The Dragon of the Ishtar Gate

V – The Temple of the Harlots

Up the mighty river rode Myron and Bessas, past endless lines of date palms, past creaking swapes by which early-rising peasants hoisted water from the public canals to the heads of their irrigation ditches, past fields of young wheat and barley, past lakes and marshes whence waterfowl rose with a thunder of wings. They passed Agade with its massive wall and dreams of ancient greatness, and Sippar with its many-storied ziggurat. They crossed canals and passed mud-walled villages innumerable.

At Kounaxa they waited for a string of dromedaries to plod across the floating bridge that spanned the Euphrates, their bells emitting a melancholy tune. Myron, looking apprehensively at the structure, remarked to the villager who took the bridge tolls:

"Your bridge doesn't look particularly secure. The planks sag, and half the boats are low in the water."

"Oh, good and great master!" said the peasant with the air of fawning servility that subjects of the Persian Empire were wont to adopt towards the Great King's servants. "That will soon be mended. The King of All Kings—may the gods preserve him—has promised your vile and unworthy slaves a new bridge."

As they crossed the rickety structure, Myron said: "Let's hope they get their new bridge before this one sinks with a quiet gurgle beneath its users."

Bessas replied: "Three things should not be counted upon: the level of a river, the tameness of a lion, and the promise of a king. Especially a king like our popeyed friend."

"Embas spoke of—ah—that same man as the son of a usurper. What did he mean?"

Bessas lowered his voice. "Repeat this not, lest your head fly off like the ball in a game of stick-and-ball. Some think the supposed false Bardias, whom Darius claimed to have slain ere he took the throne after Cambyses' death, was not false at all. They think he was Cambyses' veritable brother, whom Cambyses had never slain as Darius claimed."

"My dear fellow! Do you mean that story of Gomates the Mage, who took the place of Bardias after the latter's murder and even fooled Bardias' wives, is a lot of cock and bull?"

"So some believe. But there is no tale more dangerous to relate. You know the saying: He that keeps his mouth tightly shut shall live, while he that blathers shall meet destruction."

They rode on. At Id, Myron insisted on stopping to see the asphalt wells and to watch the Idites scooping the sticky black stuff into baskets. Bessas, fuming, growled:

"If you stop to look at every new sight along the way, we shall be dead of old age ere we return."

"What I do," said Myron, "is quite as important as our wretched little lives."

"Mean you looking at asphalt wells?"

"No; I mean reviving the glory of Miletos."

"With asphalt? Are you mad?"

"You no more understand than your horse understands astronomy. The glory of Miletos was the glory of the mind. We Milesians were the first folk ever seriously to ask how the universe is made and how it works. What shape is the earth? Where does the sun go at night? What is the basic substance of all things: fire, air, or water? Whence came mankind? We may not know the final answers to these questions, but at least we have sought the solutions, instead of swallowing the many and inconsistent myths purveyed by the priests.

"When Darius' generals crushed the first Ionian revolt, some of the Milesians were massacred; some like myself were enslaved; some were deported to Chaldea; some fled to Sicily. The city was utterly depopulated. Other people have moved into Miletos since then, but they lack our tradition of wisdom-seeking. If I can learn enough in my travels, I might yet revive the wisdom-loving tradition, which was the glory of my city."

"It sounds noble but not practical," said Bessas. "Most men, you will find, care not a whit if the earth be shaped like a plate, or a cup, or even round like a ball." He guffawed at the absurdity. "Therefore, instead of honoring you for your deep thinking, they'll scorn you as a bookish fool."

"Dogs also bark at what they do not know," bridled Myron. "Besides, wisdom-lovers can be practical when necessary. Thales, who first laid down the laws of geometry and determined the sun's course from solstice to sol-tice, was once annoyed by people who said: 'If you are so clever, why aren't you rich?' So he rented all the olive mills for one season and, having thus cornered the sources of oil, earned a large fortune. Then he went back to philosophy."

"Mithra prosper your enterprise. When you have made such a fortune yourself, you might ask Bessas of Zariaspa to help you spend it. Meanwhile, if you do not leave" your asphalt well and come along, I will toss you in head foremost, so that you shall learn the properties of mineral pitch at first hand."

Northwest of Id, the landscape became more barren. When Myron and Bessas arrived at Baia Malcha, the desert had almost crept to the river's edge, where poplars and tamarisks grew in clumps along the margins of the flume and on the islands in the river.

Towns were few and small. Most of the people were either nomads or dwellers in huts of reeds and dried mud among the feathery tamarisks. They pastured sheep on the scanty strips of grass, speared fish in the shallows, and beat up the thickets for wild pig.

The next day the travelers toiled through a desolate land of sand and rock, which rolled away gently to the horizon save when broken by outcrop or hill. Short-lived spring grasses, not yet browned by the summer sun, carpeted patches of desert with gray-green films, in which the wild flowers shone like gems. Groups of gazelles and ostriches appeared, to bolt off into the blue when the travelers turned towards them.

A little yellow whirlwind arose in the middle distance, drifting this way and that. When it dissipated, another took its place. After these dust whirls had been in sight for some time, Bessas said:

"By the four teats of Ishtar, I'll wager that is a spirit sent to spy upon us by that Labashi fellow! I'll teach the demon to pester me!"

The Bactrian spurred off into the desert, drawing his bow and an arrow. As he galloped past the dust whirl, he loosed. The arrow went through the column, which faded and died at once. Bessas circled, picked up his arrow, and rode back grinning. "What did I say?"

"I fear you but winged it," said Myron. "There's another—or perhaps the same one farther off."

Another dust whirl danced in the distance.

"I taught it a lesson, anyway," growled Bessas. "I suppose if I slay one, the wizard can always conjure up another, like that Kasmirian sorcerer I told you about, the one who sat on a Himalayan peak and collected human hides for a hobby."

"Personally," said Myron, "I should say that they were a natural phenomenon. Herakleitos insisted that most things have rational explanations, if only men took the trouble to seek them out."

"Where do the gods fit into this rational world of your Herakleitos?"

Myron shrugged. "I have heard tales of the gods of many lands, all of which can hardly be true at once. As Xenophanes said, if the horses had a god, they would visualize him with mane, tail, and hooves. I suspect that whatever gods exist are beyond our comprehension, just as we are beyond the comprehension of that butterfly." He pointed at a black and golden insect, which fluttered across their path. "To him we should no doubt seem almighty, immortal, and incomprehensible, just as the gods seem to us."

"Mean you that the gods are really mortal, though their span be greater than ours?"

"I don't know, Bessas; no god has confided in me. I merely point out a possibility."

"Take heed that, in all your pointing out and surmising, you rouse not the ire of these gods, who all the myths agree are a fractious and touchy lot." Bessas sang in his booming bass:

"Are you not a Mithraist?" asked Myron.

"Aye; but I do not importune the god to the point of boring him. When he receives a prayer from me, he knows it's about a really urgent matter."

"King Xerxes sacrifices horses to Mithra at the New Year. Wherein, then, does your creed differ from his?"

"Oh, Xerxes worships Mithra, just as we Mithraists also believe in Auramazda. The difference lies in this: that we don't think the Lord of Light bothers himself with men's personal problems, any more than King Xerxes can personally comfort every afflicted peasant in his Empire. Auramazda is remote and withdrawn from these material things; Mithra truly governs the world. So our prayers are directed to Mithra. But the Zoroastrians would lower Mithra to the rank of a mere angel. If Xerxes is fain to belittle Mithra and address Auramazda directly, that is his business, but what call does that give him to interfere with us?"

"I suppose he desires to strengthen his Empire by unifying the Aryan religion."

Bessas spat. "If he would please the unseen powers, let him begin by acting justly himself, not by causing my mother and me to suffer for others' misdeeds."

They stopped at Ana with its palm groves and its fort on an island in the river. Bessas gave Myron lessons in archery and, using sticks whittled from tamarisk stems, in sword fighting. On the morrow, Myron awoke with bruised knuckles to hear Bessas say:

"Perhaps no god has confided in you, but one of them visited me in dreams last night."

"Indeed?"

"Aye; 'twas the hero Artagnes. He said—" (Bessas closed his eyes):

"It sounds ominous. Who is Hvareno?" asked Myron. "Our goddess of fortune—our Tychê. What make you of it?"

"Nothing at the moment; but I have too often seen how oracles are manipulated to take much account of them."

"Scorn not divine warnings. We are not so sure of our way and our fate as lightly to cast aside any helpful signs."

Myron slowly repeated the poem in Persian. "So we seek something in vain? That would mean that the dragon is not to be captured at the Nile's headwaters after all."

"It might mean, not that it cannot be caught, but only that it never has been caught, by reason of its strength and ferocity."

"Or that something else—life for your mother, which you seek, and eminence as a philosopher, for me—are not to be had by searching. Well, it's true enough, I suppose—Zarina is mortal like the rest of us—but the remainder of the verse is so confused that I can make nothing of it."

Bessas sighed. "No doubt, when all is over, the meaning will stand out as plainly as the noses on the Achaemenids' faces, and we shall berate ourselves as dunces for not having seen it. Meantime we had better be on the road."

They passed Mari, a cluster of huts and a caravan station amidst the ruins of a great city. Myron rummaged through the buff-brown piles of debris with his head down, like a dog with its nose on a scent, until Bessas bellowed:

"By the bronzen balls of Ahriman, why do you waste time there?"

"I hope to find a clue to the history of this city. The people hereabouts know nothing."

"The wiser folk they. Besides, if you fool around these places long enough, you might scare up the ghost of some long-dead king. These are uncanny places. Many deeds of blood and darkness have been done in them, and evil influences last down the ages. The Corpse Fiend take your curiosity; come along!"

They passed Dura on its towering cliff, with the crumbling ruins of an Assyrian fortress. And every day, dust devils danced upon the horizon. Bessas, more and more uneasy, muttered spells of exorcism and became punctilious in his prayers to Mithra. He also exercised Vayu who, like a proper war horse, had been trained to assail his rider's foes with teeth and hooves and, if his rider fell, to stand over and protect him.

A dust storm swooped upon them, forcing them to huddle in their tent for half a day, while they listened to the howls and fiendish laughter of the demons of the waste. During the lulls in the storm, Bessas told of demons he had encountered on the fringes of the Empire.

One especially unpleasant one, nine feet tall and covered with long white hair, dwelt in the mountains of the Austanes east of Bactria. This fiend could suck all the bones out of a man's body without breaking his skin. He had not, said Bessas, actually seen this demon, but he had heard it shuffling about his hut at night and seen its footprints in the snow the next day. Only the drumming and incantations of the village shaman had kept the demon from breaking into the. hut. Although skeptical towards tales of demons and other spooks, Myron thought it more tactful to keep his doubts to himself.

They passed Sirki, where the Araxes adds its flood to the Euphrates, and whence the caravans set out for lone Thadamora in the waste. Here they heard how things went in the Desert of Aram. By protecting the caravans, Shaykh Alman, lord of Thadamora, was trying to build up caravan trade through his oasis. At the same time the nomadic Shaykh Waliq, at feud with the Thadamorites, attacked these same caravans, making the short cut across the Syrian desert an exciting passage.

Beyond Azaura, human habitations became more frequent. Hills and ridges appeared to the south. Blue lagoons fringed the Euphrates, in which mud shoals lay like colossal crocodiles. The land became more fertile, and the date palm gave way to the olive tree. Dust devils ceased to shadow the travelers.

Myron, gazing at some curious flat-topped hills that rose over a hundred feet from the banks of the river, said: "I wonder what could have given those hills that curious shape, like tables—"

"Oh, hold your tongue, Greekling!" snapped Bessas. "Your everlasting questions irk me."

Myron looked sharply at his companion. During the first part of their journey up the Euphrates, Bessas had been cheerful and good company. Now he showed increasing irascibility. Once he wept for a solid hour but refused to give any reasons for his sorrow.

The night of the twenty-ninth of Nisanu they spent at the ford of Tiphsah. Noon of the next day found them in Barbalissos. Here the Euphrates, descending from the north, bends around to eastward on its way to Sippar and Babylon, and here a steep escarpment rises on the south and west of the river.

In the tavern, Bessas cocked an ear at the buzz of talk and asked: "O Myron, what language do these folk speak? I know it not."

"Neither do I." Myron spoke in Aramaic to a short, stout youth who wore a necklace of amulets of copper and crystal: "Your pardon, sir, but do you understand me?"

"Aye; I speak the Syrian tongue. How can your slave serve you?"

"By sitting down, having a mug of wine at our expense, and telling us what travelers in the region ought to know. For one thing, what language do we hear about us?"

"Karian. Our forebears were mercenaries serving Croesus of Lydia, who fell into Cyrus' hands at the downfall of Sardeis. King Cyrus settled us here in Barbalissos, far from our native heath. Whither are you bound, my masters?"

Myron told briefly of their mission and asked about roads and accommodations in Syria. The youth answered, but then burst out:

"Masters, for such a journey you will have to hire more men ere you reach your goal, will you not? I am told that in Africa live wild black men, who eat other men when they catch them. You will need strong arms besides your own to force your way through such perilous country."

"We shall see what we need when we get there," said Bessas. "Why?"

The youth held out his hands. "Oh, my masters, take me with you! I will not even ask for pay until we reach Egypt, so long as I can go."

"We are not—" began Bessas, but Myron interrupted:

"Why are you so eager, Master—what's your name?"

"Your servant is clept Skhâ son of Thuvlo. My father is the fuller and dyer of Barbalissos and, by Teshub's beard, I tire of the stench of urine in my nostrils! Naturally, he expects me to follow in his trade. But he has two other strong sons, and I am fain to leave this dull little puddle of a town, see the world, and peradventure become a warrior as were my forefathers."

"You're a little pudgy for that sort of work, youngster," said Bessas.

"I am no weakling, even if not so long in the limbs as you! I serve in the town guard and practice with warlike gear."

"Hold out your hand," said Bessas. "Now grip mine."

Skhâ squeezed Bessas' great paw, clamping down until the sweat ran down his face into the fuzzy young beard. Bessas easily matched the pressure. Then the Bactrian began to squeeze in his turn, until at last he fetched a grunt of pain from the youth. Bessas at once released the hand, whose fingers were now swollen and purple.

"Not bad for a townsman," said Bessas.

"Then take me, I beg!" cried Skhâ. "I work hard, and I shall certainly be a brave fighter when the need arises. I fear nought, for these"—he touched the necklace of amulets—"protect me. All I shall cost you is food until we reach Egypt. Then you may pay me the going wage."

Bessas twisted a strand of his beard around his forefinger. "Master Skhâ, you say you will cost us only bread and wine from here to Egypt. But we have no spare beast to bear you, nor spare arms to arm you with."

"True," said Skhâ, his mouth turning down. "Ah, woe and misfortune!"

"Well then," continued Bessas, "we leave for Halpa at dawn tomorrow. If you would go with us, join us, armed and mounted, within an hour of our departure."

"But how—"

"How you do it is your affair. On such a journey, we need resource. Good night."

The next morning, the travelers took their way across the grassy downs of northern Syria, past villages like clusters of stone beehives. Within an hour of departure, a drumming of hooves made them turn. Along came Skhâ on a piebald pony, waving a spear. He bore a light leather buckler, like those which Myron and Bessas carried. On his head was a crested leather helmet stiffened with strips of bronze. As this helmet was too large for its wearer, it came down over his eyes. He had to tilt his head backwards to see. The pony was small beside Bessas' big charger, but as Skhâ was the shortest of the three men this made little difference.

Bessas looked slit-eyed at his recruit. "Well," he said, "where did you get the arms and the horse?"

"You said it was my affair how I- " began Skhâ, but Bessas cut him off with a roar.

"No arguments! I know what I said, but today I am asking a question, and I want a straight answer!" Skhâ bit his lips, gulped, and finally answered. "The arms I b-borrowed from the town armory, and the horse belongs to my elder brother."

"All right. We may have to borrow a thing or two ere the course be run. But that does not mean pilfering within the company! We have a short way with the light-fingered." Bessas drew the edge of his hand across his throat. "Now, think well ere you make your decision. The way will be longer and harder than you can imagine, and we may all go the Bridge of Judgment. Nor will you find me an easy, kindly leader. I will try to use you justly, but sweet-tempered and long-suffering I am not. When I command, I expect you to jump to obey. Our lives may hang upon the speed of your compliance. Do you understand?"

"Aye, my master. Your servant has already decided. I will go with you, though you be the dragon Illuyanka in disguise."

"Then swear!" Bessas administered to Skhâ an oath like those that he had exchanged with Myron.

Skhâ proved a garrulous young man, incessantly questioning his companions and chattering about his personal affairs. "By what route do you plan to reach Egypt?" he asked.

"By way of Phoenicia and Judaea," said Myron, "or the land of Canaan, as the older manuscripts call those countries."

"By land? Let me tell you: I have spoken to many travelers, and they agree that it is quicker and less arduous to take ship from one of the Phoenician ports."

"We go by land," said Bessas. "Horses and mules do not travel well by sea."

"Or perhaps it is that noble Persians, who mortally fear water, do not travel well by sea either?" Skhâ grinned impudently.

"Do you call me coward?" roared Bessas, grasping his hilt. His face became convulsed with passion. "Oh, no, sir! But you—"

"Quiet, both of you!" cried Myron. "Bessas, you warned me at the outset against disputes within the ranks. Would you quarrel over the shadow of an ass? Now, can you swim or can't you?"

"No, but what business is that of yours? That ducking I took in the Oxus, when the Massagetai were after me, will suffice me the rest of my life."

"Do you swim, Skhâ?"

Skhâ toyed with his copper and crystal amulets. "Nay. But I fear not ship travel—"

"Harken! Bessas has been teaching me archery and swordplay, on the ground that these skills may come in useful. But knowledge of swimming will be just as useful, because of the many rivers and lakes that lie before us. So, my dear fellows, since all Milesians learn to swim, I shall teach you two the art the first time we encounter a body of water deep enough for the purpose. No objections, pupils," he said firmly, as the others began to protest, "or you must confess not only that you're ignorant of a useful skill, but also that you are too timid to remedy your ignorance."

They subsided. As the sun sank, they rode down a gentle, sparsely grassed slope into a broad shallow basin. Here, rising amid its orchards and vineyards by the sluggish Chalos, stood Halpa. From the center of the town arose a steep-sided frowning citadel.

They put up at a khan. A turbaned porter with boils on his face let them in through a gate in a high, blank stone wall.

Inside was a spacious quadrangle. A fountain gurgled in the center of the quadrangle, while stalls for travelers' beasts comprised its periphery. In back of each stall was a large locker for the traveler's gear. Above each space, opening on a balcony that ran around the quadrangle, was a sleeping chamber. A cubical brown brick building, with a tavern on the ground floor and the owner's quarters above, filled a corner of the quadrangle.

Having tethered their beasts and stowed their gear, the three travelers betook themselves to the tavern to enjoy the famous wine of Halpa. When they had drunk deeply, Skhâ said:

"Master Bessas, give me, pray, a small advance—say half a shekel—on the money you will pay me in Egypt."

"Why, you little beggar! You can go to the House of the Lie."

"But, sir—"

"Shut up; curse you!"

"But—"

"Just a minute," said Myron. "What do you want this money for, Skhâ?"

"Well—ah—this is the season when the unwed girls of Halpa go to the temple of Ashtarth—or Ishtar as you easterners call her—to earn dowries as temple whores. In Barbalissos we have no such temple, so I am fain to seize my opportunity here."

Myron said: "Why not make a celebration of it? Although I am no three-ball man, I think my old yard retains a stand or two. How about it, Bessas?"

The giant sat with darkened face and clenched fists, breathing heavily. He scowled, bit his lips, hesitated, but said at last:

"I'm with you—after dinner, that is. Is your temple open of nights, Skhâ?"

"Until midnight. But, sir, if I may say so—ah—"

"Speak up, lad!"

"Think you not that we should visit the bathhouse first? I mean no offense, but you know how fussy some women are—"

Bessas, in another unpredictable change of mood, gave a rumble of laughter. "Aye, youngling, I see what you mean. Myself, I take a bath every month whether I need it or not. But this were a special occasion, eh?"

Torchlight flickered about the temple of Ashtarth to the west of the citadel. From the citadel wall came the wailing call of the Announcer of Moons and the flat blare of rams' horns saluting the thin silver sickle which, low in the western sky, marked the coming of a new month.

As Bessas and his followers entered the spacious temenos of Ashtarth, they stared about. Directly before them lay the sacred pool, in which swam fat old carp, some as long as a man's arm, bearing jewels affixed to their fins by golden clips.

A clank drew the travelers' regard to the left. There, at a safe distance from the gate, was tethered the living symbol of the goddess: an aged lion, sway-backed and gray-muzzled, fastened to a stake by a golden chain. He plodded back and forth with the air of a fat old man feebly exercising in the gymnasium.

To the right rose a great wooden pillar, twenty cubits tall and shaped from the trunk of a cedar of Mount Libanos. The pillar was roughly but unmistakably carved into the form of an erect phallus. A crowd of Syrians stood around its base, while on its top stood a priest, who had climbed to his risky perch by means of pegs driven into the sides of the pillar. This priest, making a trumpet of his hands, shouted prayers upwards into the star-spangled sky.

Next to the base of the pillar stood another priest holding an offering bowl. As each offering from the faithful tinkled into the bowl, the priest on the ground shouted up to the priest on the pillar the name of the petitioner and his particular desire. The priest above then shouted his prayer to the gods, who presumably could hear him the better because of his height. As he finished each prayer, he shook a sistrum, for the silvery clang of the instrument was known to be an effective demon repellent.

Beyond the fishpond, a small temple rose amid the sacred grove. In front of the naos stood an altar and a sacred basin, overshadowed by an ancient oak. From the lower branches of this tree depended hundreds of necklaces, trinkets, and strips of cloth, hung up by the faithful in gratitude for former benefits or in hope of future ones. From somewhere wafted a wailing hymn, sung to the tune of a lyre. Mingled with this sound and the shouts of the priests at the pillar was the bleating of sheep, kept in a fold at the back of the naos to sell to worshipers for burnt offerings.

The travelers stood in line before the basin wherein, when their turns came, their hands were washed by eunuch priests with painted faces. While waiting, Bessas muttered to Myron:

"Let's hope these lassies be not like that witch I knew in Patala, whose wont it was to turn herself into a cobra in the midst of copulation. Albeit the Indians' ways are not ours, I still think this an uncouth habit."

One of the priests, fat and beardless and clanking with jewelry, led them to the western side of the temple. Here cords attached to stakes marked out a path. The path zigzagged past a series of benches on which sat a score of young women in their finery, wearing bright-colored dresses and strings of beads about their heads and necks.

Myron took his time, strolling back and forth past the girls. He found it hard to discern their features in the dim, ruddy light. But this, he told himself, was often just as well. Some of the women smiled invitingly; some lowered demure eyelashes; some looked unhappily apprehensive. At last Myron chose one who gave back a challenging stare. He tossed his threepence into her lap, saying:

"I summon you in the name of the goddess." The girl put away the coin, rose, and led Myron to a row of huts, built against the wall of the temenos.

Half an hour later, Myron and Skhâ awaited their leader at the entrance to the temenos. Skhâ, grinning, asked:

"How did you make out?"

"I managed, though nowadays I find the early morning more propitious for such sport. And you?"

"I had a fine time; she was frightened at first …" Skhâ launched into a verbose account of his experience, detailing every thrust and parry. Then he began to tell of a great-uncle named Mizai, who served as a mercenary in Egypt before the Persian conquest of that land, and whose principal prowess was lectual rather than warlike. He rattled on for half an hour, while Myron became uneasy about Bessas' long absence. To Myron's anxious questioning, Skhâ replied:

"Oh, such a mighty man will wish to prang his lass several times in a row. So there was my great-uncle Mizai, safely hidden in King Aahmes' harem. But the women would not leave him alone for an ush; for, while a hundred wives and concubines may satisfy the vanity of a king, you would search the wide world over ere you found a king who could satisfy a hundred wives and concubines.

"But for six days Mizai did the best he could, which was no more than three ordinary men could have done. And whilst he was pleasuring the women and pacifying those who quarreled over which should have the next turn at him, a woman came running in, crying that King Aahmes had returned early from his campaign and was even now dismounting from his chariot before the palace at Memphis."

"What did they do, smuggle Mizai out in a laundry basket?" said Myron.

"Nay. They thought of that, and many other dodges, but for one reason or another none could be brought to pass. So my great-uncle, thinking valor the better part of discretion, armed himself and ran through the halls and chambers of the palace, shouting: 'Stop the intruder! Catch the skulker! A villain is sneaking into the harem!

Seize him to guard the sanctity of our divine king's dwelling!'

"Whilst thus running and shouting, Mizai met the king, who demanded to know the cause of this uproar. Mizai stammered out a story, that he had been walking his post when a eunuch called to him to come because a burglar had been espied in the palace. In the midst of which tale, Mizai swooned dead away and fell to the floor with a crash. The cause of this faint was Mizai's exhaustion from his exertions among the king's women. But the king, thinking it a result of Mizai's strenuous efforts on His Majesty's behalf, promoted him to—Good gods, look!"

Skhâ stared past Myron with popping eyes. Myron spun and gaped in turn.

Coming at a trot from the women's huts was Bessas, with a girl on his shoulder. Although Bessas was fully clad, the woman was naked. As the Bactrian passed Myron and Skhâ he shouted:

"Come on, you whoresons! This is a rescue!"

"Zeus almighty!" breathed Myron.

Not knowing what else to do, he ran after his leader. So did Skhâ; and so, shortly, did the temple guards and the eunuch priests, the latter squealing: "Stop! Rape! Kidnapping!" The lion uttered a groan.

Others took up the chase until Bessas led a procession three blocks long, some carrying torches and all screaming threats and imprecations against the foreigner. They zigzagged through narrow vaulted alleys where the only light was the ruddy, pulsing beams of the torches borne by the pursuers. They ran through the stinking tannery district, whence came Halpa's famous leather goods.

A thrown stone grazed Myron's hair. He imagined clawlike hands reaching for his back, though he did not dare to turn for fear of tripping. He drew deep, rasping breaths and pounded the pavement in an effort to catch up with Bessas. The Bactrian ran easily, not even breathing hard despite the weight he bore.

It was a long chase, for the temple was on the side of town opposite to the khan. Myron would have been utterly lost in the alleys; but Bessas, having once been over the ground, chose the right turns without hesitation.

Six furlongs from the temple of Ashtarth, the blank fortresslike walls of the khan loomed against the stars. Bessas yelled:

"Let us in!"

The night porter opened the gate. Bessas entered, pushing the man roughly aside. He set the girl on her feet. Then, seeing Myron and Skhâ stumble through the entrance, he slammed and bolted the portal. Instantly came the pounding of sticks and fists against the door and cries of, "Open! Let us in! The man is a robber! He must be brought to justice!"

"Open that gate and it's your last act," snarled Bessas to the porter, who hopped from foot to foot in indecision. To Myron, Bessas said: "Get our gear and saddle up. We'll figure how to draw them away from the gate so we can make a dash."

Myron, gasping, said: "What—what in the name of the Dog is this?"

The naked girl screamed something in the Halpine dialect. The proprietor of the khan and a couple of his guests hastened out of the tavern. The pounding on the door increased. Myron cried:

"A pestilence on you, Bessas! If you require a woman, you can purchase—"

"This is no slave, but an oppressed free maiden, whom I am rescuing—"

"Harken, pray!" cried the proprietor. "She says she does not wish to go with you. She did but jest in the temple."

"What?" Bessas whirled on the girl. "Is this true? Speak slowly!"

"It is true," said the girl, beginning to sob. Myron noticed that her arms and thighs were tattooed with flowers and doves. "You s-seemed such a great foolish lout that I thought to have a little fun with you by joking about my hard lot and how I should love to escape it. I never imagined that you would take it all to heart. Then, when you bore me out of the temenos, the jolting so knocked the wind out of me that I could not speak. But I cannot leave home and kinsmen to roam the world with wild adventurers! Cover me, somebody, and let me go back to my temple."

Bessas' pocked face fell; his mighty shoulders drooped. The proprietor opened the door a crack, while Bessas braced his back against it to keep the mob outside from rushing in. By dint of much shouting, the proprietor convinced those outside that there had been a misunderstanding. He let in the chief men, a few at a time, to see that all was now well.

The girl, wrapped in a borrowed cloak, stood with tears furrowing the paint on her face. Bessas stood to one side with hanging head, gnawing his mustache with shame and vexation.

When the girl had been led away, the high priest, backed by temple guards and armed men of the night watch, confronted the Bactrian. The priest's purple robe was disordered and his tall tiara of gilded papyrus awry, and he panted still from unaccustomed exercise.

"My good man," said the priest in his high castrate's voice, "we cannot suffer you with impunity to turn our city upside down and disturb the sanctity of our holy temple by such such ruffianly acts. Either you shall compensate the goddess for the outrage done unto her, or I will turn you over to these men, who will hale you before the magistrate."

"May the Drouth Horse trample you! If you think to squeeze money from me by blackmail and extortion—" began Bessas belligerently, but Myron intervened.

"Let me handle this," he said. "Holy Father, will you accompany me to the tavern?"

Later, Myron found Bessas sitting in a corner of the quadrangle, drinking in sullen solitude. "I got us off for ten shekels," said the Greek. "He wanted an archer, but I chaffered him down."

"That's robbery! I won't——"

"Oh, yes, you will! Consider your mother. That's better."

Next morning was passed in gloomy silence on the road to Hamath. At the noonday halt, Bessas faced the other two with fists on hips. He gruffed:

"I suppose that, having seen me make a fool of myself, you two have no more respect for me. If that be so, you may leave me; I will release you from your oaths. I'll not lead men who think me nought but blown bladder on legs."

Myron smiled. "On the contrary, old boy, we think more highly of you than before; for now we are aware that you, too, have human weaknesses. Nobody is immune to trouble."

Bessas' brown eyes glared sharply from under his bushy brows. "Do you swear that you speak truth?"

"By Zeus and all the gods I swear it. You, Skhâ?"

The Karian swore also.

"Will you then swear not to mention this matter to others?"

"May I be clawed to ribbons by ten thousand privy-haunting demons if I breathe a word of it!" said Myron. Skhâ also swore.

Bessas broke into a big grin, seized the twain in a double bear hug, and kissed them loudly. "That's better," he said. "I begin to feel like a man and a noble Aryan again." He poetized:

Myron, biting into a slab of cheese, asked: "What happened at the temple? You were not intoxicated, so what led to that astonishing episode?"

" 'Twas as the wench said," said Bessas, munching mightily. "Know that, for all my prowess, I have never been able to take women lightly, as do most warriors. With women of rank I am shy and tongue-tied, and with the baser sort I am easily disgusted. A wisdom-lover I met in India told me to try abstinence, as did the naked ascetics of his fellowship. But I do not find that easy, either, for my lance is strong and easily couched for the charge. Besides—Oh, Ahriman smite the whole fornicating sex! Except my mother."

"I sometimes think," said Myron, "that your mother has kept you too close to her for your own good."

"May you be kinless! Leave my mother out of this!" said Bessas, with such a menacing expression that Myron hastily apologized. When the Milesian had calmed the giant, Bessas continued:

"Nor do women look upon me with favor; they are sure that I shall hurt them because of my size. And I daresay I often do, being as clumsy in rut as a horse on a housetop." He grinned. "You should have included a course in practical erotics when you taught me as a boy, O Myron.

"Howsomever, being neither eunuch nor boy-lover, I am ofttimes driven nigh unto madness by unsatisfied lust. If I have sometimes used you two rudely without just cause, that is the reason, and I now beg your pardons.

"When I walked the path of choice in the temenos of Ashtarth, I saw many of the lassies quail at the sight of me. Forsooth, I should have walked out then, but one boldly met my glance. So I chose her. She is Ghulamath, daughter of a building contractor of Halpa. And, indeed, we beat out a fine marching tune in the hut."

"Who was on top?" asked Skhâ.

"None of your affair. When it was over, I asked if I might gallop a second course, if she would spare a few ush for my sword to recover its temper. Whilst we waited, Ghulamath told me a dismal tale of the hardships of temple harlotry: how she has to accept all kinds of strangers, often unwashed and stinking, and eager only for their own pleasure. \

"Now, I know that among these folk such temple service is accounted pious and honorable, but to me it seems foul and shameful for a decent woman. So when the lass wrought upon my sympathies, I fell madly in love with her. And when I love, the woman can do aught that she pleases with me.

"Hence, when she sighed the wish that some hero would 'take her away from all this,' as she put it, I did but seek to pleasure her by taking her at her word. Now I see what a fool she made of me." The giant wiped away a tear.

quoted Myron. "But we'll help that broken heart of yours to heal. Let us be off."