* * * * *

A few hours only were wanted for the time fixed for Nitetis' disgrace,
and the streets of Babylon were thronged with a dense crowd of
sightseers, when a small caravan approached the Bel gate. In the first
carriage was a fine, handsome man of about fifty, of commanding aspect,
and dressed as a Persian courtier. With difficulty the driver cleared a
passage through the crowd. "Make way for us! The royal post has no time
to lose, and I am driving some one who will make you repent every
minute's delay." They arrived at the palace, and the stranger's
insistence succeeded in gaining admission to the king. The Greek--for
such the stranger had declared himself--affirmed that he could prove the
condemned men's innocence.

"Call him in!" exclaimed Cambyses. "But if he wants to deceive me, let
him remember that where the head of a son of Cyrus is about to fall, a
Greek head has but very little chance." The Greek's calm and noble
manner impressed Cambyses favourably, and his hostility was entirely
overcome when the stranger revealed to him that he was Phanes, the
famous commander of the Greek mercenaries in Egypt, and that he had come
to offer his service to Cambyses.

Phanes now related how, on approaching Babylon by the royal post, just
before midnight, they heard some cries of distress, and found three
fierce-looking fellows dragging a youth towards the river; how with his
Greek war-cry he had rushed on the murderers, slain one of them, and put
the others to flight; and how he discovered--so he thought--the youth to
be none other but Bartja, whom he had met at the Egyptian court.