The Dragon of the Ishtar Gate

"When we appeared, everyone in the audience room went rigid. We had done a dozen steps when the high priest screamed: 'Great god Vishnu!' and cast himself down on his face. So did the king and the ministers and the soldiers and whoever else was there. I was too busy with the steps of my dance to count the audience.

"What convinced the Indians of my divinity, I think, was my size. The folk of Supara are rather small. But Shunga, being from the Land of Five Rivers, and my half brother were both over six feet, and I overtopped diem both.

"We went on dancing, never hurrying a step, through the audience hall and the outer chambers and out into the night. Now and then we passed a priest or a layman lying on his face and praying with all his might.

"Outside the entrance lay the king's riding elephant, draped and painted like King Xerxes on New Year's Day. Around it the mahouts and the grooms who held the horses and the rest of the royal crowd lay also prone.

"Shunga looked from the elephant to me and jerked his head. I climbed into the hawdah, followed by Moccus, whilst Shunga bestrode the animal's neck. He kicked the elephant under the ear, so that it got to its feet and shambled off into the night. But we had gone but half a league when Shunga stopped the elephant.

" 'Here we- take to our own feet again,' said he. 'The king and the priest may begin to have doubts about the divine visitation and start hunting for us, and we could hardly be more conspicuous.'

"So we left the beast pulling branches off trees and stuffing the foliage into its maw. We left the cloth-of-gold shawl and the sacred python in the hawdah and set out afoot for Supara. Shunga said: 'Try not to step on a serpent, for many perish thus.' This was comforting advice to a barefoot man trudging a dusty road on a pitch-black night.

"We stopped at a stream to wash the blue dye off me, then scaled the city wall and regained our quarters without detection. Though glad to have saved our hides, we were disgruntled at not having brought one single jewel out of the temple. Worse, Moccus and I had lost our jackets and boots.

"Next clay the market place buzzed with the news of this wondrous theophany. Whilst we were looking for a melon to steal, the high priest himself came strolling through, acclaimed by all and beaming like a tiger that has just swallowed a tax gatherer.

"Shunga pushed through the crowd, placed his palms together and bowed over them, and spoke to the priest.

I could not understand him, for he spoke in an ancient dialect called Sanskrit. In any case, the twain stepped aside and conversed in low voices. I saw the priest look in my direction and pass something to Shunga.

"Back at our lodgings, Shunga brought out a bag of golden rings and slugs, and square silver coins enough to see us all to our homes and have something left over. When we asked him how he had done it, he said with a chuckle:

" 'I told the holy father that I had a heinous sin to confess. Having obtained his ear, I told him the tale of our raid. He was greatly shocked by the sacrilege and spoke of having us seized and trampled by elephants. Then I reminded him that the temple had done very nicely from the manifestation of the god and doubtless would do even better in the future. But, if our little fraud were exposed, all this would cease.

" 'He saw the point at once and assured me that, as nought had been stolen, the gods could take care of themselves. In my case, they would probably do no more than degrade me to the untouchable class for a thousand incarnations.

" 'No doubt, I said. But meanwhile it were well, so as not to shake the faith of the masses in the true religion, to get my companions and me away from Supara forthwith. Otherwise we might be recognized, or my hard-drinking comrades might boast of their feat in their cups. And, although we were willing to go home quietly, we could not do so in our present penury. Well, this priest can tell a tiger from a toadstool, so here we are.'"