have.
"This, this is the end of all my speaking, O men of Tyre! Heap up your treasures, and burn them if ye will! Slaughter your beasts! Toss your babes into the fire of Moloch! But know ye that your king gives you no such commandment; nor will he have more of such counsel."
So saying, King Hiram strode down from the dais, and left the council chamber. As he passed out, the members rose and made deep obeisance; but their bowed forms did not conceal from him their scowling faces.
The councillors, left alone, gathered close together, evidently not for debate, but to confirm one another in some predetermined purpose. Their words were bitter. Old Egbalus, the high priest of Baal-Melkarth for the year, thanked his god that the throne of Tyre had lost its power, since one so utterly blasphemous, so traitorous, had come to occupy it.
"That travelling Greek, Herodotus, who is even now his guest, has bewitched the king with his talk," sneered one.
"Or with his Greek gold," timidly ventured another.
The last speaker was a young man, in princely attire, with marked resemblance to King Hiram; but such resemblance as is often noticed between an ugly and a beautiful face; certain features attesting kinship, while, at the same time, they proclaim the utmost difference of character. This person was Prince Rubaal, cousin to Hiram, and, in the event of the death of the latter without issue, the heir to the crown. His naturally selfish disposition had brewed nothing but gall since Hiram's accession. From polite disparagement he lapsed into the habit of open contempt for the person, and bitter antagonism to the interests of his royal relative. That the king was hostile to the pretensions of the priestly guild was sufficient to make Rubaal their slavish adherent.
The sneer with which he attributed a mercenary motive to the king brought him a look of blandest encouragement from the high priest, Egbalus.
This latter dignitary, however, instantly cast a less complacent and more inquisitive glance into the face of another councillor, Ahimelek. How much was meant by that look can be understood only by recalling the character and career of this man.
Ahimelek was small in stature, of low, broad brow, thin lips, restless gray eyes, which seemed to focus upon nothing, as if afraid of revealing the thought back of them; as a partridge, when disturbed, flits in all directions except over its own nest. He was the richest merchant in Tyre, the largest ship-owner in all Phœnicia. His fleets were passing, like shuttles on the loom of his prosperity, between Tyre and Cyprus, Carthage and Gades. His caravans, too, were well known on every route from Damascus to Memphis. He inherited the wealth of several generations of merchants, and also their ancestral shrewdness. His waking dream was to surpass them all by allying his financial power with the political prestige of the royal house of Tyre. To this end he had spared neither money nor sycophancy in order to gain the favor of the late king.
It was therefore with genuine elation that the merchant had noted the growing intimacy between Hiram and his daughter, the fair Zillah.
From childhood Prince Hiram and Zillah had been much together, the old king having been, in the chronic depletion of his treasury, as little averse to a family alliance with the money-bags of Ahimelek as that aristocrat was to guarding his bags with the royal seal. Indeed, on more than one occasion the king had discovered an authority in Ahimelek's darics that was lacking in his own mandates. It was rumored that the recognition of Hiram's sovereignty by the court at Susa had been deferred until the appointment of Ahimelek as his chamberlain gave promise of substantial benefit to the politicians who surrounded the Great King, Artaxerxes.
It is true, however, that the personal attractions of Zillah, without such reasons of state, had captivated young Prince Hiram. She was the goddess who inspired his dreams during his voyages, and into her ear, on his return, he narrated his adventures, and confessed his most secret projects and ambitious hopes. On the very day of his coronation, a year before our story begins, he left the great hall of ceremony, not to return to his palace, but to visit the mansion of Ahimelek, and then and there placed his crown upon the head of Zillah, claiming her oft-repeated promise to be his queen. That very night, too, the delighted merchant had given the hand of his daughter into that of her royal suitor, accepting from him a splendid gift as the marriage purchase, and presenting to him in return the dowry contract, which in this case was the bonding of his estate to pay in cash a thousand minas of gold, and half the revenues of his trade in perpetuity.
But later events had disturbed the equanimity of Ahimelek. The growing disaffection of the priestly guild towards King Hiram was too ominous to be disregarded. Their power over the people had never been challenged with impunity. Could the king maintain himself against them?
One act of Zillah herself had seemed to endanger her royal prospects. It was a sacred custom for the wife of a Phœnician king to become also a priestess of the goddess Astarte, thus consolidating the sacerdotal and royal authorities. Into this sacred office Zillah had refused to enter; in which determination she was doubtless influenced by the prejudices of her royal lover.
To Ahimelek's fears, therefore, the crown of Tyre seemed suspended by a slender thread over an abyss from which he could not rescue it if it should fall. He therefore had, on various pretexts, postponed the marriage. But his scheming mind discerned a refuge for his ambition in the fact that Rubaal was a jealous rival for the heart of Zillah. Indeed, much of that young man's hostility to his cousin was due to his wounded affections. It therefore seemed clear to Ahimelek that, in the event of the overthrow of King Hiram, there would be an equal opportunity for his own aggrandizement in transferring his daughter's hand to that of the new king. Such were the thoughts that disturbed Ahimelek as he sat at the council table.
The high priest, Egbalus, had already fathomed the perplexity of the merchant's mind when he gave him that questioning glance.
Ahimelek's eyes fluttered more than ever as they met the inquisitorial gaze of the priest. What would he not give to know the future? On which side should he cast his vote?
Egbalus was too subtle a politician to press the query to a definite answer in the council hall. He knew his man, and knew that if Ahimelek did not dare go with the priests, neither would he dare to oppose them.
Other members of the council were more readily subservient. Indeed, the predominating influence of Egbalus in public affairs had already made itself felt in the selection of the persons who were nominally the king's advisers. He knew, indeed he owned, them all.
The decree ordaining the splendid sacrifice was therefore issued. The proclamation was quickly posted on the temple gate, the door of the council chamber, and in the Great Square.
Would the king oppose it? If so, it would bring on the conflict the priests desired, and had long been preparing for.
CHAPTER II.
When King Hiram left the council hall, pages swung aside the heavy curtains which screened the doorways; lackeys bore before him, so far as the exit, the ancient sceptre of Tyre, laid upon a gemmed cushion; palanquin-bearers took their places around the royal vehicle; while the outrunners, with trim legs and short fluted white skirts, balanced in their hands the long rods of their office, and ran to clear the way. The chief attendant was distinguished from the others by his crimson skirt, which hung from a silver belt tightening his loins, and by the long ribbons of purple that, encircling his brow, hung as streamers almost to the ground. With that superb grace which only accomplished athletes acquire, he bowed to the earth as the king descended the marble steps leading from the hall.
"Whither,
