Their horns were locked again. Yet, a moment since, when the Syrian had cursed him in her scorn, her words had left a maggot in his mind. "What!" she had demanded. "Shall I, Shammuramat, go forth to point the way for thieves—disguised, perchance, as some kitchen wench?" Ah, if he could but bend her pride, how simple would be the rest!
"Listen," he begged, with deep humility. "In the hour of stress we stoop to many things. What harm if the lady Shammuramat conceal her beauty beneath an humble cloak and fare with Kishra to the river bank? By boat we may cross, returning ere the night is old, and none would be the wiser, for the city gates are free to me."
"No!" declared Semiramis, with a gesture of disdain. "I trust you not, nor will I leave the palace mound, though you prayed till dawn."
Her speech was firm, yet in it the eunuch marked a sign of wavering, so he urged his case with a beating heart:
"The gems once buried in the garden here, we wait in peace till Menon cometh to take thee hence, and for a third of this treasure store a friend is made, where an enemy might balk thy every move."
His words were words of wisdom, yet the Syrian frowned in doubt, while her sandal tapped impatiently on the graveled path.
"What will it profit," the tempter asked, "if wealth be stored away, when he whom thou loveth shall die in a distant land?"
"What mean you?" cried Semiramis, with a gasp of fear, and Kishra drove the nail:
"If the fish of malachite, with the message which it beareth, shall go into Bactria, coming not to Menon, but to the King's own hand, then in truth thy lord may suffer grievously."
At his thin-veiled threat the woman quailed, while terror leaped into her eyes.