Belshazzar. Генри Райдер Хаггард

tale, was that they had seen a man, perchance the same whose shadow flitted across the moonlight within the broken pylon.

      When we reached the camp and had passed the sentries in front of the pavilion, we met the councillor and priest Ninari, who seemed to be waiting there, doubtless for our return. He bowed low and spoke to the queen in a Syrian tongue which I did not understand, and in that tongue she answered him, somewhat sharply, as I thought. Again he bowed low, almost to the ground indeed, but all the while I felt that his fierce eyes were fixed upon me. Then with some courteous words to myself, thanking me for my company, she passed into the pavilion.

      I, too, turned to go to my own quarters where my escort awaited me, when this Ninari stepped in front of me and said in bad and guttural Greek,

      “Young lord from the Pharaoh’s court, your pardon, but I would have you know that whatever may be the fashions of Egypt, it is not our custom for strangers to walk alone with a great lady at night, especially if she chances to be our queen.”

      Now there was something in the man’s voice and manner which stirred my blood, and I answered, holding my head high,

      “Sir, I am a guest here and Pharaoh’s envoy, and I go where my hostess asks me to go, whatever may be your Syrian customs.”

      “You are strangely favoured,” he said sneering. “Your horse which you cannot manage, hurls you like a sack stuffed with barley into the presence of our mistress. She doctors your bruised poll, and now takes you out walking in the moonlight. Well, well, I should remember that you are but a forward, cross-bred Egyptian boy, well-looking enough as bastards of your kind often are in their youth, just such a one as it pleases grown women to play with for an hour and then cast aside.”

      I listened to this string of insults welling like venom from the black heart of the jealous Syrian. At first they amazed me to whom no such words had ever been used before. Then as the meaning of his coarse taunts, hissed out in broken Greek, came home to me, being no coward I grew enraged.

      “Dog!” I said, “beast of a Syrian, do you dare to talk thus to Pharaoh’s envoy, a Count of Egypt?” and lifting my arm I, who was a trained boxer, doubled my fist and smote him in the face with all my strength, so that he went headlong to the ground.

      At the sound of my raised voice men ran together from here and there – some of them those of my own escort whose tents were near at hand, some of them Syrians – and stood staring as this Ninari went backward to the earth. In a moment he was up again, blood pouring from his hooked nose, and came at me, a curved and naked blade in his hand, which I suppose he had drawn as he rose. Seeing this, I too drew my short Grecian sword and faced him, though there was this difference between us, that whereas I had no armour, being clothed only in a festal dress of linen, he wore a coat of Syrian mail. My men, noting this, would have thrown themselves between us, but I shouted to them to stand aside. The Syrians would have done likewise, but at some command that I did not hear, they also fell back. Thus we were left facing each other in the full moonlight which was almost as clear as that of day.

      Ninari smote at me with his broad, curved blade. I bent almost to my knee and the blow went over my head. Rising, I thrust back. My sword-point struck him full beneath the breast but could not pierce his good armour, though it caused him to reel and stumble. Again he came at me, smiting lower to catch me on the body which he knew was unprotected, and this time I must leap far backwards, so that the point of his blade did no more than cut through my linen garment and just scratch the skin beneath.

      Yet that scratch stung me, more perhaps than a deeper wound would have done, and made me mad. Uttering some old Greek war-cry, as I think one my mother had taught me as that of her father’s House, I flew at the man and smote him full upon his helm, shearing off one side of it and causing him to stagger. Before he could recover himself I smote again and though the steel glanced from the edge of his severed helm, yet passing downwards, it cut off his right ear and sank deep into his neck and shoulder.

      He fell and lay there, as it was thought, dead. The Syrians began to murmur for they did not love to see a noted warrior of their race thus defeated by an unarmoured youth. My men, fearing trouble, ringed me round, muttering such words as:

      “Well done, young Ramose!” “You have lopped that cur’s ear, Count, although he wore a collar when you had none.” “Now if any other Syrian would like a turn – ” and so forth, for this escort of mine, some of them Greek and some Egyptian, were all picked fighters of Pharaoh’s guard, and rejoiced that their boy officer should have won in so uneven a fray.

      The business grew dangerous; the friends of Ninari drew their weapons and waved spears. My escort made a ring about me in the Grecian fashion, their swords stretched out in front of them. Then I heard a woman’s voice cry,

      “Have done! Fools, would you bring Pharaoh’s wrath upon us and cause our country’s prayer to him to be refused? If this young Egyptian lord has done ill, let Pharaoh judge him.”

      “Queen,” I broke in, panting between my words, “I have done no ill. This follower of yours,” and I pointed to Ninari who lay upon the sand groaning, “for no cause bespattered me with the vile mud of insults, till at length unable to bear more, I felled him with my hand. He rose and although I wear no mail, sprang at me to slay me with his sword. So I must defend myself as best I might. There are many here who can bear witness that I speak the truth.”

      “It is needless, Count Ramose,” she answered in a clear voice, “for know that I heard and saw something of this business and hold that you were scarcely to blame, save that you should have taken no heed of mad or wine-bred talk. Yet, lest harm should come to you and I and my people be put to shame, I pray you leave this camp now at once and return to Sais whither I will follow you tomorrow to seek audience of Pharaoh and ask his pardon. Let the horses of Pharaoh’s envoy be made ready.”

      Men ran to do her bidding, but my guard who looked doubtfully at the Syrians, remained about me, save two of them who went to my tent and thence brought my armour which they helped me to gird on.

      Meanwhile that same old leech who had tended me, had been busy with Ninari whom he ordered to be carried to his tent. Now he rose and made his report to Atyra.

      “The Lord Ninari henceforth must go one-eared,” he said. “Also the Egyptian’s sword has cut through his mail and sunk into the flesh of his shoulder, for the blow was mighty. Yet by chance it seemed to have missed the big vein of the neck, so unless his hurts corrupt I think that he will live.”

      “I pray the gods it may be so,” answered Atyra in a cold voice, “and that henceforth his tongue may remember what has chanced to his ear. Hear me all! If any lifts a hand against Pharaoh’s envoy or his company because of this matter, he dies. Farewell, Count Ramose, till we meet again at Sais,” and with one flashing glance of her great eyes, she turned and went, followed by her women.

      A while later I and my guard rode out of the camp, I mounted upon the desert-bred stallion that the queen had given me in place of my own beast which was lamed. The Syrians watched us go in silence, except one fellow who cried out,

      “You won that fight, young cock of Egypt, but it will bring you no good luck who have cropped the ear of the priest Ninari and earned the curse of his god.”

      I made no answer, but presently when we were clear of the camp and riding alone in the moonlight, I began to think to myself that this visit of mine had been strange and ill-omened. It began with the fall of my horse, which hurled me, as Ninari had said, like a sack of barley into the presence of her to whom I was sent, a mischance which even to this day I cannot remember without shame. Then came those hours when I lay half-swooning and in pain, and woke to find that most beautiful queen watching me alone, which in Egypt we should have thought strange, though mayhap the Syrians and the desert-dwellers had easier customs. At last she spoke and told me that she had come thus to read my soul while I slept. Why should she wish to read the soul of one who was unknown to her until that day?

      Now I bethought me of what had passed between us afterwards in the ruined temple, and an answer rose in my mind. It must be because at first sight of my face this lady had been smitten with love of me, as I had heard sometimes chances to women and to men also. Could I doubt it with her kiss still burning on