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.

Boges hurried away with malicious pleasure in the near success of his
scheme. He met one of the gardeners, whom he promised to bring some of
the nobles to inspect a special kind of blue lily, in which the gardener
took great pride. He then hurried to the harem, to make sure that the
king's wives should look their best, and insisted upon Phaedime painting
her face white, and putting on a simple, dark dress without ornament,
except the chain given her by Cambyses on her marriage, to arouse the
pity of the Achaemenidae, to which family she herself belonged.

The eunuch's cunning scheme succeeded but too well. At the end of the
great banquet Bartja, to whom Cambyses had promised to grant a favour on
his victorious return from the war, confessed to him his love for
Sappho, a charming and cultured Greek maiden of noble descent, whom he
wished to make his wife. Cambyses was delighted at this proof of the
injustice of his jealous suspicions, and announced aloud that Bartja
would in a few days depart to bring home a bride. At these words
Nitetis, thinking of her poor sister's misery, fainted.

Cambyses sprang up pale as death; his lips trembled and his fist was
clenched. Nitetis looked at him imploringly, but he commanded Boges to
take the women back to their apartments. "Sleep well, Egyptian, and pray
to the gods to give you the power of dissembling your feelings. Here,
give me wine; but taste it well, for to-day, for the first time, I fear
poison. Do you hear, Egyptian? Yes, all the poison, as well as the
medicine, comes from Egypt."

Boges gave strict orders that nobody--not even the queen-mother or
Croesus--was to have access to the hanging gardens, whither he had
conducted Nitetis. Cambyses, meanwhile, continued the drinking bout,
thinking the while of punishment for the false woman. Bartja could have
had no share in her perfidy, or he would have killed him on the spot;
but he would send him away. And Nitetis should be handed to Boges, to be
made