Kedah paused, to shrug and spread his hands, palms upward.
"My lord, I came. I know not why I came—but came."
Another silence fell. The angered Governor looked from Kedah to Semiramis. She sat her steed in the glory of a beauty dear to him; her cheeks were flushed, her eyes aflame with battle-fires, her red locks tumbling on a breast revealed, for her robe was rent and torn. Still Menon's lips moved not; then Kedah raised his head, his fingers toying nervously at his noose.
"My lord, I do perceive no tree in sight, yet, haply, further on—"
He stopped, for Semiramis loosed a ringing laugh and vaulted from the back of Scimitar, to approach the chief without a sense of fear or shame.
"My lord," said she, and pointed with her hunting spear, "if, in truth, this sturdy warrior must hang, then first shalt thou hang Shammuramat." She snatched the noose from Kedah's neck and laid it about her own. "And harken, O Prince of Justice," she cried aloud, "in his throat this fellow lieth! Aye, even to spare me thy reproof! It was I who disobeyed, not he, for I told him I came at thine own command."
Now the lady had spoken no such thing, and, truly, it was as Kedah said; yet the sweet lie joyed the hearts of the horsemen mightily, and a smile ran rippling down the line. Presently Semiramis spoke again, humbly, sadly, with her hands clasped tight, in the manner of a slave condemned to die:
"My lord, I do perceive no tree in sight, yet, haply, further on—"
Then a roar of laughter burst from every rank, and even as it broke, so yearned these men to break from their ordered lines, to hoist a war-queen up and bear her on their harnessed backs, to shout her praise aloud.
So Menon ceased to frown, for how could he hold his anger at a conqueror of enemies and friends? Had she not saved his army and his very life itself? What now! So he took her to his heart, though his heart was sad. In a little space the tidings would leak abroad concerning this warrior queen who was his wife, and because of love his soul grew dark within him and was afraid.