When can I speak to you alone ?" "To-morrow morning." "That is too late." "Well then, in a quarter of an hour, when it is quite dark, at this gate of the palace." "I shall expect you." So saying the man vanished.

Once within the palace, Gyges left Bartja and Zopyrus, fastened his sword into his girdle, begged Darius to do the same and to follow him, and was soon standing again under the great portico with the stranger, but this time in total darkness.
"Auramazda be praised that you are there!" cried the latter in Persian to the young Lydian; "but who is that with you ?" "Darius, the son of Hystaspes, one of the Achaemenidae; and my friend." The stranger bowed low and answered, "It is well, I feared an Egyptian had accompanied you." "No, we are alone and willing to hear you; but be brief.

Who are you and what do you want ?" "My name is Bubares.

I served as a poor captain under the great Cyrus.

At the taking of your father's city, Sardis, the soldiers were at first allowed to plunder freely; but on your wise father's representing to Cyrus that to plunder a city already taken was an injury to the present, and not to the former, possessor, they were commanded on pain of death to deliver up their booty to their captains, and the latter to cause everything of worth, when brought to them, to be collected in the market-place.