Nobody accepted the challenge, because there was a general order that ranks should not be broken on any pretext whatsoever. The young man continued shouting and brandishing his spear and laughing contemptuously. Suddenly there was a murmur from the side-trench on the Roman left. A horseman, bending low over his horse's neck, came dashing over a bridge, past the Massagetic Huns in the angle, and went straight for the Persian. The Persian saw the charge too late. He tried to avoid it by suddenly whipping his horse forward, but the lance struck him full on the right breast and toppled him over. He lay stunned. The Roman, lustily dismounting, cut his throat – as if he had been a sacrificial animal. A mighty shout went up from the Roman army, and from the walls of Daras, which were crowded with townspeople. At first it was thought that the hero was Boutzes, avenging the capture of his brother Coutzes. But when the victor rode back at leisure across the trench, leading off the Persian's horse, with the dead Persian thrown over the saddle, it was seen who he was – bold Andreas the bath-attendant!
For Andreas, whose duties were light and whose character was energetic, had for some rime, unknown to Belisarius, been taking part in the early morning cavalry exercises under Boutzes, who was now Belisarius's Master of Horse; and his training as a wrestler had made him a formidable fighter. Belisarius sent a staff officer to him, congratulating liim, with a present of a white-tufted steel cap and a white-pennoned lance and a gold neck-chain as a sign that he wished to give him sergeant's rank in his Household cuirassiers. But the Master of Offices, who was acting as marshal to Belisarius, deplored the breach of discipline – though delighted with Andreas's success. He sent a message to all commanders of squadrons that nobody else must answer another challenge to single combat, under penalty of a severe whipping. Belisarius took the Master of Offices to task over this, because it was a threat that could not be carried out. A man who rode out to accept a challenge would cither be victorious, in which case there would be a popular outcry against his punishment; or else defeated, in which case the Persian would carry off his dead body out of range of Roman whips.
A second challenge soon came. It was from another Persian, who had been vexed that the first challenger had ridden out against the rules of courtesy. For there is a strict punctilio in these matters in the Persian army: the challenger must always be of the noblest family represented in the battle. The second such challenger therefore came riding out rather to reassert his family's pride than because he was thirsting for combat. He was no youth, but a man in the prime of life; he managed his horse and weapons with an air of experienced decision. Nor did he shout excitedly like the youth whom Andreas had killed, but only cracked his whip with a stem 'ho! Ho!' at intervals in his slow ride down the Roman lines. At one point he reined in and called out something in Persian which was thought to be an invitation to Belisarius himself to come out against him. But when this was reported to Belisarius by some of his staff, who urged him to accept the challenge for the heartening effect dm victory would have upon the army, he replied with contempt: 'If he wishes for death, why does he not put his head in a halter, privately, instead of trying to implicate me as an accessory?'
