Nabu-Nahid held out a thin, white hand to each of them, Belshazzar and

Istar, his children, and each of them pressed it reverently to brow and

breast. Then the old man threw the corner of his white mantle once more

over his shoulder, and, with a stateliness born of his newly royal

spirit, departed from the room.

Istar and Belshazzar saw him go in silence. Their own days of happiness

were at an end; but he who had ended them had given them both the desire

to meet the veiled future in a manner worthy of their God and of the

king that went before.

XV

SIPPAR

Sippar, the northernmost city of Babylonia, lay a day's journey from the

capital. Although five Sippars could have been placed within the

towering circuit of Nimitti-Bel, and room have been left for Ur besides,

still, thirty thousand people, besides Shamash the sun-god, made it

their home. Nebuchadrezzar, the great king, had thought it a town of no

little importance; for he had expended upon it as much money as the

treasury held and his conquered nations would give for tribute, in

making those vast reservoirs and the machinery by means of which the

course of the river Euphrates could be turned out of its channel and

into Sippar, and thence sent forth into a thousand cross-country canals,

leaving the river-bed, for the rest of its southward course, as dry as a

brick. On account of these vast works of primitive engineers, the little

place had for the past fifty years been famous from Agade to Terredou,

from Kutha to the desert; till, from being a dilapidated mud-village,

its pilgrim visitors had turned it, with their yearly wealth, into a

well-built and well-kept city clustered round three celebrated

buildings--the astronomical ziggurat, the temple of the sun, and the

college of the Chaldees.

These last could be grouped under one head, since all three of them were

ruled by one master--not Shamash, but the high-priest of Shamash, the

first astronomer of the kingdom and the president of this college of

sciences, and these combined dignities caused him to be known as the

first priest in the kingdom. As a matter of fact, the religious house

and its attachments were as old as--a little older than--the city of

Sippar. Sun-worship had been instituted here as long ago as tradition

knew; just as moon-worship began in Ur, according to Berossus, about

thirty thousand years before the day of the Mighty Hunter! The house

attached to the temple for the purpose of training its priests had

gradually, through three or four centuries, come to be the great school

of education for the priests of all Babylonia. It was the home of

tradition and of sedition; the breeder of anti-monarchical ideas, the

advocate of a hierarchical government. Nabonidus' father, a member of

this college and high-priest of a Babylonian temple, having married the

daughter of Nebuchadrezzar, made double claim to the throne of Chaldea;

and, though he never came into the place of his mighty father-in-law,

yet his son, the young Nabu-Nahid, educated in his father's college and

early admitted to the priesthood, was brought up in the full belief that

he was king by right of Heaven. Five years on the throne had changed him

in many respects. Amraphel had come down from Sippar to administer to

Bel-Marduk, and to keep watch over the general priesthood and the ruler

of the Great City; and Nabu-Nahid had grown more accustomed to the crown

than to the goat-skin. Moreover, the education of the prince royal was

continued along very unpriestly lines. Therefore, though the king had

never entirely severed his connection with the great institution where

he had spent his youth, his attitude towards it was indeterminate, and

its feeling for him one of well-disguised but none the less bitter

hostility.

At this time of the middle of June in the seventeenth year of the king's

reign, Sippar was in a frenzy of excitement. The town was filled to

overflowing with troops assembled a month ago from every city and

village within a radius of sixty miles. Nânâ-Babilû, commander-in-chief

of the army, was lodged with Sharrukin, governor of the city; and these

two men were loyal, heart and soul, to the king. As a consequence, they

were also bitterly inimical to the priesthood. The college, on the

contrary, bristling as it was with full-fledged priests and half-fledged

students, waited to give Cyrus himself, or Gobryas by proxy, a royal

welcome. The men of the army were divided into factions. As for the rest

of the city, it was a little Babylon in its general uneasiness and

disturbance.

Three weeks after the home army occupied Sippar, came word of the rapid

advancement of Gobryas from the northeast; and the town was hurriedly

prepared for a siege. Finally, on the night of the thirteenth, the

arrival of two despatches, one from the north, the other from the south,

brought consternation to the far-seeing mind of Nânâ-Babilû, and a

dramatic sense of triumph to the members of the college. As the news

became known in the city, the town quickly took on an air of festivity.

The night was lighted by bonfires. The streets were alive with people. A

great clamor of singing, of shouting, of drinking, and general riot rang

through the twisting streets. And men, women, and children, soldiers and

citizens, were still up and dressed in holiday garments, when, at dawn

on the morning of the fourteenth of the month, Nabu-Nahid drove in at

the southern gate of the city.

Sharrukin the governor, Nânâ-Babilû, and Ludar Bit-Shamash, the

sun-priest, each in his state chariot, each the acme of stiff courtesy,

came together at the gate to greet the king their lord. The governor and

the general regarded the arrival of the high-priest with no little

surprise and some resentment. Sharrukin's palace had been carefully

prepared for the reception of the royal master; and his chagrin at the

idea of Nabonidus' going to lodge at the college of the Chaldees,

overcame his appreciation of the policy and the daring of that act.

Nabonidus came attended by a very small suite. He had travelled from

Babylon with no more pretension than any petty nobleman. A charioteer

drove him, but he himself held his umbrella over his head. He was

dressed in the same simple white robes in which he had bidden his son

farewell. His retinue consisted of two chariots, containing his

secretaries and his favorite slave, while a group of six horsemen

followed. His manner, on arriving, was as simple as his dress. Seeing

Sharrukin and Nânâ-Babilû, his mild eyes lighted with pleasure; but it

was to Ludar that he gave his first greeting. The little party proceeded

slowly through the principal streets of Sippar on its way to the

college, Nabonidus and Ludar first, side by side in their chariots, the

governor and general just behind. Nabonidus' manner was unemotional,

rather matter-of-fact. Ludar himself never dreamed how closely the king

was watching the effect of his coming on the people, and the nature of

his reception by them. Certainly his path was thronged--and by townsmen

only. The soldiers had been ordered to their barracks and were not to

appear till the afternoon's review. As they proceeded, however, Nânâ

began bitterly to regret that at least one loyal regiment had not been

scattered among the people with the command to force their neighbors

into giving the customary loyal greeting to the king. Silence, utter,

unbreakable, significant, reigned over the crowd. A thousand black eyes

were every moment fixed unwinkingly on Nabonidus, but not a mouth was

opened to speak a welcome to him. Here and there, indeed, was the

suggestion of a muttered threat that came quickly to the ears of Ludar.

But whether the king heard, or, hearing, understood these expressions,

no one could tell.

Shamash was scarcely an hour up the sky when the four chariots and the

little guard drew rein before the gate of the great college, and

Nabonidus entered the institution between two long lines of white-robed

priests, who gave the salute to Patêsi when he passed.

Nânâ and the governor left their lord at the gate, with the understanding

that they should return to escort him to the review of troops

early in the afternoon. Ludar alone accompanied the king to the

room assigned to him--the room in which he had passed his youth--a

small, oblong, white-tiled place, with a high image of Shamash at one

end of it, and two tiny, square windows high in the opposite wall. A

narrow bed, two stools, an ivory chair, and an immovable table,

furnished the little place; and the king, seeing it again after some

years, looked about him with a faint smile of pleasure.

"Is it pleasing to the king that he should be thus humbly lodged?"

inquired Ludar, behind him. "Or will he choose to occupy the royal

apartments that are at his command?"

"The king, Ludar, is no less a king because he lives humbly. Let this

pleasant place be my abode while I am here."

Ludar wondered for a moment whether the king had intended the double

meaning in his words; and, not knowing, he yet resented the possibility.

His voice, however, was no less smooth and quiet when he said again: "It

is near the hour of sacrifice in the great temple, father king. Will you

attend it, or is it fitting that you sleep after the journey?"

Nabonidus sighed inaudibly, but his eyes never strayed to the couch. "I

come to the sacrifice, Ludar. Yet first bid them bring me milk from the

goat to be offered for sacrifice, for I need refreshment after the weary

night. Then let my slave bring to me two jars of water, that I may make

my ablutions, removing from my body the dust of the way and the sand

blown up from the desert. Then I will come to the sacrifice."

Ludar, unsuccessful in his scheme of petty torment, left the room,

smarting under the indignity of being asked to carry orders to a

slave--orders that, for reasons of policy, he could not disobey. His

only method of revenge was to prolong the sacrifice for two weary hours,

while Nabonidus, faint for food and dropping with weariness, was obliged

to stand over the sacrificial altar, chanting Sumerian prayers and

feeding the flames with oil, while the savory goat's flesh slowly

broiled before him.

At ten o'clock, however, he was able to make a dignified retreat from

his religious duties; and then, reaching his own room, and putting his

faithful eunuch on guard at the door, he left an order that he should be

awakened only on the arrival of Nânâ-Babilû, when that dignitary came to

escort him to the review of troops. This would be about two hours after

midday; and until that time Nabonidus threw himself down upon his couch.

The tired eyelids closed over the tired eyes. For a little time

earth-troubles faded from him, while in his dreams the beloved dead were

restored to him again.

When he awoke, Nânâ was at his side, looking down at him solemnly, his

arms folded across his breast. The king started up, annoyed at having

been left undisturbed for so long. The room was wrapped in twilight, and

the face of the visitor was in shadow. Something in his general's

manner, or perhaps in his attitude, caught Nabonidus' attention, and

presently, having risen from his couch, he said, tentatively:

"You are late--very late, Nânâ. Evening is upon us. Surely the review--"

"There was no review, Nabu-Nahid, my lord. I bade thy servant not

disturb thy rest. There was no need. I came to quiet thy fears--if,

indeed, there is fear in thee. Yet Chaldea knows thy race for a brave

one."

"Speak, Nânâ--speak! These words of thine come strangely to me. Or do I

dream?"

Nânâ smiled grimly. "There is no dream in this, O king, that Gobryas and

his army of Medes and Persians are encamped before the city, and that

half my troops refuse to obey my commands."

Nabonidus went back to his couch and seated himself on the edge of it.

"At what hour did the enemy come?" he asked, quietly.

"At four hours after sunrise, about the time for the close of the

sacrifice, they were observed by the men in the north watch-towers. They

marched around the city, out of the reach of arrows, and are now

encamped before the south gate."

"And there has been no move to draw them into battle? There has been no

sortie? The old form of war--"

Nânâ-Babilû bent his head upon his breast, and all of a sudden Nabonidus

came to himself and realized their situation. Before the slow, orderly

procession of thoughts that passed through his mind he did not lower his

head nor take his eyes from the form of his general. After a little

while he rose again, without any appearance of agitation, crossed the

room, pushed aside the curtain of the door, and gave certain orders to

the statue-like eunuch who waited before it. Then, returning, he sat

down in the ivory chair to wait, while, in obedience to a gesture, Nânâ

took one of the tabourets at a little distance from the bed. Then the

two men sat together, waiting silently. Presently a slave entered the

room bearing two lighted lamps, which he hung upon their accustomed

hooks in the wall. In the new light the king turned to his officer.

"When have you eaten?" he said, kindly.

"A little before dawn to-day, lord," was the reply.

"Bring thou food and wine for both, then," commanded the king; and the

eunuch, bowing, left the room.

When they were alone Nânâ's figure drooped back into its place; but the

king, with a sudden nervous spasm, got up and began jerkily to pace the

room. The general's eyes followed his movements questioningly, but for

some moments Nabonidus did not speak. Then, very suddenly, so that his

companion started, he burst out:

"Thou, too, Nânâ! Thou, too, Nânâ-Babilû! Dost thou also betray me?"

"My lord!" The commander sprang to his feet. "My lord!" he said again.

"Tell me truly, tell me plainly," went on the king, tumultuously, "is

there left in my kingdom one man that I dare trust? Is there still one

that I know to be true?"

Nânâ-Babilû looked at his king straightforwardly, grimly, honestly. "My

life belongs to the kingdom, to thy house," he said. "And in my ranks of

men there are many to be trusted. But there are also those that have

taken the bribes of Ludar and the college. Therefore the true from the

false among my own I cannot tell. How many there are of the one, how

many of the other, I do not know. When it is necessary we will strive

with our lives to defend the city; but how it will go with us, only the

great gods know."

Nabonidus heard him and sighed. He could not but believe this man, this

friend, this faithful servant of his; and his moment of passion was

over. As he came back to his chair three slaves entered the room,

bringing with them trays of food and a jar of wine. These were placed on

the fixed table, and a light couch was brought in and set before it for

the king. Nânâ was supposed to sit in his lord's presence. When at

length the slaves had been dismissed, Nabonidus lay down at table with

an air of mild pleasure at which Nânâ stared a little. Nabonidus had,

indeed, a reputation for courage principally because of the apathetic

manner that invariably came to him in times of real stress. And yet

Nabonidus realized to the full the gravity of his position.

"Nânâ," and there was the shadow of a smile in the king's face--"Nânâ,

if it comes that the city should fall, how wilt thou defend me from the

blood-thirsty Gobryas?"

"O King, I would have spoken with thee on this matter, for thou, like

all those in Babylonia, art in great danger. If Gobryas knows that thou

art in Sippar the city will surely be assaulted, and will as surely

fall. Therefore it is Sharrukin's wish, and mine, that, for thine own

sake, thou shouldst leave Sippar secretly as soon as possible--to-night,

if thou wilt. A disguise may be sent here to thee. Thine own guard shall

follow thee; and I think thou canst still take the road to Babylon

without undue risk. But if thou wait--wait till Gobryas learns thy

presence here--thou and Sippar, ay, and thus Babylonia, are lost."

"I and Sippar, but not Babylonia, Nânâ. Bel-shar-uzzur rules over the

Great City now, and he is stronger than I. He will make a good king for

this troubled land. For me--éhu! I am full of years, and weary--weary

for the silver sky. Matters it greatly how soon I go? Nay! Speak no more

of it. I forbid it, and I am the king. Tell Sharrukin that I remain in

Sippar--until the end."

Nânâ, daring to say no more, looked regretfully into the faded eyes of

the old man before him. Of every one that he had ever known, Nabonidus

was the last whom he would have expected to take this attitude. But

eddying shallows sometimes hide treasures as rare and as beautiful as

those that lie in the deep, smooth-flowing waters of greater streams.

This little pearl of courage, then, was not less admirable because it

was the treasure of a brook rather than of deep river or the sea. And

Nânâ tried no more to persuade the king to leave Sippar, though, indeed,

he felt what the end must be.

The conversation, when it revived between them, strayed away into

winding paths, through Nabonidus' fads of poetry, archæology, and

architecture, to the inevitable highway of priestcraft. With this road

Nânâ was as familiar as the king, knowing more of its detail in this

part of the land than his master.

"Let it be forgiven that I ask of thee a question, O king! Hast thou

faith in thy safety in this house? Dost thou believe that Ludar may be

trusted to keep thy person from harm?"

Nabonidus looked at his companion thoughtfully. "To this house I came,"

he said, "because I would have defied its dwellers. Now, indeed, that

Gobryas is before the city, my safety is not assured. Yet here I will

remain."

"Ludar--knows he that I am here?"

"I do not know. Let us call Ludar hither, Nânâ, and speak with him of

Gobryas."

"Thou wilt never read Ludar's mind by his words, O king. Yet--let him be

summoned."

"Kudashû!" shouted the king, accordingly, and at the cry the waiting

eunuch came quickly in. "Kudashû, bear word to the priest Ludar that I

would talk with him. Let him return with thee here."

There was a prostration and an exit, and then silence. Neither the king

nor Nânâ said anything till, ten minutes later, the slave returned

alone.

"Ludar follows thee?" asked Nabonidus, quickly.

"May the king regard me with favor--Ludar is not in the college. He is

gone forth into the city, none knows why."

The man was dismissed with a nod, and the two were left alone again.

Presently Nânâ rose and made his obeisance.

"Lord king, I must go forth. The hour is late, and I have not yet

numbered the night-guards. Before I go--let it please thee to take up

thy abode from to-morrow in the palace of Sharrukin. Everything there

was prepared for thee. Here, with Ludar, thou art not safe. If thou wilt

not escape from Sippar, come thou and take up thy dwelling with those

that regard thee with loyalty and devotion." Nânâ was not an emotional

man, but the feeling in these words was genuine, and Nabonidus was

touched.

"The gods send thee peace of heart," he said, gently.

"My lord king will not come?" persisted the soldier.

Nabonidus shook his head with a faint, stubborn smile, and, a moment

later, he was alone. For some time after his general's departure the

king sat looking vaguely into space, his lips straightening more and

more and the lines round his mouth growing stern. Presently the eunuch

glided quietly into the room and took up his position by the door,

standing there as he was trained to do when the king was alone.

Nabu-Nahid regarded him reflectively for a moment and then said:

"Kudashû, Ludar and Nânâ are gone into the city. I also will go. Bring

to me my mantle, and come thou behind me. I will behold Sippar by

night."

Kudashû obeyed promptly, but a few seconds later, as the king was

donning his white coronet and cloak, he ventured to say: "O king, live

forever! Let me summon for thee some of the soldiers of thy guard, that

they may follow thee on thy way."

"Is thy body weary, Kudashû?"

"Nay, lord my king; but my arms are weak to strike for thee."

"By Ninip! is the whole world waiting to slay me? Stay thou here, then,

with thy arm, weak one! I will go alone."

"Nay, nay, father of Babylon! I go gladly. Yet, fearing for thy safety,

I--"

"Be silent, foolish one. I go alone. Behold, I have spoken. It is my

will."

And in the face of plea, protest, and remonstrance, go forth alone

Nabonidus did, into the city of Sippar.

The streets were quiet. Early though it was, lacking yet two hours to

midnight, few towns-people were moving about. A general weariness had

followed the merry-making of the past night, and this, added to

the feeling of solemnity attendant on the actual arrival of the

long-expected invading army, had closed the doors of many a house at an

unwonted hour, and caused citizens of an ordinarily convivial

temperament to betake themselves to an early couch. Most of those abroad

in the streets were soldiers, on their way to or from the watch-towers.

It was a curious condition for the first night of a siege, and Nabonidus

could not but wonder, as he proceeded, at the extraordinary calm of the

people; for he had known many a beleaguered city, but never one that

presented a spectacle of such quiet on its first night of defence.

The night was fair, and with the coming of darkness there had sprung up

a faint breeze that came from the east, across two rivers, bearing with

it a breath of cooling fragrance. The moon was just past its second

quarter and hung suspended, in a soft, golden aureole, over the western

walls of the city. By its light the houses and towers of the town stood

out in wavering outlines against the grayish, star-strewn sky. The

stillness that wrapped the city trembled, when, occasionally, it was

pierced by a distant shout of laughter or a command called out by one of

the guards on the walls.

Nabonidus went on and on, unheeding the distance that he traversed,

allowing himself to be permeated with the night. The spotless white of

his robes caused him to be taken for a priest by the few whom he passed.

None offered to molest him. None gave him more than a fleeting glance as

he went along. After what he could hardly realize had been an hour of

walking, he found himself standing before the great south gate of the

city, through which he had come that morning. It was closed now, and

guarded with soldiers, some of whom stood or lay on the ground before

it, while others could be seen on top of the wall, walking to and from

the watch-tower, whence the confused camp of Gobryas' army could be made

out across the plain. No hostility had as yet passed between besieged

and besiegers. Not an arrow had been shot, not a javelin hurled.

The king stood off at a little distance from the gate, reflecting on the

scene before him. Presently there came a shout from some one outside the

gate, a word that was heard and answered from inside. There was a

question from the captain of the watch, to which an answer, inaudible to

Nabonidus, was returned. Then the small door in the gate opened. A

figure appeared from outside, and at sight of it Nabonidus moved swiftly

back into the shadow of the wall. The door was closed and barred again.

He who had come in paused to place something in the hand of one of the

soldiers. Then, without a word, he moved rapidly off in the direction

from which, a little while before, the king had come. Nabonidus stared

after him for a moment. His thoughts were in a whirl. Considering all

that he had known before, this incident had an unnecessarily strong

effect on him. It was only by means of a physical effort that he finally

pulled himself together and started on his return, a hundred paces back

of that other. In this fashion the two traversed the length of the city,

arriving at the college of the Chaldees in the same relative positions

as those in which they had started.

When, a few minutes after midnight, the king re-entered the building and

turned up the passage leading to his room, he found Ludar, wrapped in a

gray cloak, standing in the door-way talking with Kudashû. He hailed

Nabu-Nahid's appearance rather effusively.

"O king, live forever. What imprudence does he commit that wanders

abroad at night in the city streets!"

"And thou--wast thou guarded on thy way?" inquired the king, rather

sharply.

"Nay, truly. But for me there is no danger. I am--"

"You say well, Ludar. For you, indeed, there is no danger! Shamash guard

your sleep!" And with this curt good-night, Nabonidus brushed past the

priest, closed the curtain of his room, flung off his mantle and

coronet, and threw himself down upon the chair that still stood

before the brick table. He was in a state of tremulous anger, of

discouragement, of heart-sickness, and his head drooped lower and lower,

and his hands clasped themselves on the table before him in the

tightness of mental pain. The light from the still burning lamp above

his head fell over his white figure, and a ray of it glinted off a jewel

that hung on a thin, golden chain from his neck. A refracted ray of this

presently shone in his eye and caused him to look down upon the gem that

he was accustomed to wear inside his tunic, next his skin. It was a

charm--a holy charm, blessed and consecrated to be a sure protection

against all bodily disease or danger. In some way, the fact that it came

to his sight now, unexpectedly, seemed an omen of good-fortune; and with

a brow less clouded, the old man rose, took the jewel in his hands, and,

falling on his knees before the image of the sun-god in his room, poured

forth a piteous prayer for rest and peace. And the sun-god heard him

doubly well.

It was not till early dawn began to peer from the east that the great

king, seeking his narrow couch, dropped into an untroubled sleep.

The following day, the fourteenth of the month, was a busy one.

Nabonidus again conducted the sacrifice. Then he returned to the college

and spent two or three long hours with a class of acolytes of the

highest order of embryonic priesthood. The noon meal he partook with

Ludar, and immediately afterwards was driven in his chariot to the house

of Sharrukin, where the afternoon passed quickly in a council over

military affairs.

It was half an hour to sunset when the king returned to his room in the

college and commanded his evening meal. He was drooping with fatigue, as

the result of his short night and his crowded day. Kudashû, therefore,

was ordered to refuse admittance to any one that should seek audience

with the king that night. After a change of garments, a bath, and more

prayers to Shamash, the king lay down on his couch, much refreshed in

body and mind, and eager for the food that was presently brought him. He

ate in the twilight, for that hour of the day always brought calm to his

spirit, and even at the close of the meal, when the room was nearly

dark, he still refused lights, but lay, immovable and alone, with the

ghost of the dead day whose golden bier had been borne across the

shadowy threshold of the night.

Gradually the king sank into a profound and vividly imaged reverie. His

thoughts went back into many long-past scenes of his youth and young

manhood; and, as he afterwards remembered, the last of these was

something apart from his own life. In the twilight there rose before him

clearly and distinctly the room in which he had said farewell to his

son. Here, under the glow of the hanging-lamp, clad in her crimson and

gold, with the veil of black hair drawn back from her face, was Istar of

Babylon, Belshazzar's wife. Beside her, transformed by the new power of

his life and love, was the storm-eyed prince, holding Istar's infant in

his arms. Nabonidus' eyes looked again into those of his son, and found

there something that now only he understood. A smile stole over the

childlike face of the old man. Belshazzar had found a heart-home.

Belshazzar was a king in spirit. What mattered it how soon in truth? The

vision grew brighter still, till the three figures were aureoled with a

divine light. Istar spoke to her husband, held out her arms for the

child. Then suddenly there came, from the passage outside the door, a

low murmur of voices and a quick cry. The vision crumbled. Nabonidus

started up. His ears were pierced by the sound of a shrill scream, and

the words spoken by Kudashû: "My lord! My king! Save thys--" Then came a

heavy thud as of a body fallen, and Nabu-Nahid leaped to his feet as

three men burst into the room.

Two of them were soldiers in armor. The third, who carried a lighted

torch, was in the garb of a priest. It was Ludar, the president of the

college.

"How do ye thus enter my presence?" demanded Nabonidus, glaring about

him wrathfully.

Ludar shot a sharp glance at him, and the hands of the soldiers

tightened on their dripping pikes.

Nabonidus' question was fully answered, and he asked no more; but his

manner did not change. Perhaps he drew himself up a little, became a

little more royal, a little more angry, a little brighter of eye, a

little whiter of face. The soldiers stood mute and motionless, waiting

evidently for their next move to be ordered by Ludar, their leader. He,

after a moment or two, nodded to them.

"Do what is commanded to be done," he said.

In a breath Nabonidus of Babylon lay on his back on the floor, while the

two soldiers worked to bind him about with heavy thongs till he was

unable to move so much as a finger alone. Lastly the gag was put upon

him; but there was no need of it. During the whole business the old man

remained perfectly passive, perfectly still, gazing steadily up into the

face of Ludar, who presently refused to meet his glance, though he could

not, in that small room, get out of range of the pale, fixed eyes.

When their captive was perfectly secure, the soldiers lifted him in

their arms and carried him roughly out of the room, past the bloody body

of Kudashû, along the silent passage and out into the night, where,

before the door of the college, waited a cart, one of the rude vehicles

of the common people, drawn by a water-buffalo. Into this lowliest of

all conveyances the king was lifted and laid down. There was a word of

command from the soldier that clambered in beside him. The driver gave a

long shout, and the cart clattered away from the door of the college in

which, with his still burning torch, stood white-robed Ludar, left alone

with his triumph.

As they went along, the king, his gaze turned upward to the sky, could

see nothing of what was happening in the streets around him. But that

something unusual had occurred was only too apparent, and what that

something was, was not difficult to surmise. The city was filled with

soldiers, half of them in the uniform of the Babylonish guards, and half

of them in the dress of those that had entered the presence of the king.

Yet there was very evidently no hostility between them. Men, women, and

children were also in the streets, the last making an especial clamor

over this unexpected holiday night. Here and there bonfires burned in

the heat. In every direction torches flitted through the moonlight. And

still to the strained ears of the king came not one sound of combat, no

single clash of swords or whistling of stones from the sling. No. Sippar

had fallen, had fallen to Elam, without blood, without a suggestion of

defence, without one blow for this, Nabu-Nahid's, country, the country

over which he had ruled as justly and as gently as he could for

seventeen proud years. No. He had been left alone, utterly alone,

without a single hand to hold him back when others pushed him ruthlessly

forward to face the rainbow gates of the silver sky.

Through the city and out of the gate of Babylon and over the shadowy

plain for half a mile or more, the slow cart passed till it came to a

halt in the camp of the invader, in front of a great, crimson tent that

stood in the midst of a host of smaller ones, and on top of which, from

the head of a spear fastened to the central pole, hung suspended the

Persian sun-standard. Nabonidus saw this, rising against the shadowy

sky; and seeing it, he realized where they were.

There were two soldiers guarding the door of this tent; and, as the cart

halted before it, a short colloquy passed between them and Nabonidus'

captors. Then one of the soldiers disappeared inside, to come forth

again an instant later with an order. Nabonidus was lifted from the

vehicle and carried inside the temporary domicile of the general. He was

greeted by a glare of light so bright that, involuntarily, his weak eyes

closed before it. When he opened them again to look about, he had been

placed on his feet, and found himself facing a tall, heavily armored,

black-bearded fellow, with piercing eyes and an air of undeniable

dignity, who performed an obeisance due from a nobleman of rank to a

sovereign.

"Lord Nabonidus of Babylon, I bid you welcome to my tent in the name of

Bel, your god. I am Gobryas, general of the army of Kurush of Elam."

Nabonidus slowly bent his head. "I am your prisoner. Do your will with

me," he said, faintly.

"It is my wish, O king, that you sleep here to-night in peace. By rule

of war you are my prisoner. Yet know that I and all that is mine to

give, save only freedom, are at the king's command."

Again Nabonidus bowed his head; and then, lifting it slowly, he gazed at

Gobryas with a question in his eyes.

"I ask of you to speak, lord king!" said the general, with all courtesy

in his tone.

Nabonidus drew a quick breath. Then, with an effort, he said:

"Sippar--is fallen--to you?"

Gobryas bowed, with regret in his attitude.

"And my servants--Nânâ-Babilû, and Sharrukin, the former governor of the

city, where are they?"

"O king, they have suffered the fate of the conquered. They alone, out

of all Sippar, were killed in defending their palaces."

"They alone," whispered the king to himself, wearily. "They alone? Nay,

there was one other--one other faithful servant had I in my kingdom. I

pray that Bel--re--ceive--" The old man reeled where he stood. Gobryas

sprang quickly forward, catching him before he fell. And as he gazed

upon the helpless, innocent face of the fallen king, Gobryas was

constrained to wonder a little whether the part he had played in this

game of unwarlike war were quite worth the suffering it inflicted upon

others.

XVI

BELTI-SHAR-UZZUR

Eight days after the fall of Sippar, the army of the Elamite king lay

encamped before Babylon. Not so vast an army, after all, this that had

come out of lower Chaldea, after a series of astounding victories, to

take the Great City from her king. Less than half a mile from where the

gigantic height of Nimitti-Bel shut off the northeast horizon, the tents

of Cyrus' army lay scattered over the parched plain. The largest of

these, over which hung the royal standard, stood in the centre of the

first line of the encampment, where it was most prominent to the eye

from the city walls, and in the place of greatest danger in case of a

sortie from the city.

Inside of Cyrus' tent, on this third day of the inactive siege, sat the

royal commander himself, hard at work. The weather, even to a Babylonian

born and bred, was nearly unendurable. To one who had been reared in the

hills and had ruled over mountain-built Susa, with her fresh northerly

winds and cold torrent streams, the temperature of a Chaldean summer was

something to be marvelled at. To-day the conqueror half sat, half lay

upon the couch in his tent, dictating letters to three scribes, who bent

over their bricks in a steaming row in the door of the tent. Both the

manner and the voice of the Achæmenian betrayed his intense fatigue.

Nevertheless he kept steadily on, formulating various curious plans for

the prosecution of his siege.

A short, rather stocky man, this Cyrus, with thick, curling hair, a

beard more golden-brown than black, and eyes so piercingly brilliant

that it was difficult to determine their shade. His face had been tanned

to a leathery brown by years of exposure in various climes; but his

hands were smooth, shapely, and well-kept. In dress, there was no hint

of either soldier or ruler. His head was bound round with a red fillet

embroidered in black and gold. His body was clothed in the lightest and

simplest of yellowish cotton tunics, narrowly bordered with red. On his

feet he wore sandals, and his ankles and calves were bare. Only by his

eyes and by the quick decisiveness of his manner could one have guessed

that his station was high. And yet, with these two things to go by, few

would have failed to select this man out of a hundred others as being

indeed Kurush, the king.

Besides the king and his three scribes, there was one other person in

the royal tent on this blazing afternoon of the twenty-second of the

month Duzu. This was a young man, tall and meagre in body, with a

peculiarly long head, a face not wholly devoid of beauty, but with an

expression lurking about the lips and eyes that one who loved him would

not have cared to analyze. Richly dressed was this youth, much belted,

chained, and braceleted with silver and gold, his tunic elaborately

embroidered, the very thongs of his sandals wrought with lapis-lazuli

and crystals. It was Cambyses, eldest son and heir of the great Cyrus,

who thus lay in the presence of his father, sighing out his weariness

with the heat, with the campaign, with the lack of fighting, with the

length of days--with anything and everything that it came into his head

to say, and with that everything twisted into a complaint.

Cyrus, long accustomed to this monotone as an accompaniment to his

afternoons of labor, listened to it abstractedly as he continued his

letters. The train of thought that could not be disturbed by words,

however, was presently broken by a shadow passing the door-way of the

tent; and he suddenly looked up, staring at the second scribe, trying to

return to his sentence, but able to think of nothing but the last

imprecation uttered by his son.

"In the name of Ahura the blessed, Cambyses, get you from my presence

till these labors are at an end! Follow Bardiya into the camp, go where

you will, but leave me to the letters that must be despatched to-night

if there be no word from Gobryas this afternoon."

"May he soon come!" muttered the first scribe; and the second and third,

hearing, sighed in unison and wiped the sweat from their dripping brows.

Cambyses had risen and was doubtfully contemplating the prospect of the

camp. Cyrus had come back to the subject of his epistle, and the scribe

sat with his cuneiform iron poised in the air, when the scene was broken

up. A horse, carrying a rider who clung to its bare back like a monkey,

one hand twisted in the mane for guidance, came dashing up over the

plain from the northwest and stopped at the tent door. The rider leaped

to the ground, bending his head slightly before the king, and shouting,

in a clear, fresh voice:

"News, my father! News at last! Gobryas with his army is three miles

away. He will reach us by nightfall!"

Cyrus sprang to his feet. "How know you this, Bardiya?"

"I have seen them all, spoken with the general, and return to thee as

his messenger."

Cyrus quickly waved his hand to the scribes. "Get you to your tents. Do

not return to me till I shall command."

He waited while the three men picked up their stools in sober joy, and,

saluting the royal master with a single accord, departed in an orderly

file. When they were out of hearing, and Cyrus and his two sons were

quite alone, the king let fall the crimson flap over the tent door, and

then turned to Bardiya with his face very eager. "The king, Bar--"

"Gobryas brings with him Nabu-Nahid, the king of Babylon, a prisoner, to

deliver him up to you."

Cyrus nodded, with less satisfaction than the boy had expected, and then

thoughtfully bent his head. There was a short silence, which neither of

the sons dared break. They saw an expression of trouble creep into their

father's face. They saw him frown, and they heard him sigh. Then

suddenly he crossed to a small coffer in the lent, and drew from it a

long, white streamer.

"Bardiya, fasten this to the head of the spear on top of the tent. Put

it there thyself, and at once."

The boy, in extreme surprise, received the pennant from his father's

hand and went outside with it. Fifteen minutes later it was floating in

the hot afternoon wind from the top of the royal tent; and ten minutes

after that a white-robed acolyte had left the summit of Nimitti-Bel and

was speeding through the fields on his way to a certain house in the

centre of the city.

The afternoon passed. It came to be the hour of day's death, and in that

hour the final junction of the two invading armies was to be effected.

Seven months before, in the hills of Elam, they had separated, Gobryas

marching to the north, Cyrus to the south. And now, each of them having

fulfilled to the letter his plan of campaign, there remained only one

thing more to do, the taking of that city which, six years ago, Cyrus

had found impregnable to arms, and which he was now to assault in a less

honorable and surer way.

The lamps in the royal tent were already swinging from their chains in a

glow of fire, and the full moon was rising from the east over the city,

though the sky was still too white for stars, when Cyrus, with Cambyses

on his right hand and Bardiya on his left, stood in the door-way of his

tent, waiting. Over the plain, at no great distance, could be seen a

slow-moving line of horses and men. In front of this line, advancing at

full gallop, came a single chariot, drawn by three white horses

harnessed abreast, and carrying three men--the driver and two others.

This vehicle hurried along straight in the direction of the royal tent,

until presently Cyrus stepped eagerly forward, while his sons cried in

one voice, "Gobryas!"

The chariot came to a halt, and from it leaped a tall, bearded fellow,

whom Cyrus seized in his arms and clasped delightedly. "Welcome, lord of

Sippar. Welcome, O conqueror!" he cried, in the Aramaic language,

generally used in his camp, and understood by Babylonian, Jew, and

Elamite alike.

Having been embraced, Gobryas saw fit to bend the knee before his

master, saying: "I bring the king my lord his royal prisoner. He is full

of years and weary with the length of day. Let him, I pray, be removed

to some tent that befits his rank, where refreshment may be given him."

Three pairs of eyes looked quickly up to the chariot, but Nabonidus'

back was turned to them. He stood there alone, his chained arms at his

sides, looking off upon the walls of Babylon. His face was invisible;

but Cyrus, seeing it, would not have known the expression. As it was,

when the conqueror stepped up to the chariot and spoke a word of

courteous greeting, the old man turned to him a dull and gentle

countenance.

"O king, Nabu-Nahid of the Great City, let thy body find rest and

refreshment here in my frail dwelling-place! In the name of the blessed

Ahura-Mazda, I, Kurush, bid thee welcome. Descend from the hot chariot

and enter my tent."

Nabonidus acknowledged the courtesy with old-accustomed graciousness. In

alighting from the vehicle he stumbled a little in his great exhaustion.

Instantly Bardiya and Gobryas started to his side, and, each taking an

arm, assisted the fallen king gently inside the tent, prepared for him

the couch on which Cambyses had spent the afternoon, and made him

comfortable upon it while Cyrus called to a slave to bring food and wine

to all.

The five of them partook together of the evening meal, while

conversation ran upon general topics. Nabonidus did not speak; nor,

though the others did not guess it, did he listen to what was said.

Cyrus and his general might have discussed their most secret plans

without risk of being overheard or understood, for Nabonidus' heart was

beyond them, in Babylon, and his thoughts were of his world, not of

theirs.

After the meal was over, however, Gobryas leaned across to the king and

whispered, just audibly: "I must go forth now, for a time, to oversee

the encampment that you have commanded. While I am gone, were it not

well that Nabonidus be put in a tent of his own, under guard, that when

I return we may talk freely of many things?"

"Nabu-Nahid--" Cyrus hesitated a little in his reply. "Nabu-Nahid will,

I think, not sleep in this camp to-night. He is to be delivered into

other hands, to which, many weeks ago, I promised to intrust him."

"Whose are they?" demanded Gobryas, roughly, without any of the respect

due to his lord.

Cyrus failed to resent the breach. His expression betokened regret as he

opened his lips to reply. But before a word left his mouth two figures

appeared suddenly in the door-way--two white-robed figures, only one of

whom wore the goat-skin on his shoulder. Before Cyrus could turn to

them, the prisoner on the couch sprang suddenly to his feet, and a cry

rang out into the night:

"Amraphel--thou dog!"

Then silence ensued. Gobryas, whose back had turned to the door, moved

slowly round. Catching sight of the new-comers, he suddenly realized

what Cyrus had meant: suddenly knew why Nabonidus would not sleep that

night safely guarded in the camp. The high-priest of Babylon, and the

leader of the Jews, in response to a prearranged signal, had come to

claim their own--part of their payment for the betrayal of the city.

As he looked and understood yet more, Gobryas' face darkened with

disgust. He could imagine well enough what was to follow, and his spirit

revolted against taking any part in it.

"Let my lord give me permission to retire!" he demanded gruffly of

Cyrus.

The king nodded to him, and the general forthwith, with a curl of the

lip and a flash of disdain at the Babylonians, brushed his way by them

and hurriedly left the tent. His departure removed the single

disinterested element in the scene--and those that remained to enact it

drew mental breath. For a moment or two no one moved. Priest and Jew

stood facing the conqueror, the three of them eying one another in full

understanding of this consummation of their plot. The conqueror's sons,

more than half cognizant of the whole significance of the affair,

shifted their glances from one figure to another with a vague sense of

foreboding. Lastly, Nabonidus, the central figure in the scene, stiff

and faint in his unutterable desertion, hair and face far whiter than

his stained garments, confronted, with an air of supreme accusation, the

two betrayers of his people. The silence was long, and nearly

unendurable. Amraphel would not speak; Cyrus could not; the young men

did not dare. It remained for Belti-shar-uzzur, evading that burning

glance of Nabu-Nahid's, to address himself to the conqueror:

"We have seen the signal, Kurush, and have answered it. We are come to

receive our own."

For the shadow of an instant Cyrus dropped his eyes. He said, anxiously:

"Leave the prisoner here. I swear to his safety. He shall come to no

harm!"

Amraphel stepped forward with menace in his eyes. "The promise! Remember

the promise! Remember, or we fail you. Babylon to thee--Nabu-Nahid to

us!"

At these words two cries rang out through the tent. The one was from

Nabu-Nahid, the other from Cyrus' youngest son. The boy stepped forward

quickly, his feeling plainly written in his young face. "My father!" was

all he said; but before the words, and the unutterable things they told,

the head of the great warrior fell and his heart smote him.

"Give us our tribute, Kurush!" sneered the Jew, scorning the scene.

"Take what was promised you," answered the conqueror, slowly.

Belti-shar-uzzur stepped forward exultantly and would have put out his

hand to touch Nabonidus' arm, when the old man quickly turned from him

and cast himself at Cyrus' feet.

"Thou wearest, there at thy waist, a knife, O conqueror! Let it by thy

hand rest in my heart!" he cried out. "Send me not forth, great king, in

the power of these two, or I die terribly! I die alone, in the night,

with none to close my eyes!"

Cyrus turned his head away. "Take the prisoner from my sight, ye dogs,

or I will hold ye both here also! Take him from me!"

At this Daniel, starting forward, threw himself on the kneeling king,

caught him about the meagre body, swung him up to shoulder, and would

have started out of the tent when Amraphel stopped him.

"The gag," he muttered, sharply.

Bardiya started forward, his hand on his sword; but his father, catching

him by the girdle, held him in a grasp of iron till the operation was

over and the piece of wood lay in Nabu-Nahid's mouth, fastened there

with a white bandage. His hands and feet were also bound with leathern

thongs, and after this the body, now as helpless as a log, was borne out

into the night in the arms of the Jew. Then Cyrus and his sons were left

alone, nor, during the remainder of that unhappy night, did they speak

one to another.

In the mean time Daniel had carried the king to where, some yards from

the entrance of the royal tent, there stood a closed litter, such as was

used by women of rank. Beside it, as it rested on the ground, were its

four bearers, stalwart men, muffled from head to foot in white--slaves

of the house of Amraphel. None of these mute, dark-faced creatures

stirred as their master returned to them with his companion and his

companion's burden. Only, as they came close, the foremost fellow

silently threw back the curtain from one side of the basket-like couch.

Daniel stooped and laid the body of the king on his back on the cushions

inside. The king closed his eyes. The curtain was lowered and Amraphel

gave the signal. The four slaves seized the poles and, softly singing

their working-chorus, raised their burden waist-high and began their

walk back to the gate of Sand.

It was a twenty-minute walk, and was accomplished without adventure.

When they came to a halt outside the gate, Nabonidus, anxiously

listening, could hear nothing but a suggestion of whispering between

Amraphel and some one whom he believed to be the captain of the gate.

Presently their way was resumed, and the company passed into the city. A

little distance inside, the litter stopped again and was set down on the

ground. The curtains were thrown back, Daniel bent again over the king,

took him about the body, and, lifting him, laid him in one of two

chariots that stood waiting. In his single fleeting glance Nabonidus

recognized both of these as belonging to Amraphel's house. The king lay

in the one that Daniel entered. From the other, where Amraphel stood,

came presently the long, peculiar cry for the starting of the horses.

Daniel's driver echoed it. The animals sprang forward, and the long

drive through the city began.

In spite of the jolting misery of that ride, Nabonidus preferred it to

the litter. Air came freely to his lips, and now he could see a little

of what they passed. The moon was well up in the unclouded sky, lighting

the fields and streets of the Great City for the last passage of her

last native king. Nabonidus' heart was full, but he did not weep. The

end to which he was going was unknown. Yet this, for him, was, as he

knew well, the last sight of his beloved city. Still, even as he went,

the moonlight fell athwart the sapphire charm that hung upon his neck,

and sent forth a thin gleam of the blue light of hope--a hope that could

not be brought to fulfilment by anything short of a miracle.

The horses on both the chariots were swift, and it took scarcely a

half-hour to reach the second gate of Sand in Imgur-Bel. Through this

they passed without parley, and the journey across the inner city was

begun. They had entered Babylon at the extreme west, a little to the

north of the canal of the New Year, which, as they drove, could be seen

in the distance, shining clear as silver frost in the moonlight,

reflecting in its placid surface the shadowy black buildings near it on

either side. Ribâta's house was too far distant to be seen; and the

tenement of Ut rose tall and gaunt a long way to the south. Ten minutes

later the hurrying vehicles clattered into the Â-Ibur-Sabû. They

continued along the famous way for little more than a quarter of a mile,

and then turned to the east again, till, at something near eleven

o'clock, they came to a halt beside a small, neglected building on the

bank of the river Euphrates: mighty Euphrates whose Chaldaic waves were

of tears to-night. Here, evidently, was their destination. Nabonidus,

aching in every joint, groaning wretchedly in his heart, was lifted

again in Daniel's arms. He had one glance at the river and the group of

royal buildings clustered thereon but a little distance away. For one

instant the three famous palaces and the mound of the hanging gardens

met his eyes. Then they were lost to him, for the world swam and grew

black, and he fainted.

Two minutes later, when he returned into a dim consciousness, he was in

a place that he soon came to recognize. It was the temporary abode of

his strange gods. The interior, lighted by two torches, that burned blue

and ghostlike on the bare brick walls, was utterly forlorn. The walls,

floors, and ceiling were of crumbling gray brick, unrelieved by a single

color or attempt at ornament; and the usually open door-way was now

closed by a black curtain. So much he saw in the first moment of

arrival. In the next he realized that the gag had been taken from his

mouth and that his arms were being unbound. In the third the voice of

Amraphel was heard, bidding him rise. Obediently he made the attempt,

got, with much effort, to his feet, reeled blindly, and was saved from

falling again by Daniel. Amraphel's lip curled. Nevertheless he helped

the old man to sit down with his back to the wall. Then, when Nabonidus

had blinked a little and grown steadier as to his head, the high-priest

stood over him and spoke:

"Thou, O weak one, hast been king of the Great City. King of her shalt

thou be nevermore. Here thou art, alone, unheard, unseen, in my power

and the power of the captive Jew. Death hangs over thy head; yet by one

means thou mayst save thyself. Wilt thou hear?"

Nabonidus, looking at him steadily, nodded.

Amraphel continued: "No man, Nabonidus, either fears or loves thee. Thy

power over the people of the Great City does not by one-twentieth equal

mine. But at thy passing there are two--two whom I hate--and, I say it,

fear--that will struggle for the crown thou hast borne. One of these

thou hast seen to-night--the Achæmenian. The other is the child of thy

flesh, not of thy spirit--Belshazzar the prince. Nabu-Nahid, if thou

to-night wilt swear, on penalty of the curse of all the gods, to remove

thy son and thy son's wives, and thyself and thy wives, and all thy

household, from the royal palace, and wilt swear that thou and he will

go forth in peace out of the Great City, to return no more to it

forever, if thou wilt do this--"

"Thou fool!"

Amraphel faced round. "What sayest thou, Jew?"

"Thou fool! Wilt thou put faith in the word of a man in the death fear?

Wilt thou play me false? There was to be no choice here to-night. Mine

eyes were to behold the blood of the enemy of my race. He shall find no

mercy--or, if he finds it, then thou shalt not!"

Amraphel grew white with anger; but, before he spoke again, Nabonidus

had struggled to his feet and stood supporting himself against the wall,

gazing with fiery eyes at his enemy.

"I also say it:--thou fool!" he said. "Think you, indeed, that because I

am old and feeble, and in the power of traitors, I would sell the

birthright of my son? Thou fool!"

At these words Daniel turned to the old man and looked thoughtfully at

him. But Amraphel, with a sneer, advanced a step or two, and said, in a

soft and menacing voice: "The hour is come, Nabu-Nahid. Prepare

thyself!"

"O Bel! Receive my spirit into the silver sky!"

Slowly Daniel drew his knife, but Amraphel was before him. Nabonidus saw

the weapon of his enemy flash in the torch-light. The gleam of it passed

over his deathly face. Just at the moment of the blow, a faint cry left

his lips. Then a long spurt of heart's blood shot from the body. There

was a sickening gasp--a fall--and the flesh only was there with the

murderers. Nabu-Nahid had gone. Belshazzar was king in Babylon.

The Jew had gone rather sick, and Amraphel himself was white to the

lips. "Let us go forth," he muttered, unsteadily.

"Fool!" said Daniel, for the second time. "Wilt thou leave here the body

of the king, that all Babylon may look on it at dawn? Shall thy

charioteer and mine say who it was that brought Nabonidus here? Thou

hast struck the blow. Hast thou lost strength to finish the work?"

Amraphel caught at his nerves and said: "What is there to be done?"

Daniel's lip curled, but he did not reply in words. Passing into a far

corner of the temple, he took up two fallen bricks that lay there and

brought them over to the body. At the sight Amraphel came to his senses.

"I will make fast this one to his feet if thou takest the hands," he

said, quietly.

Accordingly Daniel drew from his girdle two more leathern thongs, and

with them the weights were bound upon the body. Then the two stood back

and looked at their work. Amraphel was satisfied. Not so the Jew. One

more brick he fetched from the little heap in the corner and fastened it

on Nabonidus' neck, never noticing that in the operation he loosened and

dislodged something that had been around the throat of the king. The

last task finished, he stood back once more, carefully examining the

bloody corpse.

"Take out thy dagger," he said, finally, to his companion.

Amraphel shrank back. "I cannot!" he whispered.

Beltishazzar bent over and drew it from the wound. Blood followed it in

a thick stream. The Jew wiped the weapon off on the skirt of Nabonidus'

robe and silently handed it to his companion. "Now--take thou the feet,"

he commanded, himself lifting the shoulders of the light body.

Revolting as it all was, Amraphel could not but obey the word of the

Jew. Together they bore the body out of the temple, into the still

moonlight, down to the edge of the quietly flowing river. For an instant

they held it over the brink. Then, at a whisper from the Jew, they let

go together. There was a splash, an eddy in the water, a little red

stain on the clear stream, and then only a widening circle of ripples

remained to mark the resting-place of Babylon's last king.

* * * * *

Late on the afternoon of the next day, Belitsum, the low-born second

wife of Nabonidus, sat, as usual, in the court-yard of her part of the

seraglio, in her usual canopied idleness. Morning prayers and exorcisms

had been said; the daily omens looked to; all the endless details of

superstition finished; and now the queen of Babylon was free to dream

away the rest of the day in comparative quiet. Beside her lay a piece of

unfinished embroidery, badly done; for her plebeian fingers had never

taken kindly to this work of the gentle-born. Two eunuchs waved over her

huge feather fans, of which the extreme size denoted her rank. Beside

her sat a pretty slave with a lute in her hand, though Belitsum was

paying no attention to the sweet monotony of the tune she played. The

queen was lost in one of those vacant reveries in which long years of

idleness and neglect had taught her to remain for hours.

Suddenly there came an interruption upon this quiet scene. A eunuch of

the outer palace hurriedly entered the court, and, prostrating himself

profoundly before Belitsum, asked permission to speak.

The queen was a moment or two coming out of her dreams, but she

presently recovered enough to find her curiosity, and to say with some

eagerness: "Speak, slave! Deliver thy message. Is it from the king?"

"May it be pleasing to the queen my lady! No word hath come from

Nabu-Nahid. It is a soothsayer that comes in royal state, beseeching the

ears of the queen to incline to him."

"A soothsayer?" Belitsum relapsed into tranquillity. "Let him be taken

into the shrine. But also cause him to know that for this day the gods

have been propitiated."

As the eunuch departed, Belitsum, who had long since lost claim to youth

and the slenderness thereof, rose with an effort to her feet. "Kudûa,"

she said to the slave, who had also scrambled up, "wait thou my return.

I am going to the shrine."

Kudûa fell back willingly enough, while the queen, followed by her

fan-bearers, waddled slowly across the court-yard towards the specially

consecrated room in which any member of the royal harem might hold

conference with men of the outer world. In spite of her slow pace, the

queen reached the dimly lighted apartment in advance of the soothsayer;

and she occupied her time till his arrival in offering up a quick prayer

to Nindar, her especial deity. The Amanû had hardly been reached when

two figures appeared in the door-way, one the attendant eunuch, the

other a magnificently robed and coroneted man, in whom one accustomed to

his usual slovenly appearance would have had great difficulty in

recognizing Beltishazzar the Jew.

Belitsum, entirely ignorant of his race and station, judging him only by

his dress and bearing, came forward with hasty respect, leaving her

fan-bearers on either side of the small altar. At the same time Daniel,

accustomed of old to the rigorous etiquette of the court, made a proper

and graceful obeisance.

"Art thou indeed but a soothsayer?" inquired Belitsum, admiringly.

"No soothsayer I, lady queen of Babylon, but a prophet and a dreamer of

dreams. And it is by reason of a dream sent me by the Lord of my race

that I come to you, seeking audience. Open my lips, O queen, that I may

tell this dream!"

"Wilt thou have gold? Wilt thou have gems and silver? How shall I open

thy lips?"

"Bid me only to speak. Grant me the favor. Let me tell the dream, and

restrain thy tears till its truth be known."

At these last words Belitsum nervously clasped and unclasped her hands.

"Speak!" she said, quickly. "Tell thy dream! Speak!"

"In the evening of yesterday I lay down and slept. And in my sleep the

Lord appeared to me in a vision, saying: 'Go thou down to the temple of

strange gods by the side of the river, and there shalt thou find him who

was king in Babylon.' And thereat, in my dream, I arose and went down

through the city to the river-bank and the deserted temple thereon. And

there I beheld Nabu-Nahid, the king, in mortal combat with two men that

sought to kill him. And in my sleep I was withheld from giving him aid.

I saw him fall by the blow from a golden dagger, and when he was dead

the assassins, whose faces remained black to me, lifted him in their

arms and cast him into the river, and he sank from my sight. Then said

the Lord unto me again: 'Having beheld this thing, hasten to her who was

the wife of him that is dead and relate it to her.' And behold, when I

awoke I obeyed the word of the Lord; and, obeying, I now go forth from

thy presence." Whereupon Daniel, with a delightfully dramatic effect,

turned short on his heel, leaving the shrine, and in three minutes was

outside the palace gates.

Through his recital Belitsum and her eunuchs had remained open-mouthed,

rooted where they stood. It was not till the Jew had actually

disappeared from her sight that the queen's amazement was overcome by

her dismay, and, with a long-drawn, preliminary howl, she fell flat upon

the floor in an agony of despair. Nabonidus, her husband, was dead.

Never for one instant did her devout soul doubt the word of the prophet.

Nabonidus was dead, and she was a widow. The shrine echoed to the sounds

of shrieks, of groans, of wailing, finally of hysterical laughter. Now

and then an attendant, drawn thither by the sounds of woe, appeared in

the door-way, looked at her, at the bewildered eunuchs behind her, and

scurried away again in empty-headed wonder. Finally one, wiser than the

rest, went to the room where Belshazzar sat in council, and informed him

that his step-mother was dying in the harem shrine. The prince was

forced to believe the frightened and excited manner of the slave, and,

hastily excusing himself to his lords, he strode through the palace to

the shrine. In the door-way he halted. Belitsum was kneeling on the

floor, beating her breast and wailing out prayers for the dead. She did

not even notice the appearance of the prince.

"Belitsum--lady--what is thy grief?" he asked, gently.

No response. Ejaculations and redoubled wails.

Then Belshazzar, perceiving that she was bordering on frenzy, went

forward and took her by the shoulders. "Art thou stricken with a

sickness?" he demanded, loudly.

"Thy father--Nabu-Nahid--the king!" was all the answer he could get.

Belshazzar grew a shade paler. "My father!" He looked about him, and

caught the eye of one of the eunuchs in the corner. This man he

addressed. "What is the cause of this weeping? Knowest thou wherefore

she cries?"

The man nodded solemnly.

"Speak, then!"

Forthwith the slave began an intelligent recital of the occurrences of

the last half-hour, including a repetition of the dream in Daniel's own

words. Belitsum quieted enough during this speech to listen again to the

dream; but, after it was finished, the look on Belshazzar's face somehow

withheld her from recommencing her lamentations.

"Who was this man? Didst thou know him?" demanded the prince of the

slave.

"O prince, live forever! He was a strange prophet. Never before have

mine eyes beheld him."

Belshazzar bit his lip. His face was very grave. After a short pause he

took Belitsum by the arm and lifted her up. Then, turning again to the

eunuch, he said, quietly:

"Go thou and command my chariot to be brought, and let the driver be

alone in it."

Then, having almost tenderly returned Belitsum to the harem, and bidding

her restrain her weeping till his return, Belshazzar went forth to

dismiss his council for the morning, retaining Ribâta alone out of all

the councillors. Fifteen minutes later he and Bit-Shumukin together

mounted the chariot and set forth for the little temple of strange gods

on the bank of the Euphrates. During the drive Belshazzar related to

Ribâta the substance of what he knew; and, like himself, Ribâta's first

question was as to the identity of the prophet.

"There is one whom it might be," suggested the nobleman, when Belshazzar

had confessed himself at fault. "It may, perhaps, be Daniel the Jew."

"So at first I thought. Yet when has any man ever beheld Daniel in such

raiment as this prophet wore? The Jew is poor."

Ribâta demurred a little, yet could not but admit that Belshazzar had

all the evidence on his side. Then, as they neared the temple, silence

fell between them.

The little building stood before them utterly deserted. Not a human

being was in sight. It was a lonely spot--too far south of the bridge

and too far north of the ferry to be frequented by any one. The prince

dismounted from the chariot first, but in the curtained door-way of the

temple he paused.

"Ribâta," said he, softly, "I am afraid."

Bit-Shumukin's reply was to lay a brother's hand on his shoulder. Then

Belshazzar lifted back the curtain and entered the room. There came a

great cry from his lips, and the hideous sight was once more veiled in

gloom.

"There is blood, Ribâta! It is blood!" whispered the prince, hoarsely.

"I saw it, Belshazzar. Yet it may be the blood of an animal, or of some

other man. I cannot think that thy father was yester-night in Babylon.

Come, let us look, my prince. Within we may find some trace--some

evidence of what has happened."

The prince shrank. "Wilt thou do it, Ribâta?" he asked.

Accordingly, while Belshazzar held aside the curtain that some light

might enter by the door-way, Ribâta, sick at heart, hunted over the

blood-splashed floor for some clew to the identity of what it was that

had died here. Belshazzar presently turned his back and stood staring

into the street, refusing to look, yet listening with every sense for a

dreaded exclamation from his friend. It came. As Bit-Shumukin bent over

the corner where Nabonidus had fallen, he found something that wrung

from him a low cry.

Belshazzar turned deathly white. "What is it?" he said, quietly.

Ribâta came to him with something in his hand. It was a small, shining,

blue stone, that showed itself in the sunshine to be an Egyptian-cut

sapphire of great value, attached to a wire of twisted gold.

Belshazzar took it dully from his hand. "My father wore it always on his

neck. Let us return to the palace," he said.

"But the body--it may surely be found!"

"The river hath it. Let her keep her own."

And so the two remounted the vehicle and started on their way back

through the city of which Belshazzar was king.

XVII

THE WOMAN'S WOE

On that fateful morning Belshazzar was away from the palace less than

one hour; yet when he re-entered it he was aged ten years at heart, and

one, at least, in appearance. He neither saw nor heard any one as he

hurried through the great court-yard to his own room, whither Ribâta

accompanied him and remained with him till late afternoon, while they

two took council together. Belshazzar was unnaturally calm. Through all

their talk neither he nor Ribâta once hinted that either knew or cared

to know the identity of the murderers. For, whatever they suspected,

whatever was all but a certainty, both of them were too painfully aware

of Babylon's present situation not to know that any accusation they

might make of those whose power was now supreme, would do infinitely

more harm than good: would merely precipitate that frightful climax that

both of them dreaded and neither spoke of. Therefore, after a careful

debate, it was decided to keep the murder of Nabonidus a profound secret

until such time as the disclosure might be safely made.

"I charge thee as my brother, Ribâta," were Belshazzar's parting words

to his friend that day, "that thou let no man or woman, of whatever

station, know from thy lips who is king of Babylon. And save for Istar,

who is as myself, none shall know it from my lips. But also, as I live

and reign, there shall come a day, not too distant, when justice shall

be done--when this foul crime shall be avenged, as never crime before,

on them that have accomplished it."

Ribâta gave his promise in all devotion, and, embracing his king, bade

him farewell and set off to his own abode, his mind unstrung by the

fearful discovery of the morning.

Long hours before, Belshazzar had sent a message of reassurance to

Belitsum; and now, with a weary sigh of relief, he turned his steps

towards the distant apartments of his wife and child. With Istar, as he

knew, was peace and sympathy. Never yet had she failed to understand

him, and to offer him in his trials the comfort that he needed. His

mind, like his heart, was absolutely hers. Arrived at the threshold of

the room where, at this hour, she was always to be found, he stopped,

his hand upon the curtain. Some one within had been singing. Now,

noiseless as was his approach, the voice was silent. The curtain was

pushed aside. Istar stood before him with a smile in her eyes.

"I felt thy presence, lord," she said, in such a tone that his face

kindled with love-light. "Thou--Belshazzar! Art thou ill?"

"Yea, at heart," he answered. "Not in body. Be not afraid. Let me come

in to thee, that I may tell thee Babylon's new woe."

Istar took him gently by the hand and led him into the apartment. Inside

stood Baba, holding the baby to her breast. It was she whose voice

Belshazzar had heard. Belshazzar greeted the little slave, and then

Istar, knowing how he wished to be alone with her, whispered a word to

Baba, who a moment later went quietly away.

When they were alone Belshazzar sank back on the divan in the corner,

and Istar, laying her baby upon the bed, seated herself at her lord's

feet, laid her hands in his, and anxiously scanned his care-worn face.

"Kurush hath stormed the walls, Belshazzar? The city is taken?" she

asked.

"Nay, my beloved. My father hath been murdered in the city--in the

temple of the strange gods, by the river-bank."

"Thy father!" Istar gasped with horror. "Thy father! Oh, my lord--my

lord--save thyself! If they should do this with--" Istar's head sank

forward. She brought both Belshazzar's hands to her lips and held them

there in an agony of love and terror. So they remained for a long time,

sorrowing together silently: Istar for her lord, Belshazzar for the

city. But Istar's presence brought comfort to the heart of the king, and

her touch filled him with that high sense of protectiveness that

generates the truest courage. In this woman life had given him enough.

He had neither desire nor need for further blessings. His father had not

been to him all that a stronger man might have been. It was the horror

of that father's lonely death that now so completely overwhelmed him.

But Istar, feminine, weak even, as she had come to be, brought him his

full meed of consolation. The two of them wore the night away in council

for Babylon; for Istar's fears for her king had now become abnormal.

Belshazzar listened in surprise to her desperate prayers that he

surround himself with every protection, that he beware against venturing

out at night, that he wear armor under his tunic, and that he carry

weapons of defence always around with him.

"They that sought thy father's life seek also thine," she insisted, till

in the end Belshazzar left her with the promise that he would care for

himself as he would have cared for her.

If this promise were not to the letter kept, it was hardly to be laid at

Belshazzar's door as a fault. For at such a time as this, when the city

was in such peril, an example of cowardly fear from its ruler would have

resulted badly. After the death of Nânâ-Babilû at Sippar, and in the

face of the continued absence of Nabonidus, Belshazzar had taken on

himself the duties of absolute monarch--lord of the people and general

of the army. And certainly it never could be charged to him that he

neglected these duties. Early and late, sometimes from dawn until dawn

again, he worked on those endless details of civil and military life

that he alone could attend to. The city was in a state of siege. All the

gates in Nimitti-Bel were closed, and those in Imgur-Bel doubly guarded.

Also, in consideration of the fact that the food supplies coming from

the country were cut off, the great fields between the outer and inner

walls were under cultivation. A census was taken of every soul in the

city, and preparations made for the regular daily grain allotments to

come now from the granaries, and later from the new crops when they

should be ready for harvest. For, by careful management, no one in

Babylon need ever suffer from hunger, no matter how long a siege should

last. This Cyrus had learned once before, six years ago; and the

question now in the mind of every man was: Could he be made to cover it

again?

Certainly the siege was conducted on an extraordinary plan. For ten days

the besieging army had lain in camp before the walls of the city, yet

not an arrow had as yet been shot on either side, not a javelin hurled

nor a stone slung. The handful of soldiers inside the walls were hardly

more than enough to man the watch-towers and guard the gates; and they

were under orders from Belshazzar to await developments passively.

Meantime they were kept in excellent form. Every day Belshazzar reviewed

them in the great field between the walls, and daily he examined a

certain number of men from his own regiment of Guti as to their

intelligence and ability. Also, late in the afternoon, it had become his

custom to drive on top of Nimitti-Bel in his chariot, showing himself to

the enemy and to the city also. There was little danger in this drive,

since the range from Cyrus' camp was too long for any known weapon, and

the height of the wall was an excellent safeguard against shots from

nearer at hand. At this time quite an extensive stable was maintained on

the giant wall. Chariots had been wheeled up the inclined plane that led

to the top of it, and orders were carried from gate to gate on horseback

along the top. Belshazzar's wild drives on that dizzy height became one

of the favorite sights of the citizens; and it grew to be the fashion

for numbers of people of all classes to drive out to Nimitti-Bel in the

afternoon, to witness the spectacle of the storm-prince in his golden

chariot lashing his four white horses madly along that smooth way, two

hundred and fifty feet above the ground.

On the afternoon of the twelfth day of the siege, one of the last days

in the month of Duzu, Charmides walked out beyond Imgur-Bel to see this

much-talked-of sight. At this time the Greek presented rather a

different appearance from that of six months ago. His resignation from

the temple of Sin had proved disastrous; and there were now times when

the meanest of food was not to be found in the house of Beltani.

Charmides had no work to do, would not beg, hated the thought of the

temple, grew gaunt and big-eyed, went unkempt as to dress, and mourned

over Ramûa, who in turn wept over him, both of them, and Beltani, too,

concealing their state from Baba with the utmost care. To-day, after a

troubled hour at home, where Ramûa's efforts at cheerfulness were like

blows to him, the Greek went out, in the face of a prostrating heat, to

seek by rapid walking an escape from the thoughts that pursued him, and

to evade the admission to himself of the inevitable end: that he must go

back to the profession of lies and of deceit; of treachery, of crimes,

of death. He made his way quickly across the city and out beyond the

first wall to a spot where green, well-watered fields stretched before

his eyes, putting him suddenly back into his youth. He halted in his

walk at a distance of thirty yards from the great wall, just behind a

group of people come evidently for the same purpose as his--that of

watching Belshazzar's drive. Rather absent-mindedly the Greek noticed

the man immediately in front of him, who had been in a measure connected

with his old life of the temple; and he watched the movements of that

lean, ill-kempt figure with the same keen sub-consciousness that one

sometimes exercises when the thoughts are very intent on something else.

It was in this way that he noted the sling in the right hand of the Jew.

There was not long to wait for the coming of Belshazzar. At a little

murmur from the men in front, Charmides turned his head and saw, far

down the wall, a black speck that gradually increased in size, and

finally resolved itself into four flying horses, harness and crests

flashing in the light of approaching sunset, that raced neck and neck

under the long, black lash wielded by him who stood alone in the

rattling vehicle--a figure the poise of which was beyond question royal.

Charmides looked on it with undisguised admiration--the superb head with

its golden coronet, the broad shoulders, to which was fastened a

fluttering, crimson cloak, and the hands flashing with jewels the least

of which would have kept the Greek's stricken household well fed for

months.

Absorbed as were Charmides' eyes in the sight of the approaching figure,

he nevertheless felt his gaze suddenly withdrawn to the man in front of

him, who was now busily fumbling with the weapon in his right hand.

Suddenly a stone had been fitted into the sling and aim taken, and at

the same time Charmides' slow thoughts resolved themselves. Leaning

forward, he twitched the sleeve on the Jew's right arm at the moment in

which the stone flew forth, wide of its mark, while the chariot passed

safely by. Beltishazzar, with a Hebrew exclamation, wheeled sharply

about. Charmides faced him in silence. A look only passed between them,

but it was enough. In that little time they knew each other. Charmides

had made an enemy, and the all-powerful Jew felt a twinge of fear.

An hour after this incident Charmides and the king met, face to face, in

the middle of the Â-Ibur-Sabû. Belshazzar was in his ordinary chariot,

slowly returning from the walls. Charmides was on foot, going his weary

way back to the tenement of Ut. It occurred to the Greek to speak to the

lord of the city on the subject of his personal safety. He therefore

stopped in the road, directly in front of the royal horses. With a sharp

exclamation Belshazzar drew up his reins. Catching sight of the Greek's

face, however, and recognizing it, he paused to listen when Charmides

spoke.

"Lord prince of the Great City--live forever!" he began, formally.

"There was to-day an attempt upon the most royal life of the prince my

lord."

Belshazzar stared a little. "How, Greek?"

"As the royal chariot drove along the top of Nimitti-Bel, a man, one of

the subjects of my lord, made endeavor to fell him by a shot from a

sling. I, pulling his sleeve at the moment, caused the stone to fly wide

of the mark. When next my lord drives it may be that I shall not be at

hand."

Belshazzar looked quizzically into the face of him who spoke these

laconic words. But he found no guile in the emaciated face. Instead,

there was something there that roused his interest. "Mount beside me,

Greek. I have not forgotten thee. Thou shalt return with me to the

palace."

Charmides refused. He had no desire for a cross-examination on the

subject that he had detailed as fully as he intended to the prince. All

efforts on Belshazzar's part to induce him to come were in vain.

Therefore, seeing that Charmides would have his way, Belshazzar did what

he could for the very apparent signs of pecuniary distress in the

youth's appearance. Detaching from his neck a golden chain wrought with

well-cut gems, he silently held it out to the Greek.

Charmides was much displeased. It was the first time that he had ever

needed a gift, and therefore the thought of taking this one shamed him.

"My words, O prince, were not a suit for gifts."

"Thy wife," suggested Belshazzar, inconsequently.

A flicker passed through the Greek's eyes, but he did not waver. "My

lord, I shall probably re-enter the priesthood."

"I think thee no such enemy to me. Come into my regiment of Gutium."

"Nay. I cannot fight. I will have no blood on my hands. I follow music

alone; and music forbids murder."

Belshazzar laughed slightly at the fellow's incomprehensible attitude.

"Go back, then, to temple service. I will trust thee there," he said,

good-naturedly. "And now, the name of him that would have had my life?"

Charmides opened his lips to speak, and then closed them again. "Ask me

not. Only beware and guard thyself."

The king bent his brows. "Greek, hast thou lied to me?"

"No, lord prince."

Belshazzar shrugged. "Out of my way, then!" he cried. And Charmides

stepped quickly out of the road while the king brought his whip over the

haunches of his steeds and started forward, tossing, as he went, the

chain of gold at the feet of the Greek. Nor was he ungenerous enough to

cast a single backward glance to see whether or no the hungry fellow

picked it up.

So Belshazzar proceeded on his way back to the palace, musing rather on

the incident of his little talk with Charmides than upon its

subject--the attempt on his life. More than this one time, and in more

dangerous ways than a sling-shot at a hundred yards, he had been

threatened with death. Those very drives round the walls carried with

them the possibility of a far more frightful end. But Belshazzar's was

an adventurous nature. And danger was his life, a life that the city's

state of quiescence had once led him to seek by other than reputable

paths.

On his arrival at the palace he went immediately to Istar's rooms,

determined to tell her nothing of the event of the afternoon, for her

fears for his personal safety would be thereby enormously increased. But

when he came to her he found another subject ready to occupy all his

thoughts. Istar was not watching for him at the door, as was her

invariable custom. Instead, he found her hanging over the bed on which

her baby lay ill--so ill that Belshazzar, on first seeing it, turned

pale for Istar's sake. And the look that he found in her face, when,

with a glad cry that he had come, she turned it to him, sent a pang to

his heart.

Istar's child, the fruit of her earth-love, had cost her her godhead,

but had returned her joy a thousandfold dearer than divinity had been.

Only now, as she stood bending over the helpless little form, racked as

it was with mortal pain, did the greatest world-horror, the horror of

death, first lay its hold upon her. The thought that this little being

whom she had brought into the world--whom, day and night since its

coming she had cherished with an all-powerful love and joy--_could_ die,

could cease to live for her forever, rushed over her as the waters close

over the head of a drowning woman.

Until an hour before the coming of Belshazzar, Istar had been alone with

the child, believing it to be suffering from some infantine ailment. But

finally the little creature's fever was so manifestly high, and its

distress so great, that she had commanded the attendance of the new

rab-mag, a man widely celebrated for the potency of his charms. He came

at once, examined the baby from head to foot, and noted certain things

that caused him to turn to the mother with a look of deep anxiety.

"Great lady," he said to her, "thou wilt do well to leave this child

alone, though before dawn it die. I, Kidish-Nindar, say it. Accept my

words, and put the child from thee for the sake of the Great City over

which thy husband rules!"

Then Istar, in fear and amazement--quickly and sharply dismissed the man

from her presence and turned again to the infant, that lay now in a

quiet stupor. It was so that Belshazzar found her, wetting the child's

forehead with her tears, pouring forth mingled prayers and the

incoherent, birdlike talk of a mother, while her own face took on the

color of chalk, and her eyes were bright with a dread to which she would

not, even to herself, give form.

The king, for a moment, took her place over the infant, and stood

regarding him while Istar told the story of the rab-mag's desertion.

Belshazzar would have commanded his return had not the mother forbidden

it. But when his displeasure had cooled a little, the king began to

ponder over the evident fear of Kidish-Nindar; and finally, bidding

Istar remain where she was, he took the child in his arms, carried it

across the room, and seated himself with it upon his knees directly

under a light. His back was turned to the divan, and Istar did not see

what he did. When he had finished his examination and carried the

faintly moaning child back to its place, he went over to her, and she

could not but start with dismay at the ghastly pallor that had come upon

him. Rising, she laid both hands upon his arm, looking silently,

wistfully, into his sad eyes.

"My lord!" she whispered, fear unlocking her lips.

Belshazzar, knowing the ineffable tenderness of her motherhood, could

not tell her what he knew. He said only: "Beloved, we will watch

together through the night."

But before that watch began Belshazzar left Istar's rooms for the space

of half an hour while he sought the apartment of Kidish-Nindar. The

rab-mag was frantically purifying his body and repeating mingled prayers

and exorcisms, in the hope of warding off that which he so unspeakably

dreaded. The king, by means of threats and bribes adroitly alternated,

extorted from the man an oath of silence, and then left him grovelling

on his knees before an image of Sin, while he, the king of Babylon,

returned to the vigil of his child.

Through the long night they sat together, man and wife, by the bedside

of the child. Together they watched the progress of that terrible

disease of which Istar was so happily ignorant. Together they saw the

flame of life struggle with the suffocating darkness in which it burned.

And they saw the little light grow feebler, and the flame flutter in the

wind that came across the dark valley of the beyond. Istar's brain

reeled and her heart grew sick. Still, as she sat with her gaze fixed on

the drawn face of the child, unconscious that Belshazzar's eyes were

always upon her, she refused to believe what was too apparent.

And there came a time in the early dawn when the mother could hold away

no longer. Lifting the baby from its place, she clasped it close to her

breast, carried it across to the soft divan, and lay down with the

little, fever-flushed body pressed warm over her heart. In this position

her eyes, weary with the long vigil, closed; and while she slept the day

broke. Belshazzar remained close at her side to watch the end alone. He

could not have told what it was that caused him to lift up his hands

there in the faint light, groping for something to which to cling, for

some higher power that should ease the terrible aching of his heart.

Suddenly the world had become a vast waste, and he was in it alone,

helpless and unutterably weary. And it was still without the hand of God

to help him that he saw the end come--the death of Istar's happiness and

of his own. It was while Istar still quietly slept that the white shadow

passed into space. And the woman awoke to find Belshazzar's hand in

hers, and the little body lying stiff and rigid across her bosom.

When Istar realized what had happened she made no outcry. She sat

clasping the lifeless form tighter to her own. Tearless, speechless,

motionless, she sat alone with that unbearable thing that mortals know

as the death-sorrow. Pitilessly it ate its way into her vitals. She

forgot everything that had been in her heart before. She was unconscious

of any living presence. She was bereft--bereft--and of her offspring. It

was in her mind to curse the God that had conceived such suffering and

put it upon man. And then there came a touch upon her arm that stilled

all her rebellion. Belshazzar's tears fell hot upon her cheek. Without a

word she lifted up to him the baby that was also his: and, when he took

it in his arms, she crept again over to the pillows, and as she laid her

face among them, the blessed tears came forth, and she could weep.

How long she lay there no one knew. Belshazzar had carried away the

body--the little body that had been hers; and when he returned to her he

brought a cup of wine. The child was gone. As he lifted her up in his

arms she asked a mute question with her eyes, and he answered her

softly:

"The baby, most beloved, is gone. Our eyes may not again behold him.

Some day--some day--" he got no further. For an instant Istar had looked

at him in a dull, meaningless sort of way. Then, no longer knowing what

she did, her nerves suddenly giving way, she threw herself upon him in

blind anger, struggling like one gone mad, crying that he had stolen her

child from her, screaming till her voice was gone and her strength gave

way, and she fell into his arms a helpless, lifeless form.

Later in the day, when, with invincible patience and tenderness, he had

soothed her into quietude and had gone forth to his inevitable duties,

Baba came--Baba, who, since her day in the house of Êgibi, had been

Istar's constant companion.

Baba had come to love Istar's child almost as Istar herself loved it.

When, therefore, the little slave first came to the mother, she could

speak no words of comfort. Her tears flowed faster than Istar's own, and

she could only grieve beside the queen. Yet in some way this human woe

brought to Istar's lonely heart its first breath of comfort and of hope.

In the evening she began to speak to Baba of many half-forgotten

things--of her own mysterious birth, of her dim remembrances of a great

preceding existence, of those beings that had sometimes come to her on

earth from space. In the last few weeks Istar had become almost utterly

oblivious of her one-time divinity. Natural life and natural love had so

blunted her former faculties of perception that the past remained only

as a misty background to her life. Yet as her mind struggled to pierce

the mists that hid from her the glory of bygone days, a longing was born

within her heart--a longing ill-defined, yet so strong that she made,

perforce, painful efforts to formulate it.

"I have beheld the glory of the setting sun--the pale light of the newly

risen moon. The murmur of waters came to me as I slept. I beheld great

lakes and white palaces, and high towers shining in the morning light.

The scent of the lotus filled the air, and the rustle of the wind was in

the palm-trees. Tell me, my Baba--tell me that for which I thirst! Tell

me the great desire of my heart! Tell me, oh my Baba, where, in the same

hour, have I known all these perfect things?"

Baba, gazing at her with the big, wondering eyes that had never in all

her little life shone with the light of complete happiness, understood

the words of her golden lady. "I will bring the great comfort to thee,"

she said. "Wait till I come again." And, rising, she left the palace.

Through two still hours Istar waited there with her heart-sorrow,

trusting in Baba to bring that for which she thirsted. And at last, when

she had grown weary with waiting, Baba came again, and with her some one

else--Charmides, with his burnished hair and his pale, gaunt face,

carrying his lyre in his hand. With a silent obeisance to Istar, he

stood off at a little distance, and, opening his lips, began to sing.

Then, indeed, came the glory of the setting sun, the pale light of the

newly risen moon, with the whisper of waters and the shining gold of

great lakes. And around fair white towers and palaces hung the scent of

lotus flowers, and the murmur of the evening wind was in the palm-trees.

All things far and beautiful came home in the same hour to Istar's

senses. And as he sang again, the tears of mingled joy and woe flowed

from her eyes. Once more, and music, which is divine, opened divinity

again before her vision, and she rose up transfigured, crying:

"Allaraine! Allaraine! Mine eyes behold thee once again!"

Then the moment of fire faded, and she was alone with only Charmides and

his careworn, ethereal face, singing on in the fragrant accents of his

Sicilian land, till Istar's passion faded gently away, and she smiled a

little, and her eyelids grew heavy with sleep. Presently her flower-like

head drooped forward. The frail, white hands fell from where they had

been clasped upon her breast. Baba drew her down upon the divan, and

when Charmides' voice died at length away, a great silence was in the

room. Baba and the Greek were alone together. Charmides stood

transfixed, his eyes fastened upon the sleeping figure of her whom he

had once worshipped. He was roused from the look by a touch on his hand.

Baba was kneeling at his side, and her lips were pressed to the fingers

that had touched the magic lyre-strings, bringing peace to the soul of

Istar of Babylon.

* * * * *

And thereafter ten days passed away, and it was the time of the great

yearly feast of Tammuz, the beautiful god of spring.

XVIII

THE FEAST OF TAMMUZ

The midsummer month, Abû, dedicated to the "Queen of the Bow," was

ushered in with heat intense, suffocating, and unendurable. The second

day of the month was the sixteenth of the siege--so-called. The camp of

the Elamite remained perfectly passive. No preparations for fighting had

been made, neither battering-ram nor catapult constructed, not an arrow

let fly from the bow, not a pebble from the sling. The great body of

stout warriors from the vigorous north remained in demoralizing

idleness, broiling in their tents, sleeping by day, living and suffering

at night, while the city they coveted lay quiet, half lifeless, on the

plain before them.

The time had come for the great religious festival celebrated each year

in the Babylonian temples by priest, king, and people, in honor of

Istar's murdered spouse, Tammuz, the young god of spring, slain by the

fierce bolts of high-riding Shamash. This feast was of three days'

duration, and began at the hour of the first sacrifice on the morning of

the second of the month. It was the most important festival in the

calendar, and never yet in the history of the city had its celebration,

for any reason whatsoever, been neglected. And this year the royal

decree concerning it was issued as usual.

In the week that preceded the prospective holiday, however, the lord of

Babylon was subject to some unaccountable forebodings with regard to

this feast. Outwardly, as any one could see, the city was quiet enough.

Inwardly it seethed. This, of course, Belshazzar knew. But of the extent

or the trend of the plot, neither he nor any of his partisans was aware.

His ears could not hear what was talked of at noon in the houses of

Zicarû. His eyes could not see the well-hidden rooms in which priests

and people met to talk over wrongs that the citizens had never thought

of before, but which their indefatigable preceptors skilfully pointed

out to them. Nor did Belshazzar much heed the harangues that daily

followed morning sacrifice in every temple. He hardly noticed how

immense were the crowds in attendance at sacrifice now; and those of the

lords and the soldiers that did notice, refused to think lucidly, but

put it all down to anxiety over the siege and a wish to propitiate the

gods. Still, blind, deaf, utterly insensible as were the king and all

his councillors to the only open evidences of treachery in the city,

there was no one of them that did not, however vaguely, feel treachery

in the air, and dread accordingly.

In the days between the fall of Sippar and the feast, Nabonidus had not

once, so far as his son knew, been inquired for by man, woman, or priest

in the Great City. If anything were said in the palace it was in

whispers too careful to reach the royal ears. Belitsum, still overcome

by the prophet's dream, had gone into an uncertain retirement; but the

remainder of the harem went thoughtlessly and light-heartedly about

their occupations, adding to their usual aimless lives the pleasure of

preparing for the great holiday, now so near at hand.

The demi-god Tammuz, beloved of the love-goddess (as Spring and Love

have been forever wedded in myth and song) had no proper place of

worship in Babylon. His romantic death, however, was celebrated in every

temple of the city and the suburbs on the same days. From time

immemorial it had been the custom for the royal household--men, women,

children, slaves, officers, and servants--to remove into the great hall

of the temple of Bel-Marduk, where the high-priest was accustomed to

officiate.[12] Here for three days they remained, engaged in mingled

prayer and revelry, the one forbidden refreshment being that only one

which could betoken forgetfulness of the gods and the purposes of the

feast--sleep.

In consequence of this, for a week after the festival of the death of

Spring, the Great City was wont to wear the aspect of a city of the

dead; for every one in it moved out from the temple in which he had

celebrated the great event, straight to his bed, and there remained till

his vitality was restored to him.

According to custom, then, on the night of the first of July Babylon was

in a ferment of activity. Houses were preparing for temporary desertion,

stripped of costly hangings and furniture, which were stowed where they

might be out of reach of sacrilegious marauders, while holiday garments

and ornaments, the costliest that each household could afford, were

making ready for wear on the morrow. In every garden garlands were

woven. In the temples, priests and eunuchs were at work setting up

tables and divans, hanging flower-ropes and wreaths over the images of

Tammuz that were placed in each house of worship. All night chariots

rattled through the streets, and men shouted to each other from house to

house. Great droves of bullocks and goats, and immense numbers of fowls

and doves, were conveyed to the temporary sheds erected on each

temple-platform, in anticipation of the needs of the sacrifices. To the

casual observer everything might have appeared exactly as usual. There

was none to know how many secret weapons were slipped into the broad

girdles of the citizens' holiday dresses. There was none to wonder why,

at some time between midnight and dawn, a Zicarî, or some member of the

priesthood, stopped at almost every house in the common quarters to

whisper certain final instructions in the ear of the householder. And

from the great height of Nimitti-Bel, the members of the city guard

failed, in the darkness, to perceive that the black camp of the invader

was not at rest.

There were two men in Babylon aware of all these things, and these two

sat together, like spiders in the great web of their spinning, watching

throughout that fervid night. They were in the house of the high-priest

of Bel, on the east side of the Â-Ibur-Sabû; and one of them was

Amraphel, the master of the house, while the other was Beltishazzar the

Jew. They did not talk, for there was little to speak of. Their plan had

been long in the making and was perfect at last. Every detail was at the

finger-tips of both of them. And it had been only a consciousness of the

gigantic consequence of their plan, and the probable monstrous results

of it, that made its originators instinctively draw together on the eve

of its fulfilment. Neither of them was nervous in the presence of the

other, for one of these men perfectly complemented his companion. The

great intellect and the talent for broad strokes of policy that had made

Amraphel's position what it was, was completed by the abnormal

characteristics of craft and foresight possessed by the Jew. Amraphel's

courage was the outcome of his great pride. Daniel's bravery was that of

the enthusiast, the fanatic, the leader of men--tempered always with a

species of cowardice, the cowardice that was to give Babylon over to

other hands than his for government.

Thus here, in the silent interior of Amraphel's vast palace, sat the two

traitors, inwardly communing, outwardly silent, throughout the long

night of the first of July, while Babylon raged within, and Belshazzar

dreamed feverishly in the house of his dead father.

Morning--the morning of the second of Ab--dawned over the city. On the

lips of every man was the name of Tammuz. In the heart of every man were

the mingled emotions of excitement, of dread, of vague desire. The

palace of the king was, early in the day, the scene of confused

preparation. Only one person in it experienced no sensation of

pleasurable excitement at the prospect of the coming feast; Istar, still

mourning her unspeakable loss, had spent the night in accustomed grief,

to which this time something was added--a vague sense of dread, of

undefined foreboding. At early dawn, before the palace was awake,

Belshazzar came in to her, and his eyes were dark with trouble. Istar

looked searchingly into his face before she spoke.

"What is the woe of my lord? Thou hast not slept, Belshazzar?"

"Yea, beloved, I have slept--and dreamed: dreamed till my head is on

fire. Let thy hands cool the burning of mine eyes. Let thy words still

the fears that are rising in my heart. Istar, I have spoken this night

with the spirit of my father, who bade me welcome--home."

Istar gave a sharp cry, and the color fled from her face.

"It was a vision, a wandering dream; and yet it has brought foreboding

in its train. Bring me comfort, Istar, my beloved."

"Comfort, lord of my heart! Comfort! Ah! I have none of it. Since my

baby is taken from me, my heart weeps. O Belshazzar, thou king, let us

not ask for comfort. Let us rather mingle our tears before the seat of

God; and from our grief shall spring the blessing of the divine comfort.

My heart weeps. Why, then, should my lips smile? Thou, dear lord,

remainest to me. If thou wert gone I should not weep, for with thee my

life, too, would go. My lord--my lord--I love thee so!"

Quickly Belshazzar caught her in his arms, crushing her to him in an

embrace wherein all their earthly and spiritual love mingled together in

one supreme moment of ecstasy. When his arms unclosed, both were faint.

Istar lay back upon her couch, her eyes shut, her breath coming with

difficulty; while Belshazzar stood over her, looking down at her beauty

with a sudden feeling of sweet, ineffable peace.

Now the day had fully broken, and the whole palace was alive. Belshazzar

took tender leave of his wife, for the two of them were to go different

ways to the temple: Istar in her litter with the members of the harem,

Belshazzar in his golden chariot, by the side of the high-priest.

"My lord shall see me clothed all in black and silver; nor, through the

three days, will I uncover my face before the eyes of those assembled,"

whispered Istar, as he knelt for the last instant beside her.

"On the evening of the third day, beloved, thou must unveil. Tammuz,

like our child, is dead; yet in their grief the women disclose their

features. So also shalt thou. Now, fare thee well--till once again we

are alone together here."

Istar started nervously, and then rose to her feet with a sudden

impulse. "Belshazzar, wilt thou guard thyself in the temple? Wilt thou

not have thy men of Gutium at thy side?"

"How had you known that, Istar? Such a thought never came to me before;

yet now--this year--I have commanded that my whole regiment, with their

arms, be gathered together in the temple with my regular household. Why

I have done this thing I myself know not. And yet--and yet--"

Istar put her arms about his neck. "Let the great God be thanked!" she

whispered, earnestly. "And I also--I also will be with thee. If harm

comes, we shall be together to the end."

Finally Belshazzar left her and went to his own rooms to see that all

preparations for the great feast were made. Istar, in the mean time,

covered herself with the long, black, silver-shot veil that she had worn

in the days of her loneliness; and, robed only in this and her white

tunic, without jewel or ornament of any kind, she sat alone in her room

till it came to be the time of setting forth. A eunuch announced that

her litter waited; and, attended by two slaves with fans, she walked out

to the great court-yard of the palace.

Here, indeed, was a scene of the liveliest confusion. Men, women,

children, and eunuchs of every type, all in holiday dress, all noisily

talking and laughing, moved about among groups of chariots, litters,

richly caparisoned donkeys, and two or three camels; for, on the way to

and from the feast, the meanest slave was never asked to walk. Istar was

the first of the royal party to appear in the court-yard, and her

mourning costume created much comment of a disappointed character. Her

veiled face and melancholy gait cast a shadow over the general merriment

of the lower class, among whom, indeed, Istar was not popular. Her

litter, however, was quickly brought to her, and just as she lay down in

it, happy to be out of sight, Belitsum, the dowager, appeared. Her mood

was quite different from that of her quasi daughter-in-law. She had cast

aside her widow's weeds, as was her privilege, for the three feast-days;

and her stout person was gorgeously arrayed. A band of flashing jewels

held her head-cloth in place above her eyebrows, and she waddled along

to a jingling accompaniment of bells that were fastened on her ankles

and strings of dangling beads that hung from her waist. Her laughter

sounded high and shrill as she tossed some light-hearted jest to the

line of attendants that followed her; and the whole court-yard responded

to her wit with mighty roars of laughter. Now, indeed, Belitsum was in

her element. It took her full fifteen minutes to settle herself in her

litter, and she was only then finally fixed because the appearance of

Belshazzar put an end to any further by-play for the benefit of the

on-lookers.

Belshazzar hastily mounted his chariot, and, the signal for the start

being immediately given, there was a mad scramble for vehicles, donkeys,

and camels, and the royal procession passed through the gate of the

palace.

The temple of Marduk, in which the king kept the feast of Tammuz, was

the largest temple in Babylon, and the only important one on the east

bank of the Euphrates. At the other end of the great bridge, Amraphel,

clad in the fullest insignia of his office, joined the king at the head

of the line of the royal household. Their way led along the Mûtaqutû,

the smaller of Nebuchadrezzar's two boulevards; and it was lined with

people that risked the possibility of being late at the opening

sacrifice in their temples in order to see this imposing spectacle. For

the first time in a year Belshazzar was cheered along his way. And there

was something in the voices of the people that went home to the heart of

the uncrowned king; so that, for the first time in his life, his eyes

were wet with the tears of love that royalty should feel for its

children.

One incident only disturbed the dignity of the march. Belitsum, the

irrepressible, had barely managed to contain herself in solitude when

the curtain of her litter finally shut her away from the eyes of the

admiring throng. But now she was consoled by the fact that, though she

was herself unseen, she could comfortably watch the crowd that lined the

streets through which she passed. The procession was more than half-way

to the temple when her sharp eyes suddenly caught sight of a man that

stood watching the procession from the left side of the street. Meanly

dressed and dull-eyed as he was, she nevertheless recognized in him her

new prophet, the man of dreams.

Quickly thrusting her head from her slow-moving equipage, she cried to

one of her bearers, pointing at the same time to the object of her

curiosity:

"Shusu-Sin! Shusu-Sin! Who is that man there--he of the brown tunic and

the rose-topped cane? Speak!"

The bearer glanced round in an embarrassed fashion as the crowd craned

forward to look at the queen. He had no difficulty in recognizing the

man she designated. Then, leaning backward, towards the waiting ear of

the dowager, he whispered, discreetly:

"He on whom the eyes of the queen have deigned to rest is Beltishazzar

the Jew, called of his people Daniel."

"A Jew!" cried Belitsum, in amazement. Then, catching the innumerable

eyes fixed upon her in wonder or in amusement, she dove hastily back

into her litter, carrying with her the long-desired knowledge.

Meantime, at the head of the procession drove Belshazzar and Amraphel,

side by side, in their golden chariots. Beyond the requisite first

salutation, neither of them had spoken on the whole way, till, at a

quarter of an hour before the time set for the first sacrifice, the

royal vehicles halted in the great square of Marduk. Here was something

at sight of which Amraphel started anxiously. In that square, south of

the main entrance of the temple, drawn rank on rank in matchless array,

spear, helmet, and sword flashing in the sun, was Belshazzar's guard,

the famous regiment of Gutium. They had been waiting here all the

morning, under command of their lieutenant, at the orders of their

commander. And now, as the king drew near, they made the royal salute,

and quietly closed ranks in preparation for marching. Belshazzar, giving

them a long, sweeping salute, suddenly halted his chariot. The

high-priest, in extreme anxiety, did the same. Then the king shouted

three orders, all of them barely comprehensible to a civilian. But

Amraphel's ears were sharp; his wits sharper. At the last command his

face grew crimson with anger.

"What means this?" he asked, hoarsely, turning on the king. "Think you

these dogs shall be admitted to the holy temple?"

Belshazzar barely turned his head towards the speaker. "What sayest

thou?" he asked, coolly.

"It is against the laws of the gods that armed men should enter into

their places of worship."

"I had not heard it," returned the king. "And it is my will that this,

my regiment, follow me into the temple. How"--suddenly he turned full on

the priest--"how wilt thou gainsay me?"

Amraphel drew back into himself. What had Belshazzar heard? How much did

he know? Could he indeed, with this handful of soldiers, hold that

temple of Marduk against the army of Cyrus and the Babylonish mob? It

was a question that was not easy to answer. Do what he would, Amraphel

was for the moment sorely nonplussed. He could see nothing for it but to

submit. It was thorough defeat; for, fifteen minutes later, fifty

members of the priesthood, the whole of the royal household, and the

regiment of Gutium, five hundred strong, had entered the temple of

Bel-Marduk.

Almost incredibly vast was the great hall of this, the greatest temple

of the first of Babylon's twelve great gods. In it the seven hundred

people that entered found plenty of room--more than enough room to

spread themselves about at will. The vast walls, which towered up to a

tremendous height, were richly adorned in the lower half with

bas-reliefs illustrating various religious myths: the council of the

gods; Bel-Marduk's combat with Tiamât the dragon; and Oannes the

fish-god, giver of wisdom, expounding religion to the throngs of people

that came down to hear him on the shores of the gulf of the setting sun.

Above these sculptures ran bands of history, in the immaculate

cuneiform, giving the story of Babylon from the time of her founding

down to to-day. Still over this, on the enamelled tiles that carried the

walls on up to the dim and shadowy roof, were the decorations for the

feast. Great cloths of silk and muslin, elaborately and beautifully

embroidered, fell, softly luminous, in the glowing light. Ropes of

flowers were everywhere festooned; and their fragrance alone would have

rendered the air rich. Their breath, however, vied with streams of

incense, with showered perfumes, with fragrance of the sweet myrrh and

Indian spices that burned along the walls in braziers of beaten brass.

Finally, the light from the scene itself furnished sweetness to the

room; for, from a thousand well-wrought hanging-lamps came flickering,

golden flames, fed with the rarest perfumed oil.

The preparations for the feast and for the innumerable sacrifices, with

which the feasting was to be varied, had been carefully made. The back

rooms of the temple had been converted indiscriminately into kitchens,

larders, and stables for the animals to be used for the sacrifice. Here

an army of slaves was already at work, and there were half a hundred

temple eunuchs, clad in spotless white, with collars of gold and caps of

Tyrian purple, to minister to the wants of the feasters.

The great hall had been prepared with infinite care for the reception of

the worshippers. In the back of the room, facing the entrance, and

raised ten feet above the floor, was the platform on which stood the

shrine of Tammuz. On the broad space before the holy of holies, carpeted

with rugs, lighted by jewel-crusted lamps, were the divan and table of

the king, who was to keep this place during the three days of the feast.

At the foot of the steps leading up into this high place was the

sacrificial altar, on which a fire was kept burning continuously; and to

the right and to the left of this stood other images of Tammuz. Here,

for six hours by day and six by night, was the place of the high-priest.

During the rest of the time he lay above, on a couch beside that of the

king, or, if he chose, moved from place to place at the long tables that

lined the walls and filled the central spaces of the hall. At these

tables rank was not observed, and the lord of the treasury and the

meanest slave of the harem might be found side by side. These matters,

however, adjusted themselves. Men sat with their chosen friends, or

moved about from hour to hour as they wished, while the women generally

remained in groups at the upper end of the hall.

To-day Ribâta, in company with the lords of the palace, took his place

immediately below Belshazzar's platform, while his slaves were just

beyond them, to the right. The soldiers of Gutium were in a body at the

end of the hall, lying awkwardly enough on their silken couches, and

dreaming grimly of nights in the watch-towers on the walls when they

feasted according to their taste. On the right hand of the great hall,

quite alone, at a solitary table under the figure of Bel on the wall,

sat the one being to whom this festival was not a thing of joy. Istar,

veiled from head to foot, uncrowned, unadorned, unattended, sat alone on

her couch, gazing straight before her, wrapped in grief and foreboding,

hearing nothing of what went on about her. Belshazzar from his place,

and Baba from where she mingled with the slaves, watched her when they

could; and for many hours that day it seemed to them that she did not

move; and their bodies grew weary with the thought of how she stayed

there, rigid and untiring.