Atossa arose, shook herself, stared once more about the hall. At the foot of the dais lay the dead charger. On a seat at her side sat Ruth, her head bowed on her hands, her lithe form quivering with fear. Beside his daughter was the old Hebrew, calm, steadfast, seemingly passionless, looking straight before, as if his sight could pass through wall and battlement, beholding the far-off peace of the upper heavens. But in the outer palace what was not befalling? Never before had Atossa heard the clangour of men at war; but she was a great king’s daughter. Should the child of Cyrus fear when her own people knocked at the gate thus loudly? The awful roar grew louder each instant. Louder the Aryan war-cry, “For Ahura, for Atossa!” And still the despairing shout was answering, “Save, O Marduk, save!” For the Babylonish lion, though at his death, must die as a lion. As the din surged in and out like some raging sea, the princess heard her own name alone shouted. Dared she believe she knew the voice? “Atossa? Atossa?” Then a new crash that drowned all else, and the whirl of a thousand feet. Men and women, cursing, howling, were rushing back into the hall. In an instant the empty scene became a chaos of forms, all the gibbering palace folk fleeing thither. “Lost! The gate is carried! The palace is taken!” So cried those not frenzied past all speech. But Atossa heard with an awful gladness. This was the hour of her triumph; the destroyers were the servants of her father, their leader the man she loved. Let, then, the Babylonian hounds whine and cringe at doom. What cared she? But the end had not yet come. Another voice was thundering in the Chaldee, Belshazzar’s voice:— “Rally again! All is not yet lost. We will defend the palace room by room!” “Forward, sons of Iran!” sped back the answer; and a shout followed it at the very entrance of the hall. “For Ahura, for Atossa!” “Darius!” cried Atossa, “Darius! Here am I!” Her scream was drowned in the chaos of battle. And then for the first time fear smote the princess. Outside those doors fought the son of Hystaspes, perilling himself in the press,—and for her sake. She could contain herself no more. “Darius,” she shrieked again, “I come! Save!” She leaped from the dais; in her madness she would have plunged into the riot below, when a heavy hand fell on her; she struggled, was helpless. Above her towered Khatin. “It is commanded, lady,” quoth the headsman, gruffly, “that you abide here, till the king order otherwise.” “Fool!” she cried, shrinking at his impure touch, “do you seek death? A moment more and your life is in my power. Release, and you shall live.” “Ah, my bright-eyed rabbit,” answered he, dryly, unmoved by all the terrors about, “I have sent too many better men than I to the ‘world-mountain’ to dread myself the journey thither. All the Chaldees have not turned traitor, nor have I. Wait.”