As soon as the great company was assembled and each had found a place,

the first sacrifice of the day was made. Two under-priests led in a

snow-white bullock with gilded horns, his body twined with lotus flowers

and his feet bound with golden chains.

This animal was led once round the room, while every one rose,

prostrated himself before it, and remained standing through the whole

sacrificial ceremony. Amraphel performed the slaughter in the name of

Tammuz. Then a short incantation was made. The blood of the dead

creature was poured out upon the altar, and the carcass was then carried

away to be flayed, dressed, and cooked. This ceremony formally opened

the festival, and it was followed by a loud chant led by the priests, in

which the praises of Tammuz and Istar were set forth. In the midst of

this singing the first wine was brought. Flagon after flagon of the

purple juice of Helbon, of Lebanon, of Izalla, of Tuhimme, of Zimini,

and of Opis in Armenia was emptied down the eager throats of both men

and women. Very shortly the scene took on a different aspect. Laughter

came freely. Voices rose clearer and higher, and snatches of song echoed

under the high roof. The music of the lutes and cymbals caused more than

one woman to rise and fall into that slow, sinuous, dreamy posturing,

called, in the East, dancing. Many sacrifices followed. Goats and lambs

were slaughtered by tens and twenties. Doves, fastened neck to neck with

fine, silver chains, were killed off by the hundreds: timid, fluttering

things, reared for this sacred end in the temple towers, but unable, in

their folly, to realize the worthiness of their holy martyrdom. Amraphel

and his under-priests admirably performed their tasks. Indeed, Amraphel

seemed doubly impressive to-day. His men were exalted with their wine,

and everything but the affairs of the hour had slipped from their

thoughts.

Only Istar, of them all, looked on unmoved and sad. To-day she saw her

lord as never before, crowning the feast in all the splendor of his

royalty. Never had the faultless beauty of his physique impressed her

so. He stood at the top of the ten steps, directly in front of the

arched door-way of the shrine, three golden-robed slaves crouching on

either side of him, lifting in his hands a yellow cup of wine that he

drank to the men of his guard, to the regiment of Guti. His purple

cloak, wrought with long scrolls of burning gold, flowed back from his

shoulders. His superb head, its black locks bound about with a twisted

fillet in which flashed fifty purple amethysts, was held like that of a

conqueror on the day of his greatest victory. Istar caught the flashing

of the storm-eyes, saw the lips curve with his deep laughter, watched

the gleaming of the jewels on his breast, and then, as he raised the cup

to his mouth, she sank back in her place, dizzy and sick at heart. He

had forgotten as she could not forget. He thought no more of the little

creature he had watched with her, that had lain in his arms so many

times warm and breathing with life, and that had been so lately taken

from him in death. And at that thought of death a terrible shudder

passed over her, and she became still and cold, and intensely weary of

the scene of revelry. Slowly she sank back into a reclining position on

her couch. She had refused every proffered dish of food, every kind of

wine. Her eyelids closed and there came over her a kind of stupor, in

which she lay for many hours. It was not sleep, for through it she could

hear the sounds in the room, could distinguish Belshazzar's voice

whenever he spoke, and always answered the slaves that came reverently

to waken her, telling them that she knew all that passed as well as they

themselves. And yet Istar was not actually in that room. Nay, she could

feel herself alone, at an infinite distance. When, after a long period

she opened her eyes again, she saw the scene more than ever full of

life. The lamps glowed brighter than before, but through the opening far

in the roof no daylight came. The day was over. Night had come. Istar

was faint for food, yet she rebelled at the idea of the heavy,

half-cooked flesh served in this room; and she thought that possibly, in

the rear of the temple, there might be some quiet place where she could

break bread and taste of fruit and wine alone and undisturbed. With this

thought she rose quietly and moved across to the foot of the shrine, on

the platform of which Amraphel and Belshazzar now sat side by side.

Here, moved by an irresistible impulse, Istar of Babylon turned to look

back on the scene she was leaving. But her eyes, first raised, did not

return to the floor. Instead, she stood transfixed, the heart in her

wildly throbbing, her head swimming with the overpowering wonder of the

sight that met her eyes. Unconscious of what she did, her two hands drew

the enshrouding veil from her face, and then there rushed upon her

vision such a sight as she had never thought to see again.

In the air, above the vast, closed doors, hung Allaraine, in a dazzling

cloud of glory, his form all but indistinguishable in the palpitating

rays of his aureole. He was without his lyre. In his right hand he held

a wand of molten gold, with which he wrote upon the broad space over the

doors. He, and that that he wrote, were clearly intelligible to Istar,

who gazed on him unnoticed in her place. For Allaraine had come for her,

and for her alone was writing his message there upon the wall. This she

knew from the first.

But how was it with those others that thronged the hall? Before their

blinded spiritual eyes all that was distinguishable were three fingers

of the archetype's hand, and the unreadable words of fire that he wrote.

Yet these were enough: infinitely more than enough. Amraphel and

Belshazzar together, from the high place, first saw the miracle; and

from the lips of the king broke forth a cry, a cry that stilled every

voice in the temple. All eyes were turned to the shrine, and beheld the

dread staring of Amraphel, whose gaze was fixed in dumb terror on the

opposite wall. With universal accord every glance followed his, and

every eye beheld the gradual fading of the hand and the blazing

brilliance of the writing that was left upon the wall. There was no cry

from the assemblage. A silence, infinitely more impressive than any

sound, fell upon them. For five long minutes none moved or spoke. Istar

remained unperceived in her place. Trembling and dazed, her lips moved

noiselessly, repeating over and over the words that were written before

her:

"Hast thou found man's relation to God? The silver sky waits for thy

soul."

Again and yet again she repeated those two phrases to herself, till, out

of the depths of the long-past, their meaning came home to her. Then a

faint sigh broke from her lips, a sigh of ineffable weariness, of

ineffable relief. She replaced the veil over her face, and, gliding

noiselessly back to her couch, lay down upon it with her new knowledge,

giving little heed to all that followed.

The voice of Belshazzar broke the spell hanging over the room. His tones

startled the company like the clarion blast of a trumpet, as he cried:

"Alchîa! Balatû! Ubar! Umarîa! Ye prophets of the great gods, arise and

come before me!"

From out of the throng of feasters rose four white-robed men,

bare-headed and bare-footed, prophets of Nabonidus' household.

Mechanically obeying the words of their lord, they came forth and stood

in a row before the steps of the high place.

"Ye that are professed to know the wishes of the gods, interpret now to

us that which is written upon the wall."

One by one the four men turned and scanned the wall with its flaming

text. And one by one each turned back to the king again, saying,

helplessly: "O prince, live forever! I cannot read it!"

Then Belshazzar's pale face became tinged with red and his eyes blazed

with anger. "Look ye again! I say that honor and riches and great power

shall be his that interprets these words upon the wall. Look ye again!"

And again they looked. But had the reward for the reading been the

kingdom of Babylonia, not one of the four possessed the wit or the

courage to interpret to the master that which was unreadable to mortal

eyes.

When it was seen in the room how the prophets had failed in their task,

the murmurs of many tongues began to be heard against them. The whole

throng was tremulous with awe and with fear. Amraphel himself felt it.

He gazed helplessly at Belshazzar, never realizing this tremendous

opportunity, never perceiving that no situation could possibly have been

more desirable than this. It was from a wholly unexpected source that

help came to his cause. In the midst of the dread silence that had

gradually overpowered the people, Belitsum sprang from her place, and,

hurrying as well as she could to the foot of the steps leading up to the

shrine, cried out to Belshazzar:

"O king, live forever! Let not thy thoughts trouble thee nor thy

countenance be changed. There is a man in thy kingdom in whom is the

spirit of the great gods; in whom was found light and understanding and

wisdom in the days of thy father's father. What hath he not shown thee

and me in the miracle of his dream? Forasmuch as great knowledge and

understanding, interpreting of dreams and showing of hard sentences and

dissolving of doubts, were found in Daniel, called Beltishazzar, let

then that Daniel be called, and he will show the interpreting of the

letters of the fiery hand."

Belshazzar heard his step-mother with no little amazement, for he had

hardly credited her with either sense or knowledge. But her words

recalled to him something that Nabonidus had once said to him regarding

this same man, and he made a sudden determination to try him with this

difficult feat.

"Ina-shu-sin!" he shouted to the officer of his house that stood on

guard at the door. "Let the door of the temple be opened. Go thou forth

into the city and find him that is called Beltishazzar the Jew, bringing

him back to the temple. Haste thee!"

The man had not time to acknowledge the command when Amraphel turned

quickly to Belshazzar: "Lord prince," said he, softly, "the man Daniel

being well known to the priesthood, send thou rather a temple steward to

find him. He will appear before thee very shortly."

Belshazzar looked searchingly into the face of the high-priest, but he

failed to find there more than a warrantable anxiety. Therefore he

replied: "As thou wilt, Amraphel. Inâ-shu-Îbni, let rather Baza of the

temple go to search for the prophet; and watch thou for them from the

door, that Daniel, coming, may quickly enter."

The priest Baza, of the third house of Zicarû, put away the cups that he

bore, and, catching Amraphel's sign, made his obeisance to the king and

hurried from the temple. Just before his disappearance Istar, who had

watched the whole scene in silence, half rose from the couch to which

she had returned, as if she would have prevented the man's departure.

For a second she stood quite still in her upright position, glancing

from the letters on the wall to Belshazzar's face. Then she sank back on

her couch again without speaking; and as her head once more touched the

cushions, Baza disappeared into the night, and Inâ-shu-Îbni shut, but

did not fasten after him, the great temple door.

Fifteen minutes passed, and still the dazed throng neither spoke nor

moved. They waited for him who could make plain to them the mystery or

the miracle that had come upon the feast. At the end of this time the

temple door once again softly opened, and a man, dark-robed,

bare-footed, gaunt, and sharp-eyed, walked into the room, and straight

to the foot of the steps of the shrine. Seeing Belshazzar and Amraphel

together above him, he made obeisance to each, and Belshazzar, rising,

came to the top of the first step, asking:

"Art thou that Daniel which art of the captivity of Judah, whom the

great king my father's father brought out of Jewry?"

Daniel bent his head.

"It is said of thee that the spirit of the gods, light, wisdom, and

understanding, are to be found in thee. Look then, thou leader of Jews,

at the wall yonder. Behold what is written on it in letters of fire. If

thou canst interpret those strange words, honor and great riches shall

be to thee. Look thou, and read."

Obediently, while the gaze of every eye in the room of the feast was

fixed upon him, Daniel turned and looked over the door, that had been

left ajar, and saw the signs that glowed more faintly now upon the

bricks above. For many seconds he stood passive, his black brows knit

under the stress of thought. Amraphel grew cold with nervousness. His

lips twitched to give the signal that should drown this incident in the

flood of something infinitely greater; and he was on the very verge of

crying out when the prophet turned and faced the king, a fire of emotion

burning in his eyes and in his cheeks. When he opened his lips the room

grew breathless, and Istar, shivering in irrepressible fear, hung upon

his words:

"O king, the most high God gave Nebuchadrezzar thy forefather a kingdom,

and majesty and glory and honor. And for the majesty that he gave him

all people, nations, languages, trembled and feared before him. Whom he

would he slew; and whom he would he kept alive; and whom he would he set

up; and whom he would he put down. But when his mind was lift up and his

heart was hardened in pride, he was deposed from his kingly throne and

they took his glory from him. And he was driven forth from the sons of

men. His heart was made like the beasts, and his dwelling was made with

wild asses. They fed him with grass like oxen, and his body was wet with

the dew of heaven, till he knew that the most high God ruled in the

kingdom of men, and that He appointeth over it whomsoever He will.

"And thou his descendant, O Belshazzar, hast not humbled thine heart,

though thou knewest all this. Thou hast lifted thyself up against the

Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of His house before

thee, thou and thy lords, thy wives and thy concubines, have drunk wine

in them. Thou hast worshipped the gods of silver and of gold, and of

brass, iron, wood, and stone, which see not, nor hear nor know. And the

God in whose hands thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast thou

not glorified. Then was the part of the hand sent from Him, and this

writing was given.

"This is the writing that was written: 'Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.'

"This is the interpretation of the thing: Mene: God hath numbered thy

kingdom and finished it. Tekel: thou art weighed in the balances and

found wanting. Peres: Thy kingdom is divided--_and given to the Medes

and Persians_!"

The last words were spoken not to Belshazzar nor to any one in the

temple. They rose to a shout that was heard outside the half-open temple

door. In the moments that followed, Istar, her eyes blazing with wrath

and scorn, sprang to her feet and came forth to confront the man of

lies. But her lips never showed him false. Even as she lifted up her

voice there came from without the sound of a mighty roar of fury. The

two doors of the temple were burst apart, and those within found

themselves face to face with the army of Cyrus and a vast Babylonish

mob.

XIX

THE REGIMENT OF GUTI

The terrible spell of silence that had spread over the feasters at the

temple was broken by a woman's scream. That scream brought men and women

alike back to life. With a loud shout Belshazzar the king leaped down

the steps of the shrine and ran forward, crying lustily to his guard to

form into line. Old as he was, Amraphel, Cyrus' tool, was an instant

before the king; and he, with Daniel the prophet close beside him, made

his way through the band of soldiers that had gathered near the door, to

the ranks of the enemy, in the vast throng of whom priest and Jew were

presently lost to sight.

Meantime Belshazzar hurriedly rallied his men around him, had them

quickly in order, and lined them before the opening, from which by this

time doors and gates had been entirely torn away. The men of Guti were

armored and armed. The scent of battle came to their nostrils. They were

at home with it. Their blood tingled with joy, and Belshazzar saw how

they would fight for him, every man to the end.

Now came the first sharp volley of arrows and sling-stones from the

multitude at the doors. Two or three of the guards fell. The ranks were

quickly closed up and the volley answered. Then the range became too

short for bows. Men of Elam and Babylonish traitors were hand-to-hand

with the defenders of the temple. In the semi-darkness it was hard to

distinguish between friend and foe; and the struggle became as man to

man. Shouts and cries ascended from the indivisible mass. In the midst

of everything rose the trumpet tones of Belshazzar, crying encouragement

to his men. But the rich and mellow voice of Cyrus was not to be heard

giving commands to the other side. Cyrus was not here to-night. Only the

open field and honorable combat were his. And he had left the dishonor

of such a victory to Amraphel the high-priest, and Cambyses, his own

son, who had asked for it.

In the temple, behind the ranks of the regiment of Guti, the royal

eunuchs, creatures of silent courage and loyalty, had gathered together

all the women into one group, round which, for protection, they and the

lords of the council were piling the temple furniture into a barricade.

Istar alone was not here. Since the first battle-cry no one had seen

her; and now, in the excitement of the moment, she, being unseen, was

also forgotten.

Baba, in her silks and chains, was with the women of Ribâta's household,

all of whom their lord had placed carefully in one corner of the

protecting barricade, behind a pile of divans and stone tables laid

beside the sacrificial altar. In the rush of the moment Ribâta had but a

word with his favorite slave. For an instant, however, he bent over her,

to see that she was well protected, and in that time he pressed his lips

as a seal against her forehead, muttering hurriedly, at the same time:

"Courage, little one! Be not afraid. Our lives are in the hands of the

great Bel. Pray to him, but do not weep."

And Baba answered readily, without any sign of fear: "My lord is my

lord. I obey his word."

Then, as he left her side, the young girl lay back on the floor close

against a couch that had been tipped beside her, and stayed there,

silent and open-eyed, listening to the tumult of the battle round the

door. The chorus of shouts and yells was deafening. Babylonish

battle-cries mingled with Median phrases of triumph. And closer at hand,

all around her, in fact, the women of high station lay wailing out their

fright. Ribâta's two wives were near, crazed with terror for themselves,

for their lord, for Babylon, for the king. Now and then, high above the

general tumult, came the shrill, fierce voice of Belitsum, crying her

anguish. Nabonidus was the name that continually left her lips, till

Belshazzar himself, from the thickest of the fight, caught the

syllables, and fought the more fiercely for the memory of his father.

While the men of Gutium held the door, there appeared to be nothing to

fear for the women in the temple. Ribâta, before joining in the

conflict, passed among his friends of the council, bidding them hold

back a little from the thick of the fight, that, should it prove

necessary, they might be unhurt to defend the women. The holders of the

temple were in bad enough straits, to be sure, yet there was no

immediate danger. Belshazzar's men, flanked by two bands of eunuchs and

noblemen, who fought with sacrificial knives and axes, were for the

moment holding all Babylon and the army of Cyrus at bay. Baba knew this,

as she lay, quiet and silent, gazing up into the shadowy spaces of the

roof. Presently, while all that terrible din sounded in her ears, with

that throng of writhing, struggling, bleeding men twenty yards away, a

little smile stretched itself over her lips, and her eyes fell shut. She

lay wrapped in a vision of her own: a vision of fair fields and broad,

blue water, where, on the shore, stood a man; a man whose hair shone

like the sun, and who bore in his hands a five-stringed lyre. And

presently, from out of the racket, she could hear the pure tones of

Charmides' voice, singing, as he had always sung throughout his life,

for love.

Baba was lying unconscious of her surroundings in this little ecstasy,

when suddenly the low wailing of the women was heightened into loud

cries of well-warranted horror. The little slave felt a new presence at

hand. She lifted up her eyes, and saw something that caused her heart to

rise into her throat. The barricade was breaking down before a band of

armed temple-servants that were advancing to the murder of the women. A

cold stream poured round Baba's heart, and for the first time to-night

she screamed aloud. Her cry was answered by Ribâta, who was trying

desperately to gather the lords out of the conflict at the door. But the

fight there was going badly. More than half the defenders of the temple

had fallen, and each of those that remained was pressed by half a dozen

of the enemy. Many of the guards had been drawn out into the square and

were keeping up the battle there while they lived. But it seemed all at

once that the defence could not last many minutes more. Not a man could

come to the rescue of the women caught in so terrible a trap. And in the

faces of the inhuman creatures that threatened them, there was no hope

for their lives. The murderers were nearly all of them Zicarû from the

third college, which was Amraphel's own; and into their hearts hatred

for the upper classes had been instilled for years. Now, as they looked

upon their helpless prey, all the animal savagery of their race rose up

in them, and their eyes sparkled and their lips twitched in the lust for

blood. The wife of Nabû-Mashetic-Urrâ, one of the old councillors of

Nabonidus, received the first blow. The knife of a seer struck her to

the heart; and with that first gush of blood the general carnage began.

Defenceless as they were, the women were roused to action. With their

hands, their limbs, their teeth, the pins that fastened their hair, they

fought uselessly for life. From the place where she lay half concealed,

Baba watched the scenes of murder around her. The woman next her had

been dodging the knife that continually pursued her, till, stabbed in a

dozen places, hair and body dripping with her blood, she proffered her

heart to the assassin, who mercifully plunged his dripping blade up to

its hilt in her breast.

Baba gave a hoarse shriek, threw up her hands, and fell, face down, upon

the floor. A second after a streak of fire ran deep into her right

shoulder. Then, immediately, all the noise died away. The world reeled

with her and became black; and for her this scene of incredible

brutality was at an end.

Not so Belshazzar's desperate task. At the moment when the Zicarû,

appearing from the back rooms of the temple, had set about the slaughter

of the women, the king, in the midst of a little band of five soldiers,

had pressed through the front ranks of the enemy, out into the temple

square. This was packed with the city mob that had gathered from the

feast in the temples of Nebo, Nergal, Istar, and Sin, and come hither

under the leadership of their officiating priests. In the darkness it

was impossible to tell friend from foe. Belshazzar's self-constituted

body-guard fought madly to preserve his life; but, fifteen minutes after

they had passed the temple doors, the last of them, wounded in twenty

places, had fallen at the feet of his king, and Belshazzar of Babylon

was alone with the darkness and with besetting death. Many set upon him

where he stood on the eastern edge of the square; but perhaps none of

his assailants knew him. He was armed only with a short sword taken from

the hand of a dying Elamite; but with this weapon his execution was

terrible. As man after man went down before his tigerish strength, the

attention of many was drawn to him, and presently he found himself

backing down a narrow and crooked street running out of the square,

engaged with three men, variously armed, that vainly strove to fell him.

An arrow stuck in the flesh of his right forearm, and there was a great

gash upon one of his knees. He left behind him a trail of blood; but, in

the heat of contest, he felt not a twinge of pain. The noise of the

battle perceptibly diminished. He heard it vaguely, caring at this time

very little how the fight was going. His adversaries pressed him hard;

yet he smiled, as continually he beat them back. The brute, the tiger in

him, was uppermost now. He had not a thought for anything but fighting.

In his slow and certain way he had retreated perhaps two hundred yards,

and was approaching the house of one of the under-priests of Bel. From

its open door-way a flood of light poured into the street, and as

Belshazzar moved into the luminous spot a cry of recognition broke from

the lips of his oppressors. At the same moment a white-robed figure came

quickly out of the house, and, unseen by him, moved behind Belshazzar.

In the moment that followed, a knife gleamed in the light behind the

king. The blow fell. With a great cry Belshazzar reeled, sank to his

knee, straightened up again with a superhuman effort, thrust weakly in

the direction of the men in front, and sank back on the ground with a

faint moan. At the same time his assassin, motioning the three soldiers

to go back, stepped in front of his victim and bent over him.

"Amraphel!" muttered the king.

"Ay, Amraphel, thou dog! Amraphel, thou tyrant of the city! Amraphel,

thou last ruler of a hated line! Amraphel, that stands at last alone in

the land of his desire! Hear thou, then, the name of Amraphel. Know his

everlasting hatred for thee and thine, and knowing--die!" Then, with his

sandalled foot, the old man spurned the face of him that was fallen,

hoping to bring some craven word to the lips of the king.

But Belshazzar was himself in death as in life. Gazing steadily into the

face of the high-priest, he permitted himself to smile--a slight,

scornful smile, such as he had sometimes worn during the sacrifice.

Seeing it, the high-priest was goaded into a hot fury. With what

strength he had he kicked the face of the dying man. Then, drawing his

bloody skirts about him, he turned and passed once more into the house

of the priest, out of Belshazzar's sight forever.

So at last the king lay alone, unmolested, with the night and with his

thoughts. Babylon was fallen--was fallen the Great City, before the hand

of no invader, but by treachery and stealth, by means of murder and of

outrage. All this the king knew; yet no regret for the inevitable

disturbed these final moments. Rather he turned his mind to that that

was his alone, to that which constituted his true, his inner life, that

made his great happiness, that had redeemed him from all mental

pain--his supreme love for Istar the woman.

In that dim dream into which all surrounding things were fading, her

name floated to his lips. Once, twice, thrice he repeated it to himself,

lingeringly, adoringly, loving each syllable as he spoke it. He had no

thought, no hope of seeing her again. She was somewhere, far away, in

the midst of those direful scenes beyond him. He commended her to his

gods as best he could. Then he thought of himself as at her side, the

mist of her hair hiding the world from his eyes, the perfume of her

breath causing his head to swim. He thought of her as she had been to

him in the last months. And then--suddenly--she was with him.

Out of the gloom of the narrow street she came, searching after him,

calling his name. The veil had fallen back from her pallid face. Her

eyes were staring wide with fear and with the horror of blood. Her

movement was slow, indeterminate, vague. Not till after he had watched

her for a full minute did she come upon his figure in its pools of

blood. Then, with a faint, fluttering cry she ran to him, only

half-believing her poor vision. Their meeting was ineffable. She lay

upon his body, eye on eye, lip on lip to him, her cries stifled by his

gasping breath, her wandering hands caressing his hair, his brow, his

neck, his bloody vestment. Not knowing what she did, she pulled the

broken arrow from his arm, and then screamed to think of where it had

been. Of the two, Belshazzar's state of mind was infinitely clearer,

infinitely stronger than hers. It was with a supreme effort that he took

his lips from hers that he might speak, might try to make her understand

what this moment must be to them.

"Oh, thou art wounded, my king, my beloved! Look--here upon thee is

blood--blood on the white of thy robe. Why art thou red?" she repeated,

once and again, anxiously examining the wet, dark stains that flowed

ever freshly from his body.

Belshazzar saw that her brain was turned, and his anguish became

terrible. Was she to bid him good-bye like this? Must he leave her

forever with the infinite unsaid? How could he bring her mind back to

him, if but for one moment? He could not think. All that he could do was

to say, thickly, with the blood in his mouth:

"Istar, beloved, I die! Dost thou hear?"

"Yea, Belshazzar, and I also. Allaraine hath written it upon the wall.

Didst thou not see? 'Hast thou found man's relation to God? The silver

sky waits for thy soul.' I also die."

"Thou!" he murmured, quickly. "Art thou wounded, Istar?" His feeble

hands searched over her body, but felt no sign of blood. She had been

untouched by any weapon. And now his eyes grew dull with suffering, and

he said, faintly, and with reluctance: "Fare thee far and well, my

Istar--Istar of my city. I go."

"Belshazzar!"

What it had been, tone or word of his, that roused her at last, the

dying man could not tell. But that name rang through the night in a

scream of living agony. Now she knew what it meant--that her Babylon was

fallen around her--that the world was empty--that the lord of her life

was passing--that henceforward her way lay through the valley of

loneliness. What mattered now the writing on the wall, hopeless prophecy

of her own death? Belshazzar was here, beneath her, dying; while

she--Istar--his wife--had received no wound.

She raised him in her arms and their eyes met for the last time. How

much passed in the look cannot be told, for it was a final mingling of

souls. All their love, their infinite happiness, their sorrow, their

tears unshed, the humanity of their two lives, was embodied in that

look. Grief of parting was not there, for the two were striving to make

parting endurable, each to each, by the look. It was finished at last,

with Belshazzar's whispered words:

"In the silver sky, O my glorious one, I wait for thee!"

"O my beloved, wait for me! Wait for me!"

Then the body dropped inert in her arms. Belshazzar was gone. Istar was

left alone in the world.

How long afterwards she rose from that place she did not know. Many

people--soldiers of the invading army and men of the mob, with

blood-dripping swords--had passed her as she lay along the ground, face

down, beside the body. And none of these offered to molest her, for they

thought that two dead lay there in the semi-darkness. The light in the

house of the priest of Bel had gone out, and the shouts of conflict had

long since been hushed. Still, through all the city, there was the

murmur of uneasiness, of many men awake and stirring. The night was

filled with stars, and with that curious white glow that comes in

midsummer to the Orient. But it seemed strange that the skies did not

turn from the hideous spectacle of Babylon that night.

Forth into the city, from the body that she loved, Istar went. Guided

and protected by some divine spirit, she passed unhurt among groups of

strange, uncouth warriors that laughed and talked in an unknown tongue.

She crossed streets where dead lay piled together. For those that were

loyal to the city had not been spared by the men of Amraphel. She passed

houses in which sat women wailing out their terror through the long

hours before the dawn; and came finally to the open doors of a small

temple in which the feast of Tammuz had been celebrated through the day.

Before this Istar paused. Inside she could see the glowing of the

sacrificial lights and the disorderly desertion of the room--the long,

empty tables covered with half-filled cups and plates, and the altar

whence, from the smouldering fire, a thin stream of blue incense still

poured upward. The woman's weary eyes saw these long, soft divans with a

sense of desire and of relief. She entered the room and went quickly

towards the nearest resting-place. She was about to lay herself down.

Her eyes were all but closed under their weight of weariness, when

suddenly, from the shadowy spaces beyond her, came a sound that caused

her to start back from the couch, and hasten in nervous terror towards

the door. It had been only the bleating of a little group of hungry

sheep in their pen near the temple kitchen; yet the unexpected noise had

shattered Istar's nerves, and she fared forth again out of the holy

house into the long, winding streets of the city.

Whither she went, how far, with what purpose, no one knew, no one cared.

She saw the river winding its tranquil way between well-stoned banks,

with the shadows of vast buildings mirrored in its depths, while the

glittering stars from their high dome shone like pale, white eyes in the

glassy, lazily moving stream. Wandering Euphrates! Took it any heed of

the deeds of good or evil performed upon its banks? God had bequeathed

to it eternal calm, had made the sight of it an eternal balm for weary

eyes. This night it brought peace on its waves and a promise of rest to

the soul of the woman. As she stood gazing down into its baffling green,

there came to her again the message from the kingdom, written in golden

letters on the surface of the water. Again Istar read and again she

wondered, yet in her soul understood the words:

"Hast thou found man's relation to God? The silver sky waits for thy

soul."

Istar, in her great woe, stood looking upon the fiery words, that seemed

to have burned themselves into her brain; and her whole heart rebelled

against them. Those that she loved had been taken from her. With

Belshazzar, the light of her life was extinguished. Man was bound to God

only by great suffering, by grief, by heart-sorrow! A sob came into her

throat, and there was anger in her mind as she would have turned away

from the mystical words. But at that instant they flashed out into

darkness, and the gleam was gone. For a moment the night grew thickly

black, and Istar reeled where she stood. Afterwards she found herself

walking on the bank of the river, only a little distance west of the

spot where the huge temple of Marduk reared its bulk into the air. It

was now in Istar's mind to go back to the place where Belshazzar's body

lay, and to remain there at his side till dawn should banish the horrors

of the night. But just as she would have left the river for the second

time, there came out upon the path that ran along its bank a group of

white-robed men, whom Istar knew for priests, bearing with them a heavy

burden covered over with a purple cloth. At sight of them Istar turned

suddenly dizzy and crouched on the bricks of the pavement.

Arrived at the edge of the river, the five priests of Amraphel's temple

laid their burden on the ground and removed the cloth that covered it.

Belshazzar's body was exposed to view. Istar, with a little moan,

pressed both hands tightly across her breast. But neither sound nor

movement attracted any attention from the priests. These now indulged in

a short parley, that ended in their taking from the corpse the royal

ornaments that covered it and dividing them evenly among the five.

"Now, Bel-shar-utsur, tyrant of the city, go down by river to plead with

the Lady Mulge in Ninkigal for a drink from the spring of life; for thou

shalt drink no more, in the Great City, of the wines of Helbon and

Izalla!"

With this only farewell, three of them lifted the body up, swung it

thrice in the air by the feet and by the head, and at the third swing

let it fly out into the waters of the river that had so short a time

before received the worn frame of the dead man's father.

As the body left their hands the priests were startled to hear a long,

low cry that came from a few yards to the right. Looking, they saw a

woman's figure run to the river-bank and peer into the waters below,

where the body of the king, as on a funeral barge, went floating down

towards the city of the dead that lay south of Babylon.

Without any attempt at accosting her who mourned, the men of Amraphel

presently turned away and began their return to the temple, carrying

with them the new wealth of jewels. Istar also rose, half consciously,

and knowing neither any abiding-place where to lay her head, nor any one

to seek who could give her help, she moved away aimlessly down the bank

of the stream. A few yards to the south there was a great ferry station,

where, by day, a dozen boats were wont to ply back and forth across the

stream. By night only one barge went its way backward and forward; and

as Istar came down to the little quay the broad scow was just ready to

start to the western shore with its load of men and soldiers. She ran

quickly down the steps and on to this moving bridge. The west bank of

the river was home to her. She knew its streets and its people. There,

to the north, was the palace of Belshazzar, and the temple in which she

had once dwelt. There, somewhere, she would find shelter.

When the barge finally touched the landing at the western shore and

Istar, last of any one, was about to leave it, she was stopped by one of

the ferrymen.

"Lady, it is two _se_ for the passage."

"Two _se_! Money? I have none," said Istar, slowly.

"Thou shalt not leave the barge till the price is paid," retorted the

boatman, angrily.

But vaguely understanding what he meant, Istar pulled the veil from her

face and fixed her great eyes upon him, the better to comprehend what it

was he told her. The man gave a great start, for in the semi-darkness

her marvellous beauty shone like a star. Then the rough fellow bent his

head before her.

"It is the lady of Babylon! Great Istar, forgive our fault! Let it

please thee to leave the barge!" he exclaimed, reverently.

Istar did not pause to wonder that he knew her. She saw that her way was

open, and she went forth, up the steps, across the path at the top, and

into the lower city. Too weary, too stricken for either rest or sleep,

she felt her brain burn and her limbs grow cold as she walked. Now there

was a fire in her veins; now they grew chill as the snows of Elam. In

the pale gray of the dawn she trembled with sickness. The coming of day

was not beautiful to her eyes. In the first pink flush from the east she

found herself standing before a miserable hut on the border of a canal,

and from the dark door-way came a voice crying in great fear:

"The plague! The plague! It is come upon us! Behold the gods visit their

wrath upon men! Woe, woe to them that see light in Babylon to-day!"

Istar shuddered at the cry. From another place farther to the north the

words of horror and grief were repeated. The reign of death was thus

proclaimed in the city. Now there was a great ringing in Istar's ears.

Lights shot up before her eyes. It seemed to her that over all the city,

from the five millions of human tongues, rose that cry of woe: "The

plague! The plague!"

The memory of her dead child was with her. A few more paces she

staggered through, half consciously. Then, of a sudden, some one

appeared beside her--some one whom she knew and had forgotten. At sight

of the well-known face the woman's brain gave way. With a long,

heart-broken sob, she fell helpless, lifeless, into the reverent arms of

Charmides, her bard.

XX

PESTILENCE

It was thus that, on the night of July 3d, in the year 538 B.C., Persian

rule began in Babylon, and native rule in the Great City was ended

forever.

Historically this was true. In actual fact, on the morning of July

4th--ay, and for many weeks thereafter--no man knew the real ruler of

the city, and no man greatly cared to know him. Every soul within the

walls was occupied with a far more terrible and more engrossing matter,

and officer and priest alike obeyed orders of Cyrus that passed through

the lips of Amraphel, without caring whence they were issued or why.

Cyrus the king, his sons, and the most of his army remained encamped

without the walls. Gobryas had returned to the governorship of Sippar.

Amraphel, unable to find any loop-hole for escape, remained shut up in

his palace, miserably afraid, not even venturing to sacrifice in the

temple for dread of the curse that hung over the city. Every place of

worship, indeed, was deserted. In the middle of the temple of Bel-Marduk

the hideous pile of dead still lay behind their barricade, just as they

had fallen on the night of the massacre. Men not cowards at other times

fled that building and the square and all the neighborhood, as a place

of the damned. The air around was thick with the stench of death; and no

command of Cyrus could force one of his men near enough to the spot to

wall up the open space between the shattered doors.

Plague reigned supreme in Babylon. The black death, that horror of

horrors that occasionally swept upon the great nations of the East, like

the scourge of God smiting every man in its path, leaving behind it a

wake of dead, dying, and miserable bereft, had entered into the

beleaguered city. It was for this that Amraphel stopped ears and eyes

and remained a prisoner behind the thick, white walls of his palace,

where the chorus of woe could not penetrate to him. And day by day

Daniel the Jew interpreted, to those that would hear, the meaning of

this further wrath of God against them that had so long allowed

themselves to be governed by such a one as Nabonidus, descendant of

Nebuchadrezzar. Indefatigably Daniel, plague-marked and immune long

years ago, preached the wrathful word of his death-bearing Lord; and

such was his success among these pagans that it became a not uncommon

thing to behold some woman, swollen and spotted, inexpressibly repulsive

and pitiable to look at, with the final frenzy upon her, kneeling in

street or hovel before the wooden image of a demon, and frantically

calling upon the god of the Jews to remove from her both the curse of

life and the after-terrors of hell, and to plunge her into the

longed-for peace of utter annihilation.

By the middle of the month bodies could not be buried, but lay piled in

streets and houses, till Babylon became the true city of Mulge, Queen of

the Dead. Those that knew, those that had gone through the visitation of

thirty years before, felt their hearts fail them as they thought of what

was still to come. Many, indeed, tried to leave the city; but Cyrus'

soldiers patrolled every gate, and any having about them the mark of

death were not allowed to pass.

Charmides the Greek was not among those that attempted an escape. By

every tie that he held sacred he was bound to his adopted city, and it

was his one desire to do what little he might to help the sufferers of

the plague.

At dawn on the fourth of Ab, the morning after the fall of the city,

Ramûa and Beltani sat together in their tenement, waiting, watching,

more than all wondering at the strange sounds that had come to them as

faint echoes of the great happenings of the night. Neither of them had

gone to celebrate the feast in any temple. Plead or storm as Beltani

would, she found Charmides fixed in his wishes on this point, and in

tears and bitterness of spirit she found it necessary to move forward

for an entire year all her dreams of three days of unlimited wine and

meat. The Greek, who had gone back to temple-service almost immediately

after his meeting with Belshazzar on the day of Daniel's attempted

assassination of the king, knew enough of what was likely to happen in

the first night of the feast to forbid his family to participate in it.

And while Beltani had raged, and even Ramûa had shed a few submissive

tears when Charmides departed for the temple of Sin, the two of them

watched quietly through the night and eagerly awaited the promised early

return of the master of the household.

Very early in the evening came vague mutterings of distant, gathering

mobs. Much later were the still more indeterminate but more ominous

sounds of battle, shouts and cries, with the underlying murmur grown

more fierce. Afterwards fell the great silence--a silence in which no

man could sleep, something more terrible than sound, something that

foreboded direful things--carnage, murder, merciless death. At this time

the name of Baba first passed the lips of the waiting women. Baba was in

Ribâta's train at the temple of Bel-Marduk. Baba, a slave, stood no

chance of salvation if any were to be lost. Had she lived or had she

died that night? Through the silence that lasted till dawn this unspoken

question lay in the hearts of the watchers. And then, with the first

streaks of day, their thoughts were turned again by something else,

another cry more awful than any battle-shout, that rose like a mist from

every hovel in the tenement quarter.

"The plague--the plague! Woe unto us! It is the plague!"

It was as if every soul in the city was become a leper, and each was

crying his disease. At the first sound of it Ramûa's heart turned sick

within her, and Beltani became as white as the dawn. For Beltani could

remember the last plague in Babylon.

"Charmides! Why does he stay?" whispered Ramûa to her mother, over and

over again; and it was the only word that passed between them till, with

the first beams of the sun, the Greek was seen coming into the square in

front of the tenement. At sight of him Ramûa gave a little cry:

"He is not alone!"

"It is not Baba," added Beltani, quickly.

Then the two of them watched in silence while Charmides advanced with

his companion, a tall, slender woman covered with the silver-woven veil,

who faltered as she moved, till Charmides was nearly carrying her. At

the first glance Ramûa perceived that the Greek was weary, so weary that

every step was an effort to him. Thus, when he finally reached the door

of the dwelling, she ran quickly forward to give him aid.

"The night has been very long. Thou must rest," she whispered,

disregarding the stranger, who drooped as they halted at the door.

"Nay, Ramûa. Nay. I am not weary," returned the Greek, monotonously.

"Behold, I bring home to you Istar, the great lady of Babylon. In this

night she, and all in the Great City, have terribly suffered. Babylon is

fallen to Kurush the king, and Belshazzar, the mighty prince, and all

that were with him in the temple of Bel, are slain."

Istar gave a quick, convulsive shudder, but Ramûa hardly noticed her.

"Baba!" she cried, in terror. "Baba was in the temple of Bel!"

Charmides turned very white, and Istar suddenly threw back the veil from

her face. "And Baba--Baba, too!" she said, mournfully, her voice ringing

like a knell.

But seeing the woman, Ramûa and her mother forgot what they said. The

two of them stood transfixed by her undreamed-of, supernatural beauty.

Her pallor was something incredible, and the unearthly purity of it, the

light in the great eyes, the bluish shadows that lay on the skin, were

enough for the moment to make one forget death itself. As she looked,

Beltani perceived something that caused her to start. She took an

impulsive step forward, and then halted again as Istar's eyes came

slowly to the level of hers.

"What seest thou?" asked the woman.

Beltani went forward again and laid a finger upon Istar's neck, and as

she draw it away Istar shuddered convulsively.

"What is it?" demanded Charmides, in a thick voice.

"The plague."

There was a momentary silence as the four that stood there gave the

words time to penetrate. Then Istar, quivering again, started suddenly

towards the door. Charmides barred her way.

"Where goest thou?" he asked, gently.

"Out! Out into the Great City! Let me go, Charmides! Let me go!"

With what little strength she had Istar threw herself upon the Greek,

that he might give way and let her escape from his house. But Charmides

was firm, and his strength infinitely greater than hers. After a

struggle of a few seconds Istar gave way and would have fallen upon the

floor had not the young man caught her about the body, lifted her in his

arms, and carried her, lifeless and unresisting, into the little-used

inner room where, at this moment, Bazuzu lay asleep. The black slave was

quickly roused and Istar was placed upon a hurriedly arranged bed. Then

Charmides returned again to his wife and sternly commanded her to retire

to her room up-stairs, forbidding her to enter the lower rooms of their

dwelling while Istar should be there. Both Bazuzu and Beltani had had

the plague, and were in no danger from it. But Charmides himself, like

Ramûa, was relegated to the upper rooms and to the roof.

The moment that her body rested upon a bed, poor as it was, Istar fell

asleep, and there, in the great weight of her sickness and her grief,

lay for many hours insensible to all things. As the heat of the day came

on, and the atmosphere of the small and ill-ventilated room became more

and more stifling, Bazuzu took his place at her side, and minute by

minute, hour by hour, fanned to her lips what air there was, while his

own face streamed with perspiration and his breath came in gasps. His

eyes, the eyes that had so tenderly watched the childlike slumbers of

Ramûa and Baba, now looked upon her whose face had been the wonder of

the East, whom he himself once had seen clothed in blinding radiance,

seated upon her golden car in a procession of the great gods and who now

lay here, alone and friendless, shorn of her divinity, stricken with

disease, to die a pauper's death or to live on to a hideous old age.

Istar suffered in her sleep. Whether it was the memory of the horror of

the past night or the pain of disease racking her body could not be

told. But Bazuzu heard her moans with heartfelt pity. Over and over

again she spoke two names, one of which the slave could scarcely

understand, the other that of the dead prince of Babylon. They were the

names of her baby and of her husband, all that world of happiness that

had gone, and that was calling to her out of the shadowy past.

Like every one in the clutch of the dread sickness, Istar thirsted

continually, yet shrank, nauseated, at the mere sight of water or milk.

Continually Beltani brought and held to her lips the refreshment that

she craved, as often to have it thrust away with a gesture of pitiable

repulsion. At length, seeing there was no other way, Bazuzu held the

sick woman fast pinioned on the ground, while Beltani poured down her

throat a pint of freshly cooled water. Over the first swallow Istar's

struggles were convulsive, but after that she drank eagerly all that was

given her, and when the last in the cup was gone she opened her burning

eyes in a mute appeal for more. This was refused, of necessity; but, in

pity for the heat of her fever and the closeness of the room, Beltani

had her carried out and laid down near the door-way of the living-room,

where presently she sank into a sleep that changed gradually to a heavy

stupor.

Noon passed and left the city streets quivering with heat. From the

burning desert in the west came a faint breath of wind, that twinkled

blue and white in the air till the eyes were blinded and the brain

reeled under its intensity. Charmides and Ramûa were sitting together on

the gallery outside their room in an upper story of the tenement,

looking off to the shining strip of canal beyond which rose the patch of

shrivelled green where, two months before, Ribâta's garden had blossomed

with many a fragrant rose and fragile lily. Charmides was mentally

preparing himself for another journey across the desolate city to the

temple of Bel, that vast tomb in which so many tangled bodies lay. He

had not yet voiced his intention to Ramûa, though he knew that she would

not oppose it.

Suddenly round the corner of the tenement, into the open square, came a

strange thing: a human being, crawling upon hands and knees along the

brick pavement, halting now and then in visible exhaustion, but

displaying also a nervous eagerness in its movements; and all the way

behind it as it came was left a deep, red trail. A mere heap of bloody

rags at first it seemed; but presently, as he watched, Charmides could

see a mop of long, black hair that fell to the ground upon one side.

"That is a woman, Ramûa," he whispered.

Ramûa, white to the lips, grasped his arm. "Go! Go to her, Charmides!"

she responded, a breathless fear coming on her.

"What is it, Ramûa? What is thy thought?" questioned the Greek.

"I do not know. Go thou, Charmides! Haste! Haste! She falls!"

Thereupon Charmides went, slowly at first, still staring in a

half-puzzled way at the little heap of bruised flesh that now lay inert

upon the bricks below. Then his pace quickened, for he realized the

woman's need. Along the gallery and down the stairs he ran, and then, at

breakneck pace, crossed the space between the wounded creature and the

door-way of the tenement. Ramûa, straining her eyes after him, saw him

bend over the fallen one, and then thought that a cry came from his

lips.

Hardly a cry, more a groan of utter horror it was. Charmides' heart was

in his throat. For a second the blue eyes closed to shut out the

pitiable sight, and then opened again upon Baba. It was Baba that lay

there before him: Baba who, mangled as she was, had, in the gray dawn,

crawled out from the bodies among which she lay in the temple, and since

then had come upon her hands and knees, inch by inch, foot by foot, all

across the Great City, to her old home, to him that stood over her now.

She had allowed herself the untold luxury of unconsciousness only when

the journey's end was reached, when at last she was at the door-way of

the place of her early poverty, her great happiness, her life-sorrow.

Charmides knelt beside her, and, with a little quiver in which pity and

fear for her were evenly mingled, lifted her in his arms. She stained

his tunic with blood; but presently he perceived that this blood was not

all Baba's own. It was caked in clots upon her torn garments; it smeared

her rich sandals; it matted her hair. Yet on her body there was, so far

as he could yet determine, only one wound--a deep stab in the back of

her left shoulder. From this the blood had almost ceased to flow, coming

only in a little trickle when she drew a longer breath than usual.

Charmides bore the light form, face downward, towards the stairs of the

tenement, thinking rapidly as he went. A horrible sight, truly, to lay

before Ramûa. Yet Ramûa must see it. Carry her into those rooms where

Istar lay in the delirium of the plague, he dared not. Nowhere

else--yes, there was one other place. There was the home of Baba's

master. Should he take her there before Ramûa guessed her identity?

Ribâta's house would be open to her. And yet--and yet--it was here that

Baba herself had chosen to come, as she might well believe, in death.

That mute appeal could not be withstood. Here, because she had asked it,

she must remain.

Step by step up the stairs to the gallery he bore the pathetic burden.

At the top of the flight stood Ramûa, face colorless, eyes wide with a

fear that she would not admit to herself. Charmides, looking up, met the

look, answered it, and saw his wife's hands go up to her head.

"Charmides! It is not--" she stopped.

"It is Baba, my beloved. Baba is alive. She has come home to us, Ramûa,

to be cared for. Be thou brave, then. Go down and bring water wherewith

to wash her, and a clean tunic of thine own to put upon her; and then

together we will bind her wound."

A little while and the sunset came, and Babylon was aureoled again in

crimson. Not till then did Ribâta's slave come back to consciousness in

her sister's arms. The horror of the past night had stamped itself as

indelibly upon her mind as on her body. Between fits of trembling she

poured out to Ramûa the story of the fight in the temple and the

massacre of the women. Charmides, standing outside the door on the

gallery, listened to the tale as he looked off across the quiet city.

"And Istar, Istar, our divine lady, I did not behold at the side of

Belitsum the queen, nor with the women of the royal house who lie

together now in the centre of the dead. May the great gods grant that

she and her lord, Belshazzar, together escaped death and are

free--somewhere--in the city."

"Baba, the Lady Istar is here--below--sick of the plague; and our mother

and Bazuzu are at her side."

"The Lady Istar! Here!" Baba struggled to sit up, but Ramûa kept her

firmly down while she told her the story of Istar's coming; how

Charmides brought her to them crazed with her grief and with her long

wandering.

Baba listened closely, and at the end of the recital her tears flowed

fast. "Belshazzar, then, is dead!" she whispered more than once. "The

mighty prince is dead, and Istar is alone--alone--even as I."

But now, while Ramûa wiped her tears away, Charmides came in to them,

saying: "Across the square from the canal come two men in the livery of

the house of Ribâta. I go forth to meet them. If it is for thee they

come, Baba, what word shall I give to them?"

Baba gave a long sigh, and her eyes closed. "I am here. Seeks my lord

for me? I am my lord's. I will return to him when I may."

And with this reply Charmides went forth to meet the messengers.

Ribâta's men halted at the foot of the steps, waiting his descent; and

the Greek found that he had guessed aright when he surmised the object

of their coming. My Lord Ribâta, terribly wounded, stricken with great

grief at the downfall of the city and the massacre of all his women, had

despatched messengers to the only place where news of his favorite slave

could be had, if mayhap she had by a miracle escaped the general

carnage. Charmides dutifully gave them Baba's message, saw their faces

light up with amazement and pleasure, and bade them, if they would carry

Baba to their lord, go fetch the easiest of litters, that she might not

suffer more than necessary on the way.

This was done. In less than an hour two litters halted in front of the

tenement of Ut, and in one of them was Ribâta himself, his head, breast,

arms, and one limb wrapped in heavy bandages, so weak that his voice was

but a whisper, yet a whisper of joy that one little creature out of all

the multitude had escaped death in the temple. Baba was carried down to

him, and their meeting had in it much of pathos. Ribâta's career was

ruined, his position gone, his lord dead, his house in disorder; yet one

thing was left to him, and her, in great joy, he took to his heart.

Charmides and Ramûa, side by side, stood listening as Ribâta whispered

to his slave the two words that changed the lives of them all.

"Baba--my wife," said he. And then presently, together, they were

carried away into the evening.

While Charmides and Ramûa went back to their room to talk over the great

thing that had come to Baba, Beltani, below, was preparing for the

doleful night. She had kindled a little fire, cooked food for herself

and Bazuzu, and was now on her knees offering up incantations to Namtar,

the demon of the plague. Bazuzu, from his place beside Istar, joined at

intervals in the prayers, which the sick woman, now in the violent

delirium of fever, broke in upon continually with appeals for help and

wails of grief over Belshazzar, who never left her thoughts.

In many a house and hovel in the Great City a similar scene was enacted

to-night. Yet there could not be one more deplorable than this. She who

raved upon the bed of straw in the heart of the most poverty-stricken

quarter of Babylon--from what things was she descended? One by one she

had lost everything that had made her life wonderful. Now the last, that

attribute that she had left uncounted because it seemed to her

indestructible, was going from her. In the next five days of this

horrible sickness her beauty fled away, and she was left a thing

dreadful for mankind to look upon.

By the second day of her attack, the mental disturbance had increased

till the intervals of her sanity entirely disappeared. On the morning of

the third day began those violent constrictions of the heart that caused

unspeakable agony and brought her to the brink of the black abyss. By

this time, also, the enlargement of glands, or buboes, the dominating

symptom of the plague, had become frightful to see. Her eyes were

suffused with a thick, white matter. Upon her body came forth great

carbuncles. On the fourth day dark spots, patches like black bruises,

and long, livid stripes, appeared upon her fair skin. The fever, now at

its height, burned itself out in a day, and Istar fell into a cold and

quiet stupor, the first stage of death. Her lips were black. Her eyes

had closed. Her body had become something from which Beltani shrank at

sight, and old Bazuzu touched only because of his great pity for the

woman. Also at this time Istar's veil of hair, which had been wont to

conceal her under its silken meshes, fell out in great masses and was

burned by Beltani as a sacrifice before the demon of the plague.

Beltani's prayers to Namtar, however, had lost their sincerity, for the

old woman could not in her heart wish Istar to live in her terrible

disfigurement. Istar herself did not yet know what she had become. But

unless, as seemed most probable, she died, there must soon come a time

when she would discover, when she would see people shrink away from

contact with her, yet turn to stare after in that fascination that a

dreadful sight draws forth. Out of pure reverence for what Istar had

been, Beltani attended her faithfully. Every herb and medicine and charm

within her means and known to her she used to mitigate the sores, and to

make the after-scars less terrible. Yet she, and Bazuzu also, felt that

death were now the greatest boon for the woman.

Death did not come. In spite of her stupor and her low temperature, the

fatal eighth day passed, and on the morning of the ninth Istar lived and

was better. She regained a dim consciousness, and the strength to ask

for food, which was given her in minute quantities, as also milk and

wine. For forty-eight hours she hovered on the brink of reawakening; and

then, finally, she found herself.

On the morning of the fifteenth of the month Istar opened her eyes in

the early dawn. She was alone. On the other side of the room, upon her

pallet, Beltani lay in a heavy sleep. Bazuzu was outside in the square.

Istar moved her hand and sighed. She felt life coursing through her

veins, and remembered the past week with only a vague, nightmarish sense

of oppression. The air of the morning, hot as it was, had in it the

gathered sweetness of the long, starry hours. She breathed it with joy;

and for a moment forgot the sorrow that must be hers perpetually.

Presently, with an old and habitual gesture, she lifted her hand to her

head to push away her hair. And her hand touched the head. There was no

hair upon it. Rather, two or three thin strands hung about her ears.

Otherwise she was bald.

The heart of Istar gave a peculiar throb. She held up both hands before

her eyes; and, as she saw them, she herself shrank. The hands, those

fragile hands, the fair, white wrists, the arms, were spotted and

streaked and swollen and hideously scabbed. She touched her cheek and

found raw flesh upon it. She tore the covering from her neck. It was the

same. Everywhere--everywhere, from head to foot, over her whole

body--she was accursed. It was the plague--the plague! Istar tottered to

her feet and uplifted her eyes. Poor, weak eyes! Yea, she was all but

blind. With one low, wailing cry the afflicted one let herself slowly

down, till she lay prone upon the kindly floor that did not hesitate to

receive her. And there, through time and the day-dawn, she wept out the

burden of her soul. But of the future and its inevitable suffering she

could not think. As yet the way was too dark, too incomprehensible to

her.

There upon the floor, motionless, Bazuzu found her two hours later. For

long minutes he stood over her, helpless, pitying, knowing that there

was no comfort to bring. But his heart was full as he felt the abandon

of her attitude. Presently, kneeling at her side, he laid a horny hand

gently upon one of her shoulders. And from his fingers a message of mute

sympathy went forth to her. When she could bear that he should look upon

her she lifted her head and opened her half-closed eyes to him. Then she

spake, quietly, but with authority:

"Let my veil be brought, that I may put it upon me."

From the corner where it had lain, carefully folded by Beltani, Bazuzu

brought it to her--the soft, black, silver-shot covering of her

happiness. In silence he watched the woman put it on, wrapping it about

her so that her head, her face, her arms, her form, were completely

shrouded. Then, from behind the veil, she spoke:

"Let no man evermore seek to behold me in my disfigurement. Behold, no

longer am I Istar, but a wanderer over the face of the earth. I go forth

from this house of friendliness. The voice of the great God bids me

follow out my life in desert places, in the lands of my enemies."

Bazuzu, from her words still believing her more than mortal, bent his

head in silent acceptance of her desires. She took two or three quiet

steps to the door, and then, when he had thought her gone, turned again,

and softly said:

"Thou, Bazuzu, and thy mistress, and the young Greek whose house this

is, take what thanks I have to give thee, and the blessing of All-Father

for thy mercy to me, an outcast. Gold have I none, nor riches of any

sort in payment for your labor. But from my heart I bless thee for thy

compassion."

Then, like a shadow, she glided out at the door, across the deserted

square, down to the canal of the New Year, and along its bank, out into

the city. Through the long morning she moved through the streets,

accosting no one, stared at by the multitude, but unaddressed. Her

miserable body burned and ached. The sun poured down its blue-hot rays

upon her head. Muffled as she was in the veil, she was like to suffocate

for air to breathe, yet she would not expose herself to the gaze of

human beings. It was noon when she entered the square of the great gods

and passed the door of the temple of Nergal, looking with weary eyes

into its vast and cool interior. At some distance within was a group of

priests, Sangû, Enû, and Barû, men of importance in their several

stations. These the plague-stricken eyes of the woman failed in the dim

light to see. But she was startled suddenly by the appearance in the

door-way of one of them, who, catching a sight of her, had run quickly

forward, and now stood eagerly staring at her form. She did not draw

back from the look, and presently the priest spoke:

"Thou that standest shadow-like before me--art thou she whom they called

Istar of Babylon?"

"I was Istar of Babylon," came the gentle voice.

"_Was!_ Comest thou from Ninkigal?" The priest started back from her,

turning a little pale.

"Nay. Still I live; yet now am nameless."

"Thou hast dwelt as a goddess in the temple of Istar? Thou hast lived in

the palace of the king as the wife of Belshazzar?"

Istar bent her head.

"Enter, then, into the temple, that I may speak with the others here

before you." He motioned her to pass into the building, and, obediently,

Istar entered it. She stood at a little distance, while he that had

accosted her returned to the group of his companions and spoke with

them. In a few moments they summoned Istar to their midst. She came

quite close, and they eyed her in silence for a little while. Then one

said:

"Ay. It is Istar of Babylon. I saw her thus from afar on the night of

the feast of Tammuz."

"She is well found. Istar, for eight days hast thou been sought

throughout the Great City. Kurush, the conqueror, demands thy presence

before him. He has heard of thee and thy beauty, and the strange things

thou art said to know; and he would have beheld thee on the day after

the taking of the city. But we have searched for thee in vain. Where

hast thou hidden?"

"I fulfilled my days. I will go now, if he wills, before the great

conqueror. Haste were best, for the time to the end is not now long."

The priests looked at each other uncertainly. Her words had in them a

ring of prophecy. They consulted for a little among themselves, till

Istar herself made all things easy for them:

"Let a swift runner be sent to the camp of Cyrus, and let the great king

be told that, one hour after the departure of the messenger, I come to

him. In that hour I will rest here in the temple, for I am weak in body.

Then ye may lead me out by the gate of Bel to the camp of the conqueror,

and there shall ye leave me. From that camp let no man follow me forth.

Now have I spoken."

And the priests heard the words of Istar and found them to be good; and

that which she had commanded was done.

XXI

KURUSH THE KING

The camp of the invading army lay spread over the sun-burned plain like

a camp of the dead. There was hardly a sign of life round any of the

many-colored tents. The very horses and pack-mules, tethered in a herd

in the midst of the desert of dry grass, lay for the most part panting

with heat, pining, no doubt, for the distant, breezy hills of fair Iran

and the snowy highlands of Media, where they had been born and bred.

Those of the soldiers not quartered inside the city lay under the shadow

of their tents, hardly caring to exert themselves to speak, sleeping if

they could, drinking as much as was to be had if they could not. Almost

the only person abroad in the noontide was the commander himself, who,

with one companion, was going through the camp, making one of his

impromptu examinations of his men and their armament. Hardened as he was

by years of campaigning in strange countries, Cyrus to-day found Babylon

as unbearable as any one. His body was damp with sweat, and his

breathing, as he walked, was audible. The blue quiver of heat that came

from the great desert near by made his eyes bloodshot, and caused him to

see with no little difficulty. Still, remonstrate as he would, the

white-robed man that walked with him succeeded only in making Cyrus more

thorough and more lingering at his task.

The commander's two sons, however, had not the energy of their father.

They lay on divans in the royal tent, Bardiya, the younger and more

favored of the two, strumming idly on a musical instrument; Cambyses,

content to be still, drinking bowl after bowl of a concoction supplied

by a slave, pausing occasionally in the bibulous process to curse at the

flies and winged insects that swarmed about him. Presently, looking over

at his brother, who for the moment had ceased to play, he asked,

civilly:

"In thy pilgrimage of yesterday, Bardiya, didst discover any cool spot

in the city yonder?"

Bardiya drew himself together with a little gesture of disgust, and his

brother's features broadened with a grin. "Babylon is city of filth, of

disease, of death. Thousands within it die of the plague. Those that

sicken and those that are dead lie alike in the open streets. There is

no relief. The very river runs like molten metal. On the pavement bricks

the flesh of a slain animal could be roasted to a turn. I go no more to

Babylon."

Cambyses laughed. "And her whom you sought, Bardiya--she loved you not?"

Bardiya, highly displeased at the tone, replied: "She is not in the

city; or, if she is, no man knows where she lies hid. Some say that she

ascended to the silver sky with the spirit of Bel-shar-utsur, who was

her husband. Again they tell me she was murdered with the other women in

the temple of Bel-Marduk, on the night we took the city. Howbeit, no man

really knows whether or not Istar of Babylon still lives."

Cambyses laughed again. "Istar of Babylon! A myth! She lives no more

than any other god. Think you the great Ahura comes down among men, a

man?"

But Bardiya's faith would not be shaken, and he had begun an elaborate

protestation, when the conversation was interrupted by the appearance of

Cyrus, returning from his round with Amraphel of Bel at his side. At the

entrance of their father the young men rose and saluted him with a

respect that was the more marked because both of them utterly ignored

the presence of the high-priest.

Amraphel's bearing was a curious contrast to that of the conqueror. It

was replete with affectation and bombastic dignity, and whatever

mortification he felt at the want of recognition shown him by Cyrus'

sons, was manifested only by an increased loftiness of carriage.

The king seated himself in an ivory chair before a little stone table

that stood in the centre of the tent, and he motioned Amraphel at the

same time to a stool at his side. No sooner was he seated than the

priest began to speak upon what was evidently a continued subject,

already much discussed. And though his tone was in itself sufficiently

self-satisfied, the terms in which he spoke were exceedingly unlike

those that he had been accustomed to use to the whilom king of Babylon.

Where once had been unutterable arrogance and supercilious disdain of

everything, was now eager flattery, cajolements, toadyism, and unceasing

assurances of devotion. In the Elamite of plebeian parentage, Amraphel

had found a none too complacent master.

"And does my lord the king think his city ill-governed, that he is not

content to remain in safety outside its unhealthy walls? Nay, great

Kurush, thine every command, to the least of them, is given there by me,

and strictly obeyed by those in office under me. As I have said, the

city is loyal to you, through my teachings."

Cyrus bit his beard impatiently. "It is not that I fear lest my commands

be disregarded. You I hold responsible for their fulfilment. It is that

I would better know what commands to give. Here am I, native of another

land, ignorant of Babylonish ways, of Babylonish needs, knowing no one

street, no temple in all the city, striving to govern it from this camp

outside the walls. It is folly, priest!"

"Nay, most mighty king. What the people need, I know. What they want

shall be given. Fear not--"

"_Fear not!_" Cyrus turned on him with such a look that the high-priest

started in confusion and shrank away a little, while from his corner

Cambyses laughed harshly; but Bardiya scowled at the presumption of the

priest. At sound of the laugh Amraphel flushed with anger; and Cyrus,

controlling himself again, observed, in a gentler tone:

"Yesterday Bardiya, my son, went into the city yonder; and his story of

those that perish of the plague is grievous."

"The young prince, the son of my lord, came into the city!" exclaimed

Amraphel, in chagrin. "Why, then, sought he me not in my house?"

"For the reason that he sought another and a fairer than thou, good

Amraphel," replied Cambyses, in a highly impertinent tone.

"Whom didst thou seek, prince?" asked the priest, turning to Bardiya.

"Her whom they call Istar of Babylon."

"Ah! Where didst thou learn that name?"

"It is to be heard through all the east--and west--and north. No man but

knows of the living goddess of Babylon. Yet within the walls of her city

I found her not, nor any that could tell me where she dwelt. _Is_ there

such an one, Amraphel?"

"Now is it seven days since I sent asking that she be brought to me, or

that I may have permission to go before her," observed Cyrus,

thoughtfully. "Yet hath she not come, nor have I had any word from her."

"There was indeed an Istar of Babylon, who was wedded to Belshazzar, the

dead tyrant. And her beauty, were it famed at all, were rightly famed

over all the world. Yet was she no goddess: rather a sorceress, a witch,

a demon, most wicked, most impure. Since the night of the taking of the

city she hath been seen by no man. She it was, no doubt, that murdered

Belshazzar the king, whom my lord commanded to be saved from death and

to be brought before him. Now, doubtless, she hath taken his spirit with

her down to her kingdom, down to Mulge, where she and he feast by day

upon the dust of the dead, and by night upon the blood of living beings;

for they are vampires. Yea, verily, Istar of Babylon is no more, O

king."

There was a little silence. Amraphel's words had been spoken with every

appearance of sincerity; and the idea that he presented was sufficiently

weird to appeal to the lively imaginations of the Elamites. Bardiya gave

a little sigh, and Cambyses and his father were for a moment lost in

thought, when the party was broken in upon by a man that appeared

suddenly in the door-way of the tent, and, seeing Cyrus and the

high-priest together, bent the knee before them and asked permission to

speak. He was a runner, or messenger, from the city, and as such his

unceremonious entrance was pardonable--nay, customary.

"What wouldst thou, swift one?" demanded the king, good-humoredly.

"May the lord king of the city live forever! I am come with word from

her that is called Istar of Babylon, whose presence before thee thou

hast desired. Behold she follows me hither in one hour; and she sends

her greeting to the great conqueror."

Cyrus, with a mixture of surprise and amusement, glanced at the priest,

who was a fair picture of uneasiness.

"Say, runner," asked the king, teasingly, "the Lady Istar, did she rise

before thee out of the ground from the land of Ninkigal? Came she forth

before thine eyes? Or art even thou, perchance, a ghost?"

The man looked his bewilderment at the king, and this time Bardiya

himself roared with laughter.

"The Lady Istar is living. The message was given me by a priest of

Nergal, who comes to conduct the lady before thee. I know no more, O

king!"

"Then take thy leave, fellow," cried Cyrus, tossing him a shekel from

his girdle, and smiling as the man prostrated with lightning-like

rapidity and was up and gone from the tent like an arrow from the bow,

ere Amraphel had time to speak.

Now the high-priest rose, and, with an air of angry dignity, demanded

permission to retire. Cyrus gave it willingly enough, for the man

wearied him, and continually angered him by his presumption. Thus, then,

a moment later, the high-priest was mounting his chariot at the edge of

the camp, and might presently have been seen rolling swiftly away in the

direction of the gate of Bel.

Cyrus and his sons were left alone till the coming of her whose name had

so long been familiar to them. At the end of half an hour Bardiya rose

from his place, straightened his tunic, and went over to the door of the

tent to look out upon the plain in the direction of the city. Cyrus and

Cambyses were eating their delayed noon meal; but the younger man, whose

vein of romance was marked, refused food, and stood here alone, looking

out over the parched fields. From time to time his father asked if

anything were to be seen of their promised visitor; and always came the

reply:

"Neither chariot nor litter do I see."

Then finally, as all three of them grew impatient at the delay, the

youth added: "But there are, near at hand, a company of priests on foot,

and in their midst is some one clad in black. They come towards our

tent. Perhaps--"

Cyrus came over and stood at his shoulder. "I think it is the woman," he

said. And he was right.

The three of them, the great king in the centre, Cambyses on the right

hand, Bardiya on the left, stood in the door-way of the tent as the

little band of white-robed priests came up to them. There was a slow,

sinking reverence on the part of the attendants, and from their midst

came forth a tall, slight figure muffled in the silver-shining veil.

Seeing her, the conqueror and his sons all three inclined their bodies,

and then Cyrus stretched out his hand.

"Istar of Babylon, we give you greeting in the name of Elam and Media,

and we bid you welcome to this tent of the plain."

Istar bent her head, acknowledging the courtesy, but denied her hand to

him that mutely asked it. Turning slightly, she dismissed the priests,

who, remembering her commands, accepted the gesture and departed from

her reluctantly.

Then Istar entered the tent and took the chair that Cambyses hastened to

place for her. Cyrus also seated himself, but the young men stood. Now

that speech seemed demanded of him, the great king looked a little

uncertain of himself. He glanced at the concealing veil which the woman

still kept close around her, and he longed greatly to ask for a sight of

the far-famed face. Yet that was a request that he dared not make.

Istar, however, read his mind without difficulty, and let her head sink

sorrowfully upon her breast. It seemed to her at last that her cup of

bitterness was full; and she whispered a little prayer into the silence.

Cyrus caught three or four of her low words, and these gave him an

opening for speech.

"You speak to the gods. Is it with the gods of Babylon that you hold

communion, lady?"

"There is no god but God, great king; and Him, in their hearts, all men

must worship."

Cyrus looked slightly puzzled, and his curiosity was stronger than ever.

Yielding to an impulse, he leaned over, asking: "Istar of Babylon, who

art thou?"

Istar glanced round her. "Let thy sons depart, that we may be alone,"

she said, in a quiet command.

Cyrus made a gesture that the young men dared not disobey, and, however

much against their wills, they quickly left the tent. In departing,

Bardiya let fall the curtain at the door, so that the king and the

king's visitor were alone in the pleasant half-light. Then Istar spoke:

"Thou hast asked what I am, O king. Tell me first who art thou, and

thereafter I will answer thee."

"I am Kurush, an Achæmenian."

"And I am Istar, a woman, sent of God to be punished on earth."

"Unveil thyself, woman. Let me behold that face that the world has

worshipped."

Istar rose. She was trembling slightly in her great shame. Yet there was

no hesitation in her movements. With a dexterous twist she flung off her

veil and stood revealed before the conqueror in all her unspeakable

ugliness.

Cyrus let a cry escape him. "Thou! Thou art not Istar of Babylon!"

She folded both hands across her breast and her dim eyes closed. "I am

Istar of Babylon," she said, softly.

After the shock of first seeing her, the king had looked away. Now, as

she stood there before him, mute and motionless, he struggled with

himself to let his eyes return to her without outward betrayal of his

feeling. When finally he looked again his brown orbs were clear and

calm, and he showed no sign of repulsion. For one, two, three minutes he

looked upon her face till, in spite of the frightful complexion, he

began to perceive its fundamental beauty. Of her eyes, only, he could

not judge. They were swollen, red, matterated, nearly closed. Otherwise

he knew from what he saw that she had once been rarely beautiful.

Only--always--she was hideous now--hideous beyond belief.

Knowing well his mind, how she revolted him, how strong was his desire

to leave her presence, Istar still stood before the great king. It was

her final mortification, and even her going forth from the temple of Bel

under Amraphel's lash had not been so terrible to her as this. Yet now,

by degrees, as if a magnetic current passed between them, some

understanding of what she underwent came home to the warrior. Compassion

and pity took the place of horror. His face grew very gentle, and,

moving to Istar's side, he laid one hand on her cotton-clad shoulder.

"Istar, thou hast greatly suffered. Is it not so?"

She shrank back from his touch as if she knew all that the move had cost

him. But the question she answered freely, without hesitation.

"I have suffered, yea, by day and by night, for many months. I doubted

the wisdom of the Lord, and I am punished. I became mortal. I loved; and

that that I loved more than myself death hath taken from me. Fame,

honor, riches, purity, love, and beauty are gone. Nothing now remains.

The end draws near. From afar I hear the voice of my beloved calling me.

"Thou, O king, great king, lord of the gate of God, art at the zenith of

thy glory. Thy greatest victory is won. Thy time here is not much

longer. After thee come two that shall dispute the throne, and they

shall fare forth from the world in the bloodshed of murder and

self-murder. After them cometh one greater than either, that shall enter

Babylon from another country. For him the sun grows golden. He shall put

down usurpers from his seat; and for a little while shall hold and rule

the kingdom with a strong and mighty hand. And then--I see the city

slowly sink--under the weight of time. One more conqueror she shall

know: a youth of iron from a land of gold. And he shall set the world

aghast with his conquests; but he shall find his tomb there within the

Great City of his conquering. After him the East grows black. The rose

shall wither unseen upon her tree. Even to the banks of the great river

blow thick the desert sands. Walls and palaces shall crumble away. And

upon the broken stairs of the tower of Bel a jewel of great price lies

for many centuries unheeded in the universal desolation. And for

centuries, Achæmenian, thou shalt sleep, ere thou art known again as

king of Babylon--the city of my lord."

With the ending of her vision Istar smiled slowly upon him that watched

her with troubled eyes. As the spell passed she trembled, and, stooping,

picked up the veil that lay about her feet. Cyrus moved forward as if he

would have stopped her.

"Speak on! Let me hear again that that thou hast foretold. Such prophecy

as this no seer of my court hath ever made."

But Istar's fire was gone. The light in her face died away, and in its

death Cyrus read her answer to his plea. Then she wrapped herself again

in the covering that hid her plight, and from it, as from behind a mask,

she spoke again:

"Thou, O Cyrus, who hast beheld me in mine ugliness, must carry with

thee the memory of it forever. Yet know that Istar of Babylon hath

humbled herself before thee as before no living man. My king is dead. In

his place, by reason of thy gentleness and justice, I hail thee lord of

Chaldea and of Babylon." And thereupon, before Cyrus understood what she

did or could prevent the act, Istar knelt at his feet and touched them,

the right and the left, with her forehead, in the manner of the day.

With a quick exclamation Cyrus lifted her up; but she spoke gently to

him, saying:

"That that was written have I done. Censure me not. I but obeyed my law.

Now fare thee well, O king. The end cometh, and I go forth to meet it."

"Nay, Istar--hold! One question more! Thou, his wife, art accused of the

murder of the king of Babylon, whom I commanded to be brought before me

living and unhurt from the feast in the temple. How dost thou answer

this accusation?"

"Who hath accused me of the deed?"

"The priest of Bel."

"Amraphel?"

"Yea."

"Then I ask thee only why I should have killed him that my soul loves as

it loved not God?"

"Knowest thou, then, the murderer?"

"He that accused me shall, in God's time, answer to that charge. But

thou, Cyrus, see that thou punish him not. Thy hands are red with the

blood of many slain in battle; and shall the slayer accuse the slayer?

Now speak no more to me. I return again to the city."

In spite of her last bidding, Cyrus, slightly angered by her perfect

assurance, would have spoken again, had he not found it to be a physical

impossibility. It was in his heart to accuse her of his own accord of

the death of Belshazzar. Yet he could not voice the thought. As she left

the tent he moved after her to the door-way, whence he could look over

the plain to the walls of the city. He saw the black-robed figure glide

unaccosted through the camp and beyond it, in the direction that

Amraphel had taken more than an hour before. And as he watched her Cyrus

felt a great reverence spring up in his heart, and in the after-wonder

at her bearing and her words he forgot how she had looked. And

presently, as he stood there lost in thought, Bardiya came to his

shoulder, asking, softly:

"My father, is she all that men have said?"

Cyrus hesitated in his reply. Finally, after a long pause, he answered

of his own will: "More wonderful than any have said. She is a woman sent

of God."

XXII

AT THE GATE

Istar went quietly over the plain towards the gate of Bel, by which she

purposed re-entering Babylon, intending to pass the night in some one of

the temples, those refuges for all the outcast paupers of the Great

City. As she went, she thought upon Cyrus the king and her talk with

him, and also of the prophecy that had been put into her mouth.

When she left the conqueror's tent her mind had been at rest. She had

neither fear nor desire. But now, as she drew near the city gate, and

could hear, as from a great distance, sounds of life coming from the

rébit, or market, held outside Nimitti-Bel, she quickened with

uneasiness and excitement. Coming nearer, she perceived that there was a

great gathering in the mart, and it seemed to her that, over the general

murmur of buyers and venders, one single voice was speaking. She did not

recognize the tall, white-robed figure standing in the very centre of

the throng, gesticulating as he spoke; nor could her ears distinguish

any of his words. Quietly enough she came along her way, instinctively

knowing that danger threatened her; while, in the square, Amraphel of

Bel spoke to the gathering crowd of Babylonians and Jews, some of whom

he himself had brought, some of whom had been here in any case, all of

whom were now waiting for the inevitable return of Istar to the city.

It was in this wise that Amraphel addressed them:

"Hear ye, men and women! Listen, and heed the word!" He paused, while

the noise in the market-place grew gradually less. "Listen and heed, and

obey my word!

"Now comes there among you one from the camp of Kurush the conqueror,

who, in shame of guilt, hath not been equalled in the Great City. The

woman of Babylon, the witch, the disciple of Namtar the plague-demon;

she by whose hand Nabonidus and Belshazzar both have fallen; she who for

so long polluted the holy sanctuary of Istar; she who, in her nameless

wrath, visits the city with the great death; she who hath lain for days

in the camp of the conqueror, vainly weaving her spells about his

dauntless heart; she who hath, in sacrilege, been called Istar of

Babylon, would now come once more among ye.

"My people, will ye let her in among your dead in the city? Will ye

again receive her that hath wrought this infinite woe? Will ye not,

rather, in the names of the great gods, drive her forth from the city

gates with stones and scourges, as from your hearths by night you

exorcise Namtar her companion?

"Behold, there comes she among you, even now, black-veiled. In the name

of Bel, our god, I bid ye drive her from your presence here in Babilû!"

Hardly comprehending at first the violent words of the high-priest, the

people had listened open-mouthed. When, however, they understood that

she whom he had designated as the incarnation of all evil was coming

among them from the camp of the Elamite, there was a quick struggle to

reach the front rank of the crowd. As yet the Babylonians were moved by

curiosity rather than by wrath, for they were a slow people and not

unreasonable. The Jews, however, as many as were there, were of a

different temperament, and it was they that began, little by little, to

raise that ominous, angry murmur that will quicken a mob to violence

sooner than any speech of a professional anarch.

Among the throng was Charmides the Greek, come out an hour before to buy

barley for his house, and remaining to chat for a time with the cheery

countrymen that were unaffected by the depression of the city. Charmides

had heard the words of Amraphel with a natural sense of horror, and now

turned to look incredulously over the plain. There, fifty yards away,

was she for whom he and Bazuzu had vainly sought since morning. There

indeed was she, the tall, slight, black-clothed figure, advancing slowly

towards the gate. In obedience to a quick impulse, Charmides ran hastily

forth from the square and placed himself before her in her path. The

ominous shouts of the mob behind him came clearly to his ears, but he

paid no heed to them. He was within five feet of her before Istar

recognized him from behind her heavy veil. Then immediately she spoke to

him, in the poor, cracked voice that contained not a trace of its former

melody.

"Comest thou from the city to meet me, O Greek? Among so many, yet I

shall not lose my way."

"Lady Istar, turn thou back. Turn away from the gate! Amraphel there

incites the mob to take thy life. Therefore be warned. Come thou with

me. I will support you. We will enter the city later by another way."

Istar stopped and hesitated a little. She lifted her eyes to look at the

great throng in the rébit, and she could read their intent from the

attitude they took. Then she turned again to Charmides, who would have

taken her about the body to help her on in her weakness.

"Nay, Greek!" She started back from him. "Lay not thy hand upon me! My

very flesh is accursed! Thou givest timely warning, yet I go up to meet

them that hate me. Have I not said the end is near? Seek not to hold the

blessed freedom from me. Let us go up to meet them at the gate."

Startled by the calm determination of her manner, Charmides could find

no fitting remonstrance for her. Indeed, he knew at once that it were

useless to attempt to combat her will. More, he felt it to be

irreverent. Keeping, then, close at her side, hoping to shield her with

his own body from those in the market-place, he walked with her up the

gradual ascent to the gate. At first their approach was watched with

murmurs of disapproval. The angry prejudice of the Jews was beginning to

extend to the Babylonians also, and momentarily Charmides expected the

first stone. But as she approached something in the bearing of the

veiled woman stilled the voice of the mob. She was coming among them

apparently without either fear or hesitation. It was perhaps her

fearlessness that sent the little tremor of shame into the minds of most

of the company. Amraphel saw this almost instantly, and quickly set to

work. There was a slight movement along the face of the mob, and when

Istar stood within fifteen feet of them she found herself confronted by

a solid line of Jews that looked upon her with a cold impassivity that

foreboded an evil ending to this strange hour.

Seeing that her way was barred, and by what immovable men, Istar finally

halted. She looked about her from side to side, betraying for the first

time a little uncertainty of manner. It was as if the guiding spirit

that had so far led her was suddenly gone; as if at last she was alone,

unprotected, mentally and physically, before an inimical world. With a

little gesture of bewilderment she turned to the Greek at her side.

"Charmides," she said, faintly, "what do they here? Why do they oppose

my coming?"

"Men of Babylon," shouted Charmides, commandingly, "open your ranks! Let

the Lady Istar pass through to the gate of Bel!"

A low, sullen murmur of refusal rose from the men in the front line. Not

one of them moved. There was not so much as a glance of encouragement

for Charmides in his hopeless championship of the woman. Nevertheless

the Greek cried again:

"What right have ye to forbid that she enter the city?"

Then came a voice from the midst of the throng, a strident voice, and

one harsh with age, known too well both to Istar and to her protector.

"The witch of the plague shall enter no more into the city. Long enough,

creature of Namtar, hast thou worked destruction among us. Let the demon

thy master save thee from our wrath!" And with the last words a piece of

broken brick was hurled from out of the throng, striking Istar upon the

shoulder.

Instantly Charmides sprang in front of her, but, violently trembling,

she pushed him back. Quite alone, quite unprotected, she faced the mob,

even advanced to them a step or two, while she asked, faintly:

"What is this that ye call me? Servant of Namtar? Witch of the plague?"

"Yea verily, wicked one!"

"Witch!"

"Sorceress!"

"Murderess!"

With the last word two or three more stones came towards her, one of

them striking her upon the knee, another passing just over her head.

Istar drew a long sigh, and for an instant she closed her world-weary

eyes. Thereafter, with a slighter movement than she had used before

Cyrus, she caused the veil to fall from her form, and stood exposed in

all her pitiable plight before the pitiless mob that had gathered

against her.

Instantly there came a chorus of wonderment and of repulsion, with which

a weak note of compassion was mingled. Charmides, who now saw her face

for the first time since the morning after the massacre, started with

horror.

"Behold, the mark of the plague is upon me. How then do ye call me

servant of Namtar?" she said.

"Sorceress! Beneath the veil thou hast transformed thyself! Take thy

true form!" cried Amraphel from the throng.

At this accusation a howl of anger suddenly rolled over the childish

multitude. At last, almost by accident, they had been successfully

roused to fury against the helpless creature before them.

"Thy true shape, witch!"

"Thy true shape!"

"Fly, if thou canst, from our wrath!"

"Pray Namtar to save thee now!"

And then, dropping articulate speech, the mob prepared themselves for

their revenge against the demon's minion.

Drops of sweat rolled down Istar's face. Faint for food and greatly

suffering from weariness, she swayed where she stood. Charmides,

overcoming his repulsion, remembering her as she had once been in the

days of her great glory, threw his arm about her and supported her.

"Dogs!" he cried, angrily, "the woman is weak and sick of the plague.

Will ye still keep her from the city wherein she must rest?"

"Shall we admit a murderess among us?" shouted one of the Jews,

wrathfully.

"Murderess? What creature have I slain?"

"Dost thou deny the murder of thy husband, Belshazzar, on the night of

the feast?" demanded Amraphel from the midst of the throng.

"Belshazzar! My beloved!--_I?_" A great sob burst from the lips of the

woman. For a moment she could feel again about her the dying arms of him

whom she had loved more dearly than godhead. The tears flowed fast down

her scarred cheeks. Before the wave of grief she bent her head low.

"Behold, she confesses! She dares not deny! Murderess! Murderess!"

The voice of the mob grew deafening; and now bricks and stones came

forth upon her in a shower. They struck her in many places, bruising her

head, her breast, her scantily clothed arms, her broken body. Under the

blows she cowered like a wounded animal, uttering no sound.

"Istar, Istar, come away with me! Fly! Here is death if we remain.

Come!"

Charmides seized hold of her while the missiles were striking them both

in great numbers. Then, taking her up bodily, the Greek turned and fled

rapidly down the hill-slope in the direction of the nearest shelter, a

broad palm-grove upon the river-bank. For a few moments Istar was

helpless; but he found, to his immense relief, that they were not

pursued. When at last they were beyond danger Istar shuddered and cried

to be put down. He set her anxiously upon her feet and found that she

could walk.

"If I had but wine to give thee!" he exclaimed, as he saw her weakness.

"Nay, Charmides, thou hast saved and greatly helped me. I give thee

blessing from the heart. And now thou must leave me, that I may go alone

down to the river. Fear not. None will accost me. I am well."

The Greek would have protested against letting her go, but that he had

an unaccountable feeling that a higher force than hers was dominating

both of them. Therefore, after a glance into her uplifted face, he fell

upon his knees before her, and bent his head before the will of the

Almighty that was over them. And there, while the sunset shed its light

around them like a halo, Istar turned away and went forth alone in the

sunset light, to the grove of palms upon the bank of the quietly flowing

Euphrates.

XXIII

THE SILVER SKY

Never, in all the days of Babylon, had there been an evening more fair

than this. At sunset the burning day melted and flowed away, down the

western sky, in a flood of liquid gold. A faint breath of air came over

the river from across the distant Tigris, out of the cool hills of Elam,

the conqueror's land. On the river-bank rose the palm-trees, casting

their shadows into the softly slipping water; and the turf beneath them

was all strewn with sunset gold. To the north lay Babylon, huge and

black and silent, her dying thousands shut away behind the vastly

towering walls. To the west and south stretched great irrigated fields

of ripening grain, in the midst of which were many shadufs, with their

patient buffaloes at the interminable work of drawing water from the

clay wells. Still farther back were the crumbling brick huts of the

tillers of the soil. On the edge of the river two long-legged cranes

stood quietly meditating. Overhead a flock of pelicans wound their slow

way southward towards the marshes where they dwelt. From the far

distance was heard the loud cry of the bittern. Otherwise the land was

silent--wrapped in evening prayer.

Along the river-bank, under the shadowy palms, with the golden light

glowing about her, walked Istar, musing gently upon many things. Voices

from the infinite addressed her. The iron was leaving her soul. Her mind

was transfused with quietude. She ceased to notice or to feel the aching

of her bruised body. She was holding communion with deeper things, and

she moved with her head bent forward and her eyes upon the ground.

Presently she paused at the brink of the river--the fair, well-flowing

river, that held in its pure depths the body of the storm-eyed, her

beloved. Its flashing waters encompassed her with glory. Her mortal eyes

grew blind with light. Presently, out of the glowing depth, there came

to her, as once before, a voice--but now a voice most familiar, most

dear to her ears, most longed-for since its silence. Belshazzar spoke

from the beyond, in the words that Allaraine had written on the temple

wall, and that had appeared to her again from the river, on the night of

death:

"Hast thou found man's relation to God? The silver sky waits for thy

soul."

And now in the heart of the woman was no bitterness, no rebellion, only

knowledge of the truth. And, answering the question of the Lord, spoken

in the voice of her dead, she whispered, softly:

"Man and man, as man and God, are bound by those ties of eternal love

that made the covenant of Creation. Consciously or unconsciously, all

living things must live with this as their law, for they are God's

children, God's brothers, God Himself sent forth to wander for a while

in time, but in the end returning to their eternal source, which is God.

"All the sin, all the sorrow of the world, I have known, have suffered.

Yet no loss nor grief can take away the great joy of love, its purity,

its perfection.

"I acknowledge the wisdom of the All-Father displayed in His creation.

Let Him do with me as He will."

As she ceased to speak a blinding, silver stillness wrapped her about

and held her immovable. From its depths in the far-off heavens there

came to her ears sounds such as she had known in the long-ago: the song

of the infinite, the infinite, unceasing chorus, the wind-choir that

sings the Creator's hymn.

Still she could see the green fields and the water, and the ferny palms

above her head. Still she beheld the broad river running full of pink

and molten gold. Still the breath of the evening wind came to her lips.

The world was all about her; but she was no longer of it all.

High over her head, in the unclouded sky, a vast web of shimmering

silver was spreading out and out, like a broad, firmly woven veil. It

scintillated with dazzling light into Istar's upraised and half-blind

eyes, yet it struck them with no pain. It was the silver sky of

Babylonish dreams opening above her, while the celestial voices sang

ever more softly, but ever more beautifully, the pure, swaying harmonies

of the great hymn of freedom. God's presence lived in the beauty of the

earthly evening scarcely less than in the splendor of that heavenly one.

In the midst of the scene of supernatural wonder, Istar sank to her

knees, and there remained transfixed before the miracle that came to be

enacted before her.

From out of the silver-spun cloud two figures, at first merely dense,

opaque bodies of mist, began to descend from the heights, growing

gradually more and more distinct in form as they came, leaving behind

them a silver trail that moved and swayed, fine and threadlike, in the

air, above them. As they approached her, Istar, in her ecstasy, quickly

recognized them both; the one, his floating locks of deepest auburn

star-crowned, his trailing garments of changing blue, carrying in his

hand the sunset lyre, was Allaraine, the archetype of song. The second

was more spiritual still, a storm-eyed being with thick, black locks

uncrowned, clothed in misty white, girdled in silver, bearing in his

hand a palm-branch of the same shimmering white metal, his face, hands,

and feet showing transparently pure, while in his back, upon the left

side, was a mark of brilliant light, glowing with ruby fire, and

resembling a hallowed wound--the releasing dagger-stroke that had freed

Belshazzar from Babylon--Belshazzar, beloved of the woman to whom he

came again.

Slowly, slowly, to that infinite, sweet chorus, these two descended till

their celestial feet touched earth, and Istar, with joyful greeting,

rose up and went to meet them. As she held forth both maimed, mortal

hands, the eyes of Allaraine glowed with sorrow, but Belshazzar's face

was alight with the fulness of great joy.

"We come to thee, O woman honored of God; and thou shalt choose between

us.

"I, Allaraine, thy brother, would lead thee back among thy fellows in

thy great purification to the perfection of rest, of insensibility to

all creation except God and His word."

"Istar, beloved, through suffering a soul, an immortal soul, hath been

born in thee; and thou mayst come forth now to rest a little on the long

pilgrimage that will lead thee finally back into the God whence all

souls are sprung."

"Choose, Istar. Choose."

Istar turned her eyes to Allaraine and looked upon him long and

earnestly, and her face grew radiant. Then, most slowly, she moved her

gaze till it met with that of the great storm-orbs of Belshazzar. And in

that look the worn-out body dropped from off her soul, which, clothed in

garments of translucent light, began its ascent between the two

messengers that had come for her. They passed, all three, above the

shadowy turf, above the line of waving palms, above the glowing river

which ran its threadlike course from distant Karchemish into the sunset

gulf; above, finally, the towering black walls of the Great City, and so

into the clouds of the silver sky, to which no mortal eye may follow

them.

* * * * *

Through this last hour and the period of her transfiguration, Charmides,

still standing at the edge of the grove of palms, had watched the figure

of Istar upon the river-bank. Rejoicing in the great beauty of the

evening, he waited peacefully, believing her wrapped in prayer. Nothing

saw he of the celestial world that had opened to her, nothing knew of

the heavenly messengers that had come. But when her body fell back upon

the earth, he, thinking that she had fainted from exhaustion, ran

quickly to the spot where his eyes had last beheld her. When he came to

the place there was nothing there--no trace of the plague-marked form of

her that had dwelt in the temple of Istar in the Great City. Long he

searched there alone in the evening, till, out of the far, blue space a

voice, the voice of the woman he had so worshipped, spoke to him:

"Thou faithful and true, seek for me no more; for that of me which was

not is not now. But my spirit shalt thou know to be watching near thee

always. Behold, I am returned unto our Father."

So, knowing all things dumbly in his heart, the young Greek obeyed her

voice, and, turning slowly away, went forth from the grove of palms, and

returned that night alone to his young wife in Babylon.

THE END

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Jowett's translation of Plato's _Statesman_, vol. iii., pp. 562,

571.

[2] Jowett's translation of Plato's _Phaedo_, vol. i., pp. 407, 408.

[3] 541 B.C.

[4] Herodotus gives it as higher than this, a few writers less, the

greatest estimate being three hundred and seventy-five feet, the least

seventy-five.

[5] "_Bit_"--tribe, or family. A general prefix to the surname.

[6] The worship of the goddess Istar began originally in the city of

Erech.

[7] Her archetypal name, Istar being only a cognomen, the name given

her by the people.

[8] According to the calculations of Babylonish historians.

[9] The fish-god.

[10] The incident of Nabu-Nahid's strange gods is an historical fact.

[11] Fourteen miles.

[12] An historical fact.

[

Transcriber's Note:

The following is a list of variations in the spelling of personal

and place names which have been retained:

Agâdé / Agade

Êa-bani / Êa-Bani

Lillât / Lilât

Nabu-Nahîd / Nabû-Nahid / Nabu-Nahid

Nabopolassar / Nabopollassar

Tiamât / Tiâmat

Vul-ramân / Vul-Ramân

The Incantation in the Prologue uses the spelling "archtype".

The following is a list of changes made to the original.

The first line is the original line, the second the corrected one.

Nabonidus: Or "Nabu-Nahîd, last native king

Nabonidus: Or "Nabu-Nahîd", last native king

right side, oars-shattered, sides still uncrushed, while

right side, oars shattered, sides still uncrushed, while

heave-offerings of oxen and of doves.

heave-offerings of oxen and of doves."

Our voyage had been too long already.

Our voyage had been too long already."

her out.

her out."

Up to this point Theron and his son stoood beside

Up to this point Theron and his son stood beside

"Y face and form, my Charmides, are beautiful--more

"Your face and form, my Charmides, are beautiful--more

is never his feeling for any other of her sex. Woman

is never his feeling for any other of her sex. Woman's

"Dishonor--in the rites of Ashtoreth! Nay. you

"Dishonor--in the rites of Ashtoreth! Nay, you

it was his home, But it was night before they entered

it was his home. But it was night before they entered

The great mutitude hardly caught his attention. He

The great multitude hardly caught his attention. He

that from the first I have feared She is become no

that from the first I have feared. She is become no

"Bunantitûm Bit-Êgibi."

"Bunanitûm Bit-Êgibi."

thy companion, Ribâta of Skumukin?"

thy companion, Ribâta of Shumukin?"

the bed She gave a little cry of astonishment and

the bed. She gave a little cry of astonishment and

Chaldean kings that had done as much

Chaldean kings that had done as much.

"Belitsum--lady--what is thy grief?" He asked,

"Belitsum--lady--what is thy grief?" he asked,

]

End of Project Gutenberg's Istar of Babylon, by Margaret Horton Potter