Had he been seen the look which Beltis cast upon him, standing behind him with folded arms and humble air, perchance he would have thought it steeper still.
"Let us talk," I said, "for the end draws near. What is your plan? How will you and we, your queens, escape from this city?"
"All is prepared," he answered. "At the King's wharf, to which a covered way runs from the palace, in the house where the royal boats are moored, is my own barge that, being thus secured, escaped burning with the ships. In this barge, which is manned with Greeks to whom a great reward is promised and who wait in the boathouse day and night, we will row from the harbour for a hidden land and be escorted thence to the encampment of the Great King. Yet perchance it may be wiser that I should be with Mentor to welc
