“You?” The others were staring now in truth.
“Open! Open, or you die the death!” howled the soldiers without; and Igas commanded fiercely: “Beat in the door! Hew it asunder!”
The stout portal shook on its pivots, battered by spear-butts. It could not last long.
“This shall never be!” shouted Darius, while the deadly clamour increased. “Who will abide with you? You are the least fit of us all.”
But at this instant Shaphat spoke forth boldly: “If my Lord Daniel remain, he shall not remain alone, nor shall my betters be brought to death. Of us all, I am of least worth. I have but one life to proffer, as sacrifice for my sins, let it be offered now!”
“Dare you trust this man?” cried the prince, nigh angrily, while the door leaped inward with every stroke—“a confessed perjurer?”
But Daniel answered, with his wonted calm majesty: “Yes, as the Lord God liveth, I can trust him. He and I shall cover your retreat as long as Jehovah grants us strength.”
But still the friendly rivalry went on, until Shaphat plucked away Zerubbabel’s own sword, and set himself boldly across the doorway. Daniel turned to the others imploring.
“Away! away!” he prayed; “do you not see delay only ruins each and all?” And with a marvellous strength that white-haired man had wrung the weapon from Darius’s grasp, and was putting on the helmet. As he stood in the wan lamplight, his form loomed erect, powerful. He seemed to have cast off the weight of twenty years. Woe to the first to meet him man to man!