Istar of Babylon Part 29

Amraphel made this speech with such an air of mingled sorrow and outraged dignity that Vul-Raman, for all his amazement, could not but applaud it. The crowd showed less indignation than bewilderment and curiosity. But as the old man turned from them to cross the platform, the people followed him like sheep, leaving only the wailing hierodules behind them in the temple.

Bit-Yakin and the high-priest arrived at the foot of the ziggurat side by side, with the foremost of the company ten feet behind. Here, once more, Amraphel turned to them, raising his right hand majestically as he spoke: "Wait here for her whom I shall drive unto you; but see that, on penalty of the wrath of the G.o.ds, ye ascend not to the shrine."

Then, hearing the low murmur that told the acquiescence of the obedient flock, Amraphel and his shadow began their ascent. From below, the people watched them in growing wonder, in growing uneasiness. They had seen the ox-goad in the high-priest's hand, and they were thrilled with strange terrors as they considered what its use might be. Istar--their Istar--Istar, the great G.o.ddess--flogged! Impossible! Yet--yet--the curiosity was upon them, and they waited to see.

And now the two priests stood at the door-way of the shrine. The leathern curtain was closed before them. Nothing could be seen. There was a little pause, and, for the shadow of an instant, Amraphel wavered.

Vul-Raman, closely watching him, felt his heart sink.

"Shall I lift the curtain?" he whispered, devoutly hoping for a negative reply.

But Amraphel had gone too far now to falter. He nodded.

The heart of the priest of Nebo gave a throb of fear. He made no move to obey the command. Amraphel glanced at him sharply, took one step forward, and dragged the curtain from the door.

There was a low, frightened cry, supplemented by a weak wail from a faint and tender voice. The high-priest shaded his eyes with his hand till he could see into the interior of the room; and then, indeed, his heart beat high.

In that room, sitting now upon the great golden chair, was Istar of Babylon. She was clothed in the long, white, woollen tunic, that was scarcely so pale as her face. She was unveiled, and her silken hair, unbound and tangled, fell over her whole form and down to the floor on either side. Upon her knees, wrapped in a square of sacrificial muslin, its little form bathed in a dim, effulgent light that radiated from its body, lay the babe--her child.

Upon the entrance of the two priests, after the one startled cry, Istar sat perfectly quiet, her drawn face no whiter than before, her great, dark eyes staring wonderingly at the intruders, her breath coming and going rapidly between her parted lips.

Amraphel, whose self-composure had returned to him doubled in strength now that he was sure of his position, stood surveying her leisurely, with undisguised triumph. Vul-Raman, on the other side, had also lost his fear. His delight at the turn of affairs was hardly less than his amazement; for, since the morning at Erech, Istar had had, in all Babylonia, no firmer believer in her divinity than Vul-Raman of Bit-Yakin. Yet now, human, mortal, weak, she certainly was. Fitting, indeed, was it that she should leave the temple of the great G.o.ddess.

And as he thought upon the manner of her expulsion, his lips curled in an involuntary smile.

At that moment Istar's eyes were resting on his face. She saw his expression, and she read all the cruelty of it; for suddenly, raising the infant in her arms, she rose to her feet.

"Why have you come hither?" she whispered, hoa.r.s.ely, her eyes moving from one to the other.

"Thou deceiver! Thou blasphemer! Thou thing of evil, of unholiness! We are come in the name of her whose abode thou hast so long profaned, to drive thee forth from e-ana to thy true dwelling--the temple of the false Istar!"

Istar's nostrils quivered with scorn. She lifted her head in a final proud defiance of the words of the high-priest. At the same instant Amraphel's left hand was raised. The goad whirred through the air, and the thongs came stinging across the face of the woman.

A sharp scream, that could be heard by the mult.i.tude below, rang out from the shrine on the ziggurat. The woman caught her baby close to her breast, s.h.i.+elding it as well as she could with both arms. The cut of the whip had left a bright crimson weal across both cheeks and just over her mouth. The goad was lifted over her again, and this time she shrank backward from it.

"Get you forth, false creature, from the heavenly house!" cried Vul-Raman, in raucous tones.

Amraphel moved out of her path, and Istar, blind and dumb with terror and amazement, started towards the door. As she went the whip fell again, this time on her shoulders, and again the scream followed it.

Hugging the babe yet closer to her breast, she ran out upon the ziggurat platform in the blaze of the sunlight, and, with Amraphel and Vul-Raman close at her heels, began an ever-hastening descent, round and round the tower, towards the square below. Up to her ears, from that square, came a long-drawn, minor groan. The people below were waiting for her, waiting for her as vultures wait. Behind her, driving her on to them, were their priests. She herself, helpless, bewildered, numb with the pain of exertion, beside herself with a desperate, fierce sense of mother-protection, knew scarcely what she did, was unmindful of what must come to her.

Since the priests had left them, the numbers of the crowd were considerably swelled. Istar's temple-servants, eunuchs and women both, had come pouring from the temple and the dwelling to witness the issue of this undreamed-of struggle. Also every one that entered the square of Istar, whether on foot or in chariot, had either been directly summoned by the mob or had joined it voluntarily from curiosity. These people, by now two hundred strong, were awaiting the development of the affair in an undecisive humor. More of them believed in the divinity of Istar than in the word of Amraphel, powerful as he was. But now, suddenly, there was to be seen, circling towards them from above, a woman's figure, utterly dishevelled, with long hair flying about her and straight woollen tunic impeding her progress, clasping in both arms a tiny bundle, and fleeing, in very evident terror, from those that followed her, one of whom held the goad uplifted in his hand. And as her weakness, her mortality, her too evident confusion, became apparent, the people felt all the old, inherent savagery of their race rise over the lately acquired civilization, and they watched with delight the approach of their helpless prey.

Istar, as she came nearer the ground, could see the crowd there close up its ranks and draw nearer the foot of the tower. She realized its att.i.tude instantly, and her heart palpitated fast with excitement. Go back she could not. Keep on she must. And soon she reached the last few feet of the inclined plane, and felt the very breath, hot and hostile, of her one-time wors.h.i.+ppers rise about her. She stopped, faltering. Her shoulders quivered in expectation of a blow; for Amraphel was close upon her. The blow was struck--fiercely--and it cut through her garment like a knife, blackening the white skin beneath it. At the same time Amraphel's voice thundered out to all the crowd:

"I bring ye the false witch out of the holy temple of Istar. Do with her as ye think fitting and meet, in reverence to the outraged G.o.ddess."

There was a deep, universal cry, a cry of hatred, of triumph, of the purest brutality, from the throng. Istar, looking down upon the ma.s.sed faces before her, reeled slightly. Then, for her child's sake, with a mighty effort she straightened up again. Knowing not what else to do, she stepped forward to the crowd. A great hand was quickly thrust into her face. Another struck her on the shoulder--but not so cruelly as the whip could strike. A dozen men seized her about the body. Then she lost every feeling save only one, that was more an instinct than a definite idea. She must protect her child. She must save it, while she lived, from the hands of her a.s.sailants. She was in the very midst of the mob.

Heads, arms, hands, all struggled around and towards her, striking, b.u.mping, pus.h.i.+ng her. Her hair and her tunic were torn. No one as yet had threatened her with a weapon; but this, she felt, was only a matter of time; and then vaguely she commended herself to the G.o.d whose will had been hers also.

All at once, however, she felt more room around her. She was in the middle of a small, empty s.p.a.ce, about which her own eunuchs stood in a circle, their backs to her, fighting with the men of the mob that sought to reach her. With a gleam of hope, she saw that all were not hostile.

Her head swam and the world grew misty around her, yet still she clung to her shred of consciousness, that she might keep the baby safe. And, while she still controlled herself, some one appeared out of the tangle of struggling forms. Some one came close to her side, saying to her, in a once familiar voice:

"Belit Istar, keep to my side, and I will make a way for you through these men."

Istar turned her half-blinded eyes upon the defender, and smiled at him--the golden-haired, the silver-voiced, whom long ago she had sheltered in her shrine.

"I will keep to thy side--Char-mides. Or--I die here. Yet I fear not death. Life--only--is--terrible," she muttered, faintly.

The Greek did not answer her. Seeing an opening in the throng, he threw one arm around her, and, holding his right hand out in front of them both, hurried quickly forward. Istar never remembered how it happened.

She saw her eunuchs all around her. She knew little of the angry people beyond. Presently she and her rescuer stood together beyond the mob on the edge of the platform steps.

"Thy eunuchs, I think, will keep the crowd from pursuit. They have been bravely true to thee. Now, canst reach my dwelling, lady? The way is far."

"To thy dwelling I cannot go. May the Almighty G.o.d make thee forever happy! Leave me now. I follow my path alone."

Charmides regarded her as slightly crazy. As she started quickly forward he kept close at her side. "Come with me--a little to the right," he suggested, gently.

She shook her head. "Nay, Charmides, I know the way. It is to the house of my lord that I go. Haste! Haste! They follow me!"

She started forward as she spoke, running in terror down the steps into the square, and turning unhesitatingly into the a-Ibur-Sabu. Charmides kept to her and supported her as she went, knowing not what else to do, not daring to take the child, to which she clung with such a mother-clasp that none could have presumed to ask her to relinquish it.

And in this wise they proceeded together up the great road, finally turning into the street of Palaces leading towards the river. As they pa.s.sed, no man or woman failed to turn and stare at the couple, for surely such a sight as this had never before been seen in Babylon. How long the walk lasted, minutes, hours, or days, or how it was that Istar kept from losing consciousness after the terrible hour she had been through, Charmides never knew. Some of the agony, mental and physical, that the woman was enduring he could read in her face. The greater part of it no mortal could have known or borne, for it was the death of her immortal existence and the beginning of her real earth-life, her life as a human being, a woman without power, without strength, without knowledge of what was to come.

Noon glared over the city as the two of them reached the border of the hunting-park that surrounded Nabu-Nahid's palace. A little farther along was the palace gate-way, with its group of guards in their magnificent liveries. Charmides looked at them in despair, for surely the poor woman at his side would meet with no courtesy here. Such fears did not trouble Istar. Advancing to the first soldier, she said at once:

"Admit me, now, to"--she faltered over the name--"to my Lord Belshazzar."

For a moment the man stared into her haggard and colorless face, crossed with the red weal of the whip, looked into the wild eyes, saw the burden that she bore, and laughed.

Istar heard him, saw him, was still and silent for a moment, and then turned dully to Charmides. The Greek's eyes brimmed with tears--tears of rage at his helplessness and unutterable pity for Istar.

"Belit, come away with me. I will keep you till my lord receives you here," he whispered to her imploringly.

Istar shook her head and turned hurriedly to the second man. "I will be taken to my Lord Belshazzar! Admit me to him!" she cried, querulously.

"There is he, then, if you would speak to him," was the jeering answer, as the man, with a grin, swept his thumb in the direction of the first court, just inside the gate.

Istar darted forward to look.

"Thou fool! Now she will scream!" said the first soldier to his comrade.

Truly enough, Belshazzar was in the court, walking slowly towards the gate of his wing of the palace. Istar's eyes fell on him instantly. She smiled a little. Then--she called:

"Belshazzar! Belshazzar--my lord!"

At the first syllable Belshazzar stopped, lifted his bowed head, and listened. At the repet.i.tion of the cry he turned towards the gate and came running--running as never before, towards it. The guards, watching him in something like consternation, opened the gate at his approach.

"Istar! Istar! Thou--here!" came in a great cry of love, of anger, of ineffable pity, from the lips of the prince royal.

Istar tremulously smiled, and held out her infant to her husband.

"I--have--come," she whispered, vaguely. Then, as Belshazzar took the child from her, she gave a gasping sob, and fell forward upon the hot bricks at his feet.