“Come up, Masistes; I did not command you to stay away.”
A gray old eunuch shuffled up the stairs, and knelt and fawned around her feet. The face of Atossa had softened as she smiled down on him, though her smile was still bitter.
“Ah! Dear old playfellow, rise up! Have I not been your fosterling since first I could walk? When at Susa or Ecbatana have I passed one day without you close by to scold and grumble over me? And now that all other friends are gone, you alone are left; and I have learned to love none too many new faces here, to wish to keep you quite afar.”
The honest fellow thrust his arm within hers,—a familiarity born of lifelong comradeship.
“Ah! Little mistress, you do not right in crying down this wondrous city. Surely, there is naught else like it under heaven!”
“Masistes,” said Atossa, looking upon him half playfully, half in anger, “I must have you whipped. Since coming hither you have learned to lie.”
“I lie?” he lifted his hands in dismay. “Ahura, Lord of Truth, forefend!”
“Nevertheless,” she answered, laughing now, “you speak falsely, praising Babylon. From the bottom of your soul you hate it. How do I learn this? Because I know when you are indifferent to a thing, you are silent; you like it, when you begin to mutter against it under breath; but if you love it exceeding well,—there is nothing you may say of it too ill! But I am open, and I say to you,—and to any who wills to hear,—this city is the abode of dævas: dævas are all its lords, its priests, its people; and Angra-Mainyu, arch-fiend, is little fiercer than its king.”
“Alas! lady, such speeches make no winds pipe sweeter!”
“Not sweeter? I only know that except I empty my heart to some one, it will burst; and I think no Egyptian doctor could heal that with all his cordials!”