CHAPTER LXIX
CHARES FINDS REST
Again Alexander and Darius stood face to face, this time upon the plainof Nineveh at Gaugamela, the Camel's House, beyond the swift Tigris.Chares and Leonidas felt the chill of autumn in the air as theystrolled out upon the earthen ramparts that sheltered the Macedoniancamp. The wide plain below them, where they knew the Persian host wasassembled, was shrouded in mist.
Both were silent, and both were thinking of Clearchus, whom they hadleft behind in Egypt, in the new city that Alexander had founded at themouth of the Nile, giving it his own name. There he was building thehouse that was to shelter him and Artemisia amid its gardens, withinsight and sound of the sea; for when he learned of the wreck of hisfortune, he had no desire to return to Athens.
"We shall soon know who is master," the Spartan said, gazing toward themist-wrapped plain.
Chares followed his look indifferently, yawned, and stretched his arms.
"I believe I would rather go back to sleep than fight," he said. "Idon't know what has come over me."
Leonidas shot him a quick glance, and it seemed to him that theTheban's face had aged and grown grave over night.
"I wonder what Clearchus and Artemisia and little Chares are doing,"Chares went on. "I would like to see them again. May the Gods givethem happiness!"
"Yes, and I shall be happy too when you have built your palace besidethem," Leonidas replied. "It will have to be a palace, for Thais willbe satisfied with nothing less."
Chares smiled a little sadly and shook his head.
"That is not for me," he said. "I shall never have a home and childrenof my own."
"Nonsense!" the Spartan replied decisively. "What is to become ofThais, then?"
"I know not," Chares said reflectively. "Watch over her, Leonidas, ifI am not there to do it. She loves me."
"You talk like a sick man," Leonidas exclaimed, "yet you were neverbetter. What is the matter with you?"
"Who can speak of to-morrow?" Chares replied. "You know, Leonidas,that I am not afraid, and yet somehow I care not. You and Clearchus Imust leave sometime, and whenever that time comes, it will be a regretto me; and Thais, of course, will grieve; but she will recover. She isnot like Artemisia. I think something is lacking in me. I have takenpleasure in life, but I am tired of everything. My city exists nomore. Perhaps I am being punished for taking service under the man whodestroyed it. I do not know--or care. Let be what will be."
"When you hear the trumpet, you will forget all this folly," Leonidassaid impatiently. "You are young and you have everything to live for.That palace will be built yet; and when our heads are gray, we shall besitting there, telling each other of this battle. See, they arewaiting for us. They have been there all night."
The mist was lifting in undulating billows and twisted scarfs of vapor,floating away into the upper air. Before them was mustered the mightof the greatest empire the world had ever seen. Away to the left andright spread the army of the Great King, a wilderness of bright plumesand glittering helmets. The spear-points, emerging from the mist,caught the rays of the sun like diamonds. Rank on rank they stood, sodeep that the young men could not distinguish where the files ceased.Far on their right was the Bactrian cavalry and the Persian horse underthe cruel viceroy Bessus, who had unwittingly saved Chares andClearchus from the Babylonian mob. They could make out the banners ofthe Susians, the Albanians, the Hyrcanians, the fierce Parthians, theSyrians, the Arachotians, the Cadusians, the Babylonian levies, thehaughty Medes, the dusky squadrons from beyond the Indus, the warriorsfrom the shores of the Red Sea, the Mesopotamians, the Armenians, theCappadocians, and the mongrel tribes of mixed blood. From theflaunting banners they could read the muster-roll of the nations thatbowed to the will of Darius.
In advance of the first rank stood a line of huge, swaying brown bulks.They were the royal elephants, stationed there to drive a pathwaythrough the Macedonian army for the Great King. Leonidas wondered attheir number and size. On both sides of them stretched rows ofchariots, with axles and neaps that terminated in long, curvedscythe-blades. Behind the elephants was the royal squadron of tenthousand picked riders, and in its rear Darius had stationed himself,surrounded by his kinsmen, and protected on either side by bodies ofGreek mercenaries. All the plain in front of the vast array had beenmade as level as a floor, so that the chariots might find no obstaclein their advance.
"This will be the last battle," Chares said indifferently. "If we winhere, the empire is ours."
"We shall win!" Leonidas exclaimed.
"I'm not so sure of that," Chares said, measuring the host of the enemywith his eye. "There are more of them than there were at Issus, andhere they have room to move."
A trumpet sent its bold notes from the Macedonian camp. The call wastaken up by others, rose, and died away. Presently the first squadronof the phalanx wheeled out upon the plain, and began marching slowlyand in silence down the gentle slope toward the Persian van.
"We must get into our armor," Chares said, and the two friends hasteneddown from the rampart.
The camp was swarming like a great beehive. Rough shouts of greeting,jests, and salutations were heard on every side as the soldiers hurriedto join their commands. The army was in high spirits at the prospectof a decisive grapple, but the heaviness that oppressed Chares' mindrefused to yield to the general enthusiasm. He made his way throughthe crowds to the purple pavilion set apart for Sisygambis, the motherof Darius, and his children. The beautiful Statira was no longerthere. She had died in her captivity.
"I wish to speak with Thais," Chares said to the eunuch who guarded thedoor.
He was admitted to an anteroom of the tent while a slave carried hismessage. Thais answered the summons quickly. A proud smile parted herlips when she saw the powerful form of the Theban, clad in resplendentarmor; but it vanished when she looked into his face.
He took her hands and bent down to kiss her, while the plumes of hishelmet fell about their heads.
"I have but a moment," he said. "Farewell, Thais; you have loved mebetter than I deserved."
"Chares!" she exclaimed, with a sinking of the heart that caused hervoice to flutter. "Why do you speak to me like this? I have loved youand I do love you with all my heart--with all my heart! Never have Iloved another, and I never shall. Without you I should die!"
She stood on tiptoe and threw her arms around his neck. "You are all Ihave!" she cried, with a sob.
"Thais," he said, holding her close, "if I come not back to you,promise me that you will accept what the Gods send. They are wiserthan we."
To Thais it seemed as though the world was slipping away from her. Hehad gone to battle before, and she well knew its chances; but he was sobrave and strong that she had never really feared for him and forherself. What would become of her without him? She remembered whatshe had been before she knew him. The future would be worse than avoid. The thought of it stabbed her heart like a knife.
"If you come not back!" she cried, clinging to him with all herstrength. "But you will come back, Chares--tell me that you will!Tell me that you will come back for my sake. I cannot let you go!"
"I will come back if the Gods permit it," he said, kissing her oncemore, "but promise me, my love, for the time is short."
A trumpet sounded, and Thais understood that he must leave her.
"I promise," she said hastily, "but, O my heart, guard thyself in thebattle; for it is thy life and mine thou bearest!"
She felt his arms press her closely and tenderly, and then he was gone.She turned slowly back to the inner rooms of the pavilion, where thequeen mother sat with her little grandson in her lap. Sisygambis hadtaken a fancy to her, especially since the death of herdaughter-in-law, whom Thais had tended in her illness. She turned herface toward her, stamped with traces of sorrow.
"What is happening?" she asked.
"They are marching out to battle," Thais replied.
"My son is there!
" the queen said. "May Astoreth have him in her care.But whichever way the battle goes, either I or thou must weep. Ourhearts are their playthings!"
As the Companions emerged from the camp, they passed through the ranksof the Thracian infantry, left behind to protect it, and saw thephalanx forming on the plain. They swung into the battle line on itsright, behind the archers and the javelin men. The Persians overlappedthem on both flanks by half a mile.
Never had Chares seen Alexander so confidently at ease as when he rodealong the line in his bright armor, his white plumes nodding as helooked to see that all was in readiness. His eye was clear and hisbrow was untroubled in the face of those tremendous odds, although heknew that his fate depended upon the issue of that day. He took hisplace beside Clitus on the extreme right wing of the army, with thesquadrons of Glaucias behind him.
There was a stir in the Persian host, and the terrible scythedchariots, drawn by horses that were lashed to madness, bounded forwardacross the interval that separated the two armies. At the same timethe elephants began to move, and the Persian centre advanced to theattack.
Chares had hardly time to note this movement before the Bactrian andScythian cavalry under Bessus swept down upon the Companions.Alexander ordered M[oe]nidas and the Greek mercenary cavalry to meetthe charge. The Greeks galloped bravely to oppose the onset, but therush of the Bactrians scattered them like chaff. The P[oe]oniancavalry under Aristo was then sent forward with better success. Thewild troops of Bessus were curbed and forced back for a space, andChares could see the bull-necked viceroy raging among them in a franticendeavor to make them stand. Finding all his efforts in vain, heordered the main body of the Bactrian cavalry, fourteen thousand inall, to charge. They left their place in the left of the Persian lineand thundered down upon the P[oe]onians like an avalanche.
Not until then did Alexander turn his face to the impatient Companions.He raised his hand as a signal to make ready. Each man gathered hisbridle reins more firmly, and tightened his grasp on his spear. A pagescurried back to Aretes, who had been posted in the rear of the mainline as a protection to the flank, telling him to charge with hissplendid lancers. Then the Companions rushed forward, with Alexanderat their head, and with their plumes fluttering like foam on the crestof a wave.
Squadron by squadron, they tore into the enemy's lines, while Scyth andBactrian went down before them. Swift and deadly as a falcon, Aretesswooped upon Bessus' flank, throwing it into confusion. But theviceroy refused to yield, and the stubborn righting continued.
Meantime the dreaded scythe-bearing chariots had neared the phalanx,which it was their task to break. The soldiers clashed their spearbutts against their shields with a clangor that frightened many of thehorses beyond control. The light-footed skirmishers in advance of theline shot their arrows into the sides of the animals, or risked theirlives to sever the traces of their harness. Some of the horses wheeledand galloped back into the Persian horde. Others were killed upon thesarissas that pierced their necks. A few of the chariots reached theline, that opened hastily to let them through, and both horses andcharioteers were slain at leisure in the rear.
The elephants, from which the Great King had hoped so much, proved asuseless as the chariots. Bewildered in the clamor raised by thephalanx, and maddened by the wounds inflicted upon them by the archers,they rushed about the field, trumpeting wildly, and trampling thePersians in their search for escape. Darius saw them, and his browclouded.
With the first stride of his horse when the Companions charged, Charesfelt his heart leap and the glow of joy in battle warm his veins.Misgiving and foreboding fell from him. He struck with mighty blows,spurring his horse forward into the Bactrian ranks until he could go nofurther. When his squadron fell back to give place to another, herefused to follow it, but remained there, fighting until the freshtroop in its charge surrounded him and bore him forward. Even when theBactrians began to give way, and Alexander, leaving them to Aretes,directed the trumpeters to draw off the Companions, the Theban wouldnot go. The young king, who happened to be near, spoke to him sharply.
"Obey orders!" he said. "You shall have your fill of fighting."
Chares reluctantly complied. His eyes were bloodshot and his faceflushed like that of a drunken man. To ease the throbbing of histemples, he loosed his helmet and threw it upon the ground.
Alexander's eye, keen as a hawk's, glanced along the front of thePersian line, and his heart leaped as he saw a wide break in the ranksjust at the left of the centre, where Darius stood in his chariot. TheSusians had shifted slightly toward Bessus, in order to give him theirsupport, and a gap had opened between them and the Greek mercenarieswho guarded the Great King on that side. The Macedonians had beenordered to fight in silence, so that the trumpets might be heard, andnow their varied notes rang across the field. At the first signal, thehypaspists under Nicanor detached themselves from the line and cameforward at a run. Another call, another, and another, brought theveterans of the phalanx swinging in behind them. Rank on rank, thetough fighting men of C[oe]nas, Perdiccas, Meleager, and Polyspherchonfell in with the rapid precision of cool discipline, forming a solidcolumn that fronted toward the gap.
Alexander gave the word to the Companions to place themselves at thehead of this enormous wedge, and then, with a shout that rolled faracross the plain, it hurled itself against the Persian line. Into thegap rode the Companions, and after them pressed the heavy infantry.The matchless horsemen struck at the heart of the Persian host; theresistless charge of the men who followed them tore wide the wound.
Close to the snowy plumes that floated from Alexander's helmet in thefront rank of the Companions streamed the yellow hair of Chares. TheTheban fought with the strength of fury. His sword rose and fell, andevery blow carried a death wound. A strange sense of unrealitypossessed him. He seemed to be fighting in a dream. Suddenly, throughthe dust and confusion of the trampled field, he caught sight of thefigure of Darius, and every sense became acute. The Great King,wearing the royal robe of purple over his armor, stood erect in hischariot, shooting arrows into the Macedonian column. Between him andthe Companions stood ten thousand Greek mercenaries.
Chares was seized by an overmastering and unreasoning rage against thetall, handsome man who had brought the vast horde together to opposethem.
"Darius! Darius!" he shouted, and spurred his horse so fiercely thatthe animal leaped forward, carrying his rider far into the mercenarycohorts. Alexander and the foremost of the Companions, among themLeonidas, pressed in after him. The Spartan shouted to him to becautious, but he might as well have warned the wind. To right and leftswung the terrible sword, and every bound of the frantic horse carriedhim farther forward. The ranks of the mercenaries were cleft apart.From every side blows were aimed at him, but the hireling troops wereprevented by those who came after from closing around him.
Chares saw nothing but the pale face of the Great King. A sword gashedhis thigh, but he did not feel the wound. An arrow pierced hisshoulder. He snapped off the shaft so that it might not interfere withthe sweep of his arm.
Darius looked toward the left, and his eyes met those of the Theban.He saw the strokes that were rained upon his armor; he saw the dartsthat were aimed at him. At every breath it seemed that he must godown, and yet onward he came, and his gaze never left the royalchariot. The Great King noticed that his lips were stained with bloodyfroth and that his hair was roped and matted with sweat. A chillsettled about the monarch's heart. It seemed to him that theyellow-headed giant, whom nothing could stay, would surely reach him;and yet he was incapable of movement. Like a man bound hand and footby a nightmare, he stood awaiting his end. The man was now so nearthat he fancied he could hear the panting of his breath. The warningcries of his kinsmen sounded in his ears, and he knew that they weretrying to throw themselves before him. Of all the Macedonian army hefeared only this one enemy. Would he succeed in reaching the chariot?No! His horse had swerved aside. Darius saw him grasp a j
avelin thatwas being thrust at his breast, and wrest it from the hands of the manwho held it. He was about to cast. The Great King could see theglitter of the point of steel. Something grazed his arm, and the haftof the weapon quivered across his heart, its blade buried in the sideof his charioteer.
Darius drew a shuddering breath of relief, and opened his eyes. He sawthe great roan steed that bore his foe rear high above the heads of hisguard. Its fore legs struck aimlessly at the air, and the face of itsrider was hidden in its tossing mane. Then, with a scream of agony,the horse fell backward, and a hundred mercenaries swarmed upon him,thrusting and thrusting with their short swords.
The Great King was saved; but he knew that the battle, upon which hehad staked all, was lost. He saw the eager faces of the Companions,and beyond them the solid wall of the phalanx, sweeping nearer, like aresistless tide. He stepped across the body of his charioteer andmounted a horse. Before his feet were in the stirrups he heard theominous cry, "The king flees!" that had run before the rout at Issus,and by the time he reached the spot where the rear guard of his armyshould have been, the dust-cloud raised by hurrying hoofs and flyingfeet obscured the sun.
Slowly, from among the dead, Chares raised himself, and gazed withdimming eyes toward the place where the Great King had stood. Only thebroken chariot and the dead were there, but far away he saw the ebbingtide of the battle. A smile flickered upon his lips, his head sankupon the side of his brave horse, and his blue eyes closed. "Sleep andrest!" he thought, and the darkness swept over him.