A vast mob of soldiers, waving arms and shouting maledictions upon Cambyses, was moving down upon the Persian square. The Prince of Iran was mounting his horse, while several orderlies were galloping along the tense lines of the Guard delivering orders to the captains. A squad of cavalry under Gobryas was marching towards the King’s tent.
“They come to arrest me!” muttered the King. “But I shall not be taken alive! Prexaspes lied. My brother lives and the world turns to him. He will surely slay me, knowing that I ordered him slain. If I die, I will die as a King!”
A sudden high resolve entered his soul. He went back into the tent, placed the crown and tiara, which he wore on state occasions, on his head, threw over his shoulders a long purple cloak, composed his countenance to a calm dignity, and, with the long, keen dagger in his hand, again went forth. Gobryas and his troopers, who were under orders to place the King in their midst and to cut their way out and escape with him should the Guard be unable to repulse the expected attack, opened up to let the King pass through. The Prince was riding towards the mob intent on a parley before the necessity of bloodshed should come. The King passed through the ranks of the Guard and halted at ten paces in front. The leaders of the mob, seeing him, suddenly halted at a hundred paces’ distance and fell silent, astonished at the appearance of the terrible Cambyses. The Prince, turning to investigate the cause of the mob’s action, saw Cambyses look a moment at the low, western sun and around at the sky and distant mountains, and at last turn his burning eyes upon the hostile faces of his subjects. Then, with a swift motion, the King elevated the gleaming dagger and plunged it into his own chest. A cry of horror involuntarily rose from the throng. The King swayed, his knees bent, and he fell prone upon the earth. The Prince, realizing what the King had done, turned upon the mob and shouted: “Back to your tents, scoundrels! You have slain your King! Back, I say, before I let loose the Guards upon you!”
An immediate backward movement of the mob took place, and it melted away in awed silence. The Prince rode quickly back to the King, and, assisted by his officers, carried the injured man into the tent. Surgeons were called, the dagger removed, and the wound bandaged. The blade had failed to reach the heart, but had passed through a lung and inflicted a fatal wound. The shock had rendered the King insensible. Blood poured from his mouth, but he did not die immediately.
Night had fallen before the King regained consciousness. He opened his eyes and looked at the flaring lamps, as if wondering whether they were torches in the underworld, and at the soft-footed attendants as if wondering whether they were lost souls. His eyes presently rested upon the Prince of Iran, who stood at the foot of his couch with folded arms looking sadly down upon him. Recognition arrested his wandering mind. He strove to rise, muttering feebly, “Then I am not dead!”
An attendant sought to restrain him. Blood gushed from his mouth, and he fell back with a bubbling groan. After resting a moment and clearing his throat, he said with difficulty: “Let all retire save the Prince. I am about to die. Let me die in peace.”
At a nod from the Prince, the attendants left the room. The Prince drew near to the head of the couch. The King looked up at him and spoke in weak, halting words:
“Strange it is, Prince of Iran, that you alone stand by me in death! A thousand times I have planned your death, but my hand has ever been held. I have done you wrong. But in you alone have I trusted. How is it that I have hated yet trusted you?”
The Prince shook his head. “I know not,” he said.
“But it is fate!” continued the King. “What of the future? Where now are the wise men? Where those prophets of the hills who predicted good fortune, who said that my seed should sit on the throne, who said I would conquer all my enemies and die at Hamadan? Would God that I had heeded the words of the prophet Belteshazzer, when he sought to teach me how to live rightly! Where is that Belteshazzer? I wish that he were here!”