Part 15 (1/2)
”There is a law in man's heart,” replied Sargon, still in the same low concentrated accents, ”that sets aside the law of nations and the artificial ordinances of priests. See here,” he continued, plucking from his girdle a knotted bowstring, limp and frayed, which he put in the other's hand; ”a reader of the stars should be able to tell a simple spearman how many knots on that bit of twisted silk go to the score.”
”It needs no great study to perceive that but one is left here now,”
answered a.s.sarac with an inquiring look into the other's face.
”The bow from which I took that string had been bent many a time in the Great King's service,” was the reply; ”and a shaft it sped but seldom missed its mark. I have covered Ninus under s.h.i.+eld, and defended him with my body, when arrows and javelins were flying thick as the sands of the desert before a south wind. I have waged my life, poured out my blood freely for my lord, and he has rewarded me with his own royal hand.”
”He is lavish enough,” observed a.s.sarac, ”be it gold or stripes, honours or death, that he awards. May the king live for ever!”
”May the king live for ever!” repeated his s.h.i.+eld-bearer, ”a G.o.d among G.o.ds, a star in the host of heaven. If an empty throne be waiting for him up yonder, may it soon be filled! When I saw my boy fall stark dead, the blood gus.h.i.+ng from his mouth and nostrils, I prostrated myself and did obeisance to the Great King; but I drew that string from my bow, and in it I tied a score of knots, swearing with each a deadly oath, that by the splendour of Nisroch I would be avenged ere the twentieth was undone. Since then I have loosed a knot with every sunrise; and lo, a priest of Baal counts, and tells me there is but one left!”
Beneath its sallow skin a terrible smile rounded the fleshy outlines of the eunuch's face. His voice, however, remained firm while he whispered--
”We understand each other, and there must be no wavering--no escape--no mercy!”
Between his clenched teeth the s.h.i.+eld-bearer's answer came in single syllables, hissing like drops of blood on a burning hearth--
”Such wavering as stayed the cruel hand, the deadly bow! Such escape as was afforded that light-footed youth, whom only an arrow's flight could overtake! Such mercy as he showed my boy!”
”Come with me,” was the high-priest's reply; and the two ascended a spiral staircase of carved and polished wood-work, leading to the Talar or cedar-chamber on the roof of the temple, where at nightfall sacrifice was to be offered, and drink-offerings poured out in person by the Great King to his a.s.syrian G.o.d. Here they drew from a store-chamber within the wall several bundles of reeds, which they strewed in profusion over the wooden floor of the cedar-house, and which a.s.sarac sprinkled a.s.siduously with a certain fluid from a phial he had kept hidden beneath his gown.
”Every precaution must be taken,” observed the priest with another hideous smile. ”But if it be the will of his ancestor Ashur to descend for him in a chariot of fire, and these reeds thus saturated should catch the flame, then must the Great King, if he be not overcome with wine and sleep, escape by yonder narrow staircase. His s.h.i.+eld-bearer will lie in wait there to help him down.”
Sargon nodded, and his white teeth gleamed between the curls of his jetty beard.
”It is a faithful servant who thus risks life with his master,”
continued the priest. ”When a subject approaches the king in his sacred office, the punishment is death.”
”Death!” repeated Sargon, and his hand stole to the haft of his two-edged sword, while he burst into a mocking laugh.
Semiramis meantime, left to her own devices, strolled through the long corridors and lofty halls of the temple with wavering steps and slow, that yet bore her nearer and nearer the chamber at the end of the painted gallery, where Sarchedon was lodged. Opposite its entrance stood an eagle-headed figure of Nisroch, with beak and wings of gold. On this the prisoner's eyes were fixed, as he watched the lapse of time by the fading sunlight on its burnished edges, and, looking only for deliverance in the carelessness of the priests, longed for darkness, that he might explore the temple and find for himself some secret pa.s.sage through which to gain the town. Thus gazing, it was with no a.s.sumed start of surprise that he marked the queen's beautiful figure and s.h.i.+ning raiment emerge like a vision from under the very shadow of the G.o.d; and while he prostrated himself at her feet, he could not forbear covering his eyes with his hands in honest doubt whether he were face to face with a woman of real flesh and blood, or with some illusive creation of his own excited fancy. Perhaps no intentional flattery could have been so grateful to the queen, whose daring nature was yet sufficiently feminine to be tempered with a certain reserve and restraint in the presence of a man she loved.
Semiramis looked tenderly down on the kneeling form at her feet, leaning towards it with the graceful pliancy of the palm-tree as she bends in the evening breeze.
”Rise, Sarchedon,” she whispered, dwelling fondly on every syllable of his name as it pa.s.sed her trembling lips; ”this is no time for empty homage and unmeaning form. Know you not that you are to die with to-morrow's dawn?”
Even that hideous prospect, even love for another woman burning at his heart, could not veil the pa.s.sionate admiration that blazed from his eyes while he looked up in the fairest face beneath the sky.
Meeting his glances, her own kindled into fire. She laid her white hand on his shoulder with a gesture that was almost a caress. But the hand, so firm to draw a bow, to grasp a sceptre, to record a doom, shook like a leaf of the great tamarisk-tree in her own gardens.
”I have come to save you,” she continued in a voice that sank lower and lower with her failing breath. ”Was I not the cause of your offence? Do I not share your crime? I cannot let you die!”
He scarcely believed his senses. Could this be the royal lady who had ruled so calmly half the nations of the East--this panting, trembling, eager woman, changing colour, mood, and bearing with every throb of her beating heart? It was hard to find voice for the conventional declaration, that ”he was the lowest of her servants, and his life lay in the hand of the Great Queen!”
”Your life, Sarchedon,” she murmured. ”If your life be indeed mine, what more can I desire? See, you shall take it back. It is a free gift; and again I am all alone. A queen, forsooth! Who would be a queen, to burn like Ashtaroth in heaven with fire kindled in her own heart, having none to counsel, none to cherish, none to love?”
He had sprung to his feet. He looked on the beautiful woman standing beside him, and every manly instinct of his nature rose to answer her appeal, so touching, so bewildering, and so fond. The very contrast of her flushed temples and disordered looks with those royal robes of state might have turned a cooler brain, and no consideration of danger or duty could have caused him to forbear exclaiming,