XXI
KURUSH THE KING
The camp of the invading army lay spread over the sun-burned plain like a camp of the dead. There was hardly a sign of life round any of the many-colored tents. The very horses and pack-mules, tethered in a herd in the midst of the desert of dry grass, lay for the most part panting with heat, pining, no doubt, for the distant, breezy hills of fair Iran and the snowy highlands of Media, where they had been born and bred. Those of the soldiers not quartered inside the city lay under the shadow of their tents, hardly caring to exert themselves to speak, sleeping if they could, drinking as much as was to be had if they could not. Almost the only person abroad in the noontide was the commander himself, who, with one companion, was going through the camp, making one of his impromptu examinations of his men and their armament. Hardened as he was by years of campaigning in strange countries, Cyrus to-day found Babylon as unbearable as any one. His body was damp with sweat, and his breathing, as he walked, was audible. The blue quiver of heat that came from the great desert near by made his eyes bloodshot, and caused him to see with no little difficulty. Still, remonstrate as he would, the white-robed man that walked with him succeeded only in making Cyrus more thorough and more lingering at his task.
The commander's two sons, however, had not the energy of their father. They lay on divans in the royal tent, Bardiya, the younger and more favored of the two, strumming idly on a musical instrument; Cambyses, content to be still, drinking bowl after bowl of a concoction supplied by a slave, pausing occasionally in the bibulous process to curse at the flies and winged insects that swarmed about him. Presently, looking over at his brother, who for the moment had ceased to play, he asked, civilly:
"In thy pilgrimage of yesterday, Bardiya, didst discover any cool spot in the city yonder?"
Bardiya drew himself together with a little gesture of disgust, and his brother's features broadened with a grin. "Babylon is city of filth, of disease, of death. Thousands within it die of the plague. Those that sicken and those that are dead lie alike in the open streets. There is no relief. The very river runs like molten metal. On the pavement bricks the flesh of a slain animal could be roasted to a turn. I go no more to Babylon."
Cambyses laughed. "And her whom you sought, Bardiya—she loved you not?"
Bardiya, highly displeased at the tone, replied: "She is not in the city; or, if she is, no man knows where she lies hid. Some say that she ascended to the silver sky with the spirit of Bel-shar-utsur, who was her husband. Again they tell me she was murdered with the other women in the temple of Bel-Marduk, on the night we took the city. Howbeit, no man really knows whether or not Istar of Babylon still lives."
Cambyses laughed again. "Istar of Babylon! A myth! She lives no more than any other god. Think you the great Ahura comes down among men, a man?"