THE CITY OF REFUGE
The fugitives pressed on apace, Sarchedon's horse, though wavering and
exhausted, vindicating nobly the purity of its lineage, a race of which
none ever failed to answer the rider's hand and voice, ask what he
would; but when they stopped, they fell stone dead. Nevertheless, the
foremost Egyptians gained ground too surely, and ere the Assyrians came
under the protection of a friendly city, the swiftest of their pursuers
had already halted to bend their bows.
A volley of arrows whistled round Sarchedon's head, who arrived last
within the welcome shelter of the walls, bristling with bowmen, prepared
to defend it against a host. As the great gate closed behind him, he
heard the war-cry of Ashur swelling to a shout of triumph; while the
baffled Egyptians, making the circuit of the place at a gallop, wheeled
round and withdrew into the desert, as though content to abandon their
prey.
"I never wish to look on Pharaoh's face again," said Sethos, drawing a
long breath of relief, while leaping nimbly to the ground, he loosened
the girths of his panting steed. "I have fronted the Great King in his
wrath, and it seemed like passing through a burning fiery furnace, that
scorches the beard and blisters the skin; but under the cold eye of
Pharaoh, I could feel the chill of death creeping into the marrow of my
bones."
Sarchedon did not answer. His heart was beating fast, and all the blood
in his body seemed surging to his brain; for amongst the spectators
looking down from the housetops on the entrance of their countrymen, he
had caught sight of a veiled figure, that had in it something of her air
and gestures who was never absent from his mind--the object of his
search, the desire of his life, the woman he had loved and lost.
It was but a momentary glimpse. The figure disappeared almost as soon as
seen. Nevertheless, for Sarchedon there was henceforth but one aim, one
interest, in the whole city of Ascalon.
His progress through the streets reminded Sethos, though on a less
splendid scale, of the Great King's return after his successful Egyptian
campaign, with its greetings, its enthusiasm, its shouts of welcome, and
casting down of flowers on the warriors' heads, though the numbers were
scanty, compared to the population of imperial Babylon, the height from
which the garlands dropped but mean and humble, measured by the
pinnacles and terraces that crowned the City of Palaces, throned on her
mighty stream.
Long before it could arrive beneath her walls, the watchman at the gate
of Ascalon had espied this scanty troop of his countrymen advancing
through the desert, pursued by an enemy from that south on which it was
his duty to keep a sleepless eye. Ere Sarchedon became satisfied that he
was making for a tangible stronghold, and not an illusion of the sandy
wilderness, the city had been alarmed, and its Assyrian garrison, tried
warriors all, were at their posts. Scores of bowmen therefore lined the
streets through which the little party passed. Many a broad hand
tendered its grasp of welcome and good-fellowship to the comrade who had
baffled yet one more danger, foiled the hated Egyptian with bow and
spear yet once again. Agron, the Captain of the Gate, a young warrior in
whose company Sethos had often emptied the wine-cup, spending days and
nights of revelry amongst the material joys of his beloved Babylon,
himself accompanied them to the stronghold of the city, now brightened
by a certain appearance of luxurious indulgence, added to its usual
aspect of defence and grim security.
"Here," said Agron, "you shall be brought into the royal presence, with
the rising of to-morrow's sun. You shall be sped on your way to Babylon
under such a guard as may laugh Pharaoh and all his chariots to scorn,
if indeed they dare thus pursue their venture into the land of Shinar.
Fear not, my friends; you shall ride out of Ascalon almost as swiftly as
you rode in, and I wish it had been the will of Nisroch that I might be
permitted to accompany you."
"Are you then so weary of the City of Towers?" asked Sethos, smiling
gaily on a group of women who were pelting him with flowers from an
upper story. "It seems to me that here, as elsewhere, Ashtaroth shines
down in light through the eyes of these southern damsels, and that Agron
may bask in her beams no less pleasantly than at home."
"Ashtaroth!" repeated the other scornfully, "and the City of Towers! Say
rather Shamash and the City of Fire! Where shall you find a palm's
breadth of shade in the whole town at noon, or a green thing within a
day's march of the walls? There was a fountain here over against us when
we arrived; but the sun licked it up ere we saw him rise three times,
dry and clean as a dog's red tongue licks a platter. For duty, it is
watch and ward day by day, with your headpiece scorching the very hair
off your brow, and alarms throughout the night, every time a camel
tinkles its bell within or a jackal howls for hunger without. As to
pleasure, if you care not to fly your hawks over a plain so barren that
the very wormwood refuses to show a twig, or to follow a lion as sulky
as yourself for lack of food, who burrows into a cave when you come up
with him, you must be content to tie knots in your bowstring, and so
keep count of the days of your captivity, as they pass by and bring no
change."
"But you hold a high post," said Sarchedon absently, for his thoughts
were still with the veiled figure that vanished so quickly from his
sight. "You have a noble command, and great honour amongst men."
"And receive gifts from travellers entering in," added Sethos. "Caravans
out of Egypt, merchants from the coast, spoilers of the desert, who must
needs replenish quiver and sharpen steel, none can pass through without
doing homage to the keeper of the gate, and his hand is never empty
whose beard brushes the dust. Tell me, Agron, are there not bales of
silk piled in thy dwelling, myrrh, spices, inlaid arms, and talents of
gold, ay, and a captive maid or two, fresh and rosy as the dawn on those
eastern mountains from which she comes?"
Agron laughed loud.
"How long would she abide with me at the gate, think you, after the
prince had heard of her white skin and ruddy cheeks? No, my friends,
wayfarers are driven from our walls as if they brought a pestilence in
their very garments. For recompense, I have stern command and scornful
look; for food, camel's flesh and dried locusts; for handmaiden, an
Ethiopian wench, black and rough as a goat's-hair tent; and for
drink--well, for drink--you are a king's cup-bearer, Sethos--I can give
you, as you will presently confess, a skin of wine equal to the richest
you ever pressed at dawn for thirsty old Ninus. May he live for ever!
Hush, man! we are now within the royal gate, and none speaks here above
his breath who values the safety of his tongue."
Thus cautioning his companions, Agron guided them through a massive
portal, into the central fortress of Ascalon, constructed to hold a foe
at bay even in the last extremity, were the outer walls destroyed, and
the town itself razed to the ground.
As a bulwark against Egyptian aggression, and a check to the excesses of
those wild tribes that, from the earliest period of history, seem to
have made the desert their home, Ascalon had been fortified with all the
appliances of defence which the experience of Ninus could suggest; and
perhaps, as the birthplace of the queen whom he loved so dearly, had
acquired in his eyes a fictitious value that caused him to regard it
with jealous and constant supervision. Its central fastness was
therefore in proportion to the strength of the whole place, nor did it
fail to impress both Sethos and Sarchedon with feelings of awe and
wonder, quite incomprehensible to the light-hearted captain of the gate.
For Agron, this lowering fortress seemed but a dreary prison, only
preferable to the tomb, because of the hope that he might at last resume
life and light amidst the luxuries of Babylon the Great. Ascalon, as the
queen remembered it, was a glittering city, beautiful in architecture,
pleasant with verdant bowers, and ripening dates, and voice of rushing
waters. As Agron found it, shorn of beauty to enhance its strength, it
was a grim solemn citadel, denuded of palm and paradise to make room for
frowning rampart and threatening tower, drained of its bubbling streams
that they might fill its moats and ditches, retaining nothing of its
ancient loveliness but the blue sea and the silver lake, that continued
to mirror its rugged features in age truly and faithfully as the smiling
freshness of its youth.
Making signs to them of silence and discretion, the captain of the gate
led his comrades through a succession of massive portals and vaulted
passages, to a chamber lined with cedar wood, taken, as it were, out of
the wall itself, and lit but sparingly by an aperture communicating with
the roof.
"The prince will not see you," said he, "because he sits at the banquet
of wine, and he holds by our ancient custom of Ashur, which forbids the
clashing of cups and counsel; but you are fasting men as yet, and you
may see _him!_"
Thus speaking, he drew aside a heavy curtain that had hitherto darkened
their hiding-place, and disclosed a sufficiently sumptuous
banqueting-hall, in which feasted some twenty or thirty guests, of whom
at least half a score were women, unveiled, with flushed cheeks,
disordered raiment, and garlands of flowers clinging to their loosened
hair.
Keen as the desert hawk's, Sarchedon's eye took in the gay assemblage at
a glance. There was less of disappointment than relief in the deep
breath he drew to miss the woman he loved amongst these restless,
lavish, and alluring forms.
Ninyas sat in their midst, gorgeously attired as was his wont, with a
jewelled drinking-cup in hand, pledging his male guests at the lower end
of the board with loud hilarity, or whispering softly in the ear of one
of those fairer companions by whom he had surrounded himself. The good
humour of princes is contagious. To the royal challenge, men raised
their goblets full and set them down empty; to the royal jest, women
replied with peals of laughter and protestations of disapproval; while
the royal whisper was answered by blush, and smile, and smothered sigh,
more flattering than the wildest outbreak of mirth.
"I told you so," said Sethos in his friend's ear. "He was anxious about
our embassy and could not remain in Babylon, but removed here to be
nearer the land of Egypt."
"His mind seems easy enough now," answered Sarchedon; while Ninyas,
taking a lotus-flower from his own garland, and steeping it in wine,
twined it through the flowing locks of a free and laughing damsel,
leaning across a comrade, till her head almost reclined on the prince's
shoulder.
As she suffered him to fasten the flower in her hair, it was evident to
those watching above that she made some vehement though mirthful
declaration, accompanied by many gestures of affected reluctance and
denial; presently, on a remark of the prince, her retort called forth an
over-powering burst of laughter, and Ninyas, taking the collar of gold
from his neck, wound it as a bracelet round her arm.
In the meantime goblets had been emptied freely, eyes began to shine,
voices to rise, and the confusion of tongues became every moment more
and more unintelligible. The captain of the gate, though a stout
warrior, possessed, like his two comrades, a leavening of that
discretion which, even if laid aside in camp, cannot be dispensed with
at court. He judged it time to retire.
"Those are full men down yonder," said he, with a meaning smile, "and ye
up here are fasting from all but desert air, and mayhap a mouthful or
two of desert sand. Had you taken your places at the banquet amongst the
others, with your feet washed, your locks combed, and garlands on your
heads, there would have seemed no shame in all this revelry, because you
too would have been merry with wine. That which is but decent mirth to
one who rises from a feast, looks like rank folly to another who is
about to sit down. Let us go hence, and you shall comfort your hearts
with bread ere I show you the place of your repose. To-morrow Ninyas
will speak with you face to face, in the light of the rising sun."
He conducted them accordingly to the lodging he himself occupied when
not actually on duty at the city gate, placing before them such fare as,
notwithstanding his protestations of its unworthiness, was exceedingly
acceptable to their sharpened appetites, and producing a measure of
Damascus wine, that even Sethos, in his official capacity, pronounced
irreproachable. It proved, indeed, of so tempting a quality, that Agron
seemed well inclined to let the gate take care of itself, while he
assisted his guests in its consumption, expostulating earnestly with
Sarchedon on his insensibility to the merits of the matchless
vintage--"ripened," as he boasted, "in the brightest beams of an
Assyrian sun, pressed by the whitest feet that ever danced under a
mountain-maid, stored in royal cellars, and worthy, if ever wine was, to
be placed before the cup-bearer of a king."
Sethos admitted its flavour, comparing it to that with which he had been
regaled in Egypt at Pharaoh's own table, not disparagingly, yet so as to
enhance in his listeners' esteem his own importance as a man of
pleasure, a man of counsel, and a man of action.
"Their feasts," he observed gravely, "are spread more fairly than ours,
their dishes are more sumptuous, their attendants more numerous. There
is not the profusion of fish, flesh, and fowl that we waste in our land
of Shinar; but dainties are brought at any cost from the extremities of
Libya and the other side of the southern mountains. They would be
ashamed to hear the heifer lowing in the court for her calf smoking on
the board at which they sit, with knife in hand. Is it not so,
Sarchedon? You tarried longer as a guest of Pharaoh than I did myself."
"My own experience is chiefly of prison fare," was the answer;
"nevertheless, though the lodging was somewhat strait and gloomy, I can
in no wise complain of the food. The bread of my captivity was meat and
wine, not to mention a barley-cake and a bunch of onions thrust into my
hand by the archer who led me to my cell."
"Barley-cake and onions!" exclaimed Agron. "They fight passing well--I
pray you suffer me to fill your cups--passing well, indeed, these nimble
friends of ours, for men who fare no better than that!"
"Fight!" repeated Sethos, in high disdain. "Call you it fighting,
forsooth, to set the battle in array, advancing in countless columns
with levelled spears and waving banners, only to halt in orderly line,
sound a trumpet, and retire discomfited before the sons of Ashur have
time to bend their bows? Fight, comrades! I tell you, that for real
fighting, man to man, hand to hand, foot to foot, and buckler to
buckler, there is but one nation on the face of the earth."
"And but one champion in that nation," observed his host, with a covert
smile at Sarchedon.
It was not lost on the merry nature of Agron, that his good wine already
sang in the brain of the king's cup-bearer.
"You are my friend, and judge me too favourably," replied the latter, in
perfect good faith. "I am no boaster, by the quiver of Merodach! yet I
may say, that this belt of mine girdles a man who never shrank from
buffets with the Egyptian at a score, ay, a hundred to one! The sun has
scarcely set since the chosen host of Pharaoh, his chief captains, his
chariots and horsemen, surrounded me in the desert, as--as I surround
this goblet in my grasp. Did I yield? Did I fly? No. I retired to--to
draw them on, as it were, and loosen their array. What! thou art a
warrior--thou knowest my cunning of defence--my skill--"
"In retreat?" asked the other, laughing outright.
Sethos gazed on him angrily, and tried to rise; but resuming his seat,
burst out laughing too.
"In retreat, in advance," said he, "in press of battle--when and how you
will. They came on at a gallop, with their spears down. I reined-in, and
stood like a rock, with my wine-cup--I would say, with my bow--laid
across my arm thus. Then I fitted an arrow to the string, and Sarchedon
will bear me witness--Is it not so? Why, where is he? Surely he was here
not a moment ago. Sarchedon, I say, will bear me--"
But turning round for better summons of this additional testimony to his
valour, he found himself so unsteady, that he was fain to give up the
search and the subject together, fixing his attention rather on the
flagon, which he and his host finished in company ere they sank into a
sound and not entirely sober repose.
Sarchedon in the meantime, anxious and sick at heart, had risen from the
revel unobserved, and retired to his assigned resting-place, where,
notwithstanding the day's exertions, sad thoughts and burning memories
banished sleep from his eyelids, peace from his troubled heart.