ngra-Mainyu surely possessed them to fight so! It
cannot be there are many more who can fight like this left in Hellas,
though Demaratus, the Spartan outlaw, says there are. Drive away,
Pitiramphes--and you, Mardonius, ride beside me. I cannot abide those
corpses. Where is my handkerchief? The one with the Sabaean nard on it. I
will hold it to my nose. Most refreshing! And I had a question to ask--I
have forgotten what."

"Whether news has come from the fleets before Artemisium?" spoke
Mardonius, galloping close to the wheel.

"Not that. Ah! I remember. Where was Prexaspes? I did not see him near me.
Did he stay in the tents while these mad men were destroyed? It was not
loyal, yet I forgive him. After all, he was once a Hellene."

"May it please your Eternity,"--Mardonius chose his words carefully,--a
Persian always loved the truth, and lies to the king were doubly
impious,--"Prexaspes was not in the tents but in the thick of the battle."

"Ah!" Xerxes smiled pleasantly, "it was right loyal of him to show his
devotion to me thus. And he acquitted himself valiantly?"

"Most valiantly, Omnipotence."

"Doubly good. Yet he ought to have stayed near me. If he had been a true
Persian, he would not have withdrawn from the person of the king, even to
display his prowess in combat. Still he did well. Where is he?"

"I regret to tell your Eternity he was desperately wounded, though your
servant hopes not unto death. He is even now being taken to my tents."

"Where that pretty dancer, your sister, will play the surgeon--ha!" cried
the king. "Well, tell him his Lord is grateful. He shall not be forgotten.
If his wounds do not mend, call in my body-physicians. And I will send him
something in gratitude--a golden cimeter, perhaps, or it may be another
cream Nisaean charger."

A general rode up to the chariot with his report, and Mardonius was
suffered to gallop to his own tents, blessing Mazda; he had saved the
Athenian, yet had not told a lie.

* * * * * * *

The ever ready eunuchs of Artazostra ran to tell Mardonius of the
Hellene's strange desertion, even before their lord dismounted. Mardonius
was not astonished now, however much the tidings pained him. The Greek had
escaped more than trifling wounds; ten days would see him sound and hale,
but the stunning blow had left his wits still wandering. He had believed
himself dead at first, and demanded why Charon took so long with his
ferry-bo