“Am I then a hostage?”
“You shall see. In dealing with Cyrus—”
But the king said no more, for Atossa deliberately placed herself betwixt the two in their anger.
“Will the king hear me?”
All her courage had returned the instant she knew Darius’s life was for the moment safe. She was the great king’s daughter still, and she stood before Belshazzar, fair and strong. He told himself he had never seen man or woman more calm, more beautiful.
“I will hearken,” was his sole answer, and Atossa continued her speech, that came very slowly.
“Lord of the Chaldees, when my father sent me to Babylon, I loved this man,” her eyes were on Darius, “beyond all the Indian’s pearls,—yes, beyond very life; but I was content to be the price paid for the peace of my people. I was resolved to be your true and faithful wife. But I come to find the price paid all in vain,—to find treachery blacker than blackest night, to learn that oaths are only to be blown out as a rushlight, at the first convenient season. My love gone, my joy all blasted, for naught, the prospering of the sapient Avil’s serpent guile, and that of his cringing master.” Avil had winced under the flash of her eye, but now she looked on Belshazzar. “King of Babylon, thus far have falsehoods borne you; count up well the cost. Do not think oath-breaking can prosper man or king forever. Let the walls of Babylon mount yet higher; higher still are God’s heavens whence He looks downward, and beholds us all, and all the secrets locked up in the heart. You can still repent. You can send Darius to his own land, and I will yet be to you an obedient wife. You can still regard the oaths taken to Cyrus as sacred, and as such keep them fast. Thus far you have done naught that may not be undone; go no farther. But let the prince, the inviolable envoy, guarded alike by Persian and Chaldee gods, endure one hour of prison, and only heaven shall judge the war. Do not think my father is all blind. The moon cannot fall from the sky, and no man marvel. This is the moment, and the last when you may choose,—the moment which we Persians say to every man is granted,—to make choice of the Right Mind or the Wrong Mind, the great spirits ever at strife. I do not pray this for myself, nor for the son of Hystaspes, but for you, O king of the Chaldees, whom I would honour as husband if I might. To you is this word,—choose the path, of righteousness or guile, of peace or war,—choose!”
The king gazed on her, and she returned his glance fearlessly. Her beauty seemed doubled in that shimmering torchlight, her presence seemed self-illumined, glorious. For an instant, before the eyes of Belshazzar’s mind there passed a vision of peace; he saw himself like the great Nebuchadnezzar, fighting as he must, but glorying in peace and not in war. He saw his kingdom prosperous and glad, and Atossa beside him on the throne, his counsellor and guide in all fair enterprise. And on the monuments in the after days, men should grave these words, “In the reign of Belshazzar the land was blessed; no war raged; no mouth lacked corn.” Fair vision! And this was truly the moment of choice—to dismiss Darius or to imprison; should he thrust this vision by? But at that instant some demon or god put speech in the mouth of Avil-Marduk.
“Verily by Bel himself,” and the pontiff gave a low and mocking laugh, “the Lady Atossa will almost persuade his Majesty to burn his war chariots and set his sword-hands to digging ditches!”
One laugh; did Avil know that the fate of the “Beauty of the Chaldees” hung on that single breath? But Belshazzar spoke now, the spell of Atossa all broken: “Surely as Samas and Sin bear rule in the heavens, so surely have I chosen. I know the path. And who shall teach another way to me?”