CHAPTER XXXIX
IN THE GATE
Bowed to the dust, with rent garments, drooping head, and aching heart, from which the very life seemed pressed out, Ishtar sat herself down in the gate to watch for the passing by of the king, as he rode from the place where he had been administering justice to his people since sunrise. She had not long to wait; the trampling of hoofs soon warned her that the royal troop was approaching, and flinging back her veil, she had scarcely time to rise erect before the well-known white horse was upon her, guided by the hand that most she feared and hated in the world.
Its rider, buried in thought, proceeded at a walk, accompanied only by Assarac, the few mounted spearmen in attendance remaining several paces behind. Ninyas appeared unusually grave and preoccupied. His face was somewhat hidden by the fall of a linen tiara and the profusion of his dark silken hair, but in his rounded symmetry of limb, his graceful gestures, and royal dignity of bearing were conspicuous those personal advantages which formed perhaps the only merit of their new ruler in the eyes of the common crowd.
Faint and forced were the cheers that greeted his approach, dark and discontented the glances that followed him as he passed on. He from whom so much was expected had turned out a failure and a disappointment. To cruelty and injustice the people of Babylon would have submitted without a murmur, but for incapacity they had little forbearance; for one who wasted neither blood nor treasure, they entertained a fierce and dangerous contempt.
Already loud regrets had been heard among the populace for the iron rule of Ninus and the warlike glories of the Great King. Already whispers, fierce and earnest in their suppression, asked when her days of mourning would be ended; and suggested that the queen should again take part in affairs of empire—should govern Babylon, her own especial city, in person. Even before the seat of judgment, murmurs to this effect were distinctly audible, and a cry of "Semiramis! Semiramis!" had been caught up and reëchoed in the outskirts of the crowd. On such occasions, the calm face of Assarac was observed to denote secret triumph and gratification, yet clouded with something of anxiety and deep earnest thought. Riding on the king's right hand, he seemed even now so engrossed in meditation, that he was the more disturbed of the two when a figure, rising, as it were, out of the earth, wound its arms round the royal knee, at the imminent risk of being trampled to death, and laid its forehead to the white horse's shoulder in an attitude of heart-broken entreaty and abasement. Merodach must have recognised her. Ishtar knew that the animal avoided touching her with its hoofs, while, in spite of skilled hand and severe bridle, it pressed its muzzle against her fair shoulder with a mute loving caress.
"How now!" exclaimed the rider haughtily.—"What foolish damsel is this who encumbers the royal path, seeing that the sun is already high? Know you not how the people cry without ceasing for justice during the space of two hours after dawn? Stand aside, girl, lest that tender body of yours be trampled like a lily in the dust!"
Ishtar raised her tear-stained face, pale as the flower to which she had been compared, and sobbed out wildly,
"As thy soul liveth, hear me! Only hear me, ere thou ride on in thy might, and crush me to death beneath thy feet! What am I that I should stand in the path of my lord the king?"