Istar's

life--that is more to me than Babylon, than myself, than all the earth.

Command a litter for her now, and take thou my chariot for thy return.

The council of lords sits to-morrow after sacrifice. Then we will speak

of the invader. Till then--Bel keep you safely!"

Smiling, Ribâta turned back into the other apartment. He found Baba on

her knees, beside Istar's couch, gazing in ecstasy into Istar's open

eyes. On the other side the baby, haloed round with a soft and luminous

light, slept quietly. Ribâta was reluctant to draw Baba from the scene;

but the child was faint with fatigue, and so, leading her gently away,

he lifted her, when they were outside the door, in both his arms, and

carried her, all black and dishevelled as she was, out to the gate,

where, in the face of a dozen astonished men, he placed her in a litter,

himself mounted Belshazzar's chariot, and drove away in it in the

direction of the canal of the Four Seasons.

If Baba's day of labor had just ended, that of Belshazzar only now

began. The affair of the rab-mag had left him intensely uneasy, and

this, coupled with his great anxiety over the sedition in the city,

promised a sleepless night. Still, till further news of Nergal-Yukin's

state should be brought him, he was powerless to act, and therefore he

returned to Istar's room and seated himself there, with his head resting

on his hands. The minutes passed unheeded, for his mind was full. He

knew that his wife lay near him, and, though her eyes had been open when

he entered the room, he believed her still incapable of sight or

hearing. Presently, when his head had sunk lower still, he felt the

lightest touch on his arm, and he started to his feet, to cry out in

amazement as he beheld Istar, tall and white, swaying beside him.

"_Thou!_" he said, gasping.

"The heart of Belshazzar is troubled. From far away come I to bring thee

consolation in thine hours of woe," she said, quietly, as one speaking

from a great distance. "Be comforted, O my lord! That that is ordained

for the Great City must come to pass. Neither thou nor any other can

prevent it. But be not troubled in thy heart, my prince. In the end this

world shall grow dim before thine eyes, for there will be opened before

them another kingdom where there shall be no time, neither any

evil-doing. Until the coming of that day, my lord, be comforted--take

heart--and be comforted!"

In that one moment Istar shone forth in all her radiant glory, like some

spirit from a divine sunset. And the prince fell down before her on his

knees, worshipping silently. But after she ceased to speak the radiance

went, and she fainted before him in her weakness of the flesh. So he

caught her in his arms and brought her once more to her couch. When she

woke again, only Belshazzar remembered the words that she had spoken to

him. Yet he knew that the message had come from out of the silver sky,

and with this knowledge peace came to him, and he went and lay down upon

the divan in the room.

He had lain there for some minutes, his mind filled less with foreboding

than with wonder, when, for the third time, the eunuch appeared at the

door, this time wearing on his carefully trained face an untoward

expression of interest.

"Speak, Âpla," whispered Belshazzar, anxiously.

"May it please my lord--Nergal-Yukin is dead."

"How? How?"

"In great anguish. Being ungagged, he cried mightily, and screamed aloud

to the gods and demons, uttering curses on Amraphel the priest of Bel,

and upon Belshazzar my lord, and upon the king Nabu-Nahid. Thus is

Nergal-Yukin dead."

"It is well that all dogs should die. Listen, then, Âpla, and do my

bidding. Let forty of my runners, attired in their liveries, go forth

into the city with trumpets and cymbals, and let them cry aloud through

all Babylon the story of the rab-mag's treachery and his end. The name

of Amraphel must not be spoken; but the criers shall so word their story

that no man can be ignorant of the fact that Amraphel himself prompted

this deed out of hatred to me. Listen, then, while I tell thee the story

of the sin of the rab-mag, and thou must repeat it as I say it to you,

to all my criers."

Then Belshazzar proceeded to recount, tersely and truthfully, the tale

of the attempted assassination of Istar. When he had finished, and Âpla,

big-eyed and eager, had repeated the words after him, he dismissed the

eunuch to assemble the runners, and then the prince, his work beginning

to assume definite proportions in his mind, summoned two women to watch

over the goddess, and, leaving them with her, went his way to the

apartments of the king his father.

Nabonidus sat in his coolest room, comfortably partaking of his supper.

A dancing-girl had just finished her postures before him, and he had

dismissed her, while his favorite poet was summoned to take her place.

Nabonidus' gentle, sheep-like face wore an air of benign content as his

hand moved regularly from mouth to plate, and his head swayed to the

rhythm of the tune that had been played. The poet was just mounting his

daïs and unrolling his strip of Egyptian papyrus when the prince reached

the door of his father's apartment. It was really pitiable that all this

pleasant twilight delight should be so roughly disturbed. But disturbed

it was, as a lake's calm by the east wind, as soon as Belshazzar entered

his father's presence and made his obeisance. Nabonidus' expression was

more that of resignation than of displeasure as he said, courteously:

"Let there be a couch brought in for thee, Bel-shar-utsur, and partake

with me of this flesh of the whirring-bird, and barley, while Kibâ

recites to us the tale of Izdubar and Êa-bani full of wisdom." Nabonidus

made his suggestion with an air of hopefulness that belied his real

feeling; and he was not surprised, however much disappointed, when

Belshazzar replied:

"May it please the king my lord to grant me a private audience. There

are matters of great import to be laid before him. I beg that my lord be

moved to grant this wish."

These words, couched as they were in the form of supplication, were

spoken in such a tone of command as Nabu-Nahid dared not refuse. But in

justice to the son be it said that this manner only ever gained for any

one, save poets and architects, a moment's consideration with the king.

By this method, however, Belshazzar succeeded; and presently he and his

father were alone.

Nabu-Nahid had ceased to eat, and sat regarding his son with an air of

petulant displeasure. "Now speak to me quickly," he said, in his mildly

injured fashion. "The season is too late for lion-hunting; your command

over the treasury equals mine; I have at present not one dancer that

would please you; and for the matter of soldiers--go to Nânâ-Babilû at

Sippar. I am not the commanding general. What, then, seeing these

things, canst thou ask of me?"

Belshazzar snapped his fingers and frowned mightily. The fears in his

mind might be vague and ill-defined as yet; but when he did consider, in

some presentient fashion, the scenes of terror that were soon to be

enacted in the Great City, and when he imagined his father, weak,

gentle, yielding as he was, swept into that furious vortex of blood and

of death, what could there be but pity for the old man and dread for his

inevitable end? Now, for a moment, indeed, Belshazzar wondered how it

was that his father had held his throne even one little twelvemonth,

after the strife that had preceded his coronation. Yet for seventeen

prosperous years this one ruler had held city and state together

peaceably; and there were few Chaldean kings that had done as much.

"My father," said Bit-Shamash at last, "it is for no matter of pleasure

or mine own affluence that I seek thee to-night. It is for thee, for thy

throne, for the sake of thy kingdom, of ancient Babylonia, that I would

take council with thee here."

Hearing these words, Nabu-Nahid's face assumed an expression that was

unexpectedly complex--a little inscrutable, indeed. "Since what time, O

my son, have thy thoughts turned towards the welfare of the throne?

Since when hath thy mind been more engaged with affairs of the state

than with wines and with feasting, dancing-girls and hunters--thou and

thy companion, Ribâta of Shumukin?"

Belshazzar flushed slightly. "My father hath judged me," was his only

answer.

Nabu-Nahid merely nodded his head a trifle, and then sat looking at his

son with a stupid expression, waiting for him to depart, as at this

stage he usually did. In point of fact, Belshazzar had a strong impulse

to turn on the instant and leave his father to his supper and his

poetry. But for once his anxiety was stronger than his pride, and he

fought back the angry taunt that had risen to his lips, and asked,

bluntly:

"Know you, O king, that letters of invitation pass from our city to

Kurush, king of Elam, to come and take his place on the throne of

Babylon?"

"Letters from the hands of Amraphel of Bel and Beltishazzar the Jew? Ay,

Bit-Shamash. Think you I do not know my city?"

Belshazzar was first astonished, then inexpressibly relieved. Was it

possible that he had so long misjudged his father? Was it possible that

this shambling and vacant manner concealed a sound mind and a great

understanding? Had he for so long kept his own best self from the king

to find out his grave mistake when it was almost too late? He bent his

head more humbly than he had ever bent it before to any man. "I crave

pardon of my lord," he said. "Behold, I go my way."

But Belshazzar had not all the magnanimity of the family. Nabu-Nahid

suddenly straightened up, and commanded a couch to be moved to the

table. Wines of Lebanon and Helbon were brought from the cellars, and

Belshazzar was waved into his place with a gesture that admitted of no

refusal. The prince obeyed the invitation rather reluctantly. He dreaded

the return of the poet, and had no desire now to discuss affairs of

state with his father. However, Nabonidus opened such a discussion in a

very tactful way.

"Tell me, Belshazzar, how many days is it since this conspiracy of the

priests hath been known to you?"

"For more than three months I have suspected it. It is but to-day that

it hath become a certainty."

"And the matter frightens thee?"

"Yea, truly, my father. When I came to thee to-night my heart was sick

with the thought of Babylon's great danger. But since thou, the king,

knowest all and fearest naught, my fears are also laid at rest. The king

my father is very great. May he live forever!" and Belshazzar smiled

filially into his father's eyes.

"You do me honor to trust in me, Belshazzar," said the king, gently.

"Yet do you well, also; for to whom save their king can a people look

for their safety? I will tell you how the Great City is to be protected

against the plots of her enemies. Priest and lord alike may prove false,

and men and soldiers turn against me. I have put my strength and my

trust in those that are above princes. Hark you, Belshazzar. When, a

month past, I learned from certain watchers whom I employ, of the great

plot against the crown, I bethought me long and earnestly of my course.

Finally I sent out secret messengers to every temple-city in Babylonia,

and from every heavenly house that my hand hath restored from ancient

decay I caused to be sent hither to me the oldest and holiest god-image.

These, to the number of twenty-one, are now in a little temple by the

river-bank, where I daily visit them and perform sacrifice before them

till the time when they shall move in procession through the city, and

go each to his special shrine. And that day approaches; for the city

grows uneasy under the seditions of the priests and their oracles. But

when my new gods are set up in their golden houses to be worshipped by

the multitude in the city, think you not that the first care of these

heavenly ones will be the safety and preservation of me and of my line?"

Belshazzar said nothing for some time. It seemed impossible for him to

speak. This sudden revelation of his father's incomprehensible

childishness, following, as it did, the equally unexpected evidence of

his understanding of the situation of the state, had completely overcome

him. It was well that the dim, bluish lamp-light made all faces look

pale; for at this moment the prince's skin was destitute of color. All

his first fears came back to him, added to a new one, that increased the

horror of the first a thousandfold. With what frightful disaster was

Babylon not threatened? And what hope had she of fighting against

devastation under the leadership of a half-crazy old man that had placed

an unalterable and inhuman faith in the power of certain blocks of gray

and crumbling stone, shaped into images that a child would hardly

believe in? Faugh! Belshazzar turned sick with disgust.

"Speak, Belshazzar! What think you of this hope of mine?"

"The king is great. May he live forever!" was the response, given in a

tone of soothing calmness. With the words the prince royal also rose

from his couch. "Now, father, I go. I must depart from thee," he said,

hurriedly. "There is a matter to be attended to. Give me leave to quit

thy presence."

"As you entered it of your own will, so depart," returned his father, in

a subdued and disappointed manner.

But Belshazzar, whose feeling was more of grief and pity than anything

else, went to his father, took his hand, and laid it upon his brow in

token of devotion and obedience.

"Thy head is hot," observed the king.

Belshazzar smiled faintly. "Grant me leave to depart," he urged again.

"Yea, in peace depart!"

Somewhat relieved at the old man's tone, a little quieted by the silence

and the dim light around him, the prince moved to the door and was all

but gone when the king turned and spoke to him again in a way that

revealed another phase of his curious character. "Belshazzar," he said,

"look well to this Jew, Daniel. He was a member of the court of the

mighty Nebuchadrezzar, thy grandfather. A traitor and a dangerous man is

he; but he is a prophet also; and gold will buy him. If, after my death,

the city should be threatened with destruction, look to him, if it is

possible, for help."

Belshazzar, dully amazed again, yet too weary of the changes of his

father's moods to pay very much attention to him, answered this advice

with an obeisance only, and then went his way towards his own rooms.

But, even as he went, his father's last words rang again through his

ears. "A traitor and a dangerous man, but a prophet also; and gold will

buy him--gold will buy him!" Thus Belshazzar pondered still.

In his private room the prince found his evening meal laid out and

waiting his coming. Food, however, was not his desire; and, letting it

remain where it stood, he began slowly to pace his room, up and down, up

and down the cool, tiled floor. His fan-slaves watched him curiously.

They had never seen quite such an expression on their lord's face. In

truth, Belshazzar's brain throbbed when he thought of what a way lay

before him to be traversed. Babylon tottered before his weary mental

vision; and finally, inexpressibly heavy-hearted with it all, he sat

down to eat his chilled supper, at the same time despatching a slave for

Khamma.

The dancing-girl, with her gauze draperies and tinkling ankle-bells,

came in to him, followed by her fellow-slaves with drum and lute. The

maid had lost neither her grace of movement nor her love for her Lord,

and therefore Belshazzar, successfully diverted for the moment, finished

his meal more pleasantly than he had begun it. When finally he rose from

his couch it was late. The moon hung in the heavens, and the court-yard

was flooded with silver light. A group of guardsmen, clustering round a

fire, sat chanting charms in chorus. Belshazzar heard their voices with

a vague longing for shouts of men, for the shrill neighs of horses, for

the rattle of chariot wheels, the clash of arms, the thunderous murmur

of battle as he had known it in his youth. If only war, open and

honorable, lay between him and Kurush of Elam--well enough. In that he

stood his fair chance of winning; and if he lost, it was death at his

own hands. The game that he feared and that he hated was the one of

underhandedness, of lies, of treachery, of bribery. When a man could be

bought for gold there was none to trust, none to feel sure of. And upon

these things the prince wearily pondered as he gazed out into the night,

wondering, half consciously, whether to go to Ribâta or to seek rest

from his mental burden in sleep.

While he debated this point with himself there came a commotion at the

palace gate, the arrival of a fast chariot, a peremptory call for

admittance, and his own name spoken in a familiar voice. An instant

later a slave ran to him with the word:

"May it be pleasing to the prince my lord, Lord Amraphel, the

high-priest of Bel, asks conduct to the presence of the Prince

Belshazzar."

"Bring him here to my side," was the quick reply.

The slave left him obediently, and Belshazzar prepared to receive his

visitor. Retreating a little towards the centre of his dining-room, he

stood with the torch-light at his back and the glow of the lamp too far

in front to shine upon his face. Here he awaited the coming of his

father's enemy.

Amraphel entered the presence of the prince royal with his usual

unruffled dignity. He was followed by two slaves, who stood behind him

during the performance of the elaborate salutations. Then they were

dismissed, and bidden to await the return of their master to his

chariot.

Belshazzar was unattended. Thus the departure of these slaves left the

two men quite alone, out of the sight and out of the hearing of the rest

of the world. However much the prince was on his guard, his manner

betrayed nothing but cold courtesy. This sudden incident had come as a

relief to him. Action of any sort was welcome. He was perfectly at his

ease, barely polite, little respectful of the age and station of the

priest.

With Amraphel it was different. The instant that his attendants departed

his air of unbending dignity dropped off him like a cloak, and into his

face there came so marked an expression of hatred and of suppressed fury

that Belshazzar's eyes, meeting by chance those of his adversary, forgot

their course, and remained fascinated and fixed on that other gaze.

Simultaneously both stepped forward.

"My lord Amraphel honors me unexpectedly," said the prince, giving the

other a free opening.

"It is not to thy honor, but rather on account of thy infamy, that I

come," was the reply.

Belshazzar's lips straightened themselves out haughtily. "Let me summon

a seer to interpret thy words," he said.

"My words shall interpret themselves to you. What answer make you to the

charge of murdering Nergal-Yukin?"

For a moment Belshazzar was silent. Then he laughed--a clear, ringing

laugh.

Instantly Amraphel lost his self-control. Reaching Belshazzar's side in

two strides, he lifted his right hand in the face of the prince. Before

the blow fell Belshazzar had seized the priest's arm fast in his grip,

and with all his giant strength thrust from him the figure of the old

man.

"Beware, Amraphel," he said, so softly that the priest just caught the

words.

"Hark you, son of the sheep-king, hark you! If within the hour your

slaves, the criers of Nergal-Yukin's death, be not recalled from the

city streets, not one of them shall be left alive by morning."

"If that is thy thought, Amraphel of Bel, at daybreak to-morrow not a

priest in the city shall dare openly to wear the goat-skin and still

live."

"You defy the gods?"

"I defy their ministers."

"Then, by all that is holy in heaven and earth, be thou and thine foully

cursed forevermore!"

Belshazzar's lips curled again; and again, desecrating all the

traditions of his race, he laughed--loud, and long, but not mirthfully.

Amraphel, as he gathered his scarlet robe close about his meagre frame,

grew white--very white. His head was held high, and his eyes flashed

with a fire that age could not quell, as he spoke his final word: "Be

_thou_ ware, Belshazzar of Babylon, lest the curse of the gods be given

for fulfilment into the hands of men!"

As he turned on his heel Belshazzar's answer came, and by it the priest

learned how surely the governor of the city was of his mother's loins,

and not of his father's blood. "Thy hand and that of Daniel the Jew,

yea, and of him ye call the Achæmenian, will find space enough on my

body whereon to strike and strike again, O Amraphel. But see that ye

fight as men, and not as dogs. Else, by my faith, as dogs ye shall

surely die!"

Belshazzar hurled the last word after the priest into the court-yard,

for Amraphel was now well on his way back to his chariot. The echo of

the prince's voice rolled off into silence; and after a little time

Belshazzar found himself still standing beside the table, his head bent,

his eyes moving vacantly over the floor, while his thoughts were as

empty as he felt his words to have been. A little after the interview he

sought his rest. And when morning dawned again and he called his slaves

to his side, the criers of Nergal-Yukin's death had not been slain;

though perhaps in the end that consummation had been better for the

royal house of Babylon.

XIV

STRANGE GODS[10]

Nergal-Yukin's death, the circumstances of it, and the blatant

proclamation of these things by Belshazzar's slaves, facts skilfully

manipulated by Amraphel and his order, threw all Babylon into an uproar.

Naturally, the city was divided into factions. The priests and their

satellites formed a sufficiently attractive nucleus to draw around it a

great body of the common people whose lives at best were only a round of

prayers and exorcisms; while all the army, that feared and followed

Belshazzar as it feared and followed no god, drew to itself the other

faction of citizens loyal to the crown. From the first, however, the

priests, who counted also the Jews to a man in their party, were

stronger than their opponents. And Amraphel, moved as he was by the two

great forces of hate and overweening ambition, worked early and late to

increase his majority. He seized every slightest advantage, manipulated

it dauntlessly, and expanded it incredibly. His final interview with the

prince was regarded by both sides as a declaration of open hostility;

and while the royal party was now apparently quiescent, the things that

Amraphel would not do to win over to his side a single man, were scarce

worth considering.

While Cyrus and Gobryas with their invading armies were still far away

in the south and in the north of the country, nothing that would

precipitate matters could be done in Babylon. Indeed, a premature

rebellion was the one thing that could save the Great City to her lawful

rulers; and no one in the city knew this better than its high-priest. It

was for this reason only that Amraphel had failed to carry out his

threat with regard to Belshazzar's criers. And it was also for this

reason that Belshazzar had so openly and so recklessly defied his enemy

at their last meeting. Could Amraphel have been irritated past his

self-control and so forced into some rash act that would precipitate the

rebellion before Cyrus was at hand, the contest would at least be an

equal one. But with Beltishazzar at his elbow, and the funds of the

house of Êgibi at Daniel's command and Daniel's command only, there was

no chance of matters coming to a crisis before their appointed time. For

Daniel's whole soul and mind were in this plot; and, whatever doubt

there might be about the soul, it was quite certain that his mind was no

ordinary one.

Amraphel's most telling means of influencing the common people was by

temple harangues. Every day, after the early sacrifice, a priest would

come before the throng of assembled people and talk to them, not of

their duty towards the gods and the priests of the gods, but of the

falseness and the iniquity of the royal house. These preachments began

almost immediately after the death of the rab-mag, the tale of which,

with its accompanying moral, was worn threadbare in order that

Belshazzar's brutal instincts might be made sufficiently plain to the

dense minds of the listening commoners. The fact that Belshazzar held

priestly office and a priestly title was of no consequence. Indeed, it

became a subject for further revilings. Certainly it could not be denied

that the heir-apparent was extremely lax in his religious duties.

Scarcely one day out of ten did he appear in the precincts of the

temple, much less officiate at sacrifice. Without doubt, the gods were

angry with him. How could it be otherwise?

It was not long before Belshazzar began to feel the breath of

unpopularity. When he drove forth into the city few people took notice

of him, none did him reverence, a few eyed him askance, and once or

twice he was assailed by some opprobrious phrase. He felt rather keenly

the disfavor of the people, but made no attempt to remedy the matter. He

knew very well the direction that affairs were taking; but he could do

nothing but bide his time, and at night keep his eyes from the future,

since sleeplessness brings back to no man his wealth. One thing,

however, the prince, as governor of the city, could do, under the

general directorship of Nânâ-Babilû at Sippar. He could keep the guards

of the city in form, and this he did well. There were at this time about

ten thousand of the regular army in Babylon, and of these the finest

were Belshazzar's own regiment, under command of Shâpik-Zeri, all of

them men of Gutium--the province of which Gobryas had once been

governor. These, the best-trained soldiers in Babylonia, were loyal to

their last drop of blood to their lord. Belshazzar was a fine soldier,

iron-clad in his rules, and known to be himself fearless on the field.

His men worshipped his physique, feared his strength, and delighted in

paying him the honor and obedience that he would otherwise have exacted

by force of arms. Thus Belshazzar was seen no longer in the goat-skin,

but he made up for the deficiency by appearing at every hour of the day

in helmet and shield, on his way either to or from the great

parade-ground where the daily reviews of the various regiments were

held.

It was about this time, the middle of the month of May, that Charmides

the Greek experienced a sudden disgust for his position in the temple

and left it, pleading that the illness of his wife demanded his

continued presence at her side. Unworldly, improvident, sentimental as

his move was, he nevertheless experienced a great relief when he turned

his back for an indefinite period on the great House of Lies. For things

had been done there that the young Greek could not think of without

furious gusts of anger and rebellion. Besides this, Ramûa was ill,

wretchedly ill, as the result of a fall that had caused a series of

complications over which both Charmides and Beltani were exceedingly

anxious. Still, she was in no real danger, and in spite of his

statement, Charmides did not spend all of his hours at her side.

About ten days after his leaving the temple, Charmides had cause of

rather a curious nature for regretting that he was no longer in a

situation to know the inner aspects of certain things. A proclamation

had gone through the city striking astonishment to every heart, and to

none more than those of the priesthood. It was to the effect that, on

the first day of the month of Duzu, twenty new gods would take up their

residence in the Great City.

Poor Nabu-Nahid, reading aright the threatening signs of his own and his

son's unpopularity, believed that the time had come for his great act.

As a priest of the highest order he was empowered to command the

high-priest of every temple, with the exception of Amraphel alone, that

he, together with two Enû, two Asipû, and two Barû, should form part of

the great procession of strange gods when these entered the city.

Moreover, each temple was to be especially purified and prepared for the

reception of a new statue, and henceforth double services must take

place in each temple, that both the old god and the new one might be

properly honored. The date for the procession was set for the last of

Sivân. A document explanatory of the whole matter, and signed and sealed

by the house of Shamash, was sent to each of the priests, and to every

monastery of Zicarû; and these were also read aloud in the temples by

eunuchs, till all Babylon was informed of the king's act, and all

Babylon prepared for the holy day.

That morning dawned like every other morning of the season, in a flush

of fierce crimson, gradually melting into the living gold that flooded

the sky with a furnace heat and poured a shower of burning light upon

the river with its clinging city, and over the yellow desert far beyond.

Holiday had been proclaimed, and at an early hour every street leading

to a temple was packed on either side with gayly dressed men and women

and their children. Charmides went alone. Ramûa could not walk, and

Beltani had preferred remaining with her to standing for hours in the

glare of the sun, waiting for the procession. Both women, however, had

begged Charmides to go and see it, that he might describe it to them on

his return. Therefore the Greek took up his position on the edge of the

square of Istar, into the deserted temple of which the old and sacred

statue of the goddess of Erech was to be carried first of all.

The crowd here was especially thick. Only by vigorous pushing and

squeezing, and some very rapid talking, could Charmides find a place for

himself. Having reached a vantage-point, however, he proceeded to fall

into a reverie--a reverie of a year ago, when he had stood waiting for a

pageant, an utter stranger to the city, hungry, friendless, and

homesick. He could recall every trivial incident of the day with ease,

from Baba and the goat's milk she gave him, to the long afternoon with

Ramûa, now for nine months his wife. He had got to a philosophical stage

in his dreams when a light hand was laid on his arm, and he looked up to

find Baba at his elbow. He was glad to see her, glad of a companion to

talk to; and so they two watched the procession together, bent to the

dust before the little black images dotting the line in twenty places,

and borne each on its golden platform on the shoulders of six eunuchs.

Nabu-Nahid, in white, drove first of all. Behind him, frowning and

stiff, and in anything but a pleasant frame of mind, was Vul-Ramân in

his car. Belshazzar came farther along the line, standing unconcernedly

in his place, his white muslin robe falling to his feet, the goat-skin

fastened over his left shoulder. Everywhere he was greeted with murmurs

of disapproval; but though he could hardly have failed to hear some of

them, his face gave no sign of it. Quiet, immovable, slightly scornful

in his expression, he endured the mental and physical discomforts of the

day with a nonchalance that would have deceived Amraphel himself.

The procession left the little temple by the river-bank at ten o'clock

in the morning and broke ranks in the square of the temple of Marduk

just at sunset, with the last ceremony concluded--Nabonidus' last card

played. Twenty new gods would watch over the city that night, and twenty

extra sacrifices would take place in their honor on the morrow. Perhaps

it was as well that Nabonidus, in his pathetic faith, should not have

heard the comments of the tired temple-servants as they worked through

the night, preparing for the next day's services. Twenty new gods asleep

in Babylon--twice twenty demons at work in the minds of men. Could the

outcome of the fast-approaching struggle still look doubtful to any

reasonable thinker whose heart was on neither side?

Belshazzar and his father drove home together from the square of Marduk.

Weary as he was, Nabu-Nahid was in a joyous frame of mind. He talked

incessantly about the success of his great experiment. Secure in the

favor of Heaven, he could easily cast aside all fears of earthly

disfavor, and his whole person so radiated delight that Belshazzar's

mood passed unnoticed, his expression of unhappiness was transfigured by

the sunset glare into one as rapt and as joyous as his father's own.

When at last they two dismounted together before the palace gates,

Belshazzar's heart gave a great throb of relief. He had that day felt

against him all the hostility of that Great City, and though they were

his own, and he should be called upon some day perhaps to die for them,

yet he felt a sensation akin to hatred for all the people whose

superstitious and pitifully cringing hearts could be moved by the

priesthood to moods and beliefs inimical in every particular to the

hopes and plans of their temporal lords.

Belshazzar made his way straight to his private apartments and there

doffed his priest's dress, commanding it to be carried out of his sight,

and vowing that never again would he put it on. Then he donned a tunic

of gray cotton cloth and took his way to the seraglio, into the presence

of Istar. He found her sitting on the broad pile of rugs and cushions

that filled half her living-room, holding the child in her arms,

crooning over it as only a mother can. She welcomed her husband with

eagerness, however, showing by the light in her face her delight in his

coming.

"And do these new gods hold not their high places in Babylon, my lord?"

she asked, when, having called for food and wine, he threw himself down

beside her.

Belshazzar's answer was a bitter little smile.

"And they were received in silence? Tell me of the image that was put up

into the shrine of Istar. Did the people honor it--did they praise it

and bow down before it?"

"More than any other they showed it honor. Ah, my beloved, for my sake

the people hate thee! Knowest thou how they hate me? My name is taught

to be reviled in every temple. I am an enemy of the priests, therefore

am I mocked in the high places. Istar--Istar--I sometimes dream that not

much longer shall I and my father dwell in our Great City." He spoke the

words lingeringly, with his eyes fixed on her face.

Istar answered the look well. Not a suggestion of fear, not a hint of

dread was to be found in her smile. And while her hand caressed the tiny

palm of the sleeping child, she said, quietly: "Whither thou goest, dear

lord, there I will go. Unto the ends of the earth--and beyond--I will

follow thee."

"Istar! Thou art happy in me?" he cried, impulsively, leaning over and

putting his hand to her lips.

The smile still lingered as she kissed the hand; and then, taking it

gently away, she answered and said: "Happy--Yea, Belshazzar, so happy

that I, too, believe that our earth-time nears its end. I believe that I

have found what I sought. It is the love for his fellows lying in the

heart of every man that binds him to the greater love of the All-Father.

The love of one for another sanctifies every life. Thee and this--my

little child--I love."

Belshazzar looked wistfully upon his wife. There were times when she was

too far above him for his own content. Yet in her words there was always

something that, vaguely understood, stirred his brain to a painful

effort to follow her to her height. Now, as if he would hold her back

with him, he took both her hands, leaving the child to lie in her lap

unheeded, and asked, with a change of tone: "Hast thou been alone

through all the weary day, beloved?"

"Nay, Baba of Ribâta's house and Charmides the Greek came here together

to me, after noon. Thou knowest the Greek--him whose lyre once you broke

before me."

"Ay. He is a temple-servant."

"He serves no longer in the temple. Out of loyalty to us--to thee and to

me--he works no more in the statue of oracles, nor does he play at

sacrifice."

"Loyalty to me!" Belshazzar laughed slightly.

Istar gave him a quiet look, and her half-open lips closed again.

"Art thou angered with me, O my beloved, for being forever jealous?

Istar! Couldst thou but know half of my love! If thou couldst read the

terror in my heart--the terror of losing thee and thy love--"

He broke off quickly as the eunuchs brought in a table covered with meat

and wine. It was placed before the prince, and Belshazzar, faint with

his long fast, applied himself to the food and drink, and the intimate

little passage with his wife was finished.

The following twelve days passed quietly in the palace. Belshazzar

withdrew himself absolutely from city affairs, and, beyond going daily

to the reviews and drills of his regiment of Guti and the city guards,

he never passed the palace gates. Nabu-Nahid, on the other hand, worked

feverishly. The state of public affairs was beginning to trouble him.

Five days after the procession of his gods he was obliged to acknowledge

to himself that his great hopes for their intercession were not to be

fulfilled. Just how far Nabonidus' blind faith went, no one, not even

himself, really knew. That which was artistic in his nature--and he was

no mean artist at heart--had led him into the pursuit of architecture

for the love of it. A passion for things of antiquity had caused him to

explore the deserted ruins of many a crumbling temple, with results that

made the soul of the seeker after knowledge tremble with delight. Many a

long-buried library had been brought by his efforts into the light of

day; and the religion of Accad of old, with its heroic tales, its

prayer-poems, its chronicles of war and the chase, had been opened to

his eyes and to those of the scholars that worked with him. The gods of

other days had been brought forth from their ruinous shrines and placed

in newer, brighter homes. And after these things, it somehow seemed to

him that a reward should be forthcoming from his country.

But when Nabonidus came to know that, at the instigation of Amraphel,

the new gods were left unworshipped in their shrines, that sacrifices

were no longer offered up in the temples, that people were turned away

out of the holy places with the word that the great gods were angered by

the intrusion of these others, that none of them would heed prayers and

burnt-offerings till the strangers were removed from the Sun-built

House, then the heart of the king grew sick within him, and suddenly he

came to a realizing sense of the power of the priesthood. Councils were

held in the palace. Lords, chancellors, judges, and officers from every

department, together with deputies from the provinces, met in the palace

and were presided over by the king. Plans were brought up, discussed,

and discarded. There was only one thing, apparently, to be done; yet the

doing of it would involve such political cataclysms that, dangerous as

was the position of the crown, Nabu-Nahid still hesitated to force

Amraphel from his place.

At this time, when Adar's month was a third gone, came news of a great

battle fought in the south country around Larsam, between the troops of

Cyrus and the defending army, resulting in the victory of the invader

and the utter rout and defeat of the Chaldees. Before the news of this

could have reached the north country, another army--the Persian, in

command of the traitor-governor Gobryas of Gutium, Cyrus' ablest

general--had gathered about Hit to begin a rapid southward march towards

Sippar, by way of Agade. The meaning of this movement was only too

plain. Cyrus and Gobryas, between them sweeping Babylonia from south to

north, would come together for their final siege before the walls of the

Great City.

This plan unfolded itself slowly before the eyes of the king and his

council, and Gobryas was within two days' march of Sippar before

Nabonidus was fully aware of the danger. Well might Amraphel and Daniel

the Jew laugh together and rejoice at the success of their allies. At a

time like this, what reproof for neglect of the gods could be given them

by a king threatened with such certain disaster? A month now, at the

outside, and Cyrus would be at the gates of Babylon. By then the long

labor of plotting and of treachery would be over. There remained only

the final stroke, now preparing, and then the swift, clean end.

During this time, while Nabu-Nahid seemed to be aging a year a day under

the pressure of difficulties that he was too weak to avert or to

overcome, Belshazzar was living a life of careless idleness with Istar

and his child. The two of them knew that the time of their joy of love

was nearly over. Both were unwilling that anything should come between

them before the inevitable end. How it was that Belshazzar could put

away all trouble, all apprehension of the future from his mind, he

himself did not know. Perhaps he had been under the spell of

apprehension for so long that now, when the dread of it had reached his

father, he was empowered to straighten up and put down his load, till he

must pick it up again increased in weight a thousandfold. But during the

days that followed he could remember his first two weeks of summer as a

foretaste of the peace eternal of the silver sky. From dawn to dawn,

barring those two noon hours when Istar slept and he rode out to the

parade, Belshazzar was at his wife's side. Their thoughts, their dreams,

their desires, were alike. There was no need to talk one to the other.

The mind of each was to the other as a written tablet; and they read in

silence, clasped each in the other's arms. Istar had become very tender,

very clinging, very feminine now. Those periods of divinity when her

personality became elusive and her mind attained to unfathomable heights

were gone. She was of earth, human in her beauty and in her frailty of

physique, radiant only with an earthly love. It was Belshazzar that was

becoming transfigured--transfigured through his love for her; for his

passion had broadened into a power of renunciation; and he showed the

woman a glorified reverence, which, beyond her to conceive, had been

beyond her to command.

It was in this wise that their twelve days passed; and on the night of

the twelfth of June Nabu-Nahid entered unannounced into the presence of

his son, with the decree that ended Belshazzar's dream lying written in

his face.

Istar, dressed in robes of deep crimson silk, girdled and sandalled with

gold, lay back upon her divan, softly singing to a lute that she played

herself. The light from a hanging-lamp fell over her figure and left the

rest of the room in shadow. In this shadow, seated upon an ivory chair,

was the prince, holding the murmuring child fast in his gentle arms.

They had been thus for an hour when the interruption came and Nabu-Nahid

entered, bringing with him the atmosphere in which he had been living of

doubts and fears, hates and quarrels, intrigues and treacheries, and

dispelling instantly the love-dreams of youth.

Nabonidus was not yet an old man in years; but few would have been able

to make out whether it had taken fourscore years, or five, to produce

his peculiar appearance. He was a vision of white. Hair, skin, hands,

robes, sandals, all were white; and which the whitest one could not have

told. His face was bloodless, and resembled a piece of bleached papyrus

which, having lain in a damp place, had curled up into a thousand minute

wrinkles, from the midst of which a pair of dark, dull eyes looked

wearily forth. These eyes were the only feature that one much regarded.

The others sloped insignificantly into the pallid plain of the cheeks.

And Nabonidus' whole mood was apparent in his walk. So dragging, so

weary, so despondent was every step, that, as he entered Istar's room,

Belshazzar shrank back from his presence in involuntary despair.

Just inside the door-way the king stopped and looked about him. Istar

laid down her lute and rose, regarding the intruder with quiet

apprehension. Seeing her, Belshazzar, too, came forward out of the

gloom, holding the child still in his arms. And his voice first broke

the silence.

"Enter thou, my father, and sit down with us!"

Istar supplemented the words with a little gesture.

Nabu-Nahid listened, looked closely at his son and the burden in his

arms, and then turned slowly to the woman, gazing at her for a long time

before he spoke. "And thou art she--whom we worshipped," he murmured,

musingly.

Istar drew back a little, and Belshazzar took two rapid strides forward.

"Dost thou desire speech with me, my father? Let us then retire to my

apartments. There we will talk."

"Twelve days hast thou been sought in thy apartment; twelve days hath

this been thy abode. Let it then be mine for an hour. After that I will

go forth again--alone." There was a kind of strength in this last word

that sounded strange from the lips of the king, and to which neither

Belshazzar nor Istar could find any reply.

Istar went to her husband and took the child from him, saying, softly:

"I will leave thee here and go into another room. Cause thy father to

sit and talk with thee. And--if there is need of thee, I pray that my

lord will come to bid me farewell before he goes." Her voice trembled

slightly, and as she lifted her eyes to Belshazzar's he found them

shining with tears.

Her husband gave her the child and would have let her go; but Nabonidus

raised his hand.

"Let her take the child, Belshazzar, for it is not meet that thou

shouldst sit as a nurse of infants. But as Istar is thy wife and beloved

of thee, let her remain here, that ye may both hear my last words

concerning Babylon."

"_Thy last words!_" cried the prince, quickly.

"Yea, for I am come to bid ye both farewell. To-morrow I go up to

Sippar, which is threatened with destruction."

"Gobryas is there?"

"To-night he lies six kasbi[11] north of the city."

"But Nânâ-Babilû and all the army are there. There will be a siege. We

will send reinforcements from Babylon. Sippar cannot fall."

For the first time in many years Nabonidus regarded his son with

something akin to scorn. "In the twelve days that thou hast lain hidden

here many things have come to pass. Sippar is in revolt. The priests of

the sun-college have incited the people to rebel against my rule; and

they threaten to open the gates to Gobryas. Nânâ-Babilû sends me

messengers to say that half his army will fail him when it comes to the

battle. It is for this reason that I go to Sippar."

Belshazzar rose, his face alight with eagerness. "Not thou, O king, not

thou, but I, will go up to-morrow into the city of the north. My

regiment of Gutium shall follow me. There, with those men alone, I will

hold Sippar against Gobryas--ay, and Kurush, too, if--"

"Many things I have known thee do, Bel-shar-utsur; yet boaster wert thou

never before. If thou know it not, my son, then I tell thee now, for it

is well that thou shouldst learn it from my lips, Babylonia hates

thee--for thy arrogance, for thy strength, for thy will, for sacrilege

committed often against the gods; above all, for thy tyranny over the

priests. If thou shouldst set forth to Sippar, thy life would not endure

a single day. And the regiment of Gutium must stay in Babylon. It is in

them that the Great City puts her trust. Thou, also, as governor of the

city, must be here to lead them. I came not to thy presence to be

taught, but rather to talk with thee upon thy position here."

Belshazzar stood silent, flushed with chagrin, yet in his heart

acknowledging the truth of his father's words. Moreover, there was in

his father's manner something that had not been there before. Beset as

he was on every side, Nabu-Nahid had suddenly become a king. Istar

perceived it and marvelled; and, though she did not speak, the old man

found sympathy in her presence. Belshazzar forced himself at last to

ask, in a subdued tone:

"Where wilt thou go in Sippar, O my father? Into the household of Nânâ,

or to the river-palace?"

"Neither of these places. I shall go to the priests' college. It was

there that my youth was spent. Five years ago I dwelt there through the

summer. When Nitocris died, I went there after the month of wailing. It

hath long been a refuge to me. I will seek it again. If I have yet any

power in the world, it is there that I shall find it."

Belshazzar nodded thoughtfully. He recognized the truth of his father's

words; yet he was only beginning to realize the danger of this desperate

journey. It came over him again, in a vast wave, how great were the

straits in which his city lay. There seemed to be nothing for him to

say, so completely was his father master of the situation. And presently

Nabonidus, with a faint sigh, lifted up his voice again:

"Belshazzar, thou seest surely the danger that all are in. Of my own

free will I go forth to Sippar; yet I have little thought that I shall

return thence again. All things are in the hands of the great gods. If

it is decreed that I perish at the hands of my enemies, I pray only that

Ânû will hold for me a place in the silver sky. Through seventeen years

I have ruled over the Great City, and in that time I have never

willingly wronged any man. Why it should be that men wrong me, I know

not; and I ask not.

"Thou, my son, art trained to the thought of ruling over the mighty

kingdom of the Chaldees. I charge thee only that if word of my death

reach thine ears, rule over thy people and mine as a brave king and not

a cruel one. In the years to come let thy people look to thee

confidently and in love. Be just with all; and let none know thee in

hate.

"Thou, Istar of the skies, who hast dwelt as a goddess in the holy

temple of Ê-Âna, and art now become a princess of the king's house, if

in time thou art made queen of Babylon, let not thy heart beat with

pride. Love thy king. Bear his children and rear them in temperance and

peace. Open thy lips to no words of folly. Unveil thy face before no

man. Be the faithful servant and companion of him who holds thee dearer

than all others. And, having heard my bidding, hold also my memory in

reverence.

"Behold, I have said my say, and I go forth. On the morrow, Belshazzar,

thou wilt be master in the palace. Take up thy duties, and leave the

child to its mother's arms. Now Ânû, Ea, and Bel, the three lords of the

gods, keep our fortunes, our lives, and our hearts in safety evermore!"