"Don't add a lie to your offense. Save yourself, quickly."
"I speak the truth, and I shall remain."
"You are infatuated. We saw you in the hanging-gardens not an hour ago."
Bartja appealed to his friends, who confirmed on oath the truth of his assertion; and before Croesus could arrive at a solution of the mystery, the soldiers had arrived, led by an officer who had served under Bartja. He had orders to arrest everybody found in the suspect's company, but at the risk of his life urged Bartja to escape the king's fury. His men would blindly follow his command. But Bartja steadfastly refused. He was innocent, and knew that Cambyses, though hasty, was not unjust.
Two hours later Bartja and his friends stood before the king who had just recovered from an epileptic fit. A few hours earlier he would have killed Bartja with his own hands. Now he was ready to lend an ear to both sides. Boges first related that he was with the Achæmenidæ, looking at the blue lily, and called Kandaules to inquire if everything was in order. On being told that Nitetis had not tasted food or drink all day, he sent Kandaules to fetch a physician. It was then that he saw Bartja by the princess's window. She herself came out of the sleep-room. Croesus called to Bartja, and the two figures disappeared behind a cypress. He went to search the house and found Nitetis lying unconscious on a couch. Hystaspes and the other nobles confirmed the eunuch's words, and even Croesus had to admit their substantial truth, but added that they must have been deceived by some remarkable likeness--at which Boges grew pale.
Bartja's friends were equally definite in their evidence for the accused. Cambyses looked first on the one, then on the other party of these strange witnesses. Then Bartja begged permission to speak.
"A son of Cyrus," he said, "would rather die than lie. I confess no judge was ever placed in so perplexing a position. But were the entire Persian nation to rise up against you, and swear that Cambyses had committed an evil deed, and you were to say, 'I did not commit it,' I, Bartja, would give all Persia the lie and exclaim, 'Ye are all false witnesses! A son of Cyrus cannot allow his mouth to deal in lies.' I swear to you that I am innocent. I have not once set foot in the hanging gardens since my return."
Cambyses' looks grew milder on hearing these words, and when Oropastes suggested that an evil spirit must have taken Bartja's form to ruin him, he nodded assent and stretched out his hand towards Bartja. At this moment a staff-bearer came in and gave the king a dagger found by a eunuch under Nitetis' window. Cambyses examined it, dashed the dagger violently to the ground, and shrieked, "This is your dagger! At last you are convicted, you liar! Ah, you are feeling in your girdle! You may well turn pale, your dagger is gone! Seize him, put on his fetters! He shall be strangled to-morrow! Away with you, you perjured villains! They shall all die to-morrow! And the Egyptian--at noon she shall be flogged through the streets. Then I'll----"
But here he was stopped by another fit of epilepsy, and sank down in convulsions.
The fate of the unfortunates was sealed when, afterwards, Cambyses made Croesus read to him Nitetis' Greek letter to Bartja.