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The enemy's cavalry was now close at hand, their arrows reached the Lacedæmonians and killed several of them. It was at this moment that Kallikrates, the tallest and handsomest man in the whole Greek army, is said to have been mortally wounded by an arrow.
Call me Leo, then, for of Kallikrates I have had enough since that night when I looked upon the last of him in Kor." "Ah! I remember," she answered, "when thou sawest thyself lying in that narrow bed, and I sang thee a song, did I not, of the past and of the future? I can recall two lines of it; the rest I have forgotten "'Onward, never weary, clad with splendour for a robe!
Before her lover's living eyes, sunk in utter shame and misery, the beautiful became hideous, the undying seemed to die. "Yet, O Kallikrates, I tell thee that she died not. Did not Ayesha swear to thee yonder in the Caves of Kor that she would come again? for even in that awful hour this comfort kissed her soul.
Then, as though she were unwilling to reveal too much, suddenly Ayesha's history passed from Egypt to Kor. She spoke to Leo of his arrival there, a wanderer who was named Kallikrates, hunted by savages and accompanied by the Egyptian Amenartas, whom she appeared to have known and hated in her own country, and of how she entertained them.
"There lived also a daughter of Pharaoh's house, one Amenartas, who cast eyes of love upon this Kallikrates, and, wrapping him in her spells for then as now she practised witcheries caused him to break his oaths and fly with her, as thou sawest written in the flame. Thou, Atene, wast that Amenartas.
We are those men who, following an ancient clue, travelled to the Caves of Kor in Central Africa, and there discovered her whom we sought, the immortal She-who-must-be-obeyed. In Leo she found her love, that re-born Kallikrates, the Grecian priest of Isis whom some two thousand years before she had slain in her jealous rage, thus executing on him the judgment of the angry goddess.
Indeed, they regarded Antikrates with such a love and admiration, because of the terror which Epameinondas had struck into their hearts while he was alive, that they decreed especial honours and presents to be bestowed upon him, and granted to his descendants an immunity from taxes and public burdens which is enjoyed at the present day by Kallikrates, one of the descendants of Antikrates.
"Aye," he said, "I bid her unveil, that I may learn the best or worst, who otherwise must die of this suspense. Howsoever changed, if she be Ayesha I shall know her, and if she be Ayesha, I shall love her." "Bold words, Kallikrates," answered the Hesea; "yet from my very heart I thank thee for them: those sweet words of trust and faithfulness to thou knowest not what.
Then a voice sweeter than honey, softer than the whisper of a twilight breeze among the reeds, spoke near to us, and these were the words it said "Come hither to me, Kallikrates, who would pay thee back that redeeming kiss of faith and love thou gavest me but now!" Leo struggled to his feet. Like a drunken man he staggered to where Ayesha stood, then overcome, sank before her on his knees.
Now, as though he heard some sound, he halts and looks towards us, and by the heaven above me, his face is the face of Leo Vincey in his youth, the face too of that Kallikrates whose corpse we had seen in the Caves of Kor! "Look, look!" gasped Leo, catching me by the arm; but I only nodded my head in answer.
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