“Lady,” said the Hebrew, gently, “whether Marduk and Ramman may requite or not, Avil-Marduk is the physician who can mingle drugs to soothe the king’s conscience. Since morning those who brought me the earlier warnings have borne me this: The king and his council have pondered long over the ownership of the Median cloak torn from the shoulders of the wrestler in the gardens. They have suspicions,—suspicions only; but if they seem well grounded, Avil and Belshazzar are not prone to stickle at trifles with such a stake.”
“Jew,” Atossa spoke slowly and calmly, “tell me, in what way is the prince to be attacked? Answer truly, as we Persians and your people call on one truth-loving God.”
Isaiah’s answer was given in so low a tone that Masistes heard none of it. When he finished, Atossa asked aloud.
“And why do you not go to the prince yourself? Why bring all this to me?”
Isaiah smiled bitterly. “Already a net of spies is spread around Darius. This morning I found I was more than suspected. An attempt to meet the prince would have been the signal for my arrest. But Zerubbabel, my good friend, stood sentry at the harem gate, and suffered me to pass. He guards below. The harem is accounted so inviolable, that in mere security it is less watched. Though you may not see Darius, have you no Persian servant who can be trusted to warn? Who dreams that you are to be guarded against?”
“Behold the messenger!” interposed Atossa, turning half playfully to Masistes.
Before Isaiah could answer there were steps again on the staircase, and there thrust itself into view of the fulsome smile of Mermaza.
“Samas pity me!” smirked that notable, “the ‘supereminently admirable’ lady alone on the harem roof with only two under-eunuchs for company! Verily, she may well cry out against the palace that supplies no more agreeable companionship!”
“Two eunuchs?” answered she, facing him with cold dignity, and moving directly before the tamarisk,—“two? I trust I grow blind, for by all gods, Persian and Babylonish, if there is another of that breed here, saving Masistes, he comes against my express command. And I will teach these well-fed underlings of yours that Cyrus’s daughter may fall in love with their heads!”
Mermaza cast his eyes about, winked, and replied suavely, that “he had thought he saw the forms of two persons near her, but was deceived. Only Masistes was present. The ‘blindness-demon’ had begun to plague his sight. Only he fell at his lady’s incomparably beautiful feet, and besought that she would not forbid him her presence.”