Her pride found an echo in his own haughty disposition.  “You have spoken well.  A separate dwelling shall be appointed you.  I, and no one else, will prescribe your rules of life and conduct.  Tell me now, how my messengers pleased you and your countrymen?”

“Who could know the noble Croesus without loving him?  Who could fail to admire the beauty of the young heroes, your friends, and especially of your handsome brother Bartja?  The Egyptians have no love for strangers, but he won all hearts.”

At these words the king’s brows darkened, he struck his horse so that the creature reared, and then, turning it quickly round, he galloped towards Babylon.  He decided in his mind to give Bartja the command of an expedition against the Tapuri, and to make him marry Rosana, the daughter of a Persian noble.  He also determined to make Nitetis his real queen and adviser.  She was to be to him what his mother Kassandane had been to Cyrus, his great father.  Not even Phaedime, his favourite wife, had occupied such a position.  And as for Bartja, “he had better take care,” he murmured, “or he shall know the fate that awaits the man who dares to cross my path.”

II.—­The Plot

According to Persian custom a year had to pass before Nitetis could become Cambyses’ lawful wife, but, conscious of his despotic power, he had decided to reduce this term to a few months.  Meanwhile, he only saw the fair Egyptian in the presence of his blind mother or of his sister Atossa, both of whom became Nitetis’ devoted friends.  Meanwhile, Boges, the eunuch, sank in public estimation, since it was known that Cambyses had ceased to visit the harem, and he began to conspire with Phaedime as to the best way of ruining Nitetis, who had come to love Cambyses with ever growing passion.

The Egyptian princess’s happiness was seriously disturbed by the arrival of a letter from her mother, which brought her naught but sad news.  Her father, Amasis, had been struck with blindness on the very day she had reached Babylon; and her frail twin-sister Tachot, after falling into a violent fever, was wasting away for love of Bartja, whose beauty had captured her heart at the time of his mission in Sais.  His name had been even on her lips in her delirium, and the only hope for her was to see him again.

Nitetis’ whole happiness was destroyed in one moment.  She wept and sighed, until she fell asleep from sheer exhaustion.  When her maid Mandane came to put a last touch to her dress for the banquet, she found her sleeping, and as there was ample time she went out into the garden, where she met the eunuch Boges.  He was the bearer of good news.  Mandane had been brought up with the children of a Magian, one of whom was now the high-priest Oropastes.  Love had sprung up between her and his handsome brother Gaumata; and Oropastes, who had ambitious schemes, had sent his brother to Rhagae and procured her a situation at court, so that they might forget one another.  And now Gaumata had come and begged her to meet him next evening in the hanging gardens.  Mandane consented after a hard struggle.