illed the plain,
till in the dim distance rose the level line of the soft blue southern
hills, blending mistily in the lazy light of a far-off warmth. It seemed
as though on one side of the palace were winter, and on the other
summer; on the one side cold, and on the other heat; on the one side
rough strength, and on the other gentle rest.

But Nehushta gazed northward and was weary of the cold, and southward,
and she wearied of the heat. There was nothing--nothing in it all that
was worth one moment of the old sweet moonlit evenings among the myrtles
at Ecbatana. When she thought, there was nothing of all her royal state
and luxury that she would not readily give to have had Zoroaster remain
faithful to her. She had put him away from her heart, driven him out
utterly, as she believed; but now that he was spoken of again, she knew
not whether she loved him a little in spite of all his unfaithfulness,
or whether it was only the memory of the love she had felt before which
stirred in her breast, and made her unconsciously speak his name when
she was alone.

She looked back over the three years that were passed, and she knew that
she had done her duty by the king. She knew also that she had done it
willingly, and that there had been many moments when she said to herself
that she loved Darius dearly. Indeed, it was not hard to find a reason
for loving him, for he was brave and honest and noble in all his
thoughts and ways; and whatever he had been able to do to show his love
for Nehushta, he had done. It was not the least of the things that had
made her life pass so easily, that she felt daily how she was loved
before her rival, and how, in her inmost heart, Atossa chafed at seeing
Darius forsake her society for that of the Hebrew princess. If the king
had wearied of her, Nehushta would very likely have escaped from the
palace, and gone out to face any misfortunes the world might hold for
her, rather than remain to bear the scoffing of the fair smiling woman
she so hated. Or, she would have stolen in by night to where Atossa
slept, and the wicked-looking Indian knife she wore, would have gone
down, swift and sure, to the very haft, into the queen's heart. She
would not have borne tamely any slight upon her beauty or her claims.
But, as it was, she reigned supreme. The king was just, and showed no
difference in the state and attendance of the two queens, but it was to
Nehushta he turned, when he drank deep at the banquet an