The star of love

Front matter

THE LIBRARY

OF

LOS ANGELES

II

T was already early in the day, yet the great northern approach to the palace of Xerxes presented a brilliant scene of bustle and activity; on the double flight of grand sculptured staircases, which connected the city of Shushan with the terraced platform which dominated both city and plain like a vast and beauti ful throne, a constant procession of people came and went in a parti-colored, glittering stream; nobles, slaves, citizens, soldiers, and officers of the guard, the latter riding their well-trained horses directly up the wide marble stair, con structed with a view to this very end. The portico itself, its lofty roof supported upon eight magnificent columns, was in effect a hall of audience and a summer throne room, since it stood open to all the winds of heaven, save for the marvelous hangings of white, green, and blue fastened with cords of the royal white and violet, which conveniently shielded it from too ardent incursions of the brilliant light of the cloudless spring sky. In and out under the carven capitals swallows flitted, cleaving the bright air like swift arrows sped from an unseen bow, while the cool marble pavements far beneath resounded to the subdued ring of armor and the sound of innumerable feet coming and going between the columns upon every side. In the midst of this vast columnar hall, the burning cynosure of every eye, sat the monarch himself upon a raised dai's which commanded a view not only of the varied groups of courtiers, who appeared to gather and dissolve beneath his eye like the gayly colored figures of a kaleidoscope, but of the fertile plains of Shushan stretching away like a lilied carpet to the mountains of Lauristan, rising dim and cold in the purple of their distant majesty.

The earlier business of the day had consisted chiefly in receiving the official reports of the various princes and sa traps who were about to accompany Xerxes upon the longcontemplated expedition into Greece. The son of Darius had begun his rule over the hundred and seven and twenty provinces wrested from the grasp of weaker potentates by the doughty enterprises of Cyrus, Cambyses and the no less valiant Darius, by the notable putting down of an insur rection in Egypt, and the quelling of minor revolts in less distant dependencies. Having done all this, and being now at such terms of peace with the world as promised a period of luxurious inaction, Xerxes had opposed, as vigorously as a rather facile and yielding temper would permit, the hazarduous campaign to which he now found himself, the re sources of his kingdom, and his honor pledged. Just how the easy-going monarch had traveled thus far on the road of an ambition not his own he could hardly have told; his advisers undoubtedly had interests at heart directly opposed to his own more peaceful inclinations, and they skillfully worked upon the imagination of the king, causing to appear there such pictures of further glory and aggrandizement as they chose for him, somewhat after the fashion of the cunning jugglers and magicians who amused the court in its idle hours.

Certain it was that Mardonius, uncle of the king by marriage, and lamentably defeated in Thrace a decade ago, burned to retrieve his military reputation, expecting for him self the rich prize of conquered Greece. Certain refugee princes of Athens, resident for some years in the Persian court, hoped to be established as dependent despots in their native city, where they promised themselves glorious orgies of revenge upon their enemies. Demoratus, the Spartan, con cealed similar ambitions under a show of loyal devotion to the Persian monarch, whose creature he had become; while the vast number of Persian and Median nobles, soldiers, sycophants, and hangers-on, accustomed to war and subsisting chiefly on the fat spoils of battle, looked forward with im patience to an expedition promising glory, plunder, and cap tives innumerable, both male and female, upon whom they would work the will of the conqueror upon the conquered.

So it had come to pass in this the third year of his reign that the great King Xerxes was about to undertake a task, the magnitude and difficulty of which he scarcely yet real ized. For more than six months the work had been going on in all parts of his dominions, and on this day the final results were being summed up; reports given of work pre viously ordered, and letters and edicts prepared by the learned scribes who sat near the throne, armed with the inkhorns, parchments, and pens of their profession. These nu merous letters, reports, and edicts must be translated into the more than seventy languages spoken in the various prov inces. When finished they were read aloud in the king's hearing and stamped by his seal-bearer with the royal seal; thereupon they were given to the hand of couriers, riding night and day on the king's business on horses swifter than the wind.

Xerxes had now listened to many detailed reports re- 2 II iating to vast levies of troops and their equipment; orders for hundreds of triremes and thousands of vessels of infe rior sorts to be furnished by the maritime states. Maga zines of corn, he was informed, had been built and stocked at various places along the line of march. The great bridge of boats over the Hellespont, superior in solidity and strength to any bridge of the sort ever attempted, a veritable high road, over which troops, infantry and cavalry, baggage and supplies might be transported with perfect safety, was re ported well-nigh completed; gangs of laborers relieving one another night and day, under supervision of competent engineers and a division of troops commanded by Meres, one of the seven hereditary princes. The grandeur of the forthcoming campaign and the almost infinite extent of his resources had been unfolded and spread out before the youth ful monarch with a fulsomeness of phrase and a tedious repetition of his own divine prerogatives, which as the hours passed became almost nauseating in their effect upon the man.

In person, Xerxes, like his father Darius before him, was dark, both as to complexion, hair, and beard ; but under his black brows and lashes there gleamed unexpectedly a pair of deep blue eyes inherited from his mother, the fair Atossa. Unlike the proud, scornful regard of the militant daughter of Cyrus, these eyes of the royal despot were sin gularly soft and sparkling. His ready smile revealed rows of perfect teeth in the depths of his beard, which he wore trimmed and curled in close soldier fashion. Xerxes would have been called a handsome man anywhere; in the lan guage of his courtiers he was the divine one, the lightning of whose glance could make alive, though it had slain ; the beauty of whose brow rivaled the grandeur of the moun tains; whose breath was sweeter than the perfume of roses, even though they were roses of Shiraz ; whose thighs and shoulders were mightier than the foundations of the earth;

and whose will was inflexible like the will of Auramazda, the All-Wise God. He was King of Kings ; the Lord of the whole Earth — invincible, inflexible, all glorious! Yet Xerxes yawned wearily and very like a common man behind his broad, brown hand, even while the acclamations, in which every soul of all the hundreds in his presence joined, rang through the great carved rafters, till the vast columns hewn from the colored ^Egean marbles, appeared to rock on their carven bases.

While the tumult was loudest the king grasped the arms of his chair as if to rise, the signal for terminating the au dience. A man who stood at the left of the monarch, with watchful eyes upon his every movement, bent forward and whispered a word in his ear.

"Another edict still?" muttered Xerxes, mouthing his words as if disgusted with them. " Let the scribes dispatch it then; I will do no more to-day. Nay, were I immortal as Auramazda I should weary of the ceaseless stream of affairs. Bid Aspamitres and Bigthana attend me, and do you, Haman, follow me to the garden. Even a god must eat and drink, and, by Bel and Nabon, I am parched as the desert and empty as a beggar's purse! "

The man addressed as Haman glanced dubiously at the scroll which an attendant had just thrust into his hand, then he beckoned to one of the scribes to follow, as he in his turn joined the train of his royal master.

The scribe in question was a tall, grave man apparently well past middle age, his untrimmed beard and certain pe culiarities of his dress setting him apart from the company of scribes from whom he had just been singled out.

" You heard what our royal master said with regard to the edict pertaining to the queen? " asked Haman in a half whisper. " You have only to affix the royal seal and dispatch it to the various provinces."

" Nay, but the Great King — may he prosper exceedingly 13

— has not yet heard the writing of the decree. I must read it in his presence, according to the law; else I cannot send it."

" You are too particular as to the law, Matacas. The king is the law. He has passed his royal word to divorce the queen; and it only remains to finish the business, as he commanded."

The scribe looked troubled.

" The king knew not what edict it was. Perchance he will repent himself of an act done in haste. The queen is the wife of his youth and the mother of his sons. She is a great princess, moreover, and of the blood royal."

Haman fixed the scribe with a lightning glance of dis pleasure.

"Who are you, Jew, to instruct me, a noble of Persia? Hold your craven tongue and follow in silence. I will see to it that the royal seal is affixed in the presence without delay."

Xerxes, lolling at his ease in a latticed marble pavilion, where his cupbearers poured for him the exquisite wines of Shiraz and Ecbatana into golden goblets cooled with snow, glanced up with a laugh of relief and pleasure as Haman again obtruded his brilliant presence within the range of the royal vision.

" Drink, Haman," he bade the courtier, " and forget care!"

" But the edict, Great King, which requires only the affixing of the royal seal to become a law."

" What edict have I issued of late which requires this unseemly haste?" demanded the king impatiently. "Can not I refresh myself for an hour in my garden without an edict being thrust into my face? Take it away! "

"May the king's excellent majesty pardon his servant; but I act under the king's express command of yesterday."

Xerxes raised his hand meditatively to his beard. 14

" Yesterday — yesterday ? Why, yesterday I feasted the princes. There was no state-craft mixed with the victuals of the king's table ; no royal commandments issued, save as to the wine and the disposition of the garlands."

" The King's Majesty cannot have forgotten the refusal of the Queen's Majesty to appear at the banquet, and the decree that went forth from the all-wise tongue of the king," faltered the courtier, paling a little before the blue light ning of the king's gaze, yet secure in the knowledge of the unalterable nature of the writing, which had already been made by the most skilled of all the king's learned scribes.

" You are talking foolishness, Haman; I remember noth ing of what you say; yet — " The king paused and passed his hand across his eyes as if to brush from them some hin dering substance. " Why, the queen was present at the banquet, and sat at my side," he exclaimed.

" The Queen Atossa, exalted mother of the divine Maj esty, sat at your right hand." The courtier's voice was low and smooth. He knew well that the king's senses had been muddled with wine when the unalterable words had issued from his lips, and also that his hasty decision had not emanated from his own mind, but, as too frequently hap pened, from the wily suggestion of Atossa herself, and of Memucan, a powerful prince of Media, who secretly hated the reigning queen.

" The queen mother — yes ; I remember now ; but my wife, my Amestris, was not there. I remember that I missed her. But — Why in the name of Auramazda do you all stare at me so? Read what you have written, Matacas; I see you are waiting, your hooked nose smelling the parch ments, like a bird of ill omen."

The scribe gravely unrolled the parchment which he held in his hand and proceeded to read to the king, in full form and in the language of the decree unalterable, after the manner of the Medes and Persians, the royal edict against Vashti Amestris, one time royal consort of Xerxes, the King of Media and Persia and of the one hundred and seven and twenty provinces, the names whereof were set down in due order; to the effect that since Vashti Amestris, the Queen's Majesty, had refused to obey the direct com mand of the king, she was hereby set aside and divorced for ever. There followed also the kingly command that all wives and maidens in all the excellent dominions and king doms of Xerxes should hereby take warning to observe and do as they were bidden by those men who had rule over them, lest a similar evil fate overtake them.

As the scribe's sonorous voice intoned the formal words of the writing, which he had himself transcribed from the unthinking words of Xerxes, words cunningly suggested to him by Memucan, chief enemy of the queen, Xerxes turned exceeding pale, and his blue eyes blazed fiercely under the penthouse of his black brows.

' 'Tis a conspiracy," he said hoarsely, " a foul con spiracy against the queen, and against myself, in that the queen is well beloved by me, and I would not willingly do her harm." His head sank forward on his breast, while unwilling Memory held her torch over the events of the pre vious day. He began to realize, albeit vaguely, the unhappy circumstances which had caused this terrible writing. Some one — it might have been Memucan — had spoken softly of the queen in his ear. She was the most beautiful, the voice had said purringly, of all women in the world; and he had assented with a shout of approval. Like the lilies of Shushan for perfection, like the snows of Lauristan for purity, and like the throne of the King's Majesty for splendor. Again and yet again his cup bearers had filled the gemencrusted goblet, and he had drunk deeply of both wine and flattery, till a great foolish longing had come upon him to display the superlative charms of his queen before the eyes of the assembled princes and potentates. He had pictured her in all the majesty of her beauty and the magnificence of her royal apparel, gleaming with the pearls and jewels which he had himself chosen for her. And forgetting all else save his fatuous pride in his queen, he had dispatched his chamberlains to fetch her.

She had not come. Aspamitres had prostrated himself in the royal presence as one overcome with fear, and de livered the queen's reply. " The Queen's Majesty," he said, " sends greeting to Xerxes, King of Media and Persia, and regrets that she cannot accede to his request, inasmuch as the etiquette prescribed by the King's Excellent Majesty forbids the presence of honorable women at banquets like the one at which the king is set down."

At this the queen mother, who sat glittering with jewels like an idol and quite unabashed at her son's right hand, blazed with ill-concealed fury.

" Honorable women, indeed ! " she exclaimed. " What then am I, daughter, wife, and mother of kings? The queen has cast a base insult at me, Atossa, daughter of the Great Cyrus, founder of the Persian dynasty ; and to you, O King, I submit the matter. Shall this descendant of a slave defy your Excellent Majesty to the face? Shall she cast asper sions upon the mother of the Divine One? Auramazda and all the gods forbid ! "

And the seven hereditary princes who sat at the king's table applauded these words to the echo; and Memucan, who, because of his semi-royal birth, sat at the king's left, whispered in the king's ear that she was not worthy who had done this thing, since certain of the foreign princes were even now laughing secretly, because the King of Kings had been flouted to his face by a woman.

The words had enraged Xerxes beyond measure, he re membered it all now; and he had shrieked out that no one should defy his authority or insult his majesty. He had turned in his rage to the men who watched the scene from under drooping lids as those who know not whither the event will turn under their eyes.

" What shall be done to this woman, according to the law, because she has disobeyed me, and defied me to my face in this, my own palace ? "

At first no one durst raise his voice against the queen, because every man of them knew that in his sober hours Xerxes was as wax in the hands of his women. And they waited for Atossa to speak first.

Atossa read their dubious glances aright. She had drunken much wine; but it had not made her merry at heart as the king had been but an hour since; only bitterness and wrath lurked in the cup. The great queen saw herself second who had always been first, and for the moment she hated Amestris with all the sullen fury of her nature. The cunningly devised insult of Aspamitres's words, which were indeed true, but which it chanced Amestris had not uttered, were as oil upon the flame of her wrath. The scroll, which Amestris had intended for the hand of her husband, Aspamitres gave to Memucan, who glanced at it slyly, then crum pled it in the palm of his hand.

" Let Amestris be no longer queen," Atossa said, in a high, strident voice which reached the ear of the most distant reveler. " Let her be strangled ! "

Memucan seized upon the words of the queen, and himself spoke to the king, with grave assumption of prudence and forbearance, yet as one who plainly foresaw unseen evils gathering in the train of the queen consort's rash action.

" May the Divine One live forever," he said, " and may his wisdom be that of Auramazda, as is his excellent glory; but the queen hath wronged not the king only, but all the princes and all the people of all the provinces of the King's Majesty. For this deed of the queen shall come abroad unto all women, so that they shall despise their husbands and them that have rule over them, when it shall be reported that the great King Xerxes commanded his queen to appear before him, but she came not. Likewise shall the ladies of Persia and Media say this day unto all the king's princes, which have heard of the deed of the queen. Then shall arise too much contempt and wrath. If it please the king let there go a royal commandment from him, and let it be written among the laws of the Medes and Persians, that it cannot be altered, that Vashti, who is also called Amestris, come no more before the king. And let the king give her royal estate unto another that is better than she. And when the king's decree which he shall make shall be published throughout all his empire — an empire which is bounded only by the ends of the earth — all wives shall give to their husbands honor, both to great and small. Then shall great glory redound to the King's Majesty, and all the men of the earth shall bow before him in praise and gratitude."

These words of the astute Memucan floated before the king's mind like phrases muttered in a dream. Like a dream, also, was the memory of the great shout of approval which shook the rafters of the banqueting hall. But had he spoken the fatal words of the decree? He could not remember.

Suddenly he dropped his hands from his eyes, and no one present ever forgot his face of anguish. He spoke directly to the scribe.

" Matacas," he said hoarsely, " tell me the truth, as thou art a Hebrew of the Hebrews and dost believe in thy in visible god, Jehovah; did I put away my wife Amestris be cause she refused to come to the banquet at my command ? "

The Jew looked at the ashen face of the king and a great pity was in his heart.

" May the King live forever," he began mechanically.

But Xerxes interrupted him with an impatient gesture. 19

" Forget empty ceremony for the moment," he said, with a frown of anger. " I asked the question of you, Matacas, because you were present. I saw you. You do not drink wine as we Persians drink it. I ask you for the truth — as man to man."

The scribe bowed his head.

" The King spoke the words even as I have read them in his presence," he said regretfully.

Xerxes groaned aloud.

" Then it is done, and no one, not even I, who am King of Potentates, can undo it ! "

He clenched his great hand, and the muscles of his arm swelled visibly within the band of red gold that encircled it. Matacas, the Hebrew scribe, whose hand had dealt the final blow, stood like a statue of bronze in his place, bearing the fateful parchment; in the background Haman, licking his lips with the furtive satisfaction of a sleek animal, awaited the issue with unconcealed eagerness; while the meaner attendants and slaves durst not raise their eyes to the stern figure that dominated them all.

In the midst of a silence which could be felt there came a rush of feet at the door without, and a woman's voice upraised in passionate entreaty.

" Let me pass ! I care not if my life is forfeit. I must — I will see the king! "

Xerxes started; then a swift flush sprang to his dark face. He strode to the door and thrust aside the crossed spears with which the guards had barred the way. The tall figure of a woman, pallid and disheveled, staggered past them, gazed wildly at the amazed and curious faces for an instant, then dropped moaning at the feet of the king.

" Xerxes — oh, my husband, listen to me, I entreat thee ! Nay, slay me if thou wilt! I cannot — I cannot bear it longer ! " And the anguished voice broke into a loud sob bing wail of inarticulate grief.

Xerxes stooped. " Amestris," he whispered raising the woman tenderly in his arms. " My Amestris ! "

Then he turned with a snarl of rage upon the watchful group.

" Out of my sight — all of you ! I would be alone with my — wife."

Ill

N the courtyard of a modest house near the eastern gate of the city of Shushan a maiden stood feeding her doves. From the red-tiled roof overhead, and from the gnarled boughs of the ancient olive tree that cast the deep shadow of its silver leaves upon the pave ment came the pretty creatures with eager swoop and flutter, crowding about her feet with outstretched necks and a pecu liar winnowing sound of their broad pinions. The girl al lowed the yellow grain to trickle slowly through her slim brown fingers, laughing the while at the antics of a couple of iridescent beauties bolder than the others, who ventured to snatch the food from her very hand.

" There, there! my little ones; it is enough! " she cried, clapping her hands over the empty bowl. " See! There is no more, and you are not hungry, only greedy; you shall drink first, then fly away."

She pushed back the cover from the stone cistern, drew out a brown jugful and poured it slowly into a broad basin of polished copper; then stood aside to watch the thirsty creatures as they plunged their pretty heads deep into the cool water. A flock of chattering sparrows had gathered and were hopping nimbly about picking the frag ments left from the pigeons' hasty meal from between the stones. The girl glanced at them thoughtfully, her red lips parting in a half smile.

As she stood thus, leaning upon the cistern watching the almoners of her lavish bounty, she looked little more than a child. Albeit her kirtle of blue and white fell about her tall, slender figure down to the small sandaled feet, while a womanly veil of darker stuff drawn over her head half hid the heavy waves of rich, dark hair. Her face, a slender oval, gleamed white under the dark mantle — yet was it white with a rich undertone of rosy olive, the cheeks flushing with a warmer color which paled and deepened with the gener ous tides of life beneath. Her features were straight and noble, her mouth red and passionate as the mouth of a woman, yet the dark eyes beneath the thick curtain of curl ing lashes still wore the soft wondering look of a young child, who gazes at the world half pleased, half affrighted, from the safe shelter of its mother's arms.

A young man wearing the gleaming armor and winged crest which distinguished the guardsmen of the king entered the cool retreat softly, and paused irresolute as if loath to disturb the utter peace and innocence of the maiden's reverie. But she heard his step and turned her head with a flashing smile which woke up a myriad of charming curves and dimples and made of her more a child than ever.

" After all your promises, Nathan, you are too late to see the pigeons feed," she said reproachfully. " I waited and waited till the poor darlings were ready to devour the very stones for hunger. And so you see I had to feed them, though I did want you to see them eat from my hand."

" It was impossible for me to get off duty before, Ha- 23 dassah," said the man, advancing into the brilliantly lighted space by the cistern. " I thought of you, dear, and longed to be here."

The girl looked up at the handsome, dark face under the gilded helmet with a little cry of surprise and pleasure.

"What beautiful, dazzling bright armor!" she cried, "and, oh, those outspread wings in the front of your cap! they are almost like the wings of my prettiest dove; and, Nathan, is that the king? " Her child's voice sank to a reverent murmur, as she touched with one slim finger the bronze figure of a man between the wings.

"Yes, little one; that small image represents the King's Majesty, and the wings are the token of his power, a power which in the language of the court overspreads the earth from the rising of the sun to the going down thereof. Nev ertheless, we must needs make war." The young man drew his black brows together half angrily as he doffed his pointed helmet, for the heat in the street without was great and he had come in haste through the city. " May I entreat you for a draught of water, dear Hadassah ? "

The girl clapped her hands.

" I have something better than that," she cried. " Guess what it is! "

She approached her brilliant child's face nearer the man, and for the life of him he could not resist the innocent freshness of the smiling lips, but touched them lightly with his own.

The girl shook her head and drew back.

" You ought not to do that, Nathan," she said gravely. " We are not yet — betrothed." She blushed deliciously as she hesitated over the last word.

" But I love you, Hadassah ; and you, dearest and loveli est of women, love me; have you not said so, sweet? " His tone breathed a subtle anxiety mingled with the passion of young love.

"THE GIRL ALLOWED THE YELLOW CHAIN TO TRICKLE SLOWLY THROUGH HER SLIM, BROWN FINGERS."

The dark maiden looked up at him, and her child's eyes were clear and deep as pools of water under the midnight sky.

" Indeed I do love you, Nathan," she said earnestly. "And I love Mordecai, too; for he is ever the best and dearest of fathers to me who have neither father nor mother ; and I love my pigeons also, and these little brown birds who glance at me with such bright, wild eyes."

The mischievous dimples had begun to come and go in her soft cheeks, and she lowered her long, dark lashes, as she saw a swift frown gather between the brows of her lover. " Now you are angry, Nathan; for you look black and fierce as an eagle about to pounce on one of my white pigeons; but why? And why should you scowl at me? Am I not right to love Mordecai, and Abihail — nay, I love her not over much. She scolds me too often, and her voice it grates like the noise of the stones when the corn is growing fine."