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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/16583-8.txt b/16583-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b6dbe8f --- /dev/null +++ b/16583-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,20064 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Yoke, by Elizabeth Miller + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Yoke + A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children + of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt + +Author: Elizabeth Miller + +Release Date: August 22, 2005 [EBook #16583] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOKE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +THE YOKE + +A ROMANCE OF THE DAYS WHEN THE LORD REDEEMED THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL +FROM THE BONDAGE OF EGYPT + + +BY + +ELIZABETH MILLER + + + + +GROSSET & DUNLAP + +Publishers -:- New York + + + + +COPYRIGHT, 1904 + +THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY + + +JANUARY + + + + +TO + +PERCY MILLER + +MY BROTHER + +WHO CONSTRUCTED + +THE PLOT + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + + I CHOOSING THE TENS + II UNDER BAN OF THE RITUAL + III THE MESSENGER + IV THE PROCESSION OF AMEN + V THE HEIR TO THE THRONE + VI THE LADY MIRIAM + VII ATHOR, THE GOLDEN + VIII THE PUNISHMENT OF ATSU + IX THE COLLAR OF GOLD + X THE DEBT OF ISRAEL + XI HEBREW CRAFT + XII CANAAN + XIII THE COMING OF THE PHARAOH + XIV THE MARGIN OF THE NILE + XV THE GODS OF EGYPT + XVI THE ADVICE OF HOTEP + XVII THE SON OF THE MURKET + XVIII AT MASAARAH + XIX IN THE DESERT + XX THE TREASURE CAVE + XXI ON THE WAY TO THEBES + XXII THE FAN-BEARER'S GUEST + XXIII THE TOMB OF THE PHARAOH + XXIV THE PETITION + XXV THE LOVE OF RAMESES + XXVI FURTHER DIPLOMACY + XXVII THE HEIR INTERVENES + XXVIII THE IDOLS CRUMBLE + XXIX THE PLAGUES + XXX HE HARDENED HIS HEART + XXXI THE CONSPIRACY + XXXII RACHEL'S REFUGE + XXXIII BACK TO MEMPHIS + XXXIV NIGHT + XXXV LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS + XXXVI THE MURKET'S SACRIFICE + XXXVII AT THE WELL + XXXVIII THE TRAITORS + XXXIX BEFORE EGYPT'S THRONE + XL THE FIRST-BORN + XLI THE ANGEL OF DEATH + XLII EXPATRIATION + XLIII "THE PHARAOH DREW NIGH" + XLIV THE WAY TO THE SEA + XLV THROUGH THE RED SEA + XLVI WHOM THE LADY MIRIAM SENT + XLVII THE PROMISED LAND + + + + +THE YOKE + +A STORY OF THE EXODUS + + +CHAPTER I + +CHOOSING THE TENS + +Near the eastern boundary of that level region of northern Egypt, known +as the Delta, once thridded by seven branches of the sea-hunting Nile, +Rameses II, in the fourteenth century B. C., erected the city of Pithom +and stored his treasure therein. His riches overtaxed its coffers and +he builded Pa-Ramesu, in part, to hold the overflow. But he died +before the work was completed by half, and his fourteenth son and +successor, Meneptah, took it up and pushed it with the nomad +bond-people that dwelt in the Delta. + +The city was laid out near the center of Goshen, a long strip of +fertile country given over to the Israelites since the days of the +Hyksos king, Apepa, near the year 1800 B. C. + +Morning in the land of the Hebrew dawned over level fields, green with +unripe wheat and meadow grass. Wherever the soil was better for +grazing great flocks of sheep moved in compact clouds, with a lank dog +and an ancient shepherd following them. + +The low, shapeless tents and thatched hovels of the Israelites stood in +the center of gardens of lentils, garlic and lettuce, securely hedged +against the inroads of hares and roving cattle. Close to these were +compounds for the flocks and brush inclosures for geese, and cotes for +the pigeons used in sacrifice. Here dwelt the aged in trusteeship over +the land, while the young and sturdy builded Pa-Ramesu. + +Sunrise on the uncompleted city tipped the raw lines of her half-built +walls with broken fire and gilded the gear of gigantic hoisting cranes. +Scaffolding, clinging to bald façades, seemed frail and cobwebby at +great height, and slabs of stone, drawn and held by cables near the +summit of chutes, looked like dice on the giddy slide. + +Below in the still shadowy passages and interiors, speckled with fallen +mortar, lay chains, rubble of brick and chipped stone; splinters, +flinders and odd ends of timber; scraps of metal, broken implements and +the what-not that litters the path of construction. Without, in the +avenues, vaguely outlined by the slowly rising structures on either +side, were low-riding, long, heavy, dwarf-wheeled vehicles and sledges +to which men, not beasts, had been harnessed. Here, also, were great +cords of new brick and avalanches of glazed tile where disaster had +overtaken orderly stacks of this multi-tinted material. In the open +spaces were covered heaps of sand, and tons of lime, in sacks; layers +of paint and hogsheads of tar; ingots of copper and pigs of bronze. +Roadways, beaten in the dust by a multitude of bare feet, led in a +hundred directions, all merging in one great track toward the camp of +the laboring Israelites. + +This was pitched in a vast open in the city's center, wherein Rameses +II had planned to build a second Karnak to Imhotep. Under the gracious +favor of this, the physician god, the great Pharaoh had regained his +sight. But death stayed his grateful hand and Meneptah forgot his +father's debt. Here, then, year in and year out, an angular sea of low +tents sheltered Israel. + +Let it not be supposed that all the sons of Abraham were here. +Thousands labored yet in the perfection of Pithom, on the highways of +the Lower country, and on the Rameside canal, and the greater number +made the brick for all Egypt in the clay-fields of the Delta. +Therefore, within the walls of Pa-Ramesu there were somewhat more than +three thousand Hebrews, men, women and children. + +On a slight eminence, overlooking the camp, were numerous small +structures of sun-dried brick, grouped about one of larger dimensions. +Above this was raised a military standard, a hawk upon a cross-bar, +from which hung party-colored tassels of linen floss. By this sign, +the order of government was denoted. The Hebrews were under martial +law. + +The camp was astir. Thin columns of blue smoke drifted up here and +there between the close-set tents, and the sibilant wearing of +stone-mills, as they ground the wheat, was heard in many households. +The nutty aroma of parching lentils, and the savor of roasting papyrus +root and garlic told the stage of the morning meal. The strong-armed +women, rich brown in tint from the ardent sun, crowned with coil upon +coil of heavy hair, bent over the pungent fires. Sturdy children, +innocent of raiment, went hither and thither, bearing well filled skins +of water. Apart from these were the men of Israel, bearded and grave, +stalwart and scantily clad. They repaired a cable or fitted an +ax-handle or mended a hoe. But they were full of serious and absorbed +discourse, for the great Hebrew, Moses, from the sheep-ranges of +Midian, had been among them, showing them marvels of sorcery, preaching +Jehovah and promising freedom. The first high white light of dawn was +breaking upon the century-long night of Israel. + +Before one of the tents an old woman knelt beside a bed of live coals, +turning a browning water-fowl upon a pointed stick. She was a +consummate cook, and the bird was fat and securely trussed. Now and +again she sprinkled a pinch of crude salt on the embers to suppress the +odor of the burning drippings, and lifted the fowl out of the reach of +the pale flames that leaped up thereafter. Presently she removed the +fowl and forked it off the spit into a capacious earthenware bowl near +by. Then, with green withes as tongs, she drew forth a round tile from +under the coals and set it over the dish to complete the baking. From +another tile-platter at hand she took several round slices of durra +bread and proceeded to toast them with much skill, tilting the hot tile +and casting each browned slice in on the fowl as it was done. When she +had finished, she removed the cover and set the bowl on the large +platter, protecting her hands from its heat with a fold of her habit. +With no little triumph and some difficulty she got upon her feet and +carried the toothsome dish into her shelter, to place it beyond the +reach of stealthy hands. No such meal was cooked that morning, +elsewhere, in Pa-Ramesu, except at the military headquarters on the +knoll. + +There was little inside the tent, except the meagerest essential +furnishing. A long amphora stood in a tamarisk rack in one corner; a +linen napkin hung, pinned to the tent-cloth, over it; a glazed laver +and a small box sat beside it. A mat of braided reeds, the handiwork +of the old Israelite, covered the naked earth. This served as seat or +table for the occupants. Several wisps of straw were scattered about +and a heap of it, over which a cotton cloak had been thrown, lay in one +corner. + +"Rachel," the old woman said briskly. + +Evidently some one slept under the straw, for the heap stirred. + +"Rachel!" the old woman reiterated, drawing off the cloak. + +Without any preliminary pushing away of the straw, a young girl sat up. +A little bewildered, she divested her head and shoulders of a frowsy +straw thatch and stood erect, shaking it off from her single short +garment. + +She was not more than sixteen years old. Above medium height and of +nobler proportions than the typical woman of the race, her figure was +remarkable for its symmetry and utter grace. The stamp of the +countenance was purely Semitic, except that she was distinguished, most +wondrously in color, from her kind. Her sleep had left its exquisite +heaviness on eyes of the tenderest blue, and the luxuriant hair she +pushed back from her face was a fleece of gold. Hers was that rare +complexion that does not tan. The sun but brightened her hair and +wrought the hue of health in her cheeks. Her forehead was low, broad, +and white as marble; her neck and arms white, and the hands, busied +with the hair, were strong, soft, dimpled and white. The grace of her +womanhood had not been overcome by the slave-labor, which she had known +from infancy. + +"Good morning, Deborah. Why--thy bed--have I slept under it?" she +asked. + +"Since the middle of the last watch," the old woman assented. + +"But why? Did Merenra come?" the girl inquired anxiously. + +"Nay; but I heard some one ere the camp was astir and I covered thee." + +"And thou hast had no sleep since," the girl said, with regret in her +voice. "Thou dost reproach me with thy goodness, Deborah." + +She went to the amphora and poured water into the laver, drew forth +from the box a horn comb and a vial of powdered soda from the Natron +Lakes, and proceeded with her toilet. + +"Came some one, of a truth?" she asked presently. + +Deborah pointed to the smoking bowl. Rachel inspected the fowl. + +"Marsh-hen!" she cried in surprise. + +"Atsu brought it." + +"Atsu?" + +"Even so. From his own bounty and for Rachel," Deborah explained. + +Rachel smiled. + +"Thou art beset from a new direction," the old woman continued dryly, +"but thou hast naught to fear from him." + +"Nay; I know," Rachel murmured, arranging her dress. + +The garb of the average bondwoman was of startling simplicity. It +consisted of two pieces of stuff little wider than the greatest width +of the wearer's body, tied by the corners over each shoulder, belted at +the waist with a thong and laced together with fiber at the sides, from +the hips to a point just above the knee. It was open above and below +this simple seam and interfered not at all with the freedom of the +wearer's movements. But Rachel's habit was a voluminous surplice, +fitting closely at the neck, supplied with wide sleeves, seamed, hemmed +and of ample length. Deborah was literally swathed in covering, with +only her withered face and hands exposed. There was a hint of rank in +their superior dress and more than a suggestion of blood in the bearing +of the pair; but they were laborers with the shepherds and +serving-people of Israel. + +"He would wed thee, after the manner of thy people, and take thee from +among Israel," Deborah continued. + +The girl drooped her head over the lacing of her habit and made no +answer. The old woman looked at her sharply for a moment. + +"Well, eat; Rachel, eat," she urged at last. "The marsh-hen will stand +thee in good stead and thou hast a weary day before thee." + +Rachel looked at the old woman and made mental comparison between the +ancient figure and her strong, young self. With great deliberation she +divided the fowl into a large and small part. + +"This," she said, extending the larger to Deborah, "is thine. Take +it," waving aside the protests of the old woman, "or the first taste of +it will choke me." + +Deborah submitted duly and consumed the tender morsel while she watched +Rachel break her fast. + +"What said Atsu?" Rachel asked, after the marsh-hen was less apparent. + +"Little, which is his way. But his every word was worth a harangue in +weight. Merenra and his purple-wearing visitor, the spoiler, the +pompous wolf, departed for Pithom last night, hastily summoned thither +by a royal message. But the commander returns to-morrow at sunset. +This morning, every tenth Hebrew in Pa-Ramesu is to be chosen and sent +to the quarries. Atsu will send thee and me, whether we fall among the +tens of a truth or not. So we get out of the city ere Merenra returns. +He called the ruse a cruel one and not wholly safe, but he would sooner +see thee dead than despoiled by this guest of Merenra's--or any other. +I doubt not his heart breaketh for thy sake, Rachel, and he would rend +himself to spare thee." + +"The Lord God bless him," the girl murmured earnestly. + +"Where dost thou say we go?" she asked after a little silence. + +"To the quarries of Masaarah, opposite Memphis." + +The color in the young Israelite's face receded a little. + +"To the quarries," she repeated in a half-whisper. + +"Fearest thou?" + +"Nay, not for myself, at all, but we may not have another Atsu over us +there. I fear for thee, Deborah." + +The old woman waved her hands. + +"Trouble not concerning me. I shall not die by heavy labor." + +But the girl shook her head and gazed out of the low entrance of the +tent. Her face was full of trouble. Once again the old woman looked +at her with suspicion in her eyes. Presently the girl asked, coloring +painfully: + +"Was Atsu commanded to hold me for this guest of Merenra's--ah!" she +broke off, "did Atsu name him?" + +"Not by the titles by which the man would as lief be known," Deborah +answered grimly, "but I remember he called him 'the governor.'" + +There was a brief pause. + +"Not so," she resumed, answering Rachel's first question. "Atsu but +overheard him say to Merenra to see to it that thou wast taken from +toil and made ready to journey with him to Bubastis." + +"He can not take me by right save by a document of gift from the +Pharaoh," Rachel protested indignantly. + +"Of a truth," the old woman admitted; "but Merenra is chief commander +over Pa-Ramesu and how shall thine appeal to the Pharaoh pass beyond +Merenra if he see fit to humor this ravening lord with a breach of the +law? The message summoning him in haste to Pithom before the order +could be fulfilled was all that saved thee. And if Merenra return ere +thou art safely gone, thou art of a surety undone." + +Rachel moved away a little and stood thinking. The old woman went on +with a note of despondency in her voice. + +"Alas, Rachel! thou art in eternal peril because of thy lovely face. +Beauty is a curse to a bondwoman. What I beheld in truth yesterday I +have seen in dreams--the discourteous hand put forth to seize thee and +the power back of it to enforce its demand. And yet, I would not wish +thee old and uncomely, for that, too, is a curse to the bondwoman," she +added with a reflective shrug of the shoulders. + +"If I but knew his name--" Rachel pondered aloud. + +"What matter?" the old woman answered almost roughly. "Suffice it to +know that he is a knave and a noble and hath evil in his heart against +thee." + +"Now, if I might dye my hair or stain my face--" Rachel began after a +pause. + +"Thou foolish child! It would not wear, nor hide thy charm at all!" + +"But I dread the quarries for thee, Deborah. If only we might be +hidden here, somewhere." + +"Come, dost thou want to marry Atsu?" the old woman demanded harshly. + +The girl turned toward her, her face flushed with resentment. + +"Nay! And that thou knowest. For this very mingling with Egypt is +Israel cursed. The idolatrous have reached out their hands in marriage +and wedded the Hebrews away from the God of Abraham. When did an +Egyptian desert his gods for the faith of the Hebrew he took in +marriage? Not at any time. Therefore have we fed the shrines of the +idols and increased the numbers of the idolaters and behold, the hosts +of Jehovah have dwindled to naught. Therefore is He wroth with us, and +justly. For are there not pitiful shrines to Ra, Ptah and Amen within +the boundaries of Goshen? Nay, I wed not with an idolater," she +concluded firmly. + +Deborah's wrinkled face lighted and she put a tender arm about the girl. + +"Of a truth, then, it is for me that thou wouldst avoid the quarries," +she said. "I did but try thee, Rachel." + +Rachel looked at her reproachfully, but the old woman smiled and drew +her out into the open. + +Without, Israel of Pa-Ramesu made ready to surrender a tenth of her +number to the newest task laid on it by the Pharaoh. Quarrying was +unusual labor for an Israelite and the name carried terror with it. +Long had it meant heavy punishment for the malefactor and now was the +Hebrew to take up its bitter life. The hard form of oppression +following so closely upon the promise of liberty by Moses had +diversified effects upon the camp. There was rebellion among the +optimists, and the less hopeful spirits were crushed. There was the +scoffer, who exasperates; the enthusiast, the over-buoyant, who could +point out favorable omens even in this bitter affliction; and it could +not be divined which of these troubled the people more. But whatever +the individual temper, the entire camp was overhung with distress. + +Israel had gathered in families before her tents--the mothers hovering +their broods, the fathers tramping uneasily about them. In the heart +of each, perhaps, was an indefinable conviction that he should fall +among the tens. Since Israel had died in droves by hard labor in the +brick-fields and along the roadways and canals, in what numbers and +with what dire speed would not Israel perish in the dreaded stone-pits! + +Just outside the doorway of their shelter, Deborah and Rachel +overlooked the troubled camp. + +"Moses comes in time," Rachel said, speaking in a low tone, "for Israel +is in sore straits. The hand of the oppressor assaileth with fury his +bones and his sinews now. How shall it be with him if he is bequeathed +from Pharaoh to Pharaoh of an intent like unto the last three? He +shall have perished from the face of the earth, for the Hebrew bends +not; he breaks." + +Deborah did not answer at once. Her sunken eyes were set and she +seemed not to hear. But presently she spoke: + +"Thou hast said. But the Hebrew droppeth out of the inheritance of the +Pharaohs in thy generation, Rachel. The end of the bondage is at hand. +Thou shalt see it. Of a truth Israel shall perish. If its afflictions +increase for long. But they shall not continue. Have we entered +Canaan as God sware unto Abraham we should? Have we possessed the +gates of our enemies? Shall He stamp us out, with His promise yet +unfulfilled? Behold, we have gone astray from Him, but not utterly, as +all the other peoples of the earth. For centuries, amid the great +clamor of prayers to the hollow gods, there arose only from this +compound of slaves, here, a call to Him. Out of the reek of idolatrous +savors, drifted up now and again the straight column from the altar of +a Hebrew, sacrificing to the One God. Where, indeed, are any faithful, +save in Israel? Shall He condemn us who only have held steadfast? +Nay! He hath but permitted the oppression that we may have our fill of +the glories of Egypt and be glad to turn our backs upon her. He will +cure us of idols by showing forth their helplessness when they are +cried unto; and when Israel is in its most grievous strait and +therefore most prone to attach itself to whosoever helpeth it. He will +prove Himself at last by His power. Aye, thou hast said. Israel can +suffer little more without perishing. Therefore is redemption at hand." + +Rachel had turned her eyes away from the humiliation of Israel to its +exaltation--from fact to prophecy. She was looking with awed face at +Deborah. The prophetess went on: + +"Israel hath been a green tree, carried hither in seed and grown in the +wheat-fields of Mizraim. The herds and the flocks of the Pharaoh +gathered under its branches and were sheltered from the sun by day and +from the wolves by night. The early Pharaohs loved it, the later +Pharaohs used it and the last Pharaohs feared it. For it grew +exceedingly and overshadowed the wheat-fields and they said: 'It will +come between us and Ra who is our god and he will bless it instead of +the wheat. Let us cut it down and build us temples of its timber.' +But the Lord had planted the tree in seed and in its youth it grew +under the tendance of the Lord's hand. And in later years, though it +lent its shadow as a grove for the idols and temples of gods, the most +of it faced Heaven, and for that the Lord loves it still. The Pharaohs +have lopped its branches, unmolested, but lo! now that the ax strikes +at its girth, the Lord will uproot it and plant it elsewhere than in +Mizraim. But the soil will not relinquish it readily, for it hath +struck deep. There shall be a gaping wound in Mizraim where it stood +and all the land shall be rent with the violence of the parting." + +The prophetess paused, or rather her voice died away as if she actually +beheld the scene she foretold, and no more words were needed to make it +plain. Rachel's hands were clasped before her breast. "Sayest thou +these things in prophecy?" she asked finally in an eager half-whisper. +Deborah's eyes seemed to awaken. She looked at Rachel a moment and +answered with a nod. The girl's vision wandered slowly again toward +the camp, and the sorrowful unrest of Israel subdued the inspired +elation that had begun to possess her. Her face clouded once more. +Deborah touched her. + +"Trouble not thyself concerning these people. They go forth to labor, +but their burdens shall be lightened ere long. As for thee and me--" +she paused and looked up toward the eminence on which the military +headquarters were built. + +"As for thee and me--" Rachel urged her. Deborah motioned in the +direction she gazed. "Come, let us make ready," she said; "they are +beginning." + +The Egyptian masters over Israel of Pa-Ramesu were emerging from the +quarters. They were, almost uniformly, tall, slender and immature in +figure. Dressed in the foot-soldier's tunic and coif, they looked like +long-limbed youths compared with the powerful manhood of the sons of +Abraham. + +Among them, in white wool and enameled aprons, was a number of scribes, +without whom the official machinery of Egypt would have stilled in a +single revolution. + +The men advanced, sauntering, talking with one another idly, as if +awaiting authority to proceed. + +That came, presently, in the shape of an Egyptian charioteer. The +vehicle was heavy, short-poled, set low on two broad wheels of six +spokes, and built of hard wood, painted in wedge-shaped stripes of +green and red. The end was open, the front high and curved, the side +fitted with a boot of woven reeds for the ax and javelins of the +warrior. Axle and pole were shod with spikes of copper and the joints +were secured with tongues of bronze. The horses were bay, small, +short, glossy and long of mane and tail. The harness was simple, each +piece as broad as a man's arm, stamped and richly stained with many +colors. + +The man was an ideal soldier of Egypt. He was tall and +broad-shouldered, but otherwise lean and lithe. In countenance, he was +dark,--browner than most Egyptians, but with that peculiar ruddy +swarthiness that is never the negro hue. His duskiness was accentuated +by low and intensely black brows, and deep-set, heavy-lidded eyes. +Although his features were marked by the delicacy characteristic of the +Egyptian face, there was none of the Oriental affability to be found +thereon. One might expect deeds of him, but never words or wit. + +He wore the Egyptian smock, or kamis--of dark linen, open in front from +belt to hem, disclosing a kilt or shenti of clouded enamel. His +head-dress was the kerchief of linen, bound tightly across the forehead +and falling with free-flowing skirts to the shoulders. The sleeves +left off at the elbow and his lower arms were clasped with bracelets of +ivory and gold. His ankles were similarly adorned, and his sandals of +gazelle-hide were beaded and stitched. His was a somber and barbaric +presence. This was Atsu, captain of chariots and vice-commander over +Pa-Ramesu. + +His subordinates parted and gave him respectful path. He delivered his +orders in an impassive, low-pitched monotone. + +"Out with them, and mark ye, no lashes now. Leave the old and the +nursing mothers." + +The drivers disappeared into the narrow ways of the encampment, and +Atsu, with the scribes at his wheels, drove out where the avenue of +sphinxes would have led to the temple of Imhotep. Here was room for +three thousand. He alighted and, with the scribes who stood, tablets +in hand, awaited the coming of the Israelites. + +The camp emptied its dwellers in long wavering lines. Into the open +they came, slowly, and with downcast eyes, each with his remnant of a +tribe. Though the columns were in order, they were ragged with many +and varied statures--now a grown man, next to him a child, and then a +woman. Here were the red-bearded sons of Reuben, shepherds in skins +and men of great hardihood; the seafaring children of Zebulon; a +handful of submissive Issachar, and some of Benjamin, Levi, and Judah. + +"Do we not leave the aged behind?" the scribe asked, indicating Deborah +who came with Judah. + +"Give her her way," Atsu replied indifferently, and the scribe subsided. + +The lines advanced, filling up the open with moody humanity. A scribe +placed himself at the head of each column, and as the hindmost +Israelite emerged into the field the movement was halted. + +If an eye was lifted, it shifted rapidly under the stress of +desperation or suspense. If any spoke, it was the rough and +indifferent, whose words fell like blows on the distressed silence. +Many were visibly trembling, others had whitened beneath the tropical +tan, and the wondering faces of children, who feared without +understanding, turned now and again to search for their elders up and +down the lines. + +The drivers distributed themselves among the Israelites and each with a +scribe went methodically along the files choosing every tenth. + +"Get thee to my house and bring me my lists," Atsu said to the soldier +who was beginning on Judah. "I will look to thy work." The man +crossed his left hand to his right shoulder and hastened away. + +One by one nine Israelites dropped out of line as Atsu numbered them +and returned to camp. He touched the tenth. + +"Name?" the scribe asked. + +"Deborah," was the reply. + +Meanwhile Atsu walked rapidly down the line to Rachel. The Hebrews +fell out as he passed, and the relief on the faces of one or two was +mingled with astonishment. He paused before the girl, hesitating. +Words did not rise readily to his lips at any time; at this moment he +was especially at loss. + +"Thou canst abide here, in perfect security--with me," he said at last. +She shook her head. "I thank thee, my good master." + +"For thy sake, not mine own, I would urge thee," he continued with an +unnatural steadiness. "Thou canst accept of me the safety of marriage. +Nothing more shall I offer--or demand." + +The color rushed over the girl's face, but he went on evenly. + +"A part go to Silsilis, another to Syene, a third to Masaarah. If +thine insulter asks concerning thy whereabouts I shall not trouble +myself to remember. But what shall keep him from searching for +thee--and are there any like to defend thee, if he find thee, seeing I +am not there? And even if thou art securely hidden, thou hast never +dreamed how heavy is the life of the stone-pits, Rachel." + +"Keep Deborah here," the girl besought him, distressed. "She is old +and will perish--" + +"Nay, I will not send thee out alone," was the reply. "If thou goest, +so must she. But--hast thou no fear?" + +Once again she shook her head. + +"I trust to the triumph of the good," she replied earnestly. + +The sound of the scribe's approach behind him, moved him on. + +"Farewell," he said as he went, and added no more, for his composure +failed him. + +"The grace of the Lord God attend thee," she whispered. "Farewell." + +All the morning the work went on, and when the Egyptian mid-winter noon +lay warm on the flat country, three hundred Israelites were ready for +the long march to the Nile. They left behind them a camp oppressed +with that heart-soreness, which affliction added to old afflictions +brings,--the numb ache of sorrow, not its lively pain. Only Deborah, +the childless, and Rachel, the motherless, went with lighter +hearts,--if hearts can be light that go forward to meet the unknown +fortunes of bond-people. + +As they moved out, one of the older Hebrews in the forward ranks began +to sing, in a wild recitative chant, of Canaan and the freedom of +Israel. The elders in the line near him took it up and every face in +the long column lighted and was lifted in silent concord with the +singers. Atsu in his chariot, close by, scanned his lists absorbedly, +but one of the drivers hurried forward with a demand for silence. A +young Hebrew, who had tramped in agitated silence just ahead, worked up +into recklessness by the fervor of the singers, defied him. His voice +rang clear above the song. + +"Go to, thou bald-faced idolater! Israel will cease to do thy bidding +one near day." + +The driver forced his way into the front ranks and began to lay about +him with his knout. Instantly he was cast forth by a dozen brawny arms. + +"Mutiny!" he bawled. + +A group of drivers reinforced him at once. + +"By Bast," the foremost cried, as he came running. "The sedition of +the renegade, Mesu,[1] bears early fruit!" + +But the spirit of rebellion became contagious and the men of Israel +began to throw themselves out of line. At this moment, Atsu seemed to +become conscious of the riot and drove his horses between the +combatants. + +"Into ranks with you!" he commanded, pressing forward upon the Hebrews. +The men obeyed sullenly. + +"I have said there was to be no use of the knouts," he said sharply, +turning upon the drivers. "Forward with them!" + +The first driver muttered. + +"What sayest thou?" Atsu demanded. + +The man's mouth opened and closed, and his eyes drew up, evilly, but he +made no answer. + +"Forward with them," Atsu repeated, without removing his gaze from the +driver. + +Slowly, and now silently, the hereditary slaves of the Pharaoh moved +out of Pa-Ramesu. And of all the departing numbers and of all that +remained behind, none was more stricken in heart than Atsu, the stern +taskmaster over Israel. + + +[1] Moses. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +UNDER BAN OF THE RITUAL + +Holy Memphis, city of Apis, habitat of Ptah! + +Not idly was she called Menefer, the Good Place. Not anywhere in Egypt +were the winds more gentle, the heavens more benign, the environs more +august. + +To the south and west of her, the Libyan hills notched the horizon. To +the east the bald summits of the Arabian desert cut off the traveling +sand in its march on the capital. To the north was a shimmering level +that stretched unbroken to the sea. Set upon this at mid-distance, the +pyramids uplifted their stupendous forms. In the afternoon they +assumed the blue of the atmosphere and appeared indistinct, but in the +morning the polished sides that faced the east reflected the sun's rays +in dazzling sheets across the valley. + +Out of a crevice between the heights to the south the broad blue Nile +rolled, sweeping past one hundred and twenty stadia or sixteen miles of +urban magnificence, and lost itself in the shimmering sky-line to the +north. + +The city was walled on the north, west, and south, and its river-front +was protected by a mighty dike, built by Menes, the first king of the +first dynasty in the hour of chronological daybreak. Within were +orderly squares, cross-cut by avenues and relieved from monotony by +scattered mosaics of groves. Out of these shady demesnes rose the +great white temples of Ptah and Apis, and the palaces of the various +Memphian Pharaohs. + +About these, the bazaars and residences, facade above facade, and tier +upon tier, as the land sloped up to its center, shone fair and white +under a cloudless sun. + +Memphis was at the pinnacle of her greatness in the sixth year of the +reign of the divine Meneptah. She had fortified herself and resisted +the great invasion of the Rebu. Her generals had done battle with him +and brought him home, chained to their chariots. + +And after the festivities in celebration of her prowess, she laid down +pike and falchion, bull-hide shield and helmet, and took up the chisel +and brush, the spindle and loom once more. + +The heavy drowsiness of a mid-winter noon had depopulated her booths +and bazaars and quieted the quaint traffic of her squares. In the +shadows of the city her porters drowsed, and from the continuous wall +of houses blankly facing one another from either side of the streets, +there came no sound. Each household sought the breezes on the +balconies that galleried the inner walls of the courts, or upon the +pillared and canopied housetops. + +Memphis had eaten and drunk and, sheltered behind her screens, waited +for the noon to pass. + +Mentu, the king's sculptor, however, had not availed himself of the +hour of ease. He did not labor because he must, for his house stood in +the aristocratic portion of Memphis, and it was storied, galleried, +screened and topped with its breezy pavilion. Within the hollow space, +formed by the right and left wings of his house, the chamber of guests +to the front, and the property wall to the rear, was a court of +uncommon beauty. Palm and tamarisk, acacia and rose-shrub, jasmine and +purple mimosa made a multi-tinted jungle about a shadowy pool in which +a white heron stood knee-deep. There were long stretches of sunlit +sod, and walks of inlaid tile, seats of carved stone, and a single +small obelisk, set on a circular slab, marked with measures for +time--the Egyptian sun-dial. On every side were evidences of wealth +and luxury. + +So Mentu labored because he loved to toil. In a land languorous with +tropical inertia, an enthusiastic toiler is not common. For this +reason, Mentu was worth particular attention. He towered a palm in +height over his Egyptian brethren, and his massive frame was entirely +in keeping with his majestic stature. He was nearly fifty years of +age, but no sign of the early decay of the Oriental was apparent in +him. His was the characteristic refinement of feature that marks the +Egyptian countenance, further accentuated by self-content and some +hauteur. The idea of dignity was carried out in his dress. The kilt +was not visible, for the kamis had become a robe, long-sleeved, +high-necked and belted with a broad band of linen, encompassing the +body twice, before it was fastened with a fibula of massive gold. + +That he was an artisan noble was another peculiarity, but it was proof +of exceptional merit. He had descended from a long line of royal +sculptors, heightening in genius in the last three. His grandsire had +elaborated Karnak; his father had decorated the Rameseum, but Mentu had +surpassed the glory of his ancestors. In the years of his youth, side +by side with the great Rameses, he had planned and brought to +perfection the mightiest monument to Egyptian sculpture, the +rock-carved temple of Ipsambul. In recognition of this he had been +given to wife a daughter of the Pharaoh and raised to a rank never +before occupied by a king's sculptor. He was second only to the +fan-bearers, the most powerful nobles of the realm, and at par with the +market, or royal architect, who was usually chosen from among the +princes. And yet he had but come again to his own when he entered the +ranks of peerage. In the long line of his ancestors he counted a king, +and from that royal sire he had his stature. + +He sat before a table covered with tools of his craft, rolls of +papyrus, pens of reeds, pots of ink of various colors, horns of oil, +molds and clay images and vessels of paint. Hanging upon pegs in the +wooden walls of his work-room were saws and the heavier drills, chisels +of bronze and mauls of tamarisk, suspended by thongs of deer-hide. + +The sculptor, rapidly and without effort, worked out with his pen on a +sheet of papyrus the detail of a frieze. Tiny profile figures, quaint +borders of lotus and mystic inscriptions trailed after the swift reed +in multitudinous and bewildering succession. As he worked, a young man +entered the doorway from the court and, advancing a few steps toward +the table, watched the development of the drawings with interest. + +Those were the days of early maturity and short life. The Egyptian of +the Exodus often married at sixteen, and was full of years and ready to +be gathered to Osiris at fifty-five or sixty. The great Rameses lived +to the unheard-of age of seventy-seven, having occupied the throne +since his eleventh year. + +This young Egyptian, nearly eighteen, was grown and powerful with the +might of mature manhood. A glance at the pair at once established +their relationship as father and son. The features were strikingly +similar, the stature the same, though the young frame was supple and +light, not massive. + +The hair was straight, abundant, brilliant black and cropped midway +down the neck and just above the brows. There was no effort at +parting. It was dressed from the crown of the head as each hair would +naturally lie and was confined by a circlet of gold, the token of the +royal blood of his mother's house. The complexion was the hue of a +healthy tan, different, however, from the brown of exposure in that it +was transparent and the red in the cheek was dusky. The face was the +classic type of the race, for be it known there were two physiognomies +characteristic of Egypt. + +The forehead was broad, the brows long and delicately penciled, the +eyes softly black, very long, the lids heavy enough to suggest serenity +rather than languor. The nose was of good length, aquiline, the +nostril thin and sharply chiseled. The cut of the mouth and the warmth +of its color gave seriousness, sensitiveness and youthful tenderness to +the face. + +Egypt was seldom athletic. Though running and wrestling figured much +in the pastime of youths, the nation was languid and soft. However, +Seti the Elder demanded the severest physical exercise of his sons, and +Rameses II, who succeeded him, made muscle and brawn popular by +example, during his reign. Here, then, was an instance of +king-mimicking that was admirable. + +Originally the young man had been gifted with breadth of shoulder, +depth of chest, health and vigor. He would have been strong had he +never vaulted a pole or run a mile. To these advantages were added the +results of wise and thorough training, so wise, so thorough, that +defects in the national physique had been remedied. Thus, the calves +were stanch and prominent, whereas ancient Egypt was as flat-legged as +the negro; the body was round and tapered with proper athletic rapidity +from shoulder to heel, without any sign of the lank attenuation that +was characteristic of most of his countrymen. + +The suggestion of his presence was power and bigness, not the +good-natured size that is hulking and awkward, but bigness that is +elegant and fine-fibered and ages into magnificence. + +He wore a tunic of white linen, the finely plaited skirt reaching +almost to the knees. The belt was of leather, three fingers in breadth +and ornamented with metal pieces, small, round and polished. His +sandals were of white gazelle-hide, stitched with gold, and, by way of +ornament, he had but a single armlet, and a collar, consisting of ten +golden rings, depending by eyelets from a flexible band of the same +material. The metal was unpolished and its lack-luster red harmonized +wonderfully with the bronze throat it clasped. + +Diminutive Isis in profile had emerged part-way from the background of +papyrus, and the sculptor lifted his pen to sketch in the farther +shoulder as the law required. The young man leaned forward and +watched. But as the addition was made, giving to the otherwise shapely +little goddess an uncomfortable but thoroughly orthodox twist, he +frowned slightly. After a moment's silence he came to the bench. + +"Hast thou caught some great idea on the wing or hast thou the round of +actual labor to perform?" he asked. + +His attention thus hailed, the sculptor raised himself and answered: + +"Meneptah hath a temple to Set[1] in mind; indeed he hath stirred up +the quarries for the stone, I am told, and I am making ready, for I +shall be needed." + +The older a civilization, the smoother its speech. Age refines the +vowels and makes the consonants suave. They spoke easily, not hastily, +but as oil flows, continuously and without ripple. The younger voice +was deep, soft enough to have been wooing and as musical as a chant. + +"Would that the work were as probable as thou art hopeful," the young +man said with a sigh. + +"Out upon thee, idler!" was the warm reply. "Art thou come to vex me +with thy doubts and scout thy sovereign's pious intentions?" The young +man smiled. + +"Hath the sun shone on architecture or sculpture since Meneptah +succeeded to the throne?" he asked. + +Mentu's eyes brightened wrathfully but the young man laid a soothing +palm over the hand that gripped the reed. + +"I do not mock thee, father. Rather am I full of sympathy for thee. +Thou mindest me of a war-horse, stabled, with his battle-love +unsatisfied, hearing in every whimper of the wind a trumpet call. Nay, +I would to Osiris that the Pharaoh's intents were permanent." + +Somewhat mollified, Mentu put away the detaining hand and went on with +his work. Presently the young man spoke again. + +"I came to speak further of the signet," he said. + +"Aye, but what signet, Kenkenes?" + +"The signet of the Incomparable Pharaoh." + +"What! after three years?" + +"The sanctuary of the tomb is never entered and it is more than worth +the Journey to Tape[2] to search for the scarab again." + +"But you would search in vain," the sculptor declared. "Rameses has +reclaimed his own." + +Kenkenes shifted his position and protested. + +"But we made no great search for it. How may we know of a surety if it +be gone?" + +"Because of thy sacrilege," was the prompt and forcible reply. "Osiris +with chin in hand and a look of mystification on his brow, pondering +over the misdeeds of a soul! Mystification on Osiris! And with that, +thou didst affront the sacred walls of the royal tomb and call it the +Judgment of the Dead. Not one law of the sculptor's ritual but thou +hadst broken, in the sacrilegious fresco. Gods! I marvel that the +rock did not crumble under the first bite of thy chisel!" + +Mentu fell to his work again. While he talked a small ape entered the +room and, discovering the paint-pots, proceeded to decorate his person +with a liberal hand. At this moment Kenkenes became aware of him and, +by an accurately aimed lump of clay, drove the meddler out with a show +of more asperity than the offense would ordinarily excite. Meanwhile +the sculptor wetted his pen and, poising it over the plans, regarded +his drawings with half-closed eyes. Then, as if he read his words on +the papyrus he proceeded: + +"Thou wast not ignorant. All thy life hast thou had the decorous laws +of the ritual before thee. And there, in the holy precincts of the +Incomparable Pharaoh's tomb, with the opportunity of a lifetime at +hand, the skill of thy fathers in thy fingers, thou didst execute an +impious whim,--an unheard-of apostasy." He broke off suddenly, +changing his tone. "What if the priesthood had learned of the deed? +The Hathors be praised that they did not and that no heavier punishment +than the loss of the signet is ours." + +"But it may have caught on thy chisel and broken from its fastening. +Thou dost remember that the floor was checkered with deep black +shadows." + +"The hand of the insulted Pharaoh reached out of Amenti[3] and stripped +it off my neck," Mentu replied sternly. "And consider what I and all +of mine who come after me lost in that foolish act of thine. It was a +token of special favor from Rameses, a mark of appreciation of mine +art, and, more than all, a signet that I or mine might present to him +or his successor and win royal good will thereby." + +"That I know right well," Kenkenes interrupted with an anxious note in +his voice, "and for that reason am I possessed to go after it to Tape." + +The sculptor lifted a stern face to his son and said, with emphasis: +"Wilt thou further offend the gods, thou impious? It is not there, +and vex me no further concerning it." + +Kenkenes lifted one of his brows with an air of enforced patience, and +sauntered across the room to another table similarly equipped for +plan-making. But he did not concern himself with the papyrus spread +thereon. Instead he dropped on the bench, and crossing his shapely +feet before him, gazed straight up at the date-tree rafters and +palm-leaf interbraiding of the ceiling. + +Though the law of heredity is not trustworthy in the transmission of +greatness, Kenkenes was the product of three generations of heroic +genius. He might have developed the frequent example of decadence; he +might have sustained the excellence of his fathers' gift, but he could +not surpass them in the methods of their school of sculpture and its +results. There was one way in which he might excel, and he was born +with his feet in that path. His genius was too large for the limits of +his era. Therefore he was an artistic dissenter, a reformer with noble +ideals. + +Mimetic art as applied to Egyptian painting and sculpture was a curious +misnomer. Probably no other nation of the world at that time was so +devoted to it, and certainly no other people of equal advancement of +that or any other time so wilfully ignored the simplest rules of +proportion, perspective and form. The sculptor's ability to suggest +majesty and repose, and at the same time ignore anatomical +construction, was wonderful. To preserve the features and individual +characteristics of a model and obey the rules of convention was a feat +to be achieved only by an Egyptian. There was no lack of genius in +him, but he had been denied liberty of execution until he knew no other +forms but those his fathers followed generations before. + +All Egypt was but a padding that the structural framework of religion +supported. Science, art, literature, government, commerce, whatever +the member, it was built upon a bone of religion. The processes and +uses of sculpture were controlled by the sculptor's ritual and woe unto +him who departed therefrom in depicting the gods! The deed was +sacrilege. + +In the portrait-forms the limits were less severely drawn. There were +a dozen permissible attitudes, and, the characteristic features might +be represented with all fidelity; but there were boundaries that might +not be overstepped. The result was an artistic perversion that +well-nigh perpetrated a grotesque slander on the personal appearance of +the race. + +After the manner of Egyptians it was understood that Kenkenes was to +follow his father's calling, and ahead of him were years of labor laid +in narrow lines. If he rebelled, he incurred infinite difficulty and +opposition, and yet he could not wholly submit. He had been an apt and +able pupil during the long process of his instruction, but when the +moment of actual practice of his art arrived, he had rebelled. His +first work had been his last and, in the estimation of his father, had +entailed a grievous loss. Thereafter he had been limited to copying +the great sculptor's plans, the work of scribes and underlings. + +Thus, he had passed three years that chafed him because of their +comparative idleness and their implied rebuke. The pressure finally +became too great, and he began to weigh the matter of compromise. If +he could secretly satisfy his own sense of the beautiful he might +follow the ritual with grace. + +His cogitations, as he sat before his table, assumed form and purpose. + +Presently Mentu, raising his head, noted that the shadows were falling +aslant the court. With an interested but inarticulate remark, he +dropped his pen among its fellows in an earthenware tray, his plans +into an open chest, and went out across the court, entering an opposite +door. + +With his father's exit, Kenkenes shifted his position, and the +expression of deep thought grew on his face. After a long interval of +motionless absorption he sprang to his feet and, catching a wallet of +stamped and dyed leather from the wall, spread it open on the table. +Chisel, mallet, tape and knife, he put into it, and dropped wallet and +all into a box near-by at the sound of the sculptor's footsteps. + +The great artist reentered in court robes of creamy linen, stiff with +embroidery and gold stitching. + +"Har-hat passes through Memphis to-day on his way to Tape, where he is +to be installed as bearer of the king's fan on the right hand. He is +at the palace, and nobles of the city go thither to wait upon him." + +"The king was not long in choosing a successor to the lamented Amset," +Kenkenes observed. "Har-hat vaults loftily from the nomarchship of +Bubastis to an advisership to the Pharaoh." + +"Rather hath his ascent been slower than his deserts. How had the Rebu +war ended had it not been for Har-hat? He is a great warrior, hath won +honor for Egypt and for Meneptah. The army would follow him into the +jaws of Tuat,[4] and Rameses, the heir, need never take up arms, so +long as Har-hat commands the legions of Egypt. But how the warrior +will serve as minister is yet to be seen." + +"Who succeeds him over Bubastis?" + +"Merenra, another of the war-tried generals. He hath been commander +over Pa-Ramesu. Atsu takes his place over the Israelites." + +"Atsu?" Kenkenes mused. "I know him not." + +"He is a captain of chariots, and won much distinction during the Rebu +invasion. He is a native of Mendes." + +Left alone, Kenkenes crossed the court to the door his father had +entered and emerged later in a street dress of mantle and close-fitting +coif. He took up the wallet and quitted the room. Passing through the +intramural park and the chamber of guests, he entered the street. It +was a narrow, featureless passage, scarcely wide enough to give room +for a chariot. The brown dust had more prints of naked than of +sandaled feet, for most men of the young sculptor's rank went abroad in +chariots. + +Once out of the passage, he turned across the city toward the east. +Memphis had pushed aside her screens and shaken out her tapestries +after the noon rest and was deep in commerce once again. From the low +balconies overhead the Damascene carpets swung, lending festivity to +the energetic traffic below. The pillars of stacked ware flanking the +fronts of pottery shops were in a constant state of wreckage and +reconstruction; the stalls of fruiterers perfumed the air with crushed +and over-ripe produce; litters with dark-eyed occupants and fan-bearing +attendants stood before the doorways of lapidaries and booths of +stuffs; venders of images, unguents, trinkets and wines strove to +outcry one another or the poulterer's squawking stall. Kenkenes met +frequent obstructions and was forced to reduce his rapid pace. +Curricles and chariots and wicker chairs halted him at many crossings. +Carriers took up much of the narrow streets with large burdens; +notaries and scribes sat cross-legged on the pavement, surrounded by +their patrons and clients, and beggars and fortune-tellers strove for +the young man's attention. The crowd thickened and thinned and grew +again; pigeons winnowed fearlessly down to the roadway dust, and a +distant yapping of dogs came down the slanting street. At times +Kenkenes encountered whole troops of sacred cats that wandered about +the city, monarchs over the monarch himself. By crowding into doorways +he allowed these pampered felines to pass undisturbed. + +In the district near the lower edge of the city he met the heavy carts +of rustics, laden with cages of geese and crates of produce, moving +slowly in from the wide highways of the Memphian nome. The broad backs +of the oxen were gray with dust and their drivers were masked in grime. + +The smell of the river became insistent. In the open stalls the +fishmongers had their naked brood keeping the flies away from the stock +with leafy branches. The limits of Memphis ended precipitately at a +sudden slope. In the long descent to the Nile there were few permanent +structures. Half-way down were great lengths of high platform built +upon acacia piling. This was the flood-tide wharf, but it was used now +only by loiterers, who lay upon it to bask dog-like in the sun. The +long intervening stretch between the builded city and the river was +covered with boats and river-men. Fishers mending nets were grouped +together, but they talked with one another as if each were a furlong +away from his fellow. Freight bearers, emptying the newly-arrived +vessels of cargo, staggered up toward the city. Now and again sledges +laden with ponderous burdens were drawn through the sand by yokes of +oxen, oftener by scores of men, on whom the drivers did not hesitate to +lay the lash. + +River traffic was carried on far below the flood-tide wharf. Here the +long landings of solid masonry, covered with deep water four months of +the year, were lined with vessels. Between yard-arms hanging aslant +and over decks, glimpses of the Nile might be caught. It rippled +passively between its banks, for it was yet seven months before the +first showing of the June rise. Here were the frail papyrus bari, +constructed like a raft and no more concave than a long bow; the huge +cedar-masted cangias, flat-bottomed and slow-moving; the ancient dhow +with its shapeless tent-cabin aft; the ponderous cattle barges and +freight vessels built of rough-hewn logs; the light passenger skiffs; +and lastly, the sumptuous pleasure-boats. These were elaborate and +beautiful, painted and paneled, ornamented with garlands and sheaves of +carved lotus, and spread with sails, checkered and embroidered in many +colors. From these emerged processions of parties returning from +pleasure trips up the Nile. They came with much pomp and following, +asserting themselves and proceeding through paths made ready for them +by the obsequious laboring classes. + +Presently there approached a corps of servants, bearing bundles of +throw-sticks, nets, two or three fox-headed cats, bows and arrows, +strings of fish and hampers of fowl. Behind, on the shoulders of four +stalwart bearers, came a litter, fluttering with gay-colored hangings. +Beside it walked an Egyptian of high class. Suddenly the bearers +halted, and a little hand, imperious and literally aflame with jewels, +beckoned Kenkenes from the shady interior of the litter. + +He obeyed promptly. At another command the litter was lowered till the +poles were supported in the hands of the bearers. The curtains were +withdrawn, revealing the occupant--a woman. + +This, to the glory of Egypt! Woman was defended, revered, exalted +above her sisters of any contemporary nation. No haremic seclusion for +her; no semi-contemptuous toleration of her; no austere limits laid +upon her uses. She bared her face to the thronging streets; she +reveled beside her brother; she worshiped with him; she admitted no +subserviency to her lord beyond the pretty deference that it pleased +her to pay; she governed his household and his children; she learned, +she wrote, she wore the crown. She might have a successor but no +supplanter; an Egyptian of the dynasties before the Persian dominance +could have but one wife at a time; none but kings could be profligate, +openly. So, while Babylonia led her maidens to a market, while +Ethiopia ruled hers with a rod, while Arabia numbered hers among her +she-camels, Egypt gloried in national chivalry and spiritual love. + +This was the sentiment of the nation, by the lips of Khu-n-Aten, the +artist king: + +"Sweet love fills my heart for the queen; may she ever keep the hand of +the Pharaoh." + +Whatever Egypt's mode of worshiping Khem and Isis, nothing could set at +naught this clean, impulsive, sincere avowal. + +Here, then, openly and in perfect propriety was a woman abroad with her +suitor. + +She might have been eighteen years old, but there was nothing girlish +in her gorgeous beauty. She was a red rose, full-blown. + +Her robes were a double thickness of loose-meshed white linen, with a +delicate stripe of scarlet; her head-dress a single swathing of scarlet +gauze. She wore not one, but many kinds of jewels, and her anklets and +armlets tinkled with fringes of cats and hawks in carnelian. Her hair +was brilliant black and unbraided. Her complexion was transparent, and +the underlying red showed deeply in the small, full-lipped mouth; like +a stain in the cheeks; like a flush on the brow, and even faintly on +the dainty chin. Her eyes were large and black, with the amorous lid, +and lined with kohl beneath the lower lash. Her profile showed the +exquisite aquiline of the pure-blooded Egyptian. + +Aside from the visible evidences of charm there was an atmosphere of +femininity that permeated her immediate vicinity with a witchery little +short of enchantment. She was the Lady Ta-meri, daughter of Amenemhat, +nomarch[5] of Memphis. + +The Egyptian accompanying the litter was nearly thirty years of age. +He was an example of the other type of the race, differing from the +classic model of Kenkenes. The forehead retreated, the nose was long, +low, slightly depressed at the end; the mouth, thick-lipped; the eye, +narrow and almond-shaped; the cheek-bones, high; the complexion, dark +brown. Still, the great ripeness of lip, aggressive whiteness of teeth +and brilliance of eye made his face pleasant. He wore a shenti of +yellow, over it a kamis of white linen, a kerchief bound with a yellow +cord about his head, and white sandals. + +He was the nephew of the king's cup-bearer, who had died without issue +at Thebes during the past month. His elder brother had succeeded his +father to a high office in the priesthood, but he, Nechutes, was a +candidate for the honors of his dead uncle. + +Kenkenes gave the man a smiling nod and bent over the lady's fingers. + +"Fie!" was her greeting. "Abroad like the rabble, and carrying a +burden." She filliped the wallet with a pink-stained finger-nail. + +"Sit here," she commanded, patting the cushioned edge of the litter. + +The sculptor declined the invitation with a smile. + +"I go to try some stone," he explained. + +"Truly, I believe thou lovest labor," the lady asserted accusingly. +"Ah, but punishment overtakes thee at last. Behold, thou mightst have +gone with me to the marshes to-day, but I knew thou wouldst be as deep +in labor as a slave. And so I took Nechutes." + +Kenkenes shot an amused glance at her companion. + +"I would wager my mummy, Nechutes, that this is the first intimation +thou hast had that thou wert second choice," he said. + +"Aye, thou hast said," Nechutes admitted, his eyes showing a sudden +light. He had a voice of profound depth and resonance, that rumbled +like the purring of the king's lions. "And not a moment since she +swore that it was I who made her sun to move, and that Tuat itself were +sweet so I were there." + +"O Ma[6]," the lady cried, threatening him with her fan. "Thou +Defender of Truth, smite him!" + +Kenkenes laughed with delight. + +"Nay, nay, Nechutes!" he cried. "Thou dost betray thyself. Never +would Ta-meri have said anything so bald. Now, when she is moved to +give me a honeyed fact, she laps it with delicate intimation, layer on +layer like a lotus-bud. And only under the warm interpretation of my +heart will it unfold and show the gold within." + +Nechutes stifled a derisive groan, but the lady's color swept up over +her face and made it like the dawn. + +"Nay, now," she protested, "wherein art thou better than Nechutes, save +in the manner of telling thy calumny? But, Kenkenes," she broke off, +"thou art wasted in thy narrow realm. They need thy gallant tongue at +court." + +The young sculptor made soft eyes at her. + +"If I were a courtier," he objected, "I must scatter my small eloquence +among many beauties that I would liefer save for one." + +She appropriated the compliment at once. + +"Thou dost not hunger after even that opportunity," she pouted. "How +long hath it been since the halls of my father's house knew thy steps? +A whole moon!" + +"I feared that I should find Nechutes there," Kenkenes explained. + +During this pretty joust the brows of the prospective cup-bearer had +knitted blackly. The scowl was unpropitious. + +"Thou mayest come freely now," he growled, "The way shall be clear." + +The lady looked at him in mock fear. + +"Come, Nechutes," the sculptor implored laughingly, "be gracious. +Being in highest favor, it behooves thee to be generous." + +But the prospective cup-bearer refused to be placated. He rumbled an +order to the slaves and they shouldered the litter. + +Ta-meri made a pretty mouth at him, and turned again to Kenkenes. + +"Nay, Kenkenes," she said. "It was mine to say that the way shall be +clear--but I promise it." + +She nodded a bright farewell to him, and they moved away. The +sculptor, still smiling, continued down to the river. + +At the landing he engaged one of the numerous small boats awaiting a +passenger, and directed the clout-wearing boatman to drop down the +stream. + +Directly opposite his point of embarkation there were farm lands, +fertile and moist, extending inland for a mile. But presently the +frontier of the desert laid down a gray and yellow dead-line over which +no domestic plant might strike its root and live. + +But the arable tracts were velvet green with young grain, the verdant +level broken here and there by a rustic's hut, under two or three +close-standing palms. Even from the surface of the Nile the checkered +appearance of the country, caused by the various kinds of products, was +noticeable. Egypt was the most fertile land in the world. + +However, as the light bari climbed and dipped on the little waves +toward the north the Arabian hills began to approach the river. Their +fronts became abrupt and showed the edges of stratum on stratum of +white stone. About their bases were quantities of rubble and gray dust +slanting against their sides in slides and drifts. Across the +narrowing strip of fertility square cavities in rows showed themselves +in the white face of the cliffs. The ruins of a number of squat hovels +were barely discernible over the wheat. + +"Set me down near Masaarah," Kenkenes said, "and wait for me." The +boatman ducked his head respectfully and made toward the eastern shore. +He effected a landing at a bedding of masonry on which a wharf had once +been built. The rock was now over-run with riotous marsh growth. + +The quarries had not been worked for half a century. The thrifty +husbandman had cultivated his narrow field within a few feet of the +Nile, and the roadway that had once led from the ruined wharf toward +the hills was obliterated by the grain. + +Kenkenes alighted and struck through the wheat toward the pitted front +of the cliffs. Before him was a narrow gorge that debouched into the +great valley over a ledge of stone three feet in height. After much +winding the ravine terminated in a wide pocket, a quarter of a mile +inland. Exit from this cul-de-sac was possible toward the east by a +steep slope leading to the top of one of the interior ridges of the +desert. Kenkenes did not pause at the cluster of houses. The roofs +had fallen in and the place was quite uninhabitable. But he leaped up +into the little valley and followed it to its end. There he climbed +the sharp declivity and turned back in the direction he had come, along +the flank of the hill that formed the north wall of the gorge. The +summit of the height was far above him, and the slope was covered with +limestone masses. There had been no frost nor rain to disturb the +original rock-piling. Only the agencies of sand and wind had +disarranged the distribution on which the builders of the earliest +dynasty had looked. And this was weird, mysterious and labyrinthine. + +At a spot where a great deal of broken rock encumbered the ground, +Kenkenes unslung his wallet and tested the fragments with chisel and +mallet. It was the same as the quarry product--magnesium limestone, +white, fine, close-grained and easily worked. But it was broken in +fragments too small for his purpose. Above him were fields of greater +masses. + +"Now, I was born under a fortunate sign," he said aloud as he scaled +the hillside; "but I fear those slabs are too long for a life-sized +statue." + +On reaching them he found that those blocks which appeared from a +distance to weigh less than a ton, were irregular cubes ten feet high. + +He grumbled his disappointment and climbed upon one to take a general +survey of his stoneyard. At that moment his eyes fell on a block of +proper dimensions under the very shadow of the great cube upon which he +stood. It was in the path of the wind from the north and was buried +half its height in sand. + +Kenkenes leaped from his point of vantage with a cry of delight. + +"Nay, now," he exclaimed; "where in this is divine disfavor?" He +inspected his discovery, tried it for solidity of position and purity +of texture. Its location was particularly favorable to secrecy. + +It stood at the lower end of an aisle between great rocks. All view of +it was cut off, save from that position taken by Kenkenes when he +discovered it. A wall built between it and the north would bar the +sand and form a nook, wholly closed on two sides and partly closed at +each end by stones. All this made itself plain to the mind of the +young sculptor at once. With a laugh of sheer content, he turned to +retrace his steps and began to sing. + +Then was the harsh desolation of the hills startled, the immediate +echoes given unaccustomed sound to undulate in diminishing volume from +one to another. He sang absently, but his preoccupation did not make +his tones indifferent. For his voice was soft, full, organ-like, +flexible, easy with illimitable lung-power and ineffable grace. When +he ceased the silence fell, empty and barren, after that song's +unaudienced splendor. + + +[1] Set--the war-god. + +[2] Thebes. + +[3] Amenti--The realm of Death. + +[4] Tuat--The Egyptian Hades. + +[5] Nomarch--governor of a civil division called a nome. A high office. + +[6] Ma--The goddess of truth. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MESSENGER + +Mentu returned from the session at the palace, uncommunicative and +moody. When, after the evening meal, Kenkenes crossed the court to +talk with him, he found the elder sculptor feeding a greedy flame in a +brazier with the careful plans for the new temple to Set. Kenkenes +retired noiselessly and saw his father no more that night. + +The next day Mentu was bending over fresh sheets of papyrus, and when +his son entered and stood beside him he raised his head defiantly. + +"I have another royal obelisk to decorate," he said, fixing the young +man with a steady eye, "of a surety,--without doubt,--inevitably,--for +the thing is all but ready to be set up at On." + +"I am glad of that," Kenkenes replied gravely. "Let me make clean +copies of these which are complete." + +He gathered up the sheets and took his place at the opposite table. +Then ensued a long silence, broken only by the loud and restless +investigations of the omnipresent and unabashed ape. + +At last the elder sculptor spoke. + +"The eye of heaven must be unblinkingly upon the divine Meneptah," he +observed, as though he had but thought aloud. + +Kenkenes gazed at his father with the inquiry on his face that he did +not voice. The sculptor had risen from his bench and was searching a +chest of rolled plans near him. He caught his son's look and closed +his mouth on an all but spoken expression. Kenkenes continued to gaze +at him in some astonishment, and the elder man muttered to himself: + +"I like him not, though if Osiris should ask me why, I could not tell. +But he hath a too-ready smile, and by that I know he will twirl +Meneptah like a string about his finger." + +The eyes of the young man widened. "The new adviser?" he asked. + +"Even so," was the emphatic reply. + +Before Kenkenes could ask for further enlightenment a female slave +bowed in the doorway. + +"The Lady Senci sends thee greeting and would speak with thee. She is +at the outer portal in her curricle," she said, addressing Mentu. + +The great man sprang to his feet, glanced hurriedly at his ink-stained +fingers, at his robe, and then fled across the court into the door he +had entered to change his dress the day before. + +Kenkenes smiled, for Mentu had been a widower these ten Nile floods. + +The slave still lingered. + +"Also is there a messenger for thee, master," she said, bowing again. + +"So? Let him enter." + +The man whom the slave ushered in a few minutes later was old, spare +and bent, but he was alert and restless. His eyes were brilliant and +over them arched eyebrows that were almost white. He made a jerky +obeisance. + +"Greeting, son of Mentu. Dost thou remember me?" + +The young man looked at his visitor for a moment. + +"I remember," he said at last. "Thou art Ranas, courier to Snofru, +priest of On. Greeting and welcome to Memphis. Enter and be seated." + +"Many thanks, but mine errand is urgent. I have been a guest of my +son, who abideth just without Memphis, and this morning a messenger +came to my son's door. He had been sent by Snofru to Tape, but had +fallen ill on the river between On and Memphis. As it happened, the +house of my son was the nearest, and thither he came, in fever and +beyond traveling another rod. As the message he bore concerned the +priesthood, I went to Asar-Mut and I am come from him to thee. He bids +thee prepare for a journey before presenting thyself to him, at the +temple." + +Kenkenes frowned in some perplexity. + +"His command is puzzling. Am I to become a messenger for the gods?" + +"The first messenger was a nobleman," the old courier explained in a +conciliatory tone, "and the holy father spoke of thy fidelity and +despatch." + +"Mine uncle is gracious. Salute him for me and tell him I obey." + +The old man bowed once more and withdrew. + +When Kenkenes crossed the court a little time later he met his father. + +"The Lady Senci brings me news that makes me envious," Mentu began at +once, "and shames me because of thee!" + +Kenkenes lifted an expressive brow at this unexpected onslaught. "Nay, +now, what have I done?" + +"Nothing!" Mentu asserted emphatically; "and for that reason am I +wroth. The Lady Senci's nephew, Hotep, is the new chief of the royal +scribes." + +"I call that good tidings," Kenkenes replied, a cheerful note in his +voice, "and worth greeting with a health to Hotep. But thou must +remember, my father, that he is older than I." + +"How much?" the elder sculptor asked. + +"Three whole revolutions of Ra." + +The artist regarded his son scornfully for a moment. + +"The Lady Senci wishes me to prepare plans for the further elaboration +of her tomb," he went on, at last, "but the work on the obelisk may not +be laid aside. If I might trust you to go on with them, the Lady Senci +need not wait." + +"But I have, this moment, been summoned by my holy uncle, Asar-Mut, to +go on a journey, and I know not when I return," Kenkenes explained. + +Mentu gazed at him without comprehending. + +"A messenger on his way to Tape from Snofru was overtaken with +misfortune here, and Asar-Mut, getting word of it, sent for me," the +young man continued. "I can only guess that he wishes me to carry on +the message." + +"Humph!" the elder sculptor remarked. "Asar-Mut has kingly tastes. +The couriers of priests are not usually of the nobility. But get thee +gone." + +The pair separated and the young man passed into the house. The ape +under the bunch of leaves in a palm-top looked after him fixedly for a +moment, and then sliding down the tree, disappeared among the flowers. + +When, half an hour later, Kenkenes entered a cross avenue leading to a +great square in which the temple stood, he found the roadway filled +with people, crowding about a group of disheveled women. These were +shrieking, wildly tearing their hair, beating themselves and throwing +dust upon their heads. Kenkenes immediately surmised that there was +something more than the usual death-wail in this. + +He touched a man near him on the shoulder. + +"Who may these distracted women be?" he asked. + +"The mothers of Khafra and Sigur, and their women." + +"Nay! Are these men dead? I knew them once. + +"They are by this time. They were to be hanged in the dungeon of the +house of the governor of police at this hour," the man answered with +morbid relish in his tone. Kenkenes looked at him in horror. + +"What had they done?" he asked. The man plunged eagerly into the +narrative. + +"They were tomb robbers and robbed independently of the brotherhood of +thieves.[1] They refused to pay the customary tribute from their spoil +to the chief of robbers, and whatsoever booty they got they kept, every +jot of it. Innumerable mummies were found rifled of their gold and +gems, and although the chief of robbers and the governor of police +sought and burrowed into every den in the Middle country, they could +not find the missing treasure. Then they knew that the looting was not +done by any of the licensed robbers. So all the professional thieves +and all the police set themselves to seek out the lawless plunderers." + +"Humph!" interpolated Kenkenes expressively. + +"Aye. And it was not long with all these upon the scent until Khafra +and Sigur were discovered coming forth from a tomb laden with spoil, +and in the struggle which ensued they did murder. But the constabulary +have not found the rest of the booty, though they made great search for +it and may have put the thieves to torture. Who knows? They do dark +things in the dungeon under the house of the governor of police." + +"And so they hanged them speedily," said Kenkenes, desirous of ending +the grisly tale. + +"And so they hanged them. I could not get in to see, and these +screaming mothers attracted me, so I am here. But my neighbor's son is +a friend of the jailer, and I shall know yet how they died." + +But Kenkenes was stalking off toward the temple, his shoulders lifted +high with disgust. + +"O, ye inscrutable Hathors," he exclaimed finally; "how ye have +disposed the fortunes of four friends! Two of us hanged, a third in +royal favor, a fourth an--an--an offender against the gods." + +Presently the avenue opened into the temple square. With reverential +hand Memphis put back her dwellings and her bazaars, that profane life +might not press upon the sacred precincts of her mighty gods. Here was +a vast acreage, overhung with the atmosphere of sanctity. The grove of +mysteries was there, dark with profound shadow, and silent save for a +lonesome bird song or the suspirations of the wind. The great pool in +its stone basin reflected a lofty canopy of sunlit foliage, and the +shaggy peristyle of palm-tree trunks. + +The shadow of the great structure darkened its approaches before it was +clearly visible through the grove. The devotee entered a long avenue +of sphinxes--fifty pairs lining a broad highway paved with polished +granite flagging. + +At its termination the two truncated pyramids that formed the entrance +to the temple towered upward, two hundred feet of massive masonry. +Egypt had dismantled a dozen mountains to build two. + +When he reached the gateway that opened like a tunnel between the +ponderous pylons, he was delayed some minutes waiting till the porter +should admit him through the wicket of bronze. At last, a lank youth, +the son of the regular keeper, appeared, and, with an inarticulate +apology, bade him enter. + +Within the overarching portals he was met by a novice, a priest of the +lowest orders, to whom he stated his mission. With a sign to the young +man to follow, the priest passed through the porch into the inner court +of the temple. This was simply an immense roofless chamber. Its sides +were the outer walls of the temple proper, reinforced by stupendous +pilasters and elaborated with much bas-relief and many intaglios. The +ends were formed by the inner pylons of the porch and outer pylons of +the main temple. The latter were guarded by colossal divinities. Down +the center of the court was a second aisle of sphinxes. They had +entered this when the priest, with a startled exclamation, sprang +behind one of the recumbent monsters in time to avoid the frolicsome +salutation of an ape. + +"Anubis! Mut, the Mother of Darkness, lends you her cloak! Out!" +Kenkenes cried, striking at his pet. The wary animal eluded the blow +and for a moment revolved about another sphinx, pursued by his master, +and then fled like a phantom out of the court by the path he came. By +this time the priest had emerged from his refuge and was attempting to +prevent the young man's interference with the will of the ape. + +"Nay, nay; I am sorry!" the priest exclaimed as Anubis disappeared. +"It is an omen. Toth[2] visiteth Ptah; Wisdom seeketh Power! Came he +by divine summons or did he seek the great god? It is a problem for +the sorcerers and is of ominous import!" + +"The pestiferous creature followed me unseen from the house," Kenkenes +explained, rather flushed of countenance. "To me it is an omen that +the idler who keeps the gate is not vigilant." + +The priest shook his head and led the way without further words into +the temple. Here the young sculptor was conducted through a wilderness +of jacketed columns, over pavements that rang even under sandaled feet, +to the center of a vast hall. The priest left him and disappeared +through the all-enveloping twilight into the more sacred part of the +temple. + +In a moment, Asar-Mut, high priest to Ptah, appeared, approaching +through the dusk. He wore the priestly habiliments of spotless linen, +and, like a loose mantle, a magnificent leopard-skin, which hung by a +claw over the right shoulder and, passing under the left arm, was +fastened at the breast by a medallion of gold and topaz. He was a +typical Egyptian, but thinner of lip and severer of countenance than +the laity. The wooden dolls tumbled about by the children of the realm +were not more hairless than he. His high, narrow head was ghastly in +its utter nakedness. + +Kenkenes bent reverently before him and was greeted kindly by the +pontiff. + +"Hast thou guessed why I sent for thee?" he asked at once. + +"I have guessed," Kenkenes replied, "but it may be wildly." + +"Let us see. I would have thee carry a message for the brotherhood." + +Kenkenes inclined his head. + +"Good. Be thy journey as quick as thy perception. I ask thy pardon +for laying the work of a temple courier upon thy shoulders, but the +message is of such import that I would carry it myself were I as young +and unburdened with duty as thou." + +"I am thy servant, holy Father, and well pleased with the opportunity +that permits me to serve the gods." + +"I know, and therefore have I chosen thee. My trusted courier is dead; +the others are light-minded, and Tape is in the height of festivity. +They might delay--they might be lured into forgetting duty, and," the +pontiff lowered his voice and drew nearer to Kenkenes, "and there are +those that may be watching for this letter. A nobleman would not be +thought a messenger. Thou dost incur less danger than the +clout-wearing runner for the temple." + +A light broke over Kenkenes. + +"I understand," he said. + +"Go, then, by private boat at sunset, and Ptah be with thee. Make all +speed." He put a doubly wrapped scroll into Kenkenes' hands. "This is +to be delivered to our holy Superior, Loi, priest of Amen. Farewell, +and fail not." + +Kenkenes bowed and withdrew. + +It was long before sunset, and he had an unfulfilled promise in mind. +He crossed the square thoughtfully and paused by the pool in its +center. The surface, dark and smooth as oil, reflected his figure and +face faithfully and to his evident satisfaction. He passed around the +pool and walked briskly in the direction of another narrow passage +lined by rich residences. + +He knocked at a portal framed by a pair of huge pilasters, which +towered upward, and, as pillars, formed two of the colonnade on the +roof. A portress admitted him with a smile and led him through the +sumptuously appointed chamber of guests into the intramural park. +There she indicated a nook in an arbor of vines and left him. + +With a silent foot he crossed the flowery court and entered the bower. +The beautiful dweller sat in a deep chair, her little feet on a carved +footstool, a silver-stringed lyre tumbled beside it. She was alone and +appeared desolate. When the tall figure of the sculptor cast a shadow +upon her she looked up with a little cry of delight. + +"Oh," she exclaimed, "a god led thee hither to save me from the +solitude. It is a moody monster not catalogued in the list of +terrors." She thrust the lyre aside with her sandal and pushed the +footstool, only a little, away from her. + +"Sit there," she commanded. Kenkenes obeyed willingly. He drew off +his coif and tossed it aside. + +"Thou seest I am come in the garb of labor," he confessed. + +"I see," she answered severely. "Am I no longer worthy the robe of +festivity?" + +"Ah, Ta-meri, thou dost wrong me," he said. "Chide me, but impugn me +not. Nay, I am on my way to Tape. I was summoned hurriedly and am +already dismissed upon mine errand, but I could not use myself so ill +as to postpone my visit for eighteen days." + +She jeered at him prettily. + +"To hear thee one would think thou hadst been coming as often as +Nechutes." + +"How often does Nechutes come?" + +"Every day." + +"Of late?" he asked, with a laugh in his eyes. + +"Nay," she answered sulkily. "Not since the day--that day!" + +Kenkenes was silent for a moment. Then he put his elbow on the arm of +her chair and leaned his head against his hand. The attitude brought +him close to her. + +"All these days," he said at length, "he has been unhappy among the +happy and the unhappiest among the sad. He has summoned the shuddering +Pantheon, to hear him vow eternal unfealty to thee, Ta-meri--and lo! +while they listened he begged their most potent charm to hold thee to +him still. Poor Nechutes!" + +"Thou dost treat it lightly," she reproached him, her eyes veiled, "but +it is of serious import to--to Nechutes." + +"Nay, I shall hold my tongue. I efface myself and intercede for him, +and thou dost call it exulting. And when I am fallen from thy favor +there will be none to plead my cause, none to hide her misty eyes with +contrite lashes." + +"Mine eyes are not misty," she retorted. + +"Thou hast said," he admitted, in apology. "It was not a happy term. +I meant bejeweled with repentant dew." + +She shook her little finger at him. + +"If thou dost persist in thy calumny of me, thou mayest come to test +thy dismal augury," she warned. + +He dropped his eyes and his mouth drooped dolorously. + +"I come for comfort, and I get Nechutes and all the unpropitious +possibilities that his name suggests." + +"Comfort? Thou, in trouble? Thou, the light-hearted?" she laughed. + +"Nay; I am discontented, but I might as well hope to heave the skies +away with my shoulders as to rebel against mine oppression. So I came +to be petted into submission." + +"Nay, dost thou hear him?" the lady cried. "And he came, because he +was sure he would get it!" + +"And he will go away because the Lady Ta-meri means he shall not have +it," he exclaimed. He reached toward his coif and immediately a +panic-stricken little hand stayed him. + +"Nay," she said softly. "I was but retaliating. Hast thou not plagued +me, and may I not tease thee a little in revenge? Say on." + +"My--but now I bethink me, I ought not to tell thee. It savors of that +which so offends thy nice sense of gentility--labor," he said, sinking +back in his easy attitude again. + +"Fie, Kenkenes," she said. "Hath some one put thy slavish love of toil +under ban? Does that oppress thee?" He reproved her with a pat on the +nearest hand. + +"The king toils; the priests toil; the powers of the world labor. None +but the beautiful idle may be idle, and that for their beauty's sake. +Nay, it is not that I may not work, but I may not work as I wish and I +am heart-sick therefore." + +His last words ended in a tone of genuine dejection. His eyes were +fixed on the grass of the nook and his brows had knitted slightly. The +expression was a rare one for his face and in its way becoming--for the +moment at least. The hand he had patted drew nearer, and at last, +after a little hesitancy, was laid on his black hair. He lifted his +face and took cheer, from the light in her eyes, to proceed. + +"Since I may speak," he began, "I shall. Ta-meri, thou knowest that as +a sculptor I work within limits. The stature of mine art must crouch +under the bounds of the ritual. It is not boasting if I say that I +see, with brave eyes, that Egypt insults herself when she creates +horrors in stone and says, 'This is my idea of art.' And these things +are not human; neither are they beasts--they are grotesques that verge +so near upon a semblance of living things as to be piteous. They +thwart the purpose of sculpture. Why do we carve at all, if not to +show how we appear to the world or the world appears to us? Now for my +rebellion. I would carve as we are made; as we dispose ourselves; aye, +I would display a man's soul in his face and write his history on his +brow. I would people Egypt with a host of beauty, grace and +naturalness--" + +"Just as if they were alive?" Ta-meri inquired with interest. + +"Even so--of such naturalness that one could guess only by the hue of +the stone that they did not breathe." + +The lady shrugged her shoulders and laughed a little. + +"But they do not carve that way," she protested. "It is not sculpture. +Thou wouldst fill the land with frozen creatures--ai!" with another +little shrug. "It would be haunted and spectral. Nay, give me the old +forms. They are best." + +Kenkenes fairly gasped with his sudden descent from earnest hope to +disappointment. A flood of half-angry shame dyed his face and the +wound to his sensibilities showed its effect so plainly that the beauty +noted it with a sudden burst of compunction. + +"Of a truth," she added, her voice grown wondrous soft, "I am full of +sympathy for thee, Kenkenes. Nay, look up. I can not be happy if thou +art not." + +"That suffices. I am cheered," he began, but the note of sarcasm in +his voice was too apparent for him to permit himself to proceed. He +caught up the lyre, and drawing up a diphros--a double seat of fine +woods--rested against it and began to improvise with an assumption of +carelessness. Ta-meri sank back in her chair and regarded him from +under dreamy lids--her senses charmed, her light heart won by his +comeliness and talent. Kenkenes became conscious of her inspection, at +last, and looked up at her. His eyes were still bright with his recent +feeling and the hue in his cheeks a little deeper. The admiration in +her face became so speaking that he smiled and ran without pausing into +one of the love-lyrics of the day. Breaking off in its midst, he +dropped the lyre and said with honest apology in his voice: + +"I crave thy pardon, Ta-meri. What right had I to weight thee with my +cares! It was selfish, and yet--thou art so inviting a confidante, +that it is not wholly my fault if I come to seek of thee, my oldest and +sweetest friend, the woman comfort that was bereft me with my rightful +comforter." + +"Neither mother nor sister nor lady-love," she mused. He nodded, but +the slight interrogative emphasis caught him, and he looked up at her. +He nodded again. + +"Nay, nor lady-love, thanks to the luck of Nechutes." + +"Nechutes is no longer lucky," she said deliberately. + +"No matter," Kenkenes insisted. "I shall be gone eighteen days, and +his luck will have changed before I can return." + +"Thine auguries seem to please thee," she pouted. + +He put the back of her jeweled hand against his cheek. + +"Nay, I but comfort thee at the sacrifice of mine own peace." + +"A futile sacrifice." + +"What!" + +"A futile sacrifice!" + +"Ah, Ta-meri, beseech the Goddess Ma to forget thy words!" he cried in +mock horror. She tossed her head, and instantly he got upon his feet, +catching up his coif as he did so. + +"Come, bid me farewell," he said putting out his hand, "and one of +double sweetness, for I doubt me much if Nechutes will permit a welcome +when I return." + +"Nechutes will not interfere in mine affairs," she said, as she rose. + +"Nay, I shall know if that be true when I return," he declared. + +She stamped her foot. + +"Fie!" he laughed. "Already do I begin to doubt it." + +She turned from him and kept her face away. Kenkenes went to her and, +taking both her hands in his, drew her close to him. She did not +resist, but her face reproached him--not for what he was doing, but for +what he had done. With his head bent, he looked down into her eyes for +a moment. Her red mouth with its sulky pathos was almost irresistible. +But he only pressed one hand to his lips. + +"I must wait until I return," he said from the doorway, and was gone. + +On the broad bosom of the Nile at sunset, four strong oarsmen were +speeding him swiftly up to Thebes. Off the long wharves at the +southernmost limits of the city, the rapid boat overtook and passed +low-riding, slowly moving stone-barges laden with quarry slaves. The +unwieldy craft progressed heavily, nearer and within the darkening +shadow of the Arabian hills. Kenkenes watched them as long as they +were in sight, an unwonted pity making itself felt in his heart. For +even in the dusk he distinguished many women and the immature figures +of children; and none knew the quarry life better than he, who was a +worker in stone. + + + +[1] In ancient Egypt burglary was reduced to a system and governed by +law. The chief of robbers received all the spoil and to him the +victimized citizen repaired and, upon payment of a certain per cent. of +the value of the object stolen, received his property again. The +original burglar and the chief of robbers divided the profits. This +traffic was countenanced in Egypt until the country passed into British +hands. + +[2] The ape was sacred to and an emblem of Toth, the male deity of +Wisdom and Law. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +THE PROCESSION OF AMEN + +Thebes Diospolis, the hundred-gated, was in holiday attire. The great +suburb to the west of the Nile had emptied her multitudes into the +solemn community of the gods. Besides her own inhabitants there were +thousands from the entire extent of the Thebaid and visitors even from +far-away Syene and Philae. It was an occasion for more than ordinary +pomp. The great god Amen was to be taken for an outing in his ark. + +Every possible manifestation of festivity had been sought after and +displayed. The air was a-flutter with party-colored streamers. +Garlands rioted over colossus, peristyle, obelisk and sphinx without +conserving pattern or moderation. The dromos, or avenue of sphinxes, +was carpeted with palm and nelumbo leaves, and copper censers as large +as caldrons had been set at equidistance from one another, and an +unceasing reek of aromatics drifted up from them throughout the day. + +For once the magnificence of the wondrous city of the gods was set down +from its usual preeminence in the eyes of the wondering spectator, and +the vastness of the multitude usurped its place. The bari of Kenkenes +seeking to round the island of sand lying near the eastern shore +opposite the village of Karnak, met a solid pack of boats. The young +sculptor took in the situation at once, and, putting about, found a +landing farther to the north. There he made a portage across the flat +bar of sand to the arm of quiet water that separated the island from +the eastern shore. Crossing, he dismissed his eager and excited +boatmen and struck across the noon-heated valley toward the temple. +The route of the pageant could be seen from afar, cleanly outlined by +humanity. It extended from Karnak to Luxor and, turning in a vast loop +at the Nile front, countermarched over the dromos and ended at the +tremendous white-walled temple of Amen. Between the double ranks of +sightseers there was but chariot room. The side Kenkenes approached +sloped sharply from the dromos toward the river, and the rearmost +spectators had small opportunity to behold the pageant. The multitude +here was less densely packed. Kenkenes joined the crowd at this point. + +Here was the canaille of Thebes. + +They wore nothing but a kilt of cotton--or as often, only a cincture +about the loins, and their lean bodies were blackened by the terrible +sun of the desert. They were the apprentices of paraschites,[1] +brewers, professional thieves, slaves and traffickers in the unclean +necessities of a great city, and only their occasional riots, or such +events as this, brought them into general view of the upper classes. +They had nothing in common with the gentry, whom they were willing to +recognize as creatures of a superior mold. Among themselves there were +established castes, and members of each despised the lower and hated +the upper. Kenkenes slackened his pace when he recognized the +character of these spectators, and after hesitating a moment, he hung +the flat wallet containing the message around his neck inside his kamis +and pushed on. Every foot of progress he essayed was snarlingly +disputed until the rank of the aggressive stranger was guessed by his +superior dress, when he was given a moody and ungracious path. But he +finally met an immovable obstacle in the shape of a quarrel. + +The stage of hostilities was sufficiently advanced to be menacing, and +the young sculptor hesitated to ponder on the advisability of pressing +on. While he waited, several deputies of the constabulary, +methodically silencing the crowd, came upon these belligerents in turn +and belabored the foremost into silence. The act decided the young +man. The feelings of the rabble were now in a state sufficiently +warlike to make them forget their ancient respect for class and turn +savagely upon him, should he show any desire to force his way through +their lines. Therefore he gave up his attempt to reach the temple and +made up his mind to remain where he was. At that moment, several +gorgeous litters of the belated wealthy rammed a path to the very front +and were set down before the rabble. Kenkenes seized upon their +advance to proceed also, and, dropping between the first and second +litter, made his way with little difficulty to the front. With the +complacency of a man that has rank and authority on his side he turned +up the roadway and continued toward the temple. He was halted before +he had proceeded ten steps. A litter richly gilded and borne by four +men, came pushing through the crowd and was deposited directly in his +path. + +But for the unusual appearance of the bearers, Kenkenes might have +passed around the conveyance and continued. Instead, he caught the +contagious curiosity of the crowd and stood to marvel. The men were +stalwart, black-bearded and strong of feature, and robed in no Egyptian +garb. They were draped voluminously in long habits of brown linen, +fringed at the hem, belted by a yellow cord with tasseled ends. The +sleeves were wide and showed the wristbands of a white under-garment. +The head-dress was a brown kerchief bound about the brow with a cord, +also yellow. + +While Kenkenes examined them in detail, a long, in-drawn breath of +wonder from the circle of spectators caused him to look at the +alighting owner of the litter. + +He took a backward step and halted, amazed. + +Before him was a woman of heroic proportions, taller, with the +exception of himself, than any man in the crowd. Upon her, at first +glance, was to be discerned the stamp of great age, yet she was as +straight as a column and her hair was heavy and midnight-black. Hers +was the Semitic cast of countenance, the features sharply chiseled, but +without that aggressiveness that emphasizes the outline of a withered +face. Every passing year had left its mark on her, but she had grown +old not as others do. Here was flesh compromising with age--accepting +its majesty, defying its decay--a sublunar assumption of immortality. +There was no longer any suggestion of femininity; the idea was dread +power and unearthly grace. Of such nature might the sexless archangels +partake. + +"Holy Amen!" one of the awed bystanders exclaimed in a whisper to his +neighbor. "Who is this?" + +"A princess from Punt," [2] the neighbor surmised. + +"A priestess from Babylon," another hazarded. + +"Nay, ye are all wrong," quavered an old man who had been looking at +the new-comers under the elbows of the crowd. "She is an Israelite." + +"Thou hast a cataract, old man," was the scornful reply from some one +near by. "She is no slave." + +"Aye," went on the unsteady voice, "I know her. She was the favorite +woman of Queen Neferari Thermuthis. She has not been out of the Delta +where her people live since the good queen died forty years ago. She +must be well-nigh a hundred years old. Aye, I should know her by her +stature. It is of a truth the Lady Miriam." + +At the sound of his mistress' name one of the bearers turned and shot a +sharp glance at the speaker. Instantly the old man fell back, saying, +as a sneer of contempt ran through the rabble at the intelligence his +words conveyed: "Anger them not. They have the evil eye." + +Kenkenes had guessed the nationality of the strangers immediately, but +had doubted the correctness of his surmise, because of their noble +mien. If he suffered any disappointment in hearing proof of their +identity, it was immediately nullified by the joy his artist-soul took +in the stately Hebrew woman. He forgot the mission that urged him to +the temple and, permitting the shifting, restless crowd to surround +him, he lingered, thinking. This proud disdain must mark his goddess +of stone in the Arabian hills, this majesty and power; but there must +be youth and fire in the place of this ancient calm. + +A porter that stood beside him, emboldened by barley beer and the +growing disapproval among the on-lookers, cried: + +"Ha! by the rags of my fathers, she outshines her masters, the +brickmaking hag!" + +Kenkenes, who towered over the ruffian, became possessed of a sudden +and uncontrollable indignation. He pecked the man on the head with the +knuckle of his forefinger, saying in colloquial Egyptian: + +"Hold thy tongue, brawler, nor presume to flout thy betters!" + +The stately Israelite, who had taken no notice of any word against her, +now turned her head toward Kenkenes and slowly inspected him. He had +no opportunity to guess whether her gaze was approving, for the crowd +about him, grown weary of waiting, had become quarrelsome and was +loudly resenting his defense of the Hebrews. The porter, supported by +several of his brethren, was already menacing the young sculptor when +some one shouted that the procession was in sight. + +From his position Kenkenes commanded a long view of the street that +declined sharply toward the river. As yet there was nothing to be seen +of the pageant, but the dense crowds far down the highway swayed +backward from the narrow path between them. Presently, scantily-clad +runners were distinguished coming in a slow trot between the +multitudes. The lane widened before the swing of their maces and there +were cries of alarm as the spectators in the middle were pressed +between the retreating forward ranks and the immovable rear. Running +water-bearers pursued the couriers with gurglets, sprinkling the way. +Directly after these, slim bare-limbed youths came in a rapid pace +strewing the path with flowers and palm-leaves. By this time the +intermittent sound of music had grown insistent and continuous. Solemn +bodies of priests approached, series after series of the shaven, +white-robed ministers of Amen. The murmur had grown to an uproar. The +wild clamor of trumpet, pipe, cymbal and sistrum, with the long drone +of the arghool as undertone, drifted by. The upper orders of priests +followed in the vibrating wake of the musicians. Then came Loi, +high-priest to the patron god of Thebes, walking alone, his ancient +figure most pitifully mocked by the richness of his priestly robes. + +After him the great god, Amen, in his ark. + +The air was rent with acclaim. The crowd was too dense for any one to +prostrate himself, but every Egyptian, potentate or slave, assumed as +nearly as possible the posture of humility. Kenkenes bent reverently, +but he lifted his eyes and looked long at the passing ark. Six priests +bore it upon their shoulders. It was a small boat, elaborately carved, +and the cabin in the center--the retreat of the deity--was picketed +with a cordon of sacred images. The entire feretory was overlaid with +gold and crusted with gems. + +Mentu, his father, had planned one for Ptah, and a noble work it +was,--quite equal to this, Kenkenes thought. + +His artistic deliberations were interrupted by an angry tone in the +clamor about him. The Israelites had called out a demonstration of +contempt before, and he guessed at once that they had further +displeased the rabble. It was even as he had thought. The four +bearers with folded arms contemplated the threatening crowd with a +sidelong gaze of contempt. The stately Israelite stood in a dream, her +brilliant eyes fixed in profound preoccupation on the distance. +Kenkenes knew by the present attitude of the group that they had made +no obeisance to Amen. Hence the mutterings among the faithful. Few +had seen the offense at first, but the demonstration spread +nevertheless, and assumed ominous proportions. + +"Nay, now," Kenkenes thought impatiently, "such impiety is foolhardy." +But he drifted into the group of Hebrews and stood between the woman of +Israel and her insulters. The bearers glanced at him, at one another, +and closed up beside him, but he had eyes only for the majestic +Israelite. Not till he saw her bend with singular grace did he look +again on the pageant, interested to know what had won her homage. + +She had done obeisance before the crown prince of Egypt. He stood in a +sumptuous chariot drawn by white horses and driven by a handsome +charioteer. The princely person was barely visible for the pair of +feather fans borne by attendants that walked beside him. Through +continuous cheering he passed on. Seti, the younger, followed, driving +alone. His eyes wandered in pleased wonder over the multitude which +howled itself hoarse for him. + +Close behind him was a chariot of ebony drawn by two plunging, +coal-black horses. A robust Egyptian, who shifted from one foot to the +other and talked to his horses continually, drove therein alone. As he +approached, the Hebrew woman raised herself so suddenly that one of the +nervous animals side-stepped affrighted. The swaggering Egyptian, with +a muttered curse, struck at her with his whip. The four bearers sprang +forward, but she quieted them with a few words in Hebrew. Reentering +her litter she was borne away, while the Thebans were still lost in the +delights of the procession. + +In the few strange words of the woman of Israel, Kenkenes had caught +the name of Har-hat. This then was the bearer of the king's fan--this +insulter of age and womanhood. And the words of Mentu seemed very +fitting,--"I like him not." + +The Thebans were in raptures. The splendors of the pageant had far +surpassed their expectations. Priests, soldiers and officials came in +companies, rank upon rank, of exalted and ornate dignity. Chariots and +horses shone with gilding, polished metal and gay housings, while the +marching legions clanked with pike and blade and shield. Now that the +chief luminaries of the procession had passed, the rich and lofty +departed with a great show of indifference to the rest of the parade. +But the humbler folk, all unlearned in the art of assumption, had not +reached that nice point of culture, and lingered to see the last +foot-soldier pass. + +Kenkenes, urged by his mission, was departing with the rich and lofty, +when his attention was attracted by the chief leading the section of +royal scribes now passing. His was a compact, plump figure, amply +robed in sheeny linen, and he balanced himself skilfully in his light +shell of a chariot, which bumped over the uneven pavement. He was not +a brilliant mark in the long parade, but something other than his mere +appearance made him conspicuous. Behind him, walking at a respectful +distance, was his corps of subordinates--all mature, many of them aged, +but the years of their chief were fewer than those of the youngest +among them. From the center of the crowd his face appeared boyish, and +the multitude hailed him with delight. But the crown prince himself +was not more unmoved by their acclaim. His silent dignity, +misunderstood, brought forth howls of genuine pleasure, and groups of +young noblemen, out of the great college of Seti I, saluted him by +name, adding thereto exalted titles in good-natured derision. + +"Hotep!" ejaculated Kenkenes aloud, catching the name from the lips of +the students. "By Apis, he is the royal scribe!" + +Not until then had he realized the extent of his friend's exaltation. + +He turned again toward the temple, walking between the crowds and the +marching soldiers, indifferent to the shouts of the spectators--lost in +contemplation. But the procession moved more swiftly than he and the +last rank passed him with half his journey yet to complete. Instantly +the vast throng poured out into the way behind the rearmost soldier and +swallowed up the sculptor in a shifting multitude. For an hour he was +hurried and halted and pushed, progressing little and moving much. +Before he could extricate himself, the runners preceding the pageant +returning the great god to his shrine, beat the multitude back from the +dromos and once again Kenkenes was imprisoned by the hosts. And once +again after the procession had passed, he did fruitless battle with a +tossing human sea. But when the street had become freer, he stood +before the closed portal of the great temple. The solemn porter +scrutinized the young sculptor sharply, but the display of the +linen-wrapped roll was an efficient passport. In a little space he was +conducted across the ringing pavements, under the vaulted shadows, into +the presence of Loi, high priest to Amen. + +The ancient prelate had just returned from installing the god in his +shrine and was yet invested in his sacerdotal robes. At one time this +splendid raiment had swathed an imposing figure, but now the frame was +bowed, its whilom comfortable padding fallen away, its parchment-like +skin folded and wrinkled and brown. He was trembling with the long +fatigue of the spectacle. + +He spelled the hieratic writings upon the outer covering of the roll +which the young man presented to him, and asked with some eagerness in +his voice: + +"Hast thou traveled with all speed?" + +"Scarce eight days have I been on the way. Only have I been delayed a +few hours by the crowds of the festival." + +"It is well," replied the pontiff. "Wait here while I see what says my +brother at On." + +He motioned Kenkenes to a seat of inlaid ebony and retired into a +curtained recess. + +The apartment into which Kenkenes had been conducted was small. It was +evidently the study of Loi, for there was a small library of papyri in +cases against the wall; a deep fauteuil was before a heavy table +covered with loosely rolled writings. The light from a high slit under +the architrave sifted down on the floor strewn with carpets of +Damascene weave. Two great pillars, closely set, supported the +ceiling. They were of red and black granite, and each was surmounted +by a foliated encarpus of white marble. The ceiling was a marvelous +marquetry of many and wondrously harmonious colors. + +In one wall was the entrance leading to another chamber. It was +screened by a slowly swaying curtain of broidered linen, which was tied +at its upper corners to brass rings sunk in the stone frame of the +door. This frame attracted the attention of the young sculptor. It +consisted of two caryatides standing out from the square shaft from +which they were carved, their erect heads barely touching the ceiling. +The figures were of heroic size and wore the repose and dignity of +countenance characteristic of Egyptian statues. The sculptor had been +so successful in bringing out this expression that Kenkenes stood +before them and groaned because he had not followed nature to the +exquisite achievement he might have attained. + +He was deeply interested in his critical examination of the figures +when the old priest darted into the apartment, his withered face +working with excitement. + +"Go! Go!" he cried. "Eat and prepare to return to Memphis with all +speed. Thine answer will await thee here to-night at the end of the +first watch,--and Set be upon thee if thou delayest!" + +Kenkenes, startled out of speech, did obeisance and hastened from the +temple. + +The outside air was thick with dust and intensely hot under the +reddening glare of the sun. It was late afternoon. The city was still +crowded, the river front lined with a dense jam of people awaiting +transportation to the opposite shore. Kenkenes knew that many would +still be there on the morrow, since the number of boats was inadequate +to carry the multitude of passengers. + +He began to think with concern upon the security of his own bari, left +in the marsh-growth by the Nile side, north of Karnak. He left the +shifting crowd behind and struck across the sandy flat toward the arm +of quiet water. Straggling groups preceded and followed him and at the +Nile-side he came upon a number contending for the possession of his +boat. They were image-makers and curriers, equally matched against one +another, and a Nubian servitor in a striped tunic, who remained neutral +that he might with safety join the winning party. The appearance of +the nobleman checked hostilities and the contestants, recognizing the +paternalism of rank after the manner of the lowly, called upon him to +arbitrate. + +"The boat is mine, children," [3] was his quiet answer. He pushed it +off, stepped into it, and turned it broadside to them. + +"See here, the scarab of Ptah," he said, tapping the bow with a paddle, +"and the name of Memphis?" With that he drew away to the sandbar +before the astonished men had realized the turn of events. Then they +looked at one another in silence or muttered their disgust; but the +Nubian went into transports of rage, making such violent demonstrations +that the image-makers and curriers turned on him and bade him cease. + +At the Libyan shore Kenkenes gave his bari into the hands of a +river-man and by a liberal fee purchased its security from +confiscation. Then he turned his face toward the center of the western +suburb of Thebes Diospolis. He had the larger palace of Rameses II in +view and he walked briskly, as one who goes forward to meet pleasure. +Only once, when he passed the palace and temple of the Incomparable +Pharaoh, which stood at the mouth of the Valley of the Kings, he +frowned in discontent. Far up the tortuous windings of this gorge was +the tomb of the great Rameses and there had the precious signet been +lost. As he looked at the high red ridge through which this crevice +led, he remembered his father's emphatic prohibition and bit his lip. +Thereafter, throughout a great part of his walk, he railed mentally +against the useless loss of a most propitious opportunity. + +To the first resplendent member of the retinue at Meneptah's palace, +who cast one glance at the fillet the sculptor wore, and bent suavely +before him, Kenkenes stated his mission. The retainer bowed again and +called a rosy page hiding in the dusk of the corridor. + +"Go thou to the apartments of my Lord Hotep and tell him a visitor +awaits him in his chamber of guests." + +The lad slipped away and the retainer led Kenkenes into a long chamber +near the end of the corridor. The hall had been darkened to keep out +the glare of the day, air being admitted only through a slatted blind +against which a shrub in the court outside beat its waxen leaves. +Before his eyes had become accustomed to the dusk Kenkenes heard +footsteps coming down the outer passage, with now and then the light +and brisk scrape of the sandal toe on the polished floor. The young +sculptor smiled at the excited throb of his heart. The new-comer +entered the hall and drew up the shutter. The brilliant flood of light +revealed to him the tall figure of the sculptor rising from his +chair--to the sculptor the trim presence of the royal scribe. + +The friends had not met in six years. + +For a space long enough for recognition to dawn upon the scribe, he +stood motionless and then with an exclamation of extravagant delight he +seized his friend and embraced him with woman-like emotion. + + +[1] Undertakers--embalmers, an unclean class. + +[2] Punt--Arabia. + +[3] The oriental master calls his servants "children." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE HEIR TO THE THRONE + +Loi was not present at the sunset prayers in Karnak. An hour before he +had summoned the trustiest priest in the brotherhood of ministers to +Amen and bade him conduct the ceremonies of the evening. Then he sent +to the temple stores, put into service another boat and was ferried +over to the Libyan suburb of Thebes. He had himself borne in a litter +to the greater palace of Rameses II, and asked an audience with +Meneptah. + +The king was at prayers in the temple of his father, close to the +palace, and the dusk of twilight was settling on the valley of the +Nile, before Loi was summoned to the council chamber. + +The hall he entered was vast and full of deep shadows. The two windows +set in one wall, many feet above the floor, showed two spaces of +darkening sky. A single torch of aromatics flared and hissed beside +the throne dais. Tremendous wainscoting covered the base of the walls, +more than a foot above a man's height. It was massively carved with +colossal sheaves of lotus-blooms and sword-like palm-leaves. Columns +of great girth, bouquets of conventional stamens, ending in foliated +capitals, supported by the lofty ceiling. The few men gathered in +council were surrounded, over-shadowed, and dwarfed by monumental +strength and solemnity. + +Behind a solid panel of carved cedar, which hedged the royal dais, +stood Meneptah. Above his head were the intricate drapings of a canopy +of gold tissue. On a level with his eyes, at his side, was the single +torch. His vision, like his father's, was defective. He was forty +years old, but appeared to be younger. His person was plump, and in +stature he was shorter than the average Egyptian. His coloring was +high and of uniform tint. The arch of the brow, and the conspicuous +distance between it and the eye below, the disdainful tension of the +nostril and the drooping corners of the mouth, gave his face the +injured expression of a spoiled child. The lips were of similar +fullness and the chin retreated. There was refinement in his face, but +no force nor modicum of perception. + +Below, with the light of the torch wavering up and down his robust +figure, was Har-hat, Meneptah's greatest general and now the new +fan-bearer. In repose his face was expressive of great good-humor. +Merriment lighted his eyes and the cut of his mouth was for laughter. +But the smile seemed to be set and, furthermore, indicated that the +fan-bearer found much mirth in the discomfiture of others. Aside from +this undefined atmosphere of heartlessness, it can not be said that +there was any craft or wickedness patent on his face, for his features +were good and indicative of unusual intelligence. To the unobservant, +he seemed to be a lovable, useful, able man. However, we have seen +what Mentu thought of him, and Mentu's estimation might have +represented that of all profound thinkers. But to the latter class, +most assuredly, Meneptah did not belong. + +Har-hat, taking the place of the king during the Rebu war, had +displayed such generalship that the Pharaoh had rewarded him at the +first opportunity with the highest office, except the regency, at his +command. + +To the king's right, beside the dais, with a hand resting on the back +of a cathedra, or great chair, was the crown prince, Rameses. The old +courtiers of the dead grandsire, visiting the court of Meneptah, flung +up their hands and gasped when they beheld the heir to the double crown +of Egypt. They looked upon the old Pharaoh, renewed in youth and +strength. There were the same narrow temples with the sloping brow, +the same hawked nose, the same full lips, the same heavy eye with the +smoldering ember in its dusky depths. The only radical dissimilarity +was the hue of the prince's complexion. It was a strange, un-Egyptian +pallor, an opaque whiteness with dark shadows that belied the testimony +of vigor in his sinewy frame. + +The old courtiers that were still attached to the court of Meneptah +watched with fascination the development of the heir's character. He +was twenty-two years old now and had proved that no alien nature had +been housed in the old Pharaoh's shape. If any pointed out the +prince's indolence as proving him unlike his grandsire the old +courtiers shook their heads and said: "He does not reign as yet and he +but saves his forces till the crown is his." So Egypt, stagnated at +the pinnacle of power by the accession of Meneptah, began to look +forward secretly to the reign of Rameses the Younger, with a hope that +was half terror. + +To-night he stood in semi-dusk robed in festal attire, for somewhere a +rout awaited him. And of the groups of power and rank about him, none +seemed to fit that majestic council chamber so well as he. It was not +the robe of costly stuffs he wore, nor the trappings of jewels, which +if he moved never so slightly emitted a shower of frosty sparks--but a +peculiar emanation of magnetism that at once repelled and attracted, +and made him master over the monarch himself. He had never met repulse +or defeat; he had never entered the presence of his peer; he had never +loved, he had never prayed. He was a solitary power, who admitted +death as his only equal, and defied even him. + +The other counselors were minor members of the cabinet, who had been +summoned, but expected only to hear and keep silence while the great +powers--the king, the prince, the priest and the fan-bearer--conferred. + +Loi entered, bowing and walking with palsied step. At one time the +three central figures of the hall had been his pupils. He had taught +them from the simplest hieratic catechism to the initiation into the +mysteries. As novices they had kissed his hand and borne him +reverence. Now as the initiated, exalted through the acquisition of +power, it lay with them to reverse conditions if they pleased. But as +the old prelate prepared to do obeisance before Meneptah, he was stayed +with a gesture, and after a word of greeting was dismissed to his +place. Rameses saluted him with a motion of his hand and Har-hat bowed +reverently. The pontiff backed away to the great council table set +opposite the throne and was met there by a courtier with a chair. + +At a sign from the king, who had already sunk into his throne, the old +man sat. + +"Thou bringest us tidings, holy Father?" + +"Even so, O Son of Ptah." + +"Say on." + +The priest moved a little uncomfortably and glanced at the ministers +grouped in the shadows. + +"Save for the worthy Har-hat and our prince, O my King, thou hast no +need of great council," he said. + +Meneptah raised his hand and the supernumerary ministers left the +chamber. When they were gone, Loi unwrapped the roll Kenkenes had +brought and began to read: + + +"To Loi, the most high Servant of Amen, Lord of Tape, the Servant of +Ra, at On, sends greeting: + +"The gods lend me composure to speak calmly with thee, O Brother. And +let the dismay which is mine explain the lack of ceremony in this +writing. + +"It is not likely that thou hast forgotten the good Queen Neferari +Thermuthis' foster-son--the Hebrew Mesu, whom she found adrift in a +basket on Nilus. But lest the years have driven the memory of his +misdeeds from thy mind, I tell again the story. Thou knowest he was +initiated a priest of Isis, and scarce had the last of the mysteries +been disclosed to him, ere it was seen that the brotherhood had taken +an apostate unto itself. + +"By the grace of the gods, he interfered in a brawl at Pithom and +killed an Egyptian. Before he could be taken he fled into Midian, and +the secrets of our order were safe, for a time. + +"One by one our fellows have entered Osiris. The young who knew not +have filled their places. Thou and I, only, are left--and the Hebrew! + +"He hath returned! + +"The gods make strong our hands against him! He went away as a menace, +but he returneth as a pestilence. The demons of Amend are with him, +and his hour is most propitious. He hath sunk himself in the +Israelitish pool here in the north, and he will breathe therefrom such +vapors as may destroy Egypt--faith--state--all! + +"The bond-people are already in ferment. There was mutiny at Pa-Ramesu +recently, when three hundred were chosen to work the quarries. +Moreover, the taskmasters are corrupt. The commander, one Atsu by +name, appointed when the chief Merenra became nomarch over Bubastis, +hath disarmed the under-drivers, removed the women from toil and +restored many privileges which are ruinous to law and order. The whole +Delta is in commotion. The nomad tribes near the Goshen country are +agitated; communities of Egyptian shepherds have been won over to the +Hebrew's cause, and now the Israelitish renegade needs but to betray +the secrets to bring such calamity upon Egypt as never befell a nation. + +"But, Brother, he is within reach of an avenging hand! Commission us, +I pray thee, to protect the mysteries after any manner that to us +seemeth good. + +"Despatch is urgent. He may fly again. Give us thine answer as we +have sent this to thee--by a nobleman--a swift and trusty one, and the +blessings of the Radiant Three be upon thy head. + +"Thy servant, the Servant of Ra, + +"Snofru." + + +When the priest finished, the king was sitting upright, his face +flushed with feeling. + +"Sedition!" he exclaimed; "organized rebellion in the very heart of my +realm!" + +He paused for a space and thrust back the heavy fringes of his cowl +with a gesture of peevish impatience. + +"What evil humor possesses Egypt?" he burst forth irritably. "Hardly +have I overthrown an invader before my people break out. I quiet them +in one place and they revolt in another. Must I turn a spear upon mine +own?" + +"Well," he cried, stamping his foot, when the three before him kept +silence, "have ye no word to say?" + +His eyes rested on Har-hat, with an imperious expectation in them. The +fan-bearer bent low before he answered. + +"With thy gracious permission, O Son of Ptah," he said, "I would +suggest that it were wise to cool an insurrection in the simmering. +The disaffection seems to be of great extent. But the Rameside army +assembled on the ground might check an open insurrection. Furthermore, +thou hast seen the salutary effect of thy visit to Tape when she forgot +her duty to her sovereign. Thy presence in the Delta would undoubtedly +expedite the suppression of the rebellion likewise." + +"O, aye," Meneptah declared. "I must go to Tanis. It seems that I +must hasten hither and thither over Egypt pursuing sedition like a +scent-hunting jackal. Mayhap if I were divided like Osiris[1] and a +bit of me scattered in each nome, I might preserve peace. But it goes +sore against me to drag the army with me. Hast thou any simpler plan +to offer, holy Father?" + +The old priest shifted a little before he answered. + +"The mysteries of the faith are in possession of Mesu," he began at +last. "The writing saith he hath exerted great influence over the +bond-people--in truth he hath entered a peaceful land and stirred it +up--and time is but needed to bring the unrest to open warfare. Thou, +O Meneptah, and thou, O Rameses, and thou, O Har-hat, each being of the +brotherhood--ye know that we hold the faith by scant tenure in the +respect of the people. Ye know the perversity of humanity. Obedience +and piety are not in them. Though they never knew a faith save the +faith of their fathers, we must pursue them with a gad, tickle them +with processions and awe them with manifestations. So if it were to +come over the spirit of this Hebrew to betray the mysteries, to scout +the faith and overturn the gods, he would have rabble Egypt following +at his heels. + +"As the writing saith, he hath the destruction of the state in mind, +and his own aggrandizement. He but beginneth on the faith because he +seeth in that a rift wherein to put the lever that shall pry the whole +state asunder. So with two and a half millions of Hebrews and a horde +of renegade Egyptians to combat, I fear the Rameside army might spill +more good blood than is worth wasting on a mongrel multitude. The +rabble without a leader is harmless. Cut off the head of the monster, +and there is neither might nor danger in the trunk. Put away Mesu, and +the insurrection will subside utterly." + +The priest paused and Meneptah stroked the polished coping of the panel +before him with a nervous hand. There was complete silence for a +moment, broken at last by the king. + +"Mesu, though a Hebrew, an infidel and a malefactor, is a prince of the +realm, my foster-brother--Neferari's favorite son. I can not rid +myself of him on provocation as yet misty and indirect." + +"Nay," he added after another pause, "he shall not die by hand of +mine." The prelate raised his head and met the eyes of the king. +After he read what lay therein, the dissatisfaction that had begun to +show on his ancient face faded. + +The Pharaoh settled back into his seat and his brow cleared as if the +problem had been settled. But suddenly he sat up. + +"What have I profited by this council? Shall I take the army or leave +it distributed over Egypt?" He stopped abruptly and turned to the +crown prince. "Help us, my Rameses," he said in a softer tone. "We +had well-nigh forgotten thee." + +Rameses raised himself from the back of his cathedra, against which he +lounged, and moved a step forward. + +"A word, my father," he said calmly. "Thy perplexity hath not been +untangled for thee, nor even a thread pulled which shall start it +raveling. The priesthood can kill Mesu," he said to Loi, "and it will +do them no hurt. And thou, my father, canst countenance it and seem no +worse than any other monarch that loved his throne. Thus ye will +decapitate the monster. But there be creatures in the desert which, +losing one head, grow another. Mesu is not of such exalted or +supernatural villainy that they can not fill his place. Wilt thou +execute Israel one by one as it raises up a leader against thee? Nay; +and wilt thou play the barbarian and put two and a half million at once +to the sword?" + +The trio looked uncomfortable, none more so than the Pharaoh. The +prince went on mercilessly. + +"Are the Hebrews warriors? Wouldst thou go against a host of +trowel-wielding slaves with an army that levels lances only against +free-born men? And yet, wilt thou wait till all Israel shall crowd +into thy presence and defy thee before thou actest? And again, wilt +thou descend on them with arms now when they may with Justice cry 'What +have we done to thee?' Thou art beset, my father." + +The Pharaoh opened his lips as if to answer, but the level eye of the +prince silenced him. + +"Thou hast not fathomed the Hebrew's capabilities, my father," Rameses +continued. "In him is a wealth, a power, a magnificence that thy +fathers and mine built up for thee, and the time is ripe for the +garnering of thy profit. What monarch of the sister nations hath two +and a half millions of hereditary slaves--not tributary folk nor +prisoners of war--but slaves that are his as his cattle and his flocks +are his? What monarch before thee had them? None anywhere, at any +time. Thou art rich in bond-people beyond any monarch since the gods +reigned." + +The chagrin died on the Pharaoh's face and he wore an expectant look. +The prince continued in even tones. + +"By use, they have fitted themselves to the limits laid upon them by +the great Rameses. The feeble have died and the frames of the sturdy +have become like brass. They have bred like beetles in the Nile mud +for numbers. Ignorant of their value, thou hast been indifferent to +their existence. Forgetting them was pampering them. They have lived +on the bounty of Egypt for four hundred years and, save for the wise +inflictions of a year or two by the older Pharaohs, they have +flourished unmolested. How they repay thee, thou seest by this +writing. Now, by the gods, turn the face of a master upon them. +Remove the soft driver, Atsu, and put one in his stead who is worthy +the office. Tickle them to alacrity and obedience with the lash--yoke +them--load them--fill thy canals, thy quarries, thy mines with them--" +He broke off and moved forward a step squarely facing the Pharaoh. + +"Thou hast thine artist--that demi-god Mentu, in whom there is +supernatural genius for architecture as well as sculpture. Make him +thy murket[2] as well, and with him dost thou know what thou canst do +with these slaves? Thou canst rear Karnak in every herdsman's village; +thou canst carve the twin of Ipsambul in every rock-front that faces +the Nile; thou canst erect a pyramid tomb for thee that shall make an +infant of Khufu; thou canst build a highway from Syene to Tanis and +line it with sisters of the Sphinx; thou canst write the name of +Meneptah above every other name on the world's monuments and it shall +endure as long as stone and bronze shall last and tradition go on from +lip to lip!" + +The prince paused abruptly. Meneptah was on his feet, almost in tears +at the contemplation of his pictured greatness. + +"Mark ye!" the prince began again. His arm shot out and fell and the +flash of its jewels made it look like a bolt of lightning. "I would +not fall heir to Israel--and if these things are done in thy lifetime I +must build my monuments with prisoners of war!" + +The old hierarch, who had been nervously rubbing the arm of his chair +during the last of the prince's speech, broke the dead silence with an +awed whisper. + +"Ah, then spake the Incomparable Pharaoh!" + +Meneptah put out his hand, smiling. + +"No more. The way is shown, I follow, O my Rameses!" + + + +[1] Osiris--the great god of Egypt, was overcome by Set, his body +divided and scattered over the valley of the Nile. Isis, wife of +Osiris, gathered up the remains and buried them at This or Abydos. + +[2] Murket--the royal architect, an exalted office usually held by +princes of the realm. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE LADY MIRIAM + +Meanwhile the scribe of the "double house of life," and the son of the +royal sculptor were taking comfort on the palace-top beneath the subdued +light of a hooded lamp. + +The pair had spoken of all Memphis and its gossip; had given account of +themselves and had caught up with the present time in the succession of +events. + +"Hotep, at thy lofty notch of favor, one must have the wisdom of Toth," +Kenkenes observed, adding with a laugh, "mark thou, I have compared thee +with no mortal." + +Hotep shook his head. + +"Nay, any man may fill my position so he but knows when to hold his +tongue and what to say when he wags it." + +"O, aye," the sculptor admitted in good-natured irony. "Those be simple +qualifications and easy to combine." + +The scribe smiled. + +"Mine is no arduous labor now. During my years of apprenticeship I was +sorely put to it, but now I have only to wait upon the king and look to +it that mine underlings are not idle. If another war should come--if any +manner of difficulty should arise in matters of state, I doubt not mine +would be a heavy lot." + +The young man spoke of war and fellowship with a monarch as if he had +been a lady's page and gossiped of fans and new perfumes. + +Kenkenes looked at him with a full realization of the incongruity of the +youth of the man and the weight of the office that was his. + +But at close range the scribe's face was young only in feature and tint. +He was born of an Egyptian and a Danaid, and the blond alien mother had +impressed her own characteristics very strongly on her son. + +He had a plump figure with handsome curves, waving, chestnut hair and a +fair complexion. Nose and forehead were in line. The eyes were of that +type of gray that varies in shade with the mental state. His temper +displayed itself only in their sudden hardening into the hue of steel; +content and happiness made them blue. They were always steady and +comprehending, so that whoever entered his presence for the first time +said to himself: "Here is a man that discovers my very soul." + +Whatever other blunder Meneptah might have made, he had redeemed himself +in the wisdom he displayed in choosing his scribe. Kenkenes had been led +to ask how Hotep had come to his place. + +"My superior, Pinem, died without a son," the scribe had explained; "and +as my record was clean, and the princes had ever been my patrons, the +Pharaoh exalted me to the scribeship." + +Kenkenes had then set down a mark in favor of the princes. + +"I doubt not," the scribe observed at last, "that my time of ease is +short-lived." + +The sculptor looked at him with inquiry in his eyes. + +"When sedition arises and defies the Pharaoh in his audience chamber," +Hotep went on, "it has reached the stage of a single alternative--success +or death. Dost know the Lady Miriam?" + +"The Israelite?" + +"Even so." + +"I saw her this day." + +"Good. Now, look upon the scene. Thou knowest she is the sister of +Prince Mesu, and the favorite waiting-woman of the good Queen Thermuthis. +She has lived in obscurity for forty years, but this morning she swept +into the audience chamber, did majestic obeisance and besought a word +'with him who was an infant in her maturity,' she said. The council +chamber was filled with those gathered to welcome Har-hat. Meneptah bade +her speak. Hast thou ever heard an Israelitish harangue?" he broke off +suddenly. + +Kenkenes shook his head. + +"Ah, theirs is pristine oratory--occult eloquence," the scribe said +earnestly, "and she is mistress of the art. She told the history of +Israel and catalogued its wrongs in a manner that lacked only measure and +music to make it a song. But, Kenkenes, she did not move us to +compunction and pity. When she had done, we had not looked on a picture +of suffering and oppression, but of insulted pride and rebellion. +Instead of compunction, she awakened admiration, instead of pity, +respect. For the moment she represented, not a multitude of complaining +slaves, but a race of indignant peers. + +"Meneptah--ah! the good king," the scribe went on, "was impressed like +the rest of us. But finally he showed her that the Israelites were what +they were by the consent of the gods; that their unwillingness but +increased the burden. He pointed out the example of his illustrious +sires as justification for his course; enumerated some of their +privileges,--the fertile country given them by Egypt, and the freedom +that was theirs to worship their own God,--and summarily refused to +indulge them further. + +"Then she became ominous. She bade him have a care for the welfare of +Egypt before he refused her. Her words were dark and full of evil +portent. The air seemed to winnow with bat-wings and to reek with vapors +from witch-potions and murmur with mystic formulas. Every man of us +crept, and drew near to his neighbor. When she paused for an answer, the +king hesitated. She had menaced Egypt and it stirreth the heart of the +father when the child is threatened. He turned to Har-hat in his +perplexity and craved his counsel. The fan-bearer laughed good-naturedly +and begged the Pharaoh's permission to send her to the mines before she +bewitched his cattle and troubled him with visions. Har-hat's unconcern +made men of us all once more, but Meneptah shook his head. 'The name of +Neferari Thermuthis defends her,' he said; 'let her go hence'." + +"'And I take no amelioration to my people?' she demanded. 'Nay,' he +replied, 'not in the smallest part shall their labor be lessened.' + +"Holy Isis, thou shouldst have seen her then, Kenkenes! + +"She approached the very dais of the throne and, throwing up her arms, +flung her defiance into the face of her sovereign. It were treason to +utter her words again. I have seen men white and shaking from rage, but +Meneptah never hath so much of temper to display. Far be it from me to +say that the king was afraid, but I tell you, Kenkenes, mine own hair is +not yet content to lie flat. She concentrated all the denunciatory +bitterness of the tongue and pronounced and gloried in the doom of the +dynasty, heaping the blame of its destruction upon the head of Meneptah!" + +The scribe finished his story in a whisper. Kenkenes was by this time +sitting up, his eyes shining with interest and wonder. + +"Gods! Hotep, thou dost make me creep." + +"Creep!" the scribe responded heartily, "never in my life have I so +wanted to flee a royal audience. When she had done, she turned and swept +from the presence and no man lifted a finger to stay her." + +For a moment there was an expressive silence between the two young men. +At last Kenkenes broke it in a voice of intense admiration. + +"What an intrepid spirit! Small wonder that she did not heed the +condemnation of the rabble at mid-day--she who was fresh from a triumph +over the Pharaoh!" + +Hotep's eyes widened warningly and he shook his head. + +"Nay, hush me not, Hotep," Kenkenes went on in a reckless whisper. "I +must say it. Would to the gods I had been there to copy it in stone!" + +"Hush! babbler!" the scribe exclaimed, his eyes twinkling nevertheless, +"thine art will make an untimely mummy of thee yet." + +Kenkenes poured out his first glass of wine and set it down untasted. +The contemplated sacrilege in stone opposite Memphis confronted him. + +"If Egypt's lack of art does not kill me first," he added in defense. + +"Nay," Hotep protested, "why wouldst thou perpetuate the affront to the +Pharaoh?" + +"Because it is history and a better delineation of the Israelitish +character than all the wordy chronicles of the historians could depict," +was the spirited reply. + +"But the ritual," Hotep began, with the assurance of a man that feels he +is armed with unanswerable argument. + +"Sing me no song of the ritual," Kenkenes broke in impatiently. "The +ritual offends mine ears--my sight, my sense. We have quarreled beyond +any treaty-making--ever." + +The other looked at him with amazement and much consternation. + +"Art thou mad?" he exclaimed. + +"Nay, but I am rebellious--as rebellious as the Israelite, for I have +already shaken my fist in the face of the sculptor's canons. And the +time will come when the world will call my revolt just. I would there +were a chronicler, here, now, to write me down, since I would be +remembered as the pioneer. I shall win no justification, in these days, +perhaps only persecution, but I would reap my reward of honor, though it +be a thousand years in coming." + +"Thou hast a grudge against the conventional forms and the rules of the +ritual?" Hotep asked, after a thoughtful silence. + +"I have a distaste for the horrors it compels and am ignorant of their +use," Kenkenes answered stubbornly. + +"Kenkenes," the scribe began, "Law is a most inexorable thing. It is the +governor of the Infinite. It is a tyrant, which, good or bad, can demand +and enforce obedience to its fiats. It is a capricious thing and it +drags its vassal--the whole created world--after it in its mutations, or +stamps the rebel into the dust while the time-serving obedient ones +applaud. So thou hast set up resistance against a thing greater than +gods and men and I can not see thee undone. I love thee, but I should be +an untrue friend did I abet thee in thy lawlessness. Submit gracefully +and thy cause shall have an audience with Law some day--if it have merit." + +The young sculptor's face was passive, but his eyes were fixed sadly on +the remote stars strewn above him. He felt inexpressibly solitary. His +zest in his convictions did not flag, but it seemed that the whole world +and the heavens had receded and left him alone with them. + +Again Hotep spoke. + +"There is more court gossip," he began cheerily, as if no word had been +said that could depress the tone of the conversation. + +Kenkenes accepted the new subject gladly. + +"Out with it," he said. "Within the four walls of my world I hear naught +but the clink of mallet and falling stone." + +"The breach between Meneptah and Amon-meses, his mutinous brother, may be +healed by a wedding." + +"So?" + +"Of a surety--nay, and not of a surety, either, but mayhap. A match +between the niece of Amon-meses, the Princess Ta-user, and the heir, +Rameses." + +Kenkenes sat up again in his earnestness. "Nay," he exclaimed. "Never!" + +"Wherefore, I pray thee?" Hotep asked with a deprecating smile. + +"There is no mating between the lion and the eagle; the stag and the asp! +They could not love." + +"Thou dreamy idealist!" Hotep laughed. "The half of great marriages are +moves of strategy, attended more by Set[1] than Athor.[2] Ta-user is mad +for the crown, Rameses for undisputed power. Each has one of these two +desirable things to give the other." + +"And how shall they appease Athor?" Kenkenes demanded warmly. "Ta-user +loves Siptah, the son of Amon-meses, and Rameses will crown whom he loves +though he had a thousand other crown-loving, treaty-dowered wives!" + +Hotep smiled. "I thought the four walls of thy world hedged thee, but it +seems thou art right well acquainted with royalty." + +"Scoff!" Kenkenes cried. "But I can tell thee this: Rameses will put his +foot on the neck of Amon-meses if the pretender trouble him, and will wed +with a slave-girl if she break the armor over his iron heart." + +Hotep laughed again and suggested another subject. + +"The new fan-bearer," he began. + +"Nay, what of him?" Kenkenes broke in at once. + +"And shall we quarrel about him, also?" + +"Dost thou know him?" Hotep queried. + +"Right well--from afar and by hearsay." + +"Do thou express thyself first concerning him, and I shall treat thee to +the courtier's diplomacy if I agree not." + +"I like him not," Kenkenes responded bluntly. + +Hotep leaned toward him, with the smile gone from his face, the jest from +his manner, and laid his hand on the sculptor's. The pressure spoke +eloquently of hearty concord. "But he has a charming daughter," he said. + +Kenkenes inspected his friend's face critically, but there was nothing to +be read thereon. + +A palace attendant approached across the paved roof and bent before the +scribe. + +"A summons from the Son of Ptah, my Lord," he said. + +"At this hour?" Hotep said in some surprise as he arose. "I shall return +immediately," he told Kenkenes. + +"Nay," the sculptor observed, "my time is nearly gone. Let me depart +now." + +"Not so. I would go with thee. This will be no more than a note. If it +be more I shall put mine underlings to the task." + +He disappeared in the dark. Kenkenes lay back on the divan and thought +on the many things that the scribe had told him. But chiefly he pondered +on Har-hat and the Israelite. + +When Hotep returned he carried his cowl and mantle, and a scroll. "I +too, am become a messenger," he said, "but I am self-appointed. This +note was to go by a palace courier, but I relieved him of the task." + +The pair made ready and departed through the still populous streets of +Thebes to the Nile. There they were ferried over to the wharves of Luxor. + +At the temple the porter conducted them into the chamber in which the +ancient prelate spent his shortening hours of labor. He was there now, +at his table, and greeted the young men with a nod. But taking a second +look at Hotep, he beckoned him with a shaking finger. + +"Didst bring me aught, my son?" he asked as the scribe bent over him. + +"Aye, holy Father; this message to the taskmaster over Pa-Ramesu." + +"Ah," the old man said. "Is that not yet gone?" + +"Nay, the Pharaoh asks that thou insert the name of him whom thou didst +recommend for Atsu's place. The Son of Ptah had forgotten him." + +The old man pushed several scrolls aside and prepared to make the +addition.. + +"But thou art weary, holy Father; let me do it," Hotep protested gently. + +"Nay, nay, I can do it," the old man insisted. "See!" drawing forth a +scroll unaddressed, "I have written all this in an hour. O aye, I can +write with the young men yet." He made the interlineation, rolled the +scroll and sealed it. "I am sturdy, still." At that moment, he dropped +his pen on the floor and bent to pick it up, but was forestalled by +Hotep. Then he addressed the scrolls, carefully dried the ink with a +sprinkling of sand and delivered one to Hotep, the other to Kenkenes. +"This to the king, and that to Snofru. The gods give thee safe journey," +he continued to Kenkenes. "Who art thou, my son?" + +"I am the son of Mentu, holy Father. My name is Kenkenes," the young man +answered. + +"Mentu, the royal sculptor?" + +Kenkenes bowed. + +"Nay, but I am glad. I knew thy father, and since thou art of his blood, +thou art faithful. Let neither death nor fear overtake thee, for thou +hast the peace of Egypt in thy very hands. Fail not, I charge thee!" + +After a reverent farewell, the two young men went forth. + +A slender Egyptian youth went with them to the wharves and awakened the +sleeping crew of a bari. + +Hotep they carried across and set ashore on the western side. + +"May the same favoring god that brought thee hither, grant thee a safe +journey home, my friend. The court comes to Memphis shortly. Till then, +farewell," said Hotep. + +"All Memphis will hail her illustrious son, O Hotep. Farewell." + +It was not long until the sculptor was drifting down toward Memphis under +a starry sky--the shadowy temples of Thebes hidden by the sudden +closing-in of the river-hills about her. + + + +[1] Set--the war-god. + +[2] Athor--the Egyptian Venus; the feminine love-deity. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ATHOR, THE GOLDEN + +At sunrise the morning after his return from On, Kenkenes appeared at +the Nile, attended by a burden-bearing slave. + +The first lean, brown boatman who touched his knee and offered his bari +for hire, Kenkenes patronized. The slave had eased his load into the +boat and Kenkenes was on the point of embarking when a four-oared bari, +which had passed them like the wind a moment before, put about several +rods above them and returned to the group on shore. + +A bent and withered servitor was standing in the bow of the boat, +wildly gesticulating, as if he feared Kenkenes would insist on pulling +away despite his efforts. The young man recognized the servant of +Snofru, old Ranas. + +The large bari was beached and the servitor alighted with agility and, +beckoning to Kenkenes, took him aside. + +"There has been an error--a grave error, concerning the message," the +old man began in excitement; "but thou art in no wise at fault. Yet +mayhap thou canst aid us in unraveling the tangle. See!" + +He displayed the linen-wrapped roll, the covering split where Snofru +had opened it, but the wavering hieratic characters of the address in +Loi's hand, still intact. + +When the young sculptor had gazed, the old servant nervously undid the +roll, and showed within a letter to the commander over Pa-Ramesu, +written in the strong epistolary symbols of the royal scribe. + +Kenkenes frowned with vexation. Innocent and efficient though he had +been, the miscarriage of his mission stung him nevertheless. The +blunder was not long a mystery to him. + +Summoning all the patience at his command, he recounted the events in +the apartments of the ancient hierarch of Amen. + +"There were two Scrolls," he explained; "one to the Servant of Ra at +On, the other to Atsu. The holy father sealed them both before he +addressed them and confused the directions. The one which I should +have brought to thine august master, hath gone to the taskmaster over +Pa-Ramesu." + +"Thou madest all speed?" the servant demanded, trembling with eagerness. + +"A half-day's journey less than the usual time I made in returning. I +doubt much, if the messenger with the other scroll hath passed Memphis +yet, since he may not have been despatched in such hot haste. +Furthermore, because of the festivities in Tape, it would have been +well-nigh impossible for him to hire a boat until the next day." + +This information kindled a light of hope on the old servant's face. + +"Thou givest me life again," he exclaimed. "The blessings of Ra be +upon thee!" + +Without further words he ran back to the boat, and the last Kenkenes +saw of him, he was frantically urging his boatmen to greater speed, +back to On. + +Kenkenes had come to the Nile that morning, rejoicing in the +propitiousness of his opportunity. Mentu was at that moment in On, +seeing to the decoration of the second obelisk reared by Meneptah to +the sun. The great artist had prepared to be absent a month, and had +left no work for his son to do. But the coming of Ranas with the news +of his mission's failure had filled Kenkenes with angry discomfiture. + +He dismissed his slave and rowed down-stream toward Masaarah. + +As he approached the abandoned wharf, a glance showed him that some +effort toward restoring it had been made. The overgrowth of vines had +been cut away and the level of the top had been raised by several +fragments of rough stone. + +The tracks of heavy sledges had crushed the young grain across the +field toward the cliffs. + +Kenkenes stood up and looked toward the terraced front of the hills, in +which were the quarries. + +There were dust, smoke, stir and moving figures. + +The stone-pits were active again after the lapse of half a century. + +"By the grace of the mutable Hathors," the young man muttered as he +dropped back into his seat, "my father may yet decorate a temple to +Set, but by the same favor, it seems that I shall be snatched from the +brink of a sacrilege." + +He permitted his boat to drift while he contemplated his predicament. +Suddenly he smote his hands together. + +"Grant me pardon, ye Seven Sisters!" he exclaimed. + +"I misread your decree. Ye have but covered my tracks toward +transgression." + +After a little thought he resumed his felicitations. + +"Who of Memphis will think I come to Masaarah, save to look after the +taking out of stone? Is it not part of my craft? Nay, but I shall +make offering in the temple for this. And need any of these unhappy +creatures in Masaarah see me except as it pleases me to show myself?" + +He seized his oars and rowed down the river another furlong. Leaving +the craft fixed in the tangle of herbage at the water's edge, he +shouldered his cargo and crossed the narrow plain to the cliffs below +Masaarah. There he made a difficult ascent of the fronts facing the +Nile and reached his block of stone without approaching the hamlet of +laborers. + +Depositing his burden, he set forth to reconnoiter. He descended again +into the Nile valley by the way he had come and wandered toward the +mouth of the gorge. From a little distance he looked upon a scene of +great activity. In the shadow of one of the dilapidated hovels, four +humped oxen stood, their heavy harness still hanging upon them, though +the sledges they drew, covered with stone dust and broken pieces, were +some distance away from them. A company of half a score of children +were ascending in single file, along a slanting plane of planks, into +the hollow in the cliff upon which work had been renewed. Along the +rock-wall ahead of them a scaffold had been erected and here were men +drilling holes in the stone, or driving wooden wedges into the holes +already made, or pouring water on the wedges as the skins the children +bore were passed up to them. + +Kenkenes picked his way through the debris of sticks, stones, dust and +cast-off water-skins, and serenely disregarding the stare of the +laborers, went up to the edge of the stone-pit and watched the work +with interest. A constant stream of broken stone rattled down under +the scaffold and long runlets of water fed an ever increasing pool in +the depression before the cliff. A single slab of irregular dimensions +lay on the sand at the base of a wooden chute, down which it had +descended from the hollow in the cliff the evening before. The cavity +it left bade fair to enlarge by nightfall, for the swelling wedges were +rending another slab from its bedding with loud reports and the sudden +etching of fissures. + +The young sculptor noted with some wonder that the laborers were +Israelites. + +After a time Kenkenes turned away and addressed one of the bearded men +at that moment, ascending the wooden plane. + +"What do ye here?" he asked. + +The man answered in unready Egyptian, but, for an inferior, in a manner +curiously collected. + +"The Pharaoh addeth to the burden of the chosen people. We dig stone +for a temple to the war-god." + +"The chosen people!" Kenkenes repeated inquiringly. + +"The children of Israel," the Hebrew explained. Kenkenes lifted one +eyebrow quizzically and went his way. As he leaped up into the gorge +he vaguely realized that he had seen no trace of an encampment near the +hamlet, which he knew to be uninhabitable. + +"Of a truth, the chosen people seem to follow me of late," he said to +himself as he rambled up the valley. "Meneptah must have scattered +them out of Goshen into all the corners of Egypt." + +As he turned the last winding of the gorge he came upon a cluster of +some threescore tents, spread over the level pocket at the valley's +end. Almost against the northern wall the house of the commander had +been built to receive the earliest shadow of the afternoon. The +military standard was raised upon its roof and a scribe, making entries +on a roll of linen, sat cross-legged on a mat before the door. In one +of the narrow ways between the tents an old woman, very bowed and +voluminously clad, prepared a great hamper of lentils and another of +papyrus root for the noonday meal. One or two children sitting on the +earth beside her rendered her assistance, and a third kept the turf +fire glowing under a huge bubbling caldron. Kenkenes passed through +the camp by this narrow way and paused to look with much curiosity at +the ancient Israelite. Never had he seen any old person so active or a +slave so wrapped in covering. He hoped she would lift her head that he +might see her face; and even as he wished, she pierced him with a look +which, from her midnight eyes, seemed like lightning from a +thunder-cloud. + +"Gods!" he exclaimed as he retreated up the slope behind the camp. And +a moment later he continued his soliloquy in a voice that struggled +between mirth and amazement: "Have I never seen an Israelite until I +beheld these twain, the Lady Miriam and that bent dart of lightning in +the valley? If these be Israelites I never saw one before. If those +cowed shepherds that have strayed now and again out of Goshen be +Hebrews, then these are not. And the gods shield me from the disfavor +of them, be they slaves or sibyls!" + +When he reached his block of stone he unrolled his load of equipments +and set to work without delay. He was remote from any possible +interruption from Memphis, and the slaves in the gorge and in the +stone-pits had no opportunity to come upon his sacrilege in idle hours. +They would be held like prisoners within the limits of the quarries. +His sense of security had been strengthened by the renewed activities +in Masaarah. + +With a shovel of tamarisk he cleared the slab of its drift of sand. He +found that the block broadened at the base and was separate from the +sheet of rock on which it stood. Among his supplies was a roll of reed +matting, and with this cut into proper lengths, he carpeted a +considerable space about the block. Precaution rather than luxury had +prompted this procedure, since the chipped stone falling on the +covering could be carried cleanly and at once from the spot. + +Pausing long enough to eat a thin slice of white bread and +gazelle-meat, and to drink a draft from the porous and ever cooling +water bottle, he turned to the protection and concealment of his statue. + +The place was strewn with tolerably regular fragments, and the building +of a segment of wall to the north at the edge of the matting required +more time than strength or skill. He built solidly against the +penetrative sand, and as high as his head. The early afternoon blazed +upon him and passed into the mellower hours of the later day before he +had finished. He hid his shovel and two cylindrical billets of wood, +such as were used to roll great weights, under the edge of his reed +carpet, and his preparations were complete. He wiped his brow, +congratulating himself on the snugness of his retreat and the +auspicious beginning of his transgression. + +Weary and happy, he rowed himself back to Memphis and slept soundly on +the eve of a great offense against the laws of Egypt. + +But the next day, when the young sculptor faced the moment of actual +creation, he realized that his goddess must take form from an +unembodied idea. The ritual had been his guide before, and his genius, +set free to soar as it would, fluttered wildly without direction. His +visions were troubled with glamours of the old conventional forms; his +idea tantalized him with glimpses of its perfect self too fleeting for +him to grasp. The sensation was not new to him. During his maturer +years he had tried to remember his mother's face with the same yearning +and heart-hurting disappointment. But this time he groped after +attributes which should shape the features--he had spirit, not form, in +mind; and the odds against which his unguided genius must battle were +too heroic for it to succeed without aid. The young sculptor realized +that he was in need of a model. Stoically, he admitted that such a +thing was as impossible as it was indispensable. It seemed that he had +met complete bafflement. + +He took up his tools and returned to Memphis. But each succeeding +morning found him in the desert again, desperately hopeful--each +succeeding evening, in the city disheartened and silent. + +So it followed for several days. + +On the sixth of January the festival in honor of the return of Isis +from Phenicia was celebrated in Memphis. Kenkenes left the revel in +mid-afternoon and crossed the Nile to the hills. He found no content +away from his block of stone--no happiness before it. But he wandered +back to the seclusion of the niche that he might be moody and sad of +eye in all security. + +The stone-pits were deserted. The festivities in Memphis had extended +their holiday to the dreary camp at Masaarah. Kenkenes climbed up to +his retreat and remained there only a little time. The unhewn rock +mocked him. + +He descended through the gorge and found that the Hebrews were but +nominally idle. A rope-walk had been constructed and the men were +twisting cables of tough fiber. The Egyptians lounged in the long +shadows of the late afternoon and directed the work with no effort and +little concern. The young sculptor overlooked the scene as long as it +interested him and continued down the valley toward the Nile. + +Presently a little company of Hebrew children approached, their bare +feet making velvety sounds in the silence of the ravine. Each balanced +a skin of water on his head. The little line obsequiously curved +outward to let the nobleman pass, and one by one the sturdy children +turned their luminous eyes up to him, some with a flash of white teeth, +some with a downward dip of a bashful head. One of them disengaged a +hand from his burden and swept a tangle of moist black curls away from +his eyes. The sun of the desert had not penetrated that pretty thatch +and the forehead was as fair as a lotus flower. + +Kenkenes caught himself looking sharply at each face as he passed, for +it contained somewhat of that for which he sought. As he walked along +looking after them he became aware that some one was near him, He +turned his head and stopped in his tracks. + +He confronted his idea embodied--Athor, the Golden! + +It was an Israelitish maiden, barely sixteen years old, but in all his +life he had never looked upon such beauty. He had gazed with pleased +eyes on the slender blush-tinted throats and wrists of the Egyptian +beauties, but never had he beheld such whiteness of flesh as this. He +had sunk himself in the depths of the dusky, amorous eyes of high-born +women of Memphis, but here were fathomless profundities of azure that +abashed the heavens. He had been very near to loveliest hair of Egypt, +so close that its odorous filaments had blown across his face and his +artist senses had been caught and tangled in its ebon sorcery. But +down each side this broad brow was a rippling wave of gold, over each +shoulder a heavy braid of gold that fell, straightened by its own +weight, a span below the waist. The winds of the desert had roughened +it and the bright threads made a nimbus about the head. Its glory +overreached his senses and besieged his soul. Here was not witchery, +but exaltation. + +Enraptured with her beauty, her perfect fulfilment of his needs, he +realized last the unlovely features of her presence. She balanced a +heavy water pitcher on her head and wore a rough surplice, more +decorous than the dress of the average bondwoman, but the habit of a +slave, nevertheless. He had halted directly in her path, and after a +moment's hesitancy she passed around him and went on. + +Immediately Kenkenes recovered himself and with a few steps overtook +her. Without ceremony he transferred the heavy pitcher to his own +shoulder. The girl turned her perfect face, full of amazement, to him, +and a wave of color dyed it swiftly. + +"Thy burden is heavy, maiden," was all he said. + +The bulk of the jar on the farther shoulder made it necessary for him +to turn his face toward her, but she was uneasy under the intent gaze +of his level black eyes. She dropped behind him, but he slackened his +pace and kept beside her. For the moment he was no longer the man of +pulse and susceptibility but the artist. Therefore her thoughts and +sensations were apart from his concern. The unfamiliar perfection of +the Semitic countenance bewildered him. He took up his panegyric. +Never was a mortal countenance so near divine. And the sumptuousness +of her figure--its faultless curves and lines, its lissome roundness, +its young grace, the beauty of arm and neck and ankle! Ah! never did +anything entirely earthly dwell in so fair, so splendid a form. + +As they neared the camp the girl spoke to him for the first time. He +recognized in her voice the same serene tone he had noted in his talk +with the Hebrew some days before. + +"Give me my burden now," she said. "Thou hast affronted thy rank for +me, and I thank thee many times." + +The sculptor paused and for a moment stood embarrassed. It went sorely +against his gallantry to lay the burden again upon her and he said as +much. + +"Nay, Egypt has no qualms against loading the Hebrew," she said +quietly. "Wouldst thou put thy nation to shame?" + +Kenkenes opened his eyes in some astonishment. + +"Now am I even more loath," he declared. "What art thou called?" + +"Rachel." + +"It hath an intrepid sound, but Athor would become thee better. Now I +am a sculptor from the city, come to study thy women for a frieze," he +continued unblushingly, "and I would go no farther in my search. +Rachel repeated will be beauty multiplied. Let me see thee once in a +while,--to-morrow." + +A sudden flush swept over her face and her eyes darkened. + +"It shall not keep thee from thy labor," he added persuasively. + +The color deepened and she made a motion of dissent. + +"Nay! thou dost not refuse me!" he exclaimed, his astonishment evident +in his voice. + +"Of a surety," she replied. "Give me my burden, I pray thee." + +Dumb with amazement, too genuine to contain any anger, Kenkenes obeyed. +As she went up the shady gorge, walking unsteadily under the heavy +pitcher, he stood looking after her in eloquent silence. + +And in eloquent silence he turned at last and continued down the +valley. There was nothing to be said. His appreciation of his own +discomfiture was too large for any expression. + +In a few steps he met the short captain who governed the quarries. +Kenkenes guessed his office by his dress. He was adorned in festal +trappings, for he had spent most of the day in revel across the Nile. + +"Dost thou know Rachel, the Israelitish maiden?" Kenkenes asked, +planting himself in the man's way. + +"The yellow-haired Judahite?" the man inquired, a little surprised. + +"Even so," was the reply. + +The soldier nodded. + +"Look to it that she is put to light labor," the sculptor continued, +gazing loftily down into the narrow eyes. The soldier squared off and +inspected the nobleman. It did not take him long to acknowledge the +young sculptor's right to command. + +"It does not pay to be tender with an Israelite," the man answered +sourly. + +Kenkenes thrust his hand into the folds of his tunic over his breast +and, drawing forth a number of golden rings strung on a cord, jingled +them musically. + +The soldier grinned. + +"That will coax a man out of his dearest prejudice. I will put her +over the children." + +Kenkenes dropped the money into the man's palm. + +"I shall have an eye to thee," he said warningly. "Cheat me not." + +He went his way. The incident restored to him the power of speech. + +"Now, by Horus," he began, "am I to be denied by an Israelite that +which the favoring Hathors designed I should have? Not while the arts +of strategy abide within me. The children, I take it, will come here +with the water," he cogitated, stamping upon the wet and deserted ledge +which he had reached, "and here will she be, also." + +He raised his eyes to the ragged line of rocks topping the northern +wall of the gorge. + +"I shall perch myself there like a sacred hawk and filch her likeness. +Nay, now that I come to ponder on it, it is doubtless better that she +know naught about it. She might drop certain things to the Egyptians +hereabout that would lead to mine undoing. The gods are with me, of a +truth." + +He descended into the larger valley and went singing toward the Nile. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE PUNISHMENT OF ATSU + +One late afternoon, in the streets of Pa-Ramesu, a curious new-comer +bowed before Atsu, the commander of Israel of the treasure city. The +visitor was old and tremulous from fatigue, and the stains of hard +travel were evident upon him. + +"Greeting, Atsu. The peace of the divine Mother attend thee," he said. +"Snofru, the beloved of Ra at On, sends thee greeting by his servant, +Ranas." + +"Greeting," the taskmaster replied, after he had inspected the +white-browed servant. "The shelter of my roof and the bread of my +board are thine;" adding after a little pause, "and in truth thou +seemest to need these things." + +The old man smiled an odd wry smile and followed lamely after the long +swinging stride of the commander toward the headquarters on the knoll. + +Within the house of Atsu, Ranas delivered into the hands of the soldier +the message that Kenkenes had brought to Snofru. While Atsu undid the +roll the old servant made voluble apologies for the broken seal. The +commander stepped to the doorway for better light and read the writing. + +The old servant back in the dusk of the interior saw the stern face +harden, the heavy brows knit blackly, the dusky red fade from the +cheek. Ranas knew what the soldier read, for he had had the roll with +its broken seal, from On to Memphis and from Memphis back to On again. +But with all his astuteness he could not have guessed what extremes of +wrath and grief the insulted taskmaster suffered. The sheet rolled +itself together again and was broken and crushed in the iron fingers +that gripped it. Presently he tossed it aside. Hardly had it left his +hand before he hastened to pick it up, straightened it out and re-read +it feverishly. He forgot the old servant; but had he remembered the +man's curious gaze, no resolution could have hidden that joy which +slowly wrote itself upon his face. There was balm in the barb for all +the wound it made. This is what he read: + + +"To Atsu, Commander over the Builders of Pa-Ramesu, These: To mine ears +hath come report of mutiny and idleness through thy weak government of +my bond-people. Also that thou hast enforced my commands but feebly, +and so defeated my purposes, which were my sire's, after whose +illustrious example I reign. + +"For these and kindred inefficiencies art thou removed from the +government over Pa-Ramesu. + +"I hereby bestow upon thee another office within the limits of thy +capacity. Thou wilt take up the flagellum over Masaarah when thou hast +surrendered Pa-Ramesu to thy successor. + +"By this thou shalt learn that the Pharaohs will be ably served. + +"Horemheb of Bubastis, thy successor, accompanieth these. + +"Give him honor. MENEPTAH." + + +The diction was manifestly the king's. None other of high estate would +have inspired so spiteful a letter. But the appointment to Masaarah +made Atsu forget the sting in the second reading. To Masaarah! To +Masaarah and Rachel! He folded the broken sheet and thrust it into his +bosom. Meeting the keen eye of his guest, the color rushed back to the +taskmaster's face and he summoned two attendant Hebrews to wait upon +the old man while he went forth to gain composure in the air. + +After the old man had been fed and given such other comfort as the +soldier's house afforded, the taskmaster returned. Then Ranas shifted +his position so that he might watch his host's face most intelligently, +and turned to the real purpose of his visit. + +"Thou canst see, my master, that if thy message bore the wrapping for +the epistle to Snofru, the message to the holy father must have borne +thy name. Thou hast received no letter as yet which was not intended +for thee?" + +The question was delivered politely, but the old man thrust his curious +face forward and shook his head with a combination of interrogation and +dissent, which was highly insincere. + +"I have received naught which was not intended for me," the taskmaster +replied warmly. + +After a moment's intent contemplation of Atsu's face the courier went +on: "Nay, so had I thought. The messenger came to Snofru with all +speed and out-stripped the courier bound for Pa-Ramesu. It is even as +I had thought. He may arrive shortly, but I must tarry till he comes." + +Atsu assented bluntly, and after that if they talked it was of +impersonal things and in a desultory manner. When night came Atsu +called his attendants and had the weary old man put to bed in a +curtained corner of the house. For himself there was no sleep. + +At midnight there came the beat of hoofs on the dust-muffled ways of +Pa-Ramesu. A sentry knocked at the door of the commander and announced +a visitor. Atsu, who still sat under the unextinguished reed light, +greeted the new-comer with an exclamation of concern. The man was +covered with dust, his dress was torn and bloody, his right hand +swathed in cloths, and his lip, right cheek and eye were swollen and +discolored. + +"By Horus, friend, thou lookest ill-used," the taskmaster exclaimed. +"What has befallen thee?" + +"Naught--naught of any lasting hurt," the newcomer replied carelessly. +"We were set upon by a troop of murdering Bedouins this side of +Bubastis and had a pretty fight." + +"Aye, thou hast the stamp of its beauty upon thy face. A slave, here, +with some balsam," Atsu continued, addressing the sentry, "and a +captain of the constabulary next. We will cure these Bedouins and +their hurt at once." + +"Nay," the visitor protested. "It is only a spear-slit in my hand, and +a flying stirrup marred my face. I am well. Look to the Bedouins, +however; they ran our messenger through--Set consume them!" + +"Doubt not, we shall look to them. They grow strangely insolent of +late." + +"Small wonder," the other responded heartily. "Is not the whole north +a seething pot of lawlessness; and by the demons of Amenti, is not the +Israelite the fire under the caldron? Nay, but I shall have especial +joy in damping him!" + +The man laughed and dropped into the chair Atsu had offered him. + +"Then thou art Horemheb, the new taskmaster over Pa-Ramesu?" + +"So! has my news outridden me?" the man exclaimed in very evident +amazement. + +Ranas, indifferently clad in a hastily donned kamis, at this moment +parted the curtains of his retreat and came forth with an apologetic +courtesy. + +"And thy messenger, sir? What of him?" he asked eagerly. + +"Dead, and left at a wayside house." + +"And the message?" the old man persisted. + +Horemheb surveyed him with increasing astonishment. + +"Where hast thou these tidings?" he demanded. "They are scarce three +hours old. Who reached thee with them before me?" + +Atsu interposed and explained the interchange of letters. + +"Oh," said Horemheb. "So the correct message came to thee, +nevertheless, good Atsu. But I can not tell thee aught of the other. +It is lost." + +"Lost!" Ranas shrieked. + +"Gods! old man. It was only pigment and papyrus, not gold or jewels. +A kindly disposed Hebrew came to our help with some of his people, and +we put the Bedouins to flight. But after the struggle, search as we +might with torches which the Hebrew brought, the message was not to be +found. A Bedouin made off with it, I doubt not." + +Ranas stood speechless for an instant, and then he rushed up to the new +taskmaster. + +"His name?" he demanded fiercely. "The Hebrew! What was he like? +Where does he dwell?" + +"A murrain on the maniac!" Horemheb exploded. + +"He called himself Aaron!" + +Ranas staggered against the wall for support and beat the air with his +arms. + +"Aaron, the brother of Mesu! O ye inscrutable Hathors!" he babbled. +"A Bedouin made off with it! Oh! Oh! What idiocy!" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE COLLAR OF GOLD + +The next morning after his meeting with the golden-haired Israelite, +Kenkenes came early to the line of rocks that topped the north wall of +the gorge and, ensconced between the gray fragments, looked down unseen +on her whenever she came to the valley's mouth. All day long the +children came staggering up from the Nile, laden with dripping hides, +or returned in a free and ragged line down the green slope of the field +to the river again. + +Vastly more simple and time-saving would have been one of the capacious +water carts. But what would have employed these ten youthful Hebrews +in the event of such improvement? There was to be no labor-saving in +the quarries. Therefore, through the dust, up the weary slanting +plane, again and again till the day's work amounted to a journey of +miles, the Hebrew children toiled with their captain and co-laborer, +Rachel. + +At the summit of the wooden slope the beautiful Israelite, who had +preceded her charges, passed up the burden of each one to the Hebrews +on the scaffold. From his aery Kenkenes watched this particular phase +of her tasks with interest. She was not too far from him for the +details of her movements to be distinguishable, and the posture of the +outstretched arms and lifted face fulfilled his requirements. He +abandoned the modeling of her features for that day and copied the +attitude. Once in the morning and once in the afternoon a countryman +of hers, strong, young and but lightly bearded, stepped down from his +place on the scaffold and relieved her. The sculptor noted the act +with some degree of disquiet, hoping that the graceful protests of the +girl might prevail. When the stalwart Hebrew overrode her +remonstrances, and motioned her toward a place at the side of the +frame-work where she might rest, the young sculptor frowned +impatiently. But his humane heart chid him and he waited with some +assumption of grace till she should take up her burden again. + +At sunset he retired cautiously, but several dawns found him among the +rocks, with reed pen, papyri and molds of clay. When he climbed to his +retreat within the walls of stone, on the hillside in the late +afternoon, he hid several studies of the girl's head and statuettes of +clay under the matting. + +At last he began the creation of Athor the Golden. For days he labored +feverishly, forgetting to eat, fretting because the sun set and the +darkness held sway for so long. Having overstepped the law, he placed +no limit to the extent of his artistic transgression. + +After choosing nature as his model, he followed it slavishly. On the +occasion of his initial departure from the accepted rules, he had never +dreamed it possible to disregard ritualistic commandments so +absolutely. He even ignored the passive and meditative repose, +immemorial on the carven countenances of Egypt. + +The face of Athor, as she put forth her arms to receive the sun, must +show love, submission, eagerness and great appeal. + +As Kenkenes said this thing to himself, he lowered chisel and mallet +and paused. Posture and form would avail nothing without these +emotions written on the face. He began to wonder if he might carve +them, unaided. He had not found them in the Israelite, and he +confessed to himself, with a little laugh, a doubt that he should ever +see them on her countenance. + +Then a vagabond impulse presented itself unbidden in his mind and was +frowned down with a blush of apology to himself. And yet he remembered +his coquetry with the Lady Ta-meri as some small defense in the form of +precedent. + +"Nay," he replied to this evidence, "it is a different woman. Between +myself and Ta-meri it is even odds, and the vanquished will have +deserved his defeat." + +That evening--it was several days after the face of the goddess had +begun to emerge from the block of stone--he went to the upper end of +the gorge and passed through the camp on his way home, that he might +meet his model. + +The laborers had not returned from the quarries, though the evening +meal bubbled and fumed over the fires in the narrow avenue between the +tents. Kenkenes passed by on the outskirts of the encampment and went +on. + +Deep shadow lay on the stone-pits when Kenkenes reached the mouth of +the gorge, and a cool wind from the Nile swept across the grain. The +day's work had been prolonged in the lowering of a huge slab from its +position in its native bed. The monolith was already on the brink of +the wooden incline, and every man was at the windlasses by which the +cables controlling its descent were paid out. Kenkenes saw at a glance +that none of the water-bearers was present, and he knew the lovely +Israelite was with them. He did not pause. + +Before the sound of the quarry stir had been left behind he heard a +sharp report, the frightened shrieks of women and shouts of warning. +He looked back in time to see the huge stone turn part way round on the +chute and rush, end first, earthward. Expectant silence fell, broken +only by the vicious snarl of a flying windlass crank. But in an +instant the great slab struck the earth with a thunderous sound that +reverberated again and again from the barren hills about. A vast +all-enveloping cloud of dust and earth filled the hollow quarry like +smoke from an explosion. But there was no further outcry, and through +the outskirts of the lifting cloud men were seen making deliberate +preparations to repair the parted cable. Assured that no calamity had +occurred, Kenkenes went on. + +In a few steps he met the children water-bearers flying to the scene of +the accident. Not one of them bore a water-skin. The excited young +Hebrews did not stop to question the sculptor, but ran on, and were +swallowed up in dust. + +Half-way to the Nile he came upon her whom he sought. She was standing +alone in the midst of ten sheepskins, and the grain was wetted with the +spilled water. He pointed to the discarded hides about her. + +"The camp will go thirsty if the runaways do not return," he said. +"Thy burden is too heavy for even me to-night." + +"They will return," she answered. + +"Aye, it was naught but a parting cable and a falling rock. I was near +and saw no evidence of disaster. Had the children asked me, I should +have told them as much." + +"They will return," she repeated, and Kenkenes fancied that there was a +dismissal in this quiet repetition. But he did not mean to see it. He +went on, with a smile. + +"I am glad they did not stop, for I wanted to see thee, with that +frightened longing of a man who hath resolved on confession and meeteth +his confessor on a sudden. Now that the moment hath arrived I marvel +how I shall make my peace with Athor, whose command I most deliberately +broke." + +She raised her beautiful eyes to his face and waited for him to +proceed. The pose of the head was exactly what he wanted. Rapidly he +compared every detail of her face with his memory of the statue of +Athor, noting with satisfaction that his studies had been happily +faithful. His scrutiny was so swift and skilful that there seemed to +be nothing unusual in his gaze. + +"I am culpable but impenitent," he continued. "I shall not forswear +mine offense. Neither is there any need of a plea to justify myself, +for my very sin is its own justification. Behold me! I perched myself +like a sacred hawk at the mouth of the valley and filched thy likeness. +Do with me as thou wilt, but I shall die reiterating approval of my +deed." + +His extravagant speech wrought an interesting change on the face before +him. There was a pronounced curve of her mouth, a slight tension in +the chiseled nostril--in fact, an indefinable disdain that had not been +there before. It would become Athor well. Kenkenes understood the +look but he did not flinch. Instead he let his head drop slowly until +he looked at her from under his brows. Then he summoned into his eyes +all the wounded feeling, pathos, soft reproach and appeal, of which his +graceless young heart was capable, and gazed at her. + +Khufu might have been as easily melted by the twinkle of a rain drop. +Never in his life had he faced such comprehensive contemplation. Calm, +monumental and icy disdain deepened on every feature. + +Kenkenes stood motionless and suffered her to look at him. Being a man +of fine soul, the eloquent gaze spoke well-deserved rebuke. He knew +that his color had risen, and his eyes fell in spite of heroic efforts +to keep them steady. His sensations were unique; never had he +experienced the like. When he recovered himself her blue eyes were +fixed absently on the distant quarries. + +Every impulse urged him to set himself right in the eyes of this most +discerning slave. + +"Wilt thou forgive me?" he asked earnestly. "I would I could make thee +know I crave thy good will." + +There was no mistaking the honesty in these words. + +Her face relaxed instantly. + +"But I fear I have not set about it wisely," he added. "Let me give +thee a peace-offering to prove my contrition." + +He slipped from about his neck the collar of golden rings and moved +forward to put it about her throat. + +She drew back, her face flushing hotly under an expression of positive +pain. + +Kenkenes dropped his hands to his sides with a limpness highly +suggestive of desperate perplexity. Was not this a slave? And yet +here was the fine feeling of a princess. He stood, for once in his +life, at a loss what to do. He could not depart without the greatest +awkwardness, and yet, if he lingered, he sacrificed his comfort. +Presently he exclaimed helplessly: + +"Rachel, do thou tell me what to say or do. It seems that I but sink +myself the deeper in the quicksand of thy disapproval at every struggle +to escape. Do thou lead me out." + +He had met a slave, justed with an equal and flung up his hands in +surrender to his better. He did not confess this to himself, but his +words were admission enough. Never would his high-born spirit have +permitted him to make such a declaration to one slavish in soul. + +The straightforward acknowledgment of defeat and the genuine concern in +his voice were irresistible. She answered him at once, distantly and +calmly. + +"Thou, as an Egyptian, hast honored me, a Hebrew, with thy notice. I +have deserved neither gift nor fee." + +"Nay, but let us put it differently," he replied. "I, as a man, have +given thee, a maiden, offense, and having repented, would appease thee +with a peace-offering. Believe me, I do not jest. By the gentle +goddesses, I fear to speak," he added breathlessly. + +The Israelite's blue eyes were veiled quickly, but the Egyptian guessed +aright that she had hidden a smile in them. + +"Am I forgiven?" he persisted. + +"So thou wilt offend no further," she said without raising her eyes. + +"I promise. And now, since the goddess hath refused mine offering, I +may not take it back. What shall I do with this?" he asked, holding up +the collar of gold. + +"Put it about thy statue's neck," she said softly. + +Kenkenes gasped and retreated a step. Instantly she was imploring his +pardon. + +"It was a forward spirit in me that made me say it. I pray thee, +forgive me." + +"Thou hast given no offense, but how dost thou know of this--tell me +that." + +"I came upon it by accident three days ago. Several of the children +had gone fowling for the taskmaster's meal, and were so long absent +that I was sent to look for them. The path down the valley is old, and +I have followed it with the idea of labor ever in my mind. And this +was a moment of freedom, so I thought to spend it where I had not been +a slave, I went across the hills, and, being unfamiliar with them, lost +my way. When I climbed upon one of the great rocks to overlook the +labyrinth, lo! at my feet was the statue. I knew myself the moment I +looked, and it was not hard to guess whose work it was." + +She paused and looked at him with appeal on her face. + +"Thou hast told no one?" + +"Nay," was the quick and earnest answer. + +"Thou hast caught me in a falsehood," he said. The statement was +almost brutal in its directness. + +But the question that came back swiftly was not less pointed. + +"There was no frieze of bondmaidens--naught of anything thou hast told +me?" + +"Nay, not anything. I am carving a statue against the canons of the +sculptor's ritual for the sake of my love of beauty. Until thou didst +come upon it, I alone possessed the secret. Thou knowest the +punishment which will overtake me?" + +"Aye, I know right well. Yet fear not. The statue is right cunningly +concealed and none will ever find it, for the children were +unsuccessful and the meals for the overseer will be brought him from +the city hereafter. And I will not betray thee--I give thee my word." + +Her tone was soft and earnest; her assurances were spoken so +confidently, her interest was so genuine, that a queer and +unaccountable satisfaction possessed the young artist at once. + +At this moment the runaway water-bearers came in sight and in obedience +to very evident dismissal in the Israelite's eyes, Kenkenes bade her +farewell and left her. + +But he had not gone two paces before she overtook him. + +"Approach thy work from various directions," she cautioned, "else thou +wilt wear a path which may spy on thee one day." + +The moment the words passed her lips, Kenkenes, who still held the +collar, put it about her neck, passing his hands under the thick +plaits, and snapped the clasp accurately. + +The act was done instantly, and with but a single movement. He was +gone, laughing on his way, before she had realized what he had done. + +There was revel in the young man's veins that evening, but the great +house of his father was silent and lonely. If he would find a +companion he must leave its heavy walls. His resolution was not long +in making nor his instinct slow in directing him. An hour after the +evening meal, when he entered the chariot that waited, he had laid +aside the simple tunic, and in festal attire was, every inch of his +many inches, the son of the king's favorite artist. His charioteer +drove in the direction of the nomarch's house. + +The portress conducted him into the faintly lighted chamber of guests +and went forth silently. Kenkenes interpreted her behavior at once. + +"There is another guest," he thought with a smile, "and I can name him +as promptly as any chanting sorcerer might." When the serving woman +returned she bade him follow her and led the way to the house-top. + +There, under the subdued light of a single lamp, was the Lady Ta-meri; +at her feet, Nechutes. + +"I should wear the symbol-broidered robe of a soothsayer," the sculptor +told himself. + +"You made a longer sojourn of your visit to Tape than you had +intended," the lady said, after the greetings. + +"Nay, I have been in Memphis twenty days at least." + +"So?" queried Nechutes. "Where dost thou keep thyself?" + +"In the garb of labor among the ink-pots and papyri of the sculptor +class," the lady answered. "I warrant there are pigment marks on his +fingers even now." + +Kenkenes extended his long right hand to her for inspection. She +received it across her pink palm and scrutinized it laughingly. + +"Nay, I take it back. Here is naught but henna and a suspicion of +attar. He has been idle these days." + +"Hast thou forgotten the efficacy of the lemon in the removal of +stains?" the sculptor asked with a smile. + +The lady frowned. + +"Give us thy news from Tape, then," she demanded, putting his hand away. + +"The court is coming to Memphis sooner. That is all. O, aye, I had +well-nigh forgot. There is also talk of a marriage between Rameses and +Ta-user." + +"Fie!" the lady scoffed. "Nechutes hath more to tell than that, and he +hath stayed in Memphis." + +"Thou wilt come to realize some day, Ta-meri, that I am fitted to the +yoke of labor, when I fail thee in all the nicer walks thou wouldst +have me tread. Come, out with thy gossip, Nechutes." + +"I had a letter from Hotep to-day--a budget of news, included with +official matters with which the king would acquaint me. Ta-user, with +Amon-meses and Siptah, hath joined the court at Tape--" + +"And Siptah, she brought with her--" the sculptor interrupted softly. + +Nechutes cast an expressive look at Kenkenes and went on. + +"And the courting hath begun." + +Silence fell, and the lady looked at the two young men with wonder in +her eyes. + +"Nay, but that is interesting," Kenkenes admitted, recovering himself. +"Tell me more." + +"The offices of cup-bearer and murket are to be bestowed in Memphis," +Nechutes continued. + +"And the one falls to Nechutes," the lady declared triumphantly. + +"Of a truth thou hast a downy lot before thee, Nechutes," the young +sculptor said heartily. "And never one so deserving of it. I give +thee joy." + +"And the other goes to the noble Mentu," Nechutes added in a meek voice. + +"Sphinx!" Ta-meri cried, tapping him on the head. "You did not tell me +that." + +The surprised delight of Kenkenes was not so bewildering as to blind +him to the reason why Nechutes had withheld this news from Ta-meri. +The blunt Egyptian was not anxious to speed his rival's cause. + +"Does my father know of this?" he asked. + +"I doubt not. The same messenger that brought me news of mine own +appointment departed for On when he learned that Mentu was there." + +"Nay, but that will be wine in his veins," Kenkenes mused happily. "It +will make him young again. His late inactivity hath chafed him sorely." + +"You have come honestly by your labor-loving," Nechutes commented. +"Hotep adds further that Mentu is the only one of the king's new +ministers that is no longer a young man." + +"It is Rameses who counsels him, I doubt not," the sculptor replied. +"He hath great faith in the powers of youth. And behold what a cabinet +he hath built up for his father. First," Kenkenes continued, +enumerating on his fingers, "there is Nechutes--" + +The new cup-bearer waved his hand, and Kenkenes went on. + +"There is my father, the murket. He needs no further praise than the +utterance of his name. There is Hotep, on whose lips Toth abideth. +There is Seneferu, the faithful, whom the Rebu dreads. Next is +Kephren, the mohar,[1] who would outshine his father, the right hand of +the great Rameses, had he but nations to conquer. After him, Har-hat--" + +"Hold! He is not appointed of the prince. He was Meneptah's +choice--and his alone," Nechutes interrupted. "It is rumored that +Rameses is not over-fond of him." + +"He will be put to it to hold his high place in the face of the +prince's disfavor," Kenkenes cogitated. + +"Nay, but he presses the prince hard for generalship. It must be so, +since he could win the king's good will over the protest of Rameses. +So I doubt not he can hold his own at court by prudence and strategy." + +Meanwhile Ta-meri, in the depths of her chair, gazed at the pair +resentfully. They had grown interested in weighty things and had +seemingly forgotten her. So she sighed and bethought her how to punish +them. + +"What a relief it will be when the Pharaoh returns to Memphis!" she +murmured in the pause that now followed. "He will be more welcome to +me than the Nile overflow. The city has been a desert to me since he +departed." + +Nechutes looked at her with reproach in his eyes. + +"Consider the desert, O sweet Oasis," Kenkenes said softly. "Is not +its portion truly grievous if its single palm complain?" + +The lady dropped her eyes and her cheeks glowed even through the dusk. +After the long interval of Nechutes' blunt love-making the sculptor's +subtleties fell most gratefully on her ear. + +Nechutes scowled, sighed and finally spoke. + +"Tape is afflicted in anticipation of the king's departure," he +observed disjointedly. + +"Tape does not love Meneptah as Memphis loves him," Kenkenes answered. +"Hast thou not this moment heard Memphis pine for him? Tape would not +have spoken thus. She would have said: 'Would that the king were here +that I might ask a boon of him.' Memphis is the cradle of kings; Tape, +their tomb. Memphis is full of reverence for the Pharaohs; Tape, of +pride; Memphis of loyalty; Tape, of boon-craving. Meneptah returns to +the bosom of his mother when he returns to Memphis." + +"But he will not remain here long," Nechutes went on. "He goes to +Tanis to be near the scene of the Israelitish unrest." + +"Alas, Ta-meri, and wilt thou droop again?" Kenkenes asked. + +"I fear," she assented with a little sigh. Then, after a pause, she +asked: "Does the murket follow the court?" + +Kenkenes shook his head. "Not when the Pharaoh travels. But should he +depart permanently from Memphis my father would go. Many of the court +returning hither will not proceed to Tanis. The city will not be so +desolate then as now." + +"Nay, but I am glad," she said. "Those who remain will suffice." + +"Of a truth?" Nechutes demanded angrily. + +"Have I not said?" she replied. + +Nechutes rose slowly and made his way to a chair some distance away +from her. Kenkenes immediately guessed why the cup-bearer was hurt, +but the lady was innocent. He knew that he had but to speak to restore +Nechutes to favor. + +Meanwhile the lady, amazed and deeply offended at the desertion of the +cup-bearer, had turned her back on him. Kenkenes arose. + +Ta-meri sat up in alarm. + +"O, do not go. You have but this moment come," she said. + +"Already have I stayed too long," he replied. "But thy hospitality +makes one forget the debt one owes to a prior guest." + +She looked at him from under silken lashes. + +"Nechutes has misconducted himself," she objected, "and I would not be +left alone with him." + +"Wouldst thou have me stay and see him restored to favor under my very +eyes? Ah, Ta-meri, where is thy womanly compassion?" + +She smiled and extended her hand. Kenkenes took it and felt it relax +and lie willingly in his palm. + +"Nay, do not go," she pleaded softly. + +"Give me leave to come again instead." + +"To-morrow," she said, half questioning, half commanding. He did not +promise, but as he bent over to kiss her hand, he said in a low tone: + +"Hast thou forgotten that Nechutes leaves Memphis with the going of the +king?" + +The lady started and flung a conscience-stricken glance at the scowling +cup-bearer. And while her face was turned, Kenkenes departed like a +shadow. But the portals of the nomarch's house had hardly closed +behind him before he demanded of himself, impatiently, why he had made +Nechutes' peace, why he kept the cup-bearer for ever between himself +and Ta-meri. And as if to evade this catechism something arose in him +and asked him why he should not. + +And to this he could give no answer. + + + +[1] Mohar--The king's pioneer, an office that might be defined as +minister of war. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE DEBT OF ISRAEL + +For an instant after the sculptor had put the collar about her throat, +Rachel stood motionless, her face flushing and whitening with +conflicting emotions. + +But her indecision was only momentary. Rebellion was in the ascendant. + +She thrust her fingers under the band and essayed to wrench off the +offending necklace, but the stout fastening held and the flexible braid +printed its woof on the back of the soft neck. Almost in tears she +undid the clasp and flung the collar away. + +It struck the earth with a musical ring, and the green of the wheat hid +all but a faint ray of the red metal. + +The rout of children descended on her, each clamoring a story of the +accident. But without a word she marshaled them and turned once again +toward the river to refill the hides. At the water's edge she kept her +eyes resolutely from the broad dimpling breast of the Nile toward the +south. She feared that she might see the light bari that was driving +back to Memphis against that slow but mighty current as easily as if +wind and water went with it. + +But even before she turned again toward Masaarah, her better nature +began to chide her. She remembered her impetuous act with a flush of +shame. + +"His peace-offering--a proof of his good will, and thou didst mistreat +it, as if he had meant it for a purchase or a fee. The indignity thou +hast petulantly fancied, Rachel." + +After a time another thought came to her. + +"The act was not womanly. Wherein hast thou rebuked him, in casting +away the trinket? Thou hast the dignity of Israel to uphold in thy +dealings with this young man." + +When she reached the spot where the collar had fallen, she sought for +it furtively, and having found it, thrust it into the bosom of her +dress. + +"I shall not keep it," she said, quieting the protests of her pride. +"I shall make him take it back to-morrow." + +Entering her low shelter in the camp some time later, she found Deborah +absent. Impelled by an unreasoning desire to keep secret this event, +she hastily hid the collar in the sand of the tent floor and laid the +straw matting of her bed smoothly over its burial place. Again she +struggled with her pride and demanded of herself why she had become +secretive. + +"Fie!" she replied. "How couldst thou tell this story to Deborah? +Why, it is well-nigh unbecoming." + +The dusk settled down over the valley. Deborah came in like a phantom +from the camp-fires with the evening meal, and the pair sat down +together to eat, Rachel silent, Deborah thoughtful. + +"Another Egyptian comes to govern Masaarah," the old woman observed. +"Agistas departed but now, leaving the camp in charge of the +under-drivers." + +"It makes little odds with us--this change of taskmasters, Deborah--be +he Agistas or any other Egyptian. They are masters and we continue to +be slaves," Rachel answered after a little silence. + +"Nay, art thou losing spirit?" Deborah asked with animation. "How +shall the elders keep of good heart if the young surrender?" + +"I despair not," the girl protested. "I did but remark this thing; and +I have spoken truly, have I not?" + +"Even so. But this evening there must be more recognition in thee of +thy lot since it overflows in words. I, too, have spoken truly, have I +not?" + +Rachel smiled. "It may be," she said. + +When they had supped, they went out before the tent to get the cooling +air. It was Deborah again that first broke the silence. + +"Elias is smitten with blindness from the stone-dust," she said +absently. + +"For all time?" Rachel asked anxiously. + +"Nay, if he could but rest them and bathe them in the proper simples." + +"Alas--" Rachel began, but she checked herself hurriedly. "He was my +father's servant," she said instead--"the last living one. Jehovah +spare him. One by one they fall, until I shall be utterly without tie +to prove I once had kindred." + +Deborah looked at the girl fixedly for a moment. Then she put up her +hand and leaned on the soft young shoulder. + +"Am I not left?" she asked. + +Rachel passed her arm about the bowed figure, with some compunction for +her complaint. + +"My mother's friend!" she exclaimed lovingly. "I know she died in +peace, remembering that I was left to thy care." + +"I mind me," she continued after a little silence, "how tender and +frail she was. Thou wast as a strong tree beside her. I seem to +myself to be mighty compared to my memory of her." + +Deborah took the white hand that lay across her shoulder. "Thou art +like to thy father. Thy mother was black-eyed and fragile--born to the +soft life of a princess. Misfortune was her death, though she +struggled to live for thee. Praise God that thou art like to thy +father, else thou hadst died in thine infancy." + +"Nay, hath my lot been sterner than the portion of all Israel?" + +"Of a surety, thou canst guess it, for are there many of thy tribe like +thee--without a kinsman?" + +Rachel shook her head, and the old woman continued absently: "Of thy +mother's family there were four, but they died of the heavy labor. Thy +father, Maai, surnamed the Compassionate, was the eldest of six. They +were mighty men, tawny like the lion and as bold--worthy sons of Judah! +But there is none left--not one." + +"Ten!" Rachel exclaimed, "and not one remaineth!" + +"Aye, and they died as though they were plague-smitten--in pairs and +singly, in a little space." + +Deborah felt a strong tremor run through the young figure against which +she leaned, and the arm across her shoulder was withdrawn, that the +hand might clear the eyes of their tears. + +The old woman discreetly held her peace till the girl should recover. + +"Thou must bear in mind, Rachel," she began, after a long silence, +"that Egypt had an especial grudge against thy house,--hence, its +especial vengeance. Seti, the Pharaoh, began the oppression of the +children of Israel, but the bondage was not all-embracing, in the +beginning. There were Hebrews to whom Egypt was indebted and chief +among these was thy father's grandsire, Aram. Seti paid the debt to +him by sparing his small lands and his little treasure and himself when +he put Israel to toil. Thy father's father, thy grandsire, Elihu, +younger brother to Amminadab, who was father-in-law to Aaron, came to +his share of his father's goods when Aram was gathered to his fathers. +This was in the latter days of Seti. Thy grandsire sent his little +treasure into Arabia and bought lands with it. After many trials he +caused to grow thereon a rose-shrub which had no period of +rest--blooming freshly with every moon. And there he had the Puntish +scentmaker on the hip, for the Arabic rose rested often. The attar he +distilled from his untiring flower, had another odor, wild and sweet +and of a daintier strength. When he was ready to trade he sent in a +vial of crystal to Neferari Thermuthis and to Moses, then a young man +and a prince of the realm, a few drops of this wondrous perfume. Doubt +not, the Hebrew prince knew that the gift came from a son of Israel. +The queen and Moses used the attar. Therefore all purple-wearing Egypt +must have it or die, since the fashion had been set within the +boundaries of the throne. Then did Elihu name a price for his sweet +odor that might have been small had each drop been a jewel. But Egypt +opened her coffers and bought as though her idols had broken their +silence and commanded her." + +The old woman paused and reflected with grim satisfaction on the remote +days of an Israelitish triumph. + +"Meanwhile," she continued finally, "thy grandsire lived humbly in +Goshen. None dreamed that this keeper of a little flock, lord over a +little tent and tiller of a few acres, was the great Syrian merchant +who was despoiling Mizraim. + +"Next he became a money-lender, through his steward, to the Egyptians, +and wrested from them what they had saved in putting Israel to toil +without hire. So his riches increased a hundredfold and the half of +noble Egypt was beholden to him. Then he turned to aid his oppressed +brethren. + +"He bribed the taskmasters or kept watch over them and discovered +wherein they were false to the Pharaoh, and held their own sin over +their heads till they submitted through fear of him. He filled +Israel's fields with cattle, the hills with Hebrew flocks, the valleys +with corn. Alas! Had it not been--but, nay, Jehovah was not yet +ready. He had chosen Moses to lead Israel." + +The old woman paused and sighed. After a silence she continued: + +"Thy father fell heir to the most of his wealth, but not to his +immunity. With a heart as great as his sire's he continued the good +work. He wedded thy mother, the daughter of another free Israelite, +and in his love for her, never was man more happy. In the midst of his +hope and his peace an enemy betrayed him to Rameses, the Incomparable +Pharaoh. And Rameses remembered not his father's covenant. So Maai's +lands, his flocks, his home, were taken; thou, but new-born, and thy +mother with her people were sent to the brick-fields--himself and his +brothers to the mines; and in a few years thou wast all that was left +of thy father's house." + +The effect of this recital on the young Israelite was deep. Anguish, +wrath, and the pain that intensifies these two, helplessness, inflamed +her soul. The story was not entirely new to her; she had heard it, a +part at a time, in her childhood; but now, her understanding fully +developed, the whole history of her family's wrongs appealed to her in +all its actual savagery. Egypt, as a unit, like a single individual, +had done her people to death. Between her and Egypt, then, should be +bitter enmity, rancor that might never be subdued, and eternal warfare. +Her enemy had conquered her, had put her in bondage, and made sport of +her as a pastime. The accumulation of injury and insult seemed more +than she could bear, and the vague hope of Israel in Moses seemed in +the face of Egypt's strength a folly most fatuous. + +"O Egypt! Egypt!" she exclaimed with concentrated passion. "What a +debt of vengeance Israel owes to thee!" + +The old woman laid her shriveled hands on the arm of her ward. + +"Aye, and it shall be paid," she said fiercely. "Thou canst not get +thy people back, nor alleviate for them now the pangs that killed them; +but to the mortally wronged there is one restitution--revenge!" + +At this moment some one over near the western limits of the camp cried +out a welcome; a commotion arose, noisy with cheers and rapid with +running. Presently it died down and the pair before the tent saw a +horseman ride through the gloom toward the empty frame house of the +overseer. + +The two women lapsed immediately into their absorbed communion again. + +"Lay it not to Egypt alone, but to all the offenders against Jehovah. +Midian and Amalek, passing through to do homage to the Pharaoh, sneer +at Israel; Babylon in her chariot of gold flicks her whip at the sons +of Abraham as she bears her gifts of sisterhood to Memphis. We suffer +not only the insults of a single nation, but despiteful use by all +idolaters. Let but the world gather before Jehovah's altar and there +shall be no more affronts to Israel." + +"Must we bide that time?" Rachel asked. "Or shall we bring it about?" + +"Nay," Deborah replied scornfully. "Even my mystic eyes are not potent +enough to see so far into the future. We throw off the bondage sooner +than thou dreamest, daughter of Judah, but if the nations bow at the +altar of Jehovah, it will take a stronger hand than Israel's to bring +them there." + +After a silence Rachel murmured, as though to herself: "We shall go, +and soon, and leave no debt behind. Will the vengeance befall all +Egypt, the good as well as the bad?" + +"Hast thou forgotten God's promise to Abraham concerning the wicked +cities of the plain? If there were ten righteous therein He had not +destroyed them utterly." + +"Nay, but if there be but one therein?" + +"One? Now, for what one dost thou concern thyself? Atsu?" + +Rachel, startled out of her dream, hesitated, her face coloring hotly, +though unseen, beneath the kindly dusk of night. + +"Yea," she said in a low tone, wondering gravely if she spake the +truth. Somebody beside her laughed the short unready laugh of one slow +at mirth. + +"Of a truth?" he asked. Rachel turned about and faced Atsu. He took +her hands and drew her near him. + +"Nay, Deborah," he said sadly; "pursue her not into the secret chambers +of her young heart. I doubt not there is 'one' therein, but why shall +we demand what manner of 'one' it is when she may not even confess it +to herself?" + +Confused and a little guilty by reason of the necklace, and wondering +why she admitted any guilt, Rachel drew away from him. + +"Nay," he went on, retaining his clasp. "Let there be perfect +understanding between us twain, thou Radiant One. I shall not plague +thee with my love, nor even let it be apparent after this. Men have +lived in constant fellowship, but no nearer to the women whom they +love, and am I less able than my kind? So I be not hateful to thee, +Rachel, I am content." + +"Hateful to me!" she cried reproachfully. + +"Nay? No more then. I have spoken the last with thee concerning my +love. And thus I seal the pact." + +He drew her, unresisting, to him, and kissed her forehead. + +"For my gentleness to the Hebrews of Pa-Ramesu," he continued in a +calmer tone as he released her, "they have stripped me of my rank and +sent me to govern Masaarah. So they thought to punish me, never +dreaming that they joined me to Rachel, and hid me away in a nook with +a handful to whom I may be merciful and none will spy upon me! They +thwarted their end." + +"Happy Masaarah!" Rachel said earnestly. + +Atsu laughed again and disappeared in the dark. + +Rachel drew her hand furtively across the place on her brow that the +taskmaster's lips had touched. The keen eyes of the old Israelite saw +the motion and understood it. + +"It is not Atsu," she said astutely. + +"Nay," the girl protested, "and yet it is Atsu, in mine own meaning, or +any one in Egypt who is fair to Israel. The grace of that one would be +sufficient in God's sight to save all Egypt from doom. That was my +meaning." + +The light in the frame quarters of the taskmaster was extinguished and +at that moment a shadowy figure emerged from the dark and approached +the pair. + +"A courier from Mesu speaketh without the camp, even now," the visiting +Israelite said in a half-whisper. "Atsu hath put out his light, to +sleep, but even if he sleep not, the people may go without fear and +listen to the speaker. Come ye and give him audience." + +"We come," Deborah replied. + +As the old woman and her ward walked down through the night in the +direction taken by the entire population of the quarries, Deborah said +quietly: + +"Thy cloud of depression hath rifted somewhat since sunset, daughter." + +Rachel pressed her hand repentantly. + +At the side of an open space, now closely filled with sitting +listeners, stood a Hebrew, not older than thirty-five. A knot of +flaming pitch, stuck in a crevice of rock near him, lighted his face +and figure. His frame had the characteristic stalwart structure of the +Israelitish bondman. The black hair waved back from a placid white +forehead; the eyes were serene and level, the mouth rather wide but +firm, the jaw square. The beard would have been light for a much +younger man, and it was soft, red-brown and curling. It added a +mildness and tenderness to the face. Whoever looked upon him was +impressed with the unflinching piety of the countenance. + +This was Caleb the Faithful, son of Jephunneh, the Kenezite. + +He was talking when Rachel and her ancient guardian entered the hollow, +and he continued in a passive tone throughout the several arrivals +thereafter. He spoke as one that believes unfalteringly and has +evidence for the faith. He did not recount Israel's wrongs--he would +have worked against his purpose had he wrought his hearers into an +angry mood. Besides, the story would have been superfluous. None knew +Israel's wrongs better than Israel. + +He talked of redemption and Canaan. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +HEBREW CRAFT + +When Mentu returned from On a light had kindled in his eyes and his +stately step had grown elastic. The man that withdraws from a busy +life while in full vigor has beckoned to Death. Inactivity preys upon +him like a disease. The great artist, forced into idleness by the +succession of an incapable king, had been renewed by the prospect of +labor which his exaltation into the high office had afforded. With +pleasure in his heart, Kenkenes watched his father grow young again. + +"Who was thy good friend in this?" the young man asked one evening +after a number of contented remarks concerning the market's +appointment. "Who said the word in the Pharaoh's ear?" + +"So to raise me to this office it is needful that something more than +my deserts must have urged the king?" Mentu retorted. + +"Nay! that was not my meaning," Kenkenes made haste to say. "But thou +knowest, my father, that Meneptah must be for ever directed. Who, +then, offered him this wise counsel? Rameses?" + +"It was never Har-hat," Mentu replied, but half placated. + +"If he had, thou and I must no longer call him a poor counselor." + +"Bribe--" the murket began, ruffled once more. + +"Nay," Kenkenes interrupted smiling. "He had but proved himself worthy +and wise." + +Mentu shook his head, but there was no more temper evident in his face. + +"Now is a propitious hour for a good counselor," Kenkenes pursued. + +"What knowest thou?" Mentu asked with interest. + +"Tape," the young man replied briefly. + +"Nay, the sedition in Tape is old and vitiated." + +"And the Hak-heb." + +"That breach may be healed. But we have sedition to fear among the +bond-people--" + +"The bond-people!" + +"Even so. Open and organized sedition." + +"The Israelites?" Kenkenes exclaimed with an incredulous note in his +voice. + +"The Israelites." + +"I would sooner fear a rebellion among the draft-oxen and the mules of +Nehapehu." [1] + +"The elder Seti's fears and the fears of the great Rameses were other +than yours." + +"O, aye, they had cause for fear then, but since Seti yoked the +creatures--" + +"The Pharaohs did not begin in time," the elder man interrupted. "Had +that royal fiat, the decimation of Hebrew children, continued, we +should not have had the Israelite to-day, but gods!" he shuddered with +horror. "I hope that is a horrid slander--tradition, not fact. I like +not to lay the slaughter or babes at the door of any Egyptian dynasty. +But had an early Pharaoh of the house of Tothmes enforced the +absorption of the Hebrew by his same rank among the Egyptian, we should +not have the menace of a hostile alien within our borders to-day. The +heavy hand of oppression has made a wondrous race of them for strength. +Theirs is no mean intellect; great men have come from among them, and +they will be a hardy foe arrayed against us." + +"They are not warriors; they are poor and unequipped for hostilities; +they are thoroughly under subjection," the young man pursued. "What +can they do against us?" + +"Do!" Mentu exclaimed with impatience in the repetition. "They have +only to say to the banished Hyksos: 'Come ye, let us do battle with +Egypt. We will be your mercenaries.' They have only to send greeting +to that lean traitor Amon-meses, thus: 'Give us the Delta to be ours +and we will help you win all Egypt,' and there will be enough done." + +"They must have a pact among themselves and a leader, first," Kenkenes +objected. + +"Have I not said they are organized? And their leader is found. He is +a foster-brother to Meneptah; an initiated priest of Isis; a sorcerer +and an infidel of the blackest order. He is Prince Mesu, a Hebrew by +birth." + +"Dost thou know him?" Kenkenes asked with interest. + +"Nay, he has dwelt in Midian these forty years. He returned some time +ago and hath dwelt passively in Goshen till--" + +The artist dropped his voice and came nearer to his son. + +"He hath dwelt passively in Goshen till of late, and it is whispered +that some secret work against him inaugurated by the priesthood, or +mayhap the Pharaoh, hath given him provocation to revolt against +Meneptah." + +After a silence Kenkenes asked in a lowered tone: + +"Hath he made demonstration?" + +"O, aye, he is clamoring to lead his people a three days' journey into +the wilderness to make sacrifice to their god." + +"Shades of mine ancestors! If that is all, let them, so they return," +Kenkenes said amicably. + +"Let them!" the sculptor exploded. "Dost thou believe that they would +return?" + +"I apprehend that the Rameside army would be capable of thwarting them +if they were disposed to depart permanently." + +"Thou dost apprehend--aye, of a truth, I know thou dost! Halt all our +works of peace for an indefinite time; mass the vast army of the +Pharaoh and spend days and good arrows in retrieving the runaways, +merely that a barbarian god may smell the savor of holy animals +sacrificed! Gods! Kenkenes, thou art as trustworthy a counselor as +Har-hat!" + +Thereafter there was a silence in the work-room. But a peppery man is +seldom sulky, and Kenkenes was fully prepared for the mildness in his +father's voice when he spoke again. + +"Thou shouldst see the pretense in his demand, Kenkenes. He must have +provocation to urge him to rebellion, and he knows full well that +Meneptah will not grant that petition." + +"But hath he not provocation--thou hast but a moment ago told--" + +"But that was only an offense against him. The whole people would not +go into revolt because some one had conspired against one of their +number. Therefore he telleth Israel that its God would have Israel +make a pilgrimage, promising curses upon the people if they obey not. +Then he putteth the appeal to the Pharaoh and the Pharaoh denieth it. +Wherefore the whole people is enraged and hath rallied to the +conspirator's cause. Seest thou, my son?" + +"It is strategy worthy the Incomparable Pharaoh--" + +"It is Hebrew craft!" + +"Perhaps thou art right. But what personal grudge hath Mesu against +Egypt or the priesthood or Meneptah?" + +"It is said that he was wanted out of the way, and by an unfortunate +sum of accidents, the miscarriage of a priest's letter and a fight +between a messenger and Bedouins in front of a Hebrew tent, gave the +information into the hands of Mesu himself." + +By this time Kenkenes was on his feet. + +"A miscarriage of a priest's letter," he repeated slowly. + +The artist nodded. + +After the silence the young man spoke again: + +"And thou believest truly that because of this letter--because of this +Israelite's grievance against the powers of Egypt, we shall have +uprising and serious trouble among our bond-people?" + +"I have said," Mentu answered, raising his head as though surprised at +the earnestness in his son's voice. Kenkenes did not meet his father's +eyes. He turned on his heel and left the work-room. + +Had the spiteful Seven, the Hathors, used him as a tool whereby +mischief should be wrought between the nation and her slaves? + + + +[1] The Fayum. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +CANAAN + +When the imperative necessity of harmonious expression became apparent, +the young artist laid aside his chisel and mallet, and the Arabian +desert knew his footsteps no more for many days after the rough-hewing +of Athor's face. Instead, he mingled with the people of Memphis in +quest of the expression. The pursuit became fascinating and +all-absorbing. With the most deliberate calculation, he studied the +faces of the betrothed and of newly wedded wives, and finding too much +of content therein, he sought out the unelect for study. And with +these, his search ended. + +Thereafter he made innumerable heads in clay, and covered linen scrolls +with drawings. But it was the semblance he gained and not the spirit. +The light eluded him. + +On the day after Mentu's return from On, Kenkenes paid the first visit +to Masaarah since the incident of the collar,--and the last he thought +to make until he had won that for which he strove. He went to bury the +matting in the sand and to hide other evidences of recent occupancy +about the niche. He left the block of stone undisturbed, for the +transgression was not yet apparent on the face of Athor. The scrolls, +which had been concealed under the carpeting, were too numerous for his +wallet to contain, but he carried the surplus openly in his hand. + +It was sunset before he had made an end. To return to the Nile by way +of the cliff-front would have saved him time, but there was a boyish +wish in his heart to look again on the lovely face that had helped him +and baffled him. So he descended into the upper end of the ravine and +slowly passed the outskirts of the camp, but the bond-girl was nowhere +to be seen. The spaces between the low tents were filled with feeding +laborers and there was an unusual amount of cheer to be noted among +Israel of Masaarah. Kenkenes heard the talk and laughter with some +wonderment as he passed. He admitted that he was disappointed when, +without a glimpse of Rachel, he emerged into the Nile valley. But he +leaped lightly down the ledge, crossed the belt of rubble, talus and +desert sand, and entered the now well-marked wagon road between the +dark green meadow land on either side. Egypt was in shadow--her sun +behind the Libyan heights,--but the short twilight had not fallen. +Overhead were the cooling depths of sky, as yet starless, but the river +was breathing on the winds and the sibilant murmur of its waters began +to talk above the sounds of the city. To the north, the south and the +east was pastoral and desert quiet; to the west was the gradual +subsidence of urban stir. Frogs were beginning to croak in the +distance, and in the long grain here and there, a nocturnal insect +chirred and stilled abruptly as the young man passed. + +Within a rod of the pier some one called: + +"My master!" + +The voice came from a distance, but he knew whom he should see when he +turned. Half-way across the field toward the quarries Rachel was +coming, with a scroll in her lifted hand. He began to retrace his +steps to meet her, but she noted the action and quickened her rapid +walk into running. + +"Thou didst drop this outside the camp," she said as she came near. "I +feared it might have somewhat pertaining to the statue on it, and I +have brought it, with the permission of the taskmaster." She stopped, +and putting her hand into the folds of her habit on her breast, +hesitated as if for words to speak further. Kenkenes interrupted her +with his thanks. + +"How thou hast fatigued thyself for me, Rachel! Out of all Egypt I +doubt if I might find another so constant guardian of my welfare. The +grace of the gods attend thee as faithfully. I thank thee, most +gratefully." + +The purpose in her face dissolved, the hand that seemed to hold +somewhat in the folds of her habit relaxed and fell slowly. While +Kenkenes waited for her to speak, he noted that a dress of unbleached +linen replaced the coarse cotton surplice she had worn before, and her +feet were shod with simple sandals--an extravagance among slaves. But +the garb was yet too mean. The sculptor wondered at that moment how +the sumptuous attire of the high-born Memphian women would become her. +He shook his head and in his imagination dressed her in snow-white +robes with but the collar of rings about her throat, and stood back to +marvel at his picture of splendid simplicity. + +"Hast thou not something more to tell me?" he asked kindly. "Do thou +rest here on the wharf while we talk. Art thou not quite breathless?" + +"Nay, I thank thee," she faltered. "I may not linger." The hand once +again sought the folds over her breast. + +"Then let me walk with thee on thy way. It will be dark soon." + +"Nay," she protested flushing, "and again, I thank thee. It is not +needful." She made a movement as if to leave him, but he stepped to +her side. + +"Out upon thee, daughter of Israel, thou art ungracious," he +remonstrated laughingly. "I can not think thee so wondrous brave. For +it is a long walk to the camp and the night will be pitch-black. Why +may I not go with thee?" + +"There is naught to be feared." + +"Of a truth? Those hills are as full of wild beasts as Amenti is of +spirits. And even if no hurt befell thee, the trepidation of that long +journey would be cruel. Nay; Ptah, the gallant god, would spurn my +next offering, did I send thee back to camp alone. Wilt thou come?" + +She bowed and dropped behind him. Her resolution to maintain the forms +of different rank between them was not characteristic of other slaves +he had known. There was no presumption or humble gratitude in her +manner when he would offer her the courtesies of an equal, but he had +met the disdain of a peer once when he thought he talked with a slave. +There was something mocking in her perfunctory deference, but her pride +was genuine. Her conduct seemed to say: "I would liefer be a Hebrew +and a slave than a princess of the God-forgotten realm of Egypt." + +The young sculptor was unruffled, however. He was turning over in his +mind, with interest, the evidence that tended to show that the +Israelite had something more to tell him, that her courage had failed +her, and that her hand had sought something concealed in her dress. He +recalled the former meetings with her and arrived at a surmise so +sudden and so conclusive that with difficulty he kept himself from +making outward demonstration of his conviction. "The collar, by Apis! +I offended her with the trinket. And she came to make me take it back, +but her courage fled. Pie upon my clumsy gallantries! I must make +amends. I would not have her hate me." + +He broke the silence with an old, old remark--one that Adam might have +made to Eve. + +"Look at the stars, Rachel. There is a dark casement in the heavens--a +blink of the eye and the lamp is alight." + +"So I watch them every night. But they are swifter here in Memphis. +At Mendes, where Israel toiled once, they are more deliberate," she +answered readily. + +"Aye, but you should see them at Philae. They ignite and bound into +brilliance like sparks of meeting metal and flint. Ah, but the tropics +are precipitate!" + +"I know them not," she ventured. + +"Their acquaintance is better avoided. They have no mean--they leap +from extreme to extreme. They are violent, immoderate. It is instant +night and instant day; it is the maddest passion of summer always. +Nature reigns at the top of her voice and chokes her realm with the +fervor of her maternity. Nay, give me the north. I would feel the +earth's pulse now and then without burning my fingers." + +"There is room for choice in this land of thine," she mused after a +little. + +"Land of mine?" he repeated inquiringly, turning his head to look at +her. "Is it not also thine?" + +"Nay, it is not the Hebrews' and it never was," the clear answer came +from the dusk behind him. + +"So!" he exclaimed. "After four hundred years in Egypt they have not +adopted her!" + +"We have but sojourned here a night. The journey's end is farther on." + +"Israel hath made a long night of the sojourn," he rejoined laughingly. + +"Nay," she answered. "Thou hast not said aright. It is Egypt that +hath made a long night of our sojourn." + +There was a silence in which Kenkenes felt accused and uncomfortable. +It would require little to make harsh the temper of the talk. It lay +with him, one of the race of offenders, to make amends. + +"It is for me to admit Egypt's sin and ask a truce," he said gently. +"So be thou generous to me, since it is I who am abashed in her stead." + +Again there was silence, broken at last by the Israelite in a voice +grown wondrously contrite. + +"I do not reproach thee. Nor, indeed, is all Egypt at fault. The sin +lies with the Pharaohs." + +"Ah! the gods forbid!" he protested. "Lay it on the shoulders of +babes, if thou wilt, but I am party to treason if I but give ear to a +rebuke of the monarch." + +"I am not ignorant of the law. I shall spare thee, but I have +purchased my right to condemn the king." + +"Thou indomitable! And I accused thee of fear. I retract. But tell +me--what is the journey's end? Is it the ultimate goal of all flesh?" + +"Not so," she answered proudly. "It is Israel's inheritance promised +for four hundred years. The time is ripe for possession. We go +forward to enter into a land of our own." + +"Thou givest me news. Come, be the Hebrews' historian and enlighten +me. Where lies the land?" + +Rachel hesitated. To her it was a serious problem to decide whether +the lightness of the sculptor's tone were mockery or good fellowship. +Kenkenes noted her silence and spoke again. + +"Perchance I ask after a hieratic secret. If so, forgive the blunder." + +"Nay," she replied at once. "It is no secret. All Egypt will know of +it ere long. God hath prepared us a land wherein we may dwell under no +master but Jehovah. We go hence shortly to enter it. The captain of +Israel will lead us thither and Jehovah will show him the way. Abraham +was informed that it was a wondrous land wherein the olive and the +grape will crown the hills; the corn will fill the valleys; the cattle +and sheep, the pasture lands. There will be many rivers instead of one +and the desert will lie afar off from its confines. The sun will shine +and the rain will fall and the winds will blow as man needeth them, and +there will be no slavery and no heavy life therein. The land shall be +Israel's and its enemies shall crouch without its borders, confounded +at the splendor of the children of God. And there will our princes +arise and a throne be set up and a mighty nation established. Cities +will shine white and strong-walled on the heights, and caravans of +commerce will follow down the broad roadways to the sea. There will +the ships of Israel come bowing over the waters with the riches of the +world, and our wharves will be crowded with purple and gold and +frankincense. Babylon shall do homage on the right hand and Egypt upon +the left, and the straight smoke from Jehovah's altar will rise from +the center unfailing by day or by night." + +They had reached the ledge and Kenkenes sat down on it, leaning on one +hand across Rachel's way. She paused near him. Even in the dark he +could see the light in her eyes, and the joy of anticipation was in her +voice. As yet he did not know whether she talked of the Israelitish +conception of supernal life, or of a belief in a temporal redemption. + +"And there shall be no death nor any of the world-sorrows therein?" he +asked. + +"Since we shall dwell in the world we may not escape the world's +uncertainties," she replied, looking at his lifted face. "But most men +live better lives when they live happily, and I doubt not there will be +less unhappiness, provident or fortuitous, in Israel, the nation, than +in Israel, enslaved." + +So the slave talked of freedom as slaves talk of it--hopefully and +eloquently. A pity asserted itself in the young sculptor's heart and +grew to such power that it tinctured his speech. + +"Is thy heart then so firmly set on this thing?" he asked gently. + +"It is the hope that bears Israel's burdens and the balm that heals the +welt of the lash." + +And in the young man's heart he said it was a vain hope, a happy +delusion that might serve to make the harsh bondage endurable till time +dispelled it. The simple words of the girl were eloquent portrayal of +Israel's plight, and Kenkenes subsided into a sorry state of helpless +sympathy. She was not long in interpreting his silence. + +"Vain hope, is it?" she said. "And how shall it come to pass in the +face of the Pharaoh's denial and the might of Egypt's arms? Thou art +young and so am I, but both of us remember Rameses. There has been +none like him. He overthrew the world, did he not? And it was a hard +task and a precarious and a long one, when he but measured arms with +mortals. Is it not a problem worthy the study to ponder how he might +have fared in battle with a god?" + +Kenkenes lifted his head suddenly and regarded her. + +"Aye," she continued, "I have given thee food for thought. Futile +indeed were Israel's hopes if it set itself unaided against the +Pharaoh. But the God of Israel hath appointed His hour and hath +already descended into fellowship with His chosen people. He hath +promised to lead us forth, and the Divine respects a promise. So a God +against a Pharaoh. Doth it not appear to thee, Egyptian, that there +approaches a marvelous time?" + +"Give me but faith in the hypothesis and I shall say, of a surety," he +replied. + +"Thou hast said. Shall we not go on, my master?" + +"I am Kenkenes, the son of Mentu," he told her. + +She bent her head in acknowledgment of the introduction and moved +forward as if to climb up by the projecting edges of the strata. But +he put a powerful arm about her and lifted her into the valley. With a +light bound he was beside her. Ahead of them was profound darkness, +hedged by black and close-drawn walls and canopied by distant and +unillumining stars. She resumed her place behind him though he was +moved to protest, but her deliberate manner seemed to demand its way. +So they continued slowly. + +"Thou givest me interest in the God of Israel," he said, to reopen the +subject. "The Egyptian dwells in his gods, but thou sayest that the +God of Israel dwells in Israel." + +"Even so. But thou speakest of Israel's God, even after the fashion of +my people. They are jealous, saying that the true God hath but one +love and that is Israel. If they would think it, let them, but He is +the all-God, of all the earth, the One God--thy God as well as mine." + +"Mine!" Kenkenes exclaimed. + +"Thou hast said." + +"Now, by all things worshipful, this is news. I had ever thought that +our gods are those to whom we bow. Either thou sayest wrong or I have +been remiss in my devotions." + +"Nay, listen," she said earnestly, stepping to his side. "Already have +I told thee of the captain of Israel. He was reared among princes in +the house of the Pharaoh, and he is learned in all the wisdom of Egypt. +He instructeth the elders concerning Jehovah, and from mouth to mouth +his wisdom traverseth till it reacheth the ears of the young. This, +then, I have from the lips of Moses, who speaketh naught but the truth. +In early times all on earth had perished for wickedness by the sending +of the One God, save a holy man and his three sons. These men +worshiped the God of Abraham, who was the father of Israel. One of the +sons founded thy race, saith Moses, and one established mine. The +tribes that went into Egypt worshiped the same God. Lo, is it not +written in the early tombs? So Moses testifieth, but if thou doubtest, +go question thy historians. And some of the tribes called that God Ra, +others, Ptah, and yet others, Amen. But in time they quarreled and +each tribe refused to admit the identity of the three-named One God, +saying, 'Thy god sendeth plague and affliction, and ours sendeth rich +harvests and the Nile floods.' Did not the same God do each of these +things in His wisdom? Even so. But when they were at last united into +one great people, they had forgotten the quarrel, forgotten that in the +beginning they had worshiped one God, and they bowed down to three +instead. Nay, if there were but one among you who dared, there are +loose threads fluttering, which, if drawn, might unravel the whole +fabric of idolatry and disclose that which it hides--the One God--the +God of Abraham." + +Kenkenes had walked in silence, looking down into the luminous eyes, +lost in wonder. Rachel suddenly realized at what length she had talked +and stopped abruptly, dropping back to her place again as if chidden. + +"Come," said Kenkenes, noting her action, "walk beside me, priestess. +I would hear more of this. It is like all forbidden things--wondrously +alluring." + +"I did forget," she answered stubbornly. "There is nothing more." + +Kenkenes stopped. + +"Come," he insisted. "The teacher rather precedes the pupil. At +least, thou shalt walk beside me." + +"I pray thee, let us go on. We are not yet at the camp--we have walked +so slowly," she answered. At that moment several fragments of rock, +loosening, slid down in the dark just behind her. She caught her +breath and was beside the young artist in an instant. He laughed in +sheer delight. + +"Thou hast assembled the spirits by thy blasphemy," he said. "And +remember, I must soon return to this haunted place alone." + +"Thou canst get a brand of fire or a cudgel at the camp," she said with +some remorse in her voice, "and run for the river bank." With that she +resumed her place behind him. + +Kenkenes laughed again. It gave him uncommon pleasure to know that his +model was concerned for him. He put out his hand and deliberately drew +her up to his side. Not content with that he bent his arm and put her +hand under it and into his palm, so that she could not leave him again. +She submitted reluctantly, but her fingers, lost in his warm clasp, +were cold and ill at ease. He felt their chill and released her to +slip about her shoulders the light woolen mantle he had worn. Her +apprehension lest he take her hand again was so evident that he +refrained, though he slackened his step and kept with her. + +But she spoke no more until they were beside the outermost circle of +coals that had been a cooking fire for the camp. Here they met a man, +whom, by his superior dress, Kenkenes took to be the taskmaster. They +were almost upon him before he was seen. + +"Rachel!" he exclaimed. + +"Here am I," she answered, a little anxiously. + +"Thou wast gone long--" he began. + +The sculptor interposed. + +"She hath done me a service and it was my pleasure to talk with her," +he said complacently. "Chide her not." + +The glow from the fire lighted the young man's face, and the +taskmaster, standing in deep shadow, scanned it sharply but did not +answer. Kenkenes turned and strode away down the valley. + +Rachel snatched a thick sycamore club which had been left over in the +construction of the scaffold and ran after him. But the young sculptor +had disappeared in the dark. + +"Kenkenes," she cried at last desperately. He answered immediately. + +She slipped off the mantle. + +"This, thy mantle," she said when he approached, "and this," thrusting +the club into his hands. "There is as much danger in the valley for +thee as for me." + +And like a shadow she was gone. + +As he hurried on again through the dense gloom of the ravine, the young +man thought long on the Israelite and her words. She had offered him +theories that peremptorily contradicted the accepted idea among +Egyptians, that Moses was inspired by a personal motive of revenge. +The argument put forth by his father began to show sundry weaknesses. +Furthermore Rachel's version gave him a much coveted opportunity to +slip from his shoulders the discomforting blame that had rested there +since he had heard that a miscarried letter might effect a national +disturbance. Much as the practical side of his nature sought to decry +the great Hebrew's motive, a sense of relief possessed him. + +"I fear me, Kenkenes, thou durst not boast thyself an embroiler of +nations," he said to himself. "The Hebrew prince is a zealot, and +zealots have no fear for their lives. Truly those Israelites are an +uncommon and a proud people. But, by Besa, is she not beautiful!" + +He enlarged on this latter thought at such exhaustive length that he +had traversed the valley and field, found his boat, crossed the Nile +and was at home before he had made an end. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE COMING OF THE PHARAOH + +On the first day of February, runners, dusty, breathless and excited, +passed the sentries of the Memphian palace of Meneptah with the news +that the Pharaoh was but a day's journey from his capital. They were +the last of a series of couriers that had kept the city informed of the +king's advance. For days before, public drapers were to be seen +clinging cross-legged to obelisk and peristyle; moving in spread-eagle +fashion, hung in a jacket of sail-cloth attached to cables, across the +fronts of buildings, looping garlands, besticking banners and spreading +tapestries. Scattering sounds of hammer and saw continued even through +the night. The city's metals were polished, her streets were sprinkled +and rolled, her stone wharves scoured, her landings painted, her +flambeaux new-soaked in pitch. The gardens, the storehouses and the +wine-lofts felt unusual draft for the festivities, and the great +capital was decked and scented like a bride. + +Now, on the eve of the Pharaoh's coming, the preparations were +complete. The city was full of excitement and pleasant expectancy. +Only once before during the six years of Meneptah's reign had such +enthusiasm prevailed. When the Rebu horde descended upon Egypt, +Meneptah had sent his generals out to meet the invader, but he, +himself, had remained under cover in Memphis because he said the stars +were unpropitious. And this was the son of Rameses II, than whom, if +the historians and the singer Pentaur say true, there was never a more +puissant monarch! But when the marauder was overthrown and routed, and +his generals turned toward Memphis with their captives in chains, +Meneptah hastened to meet them, decked his chariot with war trophies +and entered his capital in triumph. He was hailed with exultant +acclaim. + +"Hail, mighty Pharaoh! who smites with his glance and annihilates with +his spear. He overthrew companies alone, and with his lions he routed +armies. His enemies crumbled before him like men of clay, for he +breathed hot coals in his wrath and flames in his vengeance." And the +enthusiasm that inspired the eulogy was sincere. Meneptah was none the +less loved because Memphis understood him. The Pharaoh was the apple +of her eye and she worshiped him stubbornly. + +Now he was returning from a bloodless campaign--one that neither +required nor brought forth any generalship--but it was a victory and +had been personally conducted by Meneptah, so Memphis was preparing to +fall into paroxysms of delight, little short of hysteria. + +An hour after sunrise on the day of the Pharaoh's coming a gorgeous +regatta assembled off the wharves of Memphis. It was a flotilla of the +rank and wealth of the capital, with that of On, Bubastis, Busiris, and +even Mendes and Tanis. The boats were high-riding, graceful and +finished at head and stern with sheaves of carved lotus. Hull and +superstructure were painted in gorgeous colors with a preponderance of +ivory and gold. Masts, rigging and oars were wrapped with lotus, roses +and mimosa. Sails and canopies were brilliant with dyes and undulant +with fringes. Troops of tiny boys, innocent of raiment, were posted +about the sides of the vessels holding festoons. Oarsmen wore chaplets +on the head or garlands around the loins, and half-clad slave-girls +were scattered about with fans of dyed plumes. Bridges of boats had +been hastily run out between the vessels, and over these the embarking +voyagers or visitors passed in a stream. On shore was a great +multitude and every advantageous point of survey was occupied. And +here were catastrophes and riots, panics and love-making, gambling and +gossip and all the other things that mark the assembly of a crowd. But +these incidents drew the attention of the populace only momentarily +from the revel of the nobility on the Nile. For there were laughter +and songs, strumming of the lyre, shouts, polite contention and the +drone of general conversation among such numbers that the sound was of +great volume. + +At the head of the pageant were the boats of the nomarch and the +courtiers to Meneptah who remained in Memphis. Near the forefront of +these was the pleasure-boat of Mentu. + +Kenkenes dropped from its deck to the walk rising and falling at its +side, and made his way through the crowd in search of a vessel bearing +a winged sun and the oval containing the symbols of On. As he passed +the prow of a tall pleasure-boat he was caught in a rope of flowers let +down from above and looped about him with a dexterous hand. He turned +in the pretty fetters and looked up. Above him was a row of a dozen +little girl-faces, set like apple-blossoms along the side of the +vessel. The youngest was not over twelve years of age, the oldest, +fourteen. Each rosy countenance was rippled with laughter, but the +sound was lost in the great turmoil about them. In the center of the +group, a pair of hands put forth under the chin of an older girl, held +the ends of the garland with a determined grip. Her eyes were gray, +her hair was chestnut, her face very fair. Kenkenes recognized her +with a sudden warmth about his heart. The others were strangers to +him. A glance at the plate on the side of the boat showed him that +this was the one he sought. Most willingly he obeyed the insistent +summons of the garland and permitted himself to be drawn to the barge. +There, the same hands showed him the ladder against the side, and a +dozen pretty arms were extended to haul him aboard as he climbed. + +But the instant he planted foot on the deck the lovely rout retreated +to shelter at the side of a smiling woman seated in the shadow of fans. +Only his fair-faced captor stood her ground. + +"Hail, Hapi," [1] she cried, doing obeisance. "Pity the desert." She +flung wide her hands. With the exception of the youths at the oars +there was no other man on the boat. + +"Ye may call me forth," Kenkenes replied, "but how shall ye return me +to my banks? Hither, sweet On," he continued, catching the hand of the +fair-faced girl, "submit first to submergence." She took his kisses +willingly. "This for Seti, thy lover; this for Hotep, thy brother, and +this for me who am both in one. How thou art grown, Io!" + +"But she hath not denied thee the babyhood privileges for all that, +Kenkenes," the smiling woman said. + +"It is an excellent example of submission she hath set, Lady Senci," he +replied, advancing toward the young girls about her. "Let us see if it +prevail." + +But the troop scattered with little cries of dismay. + +"Nay," he observed, as he bent over Senci's hand, "never were two maids +alike, and I shall not strive to make them so." + +"Thy father hath most graciously kept his word in sending us a +protector," Senci continued, "My nosegay of beauties drooped last night +when they arrived from On with my brother sick, aboard. They feared +they must stop with me in Memphis for want of a man." + +"It was the first word I heard from my father this morning and the last +when I left him even now: 'Io's father hath failed her through +sickness, so do thou look after the Lady Senci--and the gods give thee +grace for once to do a thing well!'" + +The lady smiled and patted his arm. "He did not fear; he knew whom he +chose. But behold our gallant escort--the nomarch ahead, beside us the +new cup-bearer and behind us all the rank of the north." + +"Aye, and when we cast off thou mayest look for the new murket on thy +right." + +The lady blushed. "I have not seen thy father yet, this morning." + +"So? His robes must fit poorly." + +At that moment a gang-plank was run across from the broad flat stern of +the nomarch's boat to the prow of Senci's, a carpet was spread on it, +and Ta-meri, with little shrieks and tottering steps, came across it. +Kenkenes put out his arms to her and lifted her down when she arrived. + +"Wonder brought me," she cried. "I dreamed I saw thee kiss a maiden +thrice and I came to see if it were true." + +"O most honest vision! It is true and this is she," Kenkenes answered, +indicating Io. + +Ta-meri flung up her hands and gazed at the blushing girl with wide +eyes. + +"Enough," she said at last. "It is indeed a marvel. Never have I seen +such a thing before, and never shall I see it again." + +"And if that be true, fie and for shame, Kenkenes," Senci chid +laughingly. + +"Ta-meri always shuts her eyes," the sculptor defended himself stoutly. +The nomarch's daughter caught his meaning first and covered her face +with her hands. The chorus of laughter did not drown her protests. + +"Kenkenes, thou art a mortal plague!" she exclaimed behind her defense. + +"Truce," he said. "Thou didst accuse me and I did defend myself. We +are even." + +"Nay, but am I also even with Ta-meri?" Io asked shyly. + +"Now," Senci cried, "which of ye will say 'aye' or 'nay' to that!" + +Ta-meri retreated protesting to the prow again, but the gang-plank had +been withdrawn. An army of slaves were breaking up the bridges of +boats. The oars of the nomarch's barge rose and fell and the vessel +bore away. Ta-meri cried out again when she saw it depart but she made +no effort to stay it. + +"Come back, Ta-meri," Io called. "I shall not press thee for an +accounting." + +The lanes of water between the boats cleared, the scented sails filled, +the bristling fringes of oars dipped and flashed, a great shout arose +from the populace on shore and the shining pageant moved away toward +Thebes. The barge of Nechutes swung into position on the left of +Senci--the oars on Mentu's boat rose and halted and the vessel drifted +till it was alongside her right. Kenkenes put his arm about Io, who +stood beside him and whispered exultantly or irreverently concerning +the vigilance of the cup-bearer and the murket. + +"And," he continued oracularly, "there will be a third attending us +when we return, if thou hast been coy with the gentle Seti during his +long absence." + +"Nay, I have sent him messages faithfully and in no little point have I +failed him in constancy. But I can not see why he should love me, who +am to the court-ladies as a thrush to peafowls. He writes me such +praise of Ta-user." + +"Now, Io! Art thou so little versed in the ways of men that thou dost +wonder why we love or how we love or whom we love? The very fact that +thou art different from Seti's surroundings is like to make him love +thee best." + +"I am not jealous; only he hath so much to tell of Ta-user." + +"Aye, since she is like to become his sister, it is not strange. But +what says he of her?" + +Io thrust her hand into the mist of gauzes over her bosom and with a +soft flush on her cheeks drew forth a small, flattened roll of linen. +Kenkenes made a place for her on his chair and drew her down beside +him. Together the pair undid the scroll and Kenkenes, following the +tiny pink finger, came upon these words: + +"Ah, thou shouldst see her, my sweet. Thou knowest she was born of a +prince of Egypt and a lovely Tahennu, and the mingling of our dusky +blood with that of a fair-haired northern people, hath wrought a +marvelous beauty in Ta-user. Her hair is like copper and like copper +her eyes. There is no brownness nor any flush in her skin. It is like +thick cream, smooth, soft and cool. And when she walks, she minds me +of my grandsire's leopardess, which once did stride from shadow to +shadow in the palace with that undulatory, unearthly grace. In nature, +she is world-compelling. When first she met me, she took my face +between her palms and gazed into mine eyes. Ai! she bewitched me, then +and there. My individuality died within me--I felt an unreasoning +submission, strangely mingled with aversion. I was compelled--divorced +from mine own forces, which vaguely protested from afar. . . . And +yet, thou shouldst see her meet Rameses. He makes me marvel. He +knows--she knows--aye, all Egypt knows why she hath come to court, and +yet they meet--she salutes him with bewildering grace--he inclines his +proud head with never a tremor and they pass. Or, if they tarry to +talk, it is an awesome sight to see the determined encounter of two +mighty souls--tremendous charm against tremendous resistance--and Io, I +know that they have sounded to the deepest the depth of each other's +strength. I long to see Ta-user conquer--and yet, again I would not." + +Thereafter followed matters which Kenkenes did not read. He rolled the +letter and gave it back to Io. The little girl sat expectantly +watching his face. + +"Nay, I would not take Seti's boyish transports seriously," he said +gently. "His very frankness disclaims any heart interest in Ta-user. +Besides, she is as old as I--three whole Nile-floods older than the +prince. She thinks on him as Senci looks on me--he regards her as a +lad looks up to gracious womanhood. Nay, fret not, thou dear jealous +child." + +Io's lips quivered as she looked away. + +"It is over and over--ever the same in every letter--Ta-user, Ta-user, +till I hate the name," she said at last. + +"Then when thou seest him at midday up the Nile, be thou gracious to +some other comely young nobleman and see him wince. Naught is so good +for a lover as uncertainty. It is a mistake to load him with the great +weight of thy love. Doubt not, thou shalt carry all the burden of +jealousy and pain if thou dost. Divide this latter with him, and he +shall be content to share more of the first with thee. But thou hast +condemned him without trial, Io. Spare thy heart the hurt and wait." + +The young face cleared and with a little sigh she settled back in the +chair and said no more. + +It was noon when the royal flotilla was sighted. There were nineteen +barges approaching in the form of two crescents like a parenthesis, the +horns up and down the Nile, and in the center of the inclosed space was +Meneptah's float. Here was only the royal family, the king, queen, +Ta-user, and the two princes, who took the place of fan-bearers in +attendance on their father. The vessel was manned by two reliefs of +twelve oarsmen from Theban nobility. + +If magnificence came to conduct Meneptah, it met splendor as its +charge. The pastoral solitude of the Middle country was routed for the +moment by an assemblage of the brilliance and power of all Egypt. + +With a shout that made the remote hills reply again and again, the +convoy divided, a half retreating to either side of the Nile and the +home-coming fleet entered the hollow. The nomarch's boat detached +itself from its following and took up a position in the center, beside +the royal barge. The advance was delayed only long enough for the +escort to turn, take in the sails--for they went against the wind +now--and form an outer parenthesis. Then with another shout the +triumphant return began. + +The other fleet absorbed the attention of each voyager. Every barge +had a new-comer alongside and near enough to talk across the water. +Therefore a great babel and confusion arose in which rational +conversation became impossible. Then vessels essayed to approach +nearer one another and the formation began to break. The right oars of +one boat and the left of another would be withdrawn and the vessels +lashed together. Then they were permitted to drift, with some poling +to keep them in the proper direction. When this proceeding was +impracticable because of the construction of the barges, one boat would +take another in tow until the occupants of one had joined those of the +other by a gang-plank laid from prow to stern. By sunset the +merrymaking had developed into indiscriminate boarding. Only the +vessels of the king and the nomarch and the barge of Senci were not +involved in the uproarious revel that followed. The fates were amiable +and no mishaps occurred in spite of the recklessness of the pastime. +Men and women alike took part in the play, and the general temper of +the merrymakers was good-natured and innocent. + +The dusk fell and the shadows of night were made seductive by the dim +lamps that began to burn from mast-top and prow. On the barge of Senci +only a single and subdued light was swung from a bronze tripod in the +bow, and the fourteen charges of the young sculptor, wearied with the +long day's excitement, were disposed in graceful abandon under its +glow. Senci sat with Ta-meri's head in her lap, and three or four +drowsy little girls were tumbled about her feet. Only Io was wide +awake, and even her sweet face wore a pensive air. Kenkenes had +retired to the stern, where, under the high up-standing end, stood a +long wooden bench. The young sculptor had flung himself on this, and +with the whole of the boat and its freight within range of his vision, +he listened to the riot about him. + +Suddenly the sound of cautiously wielded oars attracted his attention. +In the end of the boat was a hawser-hole, painted and shaped like the +eye of Osiris. Kenkenes turned about on his couch and watched through +this aperture. + +A barge, judiciously darkened, emerged into the circle of faint +radiance about Senci's boat. There were probably a dozen Theban nobles +of various ages grouped in attitudes of hushed expectancy in the bow. +One robust peer, with a boat-hook in his hand, leaned over the prow. +Another, barely older than fourteen, had mounted the side of the boat, +and steadying himself by the shoulder of a young lord, gazed ahead at +the group in the bow of Senci's boat. + +"By the horns of Isis," he whispered in disgust, "the most of them are +babes!" + +The robust noble turned his head and jeered good-naturedly under his +breath. + +"Mark the infant sneering at the buds. But be of cheer. One is there, +ripe enough to sate your green appetite." + +"Nay! do you distribute them now? Let me make my choice, then." + +But a general chorus of whispered protests arose. + +"Hold, not so fast. The fan-bearer first. 'Twas he who hit upon the +plan." + +The nose of the pursuing boat crept alongside the stern of the one +pursued, and the oars rested in obedience to a whispered order. The +diagonal current which moved out from the Arabian shore, and the +backward wash of water from the oars of the forward boat, heaved the +head of the nobles' barge toward its object. The robust courtier +leaned forward and made fast to his captive with the hook. A sigh of +approval and excitement ran through the group. + +"Gods! how they will scatter!" the young lord tittered nervously. + +"Nay, now, there must be no such thing," the robust noble said, +addressing them all. "Mind you, we but come as guests. It shall be +left to the ladies to say how we shall abide with them. Show me a +light." + +The instant brilliance that followed proved that a hood had been lifted +from a lamp. One of the men held a cloak between it and the group on +Senci's boat. Kenkenes raised himself. The lamp discovered to his +angry eyes the face of Har-hat. + +"Now, hold this hook for me while I get aboard," the fan-bearer +chuckled. + +With a single step the young sculptor crossed to the side of the barge +and wrenched the hook from the hands of the man that held it. For a +moment he poised it above him, struggling with a mighty desire to bring +it down on the head of the startled fan-bearer. The youthful lord +dropped from his point of vantage and half of the group retreated +precipitately. Har-hat drew back slowly and raised himself, as +Kenkenes lowered the weapon. For a space the two regarded each other +savagely. The contemplation endured only the smallest part of a +moment, but it was eloquent of the bitterest mutual antagonism. There +was no relaxing in the rigid lines of the young sculptor's figure, but +the fan-bearer recovered himself immediately. + +"Forestalled!" he laughed. "Retreat! We would not steal another man's +bliss though it be fourteen times his share!" + +The oars fell and the boat darted back into the night, the affable +sound of Har-hat's raillery receding into silence with it. + +Kenkenes flung the boat-hook into the Nile and returned to his bench, +puzzled at the inordinate passion of hate in his heart for the +fan-bearer. + +At the end of the first watch the flotilla drifted into Memphis. +Bonfires so vast as to suggest conflagrations made the long water-front +as brilliant as day. Far up the slope toward the city the red light +discovered a great multitude, densely packed and cheering tumultuously. +Amid the uproar one by one the barges approached and discharged their +occupants along the wharves. Soldiery in companies drove a roadway +through the mass from time to time, by which the arrivals might enter +Memphis, though few of these departed at once. When the Lady Senci's +barge drew up, Mentu forced his way through the increasing crowd to +meet and assist its occupants to alight. Kenkenes, still on deck, was +handing his charges down the stairway one by one, when he saw Io, who +stood at the very end of the line, lean over the side, her face aglow +with joy. Kenkenes guessed the cause of her delight and, deserting his +post, went to her side. Below stood Seti, on tiptoe, his hands +upstretched against the tall hull. + +"O, I can not reach thee," he was crying. Kenkenes caught up the +trembling, blushing, repentant girl and lowered her plump into the +prince's eager arms. + +When Kenkenes saw her an hour later, he lifted her out of her curricle +before the portals of Senci's house. + +"What did I tell thee?" he said softly. + +But the little girl clung to his arms and leaned against him with a sob. + +"O Kenkenes," she whispered, "he came but to drag me away to look upon +her!" + +"Didst go?" he asked. + +"Nay," she answered fiercely. + +After a silence Kenkenes spoke again: + +"He does not love her, Io. Believe me. I doubt not the sorceress hath +bewitched him, but he would not rush after a whilom sweetheart to have +her look upon a new one. Rather would he strive to cover up his +faithlessness. But he hath been untrue to thee in this--that he shares +a thought with the witch when his whole mind should be full of thee. +Bide thy time till he emerges from the spell, then make him writhe. +Meantime, save thy tears. Never was a man worth one of them." + +He kissed her again and set her inside Senci's house. + +But one remained now of the procession he had escorted from the river. +This was the Lady Ta-meri's litter, and his own chariot stood ahead of +it. She had lifted the curtains and was piling the opposite seat with +cushions in a manner unmistakably inviting. He hesitated a moment. +Should he dismiss his charioteer and journey to the nomarch's mansion +in the companionable luxury of the litter? But even while he debated +with himself, he passed her with a soft word and stepped into his +chariot. + + + +[1] The inundation, more properly Nilus--the river-god. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE MARGIN OF THE NILE + +Meneptah having come and the old regime of life resumed, Memphis +subsided into her normal state of dignity. Mentu remained in his house +preparing for his investiture with the office of murket. His hours +were spent in study, and the coming and going of Kenkenes crossed his +consciousness as swiftly as the shadows wavered under his young palms. +His son might work for hours near him on mysterious drawings, but so +deep was the great artist in the writings of the old murkets that he +did not think to ask him what he did. It might not have won his +attention even had he seen the young man burn the sheets of papyrus +thereafter, and grow restless and dissatisfied. He remarked, however, +that Kenkenes was absent during the noon-meal, but when the sundown +repast was served and the young man was in his place, Mentu had +forgotten that he had not been there at midday. + +Kenkenes had visited his niche in the Arabian desert. On his way to +the statue he came to the line of rocks where he had hidden himself to +get Athor's likeness, and looked down into the quarry opposite him. He +was astonished to see at the ledge, just below, a great water-cart with +three humped oxen attached. The water-bearers were grouped about it +and a Hebrew youth was drawing off the water in skins and jars. The +children received their burdens from his hands and passed up the wooden +incline to the scaffold. There Kenkenes saw that the incline had been +extended to the level of the platform, and the children were able to +deliver the hides directly into the hands of the laborers. Then it +occurred to Kenkenes that there was not a woman in sight about the +quarries. While he wondered, Rachel emerged from the windings of the +valley into the open space below. + +She carried a band of linen and a small box of horn in her hand. When +the young bearers saw her, one of them, who had been rubbing his eye, +came to her. She set her box upon an outstanding edge of stone and +devoted herself to him. Drawing his head back until it rested against +her bosom, with tender hands she dressed the injured optic with balm +from the box. + +Kenkenes from his aery watched her, noting with a softening countenance +the almost maternal love that beautified her face. Now and then she +spoke soothingly as the boy flinched, but her words were so softly said +that the sculptor did not catch them. The eye dressed, she covered it +with the bandage and the pair separated. It was with some regret that +Kenkenes saw her turn to leave the spot. But at that moment the +taskmaster rode into the open space. She made a sign of salutation and +paused at a word from him. Kenkenes fancied that her face had sobered +and he looked down on the cowled head and shoulders of the overseer, +wrathfully wondering if the Egyptian had played the master so harshly +that Rachel dreaded him. Presently the man dismounted; and though his +back was turned toward Kenkenes, the young sculptor knew by his stature +that he was not the soldier who had first governed the quarries. The +young man watched him excitedly but there was no display of tyranny or +even authority in the taskmaster's manner. They talked, and by the +motion of the man's hand Kenkenes fancied that he described something +growing near the Nile. Presently they walked together toward the +outlet of the valley. The taskmaster leaped down the ledge and, +turning, put up his arms and lifted Rachel down. It was plain that +something more than courtesy inspired the act, for the man's hands fell +reluctantly. Kenkenes faced sharply about and proceeded up the hill to +his statue with a queer discomfort tugging at his heart. + +That night in his effort to bring forth the coveted expression in his +drawings of Athor, Kenkenes all but satisfied himself. + +The next day, without any apparent cause, he went back to the niche in +the desert, stayed without purpose, and departed when no tangible +reason urged him. When the day declined he climbed down the front of +the hill and crossed the narrow field toward his boat, which was buried +in the rank vegetation of the water's edge. At the Nile he noted, a +little distance up the river, a familiar figure among the reeds. For a +moment he hesitated and then rambled through the riotous growth in that +direction. As he drew near, Rachel raised herself from a search in a +thicket of herbs, her arms full of them and her face a little flushed. + +"Idler!" said Kenkenes. + +"Nay," she answered with a smile, "I am at work--learned work." + +"Gathering witch-weeds for an incantation, sorceress?" + +"Not so. I am hunting herbs to make simples for the sick." + +"Of a truth? Then never before now have I craved for an illness that I +might select my leech." + +Again she smiled and made a sheaf of the herbs, preparatory to binding +it. The bundle was unruly, and several of the plants dropped. She +bent to pick them up and others fell. Kenkenes came to her rescue and +gathered them all into his large grasp. + +"Now, while I hold it," he suggested. + +With the most gracious self-possession she smoothed out the fiber, put +it twice, thrice about the sheaf and knotted it, her fingers, cool and +moist after their contact with the marsh sedge, touching the sculptor's +more than once. + +"There! I thank thee." + +"Are there any sick in the camp?" + +"Only those who have been blinded by the stone-dust. But I prepare for +sickness during health." + +"A wise provision. Would we might prepare for sorrow during +contentment." + +"We may lay up comfort for us against the coming of misfortune." + +"How?" + +"In choosing friends," she answered. + +His mind went back to the scene of that morning. Did she speak of the +taskmaster? + +"Thou hast found it so?" he asked. + +"Thou hast said." She added no more, though the sculptor was eager for +an example. + +"How goes it with the statue?" she asked, seeing that he did not move +out of her path. + +"Slowly," he answered. "But it shall hasten to completeness when I +once begin." + +"What wilt thou do with it when it is done? Destroy it?" + +He shook his head with a smile. + +"Leave it there to betray thee to the vengeance of the priesthood one +day?" + +"I have no fear of discovery." + +"Nay, but fear or unfear never yet warded off misfortune," she said +gravely. "It is better to entertain causeless concern than unwise +confidence." + +He eagerly accepted this establishment of equality between them, and +overshot his mark. + +"Advise me, Rachel. What should I do?" + +She gazed at him for a moment distrustfully, wondering if he mocked her +and asking herself if she had not deserved it in assuming comradeship +with him. + +"Nay, it is not my place, my master," she said. "I did forget." + +He put his hand on hers with considerable determination in his manner. + +"Let us make an end to this eternal emphasis of different rank. I +would forget it, Rachel. Wilt thou not permit me? I am thy friend and +nothing harsher--above all things, not thy master." + +Never before had he spoken so to her. She ventured to look at him at +last. His face was grave and a little passionate and his eyes demanded +an answer. + +"Aye, I shall gladly be thy friend," she answered; "but never hast thou +been so much of a master as in the denial that thou art." The first +gleam of girlish mischief danced in her blue eyes. The young sculptor +noted it with gladness. He took the free hand and pressed it, and when +she turned toward the roadway through the wheat he turned with her and +hand in hand they went. As they neared it he spoke again. + +"Again would I ask, when wilt thou advise me concerning the statue? +Here is my boat. Let us turn it into a high seat of council and I will +sit at thy feet and learn." + +"Nay, if I sit I shall linger too long, and there is a +taskmaster--albeit a gentle one--waiting with other things for me to +do." + +Kenkenes kicked the turf and frowned. + +"It sounds barbarous--this talk of master upon thy lips, Rachel. Thou +art out of thy place," he answered. + +"I am no more worthy of freedom than my people," she replied with +dignity. + +"Thy people! They should be lawgivers and advisers among Egypt's high +places, rather than brick-makers and quarry-slaves, if thou art a +typical Israelite." + +"Aye!" she exclaimed, "and thou hast given tongue to the same estimate +of Israel, which hath wrought consternation among the powers of +Mizraim. And for that reason are we enslaved. Think of it, thou who +art unafraid to think. Think of a people in bondage because of its +numbers, its sturdiness and its wisdom. Thou who art in rebellion +against ancient law dost feel somewhat of Israel's hurt. Behold, am I +not also oppressed because I may think to the upsetting of idolatry and +the overthrow of mine oppressors? Thou and I are fellows in bondage; +but mark me! I am nearer freedom than thou. The Pharaohs began too +late. Ye may not dam the Nile at flood-tide." + +Her face was full of triumph and her voice of prophecy. She seemed to +declare with authority the freedom of her people. Kenkenes did not +speak immediately. His thoughts were undergoing a change. The pity he +had felt that night a month agone for her sanguine anticipation of +freedom seemed useless and wasted. Her confidence was no longer +fatuous. He admitted in entirety the truth of her last words. If all +Israel--nay, if but part, if but its leaders were as able and +determined as she, did Meneptah guess his peril? Was not Egypt most +ominously menaced? He remembered that he had been amused at his +father's perturbation over the Israelitish unrest, but he vindicated +Mentu then and there. Furthermore, if all Israel were like unto her, +what heinous injustice had been perpetrated upon an able people? He +found himself hoping that they would assert themselves and enter +freedom, whether it be in Canaan or in Egypt. + +"If ever Israel come to her own," he said impulsively, "I pray thee, +Rachel, remember me to her powers as her partizan in her darker days. +And take this into account when thou comest to judge Egypt. The half +of the nation know not thy people, even as I have been ignorant; and +Osiris pity the hand that would oppress them if all Egypt is made +acquainted with them as I have been in these past days. Art thou +indeed typical of thy race?" + +"Hast thou not been among us often enough to discover?" she parried +smilingly. + +He shook his head. "Nay, I have known but one Israelite, and she keeps +me perpetually aghast at Egypt." + +Rachel's eyes fell. + +"We did speak of the statue," she began. + +"O, aye! I meant to tell thee how I had fortified myself against +mischance. I can not break up the statue; sooner would I assail sweet +flesh with a sledge; but when it is done I shall bury it in the sands. +It will wrench me sorely to do even that. During the carving I feel +most secure, for Memphis and Masaarah think I come hither to look after +the removal of stones, since I am a sculptor. But if an Egyptian +should come upon it by mischance before it is complete, I have left no +trace of myself upon it. Most of all I trust to the generosity of the +Hathors, who have abetted me so openly thus far." + +Rachel heard him thoughtfully. + +"What a pity it is that thou must follow after the pattern of God and +sate thy love of beauty by stealth under ban and in fear. Till what +time Mizraim sets this law of sculpture aside she may not boast her +wisdom flawless. It is past understanding why she exacts obedience to +this law most diligently, which fathers these ill-favored images of her +gods, when their habitations are most splendidly and most beautifully +built. She robeth herself in fine linen, decketh herself with jewels, +anointeth her hair and maketh her eyes lovely with kohl, and lo! when +she would picture herself she setteth her shoulders awry and slighteth +the grace of her joints and the softness of her flesh. O, that thy +brave spirit had arisen long ago, ere the perversion had become a +heritage, dear to the Egyptian sculptor as his bones! But now, artist +though he be, his eye is so befilmed by ancient use that he sees no +monstrousness in his work. So thou hast nation-wide, nation-old, +nation-defended custom to fight. And alas! thou art but one, Kenkenes, +and I fear for thee." + +For once the young sculptor's ready speech failed him. He drew near +her, his eyes shining, his lips parted, drinking every word as if it +were authoritative privilege for him to indulge his love of beauty +without limit and openly. Here was that which he had sought in vain +from those nearest to him--that which he had ceased to believe was to +be found in Egypt--comfort, sympathy, perfect understanding. What if +it came from the lips of an hereditary slave of the Pharaoh--a toiler +in the quarries, an infidel, an alien nomad? If an alien, a slave, an +unbeliever thought so deeply, felt so acutely and responded so +discerningly to such delicate requirements--the slave, the nomad for +him! + +"Rachel," he began almost helplessly, "I am beyond extrication in debt +to thee--thou golden, thou undecipherable mystery!" + +She flushed to her very brows and her eyes fell quickly. + +"I have appealed to all sources from which I might justly expect +sympathy--to men of reason, of power, of mine own kin, and to women of +heart--and not once have I found in them the broad and kindly +understanding which thou hast displayed for me out of the goodness of +thy beautiful heart. Behold! thou hast given speech to my own hidden +longings, summarized my difficulties, foreshadowed my misfortunes, +deplored them--aye, of a truth, heaved my very sighs for me!" His +voice fell and grew reverent. "I would call thee an immortal, but +there is a better title for thee--woman--a true woman--and thou dost +even uplift the name." + +For the first time in the history of their acquaintance she laughed, +not mirthfully, but low and very happily, and the fleeting glimpse she +gave him of her eyes showed them radiant and glad. He caught her +hands, the bundle of herbs fell, and drawing her near him, he lifted +the pink palms to his lips and pressed them there. + +"Nay," she said, recovering herself and withdrawing her hands, "I am +not an Egyptian but a Hebrew, unbiased by the prejudices of thy nation. +It is not strange that I can understand thy rebellion, which is but a +rift in thine Egyptian make-up through which reason shows. Any alien +could comfort thee as well." + +"And thou hast no more sympathy for me than any alien would have?" he +asked, somewhat piqued. + +"Is there any other sympathizing alien with whom I may compare and +learn?" she asked with a smile. + +She took up her bundle of herbs again and seemed to be preparing to +leave him. + +"How dost thou know these things," he asked hurriedly; "all these +things--sculpture, religion, history?" + +"I was not born a slave," she answered simply. + +"Nay, cast out that word. I would never hear thee speak it, Rachel." + +"Then, I was born out of servitude. My great grandsire was exempted by +Seti when Israel went into bondage. His children and all his house +were given to profit by the covenant. But the name grew wealthy and +powerful to the third generation. My father was Maai the +Compassionate, who loved his brethren better than himself. Them he +helped. Rameses the Great forgot his father's promise when he found he +had need of my father's treasure--" she paused and continued as if the +recital hurt her. "There were ten--four of my mother's house, six of +my father's. To the mines and the brick-fields they were sent, and in +a little space I was all that was left." + +Horrified and conscience-stricken, Kenkenes made as if to speak, but +she went on hurriedly. + +"My mother's nurse, Deborah, who went with us into servitude, is +learned, having been taught by my mother, and I have been her pupil." + +"And there is not one of thy blood--not one guardian kinsman left to +thee?" Kenkenes asked slowly. + +"Not one." + +Up to this moment, during every interview with Rachel, Kenkenes had +forsworn some little prejudice, or sacrificed some of his blithe +self-esteem. But the tragic narrative swept all these supports from +him and left him solitary to face the charge of indirect complicity in +murder. He was an Egyptian--a loyal supporter of the government and +its policies; he had profited by Israel's toil, and if he succeeded to +his father's office, Israel would serve him directly in his labor for +the Pharaoh to be. He had known that Israel was oppressed, that Israel +died of hard labor, and he had pitied it, as the humane soul in him had +felt for the overworked draft-oxen or the sacrifices that were led +bleating to the altars. Perhaps he had even casually decried the +policy that sent women into the brick-fields and did men to death in a +year in the mines. But his own conscience had not been hurt, nor had +he taken the misdeed home to himself. + +Now his sensations were vastly different. He felt all the guilt of his +nation, and he had nothing to offer as amends but his own humiliation. +Of this he had an overwhelming plenitude and his eloquent face showed +it. With an effort he raised his head and spoke. + +"Rachel, if my humiliation will satisfy thee even a little as vengeance +upon Egypt, do thou shame me into the dust if thou wilt." + +"I do not understand thee," she said with dignity. + +"Believe me. I would help thee in some wise, and alas! there is no +other way by deed or word that I could prove my sorrow." + +Tears leaped into her eyes. + +"Nay! Nay!" she exclaimed. "Thou dost wrong me, Kenkenes. What +wickedness were mine to make the one contrite, guiltless heart in Egypt +suffer for all the unrepentant and the wrong-doers of the land!" + +Once again he took her hand and kissed it, because the act was more +eloquent than words at that moment. + +"It is near sunset," she said softly, "give me leave to depart." + +"Farewell, and the divine Mother attend thee." + +She bowed and left him. + +That night in the dim work-room Kenkenes brought forth upon papyrus a +face of Athor, so full of love and yearning that he knew his own heart +had given his fingers direction and inspiration. He sought no further. + +To-morrow in the niche in the desert he would carve the want of his own +soul in the countenance of the goddess. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE GODS OF EGYPT + +It was Kenkenes' first love and so was most rapturous, but it did not +cast a glamour over the stern perplexities that it entailed. He knew +the suspense that is immemorial among lovers, and further to trouble +him he had the harsh obstacle of different society. Rachel was a +quarry-slave, a member of the lowest rank in the Egyptian scale of +classes. She was an Israelite, an infidel and a reviler of the gods. + +He was a descendant of kings, a devout Osirian and welcomed in Egypt's +high places. + +Never could extremes have been greater. But Kenkenes would not have +given any of these obstacles a moment's consideration had not the +weight of their neglect fallen on the shoulders of Rachel. If he had +been a sovereign he could have taken her freely, and purple-wearing +Egypt would have kissed her sandal; but he occupied a place that could +provide with honor only him who was born to it. + +To lift Rachel to that position would be to expose her to the affronts +of an undemocratic society. On the other hand he might sacrifice name +and station and go down to her; but he was not to be judged harshly +because he hesitated at this step. + +Rachel had given him no sign of preference beyond a pretty fellowship. +In the beginning this realization had hurt him, but as he tossed night +after night, troubled beyond expression, he remembered this thing with +some melancholy comfort. It was a sorry solution of his problem to +feel that he was unloved, and even while he recognized its efficacy, he +prayed that it might not be so. + +His heavy heart did not retard the progress of his statue or make its +beauty indifferent. The more he suffered the greater the passion in +the face. He labored daily and tirelessly. + +But day by day he looked, unseen, on his love in the valley, and the +oftener he looked the more irresolute he grew. The conflict between +his heart and his reason was gradually shifting in favor of his love. + +His longing, as it continued to crave, grew from hunger to starving, +and though his reason pointed to disastrous results, his heart +justified itself in the blind cry, "Rachel, Rachel!" + +He had endured a month before his fortitude succumbed entirely. Once +near sunset, as Rachel was proceeding toward the camp from some helpful +mission to the quarries, she caught the fragments of a song, so +distantly and absently sung that she could not locate it. There were +singers among the Israelites, but they sang with wild exultation and +more care for the sense than the melody. They had cultivated the chant +and forgotten the lyric, because they had more heart for prophecy than +passion. Rachel had revered her people's song, but there was something +in this half-heard music that touched her youth and her love of life. +She stopped to hear it well. + +It had all the power and profundity of the male voice, but it was as +subdued, as flawless and sympathetic as a distant, deep-toned bell. +There was not even a breath of effort in it, nor an insincere +expression, and it pursued a theme of little range and much simplicity. +The singer sang as spontaneously as a bird sings. She did not catch +the words, but something in the fervor of the music told her it was a +song of love--and a song of love unsatisfied. There was a pathos in it +that touched the fountain of her tears and awoke to willingness that +impulse in her womanhood that longs to comfort. + +As she stood in an attitude of rapt attention. Kenkenes rounded a +curve in the valley just ahead of her. The song died suddenly on his +lips and the color deepened in his cheeks. + +"Fie!" he exclaimed. "Here thou art, O Athor, catching me in the +imperfection of my practice. Now will the keen edge of their perfect +beauty be dulled upon thine ear when I come to lift my tuneful +devotions to thee." + +"And it was thou singing?" she asked. + +"It was I--and Pentaur; mine the voice; Pentaur's the song." + +"Together ye have wrought an eloquent harmony, but such a voice as +thine would gild the pale effort of the poorest words," she said +earnestly. "What dost thou with thy voice?" + +"Once I won me a pretty compliment with it," he said softly, bending +his head to look at her. She flushed and her eyes fell. + +"Nay, it is but my pastime and at the command of my friends," he +continued. "See. This is what has made me sing." + +He unslung his wallet and took out of it a statuette of creamy chalk. + +"Thus far has the Athor of the hills progressed." He put it into her +hands for examination. The face was complete, the minute features as +perfect as life, the plaits of long hair and all the figure exquisitely +copied and shaped. The pedestal was yet in rough block. Rachel +inspected it, wondering. Finally she looked up at him with praise in +her eyes. + +"Dost thou forgive me?" he asked. + +"It is for me to ask thy forgiveness," she answered. "So we be equally +indebted and therefore not in debt." + +"Not so. I know the joy of creating uncramped, and the joy of copying +such a model far outweighs any small delight thy little vanity may have +experienced. Thy vanity? Hast thou any vanity?" + +"Nay, I trust not," she replied laughingly. "Vanity is self-esteem run +to seed." + +"Sage! Let me make haste to carve the pedestal that I may know how low +to do obeisance to wisdom. Hold it so, I pray thee." + +He took the statue and set it on a flat cornice jutting from the stone +wall. Rachel obediently steadied it. He selected from his tools a +knife with a rounded point of wonderful keenness and smoothed away the +chalk in bulk. They stood close together, the sculptor bending from +his commanding height to work. From time to time he shifted his +position, touching her hand often and saying little. + +The pedestal given shape, he began its elaboration. Pattern after +pattern of graceful foliation emerged till the design assumed the +intricate complexity of the Egyptic style. + +Rachel watched with absorbed interest, her head unconsciously settling +to one side in critical contemplation. Kenkenes, pressing the blade +firmly upon the chalk, felt her cheek touch his shoulder for a fraction +of a second; his fingers lost their steadiness and direction, but not +their strength; the blade slipped, and the fierce edge struck the white +hand that held the statuette. + +With a cry he dropped the knife, flung one arm about her and drew her +very close to him. The image toppled down and was broken on the rock +below, but he saw only the fine scarlet thread on the soft flesh. + +Again and again he pressed the wounded hand to his lips, his eyes +dimmed with tears of compunction. + +"O, Rachel, Rachel!" he exclaimed in a sudden burst of passionate +contrition. "Must even the most loving hand in Egypt be lifted against +thee?" + +The great content on the glorified face against his breast was all the +expression of pardon that he asked. + +"My love! My Rachel!" he whispered. "Ah, ye generous gods! indulge me +still further. Let this, your richest gift, be mine." + +The gods! + +Stunned and only realizing that she must undo his clasp, she freed +herself and retreated a little space from him. + +And then she remembered. + +Slowly and relentlessly it came home to her that this was one of the +abominable idolaters, and she had forsworn such for ever. These very +arms that had held her so shelteringly had been lifted in supplication +to the idols, and the lips, whose kiss she had awaited, would swear to +love her, by an image. The pitiless truth, once admitted, smote her +cruelly. She covered her face with her hands. + +Kenkenes, amazed and deeply moved, went to her immediately. + +"What have I said?" he begged. "What have I done?" + +What had he done, indeed? But to have spoken, though to explain, would +have meant capitulation. She wavered a moment, and then turning away, +fled up the valley toward the camp--not from him, but from herself. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +TEE ADVICE OF HOTEP + +If Mentu, looking up from the old murkets, noted that the face of his +son was weary and sad, he laid it to the sudden heat of the spring; for +now it was the middle of March and Ra had grown ardent and the marshes +malarious. The old housekeeper, to whom the great artist mentioned his +son's indisposition, glanced sharply at the young master, touched his +hand when she served him at table, and felt his forehead when she +pretended to smooth his hair. And having made her furtive examination, +the astute old servant told the great artist that the young master was +not ill. If she had further information to impart, Mentu did not give +her the opportunity, for had she not said that Kenkenes was well? So +he fell to his work again. + +Senci noted it, and sorrowful Io, but they, like Mentu, ascribed it to +the miasmas and said nothing to the young man about himself. + +But Hotep was a penetrative man, and more hidden things than his +friend's ailment had been an open secret to his keen eye. He did not +care to know which one of the butterflies was the fluttering object of +Kenkenes' bounteous love, for Hotep knew that those high-born Memphian +women, who were openly partial to the handsome young sculptor, loved +him for his comeliness and his silken tongue alone. It would take a +profounder soul than any they had displayed to understand and +sympathize with the restive genius hidden under the smooth exterior +they saw. + +Therefore, with some impatience, Hotep conceded that his friend was in +love, and presumably throwing himself away. So the scribe purposed, +even though the attempt were inevitably fruitless, to win Kenkenes out +of his dream. + +One faint dawn he entered the temple to pray for his own cause at the +shrine of the lovers' goddess. + +In the half-night of the vast interior, at the foot of the sumptuous +pedestal of Athor, he distinguished another supplicant, kneeling. But +there was a hopelessness in the droop of the bowed head and a tenseness +in the interlaced fingers of the clasped hands, which proved that +Athor's answer had not been propitious. + +Hotep knew at once who besought the goddess. Setting his offering of +silver and crystal on the altar, the scribe departed with silent step. +But without, he ground his teeth and execrated the giver of pain to +Kenkenes. + +In mid-afternoon of the same day Hotep's chariot drew up at the portals +of Mentu's house, and the scribe in his most splendid raiment was +conducted to Kenkenes. The young sculptor was alone. + +"What was it, a palsy or the sun which kept thee at home this day?" was +Hotep's greeting. "Nine is a mystic number and is fruitful of much +gain. Eight times within a month have I come for thee. The ninth did +supply thee. Blessed be the number." + +Kenkenes smiled. "But there are seven Hathors, and five days in the +epact--and the Radiant Three. To me it seemeth there are many good +numbers." + +Hotep plucked his sleeve. + +"Come, I will show thee the best of all--One, the One." + +Kenkenes arose. "Let me robe myself befittingly, then." + +"Not too effectively," the scribe cried after him. "I would not have +thee blight my chances with the full blaze of thy beauty." + +When Kenkenes returned Hotep looked at him with another thought than +had been uppermost in his mind since he had noted his friend's +dejection. This time, he was impatient with Kenkenes. + +"And such a man as this will permit a woman to break his heart!" + +Then was the young sculptor taken to the palace of the Pharaoh. On its +roof, in the great square shadow of its double towers, he was presented +to a dainty little lady, whose black eyes grew large and luminous at +the coming of the scribe. She was Masanath, the youngest and only +unwedded child of Har-hat, the king's adviser. Her oval face had a +uniform rose-leaf flush, her little nose was distinctly aquiline, her +little mouth warm and ripe. Her teeth were dazzlingly white, and, like +a baby's, notched on the edges with minute serrations. But with all +her tininess, she planted her sandal with decision and scrutinized +whosoever addressed her in a way that was eloquent of a force and +perception larger by far than the lady they characterized. + +And this was the love of Hotep. Kenkenes smiled. The top of her +pretty head was not nearly on a level with his shoulders, and the small +hand she extended had the determined grip with which a baby seizes a +proffered finger. A vision of the golden Israelite rose beside her and +the smile vanished. + +The day was warm and the courtiers in search of a breeze were scattered +about the palace-top in picturesque groups. Masanath occupied a +diphros, or double chair, and a female attendant, standing behind her, +stirred the warm air with a perfumed fan. The lady was on the point of +sharing her seat with one of her guests, when Har-hat, who had been +lounging by himself on the parapet, sauntered over to his daughter's +side. + +"My father," she said, "the son of Mentu, the first friend of the noble +Hotep." + +Kenkenes had noticed, with a chill, the approach of the fan-bearer, +and, angry with himself for his unreasoning perturbation, strove to +greet him composedly. But he could not force himself into +graciousness. The formal obeisance might have been made appropriately +to his bitterest enemy. + +"The son of Mentu and I have met before," the fan-bearer declared +laughingly. "But I scarce should have recognized him in this man of +peace had not his stature been impressed upon me in that hour when +first I met him." The fan-bearer paused to enjoy the wonder of his +daughter and the scribe, and the hardening face of Kenkenes. + +"But for the agility the gods have seen fit to leave me in mine +advancing years," he continued, "this self-same courteous noble would +have brained me with a boat-hook on an occasion of much merrymaking, a +month agone." + +He sat down on the arm of Masanath's chair and shouted with laughter. +With a great effort Kenkenes controlled himself. + +"Shall I give the story in full?" he asked with an odd quiet in his +voice. + +"Nay! Nay!" Har-hat protested; "I have told the worst I would have +said concerning that defeat of mine." Again he laughed and returned to +the young man's identity once more. + +"Aye, I might have known that thou wast somewhat of kin to Mentu. Ye +are as much alike as two owlets--same candid face." + +He sauntered away, leaving an awkward silence behind him. + +"Sit beside me?" asked Masanath, drawing the folds of her white robes +aside to make room for the scribe. But Hotep did not seem to hear. +Instead, he wandered away for another chair, became interested in a +group of long-eyed beauties near by and apparently forgot Masanath. +Kenkenes did not permit any lapse between the invitation and its +acceptance. He dropped into the place made for Hotep, as if the offer +had been extended to him. + +"From Bubastis to Memphis, from Bast to Ptah," he said. "Dost thou +miss the generous levels of the Delta in our crevice between the hills?" + +She shook her head. "Memphis is the lure of all Egypt, and he who hath +been transplanted to her would flout the favor of the gods, did he make +homesick moan for his native city." + +"And thou hast warmer regard for the stir of Memphis than the quiet of +the north?" + +"There is no quiet in the north now." + +"So?" + +"Nay; hast thou not heard of the Israelitish unrest?" + +"Aye, I had heard--but--but hath it become of any import?" + +"It is the peril of Egypt that she does not realize her menace in these +Hebrews," the lady answered. "The north knows it, but it has sprung +into life so recently, and from such miserable soil, that even my +father, who has been away from the Delta but a few months, does not +appreciate the magnitude of the disaffection." + +"Thou hast lived among them, Lady Masanath. What thinkest thou of +these people?" Kenkenes asked after a little silence. + +"Of the mass I can not speak confidently," she answered modestly. +"They are proud--they pass the Egyptian in pride; they have kept their +blood singularly pure for such long residence among us; they are +stubborn, querulous and unready. But above all they are a contented +race if but the oppression were lifted from their shoulders. They are +an untilled soil--none knows what they might produce, but the +confidence of their leader, who is a wondrous man, bespeaks them a +capable people. To my mind they are mistreated beyond their deserts. +I would have the powers of Egypt use them better." + +"Is it known in the north what Mesu's purpose is? The Israelites among +us talk of their own kingdom, and I wonder if the Hebrew means to set +up a nation within us, or assail the throne of the Pharaohs, or go +forth and settle in another country." + +The lady shrugged her shoulders. "The Hebrews talk in similitudes. +The prospect of freedom so uplifts them that they chant their purposes +to you, and bewilder you with quaint words and hidden meanings. But +these three facts, my Lord, are apparent and most potent in results +when combined; they are oppressed beyond endurance; they are many; they +are captained by a mystic. They have but to choose to rebel, and it +would tax the martial strength of Egypt to quiet them." + +The magisterial dignity of the little lady was most delightful. The +young sculptor's sensations were divided between interest in the grave +subject she discussed and pleasure in her manner. Happening to glance +in the direction of the scribe, he found the gray eye of his friend +fixed upon him from the group of beauties. Presently Hotep rambled +back with an ebony stool and sat a little aloof in thoughtful silence +until the visit was over. + +When Kenkenes alighted at the door of his father's house some time +later, Hotep leaned over the wheel of the chariot and put his hand on +the sculptor's shoulder. + +"Thou hast met Har-hat and, by his own words, thou hast had some +unpleasant commerce with him. What he did to thee I know not, but I +shall let thee into mine own quarrel with him. He lays the curb of +silence on my lips and enforces the indifference in my mien. If I +revolt the penalty is humiliation and disaster for Masanath and for me. +I love her, but I dare not let her dream it. The fan-bearer hath +greater things in store for her than a scribe can promise. I am thy +brother in hatred of him." + +The next dawn, even before sunrise, Hotep found Kenkenes once again in +the temple before the shrine of Athor. But this time the scribe knelt +silently beside his friend. + +When they emerged into the sunless solemnity of the grove he turned to +Kenkenes. + +"With the licensed forwardness of an old friend, I would ask what thou +hast to crave of the lovers' goddess, O thou loveless?" + +"Favor and pardon," Kenkenes answered. + +"So? But already have I reached the limit. Not even a friend may ask +an accounting of a man's misdeeds." + +Kenkenes smiled. "Ask me," he said, "and spare me the effort of +voluntary confession." + +"Then, what hast thou done?" + +"Come and look upon mine offense. Thine eyes will serve thee better +than my tongue." + +The pair were in costume hardly fitted for the dust of the roadway, but +Memphis was not astir. They went across the city toward the river and +at the landings found an early-rising boatman, who let them his bari. + +Kenkenes took the oars and moved out into the middle of the swiftest +current of the Nile. There he headed down-stream and permitted the +boat to drift. + +The clear heavens, blue and pellucid as a sapphire, were still cool, +but from the lower slope down the east a radiance began to crawl +upward. The peaks of the Libyan desert grew wan. + +The young men did not resume their talk. The dawn in Egypt was a +solemn hour. Kenkenes raised his eyes to the heights of the west. On +the shore a group approached the Nile edge, and Hotep guessed by the +cluster of fans and standards that it was the Pharaoh at his morning +devotions to Nilus. The white points on the hilltops reddened and +caught fire. + +Softly and absently Kenkenes began to sing a hymn to the sunrise. +Hotep rested his cheek on one hand and listened. More solemn, more +appealing the notes grew, fuller and stronger, until the normal power +of the rich voice was reached. The liquid echo on the water gave it a +mellow embellishment, and Hotep saw the central figure of the group on +shore lift his hand for silence among the courtiers. + +But Kenkenes sang on unconscious even of his nearest auditor. After +the nature of humanity he was nearer to his gods in trouble than in +tranquillity. + +The white fronts of Memphis receded slowly, for neither took up the +oars. Hotep hesitated to break the silence that fell after the end of +the hymn. The shadow on the singer's face proved that the heart would +have flinched at any effort to soothe it. It was the young sculptor's +privilege to speak first. + +After a long silence, Kenkenes roused himself. + +"Look to the course of the bari, Hotep, and chide it with an oar if it +means to beach us. I doubt me much if I am fit to control it with the +wine of this wind on my brain." + +Hotep took up the oars and rowed strongly. "Thine offense does not sit +heavily on thy conscience," he said. + +"I have made my peace with Athor." + +"Hath she given thee her word?" + +"Nay, no need. For I did not offend her. Rather hath she abetted +me--urged me in my trespass. She persuaded me to become vagrant with +her, and I followed the divine runaway into the desert. I doubt not I +was chosen because I was as lawless as her needs required. Athor is +beautiful and would prove herself so to her devotees. And to me was +the lovely labor appointed." + +Hotep looked at him mystified. + +"By the gods," he said at last, "thou hadst better get in out of this +wind." + +Kenkenes laughed genuinely. "My babble will take meaning ere long. If +thou questionest me, I must answer, but I am determined not to betray +my secret yet." + +"Go we to On?" Hotep asked plaintively, after a long interval of +industry for him and dream for Kenkenes. The young sculptor sat up and +looked at the opposite shore. "Nay," he cried, "we are long past the +place where we should have landed. Yonder is the Marsh of the +Discontented Soul. Let me row back." + +He turned and pulled rapidly toward the eastern shore. Away to the +south, behind them, were the quarries of Masaarah. But they were still +a considerable distance above Toora, a second village of +quarry-workers, now entirely deserted. The pitted face of the mountain +behind the town was without life, for, as has been seen, Meneptah was +not a building monarch. Directly opposite them the abrupt wall of the +Arabian hills pushed down near to the Nile and the intervening space +was a flat sandy stretch, ending in a reedy marsh at the water's edge. +The line of cultivation ended far to the south and north of it, though +the soil was as arable as any bordering the Nile. A great number of +marsh geese and a few stilted waders flew up or plunged into the water +with discordant cries and flapping of wings as the presence of the +young men disturbed the solitude. The sedge was wind-mown, and there +were numberless prints of bird claws, but no mark of boat-keel or human +foot. The place should have been a favorite haunt of fowlers, but it +was lonely and overshadowed with a sense of absolute desertion. + +"But," Hotep began suddenly, "thou hast spoken of offense and pardon, +and now thou boastest that Athor abetted thee." + +"Why is this called the Marsh of the Discontented Soul?" + +The scribe smiled patiently. "Of a truth, dost thou not know?" + +"As the immortals hear me, I do not. I have never asked and the +chronicles do not speak of it." + +"Nay; the story is four hundred years old, and the chroniclers do not +tell it because it is out of the scope of history, I doubt not. But it +has become tradition throughout Egypt to shun the spot, though few know +why they must. A curse is laid upon the place. An unfaithful wife +whom the priests denied repose with her ancestors is entombed yonder." +He pointed toward an angle between an outstanding buttress and the +limestone wall. "Her soul haunts him who comes here with the plea that +her mummy be removed to On, where she dwelt in life, and laid with the +respected dead, in the necropolis." + +Kenkenes shrugged his shoulders. "I trust the unhappy soul will not +trouble us. We came here by way of misadventure--not to disturb her. +But how came it they did not entomb her nearer On?" + +"She betrayed one great man and tempted another. She offended against +the lofty. Therefore, her punishment was the more heavy--her isolation +in death like to banishment in life." + +"So; if she had slighted a paraschite and tempted a beer brewer, her +fate would have been less harsh. O, the justness of justice!" + +The morning was well advanced when they reached the niche on the +hillside--Hotep, wondering; Kenkenes, silent and expectant. + +The sculptor led the way into the presence of Athor, and stepped aside. +The scribe halted and gazed without sound or movement--petrified with +amazement. + +Before him, in hue and quiescence was a statue in stone--in all other +respects, a human being. The figure was of white magnesium limestone, +and stood upon rock yet unhewn. + +The ritual had been trampled into the dust. + +The eye of the most unlearned Egyptian could detect the sacrilege at a +single glance. + +It was the image of a girl, draped in an overlong robe, fastened over +each shoulder by a fibula, ornamented with a round medallion. Through +the vestments, intentionally simple, there was testimony of the +exquisite lines of the figure they clothed. + +The sole observance of hieratic symbol were the horns of Athor set in +the hair. + +The figure was posed as if in the act of a forward movement. The knee +was slightly bent in an attitude of supplication. The face was +upturned, the eyes lifted, the arms extended to their fullest, forward +and upward, the fingers curved as if ready to receive. The hair was +separated into two heavy plaits, which fell below the waist down the +back. + +One sandaled foot was advanced, slightly; the other hidden by the hem +of the robe. + +Every physical feature visible upon the living form so disposed and +draped had been carved upon this grace in stone. Egypt had never +fashioned anything so perfect. Indeed, she would not have called it +sculpture. + +The glyptic art of Greece had been paralleled hundreds of years before +it was born. + +On the face there was the light of overpowering love together with the +intangible pride so marked on the representations of profane deities. +But the most manifest emotions were the great yearning and entreaty. +They were marked in the attitude of the head thrown back, in the +outstretched arms and in the bent knee. That there was more hopeful +expectancy than despairing insistence, was proved by the curve of the +ready fingers and the uncertain smile on the lips. It was Athor, +eternally young, eternally in love, eternally unsatisfied, receiving +the setting sun as she had done since the world began. None of the +rapturous impatience and uncertainty of the moment had been lost since +the first sunset after chaos. And yet, with all the pulse and fervor, +here was womanhood, immaculate and ineffable. + +Never did face so command men to worship. + +"Holy Amen!" the scribe exclaimed, his voice barely audible in its +earnestness. "What consummate loveliness! But what--what unspeakable +impiety!" + +"Hast thou seen Athor? She is before thee." + +"Athor! The golden goddess in the image of a mortal! Kenkenes, the +wrath of the priests awaits thee and thereafter the doom of the +insulted Pantheon!" The scribe shuddered and plucked at his friend's +robe as if to drag him away from the sight of his own creation. + +Firmly fixed were the young artist's convictions to resist the +impelling force of Hotep's consternation. + +"Nay, nay, Hotep," he answered soothingly. "The wrath of the gods for +an offense thus flagrant is exceedingly slow, if it is to fall. Lo! +they have propitiated me at great length if they mean to accomplish +mine undoing at last. Thus far, and the statue is well-nigh complete, +I have met no form of obstacle." + +But Hotep shook his head in profound apprehension. He looked at the +statue furtively and murmured: + +"O Kenkenes, what madness made thee trifle with the gods?" + +"Have I not said? The goddess herself lured me. Is she not the +embodied essence of Beauty? The ritual insults her. Ah, look at the +statue, Hotep. How could Athor be wroth with the sculptor who called +such a face as that, a likeness of her!" + +"It startles me," the scribe declared. "It is supernaturally human. +That is not art, but creation. O apostate, thine offense is of +two-fold seriousness. Thou hast stolen the function of the divine +Mother and made a living thing!" + +Kenkenes laughed with sheer joy at his comrade's genuine praise. The +more dismayed Hotep might be, the more sincere his compliment. But the +scribe, plunged into a stupor of concern lest the authorities discover +the sacrilege, went on helplessly. + +"What wilt thou do with it when it is done?" + +"I have left no mark of myself upon it." + +"Nay, but the priesthood can scent out a blasphemer as a hound scents a +jackal." + +"Thou wilt not betray me, Hotep; I shall not publish myself, and the +other--the only other who possesses my secret--the Israelite, who was +my model, is fidelity's self. I would trust her with my soul." + +"An Israelite! Thy nation's most active foe at this hour!" + +"She is no enemy to me, Hotep." + +Slowly the scribe's eyes traveled from the face of Athor to the face of +Kenkenes. The young sculptor turned away and leaned against the great +cube that walled one side of the niche. He was not prepared to meet +his friend's discerning eyes. Hotep surveyed him critically. A +momentous surmise forced itself upon him. He went to Kenkenes and, +laying an affectionate arm across his shoulder, leaned not lightly +thereon. + +"Thou hast said, O my Kenkenes, that I should understand thy meaning +when thou spakest mysteriously a while agone. May I not know, now? +Thou didst plead offense to Athor and didst boast her pardon. Later +thou calledst her thy confederate. And earliest of all, thou didst +confess to asking favor of her. How may all these things be?" + +"Look thou," Kenkenes began at once. "On one hand, I have my new +belief concerning sculpture--on the other, the beliefs of my fathers. +I practise the first and make propitiation for the second. No harm +hath overtaken me. Am I not pardoned? Furthermore, Athor is beauty, +and beauty guided my hand in creating this statue. Therefore, Athor +being beauty, Athor was my confederate. Is it not lucid, O Son of +Wisdom?" + +Hotep laughed. "Nay, thou wilt not prosper, Kenkenes. Thou servest +two masters. But there is one thing still unexplained--the favor of +Athor." + +"That is not mine to boast. I have but craved it," Kenkenes replied +hesitatingly. + +"Where doth she live?" Hotep asked, by way of experiment. + +"In the quarries below." + +There was no more doubt in the mind of Hotep. Here was a duty, plain +before him, and his dearest friend to counsel. His must be tender +wisdom and persuasive authority. Not a drop of the scribe's blood was +democratic. He could not understand love between different ranks of +society, and, as a result, doubted if it could exist. Kenkenes must be +awakened while it was time. + +"Do thou hear me, O my Kenkenes," he said after some silence. "If I +overstep the liberty of a friend, remind me, but remember +thou--whatsoever I shall say will be said through love for thee, not to +chide thee. No man shapeth his career for himself alone, nor does +death end his deeds. He continues to act through his children and his +children's children to the unlimited extent of time. Seest thou not, O +Kenkenes, that the ancestor is terribly responsible? What more heavy +punishment could be meted to the original sinner, than to set him in +eternal contemplation of the hideous fruitfulness of his initial sin! + +"I have said sin, because sin, only, is offense in the eyes of the +gods. But sin and error are one in the unpardoning eye of nature. +Thus, if thou dost err, though in all innocence, though the gods +absolve thee, thou wilt reap the bitter harvest of thy misguided +sowing, one day--thou or thy children after thee. The doom is spoken, +and however tardy, must fall--and the offense is never expiated. There +is nothing more relentless than consequence. + +"If thou weddest unwisely thou dost double thy children's portion of +difficulty, since thou art unwise and their mother unfit. If, +perchance, thy only error lay in thy choice of wife, the result is +still the same. Let her be most worthy, and yet she may be most +unfitting. She must fit thy needs as the joint fits the socket. +Virtue is essential, but it is not sufficient. Beauty is good--I +should say needful, but certainly it is not all. Love is indispensable +and yet not enough." + +"I should say that these three things are enough," put in Kenkenes. + +"They would gain entrance into the place of the blest--the bosom of +Osiris--but they are not sufficient for the over-nice nobility of +Egypt," the scribe averred promptly. "Thou must live in the world and +the world would pass judgment on thy wife. If thou art a true husband, +thou wouldst defend her, and be wroth. Yet, canst thou be happy being +wroth and at odds with the world?" + +Kenkenes slipped from under the affectionate arm and busied himself +with the statue, marking with a sliver of limestone where his chisel +must smooth away a flaw. But the voice of the scribe went on steadily. + +"The nobility of Egypt will not accept an unbeliever and an Israelite. +That monarch who favored the son of Abraham, Joseph, is dead. The +tolerant spirit died with him. Another sentiment hath grown up and the +loveliest Hebrew could not overthrow it. Henceforward, there is +eternal enmity between Egypt and Israel." + +The sliver of stone dropped from the fingers of the artist and his eyes +wandered away, dreamy with thought. He remembered the story of the +wrong of Rachel's house, and it came home to him with overwhelming +force that the feud between Egypt and Israel was the barrier between +him and his love. He was punished for a crime his country had +committed. + +"Oh!" he exclaimed to himself. "Am I not surely suffering for the sins +of my fathers? How cruelly sound thy reasoning is, O thou placid +Hotep!" + +The scribe saw that as the sculptor stood, the pleading hands of Athor +all but touched his shoulders. Hotep went to him and turned him away +from the statue. He knew he could not win his friend with the beauty +of that waiting face appealing to him. + +"Thus far thou hast borne with me, Kenkenes--and having grown bold +thereby, I would go further. Return with me to Memphis and come hither +no more. She will soon be comforted, if she is not already betrothed. +Egypt needs thee--the Hathors have bespoken good fortune for thee--and +thou art justified in aspiring to nothing less than the hand of a +princess. Come back to Memphis and let her heal thee with her +congruous love." + +"Nay, my Hotep, what a waste of words! I will go back to Memphis with +thee, not for thy reasoning, but for mine own--nay, hers." + +"Hast thou--did the Israelite--" the scribe began in amazement, and +paused, ashamed of his unbecoming curiosity. + +"Aye; and let us speak of it no more. Thou hast my story, my +confidence and my love. Keep the first and the rest shall be thine for +ever." + +"And this?" questioned Hotep, nodding toward the statue, though he +resolutely kept the face of Kenkenes turned from it. + +"Let it be," Kenkenes replied. Hotep hesitated, dissatisfied, but +feared to insist on its destruction, so he went arm in arm with his +friend down to the river, without a word of protest. "I will at him +again when he is better," he told himself, "and we will bury the +exquisite sacrilege." + +There was an animated group of Hebrew children at the Nile drawing +water, and among them was a golden-haired maiden. Hotep had but to +glance at her to know that he looked on the glorious model of the pale +divinity on the hill above. At the sound of their approach through the +grain, she looked up. As she caught sight of Kenkenes, she started and +flushed quickly and as quickly the color fled. + +Since she was near the boat, Kenkenes stood close beside her for a +moment while he pushed the bari into the water. + +"Gods! What a noble pair!" Hotep ejaculated under his breath. But he +saw Kenkenes bend near the Israelite, as if to make his final plea; a +spasm of anguish contracted her white face, and she turned her head +away. The incident, so eloquent to Rachel and Kenkenes, had been so +swift and subtile in its enactment, that only the quick eye of Hotep +detected it. Again he called on the gods in exclamation: + +"She is saner than he!" + +On the way back to Memphis he maintained a thoughtful silence. Since +he had seen Rachel, he began to understand the love of Kenkenes for her. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE SON OF THE MURKET + +March and April had passed and now it was the first of May. Five days +before, the ceremony of installation had been held for the murket and +the cup-bearer and for four days thereafter the new officers passed +through initiatory formalities. But on the fifth day the rites of +investiture had been brought to an end, and Mentu and Nechutes entered +on the routine of service. + +To Mentu fell the dignified congratulations of his own world of sedate +old nobles and stately women. But Nechutes was younger and well +beloved by youthful Memphis, so on the night of the fifth day, the +house of Senci was aglow and in her banquet-room there was much young +revel in his honor. + +Aromatic torches flaring in sconces lighted the friezes of lotus, the +painted paneling on the walls, and the clustered pillars that upheld +the ceiling of the chamber. The tables had been removed; the musicians +and tumblers common to such occasions were not present, for the rout +was small and sufficient unto itself for entertainment. + +Gathered about a central figure, which must needs be the one of highest +rank--and in this instance it was the crown prince--were the young +guests. They were noblemen and gentlewomen of Memphis, freed for an +evening from the restraint of pretentious affairs and spared the +awesome repression of potentates and monitors. + +Hotep was host and these were his guests. + +First, there was Rameses, languid, cynical, sumptuous, and enthroned in +a capacious fauteuil, significantly upholstered in purple and gold. + +Close beside him and similarly enthroned was Ta-user. She wore a +double robe of transparent linen, very fine and clinging in its +texture. The over-dress was simply a white gauze, striped with narrow +lines of green and gold. From the fillet of royalty about her +forehead, an emerald depended between her eyes. Her zone was a broad +braid of golden cords, girdling her beneath the breast, encompassing +her again about the hips, and fastened at last in front by a +diamond-shaped buckle of clustered emeralds. Her sandals were mere +jeweled straps of white gazelle-hide, passing under the heel and ball +of the foot. She was as daringly dressed as a lissome dancing-girl. + +On a taboret at her right was Seti, the little prince. Although he was +nearly sixteen he looked to be of even tenderer years. In him, the +charms of the Egyptian countenance had been so emphasized, and its +defects so reduced, that his boyish beauty was unequaled among his +countrymen. + +At his feet was Io, playing at dice with Ta-meri and Nechutes. Ta-meri +was more than usually brilliant, and Nechutes, flushed with her favor, +was playing splendidly and rejoicing beyond reason over his gains. + +Opposite this group was another, the center of which was Masanath. She +sat in the richest seat in the house of Senci. It was ivory tricked +with gold; but small and young as the fan-bearer's daughter was, there +was none in that assembly who might queen it as royally as she from its +imperial depths. By her side was the boon companion of Rameses. He +was Menes, surnamed "the Bland," captain of the royal guard, a most +amiable soldier and chiefly remarkable because, of all the prince's +world, he was the only one that could tell the truth to Rameses and +tell it without offense. + +On the floor between Masanath and Menes was the son of Amon-meses, the +Prince Siptah. He was a typical Oriental, bronze in hue, lean of +frame, brilliant of eye, white of teeth, intense in temperament and +fierce in his loves and hates. Religion comforted him through his +appetites; in his sight craft was a virtue, intrigue was politics, and +love was a fury. His eyes never left Ta-user for long, and his every +word seemed to be inspired by some overweening emotion. + +Aside from these there were others in the group. Some were sons and +daughters of royalty, cousins of the Pharaoh's sons and of Ta-user and +Siptah; many were children of the king's ministers, and all were noble. + +Senci and Hotep's older sister, the Lady Bettis, a dark-eyed matron of +thirty, presided in duenna-like guardianship over the rout. They sat +in a diphros apart from the young revelers. + +Kenkenes was momently expected. For the past two months he had been +seen every evening wherever there was high-class revel in Memphis. But +he had laughed perfunctorily and lapsed into preoccupation when none +spoke to him, and his song had a sorry note in it, however happy the +theme. But these were things apparent only to those that saw deeper +than the surface. + +"Where is Kenkenes?" Menes demanded. "Hath he forsworn us?" + +"I saw him to-day," Nechutes ventured, without raising his eyes from +the game, "when we were fowling on the Nile below the city. He was +alone, pulling down-stream, just this side of Masaarah." + +Hotep frowned and gave over any hope that Kenkenes would join the +merrymaking that night. But at that moment, Ta-meri, who sat facing +the entrance to the chamber, poised the dice-box in air and drew in a +long breath. The guests followed her eyes. + +Kenkenes stood in the doorway, the curtain thrust aside and above him. +His voluminous festal robes were deeply edged with gold, but his arms, +bare to the shoulder, and his strong brown neck were without their +usual trappings of jewels. The omission seemed intentional, as if the +young man had meant to contrast the ornament of young strength and +grace with the glitter and magnificence of the other guests. He had +succeeded well. + +Perhaps to most of those present, the young man's presence was not +unusual, but Hotep was not blind to a manifest alteration in his +manner. There was cynicism in the corners of his mouth, and a hint of +hurt or temper was evident in the tension of his nostril and the +brilliance of his eyes. Hotep had no need of seers and astrologers, +for his perception served him in all tangible things. He knew +something untoward had set Kenkenes to thinking about himself, and +guessing where the young artist had gone that evening, he surmised +further how he had been received. + +And though he was sorry in his heart for his friend's unhappiness, he +confessed his admiration for Rachel. + +"Late," cried Hotep, rising. + +"Thy pardon, Hotep," Kenkenes replied, advancing into the chamber, "I +had an errand of much importance to Masaarah and it was fruitless. It +shall trouble me no more." + +Hotep lifted his brows, as though he exclaimed to himself, and made no +answer. Kenkenes greeted the guests with a wave of his hand and did +obeisance before Rameses. + +"Thou speakest of Masaarah, my Kenkenes," the crown prince commented +after the salutation, "and it suggests an inquiry I would make of thee. +Dost thou go on as sculptor, or wilt thou follow thy father into the +art of building?" + +"Since the Pharaoh chose for my father, he shall choose for me also." + +"Nay, the Pharaoh did not choose," Rameses objected dryly. "It was I." + +"Of a truth? Then thou shalt choose for me, O my generous Prince." + +"Follow thy father. I would have thee for my murket. Nay, it is ever +so. I mold the Pharaoh and he gets the credit." + +"And thou, the blame, when blame accrues from the molding," Menes put +in very distinctly, though under his breath. + +"But be thou of cheer, O Son of the Sun," Kenkenes added. "When thou +art Pharaoh, thou canst retaliate upon thine own heir, in the same +fashion." + +"Thou givest him tardy comfort, O Son of Mentu," Siptah commented with +an unpleasant laugh. "He will lose all recollection of the grudge, +waiting so long." + +Rameses turned his heavy eyes toward the speaker, but Kenkenes halted +any remark the prince might have made. + +"Nay, let it pass," he said placidly, dropping into a chair. "All this +savors too much of the future and is out of place in the happy +improvidence of the present." + +"Let it all pass?" Ta-user asked. "Nay, I would hold the prince to the +promise he made a moment agone, when the choosing of the new murket +comes round again." + +"Do thou so, for me, then, when that time comes," Kenkenes interrupted. + +Ta-user laughed very softly and delivered the young artist a level look +of understanding from her topaz eyes. "I fear thou art indeed +improvident," she continued, "if thou leavest thy future to others." + +"Then all the world is improvident, since it belongeth to others to +shape every man's future. But Hotep, the lawgiver, denies this thing. +He holds that every man builds for himself." + +"Right, Hotep!" Rameses exclaimed. "It was such belief that made a +world-conqueror of my grandsire." + +"Nay, thy pardon, O my Prince. Hotep's counsel will not always hold," +Kenkenes objected. + +"Give me to know wherein it faileth," the prince demanded. + +"Alas! in a thousand things. In truth a man even draws his breath by +the leave of others." + +"By the puny god, Harpocrates!" the prince cried, scoffing. "That is +the weakest avowal I have heard in a moon!" + +Kenkenes flushed, and Rameses, recovering from his amusement, pressed +his advantage. + +"Let me give thee a bit of counsel from mine own store that thou mayest +look with braver eyes on life. Take the world by the throat and it +will do thy will." + +"Again I dispute thee, O Rameses." + +"Name thy witness," the prince insisted. Kenkenes leaned on his elbow +toward him. + +"Canst thou force a woman to love thee?" he asked simply. + +Ta-user glanced at the prince and the sleepy black eyes of the heir +narrowed. + +"Let us get back to the issue," he said. "We spoke of others shaping +the future of men. You may not force a woman to love you, but no love +or lack of love of a woman should misshape the destiny of any man." + +"That is a matter of difference in temperament, my Prince," Ta-user put +in. + +"It may be, but it is the expression of mine own ideas," he answered +roughly. + +The lashes of the princess were smitten down immediately and Siptah's +canine teeth glittered for a moment, one set upon the other. Kenkenes +patted his sandal impatiently and looked another way. His gaze fell on +Io. She had lost interest in the game. The color had receded from her +cheeks and now and again her lips trembled. Kenkenes looked and saw +that Seti's eyes were adoring Ta-user, who smiled at him. With a +sudden rush of heat through his veins, the young artist turned again to +Io, and watched till he caught her eye. With a look he invited her to +come to him. She laid down the dice, during the momentary abstraction +of her playing-mates, and murmuring that she was tired, came and sat at +the feet of her champion. + +"Wherefore dost thou retreat, Io?" Ta-user asked. "Art vanquished?" + +"At one game, aye!" the girl replied vehemently. + +Kenkenes laid his hand on her head and said to her very softly: + +"If only our pride were spared, sweet Io, defeat were not so hard." + +The girl lifted her face to him with some questioning in her eyes. + +"Knowest thou aught of this game, in truth?" she asked. + +He smiled and evaded. "I have not been fairly taught." + +Ta-meri gathered up the stakes and Nechutes, collecting the dice, went +to find her a seat. But while he was gone, she wandered over to +Kenkenes and leaned on the back of his chair. + +"Let me give thee a truth that seemeth to deny itself in the +expression," Io said, turning so that she faced the young artist. + +"Say on," he replied, bending over her. + +"The more indifferent the teacher in this game of love, the sooner you +learn," said Io. Kenkenes took the tiny hand extended toward him in +emphasis and kissed it. + +"Sorry truth!" he said tenderly. As he leaned back in his chair he +became conscious of Ta-meri's presence and turned his head toward her. +Her face was so near to him that he felt the glow from her warm cheek. +His gaze met hers and, for a moment, dwelt. + +All the attraction of her gorgeous habiliments, her warm assurance and +her inceptive tenderness detached themselves from the general fusion +and became distinct. Her beauty, her fervor, her audacity, were not +unusually pronounced on this occasion, but the spell for Kenkenes was +broken and the inner working's were open to him. Different indeed was +the picture that rose before his mind--a picture of a fair face, +wondrously and spiritually beautiful; of the quick blush and sweet +dignity and unapproachable womanhood. His eyes fell and for a moment +his lids were unsteady, but the color surged back into his cheeks and +his lips tightened. + +He took Io's hands, which were clasped across his knee, and rising, +gave the chair to Ta-meri. He found a taboret for himself, and as he +put it down at her feet, he saw Nechutes fling himself into a chair and +scowl blackly at the nomarch's daughter. Kenkenes sighed and +interested himself in the babble that went on about him. + +The first word he distinguished was the name of Har-hat, pronounced in +clear tones. Menes, who sat next to Kenkenes, put out his foot and +trod on the speaker's toes. The man was Siptah. + +"Choke before thou utterest that name again," the captain said in a +whisper, "else thou wilt have Rameses abusing Har-hat before his +daughter." + +"What matters it to me, his temper or her hurt?" Siptah snarled. + +"Churl!" responded Menes, amiably. + +"What is amiss between the heir and the fan-bearer?" Kenkenes asked. + +"Everything! Rameses fairly suffocates in the presence of the new +adviser. The Pharaoh is sadly torn between the twain. He worships +Rameses and, body of Osiris! how he loves Har-hat! But sometime the +council chamber with the trio therein will fall--the walls outward, the +roof, up--mark me!" + +Again, clear and with offensive emphasis, Siptah's voice was heard +disputing, in the general babble. + +"Magnify the cowardice of the Rebu if you will, but it was Har-hat who +made them afraid," he was saying. + +The slow eyes of Rameses turned in the direction of the tacit +challenge. Menes' black brows knitted at Siptah, but Kenkenes came to +the rescue. A lyre, the inevitable instrument of ancient revels, was +near him and he caught it up, sweeping his fingers strongly across the +strings. + +A momentary silence fell, broken at once by the applause of the +peace-loving, who cried, "Sing for us, Kenkenes!" + +He shook his head, smiling. "I did but test the harmony of the +strings; harmony is grateful to mine ear." + +Menes' lips twitched. "If harmony is here," he said with meaning, "you +will find it in the instrument." + +Again, a voice from the general conversation broke in--this time from +Rameses. + +"Kenkenes hath outlasted an army of other singers. I knew him as such +when mine uncles yet lived and my father was many moves from the +throne. It was while we dwelt unroyally here in Memphis. They made +thee sing in the temple, Kenkenes. Dost thou remember?" + +"Aye," Ta-user took it up. "They made thee sing in the temple and it +went sore against thee, Kenkenes. Most of the upper classes in the +college here were hoarse or treble by turns, and the priests required +thee by force from thy tutors because thou couldst sing. Thou wast a +stubborn lad, as pretty as a mimosa and as surly as a caged lion. I +can see thee now chanting, with a voice like a lark, and frowning like +a very demon from Amenti!" + +The princess laughed musically at her own narration and received the +applause of the others with a serene countenance. She had repaid +Kenkenes for his implied championship of her cause earlier in the +evening. + +"Art still as reluctant, Kenkenes?" the Lady Senci called to him. + +Kenkenes looked at the lyre and did not answer at once. There was no +song in his heart and a moody silence seemed more like to possess his +lips. His audience, too, was not in the temper for song. He took in +the expression of the guests with a single comprehensive glance. +Siptah's hands were clenched and his face was blackened with a frown. +Ta-user's silken brows were lifted, and even the pallid countenance of +the prince was set and his eyes were fixed on nothing. Seti was +entangled by the princess' witchery and he saw no one else. Io, +blanched and miserable, forgotten by Seti, forgot all others. In his +heart Kenkenes knew that Nechutes was unhappy and Hotep and Masanath; +and even if there were those in the banquet-room who had no overweening +sorrow, the evident discontent of the troubled oppressed them. + +Far from finding inspiration for song in the faces of the guests, +Kenkenes felt an impulse to rush out of the atmosphere of unrest and +unhappiness into the solitary night, where no intrusion of another's +sorrow could dispute the great triumph of his own grief. The bitter +soul in him longed to laugh at the idea of singing. + +The hesitation between Senci's invitation and his answer was not +noticeable. He put the instrument out of his reach, tossing it on a +cushion a little distance away. + +"Not so reluctant," he said, turning his face toward the lady, "as +unready. I have exhausted my trove of songs for this self-same +company,--wherefore they will not listen to reiteration, which is ever +insipid." + +Senci wisely accepted his excuse, and pressed him no further. One or +two of the more observant members of the company looked at him, with +comprehension in their eyes. Seldom, indeed, had Kenkenes refused to +sing, and his reluctance corroborated their suspicions that all was not +well with the young artist. + +The irrepressible Menes observed to Io in one of his characteristic +undertones, but so that all the company heard it: "What makes us surly +to-night? Look at Kenkenes; I think he is in love! What aileth thee, +sweet Io? Hast lost much to that gambling pair--Ta-meri and Nechutes? +And behold thy fellows! What a sulky lot! I am the most cheerful +spirit among us." + +"Boast not," she responded; "it is not a virtue in you. You would be +blithe in Amenti, for one can not get mournful music out of a timbrel." + +The soldier's eyes opened, and he caught at her, but she eluded him and +growled prettily under her breath. + +"Come, Bast," he cried, making after her. "Kit, kit, kit!" + +She sprang away with a little shriek and Kenkenes, throwing out his +arm, caught her and drew her close. + +"Menes is malevolent--" he began. + +"Aye, malevolent as Mesu!" she panted. + +"What!" the soldier cried. "Has the Hebrew sorcerer already become a +bugbear to the children?" + +"If he become not a bugbear to all Egypt, we may thank the gods," +Siptah put in. + +Rameses laughed scornfully, but Ta-user and Seti spoke simultaneously: + +"Siptah speaks truly." + +"Yea, Menes," the heir scoffed; "he hath already become a bugbear to +the infants. Hear them confess it?" + +Siptah buried his clenched hand in a cushion on the floor near him. + +"O thou paternal Prince," he said, "repeat us a prayer of exorcism as a +father should, and rid us of our fears." + +"And pursuant of the custom bewailed an hour agone, we shall return +thanks to the Pharaoh, for the things thou dost achieve, O our +Rameses," Menes added. + +"If there are any prayers said," the prince replied, "the Hebrews will +say them. Mine exorcism will be harsher than formulas." + +The rest of the company ceased their undertone and listened. + +"Wilt thou tell us again what thou hast said, O Prince?" Kenkenes asked. + +"Mine exorcism of the Hebrew sorcerer, Mesu, will be harsher than +formulas. I shall not beseech the Israelites and it will avail them +naught to beseech me." + +"Thou art ominous, Light of Egypt," Kenkenes commented quietly. "Wilt +thou open thy heart further and give us thy meaning?" + +"Hast lived out of the world, O Son of Mentu? The exorcism will begin +ere long. In this I give thee the history of Israel for the next few +years and close it. I shall not fall heir to the Hebrews when I come +to wear the crown of Egypt." + +"Are they to be sent forth?" Kenkenes asked in a low tone. + +Rameses laughed shortly. + +"Thou art not versed in the innuendoes of court-talk, my Kenkenes. +Nay, they die in Egypt and fertilize the soil." + +"It will raise a Set-given uproar, Rameses," Menes broke in with meek +conviction; "and as thou hast said--to the king, the credit--to his +advisers, the blame." + +"Nay; the process is longer and more natural," the prince replied +carelessly. "It is but the same method of the mines. Who can call +death by hard labor, murder?" + +The full brutality of the prince's meaning struck home. Kenkenes +gripped the arm of Ta-meri's chair with such power that the sinews +stood up rigid and white above the back of the brown hand. Luckily, +all of the guests were contemplating Rameses with more or less horror. +They did not see the color recede from the young artist's face or his +eyes ignite dangerously. + +Masanath sat up very straight and leveled a pair of eyes shining with +accusation at the prince. + +"Of a truth, was thine the fiat?" she demanded. + +"Even so, thou lovely magistrate," he answered with an amused smile. +"Was it not a masterful one?" + +Hotep delivered her a warning glance, but she did not heed it. Austere +Ma, the Defender of Truth, could have been as easily crushed. + +"Masterful!" she cried. "Nay! Menes, lend me thy word. Of all +Set-given, pitiless, atrocious edicts, that is the cruelest! Shame on +thee!" + +At her first words, Rameses raised himself from his attitude of languor +into an upright and intensely alert position. The company ceased to +breathe, but Kenkenes heaved a soundless sigh of relief. Masanath had +uttered his denunciations for him. + +Meanwhile the prince's eyes began to sparkle, a rich stain grew in his +cheeks and when she made an end he was the picture of animated delight. +For the first time in his life he had been defied and condemned. + +But his gaze did not disturb Masanath. Her eyes dared him to resent +her censure. The prince had no such purpose in mind. + +"O by Besa! here is what I have sought for so long," he exclaimed, at +last. "Hither! thou treasure, thou dear, defiant little shrew! Thou +art more to me than all the wealth of Pithom. Hither, I tell thee!" + +But she did not move. The company was breathing with considerable +relief by this time, but not a few of them were casting furtive glances +at Ta-user. + +"Hither!" Rameses commanded, stamping his foot. "Nay, I had forgot she +defies my power. Behold, then, I come to thee." + +Masanath anticipated his intent, and rising with much dignity, she put +the ivory throne between her and the prince. Cool and self-possessed +she gathered up her lotuses, as fresh after an evening in her hand as +they were when the slaves gathered them from the Nile; found her fan +and made other serene preparations to depart. Rameses, fended from her +by the chair, stood before her and watched with a smile in his eyes. + +Presently he waved his hand to the other guests. + +"Arise; the princess is going," he commanded. + +In the stir and rustle, laughter and talk of the guests, getting up at +the prince's sign--for it was customary to permit the highest of rank +to dismiss a company--Masanath slipped from among them and attempted to +leave unnoticed. But Rameses was before her and had taken possession +of her hand before she could elude him. As Kenkenes passed them on his +way to the door her soft shoulders were squared; she had drawn herself +as far away from the prince as she might and was otherwise evincing her +discomfort extravagantly. + +Before them was Hotep, outwardly undisturbed, smiling and complacent. +At one side was Ta-user, at the other Seti, and Io hung on Hotep's arm. + +The young artist walked past them hurriedly, moved to leave all the +ferment and agitation behind him. If he had thought to forget his +sorrows among the light-hearted revel of those that did not sorrow, he +misdirected his search. + +At the doors the Lady Senci met him and drew him over to the diphros, +now vacated by Bettis. + +And there she took his face between her hands and kissed him. + +"Hail! thou son of the murket!" she said. + +"Having much, I am given more," he responded. "Behold the prodigality +of good fortune. The Hathors exalt me in the world and add thereto a +kiss from the Lady Senci." + +"I was impelled truly," she confessed, "but by thine own face as well +as by the Hathors. Kenkenes, if I did not know thee, I should say thou +wast pretending--thou, to whom pretense is impossible." + +He did not answer, for there was no desire in his heart to tell his +secret; his experience with Hotep had warned him. Yet the unusual +winsomeness of his father's noble love was hard to resist. + +"Thy manner this evening betrays thee as striving to hide one spirit +and show another," she continued, seeing he made no response. + +"Thou hast said," he admitted at last; "and I have not succeeded. That +is a sorry incapacity, for the world has small patience with a man who +can not make his face lie." + +"Bitter! Thou!" she chid. + +"Have I not spoken truly?" he persisted. + +"Aye, but why rebel? No man but hides a secret sorrow, and this would +be a tearful world did every one weep when he felt like it." + +"But I am most overwhelmingly constrained to weep, so I shall stay out +of the world and vex it not." + +She looked at him with startled eyes. + +"Art thou so troubled, then?" she asked in a lowered tone. + +"Doubly troubled--and hopelessly," he replied, his eyes away from her. + +She came nearer and, putting up her hands, laid them on his shoulders. + +"You are so young, Kenkenes---so young, and youth is like to make much +of the little first sorrows. Furthermore, these are troublous days. +Saw you not the temper of the assembly to-night? Egypt is a-quiver +with irritation. Every little ripple in the smooth current of life +seems magnified--each man seeketh provocation to vent his causeless +exasperation. And when such ferment worketh in the gathering of the +young, it is portentous. It bodeth evil! You are but caught in the +fever, my Kenkenes, and your little vexations are inflamed until they +hurt, of a truth. Get to your rest, and to-morrow her smile will be +more propitious." + +Kenkenes looked at the uplifted face and noted the laugh in the eyes. + +"What a tattling face is mine," he said, "Is her name written there +also?" He drew his fingers across his forehead. + +"No need; I have been young and many are the young that have wooed and +wed beneath mine eyes. I know the signs." She nodded sagely and +continued after a little pause: + +"I shall not pry further into your sorrow, Kenkenes; but you are good +and handsome, and winsome, and wealthy, and young, and it is a stony +heart that could hold out long against you. I would wager my mummy +that the maiden is this instant well-nigh ready to cast herself at your +feet, save that your very excellence deters her. Go, now, and let your +dreams be sweeter than these last waking hours have been." + +Again she kissed him and let him go. + +In the corridor without, he received his mantle and kerchief from a +servant and continued toward the outer portals. But before he reached +them, Ta-meri stepped out of a cross-corridor and halted. Never before +did her eyes so shine or her smile so flash within the cloud of gauzes +that mantled and covered her. Kenkenes wondered for a moment if he +must explain the change in his countenance to her also. But the beauty +had herself in mind at that moment. + +"Kenkenes, thou hast given me no opportunity to wish thee well, as the +son of the murket." + +"Ah, but in this nook thy good wishes will be none the less sincere nor +my delight any less apparent." + +"Most heartily I give thee joy!" + +Kenkenes kissed her hand. "And wilt thou say that to Nechutes and put +him in the highest heaven?" + +"Already have I wished him well," she responded, pretending to pout, +"but he repaid me poorly." + +"Nay! What did he?" + +"Begged me to become his wife." + +"And having given him the span, thou didst yield him the cubit also +when he asked it?" he surmised. + +"Nay, not yet. But--shall I?" she lifted her face and looked at him, +smiling and bewitchingly beautiful. Her eyes dared him; her lips +invited him; all her charms rose up and besought him. For a moment, +Kenkenes was startled. If he had believed that Ta-meri loved him +never so slightly, his sensations would have been most distressing. +But he knew and was glad to know that he awakened nothing deeper than a +superficial partiality, which lasted only as long as he was in her +sight to please her eye. In spite of his consternation, he could think +intelligently enough to surmise what had inspired her words. The Lady +Senci had guessed the nature of his trouble; even Menes had hinted a +suspicion of the truth in a bantering way. What would prevent the +beauty from seeing it also and preempting to herself the honors of his +disheartenment? But he was in no mood for a coquettish tilt with her. +His sober face was not more serious than his tone when he made answer: + +"Do not play with him, Ta-meri. He is worthy and loves thee most +tenderly. Thou lovest him. Be kind to thine own heart and put him to +the rack no more. Thou art sure of him and I doubt not it pleases thee +to tantalize thyself a little while; but Nechutes, who must endure the +lover's doubts, is suffering cruelly. Thou art a good child, Ta-meri; +how canst thou hurt him so?" + +He paused, for her eyes, growing remorseful, had wandered away from +him. He knew he had reasoned well. The guests in the banquet-room +began to emerge, talking and laughing. The voice of Nechutes was not +heard among them. Kenkenes glanced toward the group and saw the +cup-bearer a trifle in advance, his sullen face averted. + +"He comes yonder," Kenkenes added in a whisper, "poor, moody boy! Go +back to him and take him all the happiness I would to the gods I knew. +Farewell." + +He pressed her hand and continued toward the door. + +Once again he was hailed, this time by Rameses. He halted, stifling a +groan, and returned to the prince. Nechutes and Ta-meri had +disappeared. + +"One other thing, I would tell thee, Kenkenes," the prince said, "and +then thou mayest go. The Pharaoh heard a song to the sunrise on the +Nile some time ago and I identified the voice for him. He would have +thee sing for him, Kenkenes." + +"The Pharaoh's wish is law," was the slow answer. + +"Oh, it was not a command," Rameses replied affably, for he was still +holding Masanath's hand and therefore in high good humor with himself. +"In truth he said the choice should be thine whether thou wilt or not. +He would not insist that a nobleman become his minstrel. But more of +this later; the gods go with thee." + +Kenkenes bowed and escaped. + +In his room a few moments later, he lighted his lamp of scented oils +and contemplated the comforts about him. His conscience pointed a +condemning finger at him. Here was luxury to the point of uselessness +for himself; across the Nile was the desolate quarry-camp for his love. +In Memphis he had robed himself in fine linen and reveled, had eaten +with princes and slept sumptuously--in his strength and his manhood and +unearned idleness. And she, but a tender girl, had toiled for the +quarry-workers and fasted and now faced death in the hideous +extermination purposed for her race. + +He ground his teeth and prayed for the dawn. + +He forgot that he had come away from the Arabian hills because she +repelled him; he remembered his scruples concerning their social +inequality, only to revile himself; Hotep's caution was more than ever +a waste of words to him. He forgot everything except that he was here +in comfort, she, there in want and in peril, and he had not rescued her. + +He did not sleep. He tossed and counted the hours. + +"Sing for the Pharaoh!" he exclaimed, "aye, I will sing till the throat +of me cracks--not for the reward of his good will alone, but for +Rachel's liberty. That first, and the unraveling of this puzzle +thereafter." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +AT MASAARAH + +Since the day Kenkenes had wounded her hand with the knife, Rachel had +seen him but twice in many weeks. + +One mid-morning, the oxen were unyoked from the water-cart and led +ambling up to the pit where a monolith, too huge to be moved by men +alone, had been taken forth and was to be transferred to the Nile. The +bearers carried water directly from the river during this time, and it +was given Rachel to govern them in the departure from the routine. + +Suddenly she became aware that some one approached through the grain, +and when she raised her head, she looked up into the face of Kenkenes. +It was Kenkenes, indeed, but Kenkenes in robes of rustling linen and +trappings of gold. Never had she seen so stately an Egyptian, nor any +so entitled to the name of nobleman. In quick succession she +experienced the moving sensations of surprise, pride in him, and +depression. The last fell on her with the instant recollection of +duty, when his face bent appealingly over hers. Trembling, she turned +away from him, and when she looked again, he was returning to Memphis. + +Now, her days had ceased to be the dreamy lapses of time in which she +lived and walked. The glamour that had made the quarries sufferable +had passed; all the realization of her enslavement, with the +accompanying shame, came to her, and her hope for Israel was lost in +the destruction of her personal happiness. + +Still, the longing to look on Kenkenes once again made the dawns more +welcome, the days longer and the sunsets more disheartening. Vainly +she summoned pride to her aid; vainly she exhorted herself to +consistency. + +"How long," she would say, "since thou didst reject the good Atsu +because he is an idolater and an Egyptian? How long since thou wast +full of wrath against the chosen people who wedded Egyptians and became +of them? And now, who is it that is full of sighs and strange conduct? +Who is it that hath forgotten the idols and the abominations and the +bondage of her people and mourneth after one of the oppressors? And +how will it be with thee when the chosen people go forth, or the +carving is complete and the Egyptian cometh no more; or how will it be +when he taketh one of the long-eyed maidens of his kind to wife?" + +In the face of all this, her intuition rose up and bore witness that +the Egyptian loved her, and was no less unhappy than she. + +So time came and went and weeks passed and he came not again. Late, +one sunset, while there yet was daylight, she left the camp merely that +she might wander down the valley to the same spot where, at the same +hour, she had met Kenkenes on that last occasion of talk between them. + +Moving slowly down the shadows, she saw a figure approaching. The +stature of the new-comer identified him. The head was up, the step +slow, the bearing expectant. In the one scant lapse between two throbs +of her heart, Rachel knew her lover, remembered all the power of his +attraction, and realized that her joy and love could carry her beyond +her fortitude and resolution. + +Just ahead of her, not farther than three paces, a long fragment of +rock had fallen from above and leaned against the wall. There was an +ample space formed by its slant against the cliff and almost before she +knew it, she had crept into this crevice. Cowering in the dusk, she +clutched at her loud-beating heart and listened intently. + +There was no sound of his steps on the rough roadway of the valley and +though she watched eagerly from her hiding-place, she did not see him +pass. After a long time she emerged. He was gone. + +When she looked in the dust she found that his footprints turned not +far from her hiding-place and led toward the Nile. + +She knew then that he had seen her when she had caught sight of him, +and failing to meet her as he had expected, had guessed she had hidden +from him. + +This was the sunset of the night of the revel at Senci's house. It was +this incident that had made Kenkenes late at the festivities, and +cynical when he came. + +On her way back to the camp Rachel met Atsu, mounted and attended by a +scribe, the taskmaster's secretary. The two officials were on their +way to Memphis to worship in the great temple and to spend a night +among free-born men. Once every month, no oftener, did Atsu return to +his own rank in the city. Recognizing Rachel, he drew up his horse; +the scribe rode on. + +"Hast been in search of the Nile wind, Rachel? The valley holds the +day-heat like an oven," he said. + +"Nay, I did not go so far. The darkness came too quickly." + +"Endure it a while. I shall move the people into the large valley +where they may have the north breeze and the water-smell after sunset, +now that the summer is near. I am glad I met thee. Deborah tells me +the water for the camp-cooking is turbid, and I doubt not the children +draw it from some point below the wharf where the drawing for the +quarry-supply stirs up the ooze. Do thou go with the children in the +morning when they are sent for the camp supply, and get it above the +wharf." + +"I hear," she answered. + +"The gods attend thee," he said, riding away. + +"Be thy visit pleasant," she responded, and turned again up the valley. + +The taskmaster was forgotten at her second step, and her contrition and +humiliation came back with a rush. There was little sleep for her that +night, so heavy was her heart. + +The next morning Rachel obeyed Atsu and followed the children to the +Nile. Crossing the field, absorbed in her trouble, she did not hear +the beat of hoofs or the grind of wheels until she was face to face +with the attendants of a company of charioteers. The troop of +water-carriers had scattered out of the road-way and each little +bronzed Israelite was bending with his right hand upon his left knee in +token of profound respect. Rachel hastily joined them. + +When she looked again the retinue of servants had passed. After them +came a gilded chariot with a sumptuous Egyptian within. By the +annulets over his temples and the fringed ribbons pendent therefrom, +the Israelite knew him to be royal. + +Behind, a second chariot was driven by a single occupant, who wore the +badges of princehood also. + +The third was a chariot of ebony drawn by two prancing coal-black +horses whose leathers and housings shone and jingled. Rachel's eyes +met those of the driver and the life-current froze in her veins. +Har-hat, fan-bearer to the Pharaoh, late governor of Bubastis, drew up +his horses and calmly surveyed her. The action halted the chariots of +a dozen courtiers following him. One by one they came to a stand-still +and each man peered around his predecessor until the fan-bearer became +conscious of the pawing horses behind him. He drove out of line and +alighted. With an apologetic wave of his hand, he motioned the +procession to proceed and busied himself with the harness as if he had +found a breakage. Those that had passed were by this time some +distance ahead and, missing the grind of wheels in their wake, looked +back. The fan-bearer beckoned to one of the attendants who had gone +before, and the man returned. + +Meanwhile the procession moved on and the nobles glanced first at the +fan-bearer, and next, at the Israelite. But Athor in the niche on the +hillside was not more white and stony than its living model in the +valley. There was no retreat. The fan-bearer stood between her and +the Nile, his servant between her and the quarries. She felt the +sickening numbness that stupefies one who realizes a terrible strait, +from which there is neither succor nor escape. + +The procession passed and the servant, halting, bowed to his master. +He was short and fat, thick of neck and long of arm--a most unusual +Egyptian. Har-hat tossed him the reins and, walking around his horses, +approached Rachel. The smallest Hebrew--too small to be awed and yet +old enough to realize that the beloved Rachel was in danger, dropped +the hide he bore, and flinging himself before her, clasped her with his +arms, and turned a defiant face at Har-hat over his shoulder. The +fan-bearer paused. + +"It is the very same," he said laughingly. "The hard life of the +quarries hath not robbed thee in the least of thy radiance. But by the +gambling god, Toth, thou didst take a risk! Dost dream what thou didst +miss through a malevolent caprice of the Hathors? Five months ago I +would have taken thee out of bondage into luxury but for an industrious +taskmaster and the unfortunate interference of a royal message. But +the Seven Sisters repent, and I find thee again." + +Rachel had fixed her eyes upon the white walls of Memphis shining in +the morning sun, and did not seem to hear him. + +"Nay, now, slight me not! It was the fault of the taskmaster and not +mine. I confess the charm of distant Memphis, but it is more glorious +within its walls. I am come to take thee thither. Thank me with but a +look, I pray thee." + +Seeing she did not move nor answer, he tilted his head to one side and +surveyed her with interest. + +"Hath much soft persuasion surfeited thee into deafness?" The color +surged up into Rachel's face. + +"Ha!" he exclaimed, "not so! Perhaps thou art but reluctant, then." +He whirled upon the other children, cowering behind him. + +"Is she wedded?" he demanded. + +Frightened and trembling, they did not answer till he repeated the +question and stamped his foot. Then one of them shook his head. + +"It is well. I need not delay till a slave-husband were disposed of in +the mines. Hither, Unas!" + +The fat servitor came forward. + +"I know this taskmaster not, nor can I coax or press him into giving +her up without the cursed formality of a document of gift from the +Pharaoh. Get thee back to Memphis with this," he drew off a signet +ring and gave it to the servitor, "and to the palace. There have my +scribe draw up a prayer to the Pharaoh, craving for me the mastership +over the Israelite, Rachel,--for household service." The fan-bearer +laughed. "Forget not, this latter phrase, else the Pharaoh might fancy +I would take her to wife. Haste thee! and bring back Nak and Hebset +with thee to row the boat back, and help thee fetch her. She may have +a lover who might make trouble for thee alone. Get thee gone." + +He took the reins from his servitor's hands and turned again toward +Rachel. + +"I go forth to hunt, and there is danger in that pastime. I may not +return. It would be most fitting to bid me a tender farewell, but thou +art cruel. Nevertheless, I shall care for myself most diligently this +day, and return to thee in Memphis by nightfall. Farewell!" He sprang +into his chariot and, urging his horses, pursued the far-away +procession at a gallop. + +Unas was already at the Nile-side, preparing to return to Memphis. To +Rachel it seemed as if she had been set free for a moment, that her +efforts to escape and her inevitable capture might amuse her tormentor. +And after the manner of the miserable captive so beset, she seized upon +the momentary release and sought to fly. The three little Hebrews +clung to her--the one that had answered Har-hat weeping bitterly and +remorsefully. + +"Nay, weep not," she said in a hurried whisper. "It would have ended +just the same. Heard ye not what he said concerning a husband? But +let me go! Let Rachel hide ere the serving men return!" + +She undid their arms and ran back toward the quarries. For a moment +the children hesitated and then they pursued her, crying in an +undertone as they ran. Past the stone-pits, up the winding valley she +fled until she reached the encampment and her own tent. + +The women saw her come and old Deborah, who was preparing vegetables +for the noonday meal, left the fires and hastened to the shelter. +There, Rachel, choking with terror and tears, gave the story of the +morning. + +Deborah made no interruption and after the disjointed and unhappy +recital was complete, she sat for some moments, motionless and silent. +Then she arose and made as if to leave the tent, but Rachel caught at +her hand in affright. + +"Nay, be not so frightened," the old woman said soothingly. "I go to +look for Atsu. He will come in a little while." + +With that, she went forth. After a time--more than two hours, in +truth, but infinitely longer to Rachel, the voice of the taskmaster was +heard without, talking with Deborah. He was permitting no curb to the +expression of his rage. + +"The gods rend his heart to ribbons!" he panted after a tempest of +anathema. "Curse the insatiate brute! Is there not enough of Egypt's +women who are willingly loose that he must destroy the purest spirit on +earth? He shall not have her, if I take his life to save her!" + +After a moment's savage rumination, he broke out again. + +"He has us on the hip! We shall be put to it to hide her away from him +now. Do thou go to her--nay, I will go." + +Rachel heard him enter the tent and walk across the matting on the +floor. She flung her arm over her face and huddled closer to the +linen-covered heap of straw against which she had thrown herself. Even +the eyes of the taskmaster were intolerable, in her shame. Atsu +plunged into the heart of his subject at once. + +"There is no escape in the choosing of the tens, now, Rachel. I have +said that I would not vex thee again with my love. Once I offered thee +marriage as refuge. My love and the shelter of my name are thine to +take or leave. I will urge thee no more." + +He paused for a space and, as she made no answer, he went on as though +she had rejected him explicitly. + +"Then I shall hide thee somewhere in Egypt. The ruse is not secure, +but it may serve." + +She sat up and put the hair back from her face. + +"Thou good Atsu," she said in a voice subdued with much weeping, "Wilt +thou add more to mine already hopeless indebtedness to thee? Art thou +blind to the ill-use thou invitest upon thine own head in thy care for +me? Let me imperil thee no more. Is there no other way?" + +He shook his head. Slowly her face fell, and she sighed for very +heaviness of spirit. Atsu stooped and took her hand. + +"Make ready and let us leave this place," he said kindly, "and thou +canst decide in the securer precincts of Memphis what thou wilt do. +Lose no time." He turned away and, signing to Deborah to follow him, +left the tent. + +Rachel arose and began her preparations to depart. The formidable +blockade in the way to safety seemed to clear and her heart leaped at +the anticipation of freedom or stopped at the suggestion of failure. +She hastened slowly, for her excitement made most of her movements +vain. Her hands trembled and held things insecurely; she forgot the +place of many of her belongings, in that humble, orderly house. +Alternately praying and fearing, she stopped now and then to be sure +that the sounds of the camp were not those of the returning servants. +The simple apparel gathered together, she collected the remaining +mementoes of her family,--saved with so much pain and guarded with such +diligence by old Deborah. These were trinkets of gold and ivory, bits +of frail gauzes in which a wondrous perfume lingered, and a scroll of +sheep-skin bearing the records of the house. And after all these had +been found and gathered together, she furtively put the straw aside and +drew forth the collar of golden rings. + +With the first glint of light on the red metal, the hope and animation +in her heart went out. What of Kenkenes? No thought came to her now, +but the most unhappy. The obligations which she would have gladly laid +on him had fallen to Atsu. She dared not confess to him her love, and +she could not give him gratitude. He had entered her life like a +bewildering radiance, but it was Atsu who had saved her and emancipated +her and would save her again. + +She thrust the collar into her bosom with a sob and went on +mechanically with her preparations. But during one of her movements +the coins clinked musically. She clutched them, and they rang again, +softly. They reproached her, and in that irresistible way,--gently. +They made a sound even as she breathed. As she walked they chafed. +They took weight and crushed her breast. And with every sound from +them, she felt Kenkenes' arm about her, her hand lost in his, the +warmth of his young cheek against hers. Never so long as his gift were +in her possession might she hope to put these memories from her, and +she could not cherish them hopefully now. Desperate grief stirred her +into action. She went quickly to the door of the tent and there met +Deborah. + +"This is not mine," she said, holding up the necklace. "It belongs to +the young nobleman who brought me back to camp that night." + +"Leave it with the tribe and it shall be given him." + +"Nay, he may not return to camp. I know where he comes and I can leave +it there. It is not far--only a little way." + +Deborah stood in her path. + +"Will he be there?" she demanded. + +"Nay, that I can pledge thee." She slipped past her guardian, out of +the tent and sped up the valley, determined that Deborah's prohibition, +however just, should not stay her. + +The old Israelite turned to look after her, and her eyes fell on Atsu, +his face black with rage, his arms folded, talking with a fat, wildly +gesticulating servitor. At that moment the courier caught sight of +Rachel flying up the valley and, flinging a document at Atsu's feet, +started to pursue. Atsu halted him with an iron hand, and Deborah +paused to see no more. With a prayer she ran up the valley the way +Rachel had taken. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN THE DESERT + +In the early morning of the next day after the rout at Senci's, +Kenkenes wandered restlessly about the inner court of his father's +house. He had slept but little the preceding night, and now, dizzy and +irritable, the freshness of the morning did not invigorate him and the +haunting perplexities were with him still. + +There was no need of haste to the Arabian hills and yet he could not +wait patiently in Memphis for an appropriate hour to visit Masaarah. +He paced hither and thither, flung himself on the benches in the shade, +only to rise and resume his uneasy walk. Anubis was omnipresent and +particularly ungovernable. If his young master were in motion he +vibrated and oscillated like a shuttle. If Kenkenes sat, he paced the +tessellated pavement slowly and with a foot-fall lighter than a birds. +The sculptor eyed him understandingly, and finally arose. + +"Come, Anubis! Tit, tit, tit!" he called, backing toward the +work-room. Anubis bounded after him, but as Kenkenes paused just over +the threshold, the ape also halted. His master retreated to the rear +of the room still calling, but to the ape there was something +portentous familiar in this proceeding. It hinted of imprisonment. +Turning as though pursued, he disappeared up an acacia tree from which +he could not be dislodged. With a vexed exclamation, Kenkenes passed +out of the court into the house, slamming the swinging door so sharply +that it sprang open again after him. As the old portress put back the +outer doors leading into the street, that her young master might go +forth, a shadow quick as thought slipped out after him. The old +portress clapped her hands with a shrill command but the shadow was +gone. + +Once more in his work-day dress, his wallet of tools and provisions +across his shoulder, the young sculptor passed toward the Nile, moody +and unhappy but determined. At the river-side he hired the shallow +bari that had given him faithful service for so long, and receiving the +oars from Sepet, the boatman, prepared to push away. At that moment, +Anubis, tremulous but unrepentant, bounded in beside him. + +"Anubis!" Kenkenes exclaimed. "Of a truth I believe thou art possessed +of the arts of magic. Now, if thou art lost in the hills and devoured +by a wolf, upon thine own head be it. Pull in that paw, before thou +becomest a foolish sacrifice to the sacred crocodile. I wonder thy +self-respect does not keep thee from coming when thou art unwelcome." +And subsiding into silence, the sculptor turned toward Masaarah. + +He made a landing below the stone wharf, for there a two-oared bari was +already drawn up, and the tangle of herbage was a safe hiding-place for +his own boat. He looked toward the quarry and hesitated. He had no +heart yet to face her, who had laid his cruelest sorrow on him. He +would continue his work on Athor until he had gathered assurance from +that unforbidding face. + +His light foot made no sound and he entered the niche silently. +Kneeling on the chipped stone at the base of the statue, her face +against the drapings, her arms clasping its knees, was Rachel. In one +hand was the collar of rings. She had not heard the sculptor's +approach. + +For an instant his surprise transfixed him. Had she repented? A great +wave of compassion and tenderness swept over him and he drew her face +away between his palms. With a terrified start, the girl turned a +swift glance upward. When she recognized Kenkenes her tearful face +colored vividly. Her posture was such that she could not rise, and +with infinite gentleness he lifted her to her feet. + +"What is it, Rachel? Art thou in trouble?" + +Joy and maidenly confusion took away her voice. + +"Alas," he went on sadly. "Am I so fallen from thy favor, shut out and +denied thy confidence?" + +"Nay, nay," she protested. "Think not so harshly of me. I am--I +came--" she faltered and paused. He did not help or spare her. He had +come to learn why she had done this thing, why she had said that, and +why she had repulsed him without explanation, when there was +unmistakable preference for him in her unstudied acts. He held his +peace and waited for her to proceed. Meanwhile Rachel suffered +cruelly. She had no thought in her mind concerning her conduct toward +him. It was the shameful event of the morning, which must be told to +explain her presence before Athor, that made her cover her crimson face +at last. Kenkenes silenced the protests of his gallantry, and drawing +her hands away, lifted her face on the tips of his fingers and waited. + +While they stood thus, Deborah, exhausted and praying, staggered into +the inclosure. + +"Rachel!" she panted. "The serving-men--thou art pursued!" The fat +courier, purple of countenance and breathing hard, appeared in the +opening. Rachel shrank against Kenkenes and Deborah dropped on her +knees between the pair and the servitor. + +"Out of the way, hag!" the man puffed. "Let me at yon slave. Out!" +He struck at Deborah with a short mace but Kenkenes caught his arm and +thrust him aside. + +"Go, go back to the camp," he said to the old woman. "No harm shall +befall Rachel." Raising her, he put her behind him, and advanced +toward the courier. + +"Hast thou words with me?" he said coolly. "What wilt thou?" + +"The girl. Give her up!" + +"Nay, but thou art peremptory. What wilt thou with her?" + +"For the harem of the Pharaoh's chief adviser," the man retorted. + +The blood in Kenkenes' veins seemed to become molten; flashes of fierce +light blinded him and his sinews hardened into iron. He bounded +forward and his fingers buried themselves in soft and heated flesh. + +The first glimmer of reason through his murderous insanity was the +consciousness of a rain of blows upon his head and shoulders, and a +blackening face settling back to the earth before him. + +He released his grip on the throat of the strangling servitor and flung +off his other assailants. For a moment, stunned by the hard usage at +the hands of the reinforcing men, he staggered, and seemed about to +succumb. The men pursued him to finish their work, but as he eluded +them, it seemed that a third person--a woman all in white with extended +arms--came into their view. + +Kenkenes saw the foremost, a tall Nubian in a striped tunic, stop in +his tracks, and the second, smaller and lighter but a Nubian also, +following immediately behind, bumped against his fellow. + +Mouths agape, eyes staring, they stood and marveled. The strange +presence, they discovered at once, was neither a human being nor an +apparition. It was stone--a statue. + +"Sacrilege!" the first exploded. "A--a--by Amen, it is the slave +herself!" + +In the little pause, Kenkenes recovered himself, but he knew that he +gave Rachel to her fate, if the pair overcame him. He caught her hand +and with the whispered word, "Run!" fled with her toward the front of +the cliff facing the Nile. It was a desperate chance for escape but he +seized it. + +Immediately they were pursued and at the brink of the hill, overtaken. +The stake was too large for the young artist to risk its loss by +adhering to the unwritten rules of combat. He released Rachel, whirled +about, and as the foremost descended on him, ducked, seized the man +about the middle, and pitched him head-first down into the valley. The +second, the tall Nubian that wore the striped tunic, halted, dismayed, +and Kenkenes, catching Rachel's hand, prepared to descend. But she +checked him with a cry. "Look!" + +His eyes followed her outstretched arm. At regular intervals along the +Nile, the distant figures of men were seen posted. Escape was cut off. +He mounted to the top of the cliff and led Rachel out of view from the +river. The second man retreated, and raged from afar. The sculptor +turned up the shingly slope toward the sun-white ridge of higher hills +inland. Here, he would hide with Rachel, till his strength returned +and the ache left his head clear to plan a safe escape. The Nubian +called on all the gods to annihilate them and started in pursuit. The +sculptor did not pause, and, emboldened by the indifference of the man +he dogged, the pursuer drew near and made menacing demonstrations. +Kenkenes had no desire to be followed. He bade Rachel wait for him and +approached the Nubian. + +"Now," he began coolly, "thou art unwelcome, likewise, insolent. Also +art thou a fool, but it is an arch-idiot indeed that lacketh caution. +This maiden is beloved of all the Israelites. Thou art one man, and +alone. It would not be safe for thee to attempt to take her without +help even across that little space between Masaarah and the Nile. I +should harass thee with others within call. Do thou save thyself and +send the chief adviser after her. I would treat with him also." + +The Nubian backed away and Kenkenes followed him relentlessly until the +man, overcome with trepidation, took to his heels and fled. + +Even then, Kenkenes did not lessen his vigilance. He caught up Anubis, +who had bounded beside him during the entire time, and running back to +Rachel, turned into the limestone wastes. + +Kenkenes had risked his suggestions to the single Nubian, and their +effect upon him gave the young sculptor some hope that the pursuing +force had been limited to these three. Though the men along the Nile +were not within call, they would prevent flight into Memphis, and the +camp of the Israelites, if not similarly picketed, would offer security +only for the moment. Why had not the Hebrews protected her in the +beginning? He would get to a place of perfect safety first and learn +all concerning this matter. + +After an hour's cautious dodging from shelter to shelter, through the +masses of rocks, they toiled up the great ridge of hills deep into the +desert. Rachel would have gone on and on, but Kenkenes drew her into +the shadow of a great rock and stopped to listen. The oppressive +silence was unbroken. Far and near only gray wastes of hills heaved in +heated solitude about them. + +"Sit here in the shadow and rest," he said, turning to the weary girl +beside him. "I shall keep watch." + +He cleared a space for her among the debris at the base of the great +fragment and pressed her down in the place he had made. Next he undid +his belt and fastened Anubis to a boulder, too heavy for the ape to +move. The animal resented the confinement, and Kenkenes, tying him by +force, found in the forepaws the collar of golden rings. With a murmur +of satisfaction, the young man reclaimed the necklace and thrust it +into the bosom of his dress. + +When he arose the day grew dark before him, and he was obliged to +steady himself against the rock till the vertigo passed. His +assailants had hurt him more than he had thought. But he took up his +vigil and maintained it faithfully till all sense of danger had +vanished. + +Rachel, who had been watching his face, touched his hand at last, and +bade him rest. The invitation was welcome and with a sigh he sank down +beside her. + +"Lie down," she said softly. "Thou hast been most cruelly misused. +And all for me!" + +Obediently, he slipped from a sitting to a recumbent posture. She put +out her arm, and supporting him, seemed about to take his head into her +lap. Instead, she slipped the mantle from the strap that bound it +across his shoulders, and rolling it swiftly, made a pillow of it for +his head. + +The wallet that had hung by the same strap over his shoulder, attracted +her attention and she guessed that it had been used as a carrier for +provision. She laid it open and took out the water-bottle. The +pith-stopper had held, during all the violent motion, and the dull +surface of the porous and ever-cooling pottery was cold and wet. + +She put the bottle to his lips and, after he had drunk, bathed his +bruises most tenderly. + +Succumbing to the gentle influence of her fingers, he put up his hands +to take them, but they moved out of his reach in the most natural +manner possible. He could not feel that she had purposely avoided his +touch, but he made no further attempt when the soothing fingers +returned. Finally he raised himself on his elbow and supported his +head in his hand. + +"Now am I new again," he said; "once more ready to help thee. Let us +take counsel together and get into safety and comfort." He paused a +moment till his serious words would not follow with unseeming +promptness upon his light tone. + +"I know thy trouble, Rachel," he began again soberly. "There is no +need that thou shouldst hurt thyself by the telling. But there are +details which would be helpful in aiding thee if I had them in mind. +Thou knowest better than I. Wilt thou aid me?" + +Her golden head drooped till her face was bowed upon her hands. After +a little silence she answered him, her voice low with shame. + +"This man sought to take me before, at Pa-Ramesu, but Atsu learned of +it in time and sent me to Masaarah. This morning I met him again--" +She paused, and Kenkenes aided her. + +"Aye, I can guess--poor affronted child!" + +"Atsu meant to escape with me again, but the servants of the nobleman +came before we could get away." + +Kenkenes knew by her choice of words that she did not know the name of +her persecutor, and he did not tell her what it was. He could not bear +the name of Har-hat on her lips. She went on, after a little silence. + +"I came--" she began, coloring deeply, "to leave thy collar with the +statue--I did not expect to find thee there." + +How little it takes to dispirit a lover! How could he know that any +thought had led her to do that thing save an impulse actuated by +indifference or real dislike? His hope was immediately reduced to the +lowest ebb. The mention of the taskmaster's name brought forward the +probability of a rival. + +"I can take thee back to Atsu," he said slowly. "These menials will +not remain in the hills after sunset, and under cover of night I can +slip thee, by strategy, past any sentries they may have set and get +thee to Atsu. I, by my sacrilege, and he by his insubordination, are +both under ban of the law, but danger with him will be sweeter danger +than peril with me, I doubt not." + +She looked at him, and the hurt that began to show on her face gave +place to puzzlement. + +"Is it not so?" he asked with a bitter smile. "The companionship of +ones beloved works wonders out of heavy straits!" + +"But--. Dost thou--? Atsu is naught to me," she cried, her grave face +brightening. + +The blood surged back to his cheeks and the life into his eyes. He +leaned toward her, ready to ask for more enlightenment concerning her +conduct, when she went on dreamily: "But he is wondrous kind and hath +made the camp bright with his humanity. Israel loveth Atsu." + +Kenkenes turned again to the perplexity in hand. + +"I came this morning to ask thy permission to give thee thy freedom. I +doubt not Israel of Masaarah, hidden in a niche in the hills, does not +dream that it is the plan of the Pharaoh--nay, the heir to the crown of +Egypt by the mouth of the Pharaoh--to exterminate the Hebrews." Rachel +recoiled from him. + +"What sayest thou?" she exclaimed, her voice sharp with terror. + +"Nay, forgive me!" he said penitently. "So intent was I on thy rescue +that I forgot to soften my words. Let it be. It is said; I would it +were not true." + +Her affright was only momentary, for her faith restored her ere his +last words were spoken. + +"It will not come to pass," she declared. "Jehovah will not suffer it. +Thou shalt see--and let the Pharaoh beware!" Her words were vehement +and she offered no argument. She saw no need of it, since her belief, +merely expressed, had the force of fact with her. + +"I am committed to the cause of Israel--that thou knowest, Rachel," +Kenkenes made answer. After another silence he took up the thread of +his talk. + +"If thy danger from this man were set aside I should not return thee to +the camp, even if there were no doom spoken upon Israel. I would have +thee free; I would have thee in luxury, sheltered in my father's +house--I would--" + +"Thou dost paint a picture that mocks me now, O Kenkenes," she broke in +on his growing fervor. "Doubly am I enslaved, and the safety of +Masaarah and Memphis is no more for me." + +"Thou hast said," he answered in a subdued voice. "It was given me +last night to win favor with the Pharaoh for thy sake, but the need of +that favor fell before it was won. But I despair not. What is thy +pleasure, Rachel? Shall I take thee to Atsu, or wilt thou stay with +me?" + +"This nobleman will know of a surety that Atsu is my friend, but he +must guess the other Egyptian who hath helped me. If I go to Atsu I +take certain danger to him; if I stay with thee the peril must wander +ere it overtakes us. But I would not burden either. Is there no other +way?" + +He shook his head. "It lies between me and Atsu to care for you, and +the peril for you and for us is equal. My name is as good as +published, for I am gifted with a length of limb beyond my fellows. I +was found before the statue and they, describing me to the priests, +will prove to the priests, who know my calling, that the son of Mentu +has committed sacrilege. And the priesthood would not wait till dawn +to take me." + +"I will stay with thee, Kenkenes," she said simply. + +He became conscious of the collar on his breast and drew it forth. + +"With this," he began, assuming a lightness, "I fear I gave thee +offense one day and thou hast held it against me. Now let me heal that +wound and sweeten thy regard for me with this same offending trinket. +Wilt thou take it as a peace-offering from my hands and wear it +always?" She bent toward him and, with worshiping hands, he put aside +the loosened braids and clasped the necklace about her throat. + +"There are ten rings," he continued. "Let them be named thus," telling +them off with his fingers, "This first of all--Hope--it shall be thy +stay; this--Faith--it shall comfort thee; this--Good Works--it shall +publish thee; this--Sacrifice--it shall win thee many victories; +this--Chastity--it shall be thy name; the next--Wisdom--it shall guide +thee; after it--Steadfastness--it shall keep thee in all these things; +Truth--it shall brood upon thy lips; Beauty--it shall not perish; this, +the last, is Love, of which there is naught to be said. It speaketh +for itself." + +Their eyes met at his last words and for a moment dwelt. Then Rachel +looked away. + +"Are the fastenings secure?" she asked. + +"Firm as the virtues in a good woman's soul." + +"They will hold. I would not lose one of them." + +A long silence fell. The curious activity of desert-life, interrupted +for the time by the presence of the fugitives, resumed its tenor and +droned on about them. The rasping grasshopper, the darting lizard, the +scorpion creeping among the rocks, a high-flying bird, a small, +skulking, wild beast put sound and movement in the desolation of the +region. The horizon was marked by undulating hills to the west; to the +east, by sharper peaks. The scant growth was blackened or partly +covered with sand, and it fringed the distant uplands like a stubbly +beard. The little ravines were darkened with hot shadows, but the bald +slopes presented areas, shining with infinitesimal particles of quartz +and mica, to a savage sun and an almost unendurable sky. From +somewhere to the barren north the wind came like a breath of flame, +ash-laden and drying. There was nothing of the cool, damp river breeze +in this. They were in the hideous heart of the desert to whom death +was monotony, resisting foreign life, an insult. + +The two in the shortening shadow of the great rock were glad of the +water-bottle. The necessity of comfortable shelter for Rachel began to +appeal urgently to Kenkenes. He put aside his dreams and thought aloud. + +"What cover may I offer thy dear head this night?" he began. "We may +not return to the camp, for there of a surety they lie in wait for us. +Toora is deserted and so tempting a spot for fugitives that it will be +searched immediately. Not a hovel this side of the Nile but will be +visited. I would take thee to my father--" + +"Nay," she said firmly. "I will take affliction to none other. +Already have I undone two of the best of Egypt. I will carry the +distress no further." + +After a silence he began again. + +"How far wilt thou trust in me, Rachel?" + +She raised her face and looked at him with serious eyes. + +"In all things needful which thou wilt require of me." + +"And thou canst sleep this night in an open boat?" + +She nodded. + +"To-morrow, then," he continued, taking her hand, "we shall reach +Nehapehu, where I can hide thee with some of the peasantry on my +father's lands. And there thou canst abide until I go to Tape and +return. + +"Thou must know," he continued, explaining, "the Athor of the hills is +not my first sacrilege. Once I committed a worse. My father was the +royal sculptor to Rameses and is now Meneptah's murket." Rachel +glanced at him shyly and sought to withdraw her hand, for she +recognized the loftiness of the title. But he retained his clasp. "He +is a mighty genius. He planned and executed Ipsambul. For that, which +is the greatest monument to Rameses, the Incomparable Pharaoh loved +him, and while the king lived my father was overwhelmed with his +favors. Nor did the royal sculptor's good fortune wane, as is the +common fate of favorites, for the great king planned that my father's +house should be honored even after his death though the dynasties +change. So Rameses gave him a signet of lapis lazuli, and its +inscription commanded him who sat at any time thereafter on the throne +of Egypt to honor the prayer of its bearer in the unspeakable name of +the Holy One. + +"After the death of Rameses," the narrator went on, "we went to Tape, +my father and I, to inscribe the hatchments and carve the scene of the +Judgment of the Dead in the tomb of the great king. Now, I am my +father's only child and have been taught his craft. I have been an apt +pupil, and he had no fear in trusting me with the execution of the +fresco. I had long been in rebellion, practising in secret my lawless +ideas, and I was seized with an uncontrollable aversion to marring +those holy walls with the conventional ugliness commanded by the +ritual. I assembled my ideas and dared. I worked rapidly and well. +The work was done before my father discovered it." Kenkenes paused and +laughed a little. + +"Suffice it to say the fresco was erased. And the solemnity of the +crypt was hardly restored before my father found that his sacred +signet, which he always wore, was gone. Nay, nay, I might not search +for it more than the fruitless once, for he declared, and of a truth +believed firmly, that the great king had reclaimed his gift. I did not +and never have I believed it. Now I need the signet and I shall go +after it on the strength of that belief. + +"Having found it, I shall appeal to Meneptah for thy liberty and safety +and whatever boon thou wouldst have and for myself. What thinkest +thou? Shall I go on?" + +Rachel smiled and looked up at him gratefully. + +"I will go with thee, Kenkenes," she said. + +Her ready confidence and the easiness of his name on her lips filled +him with joy. "Ah! ye ungentle Hathors!" he mourned to himself, "why +may I not tell her how much I love her?" + +But the white hand which he pressed against his breast asked its +release with gentle reluctance, and he set it free. + +Once again the silence fell and was not frequently broken thereafter. + +There was no invitation in her manner, and he could not speak what he +would. + +The sun dropped behind the Libyan hills and the heights filled with +shadow. At length he said: + +"It is time." + +Lifting her to her feet, the ape attending them, he went toward the +Nile, hand in hand with Rachel, his love all untold. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE TREASURE CAVE + +The sudden night had just fallen, and there was an incomplete moon in +the west. But already the desert was full of feeble shadows and silver +interspaces, and all that tense silence of evening upon unpeopled +localities. + +Kenkenes stood upon the top of a huge monolith, listening. Below, with +only her face in the faint moonlight, was Rachel, looking up to him. +Anubis, oppressed by the voiceless expectancy of the two young people, +crouched at his master's feet. For a while there was only the ringing +turmoil of his own quickened blood in the young man's ears. But +presently, up from the southern slope, rose the sound he had heard some +minutes before--a long, quavering note, ending in a high eery wail. + +Kenkenes was familiar with the screams of wild beasts, and he knew the +irreconcilable differences between them and the human voice. Instantly +he sent back across the hollow a strong reply that the startled echoes +repeated again and again. Almost immediately the first cry was +repeated, but a desperate power had entered into it. Kenkenes dropped +from his point of vantage. + +"Some one calleth, of a surety," he said, "and by the voice, it is a +woman." + +"It is Deborah come up from the camp to seek for me!" Rachel exclaimed. + +"I doubt not. But the gods are surely with her, to fend the beasts +from her in this savage place. It is well we came this way." + +With all the haste possible on the rough slope, they descended. The +ground was familiar to Kenkenes, for the niche was near the foot of the +declivity. + +Half-way down he called again, and the answer came up from the +hiding-place of Athor. In another moment they were within and beside +the prostrate form of the old Israelite. Rachel dropped on her knees, +crying out in her solicitude. Her words were in the soft language of +her own people and unintelligible to Kenkenes, but her voice trembled +with concern. The old woman answered soothingly and at some length. +The narrative was frequently broken by low exclamations from Rachel, +and at its end the girl turned to Kenkenes with a sob of anger. + +"The Lord God break them in pieces and His fury be upon them!" she +cried. "They set upon her and beat her and left her to the jackals!" + +"Set consume them!" Kenkenes responded wrathfully. "How came they upon +you? Did you not return to camp?" + +"Nay, the mother heart in me would not suffer me to desert Rachel. I +stayed without this place, and ye outstripped me when ye fled. After a +time the fat servitor, rousing out of his swoon, came forth from here, +and another, who had been lurking in the rocks, joined him, and the +pair, in searching for you, discovered me and beat me with maces, +leaving me for dead." + +After a grim silence, broken only by the low weeping of Rachel, +Kenkenes bade her continue. + +"The search they made for you was not thorough, for one was ill and +both were afraid. But they came upon the statue again, and the sight +of it mocked them, so they overthrew it and broke it." + +Kenkenes drew a sharp breath and glanced at the place where Athor +should have been. Except for themselves, the niche was evidently +vacant. The old woman continued: + +"Then they descended into the camp of Israel. After a time I heard the +sound of voices as if there were many men in the hills, and the heart +of me was afraid. With much pain and travail I crept into this place, +and here sounds come but faintly. But I heard sufficient to know that +there were many who sought diligently, but whether they were our own +people or the minions of thine enemy, Rachel, I could not with safety +discover." + +"Said they aught concerning their intents--this pair, who set upon +you?" Kenkenes asked. + +"O, aye, they blustered, and if they bring half of their threats to +pass, it will go ill with thee, Egyptian. They will set the priests +upon thee immediately; the hills will be searched; the Nile will be +picketed. It behooves thee to have a care for thyself. As for Rachel, +I know not what will become of her. She is penned out in the desert, +for the camp is to be watched, and they boast that the hunt will end +only with her capture." + +"Let them look to it that it does not end with the choking of the swine +who inspired it! I long to put him beyond the cure of leeches." + +He made no answer to Deborah's words concerning Rachel's plight. +Deborah had disarranged his plans. He could not take the old woman, +grievously wounded, on the long journey to Nehapehu, and, indeed, had +she been well, his small boat might not hold together with a burden of +three for a distance of half a hundred miles. For a moment his +perplexity baffled his ingenuity. + +It occurred to him that he might cross to the Memphian shore and +procure a larger boat; but what would protect his helpless charges +during the hours of absence, or in case he were taken? He realized +that he dare not run a risk; his every movement must be safe and sure. +He could not ask the wounded Israelite to return to the camp now, +seeing that she had suffered mistreatment at the hands of Har-hat's +servants and deserted not. + +"If there were but a grotto in the rocks--a cave or a tomb--" he +stopped and smote his hands together. + +"By Apis! I have it--the Tomb of the Discontented Soul!" + +He turned to the two women, who had talked softly together in Hebrew, +and spoke lightly in his relief. + +"We have shelter for this night--safer than any other place in all +Egypt. Trouble no more concerning that. Let me hide my sacrilege and +rob them of indisputable evidence against me, and then we shall get to +our refuge." + +He lifted Deborah in his arms, and bearing her out into the open, left +her with Rachel. + +Then he reentered the shadowy niche. The night was not too dark to +show the interior. Athor, a torso, broken in twain, headless, armless, +was prostrate. It had been pushed over against the great cube that +sheltered it and the fall against the hard limestone had ruined it. +Kenkenes clenched his hands and choked back the angry tears. To the +artist the destruction partook of the heinousness of murder, of the +pathos of death. He set about concealing the wreck with all speed, for +he wished to be merciful to his eyes. + +He collected the fragmentary members, and carrying them down the slope +a little way, dug a grave for them in the sand. To the trench he +rolled the trunk on the tamarisk cylinders, and buried all that was +left of Athor the Golden. Over the grave he laid a flat stratum of +rock that the wind might not uncover the ruin. + +Returning to the niche, he took up the matting with its weight of +chipped stone, and went down through the dark to the line of rocks +opposite the quarries. There he permitted the rubble to slide with a +mixture of earth, like a natural displacement, into the talus, of a +similar nature, at the base of the cliff. The matting he shook and +laid aside. It would serve for a bed in the tomb that night. + +Then he destroyed the north wall. In the four months of its existence +the sand had banked against it more than half its height. Each stone +removed in the dismantling was carried away to a new place, until the +whole fortification was, as once it had been, scattered up and down the +slope. The light, dry sand he pitched with his wooden shovel against +the great cube until it all lay where the wind would have piled it had +no second wall stood in its way. By dawn the strong breeze from the +north would cover every footprint and shovel-mark to a level once more. +He went again to the line of rocks and threw the shovel with a sure aim +and a strong arm into the quarries across the valley. To-morrow it +would seem that an Israelite had forgotten one of his tools. + +The work was done. + +With an ache in his heart, Kenkenes returned to Deborah and Rachel. + +"The shelter for us is in the cliff to the north, near Toora," he began +immediately. "It is a tomb, but others before us have partaken of the +dead's hospitality." [1] + +"How am I to reach it?" Deborah asked. "Is the place far?" + +"A good hour's journey, but we go by water. Still, we must walk to the +Nile." + +"That I can not do," the old woman declared. + +"Nay, but I can carry you," Kenkenes replied, bending over her. She +shrank away from him. + +"Thou hast forgotten," she protested. + +"Not so," he insisted stoutly. Taking her up, he settled her on one +strong arm against his breast. The free hand he extended to Rachel, +who had taken the matting, and together they went laboriously down the +steep front of the hill. They proceeded cautiously, watching before +and behind them lest they be surprised. + +He had covered his boat well with the tangle of sedge and marsh-vines, +and after a long space of search, he found it. + +Once again he lifted Deborah and laid her in the bottom of the boat. +With its triple burden, the bari sank low in the water, but Kenkenes +wielded the oars carefully. The faint moonlight showed him the way. +Now and then a red glimmer across the grain marked the location of a +farmer's hut, but there was no other sign of life. Even at the +Memphian shore there was little activity. + +When the line of cultivation ended Kenkenes knew he was in the +precincts of the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. He rowed across what +he believed to be one-half of its width and drew into the reeds. The +sound and movement awoke many creatures, which hurried away in the +dark, and something slid off into the river with a splash. The lapping +of the ripples sounded like a drinking beast. Kenkenes put a bold foot +on the soggy sand and stepped out. Rachel followed him with bated +breath. Anubis unceremoniously mounted his shoulder. He dragged the +bari far up on the shore, once more lifted Deborah and started up the +warm sand. + +At the base of the limestone cliff he deposited his burden and brought +together a little heap of dried reeds and flag blades. This he fired +after many failures by striking together his chisel and a stone. +Rachel hid the blaze from the Nile while he made and lighted a torch of +twisted reeds and stamped out the fire. In the feeble moonlight he +discerned a stairway of rough-hewn steps leading into a cavity in the +wall. The southern side of the ascent was sheltered by an outstanding +buttress of rock. + +He put the torch into Rachel's hand, and, taking up Deborah, climbed a +dozen steps to a dark opening half-closed by a fallen door. Pushing +the obstruction aside with his foot, he entered. When they were all +within he closed the entrance and unrolled the reeds. + +There was a helter-skelter of mice past them and a rustle of retiring +insects. The torch blazed brightly and showed him a squat copper lamp +on the floor of the outer chamber. The vessel contained sandy dregs of +oil and a dirty floss of cotton. With an exclamation of surprise +Kenkenes lighted the wick, and after a little sputtering, it burned +smokily. + +"Nay, now, how came a lamp in this tomb?" he asked without expecting an +answer. + +The chamber was low-roofed and small--the whole interior rough with +chisel-marks. To the eyes of the sculptor, accustomed to the gorgeous +frescoes in the tombs of the Memphian necropolis, the walls looked bare +and pitiful. There were several prayers in the ancient hieroglyphics, +but no ancestral records or biographical paintings. Several strips of +linen were scattered over the floor, with the customary litter of dried +leaves, dust, refuse brought by rodents, cobwebs and the cast-off +chrysalides of insects. In one corner was a bronze jar, Kenkenes +examined it and found it contained cocoanut-oil for burning. + +"Of a truth this is intervention of the gods," he commented, a little +dazed, but filling his lamp nevertheless. + +Ahead of him was a black opening leading into the second chamber. He +stooped, and entering, held the lamp above his head. He cried out, and +Rachel came to his side. + +In the center of the room was a stone sarcophagus of the early, broad, +flat-topped pattern. In one corner was a two-seated bari, in another a +mattress of woven reeds. Leaning against the sarcophagus was a wooden +rack containing several earthenware amphorae; on the floor about it was +a touseled litter of waxed outer cerements torn from mummies. All +these things they observed later. Now their wide eyes were fixed on +the top of the coffin. At one time there had been a dozen linen sacks +set there, but the mice and insects had gnawed most of them away. The +bottoms and lower halves yet remained, forming calyxes, out of which +tumbled heaps of gold and silver rings, zones, bracelets, collars and +masks from sarcophagi--all of gold; images of Isis in lapis lazuli and +amethyst; scarabs in garnets and hematite, Khem in obsidian, Bast in +carnelian, Besa in serpentine, signets in jasper, and ropes of diamonds +which had been Babylonian gems of spoil. + +"The plunder of Khafra and Sigur, by my mummy!" Kenkenes ejaculated. + +"Will they return?" Rachel asked, in a voice full of fear. + +"They are gathered to Amenti for their misdeeds many months agone," he +explained. "See how thickly the dust lies here without a print upon +it. They were tomb-robbers. None of the authorities could discover +their hiding-place, and lo! here it is." + +He walked round the sarcophagus and found at the head, on the floor, +several bronze cases sealed with pitch. He opened one of them with +some difficulty. Flat packages wrapped with linen lay within. + +"Dried gazelle-meat,--and I venture there is wine in those amphorae. +They lived here, I am convinced, and fed upon the food offerings they +filched from the tombs. Was there ever such intrepid lawlessness?" + +"Here is a snare and net," Rachel reported. + +"Did they not profit by superstition? As long as they were here they +were safe. They did not fear the spirit." + +"The spirit?" Deborah, still in the outer chamber, repeated with +interest. + +"The spirit of this tomb," Kenkenes explained, returning to her. In a +few words he told her the story as Hotep had told it to him. + +"Canst thou discover the name?" she asked when he had finished. + +"The sarcophagus is plain. There is no inscription within yonder +crypt, for I have this moment looked. But let me examine this writing +here by the door." + +After a while he spoke again. "The name is not given. It says only +this: + + 'The Spouse to Potiphar, + Captain of the Royal Guard to + Apepa, Child of the Sun, + In the Twelfth Year of Whose Luminous Reign + She Died. + Rejected by the Forty-two at On, because of + Unchastity, + She Lies Here, + Until Admitted to the Divine Pardon of Osiris.'" + + +"Aye, I know," Deborah responded. "It is history to the glory of a son +of Abraham. Him, who brought our people here, she would have tempted, +but he would have none of her. Therefore she bore false witness +against him and he was thrust into prison. + +"But the God of Israel does not suffer for ever His chosen to be +unjustly served, and he was finally exalted over Upper and Lower +Mizraim. And honor and long life and a perfumed memory are his, and +she--lo! she hath done one good thing. Her house hath become a shelter +for the oppressed and for that may she find peace at last." + +Kenkenes looked at the old woman with admiring eyes. The quaint speech +of the Hebrews had always fascinated him, but now it had become melody +in his ears. In this, the first moment of mental idleness since +midday, he had time to think on Deborah. He knew that he had seen her +before, and now he remembered that it was she who had transfixed him +with a look on an occasion when Israel had first come to Masaarah. + +But he did not remind her of the incident. Instead, he set about +counteracting any effect that might follow should her memory, unaided, +recall the occurrence. He had put her down on the matting, and the +running spiders and slower insects worried her. + +"A murrain on the bugs," he said. "We shall have a creepy night of it. +Let us bottle this treasure and lay the mattress out of their reach on +the sarcophagus. Endure them a while, Deborah, till we make thee a +refuge." + +He set the lamp in the opening from the outer into the inner crypt and +entered the second chamber. Rachel followed him, and the old Israelite +watched them with brilliant eyes. + +Kenkenes swept the jewels as if they had been almonds into an empty +amphora and returned it to the rack. The mattress he laid upon the +broad top of the sarcophagus. + +"A line of oil run around the coffin will keep the insects away," +Rachel ventured. Kenkenes returned to the outer chamber for the jar of +oil; but Rachel took it from him. + +"Let me be thy handmaid," she said softly. + +He did not protest, and she reentered the crypt. + +"Luckily the mattress is large enough for the two of you," Kenkenes +observed to Deborah, "but it will be hard sleeping." + +"The Hebrews are not spoiled with couches of down," she replied. + +"There are enough of the wrappings in yonder to take off the hardness, +but even with the matting over them they will be gruesome things to +sleep upon. They would bewitch your dreams. But mayhap ye will not +suffer from one night's discomfort." + +"Where go we to-morrow?" + +Kenkenes did not answer immediately. Another plan for Rachel's +security had been growing in his mind, and his heart leaped at the +prospect of its acceptance by her. + +"There is a large boat here, and we might go to On," he began at last. +"There is one way possible to save Rachel from this man as long as I +live, and I would she were to be persuaded into accepting the +conditions." + +"Name them and let me judge." + +He hesitated for proper words and his cheeks flushed. Deborah looked +at him with comprehension in her gaze. + +"Rachel is not blind to my love for her, and thou, too, art discerning. +Yet I would declare myself. I love Rachel, and I would take her to +wife. Then, not even the Pharaoh could take her from me by law." + +Deborah raised herself with difficulty, and after peering into the +inner chamber to see where Rachel was, approached him softly. + +"Thou lovest Rachel. Aye, that is a tale I have heard oftener than I +have fingers to count upon. From the first men of her tribe I have +heard it, from the best of Egypt and the worst. But she kept her heart +and stayed by my side. Now thou comest, young, comely, gifted with +fair speech and full of fervor. Thou lovest as she would be loved, and +her heart goes out to thee, even as thou wouldst have it--in love." + +Kenkenes' face glowed and his fine eyes shone with joy. + +"But mark thou!" she continued passively. "If thou wouldst save her, +think upon some other way, for thou mayest not wed her. Jehovah +planteth the faith of Abraham anew in Israel. In Rachel and in +Rachel's house it died not during the hundred years of the bondage. +Therefore the name is godly. Of her, what would thy heart say? Hath +she not beauty, hath she not wisdom, hath she not great winsomeness? +There is none like her in these days among all the children of Abraham. +To her Israel looketh for example, for, since she compelleth by her +grace, those who behold her will consider whatever she doeth as good. +Great is the reward of him who can direct and directeth aright, but +shall he not appear abominable in the sight of the Lord if he useth his +power to lead astray? Lo! if she wed thee, to her people it will seem +that she would say: 'Behold, this man is fair in my sight, and it is +good for the chosen of the Lord to take the idolater into his bosom.' +There is a multitude in Israel, which, like sheep, follow blindly as +they are led. Great will be the labor to engrave the worship of the +Lord God in their hearts, when all the powers of Israel shall strive to +do that thing for them. How shall there be any success if Moses and +the appointed of the Lord bid them worship, while the husband or wife +that dwelleth in their tent saith 'Worship not'? To these, Rachel's +marriage with thee would be justification and incentive to incline +toward idolaters and idols. Then there are the wise and discerning who +know that Rachel hath turned away from the best among her people. How, +then, shall she be fallen in their sight if she wed with an idolater? + +"She knoweth all these things and she keepeth a firm hold upon herself, +but she hath not said these things to thee lest her strength fail her." + +And thus was the mystery explained to him. + +"Thou bowest down to a beetle," she went on without pausing. "Thou +worshipest a cat; thou offerest up sacrifice to an image and conservest +abominable and heathen rites. Thou art an idolater, and as such thou +art not for Rachel. And yet, this further: if thou canst become a +worshiper of the true God, thou shalt take her. Never have I seen an +Egyptian won over to the faith of Abraham, but there approacheth a time +of wonders and I shall not marvel." + +To Egypt its faith was paramount. Israel in its palmiest days was not +more vigilantly, jealously fanatical than Egypt. Every worshiper was a +zealot; every ecclesiast an inquisitor. Church and State were +inseparably united; law was fused with religion; science and the arts +were governed by hieratic canons. + +The individual ate, slept and labored in the name of the gods, and +national matters proceeded as the Pantheon directed by the +ecclesiastical mouthpiece. + +Life was an ephemeral preface to the interminable and actual existence +of immortality. Temporal things were transient and only of +probationary value. The tomb was the ultimate and hoped-for, infinite +abiding-place. + +To the ideal Osirian his faith was the essential fiber in the fabric of +his existence, to withdraw which meant physical and spiritual +destruction. The forfeiture of his faith for Rachel, therefore, +appealed to Kenkenes as a demand upon his blood for his breath's sake. +His plight was piteous; never were alternatives so apparently +impossible. + +At first there was no coherent thought in the young man's mind. His +consciousness seemed to be full of rebellion, longing and amazement. +Never in his life had he been refused anything he greatly desired, when +he had justice on his side. Now he was rejected, not for a +shortcoming, but, according to his religious lights, for a virtue +instead. His gaze searched the visible portion of the other chamber +and found Rachel. In the half-light he saw that she had cast herself +down against the sarcophagus, face toward the stone, her whole attitude +one of weary depression. + +Piteous as was the sight, there was comfort in it for him. Rachel +loved him so much that she was bowed with the conflict between her love +and her duty. His manhood reasserted itself. Love in youth bears hope +with it in the face of the most hopeless hindrances. With the blood of +the Orient in his veins and the fire of youth to heighten its ardor, he +was not to be wholly and for ever cast down. Furthermore, there was +Rachel to be comforted. + +He turned to Deborah. + +"Let it pass, then. Deny me not the joy of loving her, nor her the +small content of loving me. If there should be change, let it be in +thy prohibitions, not in our love. Enough. Art thou weary? Wouldst +thou sleep?" + +"Nay," she answered bluntly. + +"Then I would take counsel with thee. Thou knowest the end of Israel?" +he asked. + +"I know the purpose of the Pharaoh, but there is no end to Israel." + +"Not yet, perchance," he said calmly, "or never. But we shall not put +trust in auguries. The oppression of the people is already begun at +Pa-Ramesu and the brick-fields. Ye shall not return to those dire +hardships. Ye can not return to Masaarah. In Memphis I offer my +father's house, but Rachel refuses it. In Nehapehu there is safety +among the peasantry on the murket's lands. My father lost an +all-powerful signet in the tomb of the Incomparable Pharaoh at Tape, +and did not search for it because he believed that Rameses had taken it +away from him. The king will honor it and grant whatever petition I +make to him. If ye are unafraid to abide in this tomb for the few +remaining hours of this night I shall take you to Nehapehu at dawn. +There ye can abide till I go to Tape and return. What sayest thou?" + +The old woman looked at him quietly for a moment. + +"Is this place safe?" she asked. + +"The forty-two demons of Amenti could not drive an Egyptian into this +tomb." + +"How comes it that thou art not afraid?" + +"I have no belief in spirits." + +"Nor have we. Why need we go hence? We shall abide here till thou +shalt return." + +"In this place!" Kenkenes exclaimed, recoiling. "Nay! I shall be gone +sixteen days at least." + +"We shall not fear to live in a tomb, we who have defied untombed death +daily. We shall remain here." + +"This hole--this cave of death!" + +"We have shelter, and by thine own words, none will molest us here. We +are not spoiled with soft living, nor would we take peril to any. +Without are fowls, herbs, roots, water--within, security, meat and +wine. We shall not fear the dead whom, living, Joseph rebuked. We +shall be content and well housed." + +"But thou art wounded," he essayed. + +She scouted his words with heroic scorn. "Nay, let us have no more. +If thou canst accomplish this thing for Rachel, do it with a light +heart, for we shall be safe. If thou art successful, Israel will rise +up and call thee blessed; if thou failest, the sons of Abraham will +still remember thee with respect." + +No humility, no cringing gratitude in this. Queen Hatasu, talking with +her favorite general, could not have commended him in a more queenly +way. + +To Kenkenes it seemed that their positions had been reversed. He +craved to serve them and they suffered him. + +"I shall go then to-night," he said simply. + +"Nay, bide with us to-night, for thou art weary. There is no need for +such haste." + +He opened his lips to protest, his objections manifesting themselves in +his manner. But she waved them aside. + +"Thou hast the marks of hard usage upon thee," she said; "thou hast +slaved for us since midday, and now the night is far spent. Thine eyes +are heavy for sleep, thy face is weary. And before thee is a task +which will require thy keenest wit, thy steadiest hand. Thou owest it +to Rachel and to thyself to go forth with the eye of a hawk and the +strength of a young lion." + +Because of Rachel's name in her argument he yielded and turned +immediately to the subject of their lonesome residence in the haunted +tomb. "If aught befall me," he said, "for I am in the unknowable hands +of the Hathors, disguise thyself and Rachel. If thou art skilled in +altering thou canst find pigment among the roots of the Nile. Dye her +hair and stain her face, take the boat and go to my father's house in +Memphis. He is Mentu, the murket to the Pharaoh--a patriot and a +friend to the kings. He knows not the Hebrew, but he is generous, +hospitable and kind to the oppressed of whatever blood. Tell him +Rachel's trouble and of me. I am his only child, and my name on thy +lips will win thee the best of his board, the shelter of his roof, the +protection of his right arm. Wait for me, however, in this place till +a month hath elapsed. + +"Keep the amphorae filled with water, fresh every day, and preserve a +stock of food within the tomb always to stand you in good stead if +Rachel's enemy discover her hiding-place and besiege it." + +His eyes ignited and his face grew white. + +"Starve within this cave," he went on intensely, approaching her, "but +deliver her not into his hands, I charge thee, for the welfare of thy +immortal soul. If thou art beset and there is no escape, before she +shall live for the despoiler--take her life!" + +Deborah scanned him narrowly, and when he made an end she opened her +lips as though to speak. But something deterred her, and she moved +away from him. + +"Come, spread the matting, Rachel," she said. "The master will stay +with us to-night." + +Obediently the girl came, still white of face, but composed. She made +a pallet of one roll of the matting, generously sprinkled the floor +about it with oil to keep away the insects, put the lamp behind the +amphora rack, hung her scarf over the frame that the light might not +shine in her guest's eyes, and set the door a little aside to let the +cool night air enter from the river. Having completed her service, she +bade him a soft good-night and disappeared into the inner crypt, where +Deborah had gone before her. + +Kenkenes immediately flung himself upon the pallet because Rachel's +hands had made it, and in a moment became acutely conscious of all the +ache of body and the pain of soul the day had brought him. The first +deprived him of comfort, the second of his peace, and there was the +smell of dawn on the breeze before he fell asleep. + +After sunset the next day Deborah roused him. He awoke restored in +strength and hungry. The old Israelite had prepared some of the +gazelle-meat for him, and this, with a draft of wine from an amphora, +refreshed him at once. Provisions had been put in his wallet, and a +double handful of golden rings, with several jewels, much treasure in +small bulk, had been wrapped in a strip of linen and was ready for him. +By the time all preparations were complete the night had come. + +He bade Deborah farewell and took Rachel's hand. It was cold and +trembled pitifully. Without a word he pressed it and gave it back. He +had reached the entrance, when it seemed that a suppressed sound smote +on his ears, and he stopped. Deborah, her face grown stern and hard, +had moved a step or two forward and stood regarding Rachel sharply. +Neither saw her. + +"Did you speak, Rachel?" Kenkenes asked. He fancied that her arms had +fallen quickly as he turned. + +"Nay, except to bid thee take care of thyself, Kenkenes," she faltered, +"more for thine own sake than for mine." + +He returned and, on his knee, pressed her hand to his lips. + +"God's face light thee and His peace attend thee," she continued. The +blessing was full of wondrous tenderness and music. He knew how her +face looked above him; how the free hand all but rested on his head, +and for a moment his fortitude seemed about to desert him. But she +whispered: + +"Farewell." + +And he arose and went forth. + + + +[1] The tombs of the Orient in ancient times were common places of +refuge for fugitives, lepers and outcasts. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +ON THE WAY TO THEBES + +The moon was ampler and its light stronger. The Nile was a vast and +faintly silvered expanse, roughened with countless ripples blown +opposite the direction of the current. The north wind had risen and +swept through the crevice between the hills with more than usual +strength, adding its reedy music to the sound of the swiftly flowing +waters. + +After launching his bari, Kenkenes gazed a moment, and then, with a +prayer to Ptah for aid, struck out for the south, rowing with powerful +strokes. + +At the western shore lighted barges swayed at their moorings or +journeyed slowly, but the Nile was wide, and the craft, blinded by +their own brilliance, had no thought of what might be hugging the +Arabian shore. Yet Kenkenes, with the inordinate apprehension of the +fugitive, lurked in the shadows, dashed across open spaces and imagined +in every drifting, drowsy fisher's raft a pursuing party. He prayed +for the well-remembered end of the white dike, where the Nile curved +about the southernmost limits of the capital. The day had not yet +broken when he passed the last flambeau burning at the juncture of the +dike with the city wall. He rowed on steadily for Memphis, and +immediate danger was at last behind him. + +The towers of the city had sunk below the northern horizon when, +opposite a poor little shrine for cowherds on the shore, a brazen gong +sounded musically for the sunrise prayers. The Libyan hilltops were, +at that instant, illuminated by the sun, and Kenkenes, in obedience to +lifelong training, rested his oars and bent his head. When he pulled +on again he did not realize that he had been, with the stubbornness of +habit, maintaining the breach between him and Rachel. There was no +thought in his mind to give over his faith. + +At noon, weary with heat, hunger and heavy labor, he drew up at +Hak-heb, on the western side of the Nile, fifty miles above Memphis. +The town was the commercial center for the pastoral districts of the +posterior Arsinoëite nome--Nehapehu. Here were brought for shipment +the wine, wheat and cattle of the fertile pocket in the Libyan desert. +Being at a season of commercial inactivity, when the farmers were +awaiting the harvest, the sunburnt wharves were almost deserted. + +Few saw Kenkenes arrive. Most of the inhabitants were taking the +midday rest, and every moored boat was manned by a sleeping crew. He +made a landing and went up through the sand and dust of the hot street +to the only inn. Here he ate and slept till night had come again. +Refreshed and invigorated, he continued his journey. At noon the next +day he stopped to sleep at another town and to buy a lamp, materials +for making fire, ropes and a plummet of bronze sufficiently heavy to +anchor his boat. He was entering a long stretch of distance wherein +there was no inhabited town, and he was making ready to sleep in the +bari. Then he began to travel by day, for he was too far from Memphis +to fear pursuit, and rest in an open boat under a blazing sun would be +impossible. + +The third evening he paused opposite a ruined city on the eastern bank +of the Nile. Hunters not infrequently went inland at this point for +large game, and although the place was in a state of partial +demolishment, Kenkenes hoped that there might be an inn. He tied his +boat to a stake and entered Khu-aten,[1] the destroyed capital of +Amenophis IV, self-styled Khu-n-Aten. + +Here under a noble king, who loved beauty and had it not, the barbarous +rites of the Egyptian religion were overthrown and sensuous and +esthetic ceremonies were established and made obligatory all over the +kingdom. In his blind groping after the One God, the king had directed +worship to the most fitting symbol of Him--the sun. + +He appeased the luminous divinity by offerings of flowers, regaled it +with simmerings from censers, besought it with the tremulous harp and +had it pictured with grace and vested with charm. And since the power +of the national faith was all-permeating, its reconstruction was +far-reaching in effect. Egypt was swept into a tremendous and +beautiful heresy by a homely king, whose word was law. + +But at his death the reaction was vast and vindictive. The orthodox +faith reasserted itself with a violence that carried every monument to +the apostasy and the very name of the apostate into dust. Now the +remaining houses of Khu-ayen were the homes of the fishers--its ruins +the habitation of criminals and refugees. + +The hand of the insulted zealot, of the envious successor, of the +invader and conqueror, had done what the reluctant hand of nature might +not have accomplished in a millennium. The ruins showed themselves, +stretching afar toward and across the eastern sky, in ragged and +indefinable lines. The oblique rays of the newly risen moon slanted a +light that was weird and ghostly because it fell across a ruin. +Kenkenes climbed over a chaos of prostrate columns, fallen architraves +and broken colossi, and the sounds of his advance stirred the rat, the +huge spider, the snake and the hiding beast from the dark debris. Here +and there were solitary walls standing out of heaps of wreckage, which +had been palaces, and frequent arid open spaces marked the site of +groves. In complex ramifications throughout the city sandy troughs +were still distinguishable, where canals had been, and in places of +peculiarly complete destruction the strips of uneven pavement showed +the location of temples. + +There was not a house at which Kenkenes dared to ask hospitality. +Those that lived so precariously would have little conscience about +stripping him of his possessions. + +He retraced his steps to the wharves and drew away, prepared to spend +the night in his boat. + +After leaving Khu-aten, the Nile wound through wild country, the hills +approaching its course so closely as to suggest the confines of a +gorge. The narrow strip of level land on the eastern side lay under a +receding shadow cast by the hills, but the river and the western shore +were in the broad brilliance of the moon. The night promised to be one +of exceeding brightness and Kenkenes shared the resulting wakefulness +of the wild life on land. + +The half of his up-journey was done and the conflict of hope and doubt +marshaled feasible argument for and against the success of his mission. +In some manner the destruction of Khu-aten offered, in its example of +Egypt's fury against progress, a parallel to his own straits. + +In his boyhood he had heard the Pharaoh Khu-n-Aten anathematized by the +shaven priests, and in the depths of his heart he had been startled to +find no sympathy for their rage against the artist-king. + +Ritual-bound Egypt had resented liberty of worship--a liberalism that +lacked naught in zeal or piety, but added grace to the Osirian faith. +In his beauty-worship, Kenkenes was not narrow. He would not confine +it to glyptic art, nor indeed to art alone--all the uses of life might +be bettered by it. His appreciation of Khu-n-Aten's ambition had been +passive before, but when his own spirit experienced the same fire and +the same reproach, his sympathy became hearty partizanship. + +His mind wandered back again to the ruin. How fiercely Egypt had +resented the schism of a Pharaoh, a demi-god, the Vicar of Osiris! The +words of Rachel came back to him like an inspiration: + +"Thou hast nation-wide, nation-old, nation-defended prejudice to +overcome, and thou art but one, Kenkenes." + +But one, indeed, and only a nobleman. Could he hope to change Egypt +when a king might not? Behold, how he was suffering for a single and +simple breach of the law. At the thought he paused and asked himself: + +"Am I suffering for the sacrilege?" + +The admission would entail a terrifying complexity. + +If he were suffering punishment for the statue, what punishment had +been his for the sacrilegious execution of the Judgment of the Dead in +the tomb of Rameses II? What, other than the reclamation of the signet +by the Incomparable Pharaoh, even as Mentu had said? If the hypothesis +held, he had committed sacrilege, he had offended the gods, and might +not the accumulated penalty be--O unspeakable--the loss of Rachel? + +On the other hand, if the signet were still in the tomb, Rameses had +not reclaimed it--Rameses had not been offended. The ritual condemned +his act, but if Rameses in the realm of inexorable justice and supernal +wisdom did not, how should he reconcile the threats of the ritual and +the evident passiveness of the royal soul? If he found the signet and +achieved his ends, aside from its civil power over him, what weight +would the canonical thunderings have to his inner heart? + +Once again he paused. The deductions of his free reasoning led him +upon perilous ground. They made innuendoes concerning the stability of +the other articles of hieratical law. He was startled and afraid of +his own arguments. + +"Nay, by the gods," he muttered to himself, "it is not safe to reason +with religion." + +But every stroke of his oar was active persistence in his heresy. + +He believed he should find the signet. + +Thereafter he could turn a deaf ear to any renegade ideas such an event +might suggest. + +It was an unlucky chance that befell the theological institutions of +Egypt as far as this devotee was concerned, that Kenkenes had landed at +the capital of the hated Pharaoh. + +But he shook himself and tried to fix his attention on the night. The +stars were few--the multitude obliterated by the moon, the luminaries +abashed thereby. The light fell through a high haze of dust and was +therefore wondrously refracted and diffused. The hills made high +lifted horizons, undulating toward the east, serrated toward the west. +In the sag between there was no human companionship abroad. + +Throughout great lengths of shore-line the tuneless stridulation of +frogs, the guttural cries of water-birds and the general movement in +the sedge indicated a serene content among small life. But sometimes +he would find silence on one bank for a goodly stretch where there was +neither marsh-chorus nor cadences of insects. The hush would be +profound and an affrighted air of suspense was apparent. And there at +the river-brink the author of this breathless dismay, some lithe +flesh-eater, would stride, shadow-like, through the high reeds to +drink. Now and then the woman-like scream of the wildcat, or the harsh +staccato laugh of the hyena would startle the marshes into silence. +Sometimes retiring shapes would halt and gaze with emberous eyes at the +boat moving in midstream. + +Kenkenes admitted with a grim smile that the great powers of the world +and the wild were against him. But Rachel's face came to him as +comfort--the memory of it when it was tender and yielding--and with a +lover's buoyancy he forgot his sorrows in remembering that she loved +him. He dropped the anchor and, lying down in the bottom of his boat, +dreamed happily into the dawn. + +During the day he landed for supplies at a miserable town of +pottery-makers, leaving his boat at the crazy wharves. + +When he returned the bari was gone. A negro, the only one near the +river who was awake, told him that a dhow, laden with clay, in making a +landing had struck the bari, staved in its side, upset it and sent it +adrift. + +The mischance did not trouble Kenkenes. + +After some effort he aroused a crew of oarsmen, procured a boat, and +continued at once to Thebes. + + + +[1] Khu-aten--Tel-el-Amarna. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE FAN-BEARER'S QUEST + +At sunset on the day after the festivities at the Lady Senci's, Hotep +deserted his palace duties and came to the house of Mentu. He had in +mind to try again to persuade his friend from his folly, for the scribe +was certain that Kenkenes was once more returning to his sacrilege and +the Israelite. + +The old housekeeper informed him that the young master was not at home, +though he was expected even now. + +Hotep waited in the house of his aunt, neighbor to the murket, and +about the middle of the first watch asked again for Kenkenes. + +Nay, the young master had not returned. But would not the noble Hotep +enter and await him? + +The scribe, however, returned to the palace, and put off his visit +until the next day. + +The following noon a page brought him a message from his aunt, the Lady +Senci. It was short and distressed. + +"Kenkenes has not returned, Hotep, and since he is known to have gone +upon the Nile, we fear that disaster has overtaken him. Come and help +the unhappy murket. His household is so dismayed that it is useless. +Come, and come quickly." + +The probability of the young artist's death in the Nile immediately +took second place in the scribe's mind. Kenkenes had displayed to +Hotep the effect of Rameses' savage boast to exterminate the Hebrews. +It was that incident which had convinced the scribe that the Arabian +hills would claim the artist on the morrow. He had not stopped to +surmise the extremes to which Kenkenes would go, but his mysterious +disappearance seemed to suggest that the lover had gone to the +Israelitish camp to remain. + +He made ready and repaired to the house of the murket. Mentu met him +in the chamber of guests. By the dress of the great artist it would +seem that he had returned at that moment from the streets. + +Hotep sat down beside him, and with tact and well-chosen words told his +story and summarized his narration with a mild statement of his +suspicions. + +There was no outbreak on the part of Mentu. But his broad chest heaved +once, as though it had thrown off a great weight. + +"But Kenkenes has been a dutiful son," he said after a silence, "I can +not think he would use me so cruelly--no word of his intent or his +whereabouts." + +The objection was plausible. + +"Then, let us go to Masaarah and discover of a surety," the scribe +suggested. + +When Atsu emerged from the mouth of the little valley into the quarries +some time after the midday meal, he was confronted by the murket and +the royal scribe. Neither of the men was unknown to him. + +Hotep halted him. + +"Was there a guest with the fair-haired Israelite maiden last night?" +the scribe asked. + +Atsu's face, pinched and darker than usual, blazed wrathfully. + +"Have ye also joined yourselves with Har-hat to run that hard-pressed +child to earth?" he exclaimed. "Do ye call yourselves men?" + +"The gods forbid!" Hotep protested. "We do not concern ourselves with +the maiden. It is the man who may be with her that we seek." + +The taskmaster made an angry gesture, and Hotep interrupted again. + +"I do not question her decorum, and the man of whom I speak is of +spotless character. He is lost and we seek him." + +"I can not help you; my wits are taxed in another search." + +Hotep's face showed light at the taskmaster's words. + +"Is she also gone?" he asked mildly. "Then let me give you my word, +that the discovery of one will also find the other." + +Atsu gazed with growing hope at the scribe. + +"How is he favored?" he asked at last. + +"He is tall, half a palm taller than his fellows; comely of +countenance; young; in manner, amiable and courteous--." + +Atsu interrupted him with a wave of his hand. "I saw him once--good +three months agone, but not since." + +The reply baffled Hotep for a moment. He realized that to find +Kenkenes he must begin a search for Rachel. + +"Good Atsu, he whom we seek is a friend to the maiden. He is much +beloved by me--by us. Whomsoever he befriendeth we shall befriend. +Wilt thou tell us when and from whom the maiden fled?" + +Atsu had become willing by this time. This amiable young noble might +be able to lift the suspense that burdened his unhappy heart. + +"Har-hat--Set make a cinder of his heart!--asked her at the hands of +the Pharaoh for his harem--" + +Mentu interrupted him with a growling imprecation and Hotep's fair face +darkened. + +"Yesterday morning he sent three men to me," the taskmaster continued, +"with the document of gift from the Son of Ptah, but she saw them in +time and fled into the desert. At that hour there were only women in +the camp, and the three men made short work of me when I would have +held them till she escaped. In three hours, two of them returned--one, +sick from hard usage, and the third, they said, had been pitched over +the cliff-front into the valley of the Nile. They had not captured her +and they were too much enraged to explain why they had not. During +their absence I emptied the quarries of Israelites and posted them +along the Nile to halt the Egyptians, if they came to the river with +Rachel. But we let them return to Memphis empty-handed, and thereafter +searched the hills till sunset. The maiden's foster-mother, it seems, +fled with her, but neither of them, nor any trace of them, was to be +found." + +"Does it not appear to thee," Hotep asked, after a little silence, +"that the same hand which so forcibly persuaded the Egyptians to +abandon the pursuit may have led the maiden to a place of safety? My +surmises have been right in general, O noble Mentu, but not in detail," +he continued, turning to the murket. "There is, however, the element +of danger now to take the place of the gracelessness we would have laid +to him. Thou knowest Har-hat, my Lord." + +He thanked the dark-faced taskmaster. "Have no concern for the maiden. +She is safe, I doubt not." + +He took Mentu's arm and passing up through the Israelitish camp, +climbed the slope behind it. + +"It is my duty and thine to hide this lovely folly up here, ere these +searching minions of Har-hat or frantic Israelites come upon it." + +The scribe's sense of direction and location was keen. It was one of +the goodly endowments of the savage and the beast which the gods had +added to the powers of this man of splendid intellect. He doubled back +through the great rocks, his steps a little rapid and never hesitating, +as though his destination were in full view. Mentu followed him, +silent and moodily thoughtful. At last Hotep stopped. + +Before them was a narrow aisle leading down from the summit of the +hill. It was hemmed in on each side by tumbled masses of stone. The +aisle terminated at its lower end in a long white drift of sand against +a great cube. Instinct and reason told Hotep that here had been the +hiding-place of Athor, but there was no sign that human foot had ever +entered the spot. After a space of puzzlement, Hotep smiled. + +"He hath made way with the sacrilege himself," he said with relief in +his voice; "I had not credited him with so much foresight. Nay, now, +if the runaway will but come home, we will forgive him." + +Mentu said nothing. Indeed, since Hotep had told him of the recent +doings of Kenkenes, the murket had had little to say. He had felt in +his lifetime most of the sorrows that can overtake a man of his +position and attainments--but he had never known the chagrin of a +wayward child. The fear that he was to know that humiliation, now, +made his heart heavy beyond words. + +As they turned away the sound of voices smote upon their ears. + +"Near this spot, it must be, my Lord," one said. + +"Find the sacrilege, lout. We seek not the neighborhood of it." + +Hotep caught the murket's arm and drew him out of the aisle into hiding +behind another great stone. + +"This is the place; this is the place," the first voice declared, and +his statement was seconded by another and as positive a voice. + +There was the sound of the new-comers emerging into the aisle, and +immediately the first speaker exclaimed in a tone full of astonishment +and disappointment: + +"O, aye; I see!" the master assented with an irritating laugh. + +"Har-hat!" Hotep whispered. + +Another of the party broke in impatiently: "Make an end to this chase. +Saw you any sacrilege, or was it a phantom of your stupid dreams?" + +"Asar-Mut," Mentu said under his breath. + +The first voice and its second protested in chorus. + +"As the gods hear me, I saw it!" the first went on. "It was a statue +most sacrilegiously wrought and the man stood before it. It was +cunningly hidden between two walls, and there is no spot on the desert +that looks so much like the place as this. And yet, no wall--no +statue--no sign of--" + +"How did you find it yesterday?" the fan-bearer asked. + +"We followed the hag, and she, the girl. The pair of them were in +sight of each other, as they ran." + +"How did they find it?" + +"Magic! Magic!" + +"There were three of you and one man overthrew you all?" the high +priest commented suspiciously. + +"Holy Father!" the servant protested wildly, "he was a giant--a monster +for bigness. Besides, there were but two of us, after he had all but +throttled me." + +Har-hat laughed again. "Aye, and after he pitched Nak over the cliff, +there was but one. But tell me this: was he noble or a churl?" + +"He wore the circlet." + +Mentu's long fingers bent as if he longed for a throat between them. + +"The craven invented his giant to salve his valor," the priest said. + +"It may be," the fan-bearer replied musingly, "but thy nephew, holy +Father, is conspicuously tall and well-muscled. Likewise, he is a +sculptor. Furthermore, the two slaves came home badly abused. Unas +has some proof for his tale--" + +"Kenkenes is the soul of fidelity," the high priest retorted warmly. +"He has had unnumbered opportunities to betray the gods and he has ever +been steadfast." + +"Nay, I did not impugn him. The similarity merely appealed to me. Let +us get down into the valley and question that villain Atsu. I would +know what became of the girl." + +"Mine interests are solely with the ecclesiastical features of the +offense, my Lord," Asar-Mut replied. "I would get back to Memphis." + +"Bear us company a little longer, holy Father. The taskmaster may tell +us somewhat of this blaspheming sculptor-giant." + +When the last sound of the departing men died away, Mentu turned across +the hill toward the Nile-front of the cliff. + +"Nay, I will go back to Memphis first," he said grimly. "Mayhap +Kenkenes hath returned. If Asar-Mut should question him, he would not +evade nor equivocate, so I shall send him away that he may not meet his +uncle. I would not have him lie, but he shall not accomplish his own +undoing." + +But days of seeking followed, growing frantic as time went on, and +there was no trace of the lost artist. Even his pet ape did not +return. Asar-Mut questioned Mentu closely concerning the fidelity of +Kenkenes to the faith and the ritual. + +"I ask after his soul," he explained. But he gained no evidence from +Mentu. + +On the fourteenth day after the disappearance of the young sculptor, +Sepet, the boatman that had hired his bari to Kenkenes, found the boat +among the wharf piling. It was overturned, its bottom ripped out, one +side crushed as if a river-horse had played with it. In the small +compartment at the tiller were provisions for a light lunch; a wallet, +empty; a rope and a plummet of bronze used to moor a boat in midstream +while the sportsman fished; the light woolen mantle worn as often for +protection against the sun as against the cold, and other things to +prove that Kenkenes had met with disaster. + +The fate of the young man seemed to be explained. The great house of +Mentu was darkened; the servants went unkempt and the artist wore a +blue scarf knotted about his hips. The high priest dismissed the +subject of the sacrilege from his mind, now that his nephew was dead. +The people of Memphis who knew Kenkenes mourned with Mentu; the +festivities were dull without him, and there were some, like Io and the +Lady Senci, who went into retirement and were not to be comforted. + +But Har-hat presented jeweled housings to Apis for the prospering of +his search after Rachel, and set about assisting the god with all his +might. He sent couriers, armed with a description and warrant for the +arrest of Kenkenes and the Israelite, into all the large cities of +Egypt. He ransacked Pa-Ramesu and the brick-fields, Silsilis, Syene, +where there were quarries, and especially Thebes, which was large and +remote, a tempting place for fugitives. + +When he heard the news of the young sculptor's death, he actually sent +a message of condolence to Mentu, much to the tearful and unspeakable +rage of the heart-broken murket. Yet, with all the limitless resources +placed at the command of a bearer of the king's fan, Har-hat continued +to search for the young artist, until word came to him from Thebes +several days later. + +His next move was to bring to the notice of the Pharaoh that the +taskmaster Atsu was pampering the Israelites of Masaarah and defeating +the ends of the government. Furthermore, the overseer had treated with +contempt the personal commands of the fan-bearer. So Atsu was removed +entirely from over the Hebrews, reduced to the rank of a common +soldier, and returned to the nome from which he came, in the coif and +tunic of a cavalryman. + +Thus it was that Har-hat avenged himself for the loss of Rachel, put +all aid out of her reach, and kept up an unceasing pursuit of her. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +THE TOMB OF THE PHARAOH + +It was far into the tenth night that Kenkenes arrived in Thebes. On +the sixteenth day Rachel would begin to expect him, and he could not +hope to reach Memphis by that time. She should not wait an hour longer +than necessary. He would get the signet that night and return by the +swiftest boat obtainable in Thebes. The dawn should find him on the +way to Memphis. + +He entered the streets of the Libyan suburb of the holy city, and +passed through it to the scattering houses, set outside the +thickly-settled portion, and nearer to the necropolis. At the portals +of the most pretentious of these houses he knocked and was admitted. + +He was met presently in the chamber of guests by an old man, +gray-haired and bent. This was the keeper of the tomb of Rameses the +Great. + +"I am the son of Mentu," he said, "thy friend, and the friend of the +Incomparable Pharaoh. Perchance thou dost remember me." + +"I remember Mentu," the old man replied, after a space that might have +been spent in rumination, or in collecting his faculties to speak. + +"He decorated the tomb of Rameses," the young man continued. + +"Aye, I remember. I watched him often at the work." + +"Thou knowest how the great king loved him." + +The old man bent his head in assent. + +"He was given a signet by Rameses, and on the jewel was testimony of +royal favor which should outlive the Pharaoh and Mentu himself." + +"Even so. A precious talisman, and a rare one." + +"It was lost." + +"Nay! Lost! Alas, that is losing the favor of Osiris. What a +calamity!" The old man shook his head and his gray brows knitted. + +"But the place in which it was lost is small, and I would search for it +again." + +"That is wise. The gods aid them who surrender not." + +By this time the old man's face had become inquiring. + +"There is need for the signet now--" + +"The noble Mentu, in trouble?" the old man queried. + +"The son of the noble Mentu is in trouble--the purity of an innocent +one at stake, and the foiling of a villain to accomplish," Kenkenes +answered earnestly. + +"A sore need. Is it-- Wouldst thou have me aid thee?" + +"Thou hast said. I come to thee to crave thy permission to search +again for the signet." + +"Nay, but I give it freely. Yet I do not understand." + +"The signet was lost in the tomb of the Incomparable Pharaoh. May I +not visit the crypt?" + +The old man thought a moment. "Aye, thou canst search. If thou wilt +come for me to-morrow--" + +"Nay, I would go this very night." + +The keeper's face sobered and he shook his head. + +"Deny me not, I pray thee," Kenkenes entreated earnestly. "Thou, who +hast lived so many years, hast at some time weighed the value of a +single moment. In the waste or use of the scant space between two +breaths have lives been lost, souls smirched, the unlimited history of +the future turned. And never was a greater stake upon the saving of +time than in this strait--which is the peril of spotless womanhood." + +The old man rubbed his head. "Aye, I know, I know. Thy haste is +justifiable, but--" + +"I can go alone. There is no need that thou shouldst waste an hour of +thy needed sleep for me. I pledge thee I shall conduct myself without +thee as I should beneath thine eye. Most reverently will I enter, most +reverently search, most reverently depart, and none need ever know I +went alone." + +The ancient keeper weakened at the earnestness of the young man. + +"And thou wilt permit no eye to see thee enter or come forth from the +valley?" + +"Most cautious will I be--most secret and discreet." + +"Canst thou open the gates?" + +"I have not forgotten from the daily practice that was mine for many +weeks." + +"Then go, and let no man know of this. Amen give thee success." + +Kenkenes thanked him gratefully and went at once. + +The moon was in its third quarter, but it was near midnight and the +valley of the Nile between the distant highlands to the east and west +was in soft light. On the eastern side of the river there was only a +feeble glimmer from a window where some chanting leech stood by a +bedside, or where a feast was still on. But under the luster of the +waning moon Thebes lost its outlines and became a city of marbles and +shadows and undefined limits. + +On the western side the vision was interrupted by a lofty, +sharp-toothed range, tipped with a few scattered stars of the first +magnitude. In the plain at its base were the palaces of Amenophis III, +of Rameses II, and their temples, the temples of the Tothmes, and far +to the south the majestic colossi of Amenophis III towered up through +the silver light, the faces, in their own shadow, turned in eternal +contemplation of the sunrise. Grouped about the great edifices were +the booths of funeral stuffs and the stalls of caterers to the populace +of the Libyan suburb of Thebes. But these were hidden in the dark +shadows which the great structures threw. The moon blotted out the +profane things of the holy city and discovered only its splendors to +the sky. + +At the northwest limits of the suburb, the hills approached the Nile, +leaving only a narrow strip a few hundred yards wide between their +fronts and the water. Here the steep ramparts were divided by a +tortuous cleft, which wound back with many cross-fissures deep into the +desert. The ravine was simply a chasm, with perpendicular sides of +naked rock. + +At its upper end, it was blocked by a wall of unscalable heights. +Nowhere in its length was it wider than a hundred yards, and across the +mouth a gateway wide enough for three chariots abreast had been built +of red granite. + +This was the valley of the Tombs of the Kings. + +In chambers hewn in solid rock, the monarchs of the eighteenth and +nineteenth dynasties were entombed. All along the walls of the gorge, +nature had secured the sacred resting-place of the sovereigns against +trespass from the end and sides of the chasm, and Egypt had dutifully +strengthened the one weak point in the fortification--the entrance--by +the gateway of granite. But there was no vigilance of guards. +Whosoever knew how to open the gates might enter the valley. The +secret of the bolts was known only among the members of the royal +family and the court. To Kenkenes, whose craft as a sculptor had +taught him the intricate devices used in closing tombs, the opening of +these gates was simple. Even the mighty portals of Khufu and Menka-ra +would yield responsive to his intelligent touch. + +He let himself into the valley and, closing the valves behind him, went +up the tortuous gorge, darkened by the shadows of its walls. He +continued past the mouth of the valley's southern arm wherein were +entombed the kings of the eighteenth dynasty. Here, in this open +space, he could see the circling bats, which before he could only hear +above his head. Somewhere among the rocks up the moonlit hollow an owl +hooted. But the tombs he sought were in the upper end of the main +ravine. + +Here lay Rameses I, the founder of that illustrious dynasty--the +nineteenth. Near-by was his son, Seti I, and next to him the splendid +tyrant, Rameses the Great, the Incomparable Pharaoh. + +By the time Kenkenes had reached the spot, all lightness in his heart +had gone out like the extinguishing of a candle, and the weight of +suspense, the fear of failure, fell on him as suddenly. He approached +the elaborate facade of the solemn portals, climbed the pairs of steps, +and paused at each of the many landings with a prayer for the success +of his mission, not for the repose of the royal soul, after the custom +of other visitors. With trembling hands he pushed the doors, rough +with inscriptions, and the great stone valves swung ponderously inward, +the bronze pins making no sound as they turned in the sockets. +Kenkenes entered and closed the portals behind him. + +Instantly all sound of the outside world was cut off--the sound of the +wind, the chafing of the sands on the hills above, the movement and +cries of night-birds, beasts and insects. Absolute stillness and +original night surrounded him. + +With all speed he lighted his lamp, but the flaring name illuminated +only a little space in the brooding, hovering blackness about him. + +The atmosphere was stagnant and heavily burdened with old aromatic +scent, and the silence seemed to have accumulated in the years. Even +the soft whetting of his sandal, as he walked, made echoes that shouted +at him. The little blaze fizzed and sputtered noisily and each throb +of his heart sounded like a knock on the portal. + +He did not pause. The darkness might cloud and tinge and swallow up +his light as turbid water absorbs the clear; the silence might resent +the violation. This was the habitation of a royal soul in perpetual +vigil over its corpse and vested with all the powers and austere +propensities of a thing supernatural. But not once did the impulse +come to him to fly. Rachel's face attended him like a lamp. + +He moved forward, his path only discovered to him step by step as the +light advanced, the sumptuous frescoes done by the hand of his father +emerging, one detail at a time. The solemn figures fixed accusing eyes +upon him from every frieze; the passive countenance of the monarch +himself confronted him from every wall. One wondrous chamber after +another he traversed, for the tomb penetrated the very core of the +mountain. + +The innermost crypt contained the altars. This was the sanctuary, the +holy of holies, never entered except by a hierarch. + +When Kenkenes reached the final threshold he paused. Thus far, his +presence had been merely a midnight intrusion. If he entered the +sanctuary his coming would be violation. He thought of the distress of +Rachel and dared. + +The first alabaster altar glistened suddenly out of the night like a +bank of snow. Kenkenes' sandal grated on the sandy dust that lay thick +on the floor. Not even the keeper had entered this crypt to remove the +accumulated dust of six years. + +Under this floor of solid granite was the pit containing the sarcophagi +of the dead monarch, of his favorite son and destined heir, Shaemus, +and his well-beloved queen, Neferari Thermuthis. The opening into the +pit had been sealed when Rameses had descended to emerge no more. The +chamber over it was brilliant with frescoing and covered with +inscriptions. There were three magnificent altars of alabaster and +over each was an oval containing the name of one of the three sleepers +in the pit below. + +In this chapel the signet had been lost. + +Kenkenes set his light on the floor and began his search. The first +time he searched the floor, he laid the lack of success to his excited +work. The second time, the perspiration began to trickle down his +temples. Thereafter he sought, lengthwise and crosswise, calling on +the gods for aid, but there was no glint of the jewel. + +At last, sick with despair, he sat down to collect himself. Suddenly +across the heavy silence there smote a sound. In a place closer to the +beating heart of the world, the movement might have escaped him. Now, +though it was but the rustle of sweeping robes, it seemed to sough like +the wind among the clashing blades of palm-leaves. + +For a moment Kenkenes sat, transfixed, and in that moment the sound +came nearer. He remembered the injunction of the old keeper. Human or +supernatural, the new-comer must not find him there. He leaped behind +the altar of Shaemus, extinguishing the light as he did so. He flung +the corner of his kamis over the reeking wick that the odor might not +escape, but his fear in that direction was materially lessened when he +saw that the stranger bore a fuming torch. + +On one end of the short pole of the torch was a knot of flaming pitch, +on the other was a bronze ring fitted with sprawling claws. The +stranger set the light on the floor and the device kept the torch +upright. He crossed the room and stood at the altar of Neferari +Thermuthis. + +By the deeply fringed and voluminous draperies, and by the venerable +beard, rippling and streaked with gray, the young sculptor took the +stranger to be an Israelite. As Kenkenes looked upon him, he was +minded of his father, the magnificent Mentu. There was the bearing of +the courtier, with the same wondrous stature, the same massive frame. +But the delicate features of the Egyptian, the long, slim fingers, the +narrow foot, were absent. In this man's countenance there was majesty +instead of grace; in his figure, might, instead of elegance. The +expression had need of only a little emphasis in either direction to +become benign or terrible. Kenkenes caught a single glance of the eyes +under the gray shelter of the heavy brows. Once, the young man had +seen hanging from Meneptah's neck the rarest jewel in the royal +treasure. The wise men had called it an opal. It shot lights as +beautiful and awful as the intensest flame. And something in the eyes +of this mighty man brought back to Kenkenes the memory of the fires of +that wondrous gem. + +The stranger stood in profound meditation, his splendid head gradually +sinking until it rested on his breast. The arms hung by the sides. +The attitude suggested a sorrow healed by the long years until it was +no more a pain, but a memory so subduing that it depressed. At last +the great man sank to his knees, with a movement quite in keeping with +his grandeur and his mood, and bowed his head on his arms. + +Pressed down with awe, Kenkenes followed his example, and although he +seemed to kneel on some rough chisel mark in the floor, he did not +shift his position. The discomfort seemed appropriate as penitence on +that holy occasion. + +After a long time the stranger arose, took up the torch and quitted the +chamber. He went away more slowly than he had come, with reluctant +step and averted face. + +When night and profound silence were restored in the crypt, Kenkenes +regained his feet and, examining the irritated knee, found the +offending object clinging to the impression it had made in the flesh. +The shape of the trifle sent a wild hope through his brain. Groping +through the dark, he found his lamp and lighted it with trembling hands. + +He held the lapis-lazuli signet! + +He did not move. He only grasped the scarab tightly and panted. The +sudden change from intense suspense to intense relief had deprived him +of the power of expression. Only his physical make-up manifested its +rebellion against the shock. + +As the tumult in his heart subsided, his mind began to confront him +with happy fancies. Rachel was already free. In that moment of +exuberance he thrust aside, as monstrous, the bar of different faith. +He believed he could overcome it by the very compelling power of his +love and the righteousness of his cause. He spent no time picturing +the method of his triumph over it. Beyond that obstacle were tender +pictures of home-making, love and life, which so filled him with +emotion that, in a sudden ebullition of boyish gratitude, he pressed +the all-potent signet to his lips. + +Then, his cheeks reddening with a little shame at his impulsiveness, he +examined the scarab. The cord by which it had been suspended passed +through a small gold ring between the claws of the beetle. This had +worn very thin and some slight wrench had broken it. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed aloud. "It is even as I had thought. But let me +not seem to boast when I tell my father of it. It will be victory +enough for me to display the jewel, and abashment enough for him to +know he was wrong." + +He ceased to speak, but the echoes talked on after him. He shivered, +caught up his light and raced through the sumptuous tomb into the world +again. + +It was near dawn and the skies were pallid. He was hungry and weary +but most impatient to be gone. He would repair to Thebes and break his +fast. Thereafter he would procure the swiftest boat on the Nile and +take his rest while speeding toward Memphis. + +The inn of the necropolis was like an immense dwelling, except that the +courts were stable-yards. The doors, opening off the porch, were +always open and a light burned by night within the chamber. So long +and so murkily had it burnt, that the chamber Kenkenes entered was +smoky and redolent of it. Aside from a high, bench-like table, running +half the length of the rear wall, there was nothing else in the room. +Kenkenes rapped on the table. In a little time an Egyptian emerged +from under the counter, on the other side. Understanding at last that +the guest wished to be fed, he staggered sleepily through a door and, +presently reappearing, signed Kenkenes to enter. + +The room into which the young sculptor was conducted was too large to +be lighted by the two lamps, hung from hooks, one at each end of the +chamber. Down either side, hidden in the shadows, were long benches, +and from the huddled heap that occupied the full length of each, it was +to be surmised that men were sleeping on them. Above them the slatted +blinds had been withdrawn from the small windows and the morning breeze +was blowing strongly through the chamber. At the upper end was another +table, similar to the one in the outer room, except for a napkin in the +middle with a bottle of water set upon it. An Egyptian woman stood +beside this table and gave the young man a wooden stool. + +As Kenkenes walked toward the seat a stronger blast of wind puffed out +the light above his head. The woman climbed up to take the lamp down +and set it on the table while she relighted it. The skirt of her dress +caught on the top of the stool she had mounted and pulled it over on +the wooden floor with a sharp sound. + +One of the sleepers stirred at the noise and turned over. Presently he +sat up. + +Kenkenes righted the stool and sat down on it, the light shining in his +face. He saw the guest in the shadow shake off the light covering and +walk swiftly through the door into the outer chamber. + +Meanwhile the silent woman served her guest with cold baked water-fowl, +endives, cucumbers, wheat bread and grapes, and a weak white wine. +Kenkenes ate deliberately, and consumed all that was set before him. +When he had made an end, he paid his reckoning to the woman and +returned into the outer chamber. + +At the doors, he was confronted by four members of the city +constabulary and a Nubian in a striped tunic. + +"Seize him!" the Nubian cried. Instantly the four men flung themselves +upon Kenkenes and pinioned his arms. + +"Nay, by the gods," he exclaimed angrily. "What mean you?" + +"Parley not with him," the Nubian said in excitement. "Get him in +bonds stronger than the grip of hands. He is muscled like a bull." + +The young sculptor looked at the Nubian. He had seen him before--had +had unpleasant dealings with him. And then he remembered, so suddenly +and so fiercely that his captors felt the sinews creep in his arms. + +"Set spare thee and thine infamous master to me!" he exclaimed +violently. + +The Nubian retreated a little, for Kenkenes had strained toward him. + +"Get him into the four walls of a cell," the Nubian urged the guards. +"I may not lose him again, as I value my head." + +The guards started out of the doors and Kenkenes went with them, +unresisting, but not passively. All the thoughts were his that can +come to a man, on whose freedom depend another's life and happiness. +Added to these was an all-consuming hate of her enemy and his, new-fed +by this latest offense from Har-hat. With difficulty he kept the +tumult of his emotions from manifesting themselves to his captors. +They feared that his calm was ominous, and held him tightly. + +The necropolis was not astir and the streets were wind-haunted. The +tread of the six men set dogs to barking, and only now and then was a +face shown at the doorways. For this Kenkenes thanked his gods, for he +was proud, and the eye of the humblest slave upon him in his +humiliating plight would have hurt him more keenly than blows. + +The prison was a square building of rough stone, flat-roofed, three +stories in height. The red walls were broken at regular intervals by +crevices, barred with bronze. There was but one entrance. + +Herein were confined all the malefactors of the great city of the gods, +and since the population of Thebes might have comprised something over +half a million inhabitants, the dwellers of that grim and impregnable +prison were not few in number. + +Kenkenes was led through the doors, down a low-roofed, narrow, +stone-walled corridor to the room of the governor of police. + +This was a hall, with a lofty ceiling, highly colored and supported by +loteform pillars of brilliant stone. Toth, the ibis-headed, and the +Goddess Ma, crowned with plumes, her wings forward drooping, were +painted on the walls. A long table, massive, plain and solid like a +sarcophagus, stood in the center of the room. A confused litter of +curled sheets of papyrus, and long strips of unrolled linen scrolls +were distributed carelessly over the polished surface. At one side +were eight plates of stone--the tables of law, codified and blessed by +Toth. + +The governor of police was absent, but his vice, who was jailer and +scribe in one, sat in a chair behind the great table. + +When the party entered, he sat up, undid a new scroll, wetted the reed +pen in the pigment, and was ready. + +"Name?" he began, preparing to write. + +"That, thou knowest," Kenkenes retorted. The Nubian bowed respectfully +and approaching, whispered to the scribe. The official ran over some +of the scrolls and having found the one he sought, proceeded to make +his entries from the information contained therein. + +When the man had finished Kenkenes nodded toward the eight volumes of +the law. + +"If thou art as acquainted with the laws of Egypt as thine office +requires, thou knowest that no free-born Egyptian may be kept ignorant +of the charge that accomplished his arrest. Wherefore am I taken?" + +"For sacrilege and slave-stealing," the scribe replied calmly. + +"At the complaint of Har-hat, bearer of the king's fan," Kenkenes added. + +"Until such time as stronger proof of thy misdeeds may be brought +against thee," the scribe continued. + +"Even so. In plainer words, I shall be held till I confess what he +would have me tell, or until I decay in this tomb. Let me give thee my +word, I shall do neither. Unhand me. I shall not attempt to escape." + +At a sign from the scribe the four men released him and took up a +position at the doors. Kenkenes opened his wallet and displayed the +signet. The scribe took it and read the inscription. There was no +doubting the young man's right to the jewel for here was the name of +Mentu, even as the chief adviser had given it in identifying the +prisoner. The official frowned and stroked his chin. + +"This petitions the Pharaoh," he said at last. "I can not pass upon +it." + +"Send me to my cell, then, and do thou follow," Kenkenes said. "I have +somewhat to tell thee." + +"Take him to his cell," the official said to the men as he returned the +signet to the prisoner. "I shall attend him." + +Kenkenes was led into a corridor, wide enough for three walking side by +side. There was no light therein, but the foremost of the four stooped +before what seemed a section of solid wall and after a little fumbling, +a massive door swung inward. + +The chamber into which it led was wide enough for a pallet of straw +laid lengthwise, with passage room between it and the opposite wall. +The foot of the bed was within two feet of the door. Between the +stones, in the opposite end near the ceiling, was a crevice, little +wider than two palms. This noted, the interior of the cell has been +described. + +The jailer entered after him, and let the door fall shut. + +"I have but to crave a messenger of thee--a swift and a sure one--one +who can hold his peace and hath pride in his calling. I can offer all +he demands. And this, further. Keep his going a secret, for I am +beset and I would not have my rescue by the Pharaoh thwarted." + +"I can send thee a messenger," the jailer answered. + +"Ere midday," Kenkenes added. + +"I hear," the passive official assented. + +The solid section of wall swung shut behind him and the great bolts +shot into place. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +THE PETITION + +Some time later the bar rattled down again, and the jailer stood +without, a scribe at his side. At a sign from the jailer, the latter +made as though to enter, but Kenkenes stopped him. + +"I have need of your materials only," he said, "but the fee shall be +yours nevertheless." The man set his case on the floor and Kenkenes +put a ring of silver in the outstretched palm. + +"Fail me not in a faithful messenger," the prisoner repeated to the +jailer. The official nodded, and the door was closed again. + +Kenkenes sat on the floor beside the case, laid the cover back and +taking out materials, wrote thus: + +"To my friend, the noble Hotep, greeting: + +"This from Kenkenes, whom ill-fortune can not wholly possess, while he +may call thee his friend. + +"I speak to thee out of the prison at Tape, where I am held for +stealing a bondmaiden and for executing a statue against the canons of +the sculptor's ritual. The accumulated penalty for these offenses is +great--my plight is most serious. + +"The pitying gods have left me one chance for escape. If I fail I +shall molder here, for my counsel is mine and the demons of Amenti +shall not rend it from me. + +"The tale is short and miserable. But for the necessity I would not +repeat it, for it publishes the humiliation of sweet innocence. + +"Suffice it to say that the offended is she of whom we talked one day +on the hill back of Masaarah; the offender is Har-hat who hath buried +me here in Tape. + +"One morning he saw her at the quarries and, taken with her beauty, +asked her at the hands of the Pharaoh, for the hatefullest bondage pure +maidenhood ever knew. + +"She fled from the minions he sent to take her, and came to me in that +spot on the hillside where thou and I did talk. + +"There the minions found us, and by the evidence they looked upon, I am +further charged with sacrilege. + +"Thou dost remember the all-powerful signet, which my father had from +the Incomparable Pharaoh. He lost it in the tomb of the king, three +years ago, abandoning the search for it before I was assured that it +was not to be found. + +"So strong was my faith that the signet was in the tomb, that when this +disaster overtook her, I came to Tape at once to look again for the +treasure. I found it. + +"But by some unknowable mischance mine enemy discovered my whereabouts +and a third minion, who escaped my wrath before the statue that +morning, appeared in the city and caused me to be delivered up to the +authorities on the charges already named. + +"She is hidden, and I have provided for her protection, as well as I +may, against the wishes of the strongest man in the land. For her +immediate welfare I am not greatly troubled. But, alas! I would be +with her--thou knowest, O my Hotep, the hunger and heartache of such +separation. + +"If the Pharaoh honor not the signet herein inclosed, tell my father of +my plight, let me know the decision of the king, and then I shall trust +to the Hathors for liberty. + +"Of this contingency, I would not speak at length. It may be tempting +the caprice of the Seven Sisters to presuppose such misfortune. + +"Let not my father intervene for me. He shall not endanger himself +further than I have already asked of him. + +"But remember thou this injunction, most surely. That it shall be last +and therefore freshest in thy memory, I put this at the end of the +letter. + +"Put the petition herein inclosed into the Pharaoh's hands! For my +life's sake let it not come into the possession of any other. + +"I shall write no more. My scant eloquence must be saved for the king. + +"Gods! but it is good to have faith in a friend. I salute thee. + +"KENKENES." + + +The letter to Hotep complete, Kenkenes took up another roll and wrote +thus to Meneptah: + + +"To Meneptah, Beloved of Ptah, Ambassador of Amen, Vicar of Ra, Lord +over Upper and Lower Egypt, greeting:" + + +At this point he paused. His power of expression, aghast at the +magnitude of the stake laid on its successful use, became +panic-stricken and fled from him. He feared that words could not be +chosen which would justify his sacrilege or prove his claims to Rachel +greater than Har-hat's. Meneptah would be hedged about with prejudice +against his first cause, and deterred by the prior right of Har-hat, in +the second. The last man that talked with the king molded him. +Flattery alone might prevail against coercion. It was the one hope. + +Kenkenes seized his pen and wrote: + + +"This from thy subject, Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, thy murket. + +"I give thee a true story, O Defender of Women. + +"There is a maiden whose kinsmen died of hard labor in the service of +Egypt. Not one was left to care for her. Of all her house, she alone +remains. They died in ignominy. Shall the last remnant of the unhappy +family be stamped out in dishonor? + +"If one came before thee seeking to insult innocence, and another +begging leave to protect it, thou wouldst choose for him who would keep +pure the undefiled. Have I not said, O my King? + +"Before thee, even now is such a choice. + +"Already thou hast given over the mastership of Rachel, daughter of +Maai the Israelite, to thy fan-bearer, Har-hat. By the lips of his own +servants, I am informed that he would have put her in his harem. + +"She fled from him and I hid her away, for I could not bear to deliver +her up to the despoiler. + +"I love her--she loveth me. Wilt thou not give her to me to wife? + +"Thine illustrious sire bespeaketh thy favor, out of Amenti. Behold +his signet and its injunction. + +"Furthermore, I confess to sacrilege against Athor, in carving a statue +which ignored the sculptor's ritual. For this, and for hiding the +Israelite, am I imprisoned in the city stronghold of Tape. + +"I would be free to return to my love and comfort her, but if it shall +overtax thy generosity to release me, I pray thee announce my sentence +and let me begin to count the hours till I shall come forth again. + +"The Israelite hath a nurse, a feeble and sick old woman, Deborah by +name, whom the minions of Har-hat abused. She can be of no further use +in servitude, and I would have thee set her free to bear company to her +love, the white-souled Rachel. + +"But if these last prayers imperil the first by strain upon thy +indulgence, O Beloved of Ptah, do thou set them aside, and grant only +the safety of the oppressed maiden. + +"These to thy hand, by the hand of the scribe, Hotep. + +"KENKENES." + + +The letter complete, he summoned the messenger. + +"How swift art thou?" he asked. + +"So swift that my service is desired beyond mine opportunities to +accept," was the answer. + +"How is it that thou art ready to serve me? Thou seest my plight." + +"The jailer spoke of thee as petitioning the Pharaoh. The king is in +the north where I have not been in all the reign of Meneptah. Thou +offerest me a pleasure and the fee shall be in proportion to the length +of the journey." + +"Nay, but thou art a genius. Thou dost move me to imitate the Hathors, +since they add fortune to the already fortunate. Mark me. I will give +thee thy fee now. If thou dost return me a letter showing that thou +hast carried the message with all faith and speed, I shall give thee +another fee on thy home-coming. What thinkest thou?" + +The man smiled and nodded. "Naught but the darts of Amenti shall delay +me." + +Kenkenes gave him the message, and a handful of rings. The man +expressed his thanks, after which he went forth, and the door was +barred. + +Kenkenes stood for a while, motionless before the tightly fitted portal +of stone. Then through the high crevice that was his window the sounds +of life outside smote upon his ear. The noise of the city seemed to +become all revel. Some one under the walls laughed--the hearty, +raucous laugh of the care-free boor. + +He turned about and flung himself face down in the straw of his pallet. + +He had begun to wait. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE LOVE OF RAMESES + +By the twentieth of May, the court of Meneptah was ready to proceed to +Tanis. + +The next week the Pharaoh would depart. To-night he received noble +Memphis for a final revel. + +His palace was aglow, from its tremendous portals to the airy hypostyle +upon its root and from far-reaching wing to wing, with countless +colored lights. From every architrave and cornice depended garlands +and draperies, and tinted banners waved unseen in the dark. The great +loteform pillars supporting the porch were festooned with lotus +flowers, and the approaches were strewn with palm-leaves. + +The guests came in chariots with but a single attendant or in litters +accompanied by a gorgeous retinue and much authority. Charioteers +swore full-mouthed oaths and smote slaves; horses reared and plunged +and bearers hurried back through the dark with empty chairs. Meanwhile +the pacing sentries made frank criticism and gazed at each alighting +new-comer with eyes of connoisseurs. + +When the portals opened, a broad shaft of light shot into the night, a +multitude of attendants was seen bowing; gusts of reedy music and +babble and the smell of wilting flowers and Puntish incense swept into +the outer air. + +Within, the great feast began and proceeded to completeness. The +tables were removed and the stage of the revel was far advanced. The +levels of scented vapor from the aromatic torches undulated midway +between the ceiling and the floor and belted the frescoes upon the +paneled walls. Far up the vaulted hall, the Pharaoh and his queen, in +royal isolation, were growing weary. + +The lions chained to their lofty dais slept. The guardian nobles that +stood about the royal pair leaned heavily upon their arms. + +Out in the sanded strip across the tessellated floor, tumblers were +glistening with perspiration from their vaguely noticed efforts. Apart +from the guests the painted musicians squatted close together and made +the air vibrant with the softly monotonous strumming of their +instruments. + +The company, which was large, had fallen into easy attitudes; an +exciting game of drafts, or a story-teller, or a beauty, attracting +groups here and there over the hall. + +Before one table, whereon the scattered pawns of a game yet lay, +Rameses lounged in a deep chair, a semi-recumbent figure in marble and +obsidian. Beside him, where she had seated herself at his command, was +Masanath. + +There was Seti at Ta-user's side, but Io was not at the feast. She +mourned for Kenkenes. Ta-meri was there, the bride of a week to +Nechutes, who hovered about her without eye or ear for any other of the +company. Siptah, Menes, Har-hat, all of the group save Hotep and +Kenkenes, were present and near enough to be of the crown prince's +party, yet scattered sufficiently to talk among themselves. + +The game of drafts, prolonged from one to many, had ended disastrously +for the prince in spite of his most gallant efforts to win. Masanath, +against whom he had played, finally thrust the pawns away and refused +to play further with him. + +"Thou dost make sport for the Hathors, O Prince," she said. "Have +respect for thyself and indulge their caprice no more." + +"Hast thou not heard that we may compel the gods?" he asked. "Perhaps +I do but indulge them, of a truth. But let me set mine own will +against fate and there shall be no more losing for me." + +"It is a precarious game. Perchance there is as strong a will as +thine, compelling the Hathors contrarily to thine own desires. What, +then, O Rameses?" + +"By the gambling god, Toth, I shall try it!" he exclaimed. "The +opportunity is before me even now." + +He took her hand. + +"I catch thy meaning. Beloved of Isis! Thou didst challenge me long +ago, and long ago I took it up. Thus far have we fenced behind +shields. Down with the bull-hide, now, and bare the heart!" + +"Thou dost forget thyself," she retorted, wrenching her hand from him. +"The eyes of thy guests are upon thee." + +He laughed. "The prince's doings become the fashion. Let me be seen +and there shall be no woman's hand unpossessed in this chamber." + +"Thou shalt set no fashion by me. Neither shalt thou rend the Hathors +between thy wishes and mine. Furthermore, if thou dost forget thy +princely dignity, thy power will not prevent me if I would remind thee +of thy lapse." + +"War!" he exclaimed. "Now, by the battling hosts of Set, never have I +met a foe so worthy the overcoming. Listen! Dost thou know that I +have sorrows? Dost thou remember that I may have sleepless nights and +unhappy days--discontents, heartaches and oppressions? I am not less +human because I am royal, but because I am royal I am more unhappy. +Sorry indeed is a prince's lot! Wherefore? Because he is sated with +submission; because he hath drunk satiety to its very dregs; because he +hath been denied the healing hunger of appetite, ambition, conquest. +How hath my miserable heart longed to aspire--to conquer! I have +starved for something beyond my reach. But lo! in thee I have found +what I sought. Thou hast defied me, rebuffed me, thwarted me till the +surfeited soul in me hath grown fat upon resistance. Now shall the +longing to conquer that racketh me be fed! Go on in thy rebellion, +Masanath! Gods! but thou art a foe worthy the subduing! I would not +have thee give up to me now. I would earn thee by defeats, losses and +many scars. And thy kiss of submission, in some far day, will give me +more joy than the instant capitulation of many empires." + +"Thou hast provided thyself with lifelong warfare, and triumph to thine +enemy at the end," she answered serenely. + +Her reply seemed to awaken a train of thought in the prince. He did +not respond immediately. He leaned his elbows on his knees, and +clasping his hands before him, thought a while. In the silence the +talk of the others was audible. + +"The festivities of Memphis have lost two, since they lost one," Menes +mused. + +"Give us thy meaning," Nechutes asked. + +"Hast seen Hotep in Memphian revels since Kenkenes died?" the captain +asked, by way of answer. + +Nechutes shook his head. "The gods have dealt heavily with Mentu," he +said after a little silence. "Not even the body of his son returned to +him for burial!" + +Har-hat, who had been perched on the arm of Ta-meri's chair, broke in. + +"Mayhap the young man is not dead," he surmised. + +"All the Memphian nome hath been searched, my Lord," Menes protested. + +"Aye, but these flighty geniuses are not to be measured by doings of +other men. Perhaps he hath gone to teach the singing girls at Abydos +or Tape." + +"Ah, my Lord!" protested Ta-meri, horrified. + +"Nay, now," Har-hat responded, bending over her. "I but give his +friends hope. To prove my sincerity I will wager my biggest diamond +against thy three brightest smiles that thou wilt hear of Kenkenes +again, alive and dreamy as ever, led into this strange absence by some +moonshine caprice." + +"I would give more than my biggest diamond to believe thee," Nechutes +muttered, turning away. + +"Wilt thou wager?" the fan-bearer demanded with animation. + +"Nay!" was the cup-bearer's blunt reply. Har-hat shrugged his +shoulders and lapsed into silence. Rameses leaned toward Masanath +again. The expression on his face during the talk and the tone he +chose now showed that he had not heard, nor was even conscious of the +silence that had fallen. His words were low-spoken, but each of his +companions heard. + +"In warfare it is common for a foe to hedge his adversary about so that +fight he must. Thou art a woman and cunning, and lest thou join +thyself to another and elude me ere the battle is on, I would better +treat thee to a strategy. I shall wed thee first and woo thee +afterward." + +Ta-user leaned across the table, and sweeping the pawns away with her +arms, said, with a smile: + +"Quarreling over a game of drafts! Which is in distress--in need of +allies?" + +"Come thou and be my mercenary, Ta-user," Masanath said with impulsive +gratitude. "Rameses hath lost and demands restitution beyond reason." + +Har-hat had risen the instant the words had passed the prince's lips +and left the group. He did not wish to let his face be seen. A dash +of dark color grew in the heir's pallid cheeks, partly because he knew +he had been heard, partly because he was angry at the princess' +interruption. + +"Strange," mused Menes once again, "that the phrases of war mark the +babble of even the maidens these days. And half the revels end in +quarrels. Though I be young in war experience, I would say the omens +point to conflict in which Egypt shall be embroiled." + +"Aye, Menes; and perchance thou wilt be measuring swords with a Hebrew +ere the summer is old," Siptah said, speaking for the first time. + +"Matching thy good saber-metal with a trowel or a hay-fork, Menes," +Rameses sneered. + +"Hold, thou doughty pride of the battling gods!" Menes cried laughingly +to Rameses. "For once, I scout thy prophecies. The Hebrews are +stirred up beyond any settling, save thou dost put them all to the +sword, and that is a task that I would go to Tuat to escape. Thou wilt +not work the Israelite to death. I can tell thee that!" + +"Hast caught the infectious terror of the infant-scaring, bugbear +Hebrew?" Rameses asked. + +Menes leaned against the nearest knee and smiled lazily. + +"If the gray-beard sorcerer did meet me in open field, protected only +with bull-hide and armed with a spear, I would fight him till he said +'enough'; but who wants to go against an incantation that would mow +down an army at the muttering? Not I; yea, Rameses, I am a craven in +battle with a sorcerer." + +"If he means to blast us, wherefore hath he not spoken the cabalistic +word ere this?" the prince demanded. + +"He had no personal provocation until late," the captain replied. + +"Hath the taskmaster set him to making brick?" the prince laughed. + +"Nay; but the priesthood plotted against his head, and he is angry." + +Rameses raised himself and looked fixedly at the soldier. Again Menes +laughed. + +"Spare me, my Prince! It is no longer a state secret. It is out and +over all Egypt. Why it came not to thine ears I know not. Perchance +every one is afraid to gossip to thee save mine unabashed self." + +"Waster of the air!" Rameses exclaimed. "What meanest thou?" + +"It seems that the older priests have a hieratic grudge against the +Israelite, and when he returned into Egypt they set themselves, with +much bustle, importance and method to silence him. Hither and thither +they sent for advice, permission and aid, till all the wheels of the +hierarchy were in motion, and the air quivered with portent and intent. +Vain ado! Superfluous preparation! The very letter which gave them +explicit and formal permission to begin to get ready to commence to put +away the Hebrew, fell--by the mischievous Hathors!--fell into the hands +of the victim himself!" + +Rameses fell back into his chair, his lips twitching once or twice, a +manifestation of his genuine amusement. + +"As it follows, the Israelite is angry. So the witch-pot hath been put +on, and in council with a toad and a cat and an owl, he thinketh up +some especial sending to curse us with," the captain concluded. + +"A proper ending," Rameses declared after a little. "Let men kill each +other openly, if they will, but the methods of the ambushed assassin +should recoil upon himself." + +At this point it was seen that the Pharaoh and his queen were preparing +to leave the hall. All the company arose, and after the royal pair had +passed out the guests began to depart. Rameses left his party and, +joining Har-hat, led the fan-bearer away from the company. + +"It seems that thou, with others, heardest my words with Masanath," the +prince began at once. "It is well, for it saves me further speech now. +I want thy daughter as my queen." + +Har-hat seemed to ponder a little before he answered. "Masanath does +not love thee," he said at last. + +"Nay, but she shall." + +"That granted, there are further reasons why ye should not wed," the +fan-bearer resumed after another pause. "Masanath would come between +Egypt and Egypt's welfare. Thou knowest what thy marriage with the +Princess Ta-user is expected to accomplish. At this hour the nation is +in need of unity that she may safely do battle with her alien foes. If +thou slightest Ta-user thou wilt add to the disaffection of Amon-meses +and his party. Furthermore, thine august sire would not be pleased +with thee nor with Masanath, nor with me. It is not my place to show +thee thy duty, Rameses, but of a surety it is my place to refuse to +join thee in thy neglecting of it." + +Rameses contemplated the fan-bearer narrowly for a moment. "Come, thou +hast a game," he said finally. "Out with it! Name thy stake." + +"O, thou art most discourteous, my Prince," the fan-bearer +remonstrated, turning away. But Rameses planted himself in his path. + +"Stay!" he said grimly. "Dost thou believe me so blind as to think +thee sincere? Thou canst use thy smooth pretenses upon the Pharaoh, +but I understand thee, Har-hat. Declare thyself and vex me no further +with thy subtleties." Har-hat measured the prince's patience before he +answered. + +"When thou canst use me courteously, Rameses," he said with dignity, "I +shall talk with thee again. Meanwhile do not build on wedding with +Masanath. I shall mate her with him who hath respect for her father." + +For a moment Rameses stood in doubt. Could it be that this soulless +man had scruples against giving him Masanath? But Har-hat, allowed a +chance to leave the prince if he would, had not moved. Rameses +understood the act. The fan-bearer was awaiting a propitious +opportunity to name his price gracefully. The momentary warmth of +respect died in the prince's heart. + +"Out with it," he insisted more calmly. "What is it? Power, wealth or +a wife? These three things I have to give thee. Take thy choice." + +"I would have thee use me respectfully, reverently," Har-hat retorted +warmly. "I would have thee speak favorably of me; I would have thee do +me no injustice by deed or word, nor peril my standing with the king! +This I demand of thee--I will not buy it!" + +"To be plain," Rameses continued placidly, "thou wouldst insure to +thyself the position of fan-bearer. Say on." + +"I am fan-bearer to the king," Har-hat continued with a show of +increasing heat, "and I would fill mine office. If thou art to be his +adviser in my stead, do thou take up the plumes, and I will return to +Bubastis." + +"Once again I shall interpret. I am to keep silence in the council +chamber and resign to thee the molding of my plastic father. It is +well, for I am not pleased with ruling before I wear the crown. But +mark me! Thou shalt not advise me when I rule over Egypt. So take +heed to my father's health and see that his life is prolonged, for with +its end shall end thine advisership. What more?" + +"So thou observest these things I am satisfied." + +"Gods! but thou art moderate. Masanath is worth more than that. Do I +take her?" + +"She does not love thee." + +The prince waved his hand and repeated his question. + +"I shall speak with her," Har-hat responded, "and give thee her word." + +For a moment the prince contemplated the fan-bearer, then he turned +without a word and strode out of the chamber. In a corridor near his +own apartments he overtook the daughter of Har-hat. Her woman was with +her. + +The prince stepped before them. + +The attendant crouched and fled somewhere out of sight. Masanath drew +herself to the fullest of her few inches and waited for Rameses to +speak. + +"Come, Masanath," he said, "thou canst reach the limit of thy power to +be ungracious and but fix me the firmer in my love for thee. I am come +to tell thee that I have won thee from thy father." + +"Thou hast not won me from myself," she replied. + +"Nay, but I shall." + +"Thou dost overestimate thyself," she retorted. Catching up the fan +and chaplet that her woman had let fall she made as though to run past +him. But he put himself in her way, and with shining eyes, caught her +in his arms. + +"There, there! my sweet. I shall do thee no hurt," he laughed, +quieting her struggles with an iron embrace. + +"Thou art hurting me beyond any cure now," she panted wrathfully. + +"It is thy fault. Have I not said I am sated with submission? If thou +wouldst unlock mine arms, kiss me and tell me thou wilt be my queen." + +"Let me go," she exclaimed, choking with emotion. + +"Better for thee to tell me 'yes'; thou wilt save thy father a lie." + +She looked at him speechless. + +"I have said. To-morrow he will tell me that thou hast promised to wed +me--whether thou sayest it or not. Spare him the falsehood, Masanath, +and me a heartache." + +"Wilt thou slander my father to me?" she demanded. "Art thou a knave +as well as a tyrant?" + +"Nay, I have spoken truly. Sad indeed were thy fate, my Masanath, did +the gods mate thee with a knave, having fathered thee with a villain. +So I am come to know of a truth what is thy will." + +"And I can tell thee most truly. Sooner would I sit upon the peak of a +pyramid all my life than upon a throne with thee; sooner would I be +crowned with fire than wear the asp of a queen to thee. My father may +wed me to thee, but I will never love thee, nor say it, nor pretend it. +Thou wilt not win a wife if thou dost take a queen by violence. +Release me!" + +"Thou dost rivet mine arms about thee." + +She stiffened herself and savagely submitted to her imprisonment. + +Rameses laughed and, bending her head back, kissed her repeatedly and +with much tenderness. She struggled madly, but he held her fast. + +"This is but the beginning," he said in a low voice, "and I have won. +The end shall be the same. I am a lovable lover, am I not, Masanath? +Am I not good to look upon? Dost thou know a more princely prince, and +is my father more of a king than I shall be? Where do I fail thee in +thy little ideals? Am I harsh? Aye, but I am a king. Am I +rough-spoken? Aye, because most of the world deserve it. Thou hast +never felt the sting of my tongue, and never shalt thou unless thou +breakest my heart. I have much to give thee; not any other monarch +hath so much as I to give his queen. And yet I ask only thy love in +return." + +This was earnest wooing, which contained nothing that she might flout. +So she strained away from him and sulked. Again he laughed. + +"Khem and Athor and Besa have combed my heart and created a being of +the desires they found therein! O, thou art mine, for the gods +ordained it so." Again he kissed her, holding her in spite of her +efforts to get away. + +"There! carry thy hate of me only to the edge of sleep and dream +sweetly of me." + +He released her and continued down the hall. + +As he turned out of the smaller passage into the larger corridor, +Ta-user stepped forth from the shadow of a pillar. The huge column +dwarfed her into tininess. The hall was but dimly lighted by a single +lamp and that flared above her head. + +Rameses paused, for she stood in his path. + +"Not yet gone to thy rest?" he asked. + +"Rest!" she said scornfully. "Gone to a night-long frenzy of +relentless consciousness--weary tossing, wasted prayers. I have not +rested since I left the Hak-heb." + +Her voice sounded hollow in the great empty hall. + +"So? Thou art ready for the care of the physicians by this, then, O my +Sister." + +"I am not thy sister." + +"What! Hast quarreled with the gentle Seti?" + +"Rameses, do not mock me. Seti does not even stir my pulses. He could +not rob me of my peace." + +"What temperate love! Mine makes my temples crack and fills mine hours +with sweet distress." + +Ta-user looked at him for a moment, then raising her hands, caught the +folds of his robe over his breast. + +"Rameses, how far wilt thou go in this trifling with the Lady Masanath?" + +"To the marrying priests." Without looking at her, he loosed her +hands, swung them idly and let them go. + +"She does not love thee," she said after a little silence. + +"Thy news is old. She told me that not a moment since." + +Ta-user drew a freer breath. "Thou wilt not wed her, then." + +"That I will. I have vowed it. Go, Ta-user, the hour is late. Have +thy woman stir a potion for thee, and sleep. I would to mine own +dreams. They yield me what the day denies." + +"Stay, Rameses," she urged, catching at his robes once more. "I would +have thee know something. But am I to tell thee in words what I would +have thee know? Surely I have not let slip a single chance to show +thee by token. Art thou stubborn or blind, that thou dost not pity me +and spare me the avowal?" + +Rameses looked down at her upturned face without a softening line on +his pallid countenance. + +"Ta-user," he said deliberately, "had I been mummied and entombed I +should have known thine intent. I marvel that thou couldst think I had +not seen. Now, hast thou not guessed my mind by this? Have I not been +sufficiently explicit? Must I, too, lay bare my heart in words?" + +She did not speak for a moment. Then she said eagerly: + +"Let not thy jealousy trouble thee concerning Seti--he is naught to +me--I love him not--a boy, no more." + +"Seti!" he exclaimed contemptuously. "I have no feeling against Seti +save for his unfealty to the little child who loves him,--whose heart +thou hast most deliberately broken." + +"Not so," she declared vehemently. "I can not help the boy's +attachment to me. She is a child, as thou hast said, and is easily +comforted. Not so with maturer hearts like mine." + +She put her arms about his neck, and flinging her head back, gazed at +him with a heavy eye. + +"O, wilt thou put me aside for Masanath? What is her little dark +beauty compared to mine? How can she, who is not even a stately +subject, be a stately queen? Wilt thou set the crown upon her unregal +head, invest her with the royal robes, and yield thy homage to a scowl +and a bitter word? And me, in whom there is no drop of unroyal blood, +in whom there is all the passion of the southlands and all the fidelity +of the north, thou wilt humiliate. The gods made me for thee--schooled +me for thy needs and shifted the nation's history so that thou shouldst +have need of me. Look upon me, Rameses. Why wilt thou thrust me +aside?" + +She was not dealing with Seti, or Siptah, or any other whom she had +bewitched. There was no spell in the topaz eyes for Rameses. If her +sorcery affected him at all, it won no more than a cursory interest in +her next move. + +"The night is too short to recount my reasons," he replied calmly, as +he put her arms away. "But I might point out the snarling cur, Siptah, +for one, and a few other comely lords of Egypt." + +"What hast thou done in thy life?" she cried. "I am no more wicked +than thou; thou hast found delight in others beside whom I am all +innocence." + +"It may be. Who knows but there is somewhat of the vulture-nostril in +man, tickled with a vague taint? But, even then, the sense is +fleeting, more or less as the natures of men vary. A man hath his +better moments, and how shall they be entirely pure in the presence of +shame? Nay, I would not mate and live for ever with mine own sins." + +"Then as thou dost permit her spotlessness to cover her hate, let my +love for thee hide my sins. From the first I have loved thee unasked. +She is all unwon." + +"Thou hast said it. She is unwon. But doth the lion prey upon the +carcass? Nay. His kill must be fresh and slain by his own might. +Thou didst stultify thyself by thine instant acquiescence. Come, let +us make an end to this. The more said the more thou shalt have of +which to accuse thyself hereafter." + +But she dropped before him, her white robes cumbering his path, her +arms clasping his knees. + +"What more have I to do of which to accuse myself, O Rameses? Egypt +knows why I came to court. Egypt will know why I shall leave it. What +have I not offered and what hast thou given me? Where shall I find +that refuge from the pitying smile of the nation? Spare my womanhood--" + +"Ah, fie upon thy pretense, Ta-user! Art thou not shrewd enough to +know how well I understand thee? Thou dost not love me. No woman who +loves pleads beyond the first rebuff. Love is full of dudgeon. Thou +dost betray thyself in thy very insistence. Thou beggest for the crown +I shall wear, and if I were over-thrown to-morrow thou wouldst kneel +likewise to mine enemy. Thou hast no womanhood to lose in Egypt's +sight. As thy caprice turned from Siptah to me, let it return thee to +Siptah once again. And if thy heart doth in truth wince with jealousy, +think on Io." + +He undid her arms, flung her from him and disappeared into the dark. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +FURTHER DIPLOMACY + +Masanath, suffocating with wrath and rebellion and overpowered with an +exaggerated appreciation of her shame, tumbled down in the shadows of +the narrow passage and wrapped her mantle around her head. + +When she had wept till the creamy linen over her small face was wet and +her throat hurt under the strain of angry sobs, and until she was sure +that Rameses was gone, she picked herself up and went cautiously to the +end of the passage to reconnoiter. + +The prince stood under the single lamp in the great corridor, between +her and the refuge of her chamber. Another was close to him, her hands +upon his shoulders. + +Masanath retired into the dusk and waited. When she looked again the +hands were clasped about the prince's neck. Back into the shadows she +shrank, pressing her tiny palms together in a wild prayer for Ta-user's +triumph. After an interval she looked again in time to see Rameses +undo the arms about his knees and fling the princess from him. Cold +with dismay and shaking with her sudden descent from hope to despair, +Masanath watched him disappear into the dark. + +"O most ill-timed, iron continence!" she wailed under her breath. But +the change which had come over Ta-user interested her immediately. +Fascinated, she forgot to hide again, but the light of the single lamp +did not penetrate to her position. + +The princess kept the posture of abandoned humiliation, into which +Rameses had flung her, until the heir's footsteps died away up the +corridor. Then she raised herself and faced the direction the prince +had taken. Her lithe body bent a little, her rigid arms were thrust +back of her, and the hands were clenched hard. Her head was forced +forward, the long neck curved sinuously like a vulture's. She began to +speak in a whisper that hissed as though she breathed through her +words. Masanath felt her flesh crawl and her soft hair take on life. +Not all the words of the sorceress were intelligible. At first only +her ejaculations were distinct. + +"Puny knave!" Masanath heard. "Well for thee I do not love thee, else +thou shouldst sleep this night in the reeking cave of a paraschite, +with the whine of feeding flies about thee for dreams. Well for me +that I do not love thee, for thine instant death would rob me of the +long revenge that I would liefer have! Share thy crown with me! When +Ta-user hath done with thee thou shalt have no crown to share! Turned +from Siptah for thee! How thou wilt marvel when thou learnest that I +never turned from Siptah nor wooed thee with a single glance but for +Siptah's sake. Go on! Sleep well! Have no regrets, for thy doom was +spoken long before this night's haughty work. Rather do I thank thee +for thy scorn. It robs me of qualms and adds instead a dark delight in +that which I shall do!" + +She turned toward Masanath, walking swiftly. The fan-bearer's +daughter, stricken with panic, fled, nor paused until she had passed +far beyond the chamber of Ta-user. + +Cowering in a friendly niche, she waited until the princess had +disappeared, and then only after a long time was she sufficiently +reassured to reach her own apartments. + +It was the next day's noon before Masanath saw her father. Then he +came with light step as she sat in her room. Approaching from behind +her, he took her face between his hands, and tilting it back, kissed +her. + +"I give thee joy, Masanath. Thou hast melted the iron prince." + +She rose and faced him. "Did Rameses tell thee I loved him?" she +demanded, a faint hope stirring in her heart. + +"Nay, far from it. He told me, and laughed as he said it, that if thy +soft heart had any passion for him it was hate." + +"Said he that? Nay, now, my father, thou seest I can not marry him." +There was relief in her voice, and she drew near to the fan-bearer and +invited his arms. He sat down instead, and drawing up a stool with his +foot, bade her sit at his feet. + +"Listen! It is a whim of the Hathors to conceal one's own feelings +from him at times, that he may accomplish his own undoing, being blind. +Much is at stake on thy love for the prince. Awake, Masanath! Thou +dost love him; thou wilt wed him--and it shall go well with--all others +whom thou lovest." + +"Wouldst use me for a price, my father--wouldst barter thy daughter for +something?" she asked in a tone low with apprehension. + +"Ah, what inelegant words," he chid. "Thou dost miscall my purpose. +Look, my daughter. Have I not served thee with hand and heart all thy +life, asking nothing, sacrificing much? I, for one, have a debt +against thee, and thou canst pay it in thy marriage to Rameses. Dost +thou not love me enough to make me secure with the prince, and so, +secure in mine advisership to the king?" + +Masanath arose slowly, as if her movements kept pace with the progress +of her realizations. Thus far she had been a loving and a believing +child. The genial knavishness of her father had never appeared as such +to her. In her sight he was cheery, great and lovable. Most of all +she had flattered herself that he loved her better than life, and that +his nights were sleepless in planning for her happiness. Now, a +terrifying lapse in his care, or a more terrifying display of his real +character, appalled her. + +He had placed his demand in the most irresistible form, by calling upon +her dutifulness. Being obedient, she felt constrained to submit, but +being spirited, with her heart already bestowed, she resisted. + +She floundered wildly for testimony that would justify her rebellion in +his sight. The memory of Ta-user's threats came to her as unexpected +and unbidden as all inspirations come. + +"Shall I hold thee in thy position at the expense of Egypt's peace, if +not at the expense of the dynasty?" she cried. + +"By the heaven-bearing shoulders of Buto!" he responded laughingly, +"thou dost put a high estimate on the results of thine acts. Add +thereto, 'if not at the expense of the Pantheon,' and thou shalt have +all heaven and earth at thy mercy." + +"Nay, my father, hear me! Thou knowest Ta-user--" + +"O, aye, I know Ta-user--all Egypt knows her--more particularly, +Rameses." + +"Thou dost not fathom the evil in her--" + +"Her fangs are drawn, daughter." + +"Hear me, father. Last night, after Rameses--after he--after he left +me, he met Ta-user. And the talk between them was of such nature that +she knelt to him and he flung her off. They were between me and mine +apartments, and I could not but know of it. When he left her she made +such threats that it were treason for me to give them voice again. +What she asked of him I surmise. It could not have been other than a +prayer to him, to fulfil what was expected of him concerning her. Thou +knowest the breach between the Pharaoh and his brother, Amon-meses, is +but feebly bridged till Rameses shall heal the wound in marriage with +Ta-user. His failure, added to the vehement contempt he displayed for +her last night, shall make that breach ten times as deep and ever +receding, so there can be no healing of it." + +Har-hat flung his head back and laughed heartily. + +"Thou timid child! frightened with the ravings of a discarded wanton. +She and her following of churls can do nothing against the Son of Ptah. +The moles in the necropolis are richer than they. None of loyal Egypt +will espouse their cause, and without money how shall they get them +mercenaries? Nay, why vex thee with matters of state? All that is +required of thee is thy heart for Rameses, no more." + +"Judge not for Rameses, I pray thee," she insisted, coming near him. +"Knowing that I love him not, perchance he might be gentler with +Ta-user did he see his peril." + +Again Har-hat laughed. + +"I am not blind, O little reluctant," he said. "I know the secret +spring of thy concern for Egypt--for Ta-user--for Rameses. I have not +told thee all the stake upon thy love for the prince. Does it not seem +that since a maiden will not love one winsome man there must be another +already installed in her heart?" + +She drew back, changing color. + +"How little of the court-lady thou art, Masanath," he broke oft, +looking at her face. "Thy sensations are too near the surface. Thou +must teach thy face to dissemble. It was this very eloquence of +countenance that betrayed thy foolish preferences. Mind thee, I know +it to be but a maiden fancy which, discouraged, dies. But have a care +lest it bring disaster upon him whom thou hast put in jeopardy of the +fierce power of the prince." + +Masanath's eyes widened with terror. The fan-bearer continued: "I have +but to mention the name of Hotep--" + +She clutched at her heart. + +"Ah?" he observed with mild interrogation in the word. "How foolish +thy caprice! Hotep does not thank thee. His marble spirit hath set +its loves upon ink-pots and papyri and such pulseless things. How I +should reproach myself if I must undo him--" + +"Nay, bring no disaster on the head of the noble Hotep," she begged. +"He--I--there is naught between us." + +"It is even as I had thought. I shall tell Rameses and send him to +thee," he said, moving away. + +With a bound she was between him and the door. + +"If he ask tell him there is naught between me and the royal scribe, +but send him not hither," she commanded with vehemence. + +"If thou art rebellious, Masanath, I must chasten thee." + +"Threaten me not!" she cried, thoroughly aroused, "or by the Mother of +Heaven, I shall demand audience with Meneptah and tell him what thou +wouldst do." + +"Bluster!" he answered with an irritating laugh. + +"Hast won the sanction of the Pharaoh for this betrothal?" she demanded. + +"Meneptah's will is clay in my hands," he replied contemptuously. + +"Vex me further and I shall tell him that!" + +He caught her arm, and though the fierce grasp pinched her, she knew by +that she had gained a point. + +"And further," she continued, gathering courage at each word, "I shall +ask him why thou shouldst be so anxious to keep the breach between him +and his brother and defeat his aims at peace." + +His face blazed and he shook her, but she went on in wild triumph. "I +have a confederate in Rameses. He loves thee not. And I have but to +hint and ruin thee beyond the restoring power of the marriages of a +thousand daughters!" + +Har-hat's forte had been polished insult, but when the evil in him +would have expressed itself in its own brutal manner he was helpless. + +"Hotep--Hotep--" he snarled. + +The name was potent. Again she recoiled. + +"I shall yield him up to Rameses," he went on. + +"And in that very hour thou dost, in that same hour will I charge thee +with treason before the throne of Meneptah!" she returned recklessly. + +The pair gazed at each other, breathless with temper. + +"Wilt thou wed Rameses?" he demanded. + +"So thou wilt avoid the name of Hotep in the presence of Rameses and +wilt shield him as if his safety were to bring thee gain," she replied, +thrusting skilfully, "I will wed the prince in one year. Furthermore, +in that time I shall be free to go where and when I please, to dwell +where I please and to be vexed with the sight of thee or that royal +monster no more than is my desire. Say, wilt thou accept?" + +He had twitted her about her frank face. He could not tell now but +that she was fearless and had measured her strength. He did not know +that within she trembled and felt that her threats were empty. But, +being guilty in his soul, and facing righteousness, Har-hat succumbed. + +"Have it thy way, then, vixen," he exclaimed; "but remember, I hold a +heavy hand above thy head and Hotep's!" + +He strode out of her presence, and when she was sure he was gone, she +fell on her face and wept miserably. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +THE HEIR INTERVENES + +At Tanis, the next day after the arrival of Meneptah, there came a +messenger from Thebes to Hotep, and the royal scribe retired to his +apartments to read the letter. + +And after he had read he was glad that he had secluded himself, for his +demonstrations of relief at the news the message imparted were most +extravagant and unrestrained. For the moment he permitted no reminder +of Kenkenes' present plight to subdue his joy in the realization that +his friend was not dead. + +Having exulted, he read the letter again, and then he summoned all his +shrewdness to his aid. + +He would wait till the confusion of the court's settling itself had +subsided before he presented the petition to Meneptah. Furthermore, he +would relieve his underlings and write the king's communications with +his own hand till he knew that the reply to Kenkenes had been sent. +Har-hat should be watched vigilantly. + +But order and routine were not restored in the palace of Meneptah. The +unrest that precedes a national crisis had developed into irritability +and pugnacity. + +Tanis was within hearing of the plaints of Israel, and the atmosphere +quivered with omen and portent. Moses appeared in this place and that, +each time nearer the temporary capital, and wherever he came he left +rejoicing or shuddering behind him. + +Meanwhile the fan-bearer laughed his way into the throne. Meneptah's +weakness for him grew into stubborn worship. The old and trusted +ministers of the monarch took offense and sealed their lips; the new +held their peace for trepidation. The queen, heretofore meek and +self-effacing, laid aside her spindle one day and, meeting her lord at +the door of the council chamber; protested in the name of his dynasty +and his realm. + +But the king was beyond help, and the queen, angry and hurt, bade him +keep Har-hat out of her sight, and returned to her women. Thereafter +even Meneptah saw her rarely. + +The rise of the fan-bearer was achieved in an incredibly short time. +It proved conclusively that until this period an influence against +Har-hat had been at work upon Meneptah, and seeing that Rameses had +subsided, having cause to propitiate the father of the woman he would +wed, the courtiers began to blame the prince and talk of him to one +another. + +He seemed lost in a dream. In the council chamber he lounged in his +chair with his eyes upon nothing and apparently hearing nothing. But +the slow shifting of the spark in his sleepy eyes indicated to those +who observed closely that he heard but kept his own counsel. If +Meneptah spoke to him he but seconded Har-hat's suggestions. But once +again the observant ones noted that the fan-bearer did not advise at +wide variance with any of the prince's known ideas. Thus far the most +caviling could not see that Har-hat's favoritism had led to any +misrule, but the field of possibilities opened by his complete +dominance over the Pharaoh was crowded with disaster, individual and +national. + +The betrothal of Rameses to Har-hat's daughter gave further material +for contention. It seemed to indicate that the fan-bearer had builded +for himself for two reigns. + +Hotep's situation was most poignantly unhappy. He was fixed under the +same roof with the man that had taken his love by piracy; he must greet +him affably and reverently every day; he must live in daily +contemplation of the time when he must meet Masanath also as his +sovereign--the wife of the prince, whom he must serve till death. +Hardest of all, he must wear a serene countenance and cover his sorrow +most surely, for his own sake and for Masanath's. + +Ta-user still remained at court. Seti, in a fume of boyish indignation +at Rameses, attended her like a shadow. Among the courtiers there were +others who were not alive to the true nature of the princess and who +joined Seti in his resentment against the heir. + +Amon-meses and Siptah, snarling and malevolent, had left the court +abruptly on the morning of its departure for Tanis. The Hak-heb +received them once again, and an ominous calm settled over that little +pocket of fertility in the desert--Nehapehu. + +Thus the court was torn with factions; old internal dissensions made +themselves evident again, but the vast murmur in Goshen was heard above +the strife. + +All this had come to pass in the short space of a month. When half of +that time had elapsed, Hotep, fearing to delay the petition of Kenkenes +longer, lest conditions should become worse rather than better, met the +Pharaoh in the hall one day and gave him the writing. Earnestly the +scribe impressed Meneptah with the importance of the petition and +begged him to acquaint himself in an hour of solitude with its contents +and the identity of the supplicant. + +Meneptah promised and continued to his apartments. There Har-hat came +in a few moments, and Meneptah, after his custom, gave over to him the +state communications of the day, and after some little hesitation, +tossed the petition of Kenkenes among them. + +"Thou canst attend to this matter as well, good Har-hat. Why should I +take up the private concerns of my subjects when I am already burdened +with heavy cares? But do thou look to this petition faithfully. It +may be important, and I know not from whom it is. I promised Hotep it +should be given honest attention." + +For seven days thereafter every letter sent by the king was written by +Hotep. At the end of that time he met Meneptah again, and bending low +before him, asked pardon for his insistence, and begged to know what +disposition the Son of Ptah had made of the petition of his friend. He +was irritably informed that the matter had been given over to the +fan-bearer for attention, since the Pharaoh had been too oppressed with +heavier matters to read the letter. + +The state of the scribe's mind, after receiving the information, was +indescribable. + +He controlled himself before Meneptah, but he suffered no curb upon his +feelings when he had returned to his own apartments. After a long time +he succeeded in choking his anger, disgust and grief, realizing that +each moment must be turned to account rather than wasted in railing. + +He viewed the situation with enforced calm. Har-hat was in full +possession of the facts. He had the signet and was absolute master of +Meneptah. The Hathors had surrendered Kenkenes wholly into the hands +of his enemy. Furthermore, the fate of the Israelite seemed to be +sealed. At the thought Hotep gnashed his teeth. + +In his sympathy for his friend's strait, the scribe gave over his +objections to Rachel. Kenkenes had suffered for her, and, if he would, +he should have her. + +Between the king and persuasion was Har-hat, vitally interested in the +defeat of any movement toward the aid of Kenkenes. The one hope for +the sculptor was the winning over of the Pharaoh, and only one could do +it. And that was Rameses, who was betrothed to the love of Hotep, and +against her will. + +Nothing could have appeared more distasteful to the scribe than the +necessity of prayer to the man for whom he cherished a hate that +threatened to make a cinder of his vitals. But the more he rebelled +the more his conscience urged him. + +He flung himself on his couch and writhed; he reviled the Hathors, +abused Kenkenes for the folly of sacrilege which had brought on him +such misfortune; he execrated Meneptah, anathematized Har-hat and +called down the fiercest maledictions on the head of Rameses. Having +relieved himself, he arose and, summoning his servant, had his +disordered hair dressed, fresh robes brought for him, and a glass of +wine for refreshment. On the way to the palace-top he met Ta-user, +walking slowly away from the staircase. Rameses, solitary and +luxurious, was stretched upon a cushioned divan in the shadow of a +canopy over the hypostyle. + +"The gods keep thee, Son of the Sun," Hotep said. + +"So it is thou, Hotep. Nay, but I am glad to see thee. Methought +Ta-user meant to visit me just now. Is there a taboret near?" + +"Aye, but I shall not sit, my Prince." + +"Go to! It makes me weary to see thee stand. Sit, I tell thee!" + +Hotep drew up the taboret and sat. + +"I come to thee with news and a petition," he began. "It is more +fitting that I should kneel." + +"Perchance. But exertion offends mine eyes in such delicious hours as +these, and I will forego the homage for the sake of mine own sinews. +Out with thy tidings." + +"Thou dost remember thy friend and mine, that gentle genius, Kenkenes." + +"I am not like to forget him so long as a bird sings or the Nile +ripples make music. Osiris pillow him most softly." + +"He is not dead, my Prince." + +"Nay!" Rameses cried, sitting up. "The knave should be bastinadoed for +the tears he wrung from us!" + +"Thou wouldst deny my petition. I am come to implore thee to intercede +for him." + +Rameses bade him proceed. + +"Thou art acquainted with the nature of Kenkenes, O Prince. He is a +visionary--an idealist, and so firmly rooted are his beliefs that they +are to his life as natural as the color of his eyes. He is a +beauty-worshiper. Athor possesses him utterly, and her loveliness +blinds him to all other things, particularly to his own welfare and +safety. + +"In the beginning he fell in love, and a soul like his in love is most +unreasoning, immoderate and terribly faithful. The maiden is +beautiful--I saw her--most divinely beautiful. She is wise, for I saw +that also. She is good, for I felt it, unreasoning, and when a man +hath a woman intuition, a god hath spoken the truth to his heart. But +she is a slave--an Israelite." + +"An Israelite!" + +Hotep bowed his head. + +"By the gods of my fathers, I ought not to marvel! Nay, now, is that +not like the boy? An Israelite! And half the noble maids of Memphis +mad for him!" + +"He is not for thee and me to judge, O Rameses," Hotep interrupted. +"The gods blew another breath in him than animates our souls. For thee +and me such conduct would be the fancies of madmen; for Kenkenes it is +but living up to the alien spirit with which the gods endowed him. It +might be torture for him to wed according to our lights." + +"Perchance thou art right. Go on." + +"It seems that Har-hat looked upon the girl, and taken by her beauty, +asked her at the Pharaoh's hands for his harem." + +"Ah, the--! Why does he not marry honorably?" + +"It is not for me to divine," Hotep went on calmly. "The fan-bearer +sent his men to take her, but she fled from them to Kenkenes, and he +protected her--hid her away--where, none but Kenkenes and the maiden +know. Har-hat is most desirous of owning her, but Kenkenes keeps his +counsel. Therefore, Har-hat overtook him in Tape, where he went to get +a signet belonging to his father, and imprisoned him till what time he +should divulge the hiding-place of the Israelite." + +"Never was there a true villain till Har-hat was born! What poor +feeble shadows have trodden the world for knaves before the fan-bearer +came. Go on. Hath he put him to torture yet?" + +"Aye, from the beginning, though not by the bastinado. He rends him +with suspense and all the doubts and fears for his love that can haunt +him in his cell. But I have more to tell. There was a signet, an +all-potent signet, which belonged to the noble Mentu--" + +"Aye, I remember," Rameses broke in. "My grandsire gave it to the +murket in recognition of his great work, Ipsambul. It commands royal +favor in the name of Osiris. That should help the dreamer out of his +difficulty." + +"Aye, it should, my Prince, but it did not. Kenkenes sent it to the +Pharaoh, with a petition for his own freedom, but the cares of state +were so pressing that the Son of Ptah gave the letter, unopened, to +Har-hat for attention." + +Rameses laughed harshly. + +"Kenkenes would better content himself. The Hathors are against him," +he cried. "Was there ever such consummate misfortune? What more?" + +"Is it not enough, O Rameses?" Hotep answered sternly. "He hath +suffered sufficiently. Now is it time for them, who profess to love +him, to bestir themselves in his behalf. Thou knowest how near the +fan-bearer is to the Pharaoh. Persuasion can not reach the king that +worketh against Har-hat. Thou alone art as potent with the Son of +Ptah. Wilt thou not prove thy love for Kenkenes and aid him?" + +Rameses did not answer immediately. Thoughtfully he leaned his elbow +on his knee and stroked his forehead with his hand. His black brows +knitted finally. + +"My hands are tied, Hotep," he began bluntly. "I permit the sway of +this knave over my father because I am constrained. Till he begins to +achieve confusion or bring about bad government I must let him alone. +There is no love between us. We have no quarrel, but I despise him for +that very spirit in him which makes him do such things as thou hast +even told me. If his offense had been against Egypt or the king or +myself, I could balk him. But this is a matter of personal interest to +him, which would be open and flagrant interference--" + +Hotep broke in earnestly. + +"Surely so small a matter of courtesy--if such it may be called--should +not stand between thee and this most pressing need." + +"Aye, thou hast said--if it were only a small matter of courtesy. But +the breach of that same small courtesy entails great disaster for me. +Thou knowest, O my Hotep, that I am betrothed to the daughter of +Har-hat." + +With great effort Hotep kept a placid face. + +"The Lady Masanath would abet him who would aid Kenkenes," he said. + +"Even so. But hear me, I pray thee, Hotep. This most rapacious +miscreant would hold his favor with the king. He knew I loved +Masanath, and he held her out of my reach till I should consent to +countenance his advisership to my father. I consented--and should I +lapse, I lose Masanath." + +Hotep was on his feet by this time, his face turned away. Rameses +could not guess what a tempest raged in his heart. + +"But be thou assured," the prince continued grimly, "that only so long +as Masanath is not yet mine, shall I endure him. After that he shall +fall as never knave fell or so deserved to fall before. Aye,--but +stay, Hotep. I have not done. I have some small grain of hope for +this unfortunate friend of ours. The marriage hath been delayed. I +shall press my suit, and wed Masanath sooner, if she will, and Kenkenes +need not decay in prison--" + +Hotep did not stay longer. He bowed and departed without a word. + +"Out upon the man, I offered all I could," Rameses muttered, but +immediately he arose and hurried to the well of the stairway. + +"Hotep!" he called. The scribe, half-way down, turned and looked up. + +"Return to me in an hour. Give me time to ponder and I may more +profitably help thee," the prince commanded. Hotep bowed and went on. + +The hour was barely long enough for the smarting soul of the scribe to +soothe itself. Deep, indeed, his love for Kenkenes that he returned at +all. Masanath's name, spoken so familiarly, so boastingly, by the +prince was fresh outrage to his already affronted heart. It mattered +not that Rameses did not know. His talk of marriage with Masanath was +exultation, nevertheless. Once again, Hotep flung himself on his couch +and wrestled with his spirit. + +At the end of the hour, he went once again to Rameses. He was calm and +composed, but he made no apology for his abrupt departure, when last he +was there. Perhaps, however, he gained in the respect of Rameses by +that lapse. The blunt prince was more patient with the sincere than +with the diplomatic. + +"Thou hast said," the prince began immediately, "that Har-hat hath +imprisoned Kenkenes till what time he shall divulge the hiding-place of +the Israelite?" + +Hotep bowed. + +"The fan-bearer charges him with slave-stealing?" + +"And sacrilege," the scribe added. The prince opened his eyes. "Aye, +Kenkenes carried his beauty-love into blasphemy. He executed a statue +of Athor in defiance of the sculptor's ritual. For this also, Har-hat +holds a heavy hand over him." + +"A murrain on the lawless dreamer!" Rameses muttered. "Is there +anything more?" + +Hotep shook his head. + +"He deserves his ill-luck. Mark me, now. He will not go mad with a +year's imprisonment, and he will profit by it. Furthermore, he can not +be persuaded into betraying the Israelite, if he knows how long and how +much he will have to endure. Once sentenced, Har-hat can add nothing +more thereto. Has he confessed?" + +"To me, he did. I know not what he said to the Pharaoh. But the +Goddess Ma broodeth on the lips of Kenkenes." + +Rameses nodded, and clapped his hands. The attendant that appeared he +ordered to bring the scribe's writing-case and implements. When the +servant returned, Hotep, at a sign from Rameses, prepared to write. + +"Write thus to the jailer at Tape: + +"'By order of the crown prince, Rameses, the prisoner, Kenkenes, held +for slave-stealing and sacrilege, is sentenced to imprisonment for one +year--'" + +Hotep lifted his pen, and looked his rebellion. + +"Write!" the prince exclaimed. "I do him a kindness, with a lesson +added. Were it in my power to free him I would not--till he had +learned that the law is inexorable and the power of its ministers +supreme. Go on--'at such labor as the prisoner may elect. No further +punishment may be added thereto.' Affix my seal and send this without +fail. Thou canst write whatever thou wilt to Kenkenes. For the +Israelite, I shall not concern myself. The nearer friends to Kenkenes +may look to her. Mine shall be the care only to see that they are not +harassed by the fan-bearer. In this, I fulfil the law. Let Har-hat +help himself." + +He dropped back on his divan and Hotep slowly collected his writing +materials and made ready to depart. Having finished, he lingered a +little. + +"A word further, O Rameses. Kenkenes is proud. He would liefer die +than suffer the humiliation of public shame. Memphis believes him +dead. None but thyself, Har-hat, the noble Mentu and I know of his +plight. Har-hat hath no call to tell it. Mentu will not; I shall not. +Wilt thou keep his secret also, my Prince?" + +"Far be it from me to humiliate him publicly. Let him have a care, +hereafter, that he does not humiliate himself." + +"I thank thee, O Rameses." + +Saluting the prince, Hotep departed. + +That night he wrote to Kenkenes and to Mentu, and the two messengers +departed ere midnight. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +THE IDOLS CRUMBLE + +Meanwhile Kenkenes seldom saw a human face. Food and water in red clay +vessels, bearing the seal of Thebes, were set inside his door by +disembodied hands. At intervals he saw the keeper, always attended by +the inevitable scribe, but the visit was a matter of inspection and +rarely was the prisoner addressed. + +Though he grew to expect these visits, each time the bar rattled down +he trembled with the hope that the jailer brought him freedom. Each +successive disappointment was as acute as the last, made more poignant +by the torturing certainty that his hopes were vain. The effect of one +was not at all counteracted by the other. + +Some time after dawn the sun thrust a golden bar, full of motes, across +the door, a foot above his head. In a space the beam was withdrawn. +The heat and dust of the midday came, instead. Gnats wove their mazes +in the narrow casement that opened on the outside world, and now and +then the twitter of birds sounded very close to it. Kenkenes knew how +they flashed as they flew in the sun. They were prodigal of freedom. +At nightfall, if he stood at full height against the door, he could see +a thread of cooling sky with a single star in its center. + +This was all his knowledge of the world. Hour after hour he paced the +narrow length of the cell, till the circumscribed round made him dizzy. +If he flung himself on his straw pallet, he did not rest. The mind has +no charity for the body. If there is to be no mental repose it is vain +to hope for physical. When the inactivity of his uneasy pallet became +intolerable, he resumed his pace. + +He expected the return of his messenger in twenty days after the man's +departure. At the expiration of that time his suspense and +apprehension became more and more desperate at the passing of each new +day. In rapid succession he accepted and rejected the thought that the +messenger had played him false, had been assassinated and robbed; that +Meneptah had recalled the signet, or had added the penalty of suspense +to his indorsement of Har-hat's fiat of imprisonment. + +When the climax of his sensations was reached, his self-sufficiency +collapsed and he entered into ceaseless supplication of the gods. He +vowed costly sacrifices to them, adding promises of self-abnegation +which became more comprehensive as his distress increased. At the end +of a month he had consecrated everything at his command. Then he +subsided into a numb endurance till what time his prayers should be +answered. + +Eight days later, about mid-afternoon, while he lay on his pallet, the +door was flung open and his messenger stood without. With a cry, +Kenkenes leaped to his feet and wrenched the scroll from the man's +hand. With unsteady fingers he ripped off the linen cover and read. + +The letter was from Hotep, conveying such information regarding his +imprisonment as we already know. If was couched in the gentlest terms, +and contained that essence of hope which loving spirits can extract +from the most desperate situation, for another's sake. But for all the +kindly intent of the scribe, his news was none the less unhappy. The +dreaded had come to pass, and the war between hope and fear was at an +end. Kenkenes read the missive calmly, and paid the messenger +according to his promise. The jailer, who had come with the man, read +the sentence and bade the prisoner make his choice of labor. + +"Anything, so it will but give me a glimpse of the horizon," he said. + +"Thou wilt pay dearly for thy sky," the keeper cautioned him. "The +softest labor is within doors." + +"Give me my wish according to the command of the prince." + +The jailer shrugged his shoulders. "As thou wilt. Make ready to +follow the canal-workers, to-morrow." + +When the door fell shut again, Kenkenes returned to his pallet and +re-read the scroll. + +A year's imprisonment! The sentence defined was the sum of daily +shame, sorrow, homesickness and misanthropy. Shame in the proud man +admits of no degrees of intensity. If it exist at all, it is +superlative. To this was added the loss of Rachel. How little it +would take to satisfy him, now that she was wholly denied to his eyes! +Only to look down on her again, unseen, from his aery in the rocks over +the valley! + +Hotep had offered him hope, based on circumstantial evidence and fact. +Har-hat could not add to his sentence. That was the only indisputable +cheer he could give. But would Rameses stay the chief adviser's hand, +seeing that the winning of Masanath depended on the prince's +neutrality, as Hotep had explained? If Rachel fled to Mentu, as +Kenkenes had bidden her, could the murket protect her, even at his own +peril? Might not the heavy hand of the powerful favorite fall also on +the head of the king's architect? Wherein was the murket more immune +than his son? Rachel's destruction seemed to be decreed by the Hathors. + +Such was his thought, and he raised himself to curse the Seven Sisters, +and growing reckless, he included the unhelpful gods in his +maledictions. The blasphemy comforted him strangely, and he persisted +till his heated brain was cooled. + +At dawn the next day he laid aside his fillet of gold, his trappings +and noble dress, and donning the kilt or shenti of the prisoners, was +handcuffed to another malefactor and taken forth to the sun-white plain +between Thebes Diospolis and the Arabian, hills, to labor in the canals +of the nome. + +Here, looking continually upon crime, brutality and misery, he asked +himself the divine motive in creating man, and having found no answer, +he began to question man's debt to the gods. + +He was going the way of all the weak in faith. He had pleaded with his +deities, and they had not heard him. He asked himself what he had done +to deserve their disfavor. The sacrilege of Athor was too slight an +offense--if offense it were--and here again he paused, set his teeth +and swore that he had done no wrong and the god or man that accused him +was impotent, unjust and ignorant. Once again he asked himself what he +had done to deserve ill-use at the hands of the Pantheon. They had +turned a deaf ear to him, and why should he render them further homage? +The doctrine of divine Love, displayed through chastisement, was not in +the Osirian creed. + +His eyes grew bold through rebellion and he attacked the wild +inconsistencies of the faith with the destructive instrument of reason. +Each deduction led him on, fascinated, in his apostasy. Each crumbling +tenet started another toward ruin. Finding no sound obstacle to stay +him, he fell with avidity to rending the Pantheon. + +But he found no cheer nor any hope that day when he told himself +bitterly, "There is no God." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +THE PLAGUES + +The court was gone and Masanath was making the most of each day of her +freedom. Memphis was in a state of apathy, worn out by revel and +emptied of her luminaries, Ta-meri, intoxicated with the importance of +her position as lady-in-waiting to the queen, had departed with her +husband, the cup-bearer. Io had returned to her home in On, with an +ache in her brave little heart that outweighed even Masanath's for +heaviness. The last of Seti's lover-like behavior toward her dated +back to a time before the court had gone to Thebes--long, long ago. + +Ta-user, also, had gone, but the fan-bearer's daughter did not regret +her. The other ladies who remained in Memphis, frightened at the +loftiness of Masanath's future, were uneasy in her presence and seemed +more inclined to bend the knee before her than to continue the girlish +companionship that had once been between them. + +So she must entertain herself, if she were entertained at all. + +For a time after the departure of Meneptah, Masanath had given herself +up to tears and gloom. When she had worn out her grief, the elastic +spirit of youth reasserted itself and once again she was as cheerful as +she felt it becoming to be under the circumstances. + +The fan-bearer had taken a house for his daughter's use, during her +year of solitary residence, and her own servants, a lady-in-waiting, +the devoted Nari, Pepi, a courier and upper servant, lean, brown and +taciturn, and several slaves, both black and white, had been left with +her. The older daughter of the fan-bearer lived with her husband in +Pelusium. Her home could have been an asylum for the younger, but +Masanath was determined to know one year of absolute independence +before she entered the long bondage of queenship. + +It was now the middle of June, the height of Egyptian summer. In a +little space the marshes, which had been, for eight months, favorite +haunts of fowlers, would be submerged, for the inundation was not far +away. + +Masanath would hunt for wild-duck and marsh-hen, while there was yet +time. + +It was an hour after sunrise. Her raft, built of papyrus, was +boat-shaped and graceful as a swan. Pepi was at the long-handled sweep +in the stern. Masanath sat in the middle, which was heaped with nets, +throw-sticks, and bows and arrows. A pair of decoy birds, tame and +unfettered, stood near her, craning their small heads, puzzled at the +movement of the boat which was undecipherable since they were +motionless. Nari sat in the prow, her hands folded, her face quite +expressionless. The service of the day was out of the routine, but as +a good servant, she was capable of adapting herself to the change. + +The little craft darted away from the painted landing for pleasure +boats, and reaching midstream, was turned toward the north. The +current caught it and swept it along like a leaf. + +As they passed the stone wharf at Masaarah, Nari looked toward the +quarries with a show of interest on her face. She even caught her +breath to speak. Masanath noted her animation. + +"What is it, Nari?" + +"Naught but a bit of gossip that came to mine ears, last night, and the +sight of Masaarah urged me to tell it again. It is said the Hebrews of +these quarries rose against the new driver and drove him out of the +camp, crying, 'Return us our Atsu, return us our Atsu.'" + +"What folly!" Masanath exclaimed. "If they had been the host which +crowds Goshen to her bounds, it might serve. But this handful in +rebellion against Egypt! The military of the Memphian nome will crush +them as if they had been so many ants." + +"I know," the serving-woman admitted. "The soldier I had it from, said +that the city commandant would move against them by noon this day." + +"The gods help them!" Pepi put in. + +"Thy prayer is too late, Pepi," Masanath answered. "The gods should +have cautioned them ere they took the step. And yet," she continued, +musing, "straits may become so sore that aught but endurance is +welcome." + +Her servants looked at her and at each other, understanding. + +Nari went on: + +"But the soldier told me further that the Israelites had spent the +night chanting and dancing before their God, and it seems from this +spot that the quarries are empty. They do not fear, boasting their +God's care." + +Masanath shook her head. "He must look to them at once, ere the +soldiery fall upon them. His time for aid is short," she said. + +A silence fell, and the raft passed below Masaarah. Again Nari spoke, +proving that she had heard and thought upon the last words of her +mistress. + +"Are not the gods omnipotent and everywhere?" + +"Aye, so hast thou been taught, Nari." + +"Our gods, and the gods of every nation like them?" the serving-woman +persisted. + +"The gods of Egypt are so, and each nation boasts its gods equally +potent." + +"Mayhap the Hebrews' God will help them," Nari ventured. + +Masanath was silent for a moment. "He hath deserted them for long," +she said at last, "but they are hard-pressed. Mayhap their loud +supplications will reach Him in His retreat." + +"They boast that He hath returned." + +"Let Him prove Himself," Masanath insisted stoutly. + +When next she spoke there was no hint of the past serious talk in her +voice. + +"A pest on the ban," she exclaimed. "Look at the Marsh of the +Discontented Soul. It fairly swarms with teal and coot, and see the +snipe on the sand." She stood up and watched the sandy strip they were +nearing. They were a goodly distance out from the shore, but Pepi +poled nearer midstream. "The pity of it," she sighed; "but I doubt not +the place swarms with crocodile, also." + +She sat down again, and looked at the decoy birds. Their timidity had +increased into actual fear. Masanath reached a soothing hand toward +one of them and it fled. The motion of the poling-arm of Pepi +frightened it again, and with a flirt of its wings it retreated toward +Masanath. + +"Stop a moment, Pepi," she said. "Let me quiet this frightened thing. +I can not fathom its terror." + +"The unquiet soul, my Lady," Nari whispered, in awe. + +"Strange that the gods gifted the creatures with keener sight than +men," Masanath answered, somewhat disturbed. She moved toward the +bird, talking softly, but the persuasion was as useless as if the decoy +had been a wild thing. At the nearer approach of the small hand it +took wings and flew. The mate followed, unhesitating. The shining +distance toward the west swallowed them up. + +The trio on the raft looked at one another. + +"Nay, now, saw ye the like before?" Masanath exclaimed, the tone of her +voice divided between astonishment and irritation at the loss of her +pets. + +"Let us leave this vicinity," Pepi said, suiting the action to the +word, "it is unholy." He seized the sweep and drove the raft about, +poling with wide strokes. At that moment, a cry, which was more of a +hoarse whisper, broke from his lips. + +"Body of Osiris! The river! the river!" + +Masanath leaned on one hand and looked over the side of the raft. With +a bound and a shivering cry, Nari was cowering beside her, the little +craft tossing on the waves at the force of the leap. Instantly, Pepi +was at her other side, on his knees, praying and shaking. And together +the trio huddled, but only one, Masanath, was brave enough to watch +what was happening. + +From the bottom of the Nile a turbid convection was taking place, as if +the river silt had been stirred up, but the fuming current was assuming +a dull red tinge. The action had been rapid. Already the stain had +predominated, streaks of clear water, only here and there, clarifying +the opaque coloring. The boat rode half its depth in red, the paddle +dripped red, the splashes of water within on the bottom were red, the +sun shone broadly into the mirroring red, a sliding, reeking red! A +lavender foam broke its bubbles against the drifting raft and a tepid, +invisible vapor, like a moist breath, exhaled from the ensanguined +surface. + +Schools of fish, struggling and leaping, filled the space immediately +above the water, and cumbered the raft with a writhing mass. +Numberless crocodiles bounded into the air, braying, snorting, rending +one another and churning the river into froth by their hideous battle. +Dwellers of the deep water drifted into the upper tide--monsters of the +muck at the Nile bottom, turtles, huge crawfish, water-newts, spotted +snakes, curious bleached creatures that had never seen the day, great +drifts of insects, with frogs, tadpoles--everything of aquatic animate +life, came up dead or dying terribly. Along either bank water-buffalo +and wallowing swine, which had been in the pools near the river, +clambered ponderously, snorting at every step. + +Vessels were putting about and flying for the shore. From the prow of +one tall boat, with distended sails, a figure was seen to spring high +and disappear under the red torrent. Rioting crews of river-men fought +for first landing at the accessible places on the banks. Memphis +shrieked and the pastures became compounds of wild beasts that deafened +heaven with their savage bellowing. + +Pepi and Nari had no thought of saving themselves. It was Masanath who +must save them. They clung to her, dragging her down with their arms +when she attempted to rise. Bereft of reason, they made the liquid +echoes of the river ring with wild cries of mortal terror. + +Masanath had sufficient instinct left to urge her to fly. With a +mighty effort she shook off her servants and sprang to the sweep. +Instantly they made to follow her, but she threatened them with a +hunting-stick. The combined weight of the three in the stern would +have swamped the frail boat. + +Seizing the sweep she poled with superhuman strength toward the nearest +shore--the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. If she remembered the +spirit, she forgot her fear of it. Any terror was acceptable other +than isolation on this mile-wide torrent of blood. + +The raft grounded, and as a viscous wash of red lapped across it, she +leaped forth, landing with both feet in the horror. She floundered out +and crying to her servants to follow her, fled like a mad thing up the +sandy stretch toward the distant wall of rock. + +The boat, lightened of her weight, received a backward thrust as she +leaped, and drifted out of the reeds. The heavy current caught it and +swept it across the smitten river to the Memphian shore. It bore two +insensible figures. + +Masanath ran, thinking only to leave the ghastly flood behind. Her wet +over-dress flapped about her ankles. It, too, was stained, and she +tore if off as she ran. Ahead of her was a sagging limestone wall, +with no gap, but Masanath, hardly sane, would have dashed herself +against it, if hands had not detained her. + +"Blood! Blood!" she shrieked. "Holy Ptah save us!" + +"Peace!" some one made answer. "God is with us." + +The voice was calm and reassuring, the hands firm. Here, then, was one +who was strong and unafraid, and therefore, a safe refuge. No longer +called upon to care for herself, Masanath fell into the arms of the +brave unknown and ceased to remember. + +Consciousness returned to her slowly and incompletely. Horror had +dazed her, and her surroundings, but faintly discovered in an +all-enveloping gloom, were not conducive to mental repose and clearness. + +She became aware, first, that she was somewhere hidden from the +sunshine and beyond reach of the strange odor from the Nile. + +Next she realized that she was sheltered in a cave; that slender lines +of white daylight sifted through the interstices of a door; that a lamp +was burning somewhere behind a screen; that a hairy thing sat in a +corner and looked at her with half-human eyes, and that, as she shrank +at the sight, the warm support under her head moved and a fair face, +framed with golden hair, bent over her. + +Then her eyes, becoming clearer as her recollection returned, wandered +away toward the walls of her shelter. They had been hewn by hands. +There was an opening in one side, leading into another and a darker +crypt. Was not this a tomb? She was in the Tomb of the Discontented +Soul! Terrified, she struggled to gain her feet and fly, but the awful +memory of the plague without returned to her overwhelmingly. Gentle +hands restrained her, and the same voice that had sought to soothe her +before, continued its soft comforting now. + +"Thou art safe and sheltered," she heard. "No evil shall befall thee." + +Was this the spirit of the tomb? If so, it was most lovely and kindly. +But a solemn voice issued out of the dark cell beyond. This was the +spirit, of a surety. She cowered against her fair-haired protector and +shuddered. But the maiden answered the voice in a strange tongue. +Masanath would have known it to be Hebrew, had she been composed. But +now it was mystic, cabalistic. + +Presently the maiden addressed her. + +"Deborah asks after thee, Lady. How shall I tell her thou findest +thyself?" + +"Oh, I can not tell," Masanath answered. "What has happened? Is it +true or did I go mad?" + +The Israelite smoothed her hair. "It is a plague," she said. + +"Then the hand of Amenti is on us," the Egyptian shuddered. "Whither +shall we flee?" + +"Ye can not flee from the One God," the voice from the crypt said +grimly. + +"Nay, but what have I done to vex the gods?" Masanath insisted. "O let +me go hence. Where are my servants?" + +"It is better for thee to bide here," the voice went on relentlessly. +"For outside the sheltering neighborhood of the chosen people, the hand +of the outraged God shall overtake Egypt and scorch her throat with +thirst and make her veins congeal for want of water." + +Masanath gained her feet, crying out wildly: + +"My servants! Where are they? Let me forth." + +The Israelite put an assuring arm about her. "Thou wilt not dare to +face the Nile again," she warned. "Stay with us." + +"To starve! To perish of thirst! To die of pestilence! The gods have +left us. We are undone!" + +"Aye, the gods have left you," the voice continued harshly. "Ye are +given over to the vengeance of the God of Abraham. Howl, Egypt! Rend +thyself and cover thy head with ashes. Thy destruction is but begun. +For a hundred years thou hast oppressed Israel. Now is the hour of the +children of God!" + +Masanath wrung her hands, but the voice went on. + +"As the Nile flows, so hath the blood of Israel been wasted by the hand +of Egypt. Now shall the God of Abraham drain her veins, even so, drop +for drop. For the despoiling of Israel shall her pastures and stables +be filled with stricken beasts--for the heavy hand of the Pharaohs +shall the heavens thunder and scourges fall. And the wrath of God +shall cool not till Egypt is a waste, shorn of her corn and her +vineyards and her riches, and foul with dead men." + +Nothing could have been more vindictive than this disembodied voice. +Masanath thrust her fingers through her hair, and drawing her elbows +forward, sheltered her face with them. + +"When have I offended against the Hebrew?" she cried, sick with terror. +"Why should your awful God destroy the innocent and the friend of +Israel among the people of Egypt?" + +Rachel, who had stood beside her, with an increasing cloud on her face, +now spoke in Hebrew. There was mild protest in her tones. + +"The plague will pass," the voice from the inner crypt continued. +"Seven days will it endure, no more." + +"Deborah is mystic," Rachel added softly, "and is gifted with prophetic +eyes. Much hath she suffered at Egypt's hands, and her tongue grows +harsh when she speaks of the oppression." + +"Nay, but let me go," Masanath begged. "Where are my servants? Came +they not after me when I fled?" + +"None followed thee, Lady, and thy raft went adrift." + +"Let me out of this hideous place, then, for I must seek them. They +may be dead." + +Her tone was imperious, and Rachel, silently obedient, led her to the +entrance and pushed aside the door. Instantly the terrible turmoil +over Egypt smote upon her ears; next she saw the Nile, moving slowly, +black where its clear surfaces had been green, scarlet and froth-ridden +where the sun had shone upon transparent ripples and white foam; after +that, the strange odor came to her, recalling the smell of the altars, +but now magnified till it was overpoweringly strong. She sickened and +turned away. + +Setting the door in place, Rachel led her back into a corner of the +outer chamber and laid her down on the matting there. + +"The Lord God will care for thy servants. Fret thyself no further, but +be content here until the horror shall pass. I shall attend thee, so +thou shalt not miss their ministrations." The Israelite spoke with +gentle authority, smoothing the dark hair of her guest. Command in the +form of persuasion is doubly effective, since it induces while it +compels. Masanath was most amenable to this manner of entreaty, since +it disarmed her pride while it governed her impulses. Thus, though her +inclination urged against it, she ate when the Israelite brought her a +bit of cold fowl and a beaker of wine at midday and again at sunset. +And at night, she slept because the Israelite told her she was safe and +bade her close her eyes. + +But once she awoke. The lamp burned behind a wooden amphora rack and +the interior of the stone chamber was not dark. The voice in the inner +chamber was still and the human-eyed beast in the corner was now only a +small hairy roll. In the silence she would have been dismayed, but +close beside her sat the Israelite. One hand toyed absently with the +golden rings of a collar about her throat. The face was averted, the +hair unplaited and falling in a shower of bright ripples over the bosom +and down the back. The beauty of the picture impressed itself on +Masanath, in spite of her drowsiness. But as well as the beauty, the +dejection in the droop of the head, the unhappiness on the face, were +apparent even in the dusk. Here was sorrow--the kind of sorrow that +even the benign night might not subdue. Masanath was well acquainted +with such vigils as the golden Israelite seemed to be keeping. + +Her love-lorn heart was stirred. She spoke to Rachel softly. + +"Come hither and lie down by me," she said. "I am afraid and thou art +unhappy. Give me some of thy courage and I will sorrow with thee." + +The Israelite smiled sadly and obeyed. + +It was dawn when the fan-bearer's daughter awoke again. + +The door had been set aside, and on the rock threshold a squat copper +lamp was sending up periodic eruptions of dense white vapor. Rachel +was feeding the ember of the cotton wick with bits of chopped root. +The breeze from the river blew the fumes back into the cave, filling +the dark recesses with a fresh and pungent odor. + +Masanath, wondering and remembering, raised her head to look through +the opening. Day was broad over Egypt, and the turmoil had subsided. +The silence was heavy. But the Nile was still a wallowing torrent of +red. + +She sank back and drew the wide sleeves of her dress over her face. +Rachel put the lamp aside, set the door in place and came to her. + +"Thou art better for thy long sleep," she said. "Now, if thou canst +bear, as well, with the meager food this house affords, the plague will +not vex thee sorely." Then, in obedience to the Israelite's offer, +Masanath sat up and suffered Rachel to dress her hair and bathe her +tiny hands and face with a solution of weak white wine. + +"The water which we had stored with us is also corrupted. I fear we +shall thirst, if we have but wine to wet our lips," Rachel explained. + +"Thou dost not tell me that ye abide in this place?" the fan-bearer's +daughter asked, taking the piece of fowl and hard bread which Rachel +offered her. + +"Even so," Rachel responded after a little silence. + +"Holy Isis! guests of a spirit! What a ghastly hospice for women! How +came ye here?" + +For a moment there was silence, so marked that Masanath ceased her +dainty feeding and drew back a little. + +"Are ye lepers?" she asked in a frightened voice. + +"Nay, we are fugitives," Rachel answered. + +"Fugitives! What strait brought you to seek such asylum as this?" + +Again a speaking pause. + +"Who art thou, Lady?" Rachel asked, at last. + +"I am Masanath, daughter of Har-hat, fan-bearer to the Pharaoh." + +"And thou art a friend of the oppressed?" the Israelite continued. + +"It is my boast before the gods," the Egyptian answered with dignity. + +"I am Rachel, of Israel, daughter of Maai, and I have fled from shame. +In all Egypt, this is the one and only refuge for such as I. If my +hiding-place were published, no help could save me from the despoiler. +My one protector is she who lies within. She is my foster-mother, old +and ill from abuse at the hands of brutal servants. Thou hast my +story." + +As Rachel ceased, Deborah called from within. + +"There is more," she said. "Come hither. I am moved to tell thee." + +Masanath obeyed with hesitation and, pausing in the doorway of the +inner chamber, heard the story of the Israelites. Great was her +perplexity and her sorrow when she heard the name of Kenkenes spoken +calmly and without grief. They did not know he was dead! She held her +peace till the story was done, How much more would her heart have been +tortured could the old woman have given her the name of the offending +noble! Instead, all unsuspecting, she heard the story of Har-hat's +wrong-doing with now and then an exclamation of indignation, condemning +him heartily in her soul. + +"The time for the Egyptian's return is long past, but he will come +soon," Deborah concluded. + +Masanath slowly turned her head and looked at Rachel. This, then, was +the love of that dear, dead artist, for whom Memphis mourned and had +ceased to wait. How doubly grievous his loss, for Rachel was undone +thereby! How heart-breaking to see her wait for him who would come no +more! Masanath choked back her tears and said, when she was composed +again: + +"Ye need not molder in this cave, I can hide you in Memphis." + +"Nay, we will await him here." + +"But the Nile will be upon your refuge in three weeks. Ye would starve +if ye drowned not," the Egyptian protested earnestly. + +"It may be we shall not wait so long," Rachel put in. + +Masanath looked at her while she thought busily. "If I tell it, I +break a heart. But if they bide here, they die. None other will come +to them by chance or on purpose." + +"I would not risk it," she answered. Returning to the pallet of +matting she finished her breakfast in silence. After a little sigh she +glanced at the wine in one of the small amphoras which Rachel had +brought to her as a drinking-cup. "Mayhap the plague is past," she +said, hinting, "and I am athirst." + +Rachel took up another jar and went forth. The hairy creature in the +corner, tethered to the amphora rack, slipped his collar and followed +her. + +As soon as the Israelite was gone, Masanath went into the inner +chamber. Standing by the old woman, who lay upon a mattress, set on +the top of the sarcophagus, she said hurriedly: + +"Ye may not remain here. Kenkenes is known to me and he will not +return." + +"Thou dost not tell me he was false to us," Deborah exclaimed. "Nay, I +will not believe it," she declared. + +"Nay, he was the soul of honor, but he is dead." + +"Dead!" the old woman cried, catching at her dress. + +"Hush! Tell her not!" + +"Aye, thou art right. Tell her not! But--but how did he die?" + +"By drowning. His boat was discovered battered and overturned among +the wharf-piling at Memphis, some weeks agone." + +The old woman was silent for a moment and then she shook her head. + +"He is a resourceful youth and he may have procured another boat and +set this one adrift to deceive his enemies. Yet, the time has been so +long, it may be; it may be." + +"None in Memphis doubts it. His father hath given him up and his house +and his people are in mourning. But we may not lose this moment in +surmises. Wilt thou go with me into Memphis--if this sending is +withdrawn?" + +"There is no other choice," Deborah answered after some pondering. +"Kenkenes offered us refuge with his father--alas! that the young man +should die!" After shaking her head and muttering to herself in her +own tongue, she went on. "But Rachel hesitated to accept, at first +from maiden shyness, though now she hath a secret fear, I doubt not, +that the Egyptian may have played her false. The sorry news must be +told her ere she would go." + +"Nay, keep it from her yet a while. Tell her not now." + +"How may we?" Deborah asked helplessly. + +"Listen. I am a householder in Memphis for a year. The place is +secure from much visiting and only my trusted servants are there. They +will not tell her--none else will--thou and I shall keep discreet +tongues, but if the fact creep out, in the way of such things, we need +not accuse ourselves of killing her hope. As thou sayest, the young +man may not be dead. But let us not risk anything. + +"And furthermore," she caught up the line of her talk before Deborah +could answer, "I may as well work good out of an evil I can not escape. +I am betrothed to the heir of the crown of Egypt--" + +Deborah flung up her hand, drawing away in her amazement. + +"Thou! A coming queen over the proud land of Mizraim--a guest in the +retreat of enslaved Israel!" + +Masanath bent her head. "Ye, in your want and distress, are not more +poor or wretched than I." + +The old Israelite's brilliant eyes glittered in the dark. + +"Hold!" she exclaimed. "Thou art not a slave--" + +"Nay, am I not?" Masanath rejoined swiftly. "A slave, a chattel, +doubly enthralled! But enough of this, I would have said that if I wed +the prince, I can ask Rachel's freedom at his hands." + +"So thou canst," Deborah said eagerly--but before she could continue, +Rachel appeared at the outer opening, the amphora held by one arm, the +ape by the other. Her face was alight with a smile that seemed +dangerously akin to tears. + +"Here is water, clean and fresh, but the Nile is bank-full of the +plague. It was Anubis that showed me!" She lowered the amphora into +the rack and took up the linen band the ape had slipped. "Oh, it is +ungrateful to tie thee, Anubis," she went on, "but thou must not betray +us, thou good creature." + +"It was Anubis!" Deborah repeated inquiringly. + +"Aye. Not once did the hideous sight disturb him. He was athirst and +he made me a well in the sand with his paws. See how Jehovah hath sent +us succor by humble hands." She stroked the hairy grotesque and +tethered him reluctantly. + +Deborah muttered under her breath. "I liked the creature not, since he +made me think of the abominable idolatries of Mizraim, but he hath +served the oppressed. He shall be more endurable to me." + +The night fell and the dawn came again and again, but holy Hapi was +denied. Hour by hour the fuming lamp was set before the entrance, the +door was put a little aside, that the entering air might be purified +for those within. When the aromatic was exhausted, Rachel sought for +the root once more, among the herbs at the river-bank; for the +atmosphere, unsweetened, was beyond endurance. + +Never a boat appeared on the water, nor was any human being seen +abroad. Egypt retired to her darkest corner and shuddered. + +But after the seven days were fulfilled, the horror on the waters was +gone. It went as miasma is dispelled by the sun and wind--as +pestilence is killed by the frost--unseen, unprotesting. The lifting +of the plague was as awesome as its coming, but it was not horrible. +That was the only difference. Egypt rejoiced, but she trembled +nevertheless and went about timidly. + +The Israelite and the Egyptian carried the punt, the boat of Khafra and +Sigur, and launched it on the clean waters. Then they prepared +themselves and Deborah and Anubis for a journey, and ere they departed, +Masanath, at Rachel's bidding, wrote with a soft soapstone upon the +rock over the portal of the tomb, the whereabouts of its whilom +dwellers: + +"Her, whom thou seekest, thou wilt find at the mansion of Har-hat in +the city." + +At sunset, Rachel, all unsuspecting, was sheltered in the house of her +enemy. + +Masanath's servants had sought for her, frantically and without system +or method. Pepi and Nari had been saved by the gods. They did not +know where she had gone, and nothing human or divine could have driven +them over the Nile to search for her in the Arabian hills. And for +that reason likewise, they did not notify Har-hat of his daughter's +loss. The messenger would have had to cross the smitten river. They +intended to send for the fan-bearer, but they waited for the plague to +lift. When it was gone, Masanath returned to them. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +"HE HARDENED HIS HEART" + +The Nile rose and fell and the seasons shifted until eight months had +passed. The period was inconsiderable, but its events had never been +equaled in a like space, or a generation, or a whole dynasty, or in all +the history of Egypt. + +When the ancient Hebrew shepherd from Midian first demanded audience +with Meneptah, Egypt was autocrat of the earth and mistress of the +seas. Her name was Glory and Perpetual Life and her substance was all +the fullness of the earth and the treasures thereof. But eight months +after the Hebrew shepherd had gone forth from that first audience, how +had the mighty fallen! She was stripped of her groves and desolated in +her wheat-fields; her gardens were naked, her vineyards were barren, +and the vultures grew fat on the dead in her pastures. About the +thrice-fortified walls of her cities her gaunt husbandmen were camped, +pensioners upon the granaries of the king. Her commerce had stagnated +because she had no goods to barter; her society ceased to revel, for +her people were called upon to preserve themselves. Her arts were +forgotten; only religion held its own and that from very fear. Egypt +was on her knees, but the gods were aghast and helpless in the face of +the hideous power of the unsubstantial, unimaged God of Israel. + +Never had a monarch been forced to meet such conditions, but in all the +mighty line of Pharaohs no feebler king than Meneptah could have faced +them. In treating with the issue he had fretted and fumed, promised +and retracted, temporized with the Hebrew mystic or stormed at him, +hesitated and resolved, and reconsidered and deferred while his realm +descended into the depths of ruin and despair. + +It would seem that the dire misfortunes would have pressed the timid +monarch into immediate submission. But a glance at conditions may +explain the cause of his obduracy. + +At this period in theological chronology, human attributes for the +first time were eliminated from the character of a god. Moses depicted +the first purely divine deity. Omnipotence was ascribed to the gods, +but Pantheism being full of paradoxes, the gods were not omnipotent. +Loud as were the panegyrics of the devout, the devout recognized the +limitations of their divinities. None had ever dreamed of a deity that +was actually omnipotent, actually infinite. Meneptah measured the God +of Israel by his own gods. Furthermore, the miracles did not amaze him +as they appalled Egypt. He was exceedingly superstitious; in his eye +the most ordinary natural phenomenon was a demonstration of the occult. +No matter that the advanced science of his time explained rainfall, +unusual heat or cold, over-fruitful or unproductive years, pestilence +and sudden death, eclipses, comets and meteors,--he believed them to be +the direct results of sorcery. Calamitous as the effects may have been +upon other people, he had ever escaped harm from these sources. It was +not strange that in time he ceased to fear miracles, and the +demonstrations of Moses were not so terrifying, inasmuch as they did +not greatly affect him. + +His horses died, but Arabia was near to replenish his stables; the +pests annoyed him, but his servants fended them from him; the blains +troubled him, but his court physicians were able and gave him relief; +the thunders frightened him, but his fright passed with the storm. +Whenever the sendings became unendurable he had but to yield to gain a +respite, and then he forgot the experience in a day. Meanwhile he ate, +slept and walked in the same luxury he had known in happier years. + +Therefore, Meneptah neither realized his peril nor was personally much +aggrieved by the troublous times. + +It did not occur to him that all the people of his realm were not +sheltered against the plagues by wealth and many servants. He could +not understand why Egypt should be restive under the same afflictions +that he had borne with fortitude. Summoning all evidence from his +point of view, he was able to present to himself a case of personal +persecution and ill-use. The Hebrews belonged to him, and because he +held them their God afflicted Egypt. Egypt complained and would have +him sacrifice his private property, his slaves, for its sake. To the +peevish king the demand was unreasonable. Yet he was not extraordinary +in his behavior. Unselfishness was not an attribute of ancient kings. + +Meneptah was a man that wished to be swayed. He craved approbation and +was helpless without an abettor. His puny ideas had to be championed +by another before they became fixed convictions. After the plague of +locusts, the Hebrew question reached serious proportions. Har-hat had +estranged most of the ministers, and in his strait Meneptah felt +vaguely and for the first time that he needed the acquiescence of +others in addition to the fan-bearer's ready concord. + +One early morning, in a corridor leading from the entrance, he met +Hotep. A sudden impulse urged him to consult his scribe. + +"Where hast thou been?" he asked, noticing Hotep's street dress. + +"To the temple, O Son of Ptah." + +"What hast thou to ask of the gods that thy king can not give thee?" + +Hotep hesitated, and the color rushed into his cheeks. The Hathors +tortured him with an opportunity he dared not seize. How could he ask +for Masanath? + +"I went to pray for that which all Egyptians crave at this hour--the +succor of Egypt," he said, instead. + +Meneptah signed his scribe to follow him to a seat near by. + +"Why may I not require of thee the services of a higher minister?" he +began, after he had seated himself. "Never hast thou failed me, and I +can not say so much of the great nobles above thee. Serve me well in +this, Hotep, and thou mayest take the place of some one of these." + +"Let me but serve thee," the scribe returned placidly; "that is reward +in itself." + +"Thou knowest," the king began, plunging into the heart of the +question, "that I yielded to these ravening wolves, Mesu and Aaron. I +have consented to release the Israelites. But other thought hath come +to me in the night. Thou knowest that no evil hath befallen the land +of Goshen. Har-hat explaineth this strange thing by the location of +the strip. The Nile toucheth it not and rains fall there. Furthermore +the winds blow differently in that district, and withal the hand of +Rannu of the harvests hath sheltered it. It may be, but to me it +seemeth that the Hebrew sorcerer hath cast a protecting spell over the +spot. But whatever the cause, the race of churls and their riches have +escaped misfortune. Thinkest thou not, good Hotep, that, if they must +go, we may by right require their flocks of them to replenish the +pastures of Egypt?" + +Surely the Hathors were exploiting themselves this day. Another +opportunity for good and what would come of it? Hotep knew the man +with whom he dealt. Still it were a sin to slight even an unprofitable +chance that seemed to offer alleviation for Egypt. He would proceed +cautiously and do his best. + +"Be the little lamp trimmed never so brightly, O Son of Ptah, it may +not help the sun. Thou art monarch, I am thy slave. How can I mold +thee, my King?" + +"Others have swayed me, thou modest man." + +"In that hour when thou wast swayed, O Meneptah, another than thyself +ruled over Egypt." + +Meneptah looked in amazement at his scribe. He had never considered +the influence of Har-hat in that light, but, by the gods, it seemed +strangely correct. He straightened himself. + +"Be thou assured, Hotep, that I weigh right well whatever counsel mine +advisers offer me before I indorse it." + +Hotep bowed. "That I know. And for that reason do I hesitate to give +thee my little thoughts. It would hurt the man in me to see them +thrust aside." + +"Thou evadest," Meneptah contended smiling. + +"Wherefore?" + +"Because, O King, I should advise against thine inclinations." + +"Wherefore?" Meneptah demanded again, this time with some asperity. + +"We hold the Hebrews," was the undisturbed reply; "through destruction +and plague we have held them. They boast the calamities as sendings +from their God. Egypt's afflictions multiply; every resort hath failed +us. One is left--to free the slaves and test their boast." + +Meneptah's face had grown deprecatory. + +"Dost thou espouse the cause of thy nation's enemy?" he asked. + +"I espouse the cause of the oppressed, and which, now, is more +oppressed--Egypt or the Hebrew?" + +This was different sort of persuasion from that which the king had +heard since Har-hat took up the fan. The scribe was compelling him by +reason; the man's personality was not entering at all into the +argument. Meneptah's high brows knitted. He felt his feeble +resolution filter away; his inclination to hold the Hebrews stayed with +him, but the power to withstand Hotep's strong argument was not in him. + +"What wouldst thou have me do?" he asked querulously. + +"I am but a mouthpiece for thy realm; I counsel not for myself. The +strait of Egypt demands that thou set the Hebrew free, yield his goods +and his children to him, and be rid of him and his plagues for ever." + +Hotep spoke as if he were reciting a law from the books of the great +God Toth. His tone did not invite further contention. He had read the +king his duty, and it behooved the king to obey. A silence ensued, and +by the signs growing on Meneptah's face, Hotep predicted acquiescence. +It can not be said, however, that he noted them hopefully. Much time +would elapse in which much contrary persuasion was possible before +Israel could depart from Egypt. + +Rameses came out of the dusk at the end of the corridor. The king +raised himself eagerly and summoned his son. + +"Hither, my Rameses!" + +With suspense in his soul, Hotep saw the prince approach. Rameses had +never expressed himself upon the Hebrew question, and the scribe knew +full well that neither himself nor Har-hat, nor all the ministers, nor +heaven and earth could militate against the counsel of that grim young +tyrant. Meneptah spoke with much appeal in his voice. + +"Rameses, I need thee. Awake out of thy dream and help me. What shall +I do with the Hebrews?" + +"I have trusted to my father's sufficient wisdom to help him in his +strait, without advice of mine," was the indifferent reply. + +"Aye; but I crave thy counsel, now, my son." + +"Then, neither god nor devil could make me loose my grasp did I wish to +hold the Hebrews!" + +Hotep sighed, inaudibly, and was moved to depart, had not lack of the +king's permission made him stay. + +"But consider the losses to my realm," Meneptah made perfunctory +protest. The prince's full lip curled. + +"This is but a new method of warfare," he answered. "Instead of going +forth with thy foot-soldiers and thy chariots, thy javelins and thy +shields, thou sufferest siege within thy borders. Wilt thou fling up +thy hands and open thy gates to thine enemy, while yet there is plenty +within the realm and men to post its walls? Let it not be written down +against thee, O my father, that thou didst so. Losses to Egypt!" the +phrase was bitter with scorn. "Dost thou remember how many dead the +Incomparable Pharaoh left in Asia? How many perished of thirst in the +deserts and of cold in the mountains, and of pestilence in the marshes? +Ran not the rivers of the Orient with Egyptian blood, and where shall +the souls of those empty bodies dwell which rotted under the sun on the +great plains of the East? The Incomparable Pharaoh cast out the word +'surrender' from his tongue. Wilt thou restore it and use it first in +this short-lived conflict with a mongrel race of shepherds? Nay, if +thou dost give over now, it shall not be an injustice to thee if it +come to pass that thou shalt bow to a brickmaker as thy sovereign, +sacrifice to the Immaterial God and swear by the beard of Abraham!" + +Meneptah winced under the acrid reproach of his son. + +"It hath ever been mine intent to keep the Hebrews, but I would not act +unadvised," he explained apologetically. + +"Wherefore, then, these frequent consultations with the wolf from +Midian?" was the quick retort. "Thou art unskilled in the ways of war, +my father. The king who would conquer treats not with his enemy. Thou +dost risk the respect of thy realm for thee. Strengthen thy +fortifications and exhaust the cunning of thy besieger. And if he +invade thy lines again with insolence and threats, treat him to the +sword or the halter. If thou art a warrior, prove thy deserts to the +name. And if Egypt backs thee not in thy stand against the Hebrew, +then it is not the same Egypt that followed Rameses the Great to glory!" + +The king put up his hand. + +"Enough! They shall not go; they shall not go!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +THE CONSPIRACY + +One morning early in March Seti stood beside the parapet on the palace +of the king in Tanis. His eyes were fixed on the shimmering line of +the northern level, but he did not see it. Some one came with silent +footfall and laid a hand on his arm. + +He turned and looked into Ta-user's eyes. His face softened and he +took the hand between his own. + +"Alas! this day thou returnest into the Hak-heb," he said. + +She nodded. "Would I could take thee with me, but not yet, not yet. +Wait till thou art a little older." + +He sighed and looked away again. "What weighty things absorb my +prince?" she asked. "What especial labors is he planning?" + +His face clouded. "Dost thou mock me, Ta-user?" he returned. + +"Hadst thou no thought at all?" she persisted. + +"I merely pondered on mine own uselessness," he answered. + +"Fie!" + +"Nay, even thou must see it. I live on my father's bounty; I accept my +people's homage; I adore the gods. I bear no arms; I neither prepare +to reign nor expect to serve. I am a thing set above the healthy labor +of the world and below the cares of the exalted. I am nothing." + +"Fie! I say." + +Seti looked at her reproachfully. + +"Thou hast wealth," she began and paused. + +"Wherein doth that make me useful?" + +"Much can be done with gold. Is there none in need?" + +"None who asks has been denied. Yet what right have I to deal alms to +them from whom my riches come? If I yielded up everything, to my very +cloak, should I have done more than return to them what they have given +me? I should still be a penniless prince, more useless than ever." He +sat down on the broad lintel capping the parapet, but retained her hand. + +"Ta-user," he continued, as she opened her lips to speak, "what wouldst +thou have me do?" + +"I would have thee be useful." + +"I shall throw away my lordly trappings," he said, "and become a lifter +of the shadoof[1] this day." + +"Seti," she said sternly, putting his hand away, "with thy people +imperiled by the sorcery of a wizard, with thy realm desolated by the +plagues of his sending, canst thou, on whom I have built so much, thus +lightly consider thy uses and ignore the things set at thy very hand to +do?" + +The prince looked at her with not a little discomfiture showing on his +young face. But the interrogation was emphatic, and she awaited an +answer. + +"I have no weight with my father," he said soberly. "Thou knowest that +Egypt will never have peace until the Hebrews depart. But I can not +persuade my father to release them and I can not persuade the Israelite +to content himself to stay. Thou dost demand much of me if thou dost +demand of me the impossible." + +As much of contempt as it was wise to show glimmered in her eyes. + +"And thou art at thy wits' end?" she asked. + +"A little way to go. Help me, Ta-user. Bear with me." + +She moved closer to him and absently smoothed down the fine locks, +disordered by the wind. Presently she lifted his face and said with +sudden impulsiveness: + +"Dost, of a truth, believe everything that is told thee?" + +"Am I over-credulous?" he asked. + +"Thou art. Thou believest this Hebrew to be honest in his show of +interest in his people?" + +"I can not doubt him, Ta-user. One has but to see him to be convinced." + +"One has but to see him to know that he might be coaxed into +passiveness with that for which an Israelite would sell his +mummy--gold!" + +"Nay! Nay!" Seti exclaimed. "Thou dost wrong him! He is the soul of +misdirected zeal. His is an earnestness not to be frightened with +death nor abated with bribes." + +She laughed a cool little laugh. + +"Deliver to him but the price he names, and the Israelitish unrest will +settle like a swarm of smoked bees." + +"Ta-user, it is thou that art deceived," Seti remonstrated. "Even the +Pharaoh does not hesitate to assert that Mesu is terribly upright. Not +even he would dream of offering the wizard Hebrew a peace-tribute." + +Once again she laughed. "Mind me, I speak reverently of the divine +Meneptah, the Shedder of Light, but I do not marvel that he is no more +willing to deliver over to Mesu one color of gold than another." + +Seti looked at her with a puzzled expression. Gazing down into his +eyes, she said with sudden solemnity: + +"My Prince, may I give my life into thy hands?" + +Impulsively he pressed her hand to his lips. + +"The gods overtake me with their vengeance if I guard it not," he +exclaimed. + +She drew him from his place on the parapet and led him to a seat in a +corner near the double towers. There she sat, and he dropped down at +her feet. He crossed his arms over her lap and lifted his face to her. +For a moment she was silent, contemplating the young countenance. What +were the thoughts that came to her then? Did she applaud or rebuke +herself? Did she pity or despise him? + +Is there more of evil than of good wrought by the mind working silently? + +Seti was ripe to be plucked by treachery. His was the faith that is +insulted by a suggestion of wariness. + +"While I dwelt obscurely in the Hak-heb," she began, "I was much among +the partizans of Amon-meses. They are friends of the Pharaoh now, so +what I tell is dead sedition. But I heard it when it lived, and thou +knowest the penalty invited by him who listens to criticism of the +king. Attend me, then, for the story is short. + +"The history of Mesu is an old tale to thee. Thy noble grandsire's +first queen, Neferari Thermuthis, adopted the Hebrew, and when she died +he shared in the allotment of her treasure. But Mesu was an exile in +Midian at the time, and his share was left with Shaemus, then the heir, +to be given over to the foster-son when he should return. But Shaemus +died, and all thy father's older brothers, so the gracious Meneptah +came to wear the crown. To him fell the guardianship of the Hebrew's +treasure till what time he should return out of Midian. Mesu hath +returned. Hath thy father delivered to him his inheritance?" + +Seti's face flamed, but, before he could speak, she went on. "Not so; +not one copper weight. It lies untouched in the treasury. Thine +august sire does not use it, because he hath wealth more than he can +spend. But it is the Hebrew's, and if it were delivered into his hands +it would redeem Egypt. I know it. There, it is done. My life is in +thy hands." + +The prince looked at her with wide eyes, his cheeks flushed, his lips +silent. + +"Wouldst thou have proof?" she continued recklessly. "Seek out Hotep, +who hath been keeper of the records at Pithom and ask him." + +"Did he tell thee?" Seti demanded. + +"Nay; I learned it from another source, not in the palace." The prince +lapsed into silence, his eyes averted. Ta-user regarded him intently. +Suddenly he raised his head. + +"Dost thou know the amount of his share?" he asked. + +"It is but a moderate part of the queen's fortune, since each of the +king's children by his many women was included." + +Seti winced, for there was something dimly offensive in the calm way +she stated the bald fact. + +"It is not much, as princely dowers go," she added casually. + +"He shall have it," Seti said almost impatiently. "Out of mine own +wealth he shall have it--not as a bribe--he would not have it so--but +because it is his." + +She caught his hands to her breast and cried out in delight. + +"And I shall be thy lieutenant, and none shall know of it, save thee +and me." + +He smiled up at her. + +"Nay, there is danger in this," he said gently, "and I would not +imperil thee. Already thou hast overstepped safety for Egypt's sake +and mine. More than this I will not let thee do." + +An expression of panic swept over her face. He interpreted it as hurt. + +"Thou hast been my guide for so long, Ta-user. Let me choose this once +for thee." + +She pouted, and putting him away from her, arose and left him. He +followed her and took her hands. + +"A confederate thou must have," she complained; "and whom dost thou +trust more than Ta-user?" + +"It is not a matter of trust," he explained, "but of thine immunity +should the Hathors frown upon my plan." + +"It matters not," she protested. "Whom wilt thou trust and imperil +instead of Ta-user?" + +"Thou dost hurry me in my plan-making," he remonstrated mildly. +"Mayhap I shall choose Hotep." + +She flung up her head, her face the picture of dismay. + +"Nay, nay! not Hotep! Of all thy world, not Hotep!" she exclaimed. + +He lifted his brows in amazement. + +"Surely thou dost not question his fidelity--his power?" + +"Nay! but dost thou not guess what he will do? Thou child! Abet thee! +Nay! he would set his foot upon thy plan and foil thee at once with his +politic hand." + +"Hotep will obey as I command; that thou knowest," he said with dignity. + +"Thou wilt not reach the point of command with him," she vehemently +insisted. "He would catch thine intent ere thou hadst stated it and +would make thee aghast at thyself in a twinkling by his smooth +reasoning and vivid auguries. Nay, if thou art to have thy way in +this, I wash my hands of it. We are as good as undone." + +She turned away from him, but he followed her contritely. + +"I submit," he said helplessly. "Advise me, but I--nay, ask me not to +endanger thee, Ta-user." + +She shook her head and moved on. He advanced a step or two after her, +stopped, and wheeling about, resumed his place at the parapet. + +After a little pause she was beside him again. + +"Shall we forego this thing?" she asked. + +"Nay," he answered quietly. "I can achieve it without help." She drew +a breath as if to speak but held her peace. They stood in silence side +by side for a while. + +Presently she slipped between him and the parapet. + +"Hast thou not called me wise in thy time?" she asked. "I believed +thee, then." + +"I told thee a truth, but I might have added that thou art over-brave," +he said, catching her drift. + +"Listen, then, to me. Thou, in thy young credulity, seest in this only +justice to an enemy. I, in the wisdom of riper years and the +discernment bred of experience with knaves, see in it the redemption of +Egypt. If the heaviest penalty overtook us is it not a result worth +achieving at any cost? Seti, believe me; grant me my belief! It is +the one hope of thy father's kingdom. Shall it fail because thou wast +envious for my safety above Egypt's? I can aid thee to success. That +thou hast said. If thou failest, though thou dost attempt it alone, +dost thou dream that I could see thee punished without crying out, 'It +was I who urged him!' If thou art undone, likewise am I. If thou art +to succeed, wilt thou selfishly keep thy success to thyself?" + +She slipped her arm about his neck and pressed close to him. + +"Nay, Seti, thou dost overestimate the peril. The Hebrew will not +betray us, and who else will know of it? I shall make a journey into +Goshen, find Mesu and bid him meet thee at a certain place. There thou +shalt come at a certain time with the treasure, and the feat is done. +But if we fail--" she flung her head back and bewitched him with a +heavy eye--"will it be hard for me to persuade the king?" + +Seti contemplated her with bewilderment in his face. The youth and +innocence in his young soul revolted, but there was another element +that yielded and was pleased. + +"Have it thy way, Ta-user," he said, with hesitation in his words, +while he continued to gaze helplessly into her compelling eyes. + +She laughed and kissed him. "I will see thee again soon." Putting him +back from her, she descended the stairway. + +In the shadow at the foot she came upon two figures, walking close +together, the taller of the two bending over the smaller. The pair +started apart at sight of the princess. + +"A blessing on thy content, Ta-meri," the princess said. "And upon +thine, Nechutes." + +The cup-bearer bowed and rumbled his appreciation of her courtesy. + +"Dost thou leave us, Ta-user?" his wife asked. + +"Aye, I return to the Hak-heb. O, I am glad to go. Would I could +leave the same quiet here in Tanis that I hope to find in Nehapehu." + +"Aye, I would thou couldst. But is it not true, my Princess, that one +may make his own content even in the sorriest surroundings?" Nechutes +asked. + +"For himself, even so. But the very making of one's selfish content +may work havoc with the peace of another. That I have seen." + +"Aye," Nechutes responded uncomfortably, wondering if the princess +meant to confess her disappointment to them. + +"It makes me quarrel at the Hathors. The most of us deserve the ills +that overtake us. But he--alas--none but the good could sing as he +sang!" + + +The cup-bearer dropped his indifference immediately. + +"Ha! Whom dost thou mean?" he demanded. + +"Oh!" the princess exclaimed. "Perchance I give thee news." + +"If thou meanest Kenkenes, indeed thou dost give us news. What of him? +We know that he is dead. Is there anything further?" + +"Of a truth, dost thou not know? Nay, then, far be it from me to tell +thee--anything." She passed round them and started to go on. In a few +paces, Nechutes overtook her. + +"Give us thy meaning, Ta-user," he said earnestly. "Kenkenes was near +to me--to Ta-meri. What knowest thou?" + +"The court buzzes with it. Strange indeed that ye heard it not. It is +said, and of a truth well-nigh proved, that the heart of the singer +broke when Ta-meri chose thee, Nechutes, and that--that the disaster +which befell him may have been sought." + +Nechutes seized her arm, and Ta-meri cried out, + +"He sent Ta-meri to me," the cup-bearer said wrathfully. "Thy news +is--" + +"Alas! Nechutes," the princess said sorrowfully, "it was sacrifice. +He knew that Ta-meri loved thee and he nobly surrendered, but was the +hurt any less because he submitted?" + +Nechutes released her and turned away. Ta-meri covered her face with +her hands and followed him. He did not pause for her, and she had to +hasten her steps to keep up with him. The princess looked after them +for a space and went on. + +Straight through the corridors toward the royal apartments she went. +Her copper eyes had taken on a luminousness that was visible in the +dark. There was an elasticity in her step that spoke of exultation. + +The Hathors were indulging her beyond reason. + +A soldier of the royal guard paced outside the doorway of the king's +apartments. Ta-user flung him a smile and, passing him without a word +of leave-asking, smiled again and disappeared through the door. + +Meneptah, who sat alone, raised his head from the scroll he was +laboriously spelling. If he had meant to resent the intrusion, the +impulse died within him at the charming obeisance the princess made. + +As she rose at his sign, Har-hat entered. Ta-user came near to the +king, smiling triumphantly at the fan-bearer. + +"The gods sped my feet," she said, "and I am here first. Hold thy +peace, noble Har-hat. Mine is the first audience." + +Having reached the king's side, she dropped on her knees and folded her +hands on the arm of his chair. + +"A boon, O Shedder of Light! So much thou owest me. Behold, I came to +thee on the hope of thy promises. What have I won therefrom? Naught +save, perchance, the smiles of Egypt at my disappointment." + +Meneptah's face flushed. + +"Say on, O my kinswoman," he said, moving uncomfortably. + +"Kinswoman! And a year agone, I thought to hear, 'O my daughter.'" + +The color in the king's face deepened. + +"Wilt thou reproach me, Ta-user, for my son's wilfulness?" was his +tactless reply. + +Ta-user shot an amused glance at the discomfited countenance of Har-hat +and went on. + +"Nay, O my Sovereign. I do but wish to incline thine ear to me. Say +first thou wilt grant me my boon." + +He looked at her doubtfully, but she drew nearer and lifted her face to +his. + +"I do not ask for thy crown, or thy son, or for an army, or treasure, +or anything but that which thou wouldst gladly give me, because of thy +just and generous heart." + +The doubt faded out of his face. + +"Thou hast my word, Ta-user." + +"And for that I thank thee." She bent her head and touched her lips to +the hand lying nearest her. + +"Give me ear, then," she continued. "Thou hast among thy ministers a +noble genius, the murket, Mentu--" + +The king broke in with a dry smile. "Wouldst have him for a mate?" + +She shook her head till the emeralds pendent from the fillet on her +forehead clinked together. Nothing could have been more childlike than +the pleased smile on her face. + +"Nay, nay, he would not have me," she protested. "But he hath a son." + +Har-hat moved forward a pace. She noted the movement and playfully +waved him back. "Encroach not. This hour is mine." Har-hat's face +wore a dubious smile. + +"He hath a son," she repeated. + +"He had a son, but he is dead," the king answered. + +"Not so! He is in prison where thy counselor, the wicked, unfeeling, +jealous, rapacious Har-hat hath entombed him!" + +Har-hat sprang forward as the king lifted an amazed and angry face. + +"Back!" she cried, motioning at him with her full arm. "It is time the +Hathors overtook thee, thou ineffable knave!" + +"I protest!" the fan-bearer cried, losing his temper. + +"Enough of this play," Meneptah said sternly. "Go on with thy tale, +Ta-user. I would know the truth of this." + +"Thou wilt not learn it from the princess," Har-hat exclaimed. + +"Ah!" Ta-user ejaculated, a world of innocence, surprise and wounded +feeling in the word. + +"Thy words do not become thee, Har-hat," Meneptah said. The fan-bearer +closed his lips and gazed fixedly at the princess. + +She drooped her head and went on in a voice low with hurt. + +"The gods judge me if my every word is not true! Har-hat imprisoned +him because the gallant young man loved the maiden whom Har-hat would +have taken for his harem." + +Meneptah's face blazed. "Go on," he said sharply. + +"The fan-bearer had some little right on his side, for the young man +had committed sacrilege in carving a statue, and had stolen the maiden +away and hidden her when Har-hat would have taken her. The maiden is +an Israelite, and her hiding-place is known to this day only by herself +and her unhappy lover. Now comes thy villainy, O thou short of +temper," she continued, looking at the fan-bearer. + +"Thy father, O Shedder of Light, the Incomparable Pharaoh who reigns in +Osiris, gave Mentu a signet--" + +The king interrupted. "I know of that. Go on." + +"When Kenkenes was overtaken and thrust into prison he sent this signet +to thee, O my Sovereign, with a petition for his release and for the +maiden's freedom. The writing and the signet came into Har-hat's hands +and he ignored them, though the signet commanded him in the name of the +holy One." Her voice lowered with awe and dismay at his unregeneracy. +"Kenkenes is still in prison." + +"Now, by the gods, Har-hat!" Meneptah exclaimed angrily. "I would not +have dreamed such baseness in thee!" + +The fan-bearer was stupefied with wrath and astonishment. Words +absolutely refused to come to him. Ta-user accused him with the wide +eyes of fearless righteousness. Presently she went on: + +"Already hath he languished eight months in prison. His offense +against the gods and against the laws of the land hath been expiated. +I would have thee set him free now, O Meneptah, that he may return to +his love and comfort her." + +Meneptah reached for the reed pen. + +"Hold!" cried Har-hat. + +"Thou dost forget thyself, good Har-hat," the princess said with +dignity. "Thou speakest with thy sovereign." + +"But I will be heard!" he exclaimed violently. "Hear me! I pray thee, +Son of Ptah!" + +Meneptah removed the wetted pen and waited. + +"Thou didst give the maiden to me thyself!" he began precipitately. +"Thy document of gift I have yet. He stole her, hid her away, +committed sacrilege and abused two of my servants nigh unto death when +they sought for her. Hath he any more right to her than I? Art thou +assured that he hath an honorable purpose in mind for her? She is +comely and well instructed in service, and I would have put her in my +daughter's train, even as the Hebrew Miriam was lady-in-waiting to +Neferari Thermuthis. If thou dost examine the records of the petitions +to thee thou wilt find that I asked her expressly for household +service. It is false that I had any other purpose in mind. + +"As to the signet," he continued breathlessly, "there is no word upon +it concerning the palliation of a triple crime! Shall we invoke the +king in the blameless name of the holy One, and demand forgiveness in +the name of Him who forgiveth no sin? Furthermore, thou didst give the +writing into my hands, and in obedience to thy command, I acted as I +thought best. My purposes have been wilfully distorted!" + +Meneptah frowned with perplexity. But while he pondered, Ta-user drew +near to him and said to him very softly: + +"If his words be true, O my Sovereign, one lovely Israelite is as +serviceable as another. The young man loves this maiden. Doubt it +not! He is a worthy off-spring of that noble sire, Mentu. If he +offended, he hath suffered sufficiently. Let him go, I pray thee." + +"It is my word against her surmises, O Meneptah," Har-hat insisted. + +The king frowned more and stroked his cheek. + +"Thine anger should be abated by this time, Har-hat," he said feebly. + +"His rebellion is not yet broken. I have not the slave yet," the +fan-bearer retorted. + +"Mayhap he is ready to surrender her now." + +"Not so!" the princess put in. "He hath endured eight months. If it +were eight hundred years his silence would be the same. It is proof of +my boast that he loves her. No man who would comfort his flesh alone +would suffer such lengths of mortification of flesh! Let him go, my +King, and give the clean-souled fan-bearer another Israelite for his +daughter." + +"Why camest thou not sooner with this to the king?" Har-hat demanded. + +"I have but this moment learned of it, and I could not leave the court +without one last act for the good of the oppressed," she replied. + +"Have it thy way, Ta-user. Come to me in an hour," Meneptah began. + +"Nay, write it now." + +"Thou art insistent." + +"Thou didst promise," she whispered, her face so close to his that the +light from the facets of her emeralds turned on his cheek. + +He took up his pen and wrote. + +"Now promise that the signet shall go back to Mentu," she continued. + +"As thou wilt, Ta-user," the king replied. + +She caught up the roll, hesitated for a moment, and then kissed his +cheek deliberately and was gone. + +A moment later Har-hat overtook her in the hall. + +"Hyena!" he exclaimed. "What is thy game?" + +She laughed and shook the scroll in his face. + +"It is my turn at the pawns now. Thou didst play between me and the +crown. Now I shall harass thee for the joy of it. Thinkest thou I +cared aught for the dreamer and his loves? Bah! I heard this tale +eight months agone while I had naught to do but eavesdrop. Nay, it was +but my one chance to vex thee." + +Again she laughed and ran away to the queen's apartments. + +"I am come to bid thee farewell," she said, kneeling before the pale +little woman who loved the king. The princess put up her face to be +kissed. + +"Not my lips!" she cried warningly. "They yet tingle with the kiss of +Meneptah, thy husband. I would not have the ecstasy spoiled by +another's touch." + +The queen flushed and kissed the cheek. + +"Farewell, and peace go with thee," she said quietly. + +The princess retained her composure until she reentered the hall. +There she flung her arms above her head and laughed silently. + +"Of a truth, I take peace with me, and I leave discord behind!" + + + +[1] Shadoof--a pole with a bucket attached, like the old well-sweep, +used by rustics to dip water from the Nile. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +RACHEL'S REFUGE + +Rachel stood by the parapet on the top of the Memphian house of +Har-hat. About her were no evidences of her former serfdom. She wore +an ample robe of white linen, with blue selvages heavily fringed. +About her neck was the collar of gold. The costume was distinctly +Israelitish, elaborated somewhat at the suggestion of Masanath, to whom +Rachel's golden beauty was a never-lessening wonder. Compared to the +tiny gorgeous lady, Rachel was as a tall lily to a mimosa. + +Masanath was comfortably pillowed on cushions, close to the Israelite. +The rose-leaf flush on her little face was subdued and her dark eyes +were larger than usual. The physical discomforts of the plagues had +overtaken her; and Rachel, the only one of all the household who had +passed unscathed through the troublous time, had been so tender a nurse +that Masanath recovered with reluctance. + +This was the Egyptian's first day on the housetop, and she was not +happy. The great pots of glazed earthenware, each a small garden in +size, were filled with baked earth. The locusts had taken her flowers. +In the park below the grass was gone and the palm trees were +shadowless. Her chariot horses had died in the stables; her pets had +drooped and perished; her birds were missing one morning, and Rachel +said they had flown to Goshen, where there were grain and grasses. +Furthermore, the year of freedom had almost expired and she began to +anticipate sorrowfully. + +The period of the Israelite's residence with Masanath had been +uneventful save for those grim, momentous days of plague and loss. +Deborah had survived the removal to comfort in Memphis only a month. +The brutal injuries inflicted by the servants of Har-hat had been too +severe for her age-enfeebled frame to repair. So she died, blessing +the two young girls who had attended her, and promising peace and +happiness to come. Then they laid her in a new tomb cut in the rock +face of the Libyan hills and wrote on her sarcophagus: + +"She departed out of the land of Mizraim before her people." + +And this was prophecy. + +Thus was Rachel left, but for Masanath, entirely alone. None of the +afflictions had overtaken her. A mysterious Providence shielded her. +Anubis, which she formally claimed as hers, was the only one of the +numerous dumb dwellers in the fan-bearer's house that had escaped. And +of him there is something to be told. + +Shortly after the arrival of the Israelites in Memphis, Anubis +disappeared for days. + +"He is gone to visit the murket," Masanath explained. + +One noon Rachel, resting on the housetop with her hostess, saw him +leisurely returning, by starts of interest and recollection. Behind +him, walking cautiously, was a man. + +"Anubis returneth," Rachel said, sitting up. + +Masanath raised herself and looked. + +"Imhotep[1] plagues mine eyes, or that is the murket following him," +she exclaimed. + +Immediately Rachel began to tremble and, sinking back on her cushions, +hid her face. Masanath continued to watch the approaching man. + +"If he comes shall I send for thee?" she asked in a half-whisper. + +The Israelite shook her head. "Only if he asks for me," she answered. + +"A pest on the creature!" Masanath exclaimed impatiently after a little +silence. "He is torturing the man! Hath he forgot the place?" + +She leaned over the parapet and called the ape. The murket looked up. + +"Anubis is my guest, noble Mentu," she replied. "Wilt thou not come up +with him?" + +The murket looked at her a moment before he answered. + +"Nay, I thank thee, my Lady. I left the noonday meal that I might be +led at the creature's will. He is restless since my son is gone." + +Every word of the murket's fell plainly on Rachel's ears. The tones +were those of Kenkenes, grown older. The statement came to her as a +call upon her knowledge of the young artist's whereabouts. + +"Tell him--tell him--" she whispered desperately. + +"What?" asked Masanath, turning about. + +"Tell him where Kenkenes went!" + +The Egyptian leaned over the parapet. "Fie! he is gone!" she said. +"Nay, but I shall catch him;" and flying down through the house, out +into the narrow passage, she overtook the murket. + +This is what she told Rachel when she returned: + +"I said to him: 'My Lord, I know where Kenkenes went.' And he said: +'Of a truth?' in the calmest way. 'Aye,' said I. 'It hath come to +mine ears that he went to Tape,' 'That have I known for long,' he +answered, after he had looked at me till I wished I were away. 'That +have I known for long, and why he went and why he came not back,' and +having said, he smoothed my hair and told me I was not much like my +father, and departed without another word. To my mind he hath +conducted himself most strangely. I doubt not he knows more than you +or I, Rachel." + +To Masanath's dismay the Israelite flung herself face down on the rugs +and wept. "He is not dead; he is not dead," she cried. + +The collapse of a composure so strong and bridled filled Masanath with +consternation. Had Rachel's spirit been of weaker fiber the Egyptian's +own forceful individuality would have longed to sustain it, but when it +broke in its strength she knew that here was a stress of emotion too +deep for her to soothe. + +"Then if he is not dead," she said, searching for something to say, +"why weepest thou?" + +"Alas! seest thou not, Masanath? He hath not returned to me; his +father knows his story, and if he be not dead how shall I explain his +absence save that he hath forgotten or repented?" + +"Not so!" Masanath declared. "He is the soul of honor, and there is a +mystery in this that the gods may explain in time. Comfort thee, +Rachel, for there stirreth a hope in me." Then with the utmost tact +she told the story of the finding of Kenkenes' boat and the theory +accepted in Memphis. + +"I can offer thee hope," she concluded, "but I can not even guess what +should keep him so long. Of this be assured, however, he did not +desert thee, Rachel." + +Enigmatical as it was, the incident was comforting to Rachel. + +So the Nile rose and subsided, the winter came and went, and now it was +near the middle of March, Masanath forgot Kenkenes and remembered her +own sorrow now that its consummation was surely approaching. During +the hours that darkened gradually Rachel was to her an ever-responsive +comforter. Even in the dead of night, if the weight of her care +burdened her dreams so that she stirred or murmured, she was instantly +soothed till she slept again. Usually the day did not harass her with +oppression, but if she grew suddenly afraid, Rachel was at her side to +comfort her--never urging, either to rebellion or submission, but ever +offering hope. + +So the little Egyptian came to love the Israelite with the love that +demands rather than gives--the love of a child for the mother, of the +benefited for the benefactor. Gradually Rachel lost sight of her own +trouble in her devotion to Masanath. She had no time for her own +thoughts. Each passing day brought the Egyptian's martyrdom nearer, +and Rachel's uses hourly increased. + +This day Masanath, who had been ill, was unusually downcast. + +"It may be," she said with more cheer in her tones than had been in her +previous remarks, "that I shall die before they can wed me to Rameses." + +"Nay, why not say that the Lord God will interfere before that time?" + +"Evil and power have joined hands against me, and even the gods are +helpless against such collusion," Masanath answered drearily. + +"The sorrows of Egypt are not yet at an end; mayhap the hand of the God +of Israel will overtake the prince." + +"Thy God is afflicting, not helping; He will not spare me." + +"The hand of the Lord is lifted against Egypt. Will He bless the land, +then, with such a queen as thou wouldst be?" + +"Nay, but thine is a strange God! Mark thou, I doubt Him not! But ai! +I should face Him for ever in sackcloth and ashes lest He smite me for +smiling and living my life without care." + +"Hath an ill befallen Israel?" + +"If thou art Israel, nay! Thou hast flourished in this dread time like +a palm by a deep well." + +"So he prospereth all his chosen." + +Masanath shook her head and looked away. From the stairway Nan +approached. + +"Unas hath come from Tanis, my Lady," she said with suppressed +excitement. Masanath sat up, trembling. + +"Isis grant he hath not come to take thee to marriage," the waiting +woman breathed. Rachel laid an inquiring hand on the little Egyptian's +arm. + +"My father's courier," she explained. "Let him come up," she continued +to Nari. The waiting woman bowed and left her. + +Rachel arose and took a place on the farther side of the hypostyle, +with the screens of matting between her and Masanath. She was still in +hiding. + +The fat servitor came up presently. + +"The gracious gods have had thee under their sheltering wings during +these troublous times," he said, bowing. "It is worth the trip from +Tanis to look upon thee." + +"Thy words are fair, Unas. How is it with my father?" Masanath asked +with stiff lips. + +"The gods are good to the Pharaoh. They permit the wise Har-hat to +continue in health to render service to his sovereign." + +Masanath, dreading the news, asked after it at once. Men have killed +themselves for fear of death. + +"Thou hast come to conduct me to court?" + +"That is the gracious will of my master." + +Masanath half rose from her seat. "When?" she asked almost inaudibly. + +"In twenty days; no more. I have a mission to perform and shall go +hence immediately. But I shall return in twenty days, never fear, my +Lady." + +Masanath saw that he mocked her. Her wrath was an effective +counter-irritant for her trouble. She was calm again. + +"Then, if thy message is delivered, go!" + +He backed out and descended the stairway. + +When she was sure he was gone she flung herself, in a paroxysm of wild +grief and despair, face down on her cushions. At that moment a cold +hand caught her arm. She looked up and saw Rachel. All the blue had +gone from the Israelite's eyes, leaving them black with dreadful +conviction. The color had receded from her cheeks and her figure was +rigid. + +"Who was that man?" she demanded in a voice low with concentrated +emotion. + +"Unas, my father's man. What is amiss, Rachel?" + +The Israelite stood for a moment as though she permitted the +intelligence to assemble all the further facts that it entailed. Then +she turned away and walked swiftly toward the well of the stair. + +"Rachel! Thou--what--thou hast not answered me," Masanath called. + +"There is naught to be said. I--it were best that I go to my people +now, since thou goest to marriage," was the unready reply. + +"Thou wilt return to thy people! Rachel! Nay, nay I Thou art all I +have. Come back! Come back!" Masanath cried, running after her. + +Rachel hesitated, trembling with a multitude of emotions. + +"It were better I should go," she insisted, trying to escape Masanath's +clasp. "If I go now I can reach my people and be hidden safely." + +The little Egyptian flung herself upon the Israelite, weeping. + +"Art thou, too, deserting me--thou, who art the last to befriend me? +What have I done that thou shouldst desert me?" + +"Naught! Naught! Thou dear unfortunate!" was the passionate reply. +"But I must go! I must!" + +"Thou must flee from sure safety to only possible security!" Masanath +demanded through her tears. "If I must wed this terrible prince, I +shall put my misery to some use. I shall ask thy liberty at his hands +and thou shalt live with me for ever, my one comfort, my one support." + +"But Israel departeth shortly--" + +"Thou shalt not go," Masanath declared hysterically. "I will not +suffer thee! The doors shall be barred against thy departure!" + +Rachel turned her head away and pushed back her hair. Her plight was +desperate. Meanwhile Masanath went on. + +"It is not like thee, Rachel, to desert me! I had not dreamed thee so +selfish--so cruel!" + +"Sister!" Rachel cried, "thou torturest me!" On a sudden Masanath +raised her head and gazed at the Israelite. + +"What possessed thee to go?" she demanded. "Is it Rameses who hath +beset thee?" + +Rachel shook her head and avoided Masanath's eye. + +"Tell me," the Egyptian insisted. "There is mystery in this. What had +my father's man to do with thy hasty resolution to depart?" + +There was no answer. Masanath put the Israelite back from her a little +and repeated her question. + +"I can not tell thee," Rachel responded slowly. + +Silence fell, and Masanath spoke at last, in a decided voice. + +"Thou art within my house, and so under my command. Thou shalt not +leave me! I have said!" She turned to go back to her cushions. +Rachel followed her. + +"I pray thee, Masanath--" + +"Hold thy peace. Let us have no more of this." + +Rachel grew paler, and she clasped her hands as though praying for +fortitude. At last she broke out: + +"Masanath! Masanath! That man--that Unas--attended the noble who +halted me on the road to the Nile, that morning; he was the one sent +back to Memphis for the document of gift; he pursued me into the hills. +He is the servant of the man who follows me!" + +The Egyptian recoiled as though she had been struck. + +"Nay, nay," she cried, throwing up her hands as though to ward off the +conviction. "Not my father! Not he! Thou art wrong, Rachel!" + +"Would to the Lord God that I were, my sister! But I am not mistaken +in that face. He was the one that disputed with Kenkenes--was the one +Kenkenes choked. Never was there another man with such a voice, such a +face, such a figure! It is he!" + +Masanath wrung her hands. + +"Tell it over again. Describe the noble to me." + +"He was third in the procession and drove black horses--" + +"Holy Mother Isis! his horses were black. The first two would have +been the princes of the realm, the next the fan-bearer. Nay, I dare +not hope that it is not true. Since he would barter his own daughter +for a high place, he would not hesitate to take by force the daughter +of another. O Mother of Sorrows, hide me! my father! my father!" she +wailed. + +Under the combined weight of her griefs, she dropped on the carpeted +pavement and wept without control. All of Rachel's fear and horror +were swept away in a wave of compunction and pity. She lifted the +little Egyptian back upon her cushions again and, kneeling beside her, +took the bowed head against her heart. Her hair fell forward and +framed the two sorrowing faces in a shower of gold. + +"Lo! I have been a guest under thy roof and at thy board, a pensioner +upon thy cheer, and now, even while my heart was full of gratitude, +have I encroached upon thy happiness and broken thine overburdened +heart. Forgive me, Masanath. Let me not come between thee and thy +father, sister! Let me return to my people, for Israel shortly goeth +forth. Doubt it not. Then shall I be out of his reach, and the Lord +will not lay up the sin against him. Furthermore, dost thou not +remember Deborah's words while the spirit of prophecy was upon her? +Promised she not peace for us, and happiness and long tranquillity to +follow these days of sorrow? Do thou have faith, Masanath. Cease not +to hope, for the forces of evil have never yet triumphed wholly." + +"Nay, but how shall that restore my pride in my father?" Masanath +sobbed. "How shall I ever think of him without the bitterness of +shame? What must the world think of him--of me? Now I know what the +murket meant. He knew, and Kenkenes knew and all-- Alas! alas!" she +broke forth in fresh grief, "and Hotep knows!" + +Rachel could say no more, for in this sorrow no comfort could avail. + +She stroked the little Egyptian's hair and let the wounded heart soothe +itself. + +Presently Masanath's mind wandered from the new villainy of her father +to the memory of the older offense and she wept afresh. + +"If thou goest, Rachel, there is none left to comfort me," she mourned. +"I am alone--desolate, and the powers of Egypt are arrayed against me!" +Rachel was hearing her own plight given expression. She put aside any +thought of herself and applied herself to Masanath's need. + +"Nay, there is Hotep," she whispered. "He loves thee, and if there is +aught in prophecy, he will comfort thee when I am gone." + +"But thou shalt not go," Masanath cried. "Stay with me, Rachel." + +"Thy father's servant returneth in twenty days. As I have said, if I +go now, I can reach my people and be hidden safely." + +The Egyptian held fast to the Israelite and wept. + +"Nay, Rachel. Stay with me. Thou art all I have!" + +Rachel turned her head and gazed toward the south. Across the +housetops, the far-off sickle of the Nile curved into a crevice between +the hills and disappeared. Somewhere beyond that blue and broken +sky-line her last claim to Egypt had been lost. Why should she stay +when Kenkenes was gone? Meanwhile Masanath went on pleading. + +If she departed, the next day's sun might dawn upon him in Memphis, +searching and sorrowing because he found her not. The hour of +separation might be delayed for twenty days--in that time he might come. + +"I will stay till my people go--if they depart within twenty days," +Rachel made answer. "But I must be gone ere thy father's servant +returns." + +Masanath rebelled, sobbing. + +"Nay, weep not. The hour is distant. In that time, since these are +days of miracles, thy sorrows and mine may have faded like a mist. +Come, no more. Let us bide the workings of the good God." + + + +[1] Imhotep--The physician-god. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII + +BACK TO MEMPHIS + +The valley in which Thebes Diospolis was situated was wide and the +overflow of the Nile did not reach the arable uplands near the Arabian +hills. Three thousand years before, Menes had established a system of +irrigation which had added hundreds of square miles to the agricultural +area of Egypt, and every monarch after him had unfailingly preserved +the institution. From Syene to Pelusium the country was ramified with +canals, and vast sums and great labor were expended yearly upon their +keeping. + +Since the work was heavy and the demand for it constant, it became a +punitive part of each nome's administration. Therefore, the convicts +whose misdeeds were too serious to be punished adequately by the +bastinado or the fine, and yet not grave enough to merit a sentence to +the quarries or the mines, were sent to the canals. + +So here in the canals of the eastern Thebaid, was Kenkenes, a prisoner +known only by a number. His fellows were unjust public weighers, +usurers, rioters, habitual tax-evaders, broken debtors, forgers and +housebreakers. + +The season of toil had been unusually severe. The native convicts had +more to endure than the lash, the bitter fare, the terrible sun by day, +and a bed of dust by night, for the afflictions that befell all Egypt +were theirs also. The strange prisoner among them suffered these +things and had further the drawback of his own physical strength to +combat. The plagues overcame the weaker convicts and decimated the +number of laborers, so Kenkenes was put, alone, to the work that two +men had done before. + +However, the accumulation of toil came upon him gradually and his +supple frame toughened as the demand upon it increased. Nor was he +sensible of pain or great weariness, for his mind was far away from the +sun-heated desert of the eastern Thebaid. He spoke seldom, and held +himself aloof from his fellow prisoners. He regarded his taskmasters +as if they were written authority no more animate than watered scrolls +of papyrus. No one doubted from the beginning that he was high-born, +and this mark of a great fall might have exposed him to abuse; but his +great strength and unusual deportment did not invite mistreatment. In +short, he was looked upon as mildly mad. + +When Kenkenes had rejected the gods, hope, sundered from faith, groped +wildly and desperately. In his rare moments of cheer he could not +anticipate freedom without trusting to something, and in his +misanthropy his doubt had placed no limit on its scope, questioning the +honor of king or slave. In these better moments he wanted to believe +in something. + +So constantly had his sorrows attended him that he had come to dread +the night, when there was neither event nor labor to interrupt their +dominance over his mind. He caught eagerly at any less troublous +problem that might suggest itself, for he felt that he had been +conquered by his plight. + +As he lay by night, apart from the rest of the prisoners, he gazed at +one glittering star that stood in the north. About it were +scintillating clusters, single stars and faint streaks of +never-dissipated mists. Night after night that one brilliant point had +remained unmoved in its steady gaze from the uppermost, but the +clusters rotated about it; the single stars were westward moving; the +mists shifted. And a question began to trouble him: What hand had +marshaled the stars? Seb,[1] whom Toth had supplanted? Osiris, whom +Set destroyed? The young man put them aside. They were feeble. +Nothing so weak had created the mighty hosts of heaven. So he began to +weigh the question. + +What hand had marshaled the stars? An accident? Since man must +worship something supernal, what more tremendous than the cataclysm, if +such it were, that evolved the stars. Had the same or a series of such +events brought forth the earth and man? Was the accident continuously +attendant? Did it spread the Nile over Egypt and call it again within +its banks every year? Did it clothe the fields and bring them to +harvest every revolution of the sun? Did it hang the moon like a +sickle in the west or lift it over the Arabian hills like a bubble of +silver every eight and twenty days? + +If it were omnipotent, infinite and omnipresent, could it be an +accident? If it were, why not worship it and call it God? + +The reasoning led him again in the direction of the gods, but he saw no +reason for a multiplicity of deities. Each member of the Egyptian +Pantheon presided over some special field of human interest or human +environment. To him, who had lived next to nature till her study had +become a worship, there were no flaws in her chronology, no +shortcomings or plethora. The earth responded to the skies; the waters +were in harmony with the earth, the harvests with all. There was unity +in the control over the universe and the hand that was powerful enough +to swing the moon was mighty enough to flood the Nile, was tender +enough to nourish the harvests, was wise enough to govern men. Where, +then, was any need of a superfluity of powers? + +But behold, something had thrust a dread hand between the tender +ministrations of this other Thing and the benefits to men. By this +time it had reached the remotenesses of Egypt that it was the God of +the Hebrews. The young man arrived at this alternative in his +reasoning: There was a minister of good and another of evil--two powers +presiding over the earth,--or,--the sole minister was offended and had +deserted its charge, or had loosed upon Egypt the evil at its command. +Here Kenkenes paused. He could not arrive at any conclusion on the +matter or convince himself that he had not reasoned well. + +Night after night, he fell asleep upon his ponderings, but they +returned to him with fresh food for thought after every sunset. The +reconstruction of something worshipful was more fascinating than had +been the demolition of the gods. It took many a night's meditation for +the evolution of any fixed idea from the bewildering convection of +thought. And at last he had concluded only that there was one +thing--Power--Purpose, which was greater than man. + +This was not a great achievement. He had simply permitted the +universal, indefinable claim to piety, inherent in every reasoning +thing, to assert itself. + +Great and sincere and beyond expression was his amazement and his joy +when a taskmaster called him from the canal-bed one day and informed +him that he was free. + +The order was shown him at his request, and the name of the Princess +Ta-user as his champion filled him with puzzlement. State news +filtered slowly down even to the level he had occupied for the past +eight months. He had heard that it was Masanath whom the Hathors had +destined to wear the crown of queen to Rameses; the convicts had known +of the supremacy of Har-hat. He could not understand how it came that +Ta-user, lately discarded, could prevail upon the crown prince to +persuade Meneptah, or could herself persuade the king to the overthrow +of the fan-bearer's wishes in the matter. Furthermore, why should the +princess have taken up his cause? But he did not tarry while he +pondered. + +His raiment and his money, conscientiously preserved for him by the +authorities, had been sent to him, and a little way outside the camp he +stepped from the lowest to his rightful rank, swifter than he had +descended from it. Covering his sun-burnt shoulders with his robes, +assuming the circlet once again, he went toward the distant city of +Thebes, once more in spirit and dress the son of the royal murket. + +At the heavy-walled prison across the Nile he asked after the signet. +It had not been returned with the writing. Neither was there any word +to him concerning his prayer to Pharaoh for the liberty of Rachel. It +began to dawn on him that he had been released only after he had been +sufficiently punished; that he had failed in the most vital aims of his +mission; that the signet, having been found, seemed now to be lost +irretrievably. For a space his relief at his freedom was overshadowed +by chagrin, but after a little he recovered himself. "At least I am +free to care for her, now," he reflected. + +Just as he emerged from the imposing doorway of the house of the +governor of police, he was jostled by a half-grown boy. To Kenkenes, +it seemed that the youth had been on the point of entering, but instead +he apologized inaudibly and walked away. + +A great rush of impatience, suspense, eagerness and heart-hunger fell +on the young artist the instant he knew his footsteps were turned +toward Memphis and Rachel. The six days that must intervene between +the present time and the moment he entered the old capital seemed +insufferable. Never did a lover so fume against the inexorable +deliberation of time and the obstinate length of distance. The +preliminaries to departure seemed to accumulate and lengthen--and +lessen in importance. Haste consumed him. Under a momentary impulse, +with all seriousness he began to consider his own fleetness of foot as +more expedient than travel by boat. But he put the thought aside, and +summoning as much patience as was possible, set about with all speed +preparing to depart. + +Thebes had not awakened from the coma of horror into which it had +lapsed during the great plagues. It was Kenkenes' first visit to the +city since he had left it for the desert, eight months before. Now, +the change in the great capital of the south impressed itself upon him, +in spite of his haste and his all-absorbing thought of Memphis. The +activities of life seemed to be suspended. The call to prayers could +be heard hourly from the great gongs of the temple at Karnak, when in +happier days the sound had been lost in the city's noises within the +very shadow of the pylons. He could hear strains of music in religious +processions, when the wind was fair, but he missed the acclaim of the +populace. Besides these sounds, silence had settled over Thebes. +Booths were closed in many instances; the streets, which ordinarily +were quiet, were now deserted; there were no carpets swinging from +balconies and housetops, and the citizens he saw were sober of +countenance and of garb. So few, indeed, he met, that he noted each +passer-by as an event. Once, some distance away from him, he saw again +the youth whom he had met in the doorway of the prison. + +At a caterer's he purchased supplies for a day's journey and looked +about him for a carrier. Catching the boy's eye, he beckoned him, but +the youth turned on his heel and disappeared. The son of the merchant +offering himself, Kenkenes continued rapidly toward the river where he +engaged a vessel to take him to Memphis. + +He roused the boatmen into immediate activity by promises of reward for +every mile gained over the average day's journey. Their passenger and +cargo shipped, the men fell to their oars and the craft shot out of the +still waters by the landings into midstream and turned toward the north. + +As they cleared, the private passage boat belonging to a nobleman swept +up near to them and crossing their track took the same direction +several hundred yards nearer the Libyan shore. Kenkenes noted that it +was a bari of elegant pattern, deep draft and more numerously manned +than his. He noted further that one of the boat's crew was the youth +he had met thrice in a short space at Thebes. + +"Small wonder that he was not willing to serve me," he commented to +himself. + +If he observed the companion boat during the next five days it was to +remark that since his own vessel kept sturdily alongside one of +superior rowing force his men were of a surety earning the promised +reward. When they entered the long straight stretches of the Middle +country the elegant stranger dropped behind and attended Kenkenes and +his crew more distantly thereafter. + +Except for these few occasions, Kenkenes had no thought of his +surroundings. He stood in the prow and looked down the shimmering +width of river, in the direction his heart had taken long before him. +And when the white cliffs that proved him close to Memphis came +shouldering up from the northern horizon, he had forgotten the stranger +in the eager, trembling anticipations that possessed him. + + + +[1] Seb--The Egyptian Chronos. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV + +NIGHT + +On the morning of the eighteenth day, immediately after sunrise, Rachel +came to the curtains over Masanath's door, and put them aside. + +Within, she saw her hostess yet in her bed-gown, her hair disordered +and her tiny feet bare. She stood before a shrine of silver, the +statue of Isis in turquoise displayed therein, and an offering of +pressed dates before it. But there was no sign of devotion or humility +in the attitude of the Egyptian. One plump arm was stretched toward +the image and the hand was tightly clenched. Neither was there any +reverence in her voice. + +Rachel dropped the curtain and waited. The words came distinctly +through the linen hangings. + +"Thou false one![1] thou ingrate! Is it for this that every day I have +sent two fat ducks to the altar in thy name? Is it that I must be +separated from my beloved and wedded to the man I hate, that I have +prayed to thee day and night? Who hath been more faithful to thee and +whom hast thou served more cruelly? Mark thou! If thou darest to +cause this thing to come to pass, night nor day shall I rest until I +have found the bones of Osiris and scattered them to the four winds of +heaven! So carefully shall I hide them, so widely shall I scatter +them, that no help of Nepthys, Toth or Anubis shall let thee gather +them up again! Aye, I will do it, though I die in the doing and remain +unburied, I swear by Set! Remember thou!" + +Rachel went softly away. + +After a time she returned. She had covered her white dress with a +mantle of brown linen and over her head she wore a wimple of the same +material. Her hair had been coiled and secured with a bodkin. When +she put her hand under the wimple and drew it across her mouth, only +her fair skin and blue eyes distinguished her from any other Egyptian +lady dressed for a long journey. + +She lifted the curtains and entered, and it was long before she came +forth again. Then her eyes were hidden and her head bowed, for she had +bidden farewell to Masanath. She was returning to Goshen. + +In the street before the house she entered her litter and with Pepi +walking beside her went to the Nile. And there they were joined by +Anubis. He had been absent for days, so his greeting was extravagant, +his loyalty inalienable. He entered the bari Pepi had loaded with +Rachel's belongings, and would not be coaxed or menaced into +disembarking. + +"Nay, let him come," Rachel said at last. "Thou canst set him on the +shore opposite the tomb. He will leave us willingly there." + +So they pushed away. + +Rachel wrapped her wimple about her face and removed it once only to +gaze at the quarries of Masaarah. They were deserted. Months before, +directly after the affliction of the Nile, the Israelites had been +returned to Goshen. + +After the bari had passed below the stone wharf, Rachel covered herself +and neither spoke nor moved. Her heart was heavy beyond words. + +Pepi broke the silence once. + +"Shall we drop the ape first, my Lady?" + +Rachel shook her head. Anubis was her last hold on Kenkenes. + +At the Marsh of the Discontented Soul, the bari nosed among the reeds +and grounded gently. Rachel stood for a moment gazing sadly across the +stretch of sand toward the abrupt wall against which it terminated +inland. Pepi, already on shore, reached a patient hand toward her and +awaited her awakening. Anubis landed with a bound and made in a series +of wide circles for the cliff. His escape aroused Rachel and she +stepped out of the boat. After a moment's thought, she bade Pepi pull +away from the shore and await her at a safe distance. + +"I shall stay no longer than to write my whereabouts on the tomb, but +thy boat here may attract the attention of others on the river, and +hereafter they might ask what thou didst in this place. And I am not +afraid." + +The slow Egyptian obeyed reluctantly, shaking his head as he stood away +from shore. + +With a sigh that was almost a sob, Rachel walked back over the sand +toward the cave that had been her only shelter once. + +She did not fear it. Kenkenes had crossed this gray level of sand in +the night and its wet border at the river had borne the print of his +sandal. He had made the tomb a home for her, he had knelt on its rock +pavement and kissed her hands in its dusk and had passed its threshold, +like a shadow, to return no more. And here, too, was the other +faithful suggestion of her lost love--the pet ape. How his fitful +fidelities had directed themselves to her! She caught him up as he +passed her. He struggled, turned in her arms, and then became passive, +breathing loudly. + +She climbed the rough steps and sat down on the topmost one to think. + +She was surrounded with old evidences of her sorrow. Nor was there any +cheer before her. Escape was in prospect, but it was liberty without +light or peace--a gray freedom without hope, purpose or fruit. Her +retrospect gradually brightened, never to brilliance but to a soft +luminance, brightest at the farthermost point and sad like the dying +daylight. She summarized her griefs--danger, death, suspense, shame +and long hopelessness. The lonely girl's stock of unhappiness took her +breath away and she pushed back the wimple as if to clear away the +oppression. + +Anubis realized his moment of freedom was short and with an instant +bound he was out and gone. + +In no little dismay Rachel started in pursuit, but she had not moved +ten paces from the bottom of the steps before she paused, transfixed. + +An Egyptian, not Pepi, was hauling a boat into the reeds. The craft +secure, he turned up the slant, walking rapidly. + +There was no mistaking that commanding stature. + +Anubis descended on him like an arrow. The man saw the ape, halted a +fraction of an instant, caught sight of Rachel, and with a cry, his +arms flung wide, broke into a run toward her. + +The ape bounded for his shoulder, but missed and alighted at one side, +chattering raucously. The running man did not pause. + +The world revolved slowly about Rachel, and the sustaining structure of +her frame seemed to lose its rigidity. She put out her hands, blindly, +and they were caught and clasped about Kenkenes' neck. And there in +the strong support of his tightening arms, her face hidden against the +leaping heart, all time and matters of the world drifted away. In +their place was only a vast content, featureless and full of soft dusk +and warmth. + +Gone were all the demure resolutions, the memory of faith or unfaith. +Nothing was patent to her except that this was the man she loved and he +had returned from the dead. + +Presently she became vaguely aware that he was speaking. Though a +little unsteady and subdued, it was the same melody of voice that she +seemed to have known from the cradle. + +"Rachel! Rachel!" he was saying, "why didst thou not go to my father +as I bade thee? Nay, I do not chide thee. The joy of finding thee +hath healed me of the wrench when I found thee not, at my father's +house, at dawn to-day. But tell me. Why didst thou not go?" + +"I--I feared--" she faltered after a silence. + +"My father? Nay, now, dost thou fear me? Not so; and my father is but +myself, grown old. He was only a little less mad with fear than I, +when he discovered that thou shouldst have come to him so long ago, and +camest not. It damped his joy in having me again, and I left him pale +with concern. Did I not tell thee how good he is?" + +"Aye, it was not that I feared him, but that I feared that thou--" And +she paused and again he helped her. + +"That I was dead? That I had played thee false? Rachel! But how +couldst thou know? Forgive me. Since the tenth night I left thee I +have been in prison." + +"In prison!" she exclaimed, lifting her face. "Alas, that I did not +think of it. It is mine to beg thy forgiveness, Kenkenes, and on my +very knees!" + +"So thou didst think it, in truth!" She hid her face again and craved +his pardon. + +But he pressed her to him and soothed her. + +"Nay, I do not chide thee. Had I been in thy place, I might have +thought the same. But it is past--gone with the horrors of this +horrible season--Osiris be thanked!" + +"Thanks be to the God of Israel," she demanded from her shelter. + +"And the God of Israel," he said obediently. + +"Nay, to the God of Israel alone," she insisted, raising her head. + +He laughed a little and patted her hands softly together. + +"It was but the habit in me that made me name Osiris. There is no god +for me, but Love." + +"So long, so long, Kenkenes, and not any change in thee?" she sighed. +"How hath Egypt been helped of her gods, these grievous days?" + +"The gods and the gods, and ever the gods!" he said. "What have we to +do with them? Deborah bade me turn from them and this I have done with +all sincerity. Much have I pondered on the question and this have I +concluded. Egypt's holy temples have been vainly built; her worship +has been wasted on the air. There was and is a Creator, but, Rachel, +that Power whose mind is troubled with the great things is too great to +behold the petty concerns of men. My fortunes and thine we must +direct, for though we implored that Power till we died from the fervor +of our supplications, It could not hear, whose ears are filled with the +murmurings of the traveling stars. Why we were created and forgotten, +we may not know. How may we guess the motives of anything too great +for us to conceive? Whatsoever befalls us results from our use at the +hands of men, or from the nature of our abiding-place. We must defend +ourselves, prosper ourselves and live for what we make of life. After +that we shall not know the troubles and the joys of the world, for the +tombs are restful and soundless. Is it not so, my Rachel?" + +She shook her head. "Thou hast gone astray, Kenkenes. But thou wast +untaught--" + +"I have reasoned, Rachel, and the Power I have found in my ponderings, +makes all the gods seem little. Thy God must manifest himself more +fearfully; he must overthrow my reasoning before I can bow to him. And +if, of a surety, he is greater than the Power I have made, will he need +my adoration or listen to my prayers? Nay, nay, my Rachel. If thou +wilt have me worship, let me fall on my face to thee--" + +She interrupted him with a quick gesture. + +"Kenkenes, have I prayed in vain for the light to fall on thee?" she +asked sadly. + +He smiled and moved closer, looking down into her face as he had done +when he studied it as Athor. + +"Nay, hast thou done that, and hast thou not been heard? Thou dost but +fix me in mine unbelief. Did any god exist he would have heard thy +supplications. Come, let us make an end of this. There are sweeter +themes I would discuss. Where hast thou been, these many months? Not +here in this haunted cave?" + +His lightness sank her hope to the lowest ebb. A sudden hurt reached +her heart. His unregeneracy suggested unfaithfulness to her. Their +positions had been reversed. It was she that had been denied. Duty +reasserted itself with a chiding sting. + +"I have been a guest with Masanath--" + +"The daughter of Har-hat!" he cried, retreating a step. + +"The daughter of mine enemy," she went on. "She found me here by +accident and took me to her home in Memphis. There Deborah died. And +there, eighteen days agone, I discovered who it was that sheltered me, +and now I return to my people." + +"The fan-bearer did not find thee?" he demanded at once. + +"Nay. Unseen, I looked upon his man. Alas! the wound to the +daughter-love in Masanath! On the morrow she departeth for Tanis where +she will wed with the Prince Rameses." + +Kenkenes' hands fell to his sides. "Nay, now! Of a surety, this is +the maddest caprice the Hathors ever wrought. In the house of thine +enemy! Well for me I did not know it! I should have died from very +apprehension. And all these months thou wast within sight of my +father's doors!" + +"I saw him once," she said. + +"And discovered not thyself! How cruelly thou hast used thyself, +Rachel. He would have told thee, long ago, why I came not back." + +"Aye, now I know; but, Kenkenes, I could not go, fearing--" + +"Enough. I forgot. Come, let us go hence. Memphis and my father's +house await thee now." + +"But I go to my people, even now," she answered, with averted face and +unready words. + +Kenkenes whitened. + +"And leave me?" he asked quietly. + +"Think me not ungrateful," she said. "I have said no words of thanks +since there is none that can express a tithe of my great indebtedness +to thee." + +"I have achieved nothing for thee. Not even have I won thy freedom. I +have failed. But shameless in mine undeserts, I am come to ask my +reward nevertheless." He was very near to her, his face full of +purpose and intensity, his voice of great restraint. + +"That which once thou didst refuse to hear, thou hast known for long by +other proof than words," he went on. "Let me say it now. I love thee, +Rachel." Taking her cold hands he drew her back to him. + +"Once I forbore," he continued, the persuasive calm in his manner +heightening, "because I knew it would hurt thee to say me 'nay,' I told +myself that I was brave, then, when the actual loss of thee was +distant. But thou wilt leave me now and my fortitude for thy sake is +gone. I am selfish because I love thee so. The extreme is reached. I +can withstand no more. Dost thou love me, Rachel?" + +What need for him to wait for the word that gave assent? Was there not +eloquent testimony in her every feature and in every act of that hour +he had been with her? But his hands trembled, holding hers, till she +told him "aye." + +"Then ask what thou wilt of me," he said, the restraint gone, +desperation taking its place. "I submit, so thou dost yield thyself to +me. Shall I pray thy prayers, kneel in thy shrines? Shall I go with +thee into slavery? Shall I learn thy tongue, turn my back on my +people, become one of Israel and hate Egypt? These things will I do, +and more, so I shall find thee all mine own when they are done." + +But she freed her hands to cover her face and weep. Kenkenes sighed +from the very heaviness of his unhappiness. + +"Thou shouldst hate me, if, to win thee, I bowed in pretense to thy +God," he said weakly. + +Perhaps his words awakened a hope or perhaps they made her desperate. +Whatever the sensation, she raised her head and spoke with a sudden +assumption of calm: + +"Naught could make me hate thee, Kenkenes, but I should know if thou +didst pretend. Thou art as transparent as air. Thou art honest, +guileless--too good to be lost to the Bosom that must have thrilled +with joy when he beheld what a beautiful soul His hands had wrought. +Few of His believers have conceived the greatness of Jehovah as thou +hast, O my Kenkenes. In that art thou proved ripe for His worship. +Thou hast found His might to be so limitless that thou thinkest thyself +as naught in His sight. In that hast thou gone astray. The mind is +gross that can not heed the weak and small. Shall we say that the +spinner of the gossamer, the painter of the rose is not fine? Shall He +forget His daintiest, frailest works for His mightiest? Thou, artist +and creator thyself, Kenkenes, answer for Him. Nay; not so! He, who +hath an ear to the lapse between an hour and an hour, hath counted His +song-birds and numbered His blossoms. For are they, being small, less +wondrous than the heavens, His handiwork? Shall He then fail to hear +the voice of His sons in whom He hath taken greater pains?" + +She paused for a moment and looked at him. His expression urged her on. + +"Does it not trouble thee when I, whom thou hast but lately known, am +in sorrow? How much more then does thine unhappiness vex His holy +heart, who fashioned thee, who blew the breath of life into thy +nostrils! Wilt thou deny the Hand that led thee to me, here, in this +hour--that cared for me during the season of distress and peril? Nay, +my beloved, there is no greater virtue than gratitude. It is an +essential in the make-up of the great of heart--wilt thou put it out of +thy fine nature?" + +Again she paused, and this time he answered in a half-whisper: + +"Thou dost shake me in mine heresy." + +"It is but newly seated in thy credence," she said eagerly, "and is +easy to be put aside--easier to cast off than was the idolatry. Put it +away in truth from thee and grieve thy Lord God no more." + +"Would that I could, now, this hour. We may discipline the soul and +chasten the body, but how may we govern the mind and its disorderly +beliefs? It laughs at the sober restraint of the will; my heart is +broken for its sake, but it is reprobate still." + +"And I have not won thee?" she asked, shrinking from him. + +"Give me time--teach me more--return not to Goshen. Come back to +Memphis with me!" he begged in rapid words, pressing after her. "No +man uncovered so great a problem, alone, in a moment. How shall I find +God in an hour?" + +"O had I the tongue of Miriam!" she exclaimed. + +"Go not yet. Wilt thou give me up, after a single effort? Miriam +could not win me, nor all thy priests. I shall be led by thee alone. +A day longer--an hour--" + +"But after the manner of man, thou wilt put off and wait and wait. +Thou art too able, Kenkenes, too full of power for aid of mine--" + +"Rachel, if thou goest into Goshen--" he began passionately, but she +clutched him wildly, as if to hold him, though death itself dragged at +her fingers. + +"Hide me!" she gasped in a terrified whisper. "The servant of Har-hat!" + +At the mention of his enemy's name, Kenkenes turned swiftly about. + +Two half-clad Nubians were at the river's edge, hauling up an elegant +passage boat. It was deep of draft and had many sets of oars. +Approaching over the sand, hesitatingly, and with timid glances toward +the tomb beyond, were four others. The foremost was the youth he had +seen in Thebes. The next wore a striped tunic. Fourth and last was +Unas. + +"Now, by my soul," Kenkenes exclaimed aloud, "there is no more mystery +concerning the boy." He turned and took Rachel in his arms. + +"Now, do thou test the helpfulness of thy God! I have been tricked and +I see no help for us. Enter the tomb and close the door, and since +thou lovest honor better than liberty, let this be thine escape." + +He put his only weapon, his dagger, into her hands. For an instant he +gazed at her tense white face; then bending over her, he kissed her +once and put her behind him. + +"Go," he said. + +"What want ye?" he demanded of the men. + +"A slave," Unas answered evilly, stepping to the fore. + +"Your authority?" The fat courier flourished a document and held up a +blue jewel, hanging about his neck. Meneptah had forgotten his promise +to return the lapis-lazuli signet to Mentu. + +"Thou art undone, knave!" the courier added with a short laugh. He +clapped his hands and the four Nubians advanced rapidly upon Kenkenes. +There was to be no parley. + +Kenkenes glanced at the youth. He was not full grown,--spare, light +and small in stature. + +"I am sorry for thee, boy," Kenkenes muttered. "Thy gods judge between +thee and me!" + +The Nubians, two by two, each man ready to spring, rushed. + +With a bound, Kenkenes seized the youth by the ankles and swung him +like an animate bludgeon over his head. The attacking party was too +precipitate to halt in time and the yelling weapon swung round, +horizontally mowing down the foremost pair of men like wooden pins. +The weight of the boy, more than the force of the blow, jerked him from +the sculptor's hands. Kenkenes recovered himself and retreated. As he +did so, he stumbled on a fragment of rock. He wrenched it from its bed +and balanced it above his head. + +The powerful figure with the primitive weapon was too savage a picture +for the remaining pair to contemplate at close quarters. Unas had made +no movement to help in the assault. He had felt the weight of the +sculptor's hand and had evidently published the savagery of the young +man to his assistants. They had come prepared to capture an athletic +malefactor, but here was a jungle tiger brought to bay. They retired +till their fallen fellows should arise. + +The vanquished were struggling to gain their feet, and Kenkenes noted +it with concern. He was not gaining in this lull. There were other +stones about him. He hurled the fragment with a sure aim, and a +Nubian, who had been overthrown, dropped limply and stretched himself +on the sand. + +With a howl the remaining three charged. They were too close for the +second missile of Kenkenes to do any slaughter, and he went down under +the combined attack, fighting insanely. + +"Slit his throat," Unas shrieked, tumbling on the captive, as Kenkenes' +superhuman struggles threatened to shake them off. One of the men +raised himself and made ready to obey. Holding to Kenkenes with one +hand, he drew a knife from his belt and prepared to strike. + +At that instant, the captive caught sight of a pale woman-face, the +eyes blazing with vengeance. There was a flash of a white-sleeved arm +and the thump and jolt of a dagger driven strongly through flesh. The +murderous Nubian yelled and tumbled, kicking, on the sand. He carried +a knife at the juncture of the neck and shoulder. + +Instantly there was a chorus of yells. + +"She-devil! Hyena!" + +Unas detached himself from the struggle and plunged after Rachel, now +in full sight of Kenkenes. He saw her retreat, warding off the fat +courier with her hands; he saw her stumble and fall; he saw Anubis fly, +with a chatter of rage, in the face of the courier, and struggling +mightily, he threw off his captors, and leaped to his feet. + +And then the light went out in Egypt! + + + +[1] It was not uncommon for Egyptians to threaten their gods. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV + +LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS + +A water-carrier in Syene was carrying a yoke across his shoulders and +the great earthen jars swung ponderously as he walked. His bare feet +disturbed the red dust of the path down to the granite-basined river, +and tiny clouds puffed out on each side of the way at every footfall. + +On a housetop in Memphis, a gentlewoman, in a single gauze slip and +many jewels, lounged on a rug and gazed at nothing across the city. A +flat-shanked Ethiopian fanned her listlessly and dreamed also. + +A little boy, innocent of raiment, stood before a new tomb, opposite +Tanis and awaited his father who labored within. + +The water-carrier collapsed in his tracks; the lady shrieked; the +Ethiopian dropped the fan; the little boy fell on his face--all at the +same instant. + +From the sea to the first cataract, from the deepest recess in the +Arabian hills to the remotest peak in the Libyan desert, Egypt was +blinded and muffled and smothered in a dead, black night--even darkness +that could be felt. + +Kenkenes stood still. Harsh hands were no longer on him and for an +instant no sound was to be heard. Profound gloom enveloped him. His +every sense was frustrated. + +Some one of his assailants had found his heart with a knife and this +was death, he thought. + +Then strange, far-off murmurings filled his ears. From the river and +beside him went up wild, hoarse cries of men in mortal terror. Memphis +began to drone like a vast and troubled hive. The distant pastures +became blatant and the poultry near the huts of rustics cackled in wild +dismay. In the hills about beasts whimpered and the air was full of +the screaming of bewildered birds. + +With the awakening of sound, Kenkenes knew that another plague had +befallen Egypt. + +The dread that might have transfixed him was overcome by the instant +recollection of Rachel's peril. No restraining hands were upon him, +but he stood yet a space attempting to catch some rift in the thick +night. There was not one ray of light. + +While he waited it was more distinctly borne in upon him that during +that space Rachel might suffer. He would go to her. + +The night made a wall ahead of him which was imminent and +indiscernible. It was like a great weight upon his shoulders and a +pitfall at his feet. + +He crouched and fumbled before him. His apprehension was physical; his +mind urged him; his body rebelled. He would have run but he could +barely force one foot ahead of the other. Illusory obstacles +confronted him. He waved his arms and put forward a foot. The ground +was lower than he thought, and he stepped weightily. He brought up the +other foot laboriously, hesitatingly. This was not advance, but +time-losing. + +Meanwhile, what might not be happening to Rachel in this chaos of gloom +and clamor? Why need he hide his escape? None of these near-by +assailants had any care now save for his own safety. + +He called her name loudly and listened. + +There was no answer in her voice. + +He forced himself to move, but had the next step led into an abyss his +feet could not have been more reluctant. He flailed the air with his +arms and accomplished another pace. He realized that he could not +reach, in an hour, at this rate, the spot in which he had last seen +her. Again he called, using his full lung power, but the only reply +was an echo, or the hoarse supplications of men, near him and on the +river. The river! Had Rachel gone that way too far and beyond +retreat? The thought chilled him with terror and horror. + +He execrated himself for his trepidation and strove wildly to proceed; +but strive as he might he could not advance. How long since the +darkness had fallen, and he had moved but two paces from the spot in +which it had overtaken him! The outcry near him subsided into low +murmurs of terror, and none lifted a voice in answer to his distracted +call. + +If Rachel had been near she would have replied to him. The +alternatives he had to choose as her possible fate were death in the +Nile or capture by Unas. The one he fought away from him wildly, the +other made him frantic. And the realization of his own helplessness, +with the picture of her distress at that moment, crushed him. + +A tangle of wind-mown reeds tripped him and pitched him to his knees +among the high marsh growth. + +He did not rise. + +The babe in pain cries to his mother; the man in his maturity may +outgrow the susceptibility to tears, but he never outwears the want of +a stronger spirit upon which to call in his hour of distress. + +For Kenkenes it had been a far cry, from his careless days and his +empyrean populous with deities, to this utter and unhappy night and one +unseen Power. In that time he had run the gamut of sensations from a +laugh to a wail. Now was his need the sorest of all his life. The +most helpful of all hands must aid him. His fathers' gods were in the +dust. What of that unapproachable, unfeeling Omnipotence he had +created in their stead? + +He fell on his face and prayed. + +"O Thou, who art somewhere behind the phantom gods that we have raised! +To whom all prayer ascends by many-charted paths; Thou who canst spread +this sooty night across the morning skies and turn to milk the bones of +men! Thou who didst undo my surest plans, who dost mock my boasted +power, who hast stripped me till my feeble self is bared to me even in +this dreadful night; Thou who wast a fending hand about her; who art +her only succor now--to whom she prays--and by that sign, Thou Very +God! I bow to Thee. + +"My lips are stiff at prayer to such as Thou. But what need of my +tongue's abashed interpretation of that which I would say, since even +the future's history is open unto Thee? + +"I have run my course without craving Thine aid, and lo! here have I +ended--a voice appealing through the night--no more. + +"Now, wilt Thou heed an alien's plea; wilt Thou know a stranger +petitioning before Thy high and holy place? How shall I win Thine ear? +Charge me with any mission, weight me with a lifetime of penances, +strip me of power everlastingly, but grant me leave to supplicate Thy +throne. + +"Not for myself do I pray, O Hidden God! Not one jot would I overtax +Thy bounty toward me beyond the sufferance of my devotion. But for her +I pray--for her, out somewhere in this unlifting gloom, her tender +maidenhood uncomforted--with night, with death, with long dishonor +threatening her. Attend her, O Thou august Warden! Let her not cry +out to Thee in vain! Be Thou as a wall about her, as a light before +her, as a firm path beneath her feet. Do Thou as Thou wilt with me. +Lo! I offer up myself as ransom for her--myself--all I have! Take her +from me, deny mine eyes the sight of her for ever, blot me wholly out +of her heart, yield me over to the wrath of mine enemies, and to Thine +unknowable vengeance thereafter; but save her, Great God! save her from +her enemy! + +"Dost Thou hear me, O Holy Mystery? Is there no sign, no manifestation +that Thou dost attend? + +"Nay, but I know that Thou hearest me! By my faith in Thy being I know +it, Lord!" + +Peace fell on him and he slept. + +In after years Kenkenes remembered only vaguely the long hours of that +black and lonely vigil. This climax to a calamitous space eight months +in length might have crushed a less sturdy spirit, but he was +mystically sustained. + +With the exception of a few intervals of short duration most of the +time was spent in sleep, so profound and dreamless as to border on +coma. The reeds had received him on a bed of crushed herbage and the +upstanding ranks about him sheltered him from the blowing sand. The +whilom assailants of the young man were not so kindly served by the +gods to whom they appealed loudly and frequently. The city in the +distance moaned and complained and the hills were full of fear. + +In one of his profound lapses of slumber a hairy paw felt of Kenkenes' +face. Later a drifting boat nosed about among the reeds at the water's +edge. Presently one of the crew cried out, and a second voice said: + +"Nay, fear not; it is an ape, by the feel of him. Toth is with us. It +is a good omen; let him not go forth." + +Silence fell again, for the boat drifted on. + +At last dawn-lights reddened about the horizon; stars faded out of the +uppermost as naturally as if they had been there during the three days +of unlifting night. All Egypt showed up darkly in the coming day. + +Kenkenes, in his couch of reeds, slept on peacefully. The mid-morning +sun shone in his face before he awakened. + +He leaped to his feet, cramped and stiffened by his long inactivity, +and looked about him. Near by was a disturbed spot of wide +circumference. Here had the struggle taken place. Here, also, some of +the sand was stained with the blood of the Nubian, who had been wounded +by Rachel. Fresh footprints led toward the water. He followed them +with a wildly beating heart. There were no marks of a little sandal. +At the Nile edge the deep line cut by a keel was still visible in the +wet sand. His own boat and the other were gone. All other signs had +been obliterated, for the wind had been busy during the darkness. + +Across the cultivated land, or rather the land which would have been +wheat-covered but for the locusts, he saw the huts of rustics, and to +each of these he went, asking of the pallid and terror-stricken tenants +if Rachel had come to them. Gaining no information, he went next to +Masaarah, appeasing his hunger with succulent roots plucked from the +loam beside the river. The quarries were deserted, the pocket in the +valley, where the Israelites had pitched their tents, was as solitary +as it had ever been. There was no place here to shelter the lost girl. + +There were the huts to the north of the Marsh and the deserted village +of Toora to search. He retraced his steps. + +As he came again before the tomb he went to it. Half-way up the steps +he stopped. + +On a blank face of the rock, sheltered by a jutting ledge above it, was +an inscription, a little faint, but he ascribed that to the poor +quality of the pencil and roughness of the tablet. This is what he +read: + + +"Her whom thou seekest thou wilt find in the palace of Har-hat, in the +city." + + +Perhaps under other circumstances Kenkenes would have understood +correctly the origin and intent of the writing. Already, however, his +fears pointed to the palace of Har-hat as the prison of Rachel, and +this faint inscription was corroboration. It appealed to him as +villainy worthy of the fan-bearer. It was like his exquisite +effrontery. + +Kenkenes whirled away with an indescribable sound, rather like the +snarl of an infuriated beast than an expression of a reasoning +creature. Dashing down the sand, he plunged into the Nile and swam +with superhuman speed for the Memphian shore. + +He defied death as a maniac does. The river was a mile in width and +teeming with crocodiles. But the same saving Providence that shields +the adventurous child attended him. He clambered up the opposite bank +and struck out for Memphis on a hard run. + +He had but one purpose and that was to find Har-hat and strangle him +with grim joy. The rescue of Rachel did not occur to him, for in his +excited mind the simple touch of the fan-bearer's hand was sufficient +to kill her with its dishonor. + +He did not remember anything that Rachel had told him concerning her +life in Memphis, or that Har-hat was in Tanis, and Masanath like to be +the only resident in the fan-bearer's palace. His reasoning powers +abandoned their supremacy to all the fierce impulses toward revenge and +bloodletting of which his nature was capable. + +Though it was day when he entered the great capital of the Pharaohs, +the streets were almost deserted, and every doorway and window showed +interiors brilliant with a multitude of lamps. Memphis was prepared +against a second smothering of the lights of heaven. + +The few pedestrians Kenkenes met fell back and gave room to the +dripping apparition which ran as if death-pursued. One told him on +demand where the mansion of Har-hat stood, and after a few slow minutes +he was within its porch. He flung himself against the blank portal and +beat on it. He did not pause to await a response. He felt within him +strength to batter down the doors if they did not open. + +Presently an old portress came forth from a side entry and Kenkenes +seized her. Fearing that she might cry out and defeat his purpose, he +put his hand over her mouth. + +"Your master," he demanded hoarsely. "Where is he? Answer and answer +quietly!" + +For a moment she was dumb with terror. + +"Gone," she gasped at last when Kenkenes shook her. + +"Where? When?" he insisted. + +"To Tanis, eight months since!" + +"Was an Israelite maiden brought here? Answer and truly, by your +immortal soul!" + +"Many months ago, aye, but she departed three days ago for Goshen," the +old woman answered falteringly. + +"And she came not back?" + +"Nay." + +"Swear, by Osiris!" + +"By Osiris--" + +"And the Lady Masanath?" + +"Gone, also, to Tanis with Unas, this morning." + +"Thou liest! In the dark?" + +"Nay, I swear by Osiris," she protested wildly. "The light came in +with the hour of dawn." + +Kenkenes released her and hurried away. He did not doubt that the old +woman had told the truth. He had overslept the light. Unas could not +have taken Rachel and Masanath to Tanis together. The Israelite would +have been sent on before. + +There was yet Atsu to question, and then--on to Tanis to rescue Rachel +or to avenge her. + +He met no one until he reached a bazaar of jewels near the temple +square. An armed watchman stood before the tightly closed front of the +lapidary's booth, above the portal of which a flaring torch was stuck +in a sconce. + +"The house of Atsu?" the watchman repeated after Kenkenes. "Atsu is no +longer a householder in Memphis." + +"When did he depart?" + +"Eight or nine months ago, at the persuasion of the Pharaoh." + +The lightness of the man's manner irritated the already vexed spirit of +the young artist. + +"Be explicit," he demanded sharply. "What meanest thou?" + +"He was stripped of his insignia and reduced to the rank of ordinary +soldier," the man answered, "for pampering the Israelites. He is with +the legions in the north." + +"Hath he kin in the city?" + +"Nay, he is solitary." + +Kenkenes walked away unsteadily. The nervous energy that had upborne +him during his intense excitement was deserting him. His hunger and +weariness were asserting themselves. + +He turned down the narrow passage leading to his father's house. And +suddenly, in the way of such vagrant thoughts, it occurred to him that +the inscription on the tomb had been pointedly denied by the old +woman's statements. + +"Ah, I might have known," he said impatiently. "Rachel put the writing +there for me when she left the tomb for the shelter Masanath offered +her in Memphis." + +The admission cheered him somewhat, but it did not repair his exhausted +forces. By the time he reached his father's door he was unsteady, +indeed, and beyond further exertion. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI + +THE MURKET'S SACRIFICE + +The murket sat at his place in the work-room, but no papyrus scrolls +lay before him; his fine implements were not in sight; the ink-pots and +pens were put away and the table was clear except for a copper lamp +that sputtered and flared at one end. The great artist's arms were +extended across the table, his head bowed upon them, his hands clasped. +The attitude was not that of weariness but of trouble. + +Kenkenes hesitated. For the first time since the hour he left Memphis +for Thebes, months before, he felt a sense of culpability. He +realized, with great bounds of comprehension, that the results of his +own trouble had not been confined to himself. He began to understand +how infectious sorrow is. + +He crossed the room and laid a trembling hand on the murket's shoulder. +Instantly the great artist lifted his head and, seeing Kenkenes, leaped +to his feet with a cry that was all joy. + +The young man responded to the kiss of welcome with so little composure +that Mentu forced him down on the bench and summoned a servant. + +The old housekeeper appeared at the door, started with a suppressed cry +and flung herself at her young master's feet. He raised her and +touched her cheek with his lips. + +"Bring me somewhat to eat and drink, Sema," he said weakly. "I have +fasted, since I returned here, well-nigh four days agone." + +The stiff old creature rose with a murmur half of compassion, half of +promise, and went forth immediately. + +The murket stood very close to his son, regarding him with +interrogation on his face. + +"Memphis was full of famishing at the coming of dawn this morning," he +said. "For the first time in my life I knew hunger, and it is a +fearsome thing, but thou--a shade from Amenti could not be ghastlier. +Where hast thou been--what are thy fortunes, Kenkenes?" + +"Rachel--thou knowest--" Kenkenes began, speaking with an effort. + +"Aye, I know. Didst find her?" + +"Aye, and lost her, even while I fought to save her!" + +"Alas, thou unfortunate!" Mentu exclaimed. "Of a surety the gods have +punished thee too harshly!" + +Kenkenes was not in the frame of mind to receive so soft a speech +composedly. A strong tremor ran over him and he averted his face. The +murket came to his side and smoothed the damp hair. + +The old housekeeper entered with broth and bread and a bottle of wine. +Mentu broke the bread and filled the beaker, while Sema stood aloof and +gazed with troubled eyes at the unhappy face of the young master. +Silent, they watched him eat and drink, grieved because of the visible +effort it required and because no life or strength returned to him with +the breaking of his fast. When he had finished, the bowl and platter +were taken away, but at a sign the old housekeeper left the wine with +the murket. After she had gone Mentu glanced at the draggled dress of +his son. + +"Thou needest, further, the attention of thy slave, Kenkenes," he +suggested. + +The young man shook his head. "Not yet," he said. "My time is short, +and it is thy help I need." + +The murket sat down beside his son. + +Without further introduction Kenkenes plunged into his story. He had +had no time to tell it four days before. Then he had asked for Rachel +with his second word, and finding her not, had rushed immediately to +the search for her. + +Mentu heard without comment till the story was done. Most of it he had +known from Hotep, and only the recent events at the tomb excited him. + +When Kenkenes made an end the murket brought his clenched hand down on +the table with a force that made the lamp wink and the implements +rattle in their boxes above him. + +"Curse that smooth villain Har-hat!" he cried in a tempest of wrath. +"A murrain upon his greedy, crafty lust! The gods blast him in his +knavery! Now is my precious amulet in his hands. Would it were +white-hot and clung to him like a leech!" + +Kenkenes said nothing. The murket's wrath was more comforting to him +than tender words could have been. + +"Who hath the ear of Meneptah?" the murket continued with increasing +vehemence. "Har-hat! And behold the miseries of Egypt! Shall we put +any great sin past the knave who sinneth monstrously, or divine his +methods who is a master of cunning? The land is entangled in +difficulty! Give me but a raveling fiber to pull, and, by the gods, I +know that we shall find Har-hat at the other end of it! He is +destroying Egypt for his ambition's sake! And that a son of mine--me! +the right hand of the Incomparable Pharaoh--should furnish meat for his +rending!" His voice failed him and he shook his clenched hands high +above his head in an abandon of fury. + +"Did I not tell thee?" he burst forth again, pointing a finger at his +son. "Did I not warn thee from the first?" + +Kenkenes raised his head. + +"Can you avoid a knave if he hath designs on you?" he asked. "Have I +erred in crossing his will? Have I sinned in loving and protecting her +whom I love?" + +Mentu's hands fell down at his sides. The simple questions had +silenced him. His son was blameless now that he had expiated his +offenses against the law, and from the moral standpoint his persistence +in his claim on Rachel was just--praiseworthy. + +"Nay," he said sullenly, "but since thou didst love the girl, how came +it that thou didst not wed her long ago and save her this shame and +danger?" + +He saw the face of his son grow paler. + +"The bar of faith lay between us," Kenkenes answered. "I was an +idolater, she a worshiper of the One God. She would not wed with me, +therefore." + +The murket looked at his son, stupefied with amazement. + +"Thou--thou--" he said at last, his words coming slowly by reason of +his emotions. "The Israelite rejected thee!" + +Kenkenes bent his head in assent. + +"Thou! A prince among men--a nobleman, a genius--a man whom all +women--Kenkenes! by Horus, I am amazed! And thou didst endure it, and +continue to love and serve and suffer for her! Where is thy pride?" + +Kenkenes stopped him with a motion of his hand. + +"A maid's unwillingness is obstacle enough," he said. "Shall a man +summon further difficulty in the form of his self-esteem to stand in +the way of his love? Nay, it could not be, and that thou knowest, my +father, since thou, too, hast loved. When a man is in love it is his +pride to be long-suffering and humble. But there is naught separating +us now save it be the hand of Har-hat." + +"So much for Israelitish zeal! Thou hast been a pawn for her to play +during these months. Long ago had she surrendered if thou hadst been--" + +Kenkenes smiled. "She did not surrender. It was I." + +"Thy faith?" the murket asked in a voice low with earnestness. + +"Thou hast said!" + +A dead silence ensued. Kenkenes may have awaited the outbreak with a +quickening of the heart, but it did not come. Instead, the murket sat +down on the bench and gazed at his son intently. + +After a long interval he spoke. + +"Thus far had I hoped that thou wast taken by the Israelite but in thy +fancy. The hope was vain. Thou art in love with her." + +Kenkenes endured the steady gaze and waited for Mentu to go on. + +"There is no help for thee now," the murket continued stoically. "If +the gods will but tolerate thee till the madness leaves thee after thou +art wedded and satisfied, it may be that thou wilt turn again to the +faith of thy fathers. But if I would fix thee in thine apostasy I +should try to persuade thee now." + +"Aye, and further, I should be moved to urge thee into heresy," calmly +responded Kenkenes. + +The murket flung up one hand in a gesture of dissent, and arising, +walked toward the door of the workroom. There he leaned his shoulder +against the frame and looked out at the night. Presently Kenkenes went +to him and laid his hand on his sleeve. + +The murket spoke first, proving what thoughts had been his during the +little space of silence. + +"There is little patriotism in thee, Kenkenes. Thou wouldst wed with +one of Egypt's enemies and bow down to the God which has devastated thy +country." + +The hand on his sleeve fell. + +"What did Egypt to Israel for a hundred years before these miseries +came to pass?" Kenkenes asked. "Let me tell thee how Egypt hath used +Rachel. She is free-born, of noble blood, even as thou art and as I +am. Her house was wealthy, the name powerful. There were ten of her +family--four of her mother's, six of her father's. Rameses, the +Incomparable Pharaoh, had use for their treasure and need of their +labor in the brick-fields and mines. This day Rachel possesses not +even her own soul and body, nor one garment to cover herself, nor a +single kinsman to shield her from the power of her masters! Well for +Egypt that the God of Israel hath not demanded of Egypt treasure for +treasure seized, toil for toil compelled, lash for lash inflicted, +blood for blood outpoured! This desolation had been thrice desolate +and Egypt's glory gone like the green grass in the breath of the +Khamsin! And yet would such justice restore to Rachel the love she +lost, the comfort that should have been hers? Nay, not even the +sorcery of Mesu might do that. The debt of Egypt to Rachel is most +cheaply discharged by the service of one life for the ten which were +taken from her!" + +"Let be; Israel shall cumber Egypt no longer," the murket muttered +after a little; "and the quarrel between them shall be at an end. The +hour approacheth when every Hebrew shall leave Egypt--shall be driven +forth if he leave it not willingly." + +"Thinkest thou so of a truth?" Kenkenes asked earnestly. + +"Of a truth. Thou seest the plight of the nation. Can it endure +longer? And if thou takest this Israelite to wife--" He paused +abruptly, for he had pressed the problem and a solution opened itself +so suddenly that it staggered him. Kenkenes understood the pause. +Again he laid his hand on the murket's sleeve. + +"On this very matter would I take counsel with thee, my father," he +said gently. "The night grows, and my time is short." + +Mentu turned an unhappy face toward his son and followed him back to +the bench they had left. He felt, intuitively, that there was further +grave purpose in the young man's mind and there was dread in his +paternal heart. + +"Thou knowest, my father," Kenkenes began, "that I may not give over my +love for Rachel. I am free to love her and she to love me. There is +no obstacle between us. Such love, therefore, in the sight of heaven, +becometh a duty and carrieth duty with it. In the spirit I am as +though I had been bound to her by the marrying priests. Her griefs are +mine to comfort, her wrongs mine to avenge. + +"She is gone and there are these three surmises as to her whereabouts. +She may have escaped and returned to Goshen; she may have wandered to +death in the Nile; she may have been taken by Har-hat." + +He paused, and Mentu gazed fixedly at the lamp. + +"I am going to Tanis," Kenkenes began, with forced restraint. + +"Wherefore?" Mentu demanded. + +"To discover if Har-hat hath taken her!" + +"Go on." + +"If he hath the Lord God make iron of my hands till I strangle him!" + +"Madman!" Mentu exclaimed. "Thou wilt be flayed!" + +"Be assured that I shall earn the flaying! The punishment shall be no +more savage than the deed that invites it! But enough of that. If I +go to Tanis and find her the spoil of the fan-bearer, thine augury will +hold, I return not to Memphis. . . . If she was lost in the Nile--!" + +"Nay! Nay! put away the thought if it wrench thee so. No man removed +from his place during that night. We were caught and transfixed at +what we did. For three days I sat in the court, where I was overtaken +by the darkness, and in that time I stirred not except to slip down on +the bench and sleep. The palsy seized all Memphis likewise--not one of +my neighbors moved. But the resident Hebrews of the city seemed to +have been warned, or else the favor of their strange God was with them. +For it is said they came and went as they willed, carrying lamps." + +Kenkenes looked at his father with growing hope. + +"If that be true," he said eagerly, "if the palsy fell upon Egypt and +not upon Israel, Rachel may have fled safely--she may have escaped +them!" Mentu assented with a nod. + +"She may have returned to her people," Kenkenes went on. "And if she +be in Goshen I must reach her, find her, before her people depart. +Having found her--" but Kenkenes stopped and made no effort to resume. +Mentu set his teeth, his hands clenched and his whole figure seemed to +denote intense physical restraint. Suddenly he whirled upon his son. + +"Thou wilt go with her, out of Egypt?" he demanded. + +"I shall go with her, out of Egypt." + +Mentu gained his feet. "And dost thou remember that while I live my +commands are yet law over thee?" he continued in a tone of increasing +intensity. "Mine it is to say whether thou shall do this thing or do +it not!" + +He turned away and strode back to his post against the door-frame, his +face toward the night. Kenkenes had slowly risen to his feet. Not for +an instant did his father's authority appear to him as an obstacle. He +knew that the murket's outburst was a final stand before capitulation. +Kenkenes was troubled only for what might follow after his father had +surrendered. + +He followed the murket to the door and laid his arm across the broad +shoulders. + +"Father," he said persuasively. Mentu did not move. + +"Look at me, father," Kenkenes insisted. Still no movement. The young +man put his arm closer about the shoulders, and lifting his hand, would +have turned the face toward him. But the palm touched a wet cheek. + +The murket had consented. + + * * * * * * + +An hour later, when it was far into the second watch, Kenkenes changed +his dress and made himself presentable. Then, without further counsel +with the murket, he went silently and unseen to the portal of Senci's +house. After a long time, for her household had been asleep, he was +admitted, and the Lady Senci, perplexed and surprised, joined him in +the chamber of guests. + +With few and simple words he told his story, pictured his father's +loneliness and, while she wept silently, begged her to become his +father's wife--on the morrow. + +There was no long persuasion; the need of the occasion was sufficient +eloquence for the murket's noble love. + +An hour after the next day's sunrise Mentu and Senci repaired together +to the temple, and when they returned Senci went not again into her own +house. + +In preparing for his departure, Kenkenes asked at the hands of his +father, not his patrimony, for that would have been an embarrassment of +wealth, but such portion of it as might be carried in small bulk. In +mid-afternoon Senci brought him a belt of gazelle-hide and in this had +been sewed a fortune in gems. The murket had given his son his full +portion and more. + +At the close of day, with his face set and colorless, Kenkenes stepped +into the narrow passage before his father's house. The great portal +closed slowly and noiselessly behind him. He did not pause, but sprang +into his chariot and was driven rapidly away. + +At a landing near the northern limits of Memphis he took a punt, bade +farewell to his sad-faced charioteer and pushed off. + +The broken bluffs about Memphis, the temples, the obelisks, the Sphinx, +the pyramids melted into night behind him. He kept his head down that +he might not look his last on his native city. + +He had reached that point where endurance must conserve itself. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII + +AT THE WELL + +Once out of its confines the Nile divided its flood over and over again +and hunted the sea in long meanderings over the flat Delta. A few +miles above On the separation began and continued to the marshy coast +far to the north. From the summit of the great towers of Bubastis and +Saïs the glistening sinuosities of its branches might be discerned for +many miles. + +There was no thirst in the Delta. Nowhere did the capillary, the +irrigation canal, fail to reach, even now in the season of desolation +and loss. Half-green stubble, hail-mown and locust-eaten, showed where +a wheat-field had been. Regular, barren rows were the only evidences +of the lentil and garlic gardens in happier days, and the location of +pastures might be guessed by the skeletons that whitened the uplands. +Through fringes of leafless palm trees, stone-rimmed pools, like +splashes of quicksilver or facets of sapphire, reflected the sky. + +Half-way between On and Pa-Ramesu was one of these basins, elliptical +in shape and walled with rough limestone. Moss grew in the crevices of +the masonry and about it had been a sod of velvet grass. Black beetles +slipped in and out among the stones; dragon-flies hung over the surface +of the water and large ants made erratic journeys about the rough bark +of the naked palms. Whoever came dipped his goblet deep, for there the +water was cold. If he gazed through to the bottom he detected a +convection in the sand below. This was not a reservoir, but a well. + +Once only had it failed, but then Hapi, the holy river, had been +smitten also. + +The spring bubbled up at the division of a road. One branch led along +the northern bank of the Rameside canal, eastward to Pa-Ramesu. The +other crossed the northwestern limits of Goshen and went toward Tanis, +in the northeast. Round about the little oasis were the dark circles +where the turf fires of many travelers had been. The merchants from +the Orient entering Egypt through the great wall of Rameses II, across +the eastern isthmus, passed this way going to Memphis. Here +Philistine, Damascene, Ninevite and Babylonian had halted; here +Egyptian, Bedouin, Arabian and the dweller of the desert had paused. +The earth about the well was always damp, and the top-most row of the +curb was worn smooth in hollows. This, therefore, was a point common +to native and alien, the home-keeping and the traveler, the faithful +and the unbeliever. + +The strait of Egypt was sore and the aid of the gods essential. The +priests had seized upon the site as a place of prayers, placed a tablet +there, commanding them, and a soldier to see that the command was +obeyed. + +The soldier was in cavalry dress of tunic and tasseled coif, with pike +and bull-hide shield and a light broadsword. He was no ordinary bearer +of arms. He walked like a man accustomed to command; he turned a cold +eye upon too-familiar wayfarers and startled them into silence by the +level blackness of his low brows. Wealth, beauty, age nor rank won +servility or superciliousness from him. The Egyptian soldier was not +obliged to cringe, and this one abode by the privilege. + +He was a man of one attitude, one mood and few words. The Memnon might +as well have been expected to smile. The earliest riser found him +there; the latest night wanderer came upon him. When the day broke, +after the falling of the dreadful night, the brave or the thirsty who +ventured forth saw him at his post, silent, unastonished, unafraid. + +Once only the soldier had been seen to flinch. Merenra, now nomarch of +Bubastis, but whilom commander over Israel at Pa-Ramesu, paused one +noon with his train at the well. The governor glanced at the soldier, +glanced again, shrugged his shoulders and rode away. The man-at-arms +winced, and often thereafter stood in abstracted contemplation of the +distance. + +Just after sunrise on the second day following the passing of the +darkness, four Egyptians, lank, big-footed and brown, came from the +northeast. By their dress they had been prosperous rustics of the +un-Israelite Delta. But the healthful leanness, characteristic of the +race, had become emaciation; there was the studious unkemptness of +mourning upon them, and they, who had ridden once, before the plagues +of murrain and hail, traveled afoot. + +They were evidently journeying to On, where the benevolence of Ra would +feed them. + +They said nothing, looking a little awed at the soldier and puzzled at +the stela. The warrior read the command and the unlettered men fell on +their knees, each to a different god. The Egyptian was not ashamed of +his piety nor did he closet himself to pray. + +"Incline the will of the Pharaoh to accord with the needs of the hour, +O thou Melter of Hearts!" + +"Rescue the kingdom, O thou Controller of Nations, for it descendeth +into death and none succoreth it!" + +"Deal thou as thou deemest best with the destroyer of Egypt, O thou +Magistrate over Kings!" + +Thus, in these fragments of prayers was it made manifest that the worm +was turning, apologetically, it is true, but surely. For once the +prescribed defense of the Pharaoh was ignored. "It is not the fault of +the Child of the Sun, but his advisers, who are evil men and full of +guile." And in the odd perversity of fate for once its observance +would have been just. + +Having fulfilled the command and relieved their souls, the four arose +and went their way, soft of foot and stately of carriage, after the +manner of all their countrymen. + +Next, descending with a volley of yells, a rout of the nomad tribes, +mounted on horses, came from the southwest. + +They were chiefly Bedouins, their women perched behind them with the +tiniest members of their broods. But every child that could bestride a +horse was mounted independently. Whatever worldly possessions the +nomads owned were bound in numerous flat rolls on other horses which +they led. + +"Hail!" they shouted to the warrior, for the desert races are prankish +and unabashed. A younger among them, without wife or goods, drew his +gaunt horse back upon its scarred haunches and saluted the soldier. + +"Greeting, bearer of many arms!" he said, and then addressed a near-by +companion as if he were rods away. "Behold leaden-toed Egypt, cumbered +with defense! Bull-hide for shield instead of the safe remoteness of +distance, blade and pike for vulgar intimacy in combat instead of the +nice aloofness of the launched spear--" + +"Go to, thou prater!" interrupted a companion. "If thou lovest Bedouin +warfare so well, wherefore dost thou join thyself to the Israelite who +fights not at all?" + +"Spoil!" retorted the first, "and new fields, O waster of the air! +Hast thou not heard of Canaan?" + +"Nay," shouted a third, "he hath an eye only to some heifer-eyed +brickmaker among them!" + +The soldier moved forward to the group and grounded his pike. His +attitude interested them, and in the expectant silence he repeated the +writing on the tablet. + +"So saith the writing," the first speaker began, but the warrior +interrupted him. + +"It behooves thee to obey. Thou art yet within the reach of the +awkward arms of Egypt." + +"One against a troop of Bedouins," the trifler laughed. + +"And there are a thousand within sound of my beaten shield," was the +harsh answer. + +"Come," said an elder complacently, "it does no harm to ask the +alleviation of any man's hurt, and it may keep us whole for the journey +into Canaan." He dismounted, and in a twinkling the company, even to +the babes, had followed his example. Each dropped to his haunches, his +hands spread upon his knees, and there was no sound for a few minutes. + +Then they rose simultaneously and, flinging themselves upon their +horses, departed as they came, like the whirlwind, over the road to +Pa-Ramesu and the heart of Goshen. + +These were part of the mixed multitude that went with Israel. + +The dust of their going had hardly settled before a drove of +hosannahing Israelites approached from the direction of the Nile. The +soldier saw them without seeming to see and, moving toward the tablet, +a four-foot stela of sandstone, planted himself against its inscribed +face, and, resting his pike, contemplated the west. + +The ragged rout approached, singing and shouting, noisy and of doubtful +temper. A cloud of dust came with them and the odor of stall and of +quarry sweat. + +Want plays havoc with the Oriental's appearance. It acutely +accentuates his already aggressive features and reduces his color to +ghastliness. The approaching Hebrews were studies of sharp angularity +in monochrome, and the soul which showed in the eyes was no longer a +spiritual but a ravenous thing. + +Being something distinctly Egyptian, the soldier brought their actual +temper to the surface. They had suffered long, but their time had come. + +The foremost flung themselves into his view and halted, hushed and +amazed. When those behind them tried to press forward with jeers, they +turned with a frown and a significant jerk of the head in the direction +of the man-at-arms. These, also, subsided and passed along the sign of +silence. A leader in the front rank walked away and took a drink, +using his hands as a cup. The whole silent herd followed and did +likewise, solemnly and thoughtfully. + +Presently the bolder began to whisper and conjecture among themselves, +hushing the sibilant surmises of the humbler with a cautioning frown. +An old man, who could not lower his voice, quavered a resolve to "ask +and discover," and started toward the soldier to put his resolution +into effect. A wiry old woman seized him and drew him back. + +"Wilt thou humiliate him with thy notice, meddler?" she demanded in a +fierce whisper. "See him not, and it will be a mercy to him in his +hour of abasement,--him who hath been balsam to the wound of Israel!" + +She turned about and took the road toward Pa-Ramesu, the unprotesting +old man trotting after her. The crowd followed, silent at first, then +softly talkative, and finally, in the distance, singing and noisy once +again. + +A careening camel, almost white in the early morning sunshine, broke +the sky-line far up the road leading from Tanis in the north. Very +much nearer, to the west, two single litters, with a staff-bearing +attendant, were approaching. + +The camel rider was a Hebrew by the beast that bore him. Egypt had no +liking for the bearer of the Orient's burdens and small acquaintance +with him. Likewise the litters were Hebraic, for the attendant was +bearded. The soldier kept his place before the stela and contemplated +the distance. + +The time was not long, though in that land of distances the camel had +far to come from the horizon to the well, until by the soft jarring of +the earth the motionless sentinel knew that the swifter traveler had +arrived. Haste is not common in tropical countries, and the camel had +been put to his limit of speed. A commoner spirit than the soldiers +could not have resisted the impulses of curiosity concerning this hot +haste. But he did not turn his eyes. + +The traveler alighted before his mount ceased to move, and undoing his +leathern belt with a jerk, he struck the camel a smart blow on the +shoulder. There was the protesting buzz of a large fly and an angry, +disabled blundering on the sand, silenced by the stamp of a sandal. + +"Thou wouldst have it, pest!" the traveler exclaimed. "Thy kind is not +to be persuaded from its blood-sucking by milder means. Ye mind me of +the Pharaoh!" + +He turned toward the well, and his glance fell on the man-at-arms for +the first time. He started a little to find himself not alone, and a +second time he started with sudden recognition. The well was between +him and the soldier. He leaned upon his hands on the top of the curb +and gazed at his opposite. Once he seemed about to speak, but the +studious disregard of the soldier deterred him. Slowly his eyes fell +until they were directed thoughtfully through his own reflection into +the green depths of the well. + +Although there were ten years in favor of the Egyptian, there was a +certain similarity between the two men. Both were soldiers, both black +and stern. But one was a Hebrew, no less than forty-five years of age. +He wore a helmet of polished metal, equipped with a visor, which, when +raised, finished the front with a flat plate. The top of the +head-piece was ornamented with a spike. His armor was complete--shirt +of mail, shenti extending half-way to the knees, greaves of brass and +mailed shoes. + +He was as tall as the Egyptian and as lean, but his structure was +heavy, stalwart and powerful. His forehead was broad and bold, his +eyes deep-set, steel-blue and keen. He had the fighting nose, +over-long and hooked like an eagle's beak. The inexorable character of +his features was borne out by the mouth, thin-lipped and firm in its +closing. Even his beard, scant and touched with gray, was intractable. +Here was an Israelite who was a warrior, a rare thing--but splendid +when found. + +After a pause he turned, and the camel knelt at his command. The +litters had halted a little distance away under two palms that leaned +their leafless crowns together. The attendant was hastening toward the +well. + +"Joshua!" he cried joyously. + +"Even I," the Hebrew soldier said, walking around the kneeling beast. +"Peace to thee, Caleb." + +The two men embraced; the warrior imperturbably, the attendant +tearfully. + +"What dost thou away from Goshen?" Joshua asked, disengaging himself. +"The faithful of Israel have been summoned thither from the +remotenesses of Mizraim." + +But Caleb did not hear, having caught sight of the Egyptian. The +recognition startled him as it had all the others, but he did not hold +his peace. + +"Atsu!" he exclaimed. Joshua checked him. + +"Vex him not with attention," he said in a lowered tone. "His fall +hath been great, but it hath not killed his pride. He would speak if +it hurt him to be unremembered." + +"Hath he a grudge against us?" Caleb asked in astonishment. + +"Nay, look thou at the writing on the tablet. He would hide its +command from us. Is he not a friend to Israel still?" + +He indicated the characters on either side of the soldier. The words +were disconnected, but the sense was easily guessed. The command for +prayers to the Pantheon of Egypt was not hidden, beyond conjecture, +from the discerning. Caleb saw the meaning of the inscription, but +looked to Joshua for further enlightenment. + +"He would spare us," the abler Israelite said. "Let us return the +kindness and see him not." + +All this had the Egyptian heard, but his eyes, fixed so absently on the +horizon, seemed to indicate that he was not conscious of his +surroundings. + +Joshua repeated his question. + +"I was sent forth with Miriam," Caleb made answer. "She hath been +abroad, gathering up the scattered chosen." + +His eyes brightened and he clasped his hands with the gesture of a +happy woman. + +"Deliverance is at hand! Doubt it not, O Son of Nun! We go forth!" he +exclaimed. + +On the camel were hung a shield, a javelin and a quiver of arrows. +Joshua jostled the arrows in their case before answering. + +"Not as the moon changes," he said grimly. "The time for mild +departure is past and the word of the Lord God unto Moses must be +fulfilled." + +"So we but go," Caleb assented, "I care not. And such is the temper of +all Israel--nay," he broke off, conscientiously; "there is an +exception, an unusual exception." + +"There may be more," Joshua replied. "There is much in Egypt to hold +the slavish. But the captain of Israel hath called me, out of peaceful +shepherd life, to the severe fortunes of a warrior, and I go, no mile +too short, no moment too swift, that shall speed me into Pa-Ramesu." + +"And thou takest up arms for Israel?" Caleb cried. "Ah! but Moses hath +gloved his right hand in mail, in thee, O Son of Nun! But," he +continued, uneasy with his story untold, "this was no slavish content +under a master. Rather did it come from one of the best of Israel." + +"Strange that the lofty of Israel should regret a departure from the +land of the oppressors." Joshua settled himself on the camel and the +tall beast rose to its feet with a lurch. + +"Even so," Caleb answered, patting the nose of the camel and arranging +the tassels of its halter. "It was a quarry-slave, a maiden and of +gentle blood among the nobility of Israel. She is in the bamboo +litter, Miriam is in the other. + +"We are come from farthest Egypt, fifty of us in three barges," he +began. "To Syene have we been and all the Nilotic towns. To Nehapehu, +and even deep into the Great Oasis were messengers sent, for we would +not leave a single son of Abraham behind. And the masters surrendered +them to a man! Was it the face of Miriam or the fear of Moses or the +might of the Lord that tamed them? Hath Miriam a compelling glance, or +Moses a power that came not from Jehovah? Nay, not so. Praised be His +holy name!" + +The mild Israelite clasped his hands and raised his eyes devoutly. But +fearful lest his pause might furnish an opportunity for Joshua's +escape, he continued at once: + +"We were descending the Nile, below Memphis; the river sang and the +hills lifted up their voices. There was rejoicing in the meadows and +clapping of hands in the valleys. We possessed the gates of our +enemies and Mizraim sat upon the shores and wept after us. + +"Below Masaarah, the darkness fell; the sun perished in the morning and +the stars were not summoned in the night, for the Lord had withdrawn +the lights of heaven. But His hand was upon the waters and His glory +stood about us and we feared not. + +"And lo! there came a call upon Him from the shores to the east. The +barge of Miriam paused and from the land we succored an Israelitish +maiden. But when we would have moved on, she flung herself before +Miriam and besought her: + +"'Depart not yet, for there is another.' + +"'Of the chosen?' the prophetess asked. + +"'Nay, an Egyptian, but better and above his kind.' + +"'Of the faith?' Miriam asked further. And the maiden faltered and +said, 'Nay, not yet--but worthy and kindly.' + +"But the prophetess bade the men at the poles to continue, saying: +'Shall we cheat Jehovah in his intent and rescue an oppressor?' + +"But the maiden clung about the knees of Miriam and prayed to her, +while the prophetess said, 'Nay, nay' and 'Peace,' and sought to soothe +her, and when at that moment some one called out of the darkness, she +put her hand over the maiden's mouth and would not let her answer. And +the barge went swiftly away. Then the maiden fell on her face, like +one dead, and she will not be comforted." + +Joshua drew himself into securer, position on the camel and shook its +harness. + +"Love!" he said with a frown. "The evilest tie and the strongest +between Israel and Mizraim!" + +"Nay," Caleb protested, "thou hast loved." + +"A daughter of Israel," the warrior answered bluntly. "Dost thou +follow me into Goshen, Caleb?" + +"Nay, we go on to Tanis, where we shall join Moses and Aaron who lie +there awaiting the Pharaoh's summons." + +"The parting shall not be long between thee and me, then. Peace to +thee, Caleb. To Miriam, greeting and peace." + +The warrior urged his camel and, rounding the stela-guarding soldier +who had stood within ear-shot of the narrative, he was gone in a long +undulating swing up the road that led to Pa-Ramesu. + +Caleb gazed after him until he was only a tall shape like the stroke of +a pen in the distance. Then the mild Israelite looked longingly at the +Egyptian, and finally returned to the litters. These in a moment were +shouldered by the bearers and moved out up the road toward Tanis. +Caleb walked before them, dotting every other footprint with the point +of his staff. He sighed gustily and sank his bearded chin on his +breast. + +The soldier turned his head as soon as the attendant had passed and +gazed at the litters. + +The Hebrew bearers of the foremost were four in number, dressed in the +garb of serving-men to noble Israel. The hangings of blue linen had +been thrust aside and within was the semi-recumbent figure of a woman. +One knee was drawn up, the hands clasped behind the head, but the +majesty of the august countenance belied the youth of the posture. The +eyes of the woman met those of the Egyptian and lighted with +recognition. She lowered her arms and crossed the left to the shoulder +of the right. It was the old attitude of deference from Israel to +Atsu. A dusky red dyed the man's cheeks and he touched his knee in +response. + +The litter of Miriam passed. + +The next was a light frame of jungle bamboo, borne by a pair of young +men. Its sides were latticed, with the exception of two small +window-like openings on either side. These were hung with white linen, +but the drapings had been put aside to admit the morning air. + +The soldier looked and the shock of recognition drew him a pace away +from the stela. + +The head of a young girl, partly turned from him, was framed in the +small window. The wimple had been thrown back and a single tress of +golden hair had escaped across the forehead. The countenance was +unhappy, but beautiful for all its misery. The lids were heavy, as if +weighted down with sorrow; the cheeks were pallid, the lips colorless +and pathetically drooped. A white hand, resting on the slight frame of +the small opening, was tightly clenched. + +The picture was one of weary despair. + +The soldier, blanched and shaken, took a step forward as if to speak, +but some realization brought him back to rigid attention against the +stela. + +The light litter passed on. + +The regular tread of the men grew fainter and fainter and silence +settled again about the well. + +The soldier stood erect, gray-faced and immovable, his eyes fixed, his +teeth set, his hand gripping the pike, till the insects, reassured, +began to chirr close about him. Then his lids quivered; the pike +leaned in his grasp; his jaw relaxed, weakly. He shifted his position +and frowned, flung up his head and resumed his vigil. The moments went +on and yet he retained his tense posture. The hour passed and with it +his physical endurance. + +Then his emotion gathered all its forces, all the compelling sensations +of disappointment, rebuff, heart-hurt, jealousy, hopelessness, and +stormed his soul. He turned about and, stretching his arms across the +top of the stela, hid his face and surrendered. + +Around him was the unbroken circle of the earth and above the blue +desert of sky, solitary, soundless. And the union of earth and heaven, +like a mundane and spiritual collusion, lay between him and the little +litter. + +The beat of a horse's hoofs in the distance roused him after a long +time, and hastily turning his back toward the new-comer, he resumed at +once his soldierly attitude. + +The traveler bore down on him from the west and reined his horse at the +intersection of the two roads. He looked up the straight highway +toward Pa-Ramesu, then turned in the saddle and gazed toward Tanis. +His indecision was not a wayfarer's casual hesitancy in the choice of +roads. By the anxiety written on his face, life, fortune or love might +be at stake upon the correct selection of route. Once or twice he +looked at the soldier, but showed no inclination to ask advice, even +had the man-at-arms turned his way. + +It was one of fate's opportunities to be gracious. Here was Kenkenes +seeking for the maiden whom he and the soldier loved, and it lay in the +power of the unelect to direct the fortunate. But Kenkenes did not +know the warrior, and Atsu had no desire to turn his unhappy face to +the new-comer. The young man grew more and more troubled, his +indecision more marked. Suddenly he dropped the reins, and without +guiding the horse, urged the animal forward. + +Kenkenes was relying on chance for direction. + +Confused and unready the horse awaited the intelligent touch on the +bridle. It did not come. He flung up his head and smelt the wind. +Nervously he stamped and trod in one place, breathing loudly in protest. + +The low voice of his rider continued to urge him. Perhaps the wind +from Goshen brought the smell of unblighted pastures. Whatever the +reason, the horse turned, with uncertainty in his step and took the +road eastward to Pa-Ramesu. + +Having chosen, he went confidently, and as he was not halted and was +young and swift, he increased his pace to a long run. + +Meanwhile far to the north the little litter was borne toward Tanis. +And Atsu, the warrior, did not move his eyes from the distant point +where it had disappeared over the horizon. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII + +THE TRAITORS + +The morning of the second day after the lifting of the darkness lay +golden over Egypt, blue-shadowed before the houses and trees to the +west and shimmering and illusory toward the east. A slow-moving, +fragmentary cloud had gathered in the zenith just after dawn and for +many minutes over the northern part of Goshen there had been a +perpendicular downpour of illuminated rain. Now the sky was as clear +and blue as a sapphire and the little wind was burdened with odorous +scents from the clean-washed pastures of Israel. + +Seti had crossed the border into Goshen at daybreak and was now well +into the grazing-lands, yet scintillating with the rain. The hoofs of +his fat little horse were patched with wet sand of the roadway and +there was no dust on the prince's modest raiment. Behind the youth +plodded two heavy-headed, limp-eared sumpter-mules, driven by a +big-boned black. + +Seti was not far from his destination, an obscure village of +image-makers directly south of Tanis and situated on the northern +border of Goshen. The same region that furnished clay to Israel for +Egypt's bricks afforded material for terra-cotta statuettes. + +Ahead of him were fields with clouds of sheep upon the uplands and +cattle standing under the shade of dom-palms. Here and there hovels +with thatches no higher than a man's head, or low tents, dark with long +use, and lifted at one side, stood in a setting of green. About them +were orderly and productive gardens. Nowhere was any sign of the +desolation that prevailed over Egypt. + +Seti looked upon the beautiful prosperity of Goshen at first with the +natural delight loveliness inspires, and then with as much savage +resentment as his young soul could feel. Belting this garden and +stretching for seven hundred miles to the south, was Egypt, desolate, +barren and comatose. The God of the Hebrews had avenged them fearfully. + +"They had provocation," he muttered to himself; "but they have overdone +their vengeance." + +A figure appeared on the road over the comb of a slight ridge, and Seti +regarded the wayfarer with interest. + +He was a Hebrew. His draperies were loose, voluminous, heavily +fringed, and of such silky texture of linen that they flowed in the +light wind. His head was covered with a wide kerchief, which was bound +with a cord, and hid the forehead. + +He was of good stature and upright, but his drapings were so ample that +the structure of his frame was not discernible. His eyes were black, +bright and young in their alertness, but the beard that rippled over +his breast to his girdle was as white as the foam of the Middle Sea. + +The Hebrew walked in the grass by the roadside and came on, his face +expectant. At sight of the prince he stepped into the roadway. Seti +drew up. + +"Thou art Seti-Meneptah?" the ancient wayfarer asked. + +"Even so," the prince answered. + +The Hebrew put back his kerchief and stood uncovered. + +"Dost thou know me, my son?" he asked. + +"Thou art that Aaron, of the able tongue, brother to Mesu. Camest thou +forth to meet me?" + +The Hebrew readjusted the kerchief. + +"Thou hast said." + +"Wast thou, then, so impatient? Where is thy brother?" + +"Nay. The village of image-makers is not safe. Moses hath departed +for Zoan." [1] + +"And named thee in his stead. But his mission to my father's capital +bodes no good. He might have stayed until I could have persuaded him +into friendship." + +"Not with all thy gold!" said Aaron gravely. + +"Nay, I had not meant that," Seti rejoined with some resentment. "If +Egypt's plight can not win mercy from him by its own piteousness, the +treasure I bring is not enough." + +The Hebrew waved his hand as if to dismiss the subject. + +"Let us not dispute so old a quarrel," he said. "We have a new sorrow, +thou and I." + +"Of Mesu's sending?" + +"Nay, of thine own misplaced trust." + +"What!" the prince exclaimed. "Have I clothed thy kinsman with more +grace than he owns?" + +"Thou hast put faith in thine enemy. A woman hath deceived thee." + +"What dost thou tell me?" Seti cried, leaping to the ground and angrily +confronting Aaron. + +"A truth," the Hebrew answered calmly. "The Princess Ta-user is a +fugitive charged with treason." + +Seti turned cold and smote his forehead. "Undone through me!" he +groaned. + +"Not so, my son. Thou art undone through her. She betrayed thee." + +Seti turned upon him with a fierce movement. + +"Peace!" the Hebrew interrupted the furious speech on the prince's +lips. "I bear thee no malice." + +"I will give ear to no tales against the princess," Seti avowed with +ire. + +"Thy blind trust hath already wrought havoc with thee. Let it not +bring heavy punishment upon thy head. Thou hast dealt kindly with me, +and I am beholden to thee. Give me leave to discharge my debt." + +The prince looked stubbornly at Aaron for a moment, but the doubt that +had begun to assert itself in his mind clamored for proof or refutation. + +"Say on," he said. + +"The story is long," the Hebrew explained mildly, "and the sun is +ardent. There are friends in yonder house. Let us ask the shelter of +their roof for an hour." + +Gathering his robes about him with peculiar grace, he went through the +grass toward a low, capacious tent, pitched by a trickling branch of +the great canal. Seti followed moodily. + +A black-haired Israelitish woman, sitting on the earth before the +lifted side of the tent, arose, and reverently kissed the hem of +Aaron's robes. Her dark-eyed brood appeared at various angles of the +tent, and at a sign and a word from the woman they did obeisance and +hailed the ancient visitor in soft Hebrew. + +After a short colloquy between Aaron and the woman of Israel, the +children were dismissed to play in the fields and the woman carried the +bowl and basket of lentils out of ear-shot of her house. + +"Let us enter," Aaron said, with an inclination of his head toward +Seti. He stooped and preceded the young man into the home of the +Hebrew. + +The prince saw the black dispose himself on the grass outside, with his +eyes upon the sumpter-mule. + +Aaron sat upon one of the rugs, and Seti, following his example, took +another. + +"Say on," the prince urged. + +The Hebrew began at once. + +"What I tell thee, O my son, will soon be talked abroad over the land. +But if thou hast a doubt in thy heart, and art like to question my +truth-speaking, there are witnesses I may summon, such as no wise man +will deny. And these be Jambres, and the twelve priests of the cities +of the north, and the innkeeper at Pithom, also the governor over the +treasure-city, his soldiers, and others, who know the secret by now. + +"I will give thee the tale now, and the proof thereafter, if thou +believest me not. + +"Last night, I lay under the tent of a son of Israel, at Pithom. When +I arose, two hours before dawn, horsemen began to gallop through the +city toward the south. The inhabitants were aroused; there was much +running to and fro, and the inn was full of lights. + +"We approached, and when the tumult had died and the Egyptians were so +full of the tidings that they were glad to relieve themselves even to +an Israelite, I asked and learned this story. Many times afterward, on +my way hither, I heard it from the lips of men whom I passed, so I am +not deceived. + +"Seven days agone, under an evil star, a veiled woman came to the +temple of Bast, in the village of image-makers, and made offerings to +the idol. She remained in the shrine, praying, for a time without +reason, as though she pretended to worship, until a certain space +should elapse. At the end of the hour in which she came, another +woman, closely covered, her mouth hidden, entered and knelt near her. +In a little they arose and went forth together, and Jambres, who is +priest at the little temple, grown suspicious by reason of their +behavior, looked after them. The wind swayed the garments of the +second stranger, and showed the foot and ankle of a man. Filled with +wonderment, Jambres laid aside his priest's robes and garbing himself +like a wayfarer, followed. They left the village, going east where the +road leadeth along the canal, which is hidden by the sprouts of young +trees. Farther up the way were servitors who waited for the man and +woman, but the two stepped out of ear-shot, and sat by the road to talk. + +"Jambres, hidden in the fringe of bushes behind, heard them. + +"They laid a snare. And thou, O Prince, wast to be trapped therein." + +Seti's eyes were veiled and his face showed a heightening of color. + +"Thou wast to come to the temple in the village of image-makers with +treasure to give into the hands of Moses. Thy message to my brother +was to be delivered by the Princess Ta-user. She delivered it not. +The word she should have brought came to Moses by a son of Belial, a +godless Hebrew, sent by Jambres, for the brotherhood of priests would +have had Moses come to the temple, for their own ends. But the +servants of the Lord God of Israel are keen-eyed and they know a jackal +from a hare. However, these matters I did not hear from the people. +Such secret things are not discussed upon the streets. All that I +heard in Pithom may be talked openly over Egypt. + +"The man and the woman laid their plans, and they were these: Last +night, the man and his servants were to lie at Pithom, and to-day they +were to meet thee at the temple of Bast, overpower thee, take thy +treasure and, with the woman, fly to some secure place. With the +treasure they were to hire them soldiers--mercenaries, and take arms +against the king, thy father." + +The speaker paused again. Seti's breast labored and his gaze was fixed +upon the Hebrew. + +"The ire of Jambres was kindled against the plotters, and he called an +assembly of the priests within short distances from the village of +image-makers and laid his discoveries before them. They pledged +themselves to proceed to Pithom last night, which was the night they +came together in council, and take the traitors. But one among their +number, a young priest who knew the woman, played them false, entered +the city before his fellows and warned the plotters. They had fled, +with the priests in pursuit. + +"My son, the man was Siptah, son of Amon-meses; the woman, the Princess +Ta-user." + +The prince's face took on an insane beauty. In each cheek was a +scarlet stain--his lips smiled without parting and his eyes glittered. +He did not question the Hebrew's story. Something within him +corroborated every word. He sprang to his feet and with an unnatural +laugh flung his hand above his head. + +"Now, by Horus," he cried, "I must get back to Tanis. I would ask the +pardon of Rameses!" + +Aaron arose and laid detaining hands upon him. + +"I did not tell thee this, that I might be a bearer of evil tidings. I +came forth to meet thee, that thou mayest save thyself. Far be it from +me to bring misfortune upon Israel's one friend in Egypt's high places. +Return to Tanis with all speed and take the treasure with thee. Then +only will the intent rest against thee--" + +"Not so," Seti interrupted harshly. "Wilt thou rob me of the one balm +to my humiliation? Wilt thou defeat me also in the one good deed I +would do? Take thou the treasure and be glad that it fell not into the +hands of the wanton. Let me depart." + +But Aaron was planted in his way. + +"Knowest thou not what they will do with thee? Thou wouldst have given +aid to the enemy of Egypt. Thou knowest the penalty. Sooner would +Israel make it a garment of sackcloth and feed upon alms, than yield +thee up to thine enemies for thy gold's sake--" + +But Seti would not hear him. "I care not what they do with me," he +said. "The gods grant they lay upon me the extreme weight of the law. +I go back to Tanis as one returneth to his beloved." + +He shook off the Israelite's hands and ran into the open. There, he +ordered the black to give the treasure over to the Hebrew, and flinging +himself upon his horse, galloped furiously toward Tanis. + +Of the remainder of the day Seti had little memory. Once or twice as +he proceeded headlong through hamlets, he caught from the lips of +natives a denunciation of Siptah, a vicious epithet applied to Ta-user, +or, like a fresh thrust in an old wound, a pitying groan for himself. +His shame had preceded him on fleet wings. He hoped he might as +swiftly run his sentence down. + +None knew him in the roadways and the towns did not expect him. The +pickets on the outer wall of Tanis halted him, but when they beheld his +face, their pikes fell and with hands on knees, they bade him pass. +The palace sentries started and gave him room. + +He was running, sobbing, through the dark and capacious corridors of +the palace and no man had stayed him yet. Were they to make his shame +more poignant by pitying him and punishing him not at all? He flung +himself through the doors of the council chamber and halted. + +The great hall was crowded and full of excitement. Meneptah had +summoned the court to the royal presence. + +In his loft above the throng stood the king, purple with rage. The +queen, in her place at his side, was staying his outstretched hand. +Below at his right stood Rameses, the kingliest presence that ever +graced a royal sitting. At the left of Meneptah, was Har-hat, +complacent and serene. + +Out in the center of a generous space stood Moses. The great Hebrew +was alone and isolated, but his personality was such that a throng +could not have obscured him. + +In his massive physique was an insistent suggestion of immovability and +superhuman strength; in the shape of his imperial head, there was +illimitable capacity; in his face, the image of a nature commanding the +entire range of feeling, from the finest to the fiercest. There was +nothing of the occult in his atmosphere. His intense human force would +have commanded, though Egypt had not known him as the emissary of God. + +As it was, when he moved the assembly swayed back as if blown by a +wind. A motion of his hand sent a nervous start over the hall. The +nearest courtiers seemed prepared to crouch. Meneptah did not win a +glance from his court. Every eye, wide and expectant, was fixed upon +the Israelite. + +The pale and troubled queen strove in vain. Meneptah thrust her aside +and shaking his clenched hand at the solitary figure before him, ended +the audience in a voice violent with fury. + +"Get thee from me! Take heed to thyself; see my face no more. For in +that day thou seest my face, thou shalt die!" + +After the speech, the silence fell, deepened, grew ominous. None +breathed, and the overwrought nerves of the court reached the limit of +endurance. + +Then Moses answered. His tones were quiet, his voice full of a calm +more terrifying than an outburst had been. + +"Thou hast spoken well," he said. "I will see thy face no more." + +Another breathless silence and he turned, the courtiers shrinking from +his way, and passed out of the hall. + +At the doors, his eyes fell upon Seti. He made no sign of surprise. +Indeed his glance seemed to indicate that he expected the prince. He +raised his hand and extended it for a moment over the boy's head, and +went forth. + +The strength went from Seti's limbs, the passion from his brain, and +when Rameses with grim purpose in his face beckoned him, he obeyed +meekly and prostrated himself before the angry king. + + + +[1] Zoan--The Hebrew name for Tanis. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX + +BEFORE EGYPT'S THRONE + +The distance by highway between Memphis and Tanis was eighty miles, a +little more than two days' journey by horseback. + +Masanath had required two weeks to accomplish that distance. She refused +to travel except in the cool of the morning and of the afternoon; if she +felt the fatigue of an hour's journey, she rested a day at the next town; +she consulted astrologers, and moved forward only under propitious signs; +she insisted on following the Nile until she was opposite Tanis, instead +of taking the highway at On and continuing across the Delta. + +The most of her following walked, and she proceeded at the pace of her +plodding servants. + +She spoke of her freedom as though she went to meet doom; she gazed on +the sorry fields and pastures of Egypt as though the four walls of a +prison were soon to shut out heaven and earth from her eyes. + +She was now within ten miles of Tanis, fourteen days after her departure +from Memphis. + +Four solemn Ethiopians bore her litter upon their shoulders, and another +waved a fan of black ostrich plumes over her. The litter was of +glittering ebony, hung with purple, tasseled with gold. At her right, +was Unas; at her left, Nari. Behind her were dusky attendants and sooty +sumpter-mules. + +Her robes were white, and very fine, but there was no henna on her nails, +nor kohl beneath her lids, nor jewels in her hair. So she would prove +that, though she was a coming queen, she was not glad of it. Hers was +not the spirit that hides its trouble and enamels the exterior with false +flushes and smiles. She enveloped herself in her feelings. She +tinctured her voice with them; she made her eyes languid with them; and +the touch of her hand, the curve of her lips and the droop of her head +were eloquent of them. + +By this time, she had despaired. There was yet an opportunity to spend +another day covering the remaining ten miles, but she would loiter no +longer. She was tired, of a truth. + +It was near sunset when a company of royal guards, under Menes, rode up +from the north. + +The captain flung himself from his horse and hurried to Masanath's litter. + +"Holy Isis! Lady Masanath," he exclaimed; "where in all Egypt hast thou +hidden thyself these fourteen days? The whole army of the north hath +been searching after thee, and Rameses hath raved like a madman since +that day long past on which thou shouldst have arrived in Tanis." + +"I have been on the way," she answered loftily. "The haste of the prince +is unseemly. I would not fatigue myself nor court disaster by +incautiousness, these perilous days." + +Menes bowed. "I am reproved, and contrite. I forgot that I spoke with +my queen. But I am most grateful that thou didst permit me to find thee, +for Rameses sent me forth an hour since, with the hard alternative of +fetching thee to him or losing my head. But that he was sure of my +success is proved by the litter he sent between two horses for thee. +Wilt thou leave this and proceed in the other?" + +Masanath answered by extending her hand to him. Three of the soldiers +laid their cloaks on the earth for her feet; six others let down the +litter and Menes assisted her into the sumptuous conveyance Rameses had +sent. + +Another soldier, after rapid and low-spoken instructions from the +captain, whirled his horse about, saluted and took the road toward Tanis +at a gallop. + +The six shouldered the litter of the crown princess-to-be, Menes mounted +his horse and rode beside her; Unas, her Memphian train, and the +riderless horses were left to bring up the rear, and Masanath continued +to the capital. + +"Perchance, thou hast been famished these fourteen days in the matter of +court-gossip," the captain said. "Wherefore I am come as thy informant +with such news as thou shouldst know. For, being ignorant of the +infelicities in the household of the king, it may be that thou wouldst +ask after the little prince, Seti, and wherefore the queen appears no +more at the side of the Pharaoh, nor speaks with thy lord nor sees thy +noble father; and furthermore, where Ta-user hath taken herself and other +things which would embarrass thee to hear answered openly." + +Masanath roused herself and prepared to listen. Serious words from the +lips of the light-hearted captain were not common, and when he spoke in +that manner it was time to take heed. + +"I had heard of the little prince's misfortune and of the treason of +Ta-user and her party, and the placing of a price upon her head; but +nothing more hath come to mine ears. Is there more, of a truth?" + +"Remember, I pray thee," the captain replied, riding near to her, "that I +bring thee this for thine own sake--not for the love of tale-bearing. On +the counsel of Rameses, this day the Pharaoh sentenced Seti to banishment +for a year to the mines of Libya--" + +"To the mines!" Masanath cried in horror. + +"Not as a laborer. Nay, the sentence was not so harsh. But as a scribe +to the governor over them." + +"It matters little!" she declared indignantly. "The boy-prince--the +poor, misguided young brother sent to a year of banishment--a lifelong +humiliation! Libya, the death-country! Now, was anything more brutal? +Nay, it is like Rameses!" + +"Aye," the captain replied quickly, leaning over her with a cautioning +motion of his hand. "Aye, and it is like thee to say it. But hear me +yet further. The queen and the Son of Ptah have quarreled, violently, +over Seti," he continued in a low tone. "The little prince merited thy +father's disfavor, because Seti espoused the cause of Ta-user in thy +place, though he loves thee, and for that--we can find no other +reason--the noble Har-hat also urged the king into the harsh sentence of +the little prince. For this the queen hath publicly turned her back upon +the crown prince and the fan-bearer, and the atmosphere of the palace is +most unhappy." + +He lowered his voice to a whisper. "Hotep championed Seti,--for the +young sister's sake, it would appear,--but to me it seemeth that the +scribe hath lost his wits." + +"It would seem that he courteth a sentence to the mines likewise, and he +needs but to go on as he hath begun to succeed most thoroughly. And it +behooveth his friends to prevent him." + +He took Masanath's hand and, leaning from the saddle, whispered: + +"Ye are under the same roof--thou and Hotep. Avoid him as though he were +a pestilence." + +He straightened himself and drew his horse away from her so that she +could not answer. + +The captain's meaning, though obscure to any other that might have heard +him, was very clear to Masanath. Har-hat was still holding a threat of +Hotep's undoing over his daughter's head, lest, at the last moment, she +rebel against her marriage. She trembled, realizing how desperately she +was weighted with the safety of the scribe. Her fear for him brought the +first feeling of willingness to wed with Rameses that she had ever +experienced. Distasteful as marriage was to her, it was a species of +sacrifice to be catalogued with the many self-abnegations of which +womanhood is capable when the welfare of the beloved is at stake. + +She sank back in the shadows of her litter, covered her face with her +hands and shuddered because of the imminence of her trial. + +So they journeyed on, till at last Masanath fell asleep--not from +indifference, for her fears exhausted her--but because her mind still +retained babyhood's way of comforting itself when too roughly beset. + +She was aroused in the middle of the first watch by the passage of her +litter between bewildering stretches of lights. She was within the +palace. The soldiers that bore her were tramping over a Damascene +carpet, and between long lines of groveling attendants, through an +atmosphere of overwhelming perfume. The messenger had been swift and the +court had had time to prepare to greet the coming crown princess with +propriety. + +After the first spasm of terror, Masanath set her teeth and prepared to +endure. She was borne to the doors of the throne-room and two nobles +gorgeously habited set the carved steps beside the litter for her feet. + +Without hesitation she descended. + +The great hall was ablaze with light and lined with courtiers. The +Pharaoh, with the queen by his side again, was in his place under the +canopy. + +How tiny the little bride seemed to those gathered to greet her! In that +vast chamber, with its remote ceiling, its majestic pillars, its +distances and sonorous echoes, her littleness was pathetically +accentuated. + +Outside the shelter of her litter, she felt stripped of all protection. +She dared not look at the ranks of courtiers, lest her gaze fall on the +fair face of the royal scribe. She reminded Isis of her threat and moved +into the open space, which extended down the center of the hall. + +Har-hat, glittering with gems, and rustling in snow-white robes, +approached with triumph in his face to embrace her. But within three +steps he paused as suddenly as though he had been commanded. Masanath +had not spoken, but her pretty chin had risen, her mouth curved +haughtily, and the gaze she fixed upon him from under her lashes was cold +and forbidding. + +She extended the tips of her fingers to him. The action clamored its +meaning. Not in the face of that assembly dared he disregard it, but his +black eyes hardened and flashed threateningly. The warning given, he +bent his knee and kissed the proffered hand. He had become the subject +of his daughter. + +She suffered him to lead her to the royal dais where she knelt. The +queen descended, raised her and led her to the throne. Meneptah met +them, kissed Masanath's forehead, and blessed her. The queen embraced +her and returned to her place beside the Pharaoh. + +Masanath turned to the right of the royal dais and faced the prince. +Thus far, her greetings had not been hard. Now was the supreme test. +Har-hat conducted her within a few paces of the prince and stepped aside. +What followed was to prove Masanath's willingness. + +Rameses stood in the center of a slightly raised platform, which was +carpeted with gold-edged purple. Behind him was his great chair. But +for the badge of princehood, the fringed ribbon dependent from a +gem-crusted annulet over each temple, his habiliments were the same as +the Pharaoh's. + +Masanath gave him a single comprehensive glance. She was to wed against +her will, but she noted philosophically that she was to wed with no +puppet, but a kingly king. With all that, admitting herself a peer to +this man, it wrenched her sorely to acknowledge subserviency to him. + +Hope dead--the hour of her trial at hand--nothing was left to uphold her +but the memory of the good she might do for Hotep. Her face fell and she +approached the prince with slow steps. Within three paces of the +platform she paused and sank to her knees. + +It was done. She had acknowledged the betrothal and knelt to her lord. +Somewhere in that assembly Hotep had seen it, and she wondered numbly if +he understood why she had submitted; wondered if she had saved him; +wondered if she could endure for the long life they must spend under the +same roof; wondered if the gods would take pity on her and kill her very +soon. + +By this time, Rameses had raised her. He lifted the badge of princehood +from his forehead, shortened the fillet from which it hung, so that it +would fit her small head and set it on her brow. + +The great palace shook with the acclaim of the courtiers. Organ-throated +trumpets were blown; the clang of crossed arms, and sound of beaten +shields arose from all parts of the king's house; all the ancients' +manifestations of joy were made,--and the pair that had brought it forth +looked upon each other. + +Masanath was trembling, and filled with a great desire to cry out. All +this was manifest on her small, white face. The light had died in the +prince's eyes, the exultation was gone from his countenance. He knew +what thoughts were uppermost in the mind of Masanath, and the tyrant had +spoken truly to her long ago, when he said his heart might be hurt. His +brow contracted with an expression of actual pain and he turned with a +fierce movement as if to command the rejoicings to be still. But a +thought deterred him and taking Masanath's hand he led her down the hall +through the bending ranks of purple-wearing Egyptians to the great +portals of the hall. There, he gave her into the hands of a troop of +court-ladies, lithe as leopards and gorgeous as butterflies, who led her +with many sinuous obeisances to her apartments. She had not far to go. +The suite given over to the new crown princess was within the wing of the +palace in which the royal family lived. Masanath noted with a little +trepidation that her door was very near to the portals over which was the +winged sun, carven and portentous. Here were the chambers of her lord, +the heir. + +Within her own apartments, she was attended multitudinously. +Ladies-in-waiting bent at her elbow; soft-fingered daughters of nobility +habited her in purple-edged robes; flitting apparitions, in a distant +chamber, glimpsed through a vista, laid a table of viands for her, to +which she was led with many soft flatteries; her every wish was +anticipated; all her trepidation conspicuously overlooked; her rank +religiously observed in all speech and behavior. And of all her retinue, +she was the least complacent. + +After her sumptuous meal, she was informed that a member of her private +train had come to Tanis from Memphis, ten days agone, in a state of great +concern and had awaited all that time in the palace till she should +arrive. Now that she had come, the servitor insisted on seeing the +princess and would not be denied. Troubled and wondering, Masanath +ordered that he be brought. In a few minutes, Pepi stood before her. +The taciturn servant was visibly frightened. + +"Pepi!" she cried. "What brings thee here?" + +"I have lost the Israelite," he faltered. + +"Thou hast lost Rachel!" + +"Hear me, my Lady, I pray thee. Thou knowest we were to stop at the +Marsh of the Discontented Soul to leave a writing on the tomb for the son +of Mentu. So we did. The Israelite bade me stand away from the shore +lest we be seen. I put out into midstream and while mine eyes were +attracted for a space toward the other shore, a boat drew up at the +Marsh. I started to return, but before I could reach the place, the +Israelite--the man--they were in--each other's arms." + +Masanath clasped her hands happily, but the servant went on, in haste. +"It was the son of Mentu, I know, my Lady. He was wondrous tall, and the +Israelite was glad to see him--" + +"O, of a surety it was Kenkenes," Masanath interrupted eagerly. + +"Nay, but hear me, my Lady," the serving-man protested, his distress +evident in his voice. "I moved away and turned my back, for I knew they +had no need of me. Once, twice, I looked and still they talked together. +But, alas! the third time I looked, it was because I heard sounds of +combat, and I saw that the son of Mentu and several men were fighting. +One, whom by his fat figure I took to be Unas, was pursuing the +Israelite. I would have returned to help her, but the dreadful night +overtook me before I could reach her--and as thou knowest,--none moved +thereafter. + +"When the darkness lifted, I was off the wharves at On, where my boat had +drifted. I halted only long enough to feed, for I was famished, and with +all haste I returned to the Marsh. None was there. I went to the house +in Memphis, but it was dark and closed. Next I visited the home of Mentu +and asked if Rachel were there, but the old housekeeper had never heard +of such a maiden. But when I asked if the young master had returned, she +asked me where I had been that I had not heard he was dead. And having +said, she shut the door in my face. I think he was within, and she would +not answer me 'aye' or 'nay,' but I know that she told the truth +concerning the Israelite." + +Masanath, who had stood, the picture of dismay and apprehension during +the last part of the recital, seized his arm. + +"Hast thou had an eye to the master?" she demanded in a fierce whisper. + +"Aye," he answered quickly. "I have followed him like a shadow, and this +I know. Nak and Hebset were here when I came, but they went that same +night, each in a different direction, to search further for her. They +returned to-night, but I know not whether they brought one with them." + +Masanath clasped her hands and thought for a moment, a mental struggle +evidenced on her little face by the rapid fluctuations of color. + +"Get thee down to the kitchens, Pepi," she said presently, "and if Nari +hath come, send her up to me. Give thyself comfort and remain in the +palace. It may be that I shall need thee." + +She surveyed herself with a swift glance in a plate of polished silver +which was her mirror, and then, darting out of her door, ran down the +corridor as though she would outstrip repentance before it overtook her. + +The flight was not long, but she had lost her composure before she +started. Outside her doors, she trembled as if unprotected. Soldiers of +the royal guard paced along the hall before her chambers. The lamps that +burned there were of gold; the drapings were of purple wrought with the +royal symbols; the asp supported the censers; the head of Athor +surmounted the columns. She was a dweller of the royal house. Far, far +away from her were the unimperial quarters in which, once, she would have +lived. There was her father--there was Hotep-- + +She came upon him whom she sought. He was on the point of entering his +apartments. He paused with his hands on the curtains and waited for her. + +"A word with thee, my Lord," she panted, chiefly from trepidation. + +"I have come to expect no more than a word from thee," he said. + +The answer would have sent her away in dudgeon, under any other +circumstances, but her pride could not stand in the way of this very +pressing duty. + +"A boon," she said, choking back her resentment. + +"A boon! Thou wouldst ask a boon of me! Nay, I will not promise, for it +may be thou comest to ask thy freedom, and that I will not grant for +spleen." + +Still she curbed herself. "Nay, O Prince; I am come to ask naught of +thee which--a wife--may not justly ask of--her--lord." + +He left the curtain and came close to her. "Had the words come smoothly +over thy lips, they would have meant any wife--any husband. But thy very +faltering names thee and me. What is the boon that thou mayest justly +ask of me?" + +"My father--." + +"Hold! There, too, I make a restriction. Already have I suffered thy +father sufficiently." + +Tears leaped into her insulted eyes, and in the bright light, shining +from a lamp above her head, her emotion was very apparent. + +"Thou hast begun well in thy siege of my heart, Rameses," she said. "I +am like to love thee, if thou dost woo me with affronts!" + +"I am as like to win thee with rough words as I am with soft speeches. I +had thought thee above pretense, Masanath." + +"I pretend not," she cried, stamping her foot. "And if thou wouldst know +how I esteem thee, I can tell thee most truthfully." + +He laughed and caught her hands. "Nay, save thy judgment. Thou hast a +long life with me before thee, and the minds of women can change in the +blink of an eye. Furthermore, I love thee none the less because thou art +so untamed. Thou art the world I would subdue. So thou dost not give +allegiance to another conqueror, I shall not grieve over thy rebellion. +Is there another?" he asked. + +"I would liefer wed with well-nigh any other man in Egypt than with thee, +Rameses," she replied deliberately. + +The declaration swept him off his feet. + +"Gods! but thou dost hate me," he cried. Panic possessed her for a +moment, remembering Hotep, but it was too late. She returned the +prince's gaze without wavering, though her hands shook pitifully. After +what seemed to her an interminable time, he spoke again. + +"Perchance I am unwise in taking thee," he said. "Perchance I but give +thee opportunity to spit me on a dagger in my sleep." + +The tears brimmed over her lashes this time. + +"Thou dost slander me!" she exclaimed passionately. + +"Then I do not understand thee, Masanath," he asserted. + +"Of a surety," she declared, withdrawing a hand that she might dry the +evidences of her indignation from her cheeks. "Take the example home to +thyself! Thou hast been loved in thy time, and if ever there was +awakened any feeling in thy heart in response it was repugnance. What if +one of these women had it in her power to take thee against thy will? By +this time thou hadst been dead of thy frantic hate of her, if self-murder +had not been done!" + +"Even so," he answered with a short laugh; "but I will not set thee free, +Masanath, if thou didst convict me a monster in mine own eyes. If thou +art good thou wilt love me or do thy duty by me. If thou art base, I +have wedded mine own deserts." + +He took the hand she had withdrawn and prepared to go on, but she +interposed. + +"Not yet have I asked my boon." + +"I am no longer in debt to thy father." + +"I ask no favor for my father at thy hands. Rather am I come to crave a +boon for myself." + +"Speak." + +"My father asked an Israelite maiden at the hands of the Pharaoh a year +agone, and she was beloved by my friend and thine. She fled from my +father and was hidden by the man she loved--" + +"Aye, I know the story. Hotep brought it to mine ears months ago. The +man was Kenkenes, and thy father overtook him and threw him into prison +in Tape. What more?" + +"The gods keep me in my love for thee, O my father! for thou dost strain +it most heavily," Masanath thought. After an unhappy silence she went on. + +"Thou hast given me news. I know little of the tale save that the day +the darkness fell Kenkenes met his love on the eastern shore of the Nile +opposite Memphis, and there my father's servants came upon them and +fought with him for the possession of the Israelite. The Israelite is +gone, and my father's servants are still seeking for her, and I would not +have her taken." + +"Thou art a queen. What is she, a slave, to thee?" + +"A sister, my comforter, my one friend!" + +"Thou canst find sisters and comforters and friends among high-born women +of Egypt. I had laid Kenkenes' folly concerning this Israelite to the +moonshine genius in him. But the slave is a sorceress, for the madness +touches whosoever looks upon her. Behold her worshipers--first, thy +father, Kenkenes, Hotep and thyself, and the gods know whom else. She +would better be curbed before she bewitches Egypt." + +"It is her goodness and her grace that win, Rameses. If that be sorcery, +let it prevail the world over. Give her freedom and save her +spotlessness." + +"Har-hat shall not take her, I promise thee. I shall send her back to +her place in the brick-fields." + +Masanath recoiled in horror. "To the brick-fields!" she cried. "Rachel +to the brick-fields!" + +"I have said. Her Israelitish spotlessness will be secure there, and the +reduction of her charms will be the saving of Kenkenes." + +"Alas! what have I done?" she cried. "I am as fit for the brick-fields +as Rachel. O, if thou but knew her, Rameses!" + +"Nay, it is as well that I do not; she might bewitch me. And seeing that +she is born of slaves, how shall she be pampered above her parents? Put +the folly from thy mind, Masanath, and trouble me not concerning a single +slave. Shall I let one go, seeing that I am holding the body at the +sacrifice of Egypt?" + +Great was Masanath's distress to make her seize him so beseechingly. + +"Turn not away, my Lord," she begged. "See what havoc I have wrought for +Rachel when I sought to help her. And behold the honesty of thy boast of +love for me. My first boon and thou dost deny it!" + +He laughed, and slipping an arm about her, pressed her to him. + +"First am I a king--next a lover," he said. "Thy prayer seeketh to come +between me and my rule over the Israelites. Ask for something which hath +naught to do with my scepter." + +"Surely if thou sendest her to the brick-fields Kenkenes will go into +slavery with her," she persisted, enduring his clasp in the hope that he +might soften. + +"Then it were time for the dreamer to be awakened by his prince." + +"Thou wilt not come between them!" she exclaimed. + +"Nay, no need. Seven days of the lash and the sun of the slave-world +will heal Kenkenes." + +"Thou shalt see!" Masanath declared, endeavoring to free herself. "And +the gods judge thee for thy savage use of maidenhood!" + +Again he laughed, and this time he kissed her in spite of her resistance. + +"The gods judge me rather for this sweeter use of maidenhood," he said. +"Let them continue to prosper me in it and hasten the day of her +willingness. Meanwhile," he continued, still holding her, as if he +enjoyed the mastery over her, "get thee back to thy sleep and put the +thought of slaves out of thy mind. To-morrow thou settest thy feet in +the path to the throne; to-morrow there will be ceremonies and prayers +and blessings out of number; and to-morrow sunset thou art no longer +betrothed but a bride! My bride! Go now, and be proud of me if thou +canst not love me!" + +He released her and, as he entered his apartments, lifted the curtain and +stood for an instant looking back at her. + +Masanath saw him through her despairing tears--strong, immovable, +terrible--in his youth and his purposes and his capabilities. + +Then the curtain fell behind him. + +Crushed and stunned with despair and horror, she made her way to her +apartments in a mist of tears. + +There was no help for the beloved Rachel or for the young lover. All +whom she might ask to approach the king in their favor were helpless or +prejudiced. Seti was disgraced; the queen, useless; Hotep, already too +imminently imperiled; Rameses, Har-hat, against the lovers; and the +king--the poor, feeble king, hopelessly beyond any appeal that she might +direct to him. + +A sorry resolve shaped itself in her mind. To-morrow at dawn she also +would put forth searchers, and finding Rachel, send her out of Egypt, and +Kenkenes after her. + + + + +CHAPTER XL + +THE FIRST-BORN + +At the door of her apartments Masanath was met by the faithful Nari, +who drew her within and showed her triumphantly that the usurping +ladies-in-waiting had departed. The unhappy girl was grateful for the +change. The relief for her sorrow was its expression, and she dreaded +the restraint put upon her by the presence of discerning and unfamiliar +eyes. + +All desire for sleep had left her. Nari, weary and heavy-headed, +begged her to retire, but she would not. So at last the waiting woman, +at her mistress' command, lay down and slept. + +The apartment consisted of two chambers running the width of the +palace. The outer chamber had a window opening on the streets of +Tanis, the inner looked into the palace courtyard. + +Masanath wrapped a woolen mantle about her and sat at the window +overlooking the park. + +Without was the wide hollow, walled by the many-galleried stories of +the king's house. Below a fountain of running water, issuing from an +ibis-bill of bronze, and falling into a pool, purled and splashed and +talked on and on to itself. + +Above, the mighty constellations were dropping slowly down the west. +The wild north wind from the sea strove against her cheek. The gods +were too absorbed in great things, the shifting of the heavens, the +flight of the wind and the rocking of the waters, to care for her great +burden of trouble. Or, indeed, were they not prejudiced against her as +all the world was? They had heard every prayer but hers. They had +harkened to Rameses when he asked for her at their hands; they had +harkened to her father and yielded him power at her sacrifice; they had +even pitied Rachel; they had returned her love from Amenti, and yet had +not Rachel reviled them? Nay, there was conspiracy laid against her by +the Pantheon, and what had she done to deserve it? + +In some one of the many windows that looked into the court another +dragged at his chestnut locks and execrated gods and men because of +their hardness of heart. + +So the night wore on to its noon. + +Masanath was becoming drowsy in spite of her determination to keep a +sleepless vigil until dawn, when she was aroused by a commotion in the +vicinity of the palace. There were indoor cries and shouts for help. + +"A brawl," she thought. But the noise seemed to emerge into the +street, and there came the sound of flying footsteps and frantic knocks +upon doors without. The sound seemed to swell and spread abroad, +widening and heightening. Wild shrieks and husky broken shouts swept +up from all quarters of the town, and the whole air was full of a vast +murmur of many voices, calling and wailing, excited, tremulous and full +of fear. + +Masanath passed into the outer room to the window that looked upon the +city. + +Every house had a light, which flickered and appeared at this window +and that, and the streets were full of flying messengers, who cried out +as they ran. Now and then a chariot, drawn at full speed, dashed past, +and by the fluttering robes of the occupants Masanath guessed them to +be physicians. All Tanis was in uproar, and its alarm possessed her at +once. + +She turned to awaken Nari, when she heard inside the palace excited +words and hurrying feet. Some one ran, barefoot, past her door, +calling under his breath upon the gods. At that moment an incisive +shriek cut the increasing murmur in the palace and died away in a long +shuddering wail of grief. + +"Awake, awake, Nari!" Masanath cried, shaking the sleeping woman. +"Something has befallen the city. It is in the palace and everywhere." + +Meanwhile a chorus of screams smote upon her ears and the wild outcries +of men filled the great palace with terrifying clamor. + +Masanath, shaking with dread, wrung her hands and wept. Nari, stupid +with fear, sat up and listened. + +Presently some one came running and beat, with frenzied hands, upon the +door. + +"Open! Open! In the name of Osiris!" cried a voice which, though it +quaked with consternation, Masanath recognized as her father's. + +She flew to the door and wrenched it open. Har-hat, half-dressed, +stood before it. + +"Father, what manner of sending is this?" she cried. + +"Death!" he panted. "Come with me!" He caught her arm and ran, +dragging her after him down the corridor, half-lighted, but murmurous +with sound. + +"What is it, father?" she begged as he hurried her on. + +"The gods only know. Rameses hath been smitten and is dying, or even +now is dead!" + +"Rameses!" she breathed in a terrified whisper. "Rameses! And an hour +ago I talked with him--so strong, so resolute, so full of life--O Holy +Isis!" + +"It is a pestilence sent by Mesu. The whole city is afflicted. Ptah +shield us!" + +The hangings that covered the entrance to each suite of chambers had +been thrown aside and the interiors were vacant. But the farther end +of the hall was filled with terrified courtiers in all attitudes and +degrees of extravagant demonstration of grief. Men and women were +fallen here and there on the pavement or supporting themselves by +pillar and wall, wailing, tearing their hair, wounding their faces, +rending their garments. + +All the dwellers of the palace were flocked about the apartments of +Rameses. From the entrance into these chambers issued sounds of the +wildest nature. Masanath heard and attempted to draw away from the +fan-bearer. + +"Take me not into that awful place!" she pleaded. "How canst thou +force me, my father!" + +But Har-hat did not seem to hear and pushed his way, still dragging her +through the crush of shaking attendants that crowded into the outer +chambers. + +The sleeping-room of the heir was the focal spot of violent sorrow. + +The royal pair, the king's ministers, the immediate companions of +Rameses, the high priest from the Rameside temple to Set at Tanis and a +corps of leeches were present. The couch was surrounded. + +Seti was not present, for only in the last moment had some one realized +that the young prince should be brought. Hotep had gone to conduct him +to the chamber. + +The queen, inert and lifeless, lay on the floor at the foot of the +prince's bed. Most of the physicians bent over her. Her women, +chiefly the wives of the ministers, were hysterical and helpless. + +But it was Meneptah who froze the hearts of his courtiers with horror. + +Because of his obstinacy Egypt had gone down into famine, pestilence +and destruction. Without more than ordinary concern he had watched the +hand of the scourge pursue it into ruin till what time he should +relent, and he had not relented. + +But now that dread Hand had entered within the boundaries of his loves +and had smitten Rameses, his heir, his idol! + +The effect upon him was terrible. The death chamber rang like a +torture dungeon. Nechutes and Menes, by united efforts, barely +prevented him from doing self-murder. The earnest attempts of the +priest to quiet him were totally useless. Nothing could have been more +shocking. + +The violent scene wrought Masanath's already over-strained nerves to +the highest pitch of distress. The blood congealed in her veins and +her steps lagged, but Har-hat, for some purpose not apparent to any who +looked upon his daughter's anguish, drew her to the very side of the +couch. The leeches, who had been vainly seeking for some flicker of +life, stepped aside and the eyes of the cowering girl fell on the +prince. + +Rameses had seen the Hand that smote him. + +The look on the frozen features completed the undoing of Masanath's +self-control and she collapsed beside the bed, utterly prostrated. + +Hotep entered with Seti. The boy prince's face was inflamed with much +weeping, and he flung himself upon the cold clay of Rameses, forgetting +wholly that the older brother had urged the passage of a harsh sentence +upon his young head. + +The courtiers, who had stoically witnessed Meneptah's frantic grief, +turned now and hid their blinded eyes. Hotep went to the Pharaoh and +laid his hand on the monarch's shoulder. The action commanded. +Exhausted by his frenzy, Meneptah leaned against his scribe. The +cup-bearer and the captain released him and Hotep spoke quietly. + +"Seest thou, O my King, the sorrow of thy people? Behold thy young son +and pity him. Look upon thy queen and comfort her. If thou, their +staff, art broken, who shall bear them up in their sorrow? Break not. +Be thou as the strong father of thy great son, so that from the bosom +of Osiris he may look upon Egypt and sleep well, seeing that in his +loss his kingdom lost not her prop and stay, her king, also." + +The scanty manhood of the monarch, thus ably invoked, responded +somewhat. He raised himself and permitted Hotep to conduct him to the +side of the boy prince. Seti fell down at his father's feet, and Hotep +took Meneptah's hand and laid it on the bowed head. + +"Thou dost pardon him, O Son of Ptah," the scribe said in the same +quiet voice. The king nodded weakly and wept afresh. After the prince +had clasped his father's knees and covered the hand with kisses, he +obeyed the scribe's sign and went away to his mother's side. Again +Hotep, compelling by his low voice, spoke to the king and the assembly +listened. + +"The gods have not limited the darts of affliction to thee, O Son of +Ptah. Rameses journeyed not alone into Amenti. He took a kingdom with +him. Behold, the Hebrew hath loosed his direst plague upon Egypt, and +by the lips of an Israelite, in the streets, every first-born in thy +realm perished in the home of his father this night!" + +The entire assembly cried out, and most of them ran sobbing and praying +from the chamber. Instantly the outcry and clamor in the palace broke +forth again, for the inhabitants knew that the blow which had smitten +Rameses had fallen on one of their own. + +Meneptah staggered away from Hotep, his frenzy upon him again. + +"Send them hither," he cried hoarsely, waving his arms toward a +white-faced courtier that had stood his ground. "Send them hither--the +Hebrews, Mesu and Aaron! Israel shall depart, before they make me sink +the world! For they have sent madness upon me! I condemned my gentle +son, I punished those who gave me wise counsel, I have ruined Egypt, I +have slain mine heir, and now the blood of the first-born of all my +kingdom is upon my head!" His voice rose to a shriek, and Hotep, +putting an arm about him, hushed him with gentle authority and signed +the courtier to obey. + +The physicians lifted the queen and bore her away. Seti stopped at +Masanath's side and looked at her with compassion in his eyes. Har-hat +came to him. + +"Seeing that thou hast won the pardon of thy father, am I not also +included in the restoration of good feeling? Have I won thine enmity, +my Prince?" + +"I hold naught against thee, O Har-hat, but thou hast not been a +profitable counselor to my father in these days of his great need." +The young prince spoke frankly and returned the comprehending gaze of +the fan-bearer. Har-hat's eyes fell on his daughter, and again on the +prince. Slow discomfiture overspread his features. Rameses was dead +and with him died the fan-bearer's hold upon his position. Seti was +arisen in the heir's place, with all the heir's enmity to him. But +from Seti he could not purchase security with Masanath. + +Hotep supported Meneptah out of the death chamber, for the court +paraschites were already hiding in the shadows of the great halls +without. The bed-chamber slowly emptied. Har-hat lifted Masanath and +followed the last out-going courtier. + +Another tumult had arisen in the great corridor, an uproar of another +nature that advanced from the entrance hall of the palace. There were +cries of supplication, persuasion, urging, that were frantic in their +earnestness. The whole palace seemed to be on its knees. + +Hotep, with the king, had paused, and several courtiers went before him +and looked down the cross corridor. Instantly they fell on their +knees, crying out: + +"Ye have the leave of the powers of Egypt! Go! Make haste! Take your +flocks, all that is yours! Aye, strip us even, if ye will! But let +not the sun rise upon you in Egypt! For we be all dead men!" + +A murmur ran through the ministers. "The Hebrews!" + +They came slowly, side by side, the two brothers. Egyptians in all +attitudes of entreaty cumbered their path--Egyptians, born to the +purple, rich, proud, powerful, on their faces to enslaved Israel! + +Meneptah wrenched himself from Hotep's sustaining arms and, staggering +forward, all but on his knees, met them. + +"Rise up and get you forth from among my people," he besought them, +"both ye and the children of Israel, and go and serve the Lord as ye +have said. Also take your flocks and your herds as ye have said, and +be gone; and bless me also!" + +Great was the fall for a Pharaoh to pray a blessing from the hands of a +slave; great was his humility to kneel to them. But there was no +triumph, no exultation on the faces of the Hebrews. Aaron, with his +bearded chin on his breast, looked down on the head of the shuddering, +pleading monarch; but Moses, after sad contemplation of the humbled +king, raised his splendid head and gazed with kindling eyes at Har-hat. + +Then with the words, "It is well," spoken without animation, he turned +and, with his brother, disappeared into the dusk of the long corridor. +The expression, the act, the mode of departure seemed to indicate that +the Israelites doubted the stability of the king's intent. In a +moment, therefore, the courtiers were pursuing the departing brothers, +urging and praying with all their former wild insistence. + +Har-hat put Masanath on her feet and started to leave her, but she +flung her arms about his neck. + +"Forgive me, my father," she sobbed. "For my rebellion the gods may +absolve me, but I have been unfilial and for that there is no +justification. If aught should befall thee in these awful days, how I +should reproach myself! Sawest thou not the Hebrew's gaze upon thee? +Say thou dost forgive me!" + +"Nay, nay," he said hastily; "thou hast not done me to death by thine +undutifulness. And the Hebrew fears me. Get back to thy chamber and +rest." He kissed her and undid her clinging arms. Going to the king, +he put aside Hotep, who was striving to raise the monarch, and lifted +Meneptah in his arms. + +"Masanath is better now, good Hotep, and I would take my place beside +my king." + +Without summoning further aid, he half carried the limp monarch up the +hall and into the royal bed-chamber. + +Weak, shaking, sated with horror and numb with fear, Masanath attempted +to return to her apartments, but at the second step she reeled. Hotep +saw her. The fan-bearer was not in sight. In an instant the scribe +was beside the fainting girl, supporting her, nor did he release her +until she was safe in the ministering arms of Nari. + +As he was leaving her he commended her most solemnly to the gods. + +"Death hath wrenched a scepter from the gods and ruled the world this +night," he said. "We may not delude ourselves that we have escaped, my +Lady. As sure as there is a first-born in thy father's house and in +mine, that one is dead. And think of those others whom we love, the +eldest born of other houses! Do thou pray for us, thou perfect spirit. +I can not, for there is little reverence for my gods in me this night." + +He turned away and disappeared down the corridor. + +Within her chamber Masanath knelt and dutifully strove to pray, but her +petition resolved itself into a repeated cry for help. In that hour +she did not think of the relief to her and to many that the death of +Rameses had brought about, for in her heart she counted it sin to be +glad of benefit wrought by the death of any man. + +Through the fingers across her face she knew that dawn was breaking, +but quiet had not settled on the city. Surging murmurs of unanimous +sorrow rose and fell as if blown by the chill wind to and fro over +Egypt. The nation crouched with her face in the dust. There was no +perfunctory sorrow in her abasement. She was bowed down with her own +woe, not Meneptah's. Never before had a prince's going-out been +attended by such wild grief. There was no comfort in Egypt, and the +air was tremulous with mourning from the first cataract to the sea. + + + + +CHAPTER XLI + +THE ANGEL OF DEATH + +Kenkenes had spent two weeks in Goshen in systematic search for Rachel. + +The labor had been time-consuming and fruitless. + +More than two million Israelites were encamped about Pa-Ramesu, and +among this host Kenkenes had searched thoroughly and fearlessly. He +was an Egyptian and a noble, and Israel did not make his way easy. But +all Judah knew Rachel and loved her, and the first the young man came +upon was a quarryman who had known of Rachel's flight from Har-hat and +of her protection at the hands of an Egyptian. Therefore when Kenkenes +bore witness, by his stature, that he was the protecting Egyptian, and +by his testimony concerning the God of Israel, that he was worthy, this +friendly son of Judah began to suspect that Rachel would be glad to see +the young noble, and he joined Kenkenes in his search. Furthermore, he +softened the hearts of the tribe toward the Egyptian and they tolerated +him with some assumption of grace. + +The other tribes gave him no heed except to glower at him in the +camp-ways or to mutter after him when he had passed. Seeing that Judah +suffered him, they did not fall on him. Thus the young man was safe. +As for the notice Kenkenes took of Israel, it began and ended with his +inquiry after Rachel, the daughter of Maai the Compassionate, a son of +Judah. His earnestness absorbed him. Otherwise he was but partly +conscious of great preparations making in camp, of tremendous +excitement, heightening of zeal and vast meetings after nightfall, when +he had withdrawn to a far-off meadow to sleep in the grass. + +When he had searched throughout the length and breadth of Israel and +found Rachel not, he led his horse from the distant meadow, where he +had been pastured, and turned his head toward Tanis. + +While he was binding the saddle of sheep's wool about the Arab's narrow +girth he was surprised to find that the friendly son of Judah had +followed him to the pasture. The man approached, as though one spirit +urged him and another held him back, and offered Kenkenes the shelter +of his tent for the night. + +Somewhat gratified and astonished, Kenkenes, thanked him and declined. +Still the Hebrew lingered and urged him with strange persistence. +Kenkenes expressed his gratitude, but would not stay. + +Having taken the road toward Tanis where Rachel might be in the hands +of Har-hat, his heart seemed to turn to iron in his breast. All the +energies and aims of his youth seemed to resolve into one grim and +inexorable purpose. + +It was far into the second watch when he left Pa-Ramesu. But the great +city of tents was not yet sleeping. + +The horse was anxious for a journey after a fortnight of idleness and +he bade fair to keep pace with his rider's impatience. The Arabian +hills had sunk below the sky-line and the Libyan desert was not marked +by any eminence. With Pa-Ramesu behind him, a wide unbroken horizon +belted the dusky landscape. The lights winked out over Goshen and the +hamlets were not visible except as Kenkenes came upon them. The +shepherd dogs barked afar off, or now and then a wakened bird cheeped +drowsily, or the waters in the canals rippled over a pebbly space. + +But these sounds ceased unaccountably, at last, and a silence settled +down till the atmosphere was tense with stillness. A deadening hand +seemed to cover the night. + +The silence roused Kenkenes and he realized the solemnity of the earth, +the vastness of the sky and the majesty of the solitude. Mysteriously +affected, he withdrew within himself and humbly acknowledged the One +God. + +At midnight a chill struck the breeze and he drew his mantle about him +while he rode. The wind freshened and a heated counter-current from +the desert met it and they whirled away, rustling through the grassy +country. + +The Arab reduced his gallop so suddenly that Kenkenes was jolted. The +small peaked ears of the horse went up and he showed a disposition to +move sidewise into the meadow growth beside the way. + +"A wild beast hath taken the road," Kenkenes thought. + +The horse brought up, with a start, his prominent muscles twitching, +and sniffed the air strongly. + +A high oscillation in the atmosphere descended on Kenkenes. + +The Arab reared, snorting, and then crouched, quivering with wild +terror in every limb. + +Unconscious, even of the movement, Kenkenes threw up his arm as if to +ward off the blow and bent upon his horse's neck. + +Gust after gust of icy air swept down on his head, as if winnowed by +frozen wings. Then with a backward waft, colder than any wind he had +ever known, the hovering Presence passed. + +Instantly the horse plunged and took the road toward Tanis as if stung +by a lash. Kenkenes, shaken and full of solemn dread, did well to keep +his saddle. He grasped the stout leather bridle with strong hands, but +he might have curbed the hurricane as easily. The Arab stretched his +gaunt length, running low, and the haunted night reechoed with the +sound of his hoofs. The land of Goshen lay east and west, with a +slight divergence toward the north. The road to Tanis ran due north. +It was not long until Kenkenes' flying steed brought him in sight of +the un-Israelite Goshen. Illuminated windows starred the plain and the +wind shrilling in Kenkenes' ears bore uncanny sounds. A turf-thatched +hovel at the roadside showed a light as they swept by and a long scream +clove the air, but the Arab was not to be halted. + +The murmurous wind did not soothe him, and the wakeful night had a +terror for him that he could not outrun. He veered sharply and +galloped through the pastures to avoid a roadside hamlet that shrieked +and moaned. He leaped irrigation canals and brush hedges, swept +through fields and gardens, until, at last, by dint of persuasion, +coupled with the animal's growing fatigue, Kenkenes succeeded in +drawing the horse down into a milder pace. + +The young man made no effort to fathom the mysterious visitation. +Instead, he bowed his head and rode on, awed and humbled. + +The night wore away and the gray of the morning showed him, +strange-featured, the misty levels, meadows, fields and gardens of +northern Goshen. The wind faltered and died; the stars, strewn down +the east, paled and went out, one by one. Fragmentary clouds toward +the sunrise became apparent, tinted, silvered and at last, like flakes +of gold, scattered down to a point of intensest brilliance on the +horizon. A lark sprang out of the wet, wind-mown grass of a meadow and +shot up, up till it was lost in radiance and only a few of its +exquisite notes filtered down to earth again. + +A brazen rim showed redly on the horizon and the next instant the sun +bounded above the sky-line. + +It was the morning after the Passover, and Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, +was the only Egyptian first-born that lived to see it break. + + + + +CHAPTER XLII + +EXPATRIATION + +At sunrise, Kenkenes drew up his horse and took counsel with himself. +By steady riding he could reach Tanis shortly, but once within the +capital of the Pharaoh, he was near to Har-hat and within reach of the +fan-bearer's potent hand. When he entered the city he must be mentally +and physically alert. He had not slept since the last daybreak, and he +was weary and heavy-headed. + +Ahead of him was a squat hamlet, set on the very border of Goshen. It +was the same village that Seti had designated in his appointment with +Moses. Here he might have found a hospitable roof and a pallet of +matting, but the accompanying gratuity of curiosity and comment would +have outweighed the small advantage of a bed indoors over a bed in the +meadows. + +He dismounted and, leading his horse some distance from the road, into +the fringe of water-sprouts which lined the canal, picketed him within +shade, out of view from the highway. Usually the meadow growth within +reach of the seepage from the canals was most luxuriant, and here the +flocks of the Israelites had come for sweet grass. They had kept the +underbrush down, and the herbage closely cropped. But for two months +Israel had been near Pa-Ramesu with its cattle, and the canal-borders +were again riotous with growth. The place Kenkenes came upon was most +tempting, odorous and cool. He rolled his mantle for a pillow and +flung himself into the grass, where he lay, half-buried in green, and +slept. + +The April sun, hot as a torrid July noon in northern lands, discovered +the sleeper and stared into his upturned face. He flung his arm across +his eyes and slept on. Shadows fell and lengthened; the afternoon +passed, and still he slept. + +Mounted couriers riding at a dead gallop, passed over the road, toward +Tanis. Following them, war-chariots thundered by with a castanet +accompaniment of jingling harness and jarring armor. Kenkenes stirred +during the tumult, but when it had receded he lay still again. Three +mounted soldiers leading a score of horses passed. The Arab in the +copse whinnied softly. A second trio of soldiers, following with a +smaller drove, heard the call from the bushes and drew up. The +foremost man spoke to another, tossed the knotted bridles to him and, +dismounting, came through the copse to the Arab. There he found the +young nobleman, sleeping. + +For a moment he hesitated, but no longer. Silently he untied the +horse, led him forth, attached him with the others and speedily took +the road toward Tanis. + +After these had passed the road was deserted and no more came that way. +In a little time the sun set. The wind from the north freshened and +swayed the close-standing bushes so that their branches chafed one +against another. At the sound Kenkenes, ready to wake, stirred and +opened his eyes. After a moment he sat up and looked for the Arab. +The horse was gone. + +Kenkenes arose and searched industriously. The trampled space in the +road convinced him that the horse had departed with a number of others. +Hoping that he might find some trace of the lost animal among the +inhabitants, he went to the hamlet. + +Two ragged lines of huts, built of sun-dried brick, formed a single +straggling street. A low shed, the first building Kenkenes came upon, +showed a flickering red light. A spare figure darted into it, just +ahead of the young man. + +From the threshold, the whole of the small interior was visible. + +The light came from a small annealing oven. At a table, overlaid with +a thin slab of stone, a man was modeling a cat in clay. On the +opposite side of the room was a younger man, painting an image, +preparatory to burning it in the oven. The walls were black with +smoke, the floor strewn with broken images and dried crumbs of clay. + +In the center of the room was the spare figure, in white robes. +Kenkenes had opened his lips to speak when the conversation among the +trio stopped him. + +"Cowards! Dastards!" the spare man vociferated. "Is there not a +patriot in Egypt? The Pharaoh in danger and not a man in the hamlet +who will raise a heel to save him!" + +"Holy Father," the short man protested, "the way is long, the horses +have been required at our hands by the Pharaoh and were taken from us, +and if there be evil omens, the king's sorcerers will discover them." + +"King's sorcerers!" the spare man repeated indignantly. "There is not +one of them who can tell a star from a fire-fly or read the events of +yesterday! Horses! Must ye go mounted, in litters, in chariots, +afraid of the harsh earth and a rough mile? In my youth, the young men +went barefoot and traveled the desert for the joy of effort. Oh, for +one of mine own best days! Horses!" + +"Is the son of Hofa away?" the younger man asked. "He is a runner as +well as a soldier." + +The spare man broke out afresh. + +"A runner! Aye, of a truth he is a runner. When the tidings came that +the Pharaoh was to pursue the Israelites he ran his best--for the +hay-fields--and is hidden safe under a swath somewhere--the craven!" + +Kenkenes stepped into the shed. + +"What is this concerning the Israelites?" he demanded. + +The spare man turned and the two artisans gazed at the young sculptor +with open mouths. + +"The news is not to be cried abroad," the spare man replied shortly. + +"Thou hast become cautious too late," Kenkenes retorted. "The most of +thy talk have I heard. I would know the rest of it." + +"By Bast, thou art imperious! In my great days the nobles groveled to +me. Now, am I commanded by them. How thou art fallen, Jambres! + +"The Israelites, my Lord," he continued mockingly, "departed out of the +land of Goshen, in the early morning hours of this day, but the Pharaoh +hath repented, and will pursue them--to turn them back, or to destroy +them." The old man's voice lost its sarcasm and became anxious. + +"But the signs are ominous, the portents are evil. I know, I know, for +I am no less a mystic because I have fallen from state. His seers are +liars, they can not guide the king. He must not pursue them, for death +shadows him the hour he leaves the gates of Tanis. He must not go! I +love him yet, and I can not see him overthrown." + +"Thou art no more eager to stay him than I," Kenkenes answered quickly. +"Thou art in need of a runner. I am one." + +The eye of the sorcerer fell on the young man's dress. + +"A runner among the nobility?" he commented suspiciously. + +"Is a man less likely to be a patriot because he is of blood, or less +fleet of foot because he is noble?" + +"Nay; nor less useful because he is sharp of tongue. Come with me!" +Jambres seized his arm and, hurrying him out of the shed, went through +the ragged street to the shrine at the upper end of the village. + +From the tunnel-like entrance between the dwarf pylons a light was +diffused as though it came through thin hangings. The pair entered the +porch and passed into the sanctuary. + +Entering his study, Jambres made his way to the heavy table and, +fumbling about the compartments under it, drew forth a wrapped and +addressed roll. Taking up a lighted lamp, he scrutinized the messenger +sharply. + +While he gazed, Kenkenes took the opportunity of inspecting the priest. +He had been a familiar figure about the palaces of two monarchs. For +thirty years he had read the stars for the great Rameses, six for +Meneptah, but he had measured rods with Moses and had fallen. From the +pinnacle of power he had declined precipitately to the obscurest office +in the priesthood. This bird-cote shrine was his. + +"Art thou seasoned? Canst thou endure? Nay, no need to ask that," he +answered himself, surveying the strong figure before him. "But who art +thou?" + +"I am the son of Mentu, the murket." + +"The son of Mentu? Enough. If a drop of that man's blood runneth in +thy veins, thou art as steadfast as death. Surely the gods are with +me." + +He opened a second compartment in the end of the table, but before he +found what he sought he raised himself, suddenly. + +"If thou art that son of the murket," he asked, "how is it thou art not +dead?" + +Kenkenes looked at him, wondering if the news of his supposed death had +penetrated even to this little hamlet. + +"Art thou not thy father's eldest born?" the priest asked further. + +"His only child." + +"What sheltered thee in last night's harvest of death?" + +"Thou speakest in riddles, holy Father." + +"Knowest thou not that every first-born in Egypt died last night at the +Hebrew's sending?" the sorcerer demanded. + +"The first-born of Egypt," Kenkenes repeated slowly. "At the Hebrew's +sending?" + +"Aye, by the sorcery of Mesu. Save for the eldest of Israel, there is +no living first-born in Egypt to-day. From that most imperial Prince +Rameses to the firstling of the cowherd, they are dead!" + +The young man heard him first with a chill of horror, half-unbelieving, +barely comprehending. He was not of Israel and yet he had been spared. +Then he remembered the dread presence above him in the night,--the +chill from its noiseless wing. A light, instant and brilliant as a +revelation, broke over him. Unconsciously, he raised his eyes and +clasped his hands against his breast. He knew that his God had +acknowledged him. + +When his thoughts returned to earth, he found the glittering eyes of +the sorcerer fixed upon him. + +"Seeing that thou dost live, tell me what sheltered thee in this +harvest of death?" Jambres repeated. + +"The Lord God of Israel, who reaped it." + +The answer was direct and fearless. To the astonished priest who heard +it, it seemed triumphant. + +Each of the many emotions the sorcerer experienced, displayed itself, +in turn, on his face,--amazement, anger, censure, irresolution, +distrust. After a silence, he took up the scroll and made as if to +return it to its hiding-place in the compartments under the table. + +"Stay," Kenkenes said, laying his hand on the sorcerer's. "Put it not +away, for I shall carry it. Shall I, being a believer in Israel's God, +be willing for the Pharaoh to pursue Israel?" + +"Nay," Jambres replied bluntly; "but thou wouldst stay him for Israel's +sake; I would prevent him for his own." + +"So the same end is accomplished, wherefore quarrel over the motive? +But when thou speakest of Israel's sake, which, by the testimony of +past events, is now the more imperiled, Egypt or Israel?" + +"Egypt! But it shall not be wholly overthrown through mine incautious +trust of a messenger." + +The young man still retained his hold on the sorcerer's hand. + +"Thou dost impugn my fidelity. Now, consider this. I could have +defeated thee and accomplished the Pharaoh's undoing by refusing to +carry the message, by keeping silence in yonder shed of image-makers. +Is it not so?" + +Jambres assented. + +"Even so. Instead, I offered and now I insist. Now, if thou deniest +me, there is none to carry the warning and thou, thyself, hast undone +the Pharaoh." + +The sorcerer put away the hand and showed no sign of softening. + +"Nay, then," Kenkenes said, "there is no need of the writing. I shall +warn the king by word of mouth." He turned away and walked swiftly +toward the portals of the shrine. Jambres beheld him recede into the +dusk and wavered. + +"Stay!" he called. + +Kenkenes stopped. + +"Wilt thou swear fidelity by the holy Name?" + +"Aye, and by that holier Name of Jehovah, also." + +He returned and faced the priest. "Thou art mystic, Father Jambres," +he said persuasively; "what does thy heart tell thee of me?" + +"The supplication of the need indorses thee, as it indorses any +desperate chance. If thou art false, thou art the instrument of Set, +whom the Hathors have given to overthrow Egypt. If thou art true, the +Pharaoh shall return safe to his capital in Memphis. The gratitude of +Egypt will be sufficient reward." + +"And I take the message?" + +Jambres nodded. "Art thou armed?" he asked, bending again to look into +the compartment he had opened. + +"Except for my dagger, nay." + +The sorcerer brought forth a falchion of that wondrous metal that could +carve syenite granite and bite into porphyry; also, a pair of +horse-hide sandals and a flat water-bottle. + +"Put on these." + +Kenkenes undid his cloak and untying his broidered sandals, wrapped +them in his mantle and bound the roll, crosswise, on his back. Over +this he slung the water-bottle, which the priest had filled in the +meantime, fixed the falchion at his side and put on the horse-hide +sandals. + +"When hast thou broken thy fast?" the priest asked next. + +"At sunset yesterday." + +The priest turned with a sign to the young man to follow him and, +passing through the shrine, led the way out of the sanctuary into the +house of the sorcerer. Here, shortly, Kenkenes was served by a slave, +with a haunch of gazelle-meat, lettuce, white bread and wine. + +While he ate, the priest informed him of the situation he might expect +to find at the end of his journey. + +"The Israelites departed in the early hours of this morning taking the +Wady Toomilat, east, toward the gates of the Rameside wall. It was the +going forth of a multitude,--the exodus of a nation! And they will +travel at the pace of their slowest lambs. Thus Meneptah can gather +his legions and make ready to pursue ere they have reached the wall." +The priest had begun calmly, but the thought of pursuit excited him. + +"He must not follow!" he continued. "They are unarmed, but the Pharaoh +deals with a wizard and a strange God--no common foe. And if these +were all who have evil intents against him, but there is +another--another!" + +He came to the young man's side, saying in an excited whisper: + +"There is another, I say, within the king's affections--a scorpion +cherished in his bosom!" + +The old man's vehemence and his words fired Kenkenes. He arose and +faced Jambres with kindling eyes. The sorcerer went on with increasing +excitement. + +"Better that his slaves depart increased, enriched threefold by Egypt, +better that never again one stone be laid upon another, nor monument +bear the king's name, than that Meneptah should leave the precincts of +shelter! For his enemy would lead him outside the pale of protection, +and there put him to death, and wear his crown after him!" + +During this impetuous augury, the young man naturally searched after +the identity of the offender. Not Ta-user, nor Siptah, nor Amon-meses, +for the sorry tale of Seti and the outlawing of the trio had reached +him at Pa-Ramesu. Furthermore, they had never had a place in the +affections of the king. There was a new conspirator! At this point +the blood heated and went charging through the young man's veins. + +"If the king's enemy be mine enemy," he declared passionately, "thou +hast this hour commissioned and armed that enemy's dearest foe! Name +him." + +The priest shook his head. His excitement had not carried him beyond +the limits of caution. + +"Save for my mystic knowledge, I have no proof against him, and if I +balk him not and offend him, he hath a heavy and a vengeful hand." + +"And thou hast not named him in the writing?" + +Again the priest shook his head. + +"Then," said the young man firmly, "then will I name him to the +Pharaoh!" + +Jambres looked at Kenkenes with profound admiration, not unmixed with +apprehension. + +"Let not thy youthful zeal undo thee," he cautioned. "Perchance thou +dost mistake the man." + +"The gods did not bestow all the art upon the mystics when they endowed +thee with divining powers. They gifted every man with a little of it, +and it speaketh no less truthfully because it is small. Come, thy +board has been generous and I am satisfied. I have another and a +fiercer hunger I would appease. Give me the message and let me be +gone." + +Silent, the priest led the way again into the sanctuary. Taking the +scroll from its hiding-place once more he said, as he gave it into the +messenger's hands: "Go first to Tanis, and if thou findest not the king +in his capital, seek until thou dost find him. And have a care to +thyself." + +Kenkenes hesitated a moment, and said at last: + +"It may be that I shall not return, but I would have my father know +that I died not with the first-born. Wilt thou tell him, when thou +canst?" + +"The word shall go to him by sunset to-morrow if I carry it myself." + +Kenkenes expressed his thanks and the priest went on. + +"Be not rash, I charge thee. Farewell, and thy father's gods attend +thee." + +Without the dwarf pylons, Kenkenes bent for the old man's blessing and +turned away. Walking rapidly to the northern limits of the town, he +took the dusty highway again, and struck into an easy run. + +The road sloped up toward the north, but the rise was gradual and the +ascent was not wearying. The miles slipped behind swiftly, for he +covered them as naturally as the unloitering bird traverses the air. + +In two hours he had reached the pinnacle of the upland. To the north +the road led continuously down to the sea. He paused and looked back +over the long gentle declivity toward the south and west. + +A sharp pain pierced him. In that moment, he realized that he was +expatriated. After he had warned Meneptah, Egypt dropped out of his +aims. Thereafter he had the rescue of Rachel, or her avenging to +accomplish, and the results following upon the necessity of either of +these alternatives would not permit him to return into the land of his +fathers. There was no turning back now, nor any desire in him to do +so. His conscience had been witness to the renunciation of his nation +and his faith, and it did not chide him. + +Still he stretched out his arms to the limitless, featureless, velvety +dusk that was Egypt by day, and wept. + +He entered Tanis in the middle of the third watch, and there he learned +that the Pharaoh had departed, but whither, the solemn, haggard +citizens he met could not tell. He repaired to the inn, a house of +mourning, also, and awaited the dawn. Then he looked on the funereal +capital of Meneptah. The city no longer cried out; it sighed or +sobbed, exhausted with its grief; it went the heavy round of labor +demanded by the necessities of life, bowed, disheveled and blinded with +woe. Kenkenes, humbled, sorrowful, and helpless, averted his eyes and +hurried to the palace. + +There he found that the queen and Seti, with all the queen's retinue, +had departed on a pilgrimage to the temple of the sacred ram at Mendes +for the welfare of the soul of Rameses. Masanath was in Pelusium +mourning for her sister who died with the first-born. The +others,--Har-hat, Hotep, Nechutes, Menes, Seneferu, Kephren the +mohar,--all except the palace attendants had accompanied the king. The +great house of the Pharaoh was empty, solitary and haunted. + +The destination of the king was a state secret that had not been +imparted to the chamberlains. Kenkenes returned into the unhappy +streets again. + +He went to the square in which the loiterers were congregated, even +though there was one dead in the household, and seeking out the most +intelligent, questioned him concerning the departure of the Pharaoh. + +He learned that the king and the ministers had left Tanis, and driven +south, the afternoon after the night of death. At nightfall, sixteen +chariots from the nome followed him. And though the young man inquired +of many sources in the capital, he discovered nothing further. + +Avowedly, it was Meneptah's intent to overtake the Hebrews, turn them +back, or destroy them. He could not accomplish that thing with a score +of ministers and sixteen picked chariots. It was evident that he meant +to collect an army near the track of the Hebrews, and that he had +departed for the rendezvous. + +If the Israelites traveled but two miles an hour, they could cover the +distance between Pa-Ramesu and the Rameside wall by the sunset of this, +the second day after the death of the first-born. It would have been +the first act of the Pharaoh to close the gates of the wall against +them. The army of the north could gather from the remotest nomes by +the close of this day also. Therefore, the hour to proceed against the +Israelites was not far away. Kenkenes knew that he might not delay, +even for a short sleep, in Tanis. + +He fixed upon Pithom as the chosen spot for the rendezvous, since it +was situated on the Wady Toomilat. + +He refreshed himself with a beaker of sour wine in which a recuperative +simple had been stirred, and took the road to the south. + +Immediately outside of the city walls he came upon the track of the +departing king, and followed it faithfully as long as there was light +to show it to him. A dozen miles out of Tanis he ceased to run, and +thereafter his progress became slower as his fatigue increased. Toward +the end of the first watch, at the northern borders of the district +known as Succoth, at the extreme east of Goshen, he came upon a mighty +track. + +Even in the dark he could see that a diaphanous gauze of dust overhung +it and the air was heavy with the most volatile particles. The sandy +earth had been ground and worked to the depth of over a foot. How +difficult had it been for the rearmost ranks to cover this ploughed +soil! The track was a mile in width, and by the nature of the marks +upon it, Kenkenes knew that husbandmen, not warriors, had passed over +this spot. It was the path of Israel, leading east to the Rameside +wall. + +Kenkenes tightened his sandal straps and continued toward the south. +Ahead of him, the horizon began to glow and then an edge,--a half,--all +of a perfect moon lifted a vast orange disk above the world. At its +first appearance it was sharply cut by a tower of the city of Pithom. + +"Now, the God of Israel be thanked," he said to himself, "for another +mile I can not cover." + +The gates were tightly closed and a sentry from the wall challenged him. + +"I bring a message to the Pharaoh," he answered. + +"The Son of Ptah is not within the walls." + +"Hath he departed," Kenkenes wearily asked, "or came he not hither?" + +"He came not to Pithom." + +"Come thou down, then, and let me in, friend, for I am spent." + +In a little time, he entered the inn of the treasure city, was given a +bed, upon which he flung himself without so much as loosening the +kerchief on his head, and slept. + + + + +CHAPTER XLIII + +"THE PHARAOH DREW NIGH" + +In mid-afternoon of the following day, Kenkenes awoke and made ready to +take up his search again. He was weary, listless and sore, but his +mission urged him as if death threatened him. + +The young man's athletic training had taught him how to recuperate. +Most of the process was denied him now, because of his haste and the +little time at his command, but the smallest part would be beneficial. +He stepped into the streets of the treasure city, and paused again, +till the recollection of the sorrow upon Egypt returned to him to +explain the gloom over Pithom. The great melancholy of the land, +attending him hauntingly, oppressed him with a sense of culpability. +And he dared not ask himself wherein he deserved his good fortune above +his countrymen, lest he seem to question the justice of the God of his +adoption. + +At a bazaar he purchased two pairs of horse-hide sandals, for the many +miles on the roads had worn out the old and he needed foot-wear in +reserve. From the booth he went straight to the baths, now wholly +deserted; for when Egypt mourned, like all the East, she neglected her +person. + +When he came forth he was refreshed and stronger. Of the citizens, +haggard and solemn as they had been in Tanis, he asked concerning the +Pharaoh. None had seen him, nor had he entered the city. The last one +he questioned was a countryman from Goshen, and from him he learned +that the army was assembling in a great pasture on the southern limits +of the Israelitish country. + +At sunset he was again upon the way, taking the level highway of the +Wady Toomilat for a mile toward the west, and turning south, after that +distance, as the rustic had directed him. + +The road was good and he ran with old-time ease. At midnight he came +upon the spot where the army had camped, but the Pharaoh had already +moved against Israel. He had left his track. The great belt of +disturbed earth wheeled to the south, and as far as Kenkenes could see +there was the same luminous veil of dust overhanging it, that he had +noted over the path of Israel. + +The messenger drank deep at an irrigation canal, for he turned away +from water when he followed the army, and leaving the level, +dust-cushioned road behind, plunged into a rock-strewn, rolling land, +desolate and silent. The growing light of the moon was his only +advantage. + +The region became savage, the trail of the army wound hither and +thither to avoid sudden eminences or sudden hollows. Kenkenes dogged +it faithfully, for it found the smoothest way, and, besides, the wild +beasts had been frightened from the track of a multitude. + +In the early hour of the morning, Kenkenes emerged from a high-walled +valley with battlemented summits. Before him was the army encamped, +and wild, indeed, was the region chosen for the night's rest. The +glistening soil was thickly strewn with rocks, varying in size from +huge cubes to sharp shingle. Every abrupt ravine ahead was accentuated +with profound shadow, and the dim horizon was broken with hills. The +locality maintained an irregular slope toward the east. The camp +stretched before the messenger for a mile, but the great army had +changed its posture. It squatted like a tired beast. + +Kenkenes approached it dropping with weariness, and after a time was +passed through the lines and conducted to the headquarters of the king. +In the center of the great field were pitched the multi-hued tents of +Meneptah and his generals. Above them, turning like weather-vanes upon +their staves, were the standards bearing the royal and divine device, +the crown and the uplifted hands, the plumes and the god-head. + +About the royal pavilion in triple cordon paced the noble body-guard of +the Pharaoh. + +Of one of these Kenkenes asked that a personal attendant of the king be +sent to him. + +In a little time, some one emerged from the Pharaoh's tent, and came +through the guard-line to the messenger. It was Nechutes. + +The cup-bearer took but a single glance at Kenkenes and started back. + +"Thou!" he exclaimed in a hoarse whisper. "Out of Amenti!" + +"And nigh returning into it again," was the tired reply. + +In a daze, Nechutes took the offered hands and stared at Kenkenes +through the dark. + +"Where hast thou been?" he finally asked. + +"In the profoundest depths of trouble, Nechutes, nor have I come out +therefrom." + +The cup-bearer's face showed compassion even in the dusk. + +"Nay, now; thine was but the fortune a multitude of lovers have +suffered before thee," he said, with a contrite note in his deep voice. +"It was even odds between us and I won. Hold it not against me, +Kenkenes." + +It was the sculptor's turn to be amazed. But with one of the instant +realizations that acute memory effects, he recalled that he had +disappeared immediately after Nechutes had been accepted by the Lady +Ta-meri. And now, by the word of the apologetic cup-bearer, was it +made apparent to Kenkenes that a tragic fancy concerning the cause of +his disappearance had taken root in the cup-bearer's mind. With a +desperate effort, Kenkenes choked the first desire to laugh that had +seized him in months. + +"Nay, let it pass, Nechutes," he said in a strained voice. "Thou and I +are friends. But lead me to the king, I pray thee." + +"To the king?" the cup-bearer repeated doubtfully. "The king sleeps. +Will thine interests go to wreck if thou bidest till dawn?" + +"I carry him a message," Kenkenes explained. + +"A message!" + +"Even so. Hand hither a torch." + +A soldier went and returned with a flaming knot of pitch. In the +wavering light of the flambeau, Nechutes read the address on the linen +scroll. + +"The king could not read by the night-lights," he said after a little. +"Much weeping is not helpful to such feeble eyes as his. Wait till +dawn. My tent is empty and my bed is soft. Wait till daybreak as my +guest." + +"Where is Har-hat?" + +"In his tent, yonder," pointing to a party-colored pavilion. + +"Dost thou keep an unsleeping eye on the Pharaoh?" + +"By night, aye." + +Kenkenes had a thought to accept the cup-bearer's hospitality. He knew +that the expected climax would follow immediately upon the king's +perusal of the message, and that the nature of that climax depended +upon himself. He needed mental vigor and bodily freshness to make +effective the work before him. His cogitations decided him. + +"Let the unhappy king sleep, then, Nechutes; far be it from me to bring +him back to the memory of his sorrows. Lead me to thy shelter, if thou +wilt." + +With satisfaction in his manner Nechutes conducted his guest into a +comfortably furnished tent, and showed him a mattress overlaid with +sheeting of fine linen. + +"Shame that thou must defer this soft sleeping till the noisy and +glaring hours of the day," Kenkenes observed as he fell on the bed. + +"By this time to-morrow night, I may content myself in a bed of sand +with a covering of hyena-fending stones," the cup-bearer muttered. + +"Comfort thee, Nechutes," the artist said sententiously, "But do thou +raise me from this ere daybreak, even if thou must take a persuasive +spear to me." + +So saying, he fell asleep at once. + +After some little employment among his effects, the cup-bearer came to +the bedside on his way back to the king's tent, and bent over his guest. + +"Holy Isis! but I am glad he died not!" he said to himself. "Aye, and +there be many who are as glad as I am. Dear Ta-meri! She will be +rejoiced, and Hotep. What a great happiness for the old murket--" he +paused and clasped his hands together. "He is Mentu's only son! Now, +in the name of the mystery-dealing Hathors, how came it that he died +not with the first-born?" After a silence he muttered aloud: "Gods! +the army would barter its mummy to have the secret of his safety, this +day!" + +At the first glimmerings of the dawn, the melody of many winded +trumpets arose over the encampment of the Egyptians. Now the notes +were near and clear, now afar and tremulous; again, deep and sonorous; +now, full and rich, and yet again, fine and sweet. There is a pathos +in the call of a war-trumpet that no frivolous rendering can subdue--it +has sung so long at the death of men and nations. + +Outlined in black silhouette against the whitening horizons, the +sentries, tiny and slow-moving in the distance, tramped from post to +post in a forward-leaning line. Soldiers began to shout to each other. +The clanking of many arms made another and a harsher music. The tumult +of thousands of voices burdened the wind and above this presently arose +the eager and expectant whinnyings of a multitude of war-horses. + +While the army broke its fast and prepared to move the king stood in +the open space before his tent, with his eyes on the east. The Red Sea +lay there beyond the uplifted line of desert sand, and it was the +birthplace of many mists and unpropitious signs. + +Would the sun look upon the king through a veil, or openly? Would he +smile upon the purposes of the Pharaoh? + +There were striations, watery and colorless, in the lower slopes of the +morning sky, and these were taking on the light of dawn without its +hues. Long wind-blown streaks crossed the zenith from east to west and +the setting stars were blurred. The moon had worn a narrowing circlet +in the night. Meneptah shook his head. + +Suddenly some one in the ranks of the royal guard exclaimed to a mate: + +"Look! Look to the southeast!" + +Meneptah turned his eyes in that direction, as though he had been +commanded. There, above the spot where he had guessed the Israelites +to be, a straight and mighty column of vapor extended up, up into the +smoky blue of the sky. The tortuous shapes of the striations across +the zenith indicated that there was great wind at that height, but the +column did not move or change its form. It was further distinguished +from the clouds over the dawn, by a fine amber light upon it, deepening +to gold in its shadows. So vivid the tint, that steady contemplation +was necessary to assure the beholders that it was not fire, climbing in +and out of the pillar's heart. Egypt's skies were rarely clouded and +never by such a formation as this. + +Meneptah turned his troubled eyes hurriedly toward the east. He must +not miss the sunrise. At that moment, unheralded, the disk of the sun +shot above the horizon as if blown from a crater of the +under-world--blurred, milky-white, without warmth. + +He turned away and faced Nechutes, bending before him; behind the +cup-bearer, a stately stranger--Kenkenes. + +"A message for thee, O Son of Ptah," Nechutes said. + +At a sign from the king, the messenger came forward, knelt and +delivered the scroll. The king looked at the writing on the wrapping. + +"From whom dost thou bring this?" he asked. + +"From Jambres, the mystic, O Son of Ptah." + +"Ah!" It was the tone of one who has his surmises proved. "Now, what +is contained herein?" + +Kenkenes took it that the inquiry called for an answer. + +"A warning, O King." + +"How dost thou know?" + +"The purport of the message was told me ere I departed." + +"Wherefore? It is not common to lead the messenger into the secret he +bears." + +"I know, O Son of Ptah," Kenkenes replied quietly; "but the messenger +who knew its contents would suffer not disaster or death to stay him in +carrying it to thee." + +As if to delay the reading of it, the king dismissed Nechutes and +signed Kenkenes to arise. Then he turned the scroll over and over in +his hands, inspecting it. + +"Age does not cool the fever of retaliation," he said thoughtfully, +"and this ancient Jambres hath a grudge against me. Come," he +exclaimed as if an idea had struck him, "do thou open it." + +Kenkenes took the scroll thrust toward him, and ripped off the linen +wrapping. Unrolling the writing he extended it to the king. + +"And there is naught in it of evil intent?" Meneptah asked, putting his +hands behind him. + +"Nay, my King; naught but great love and concern for thee." + +"Read it," was the next command. "Mine eyes are dim of late," he added +apologetically, for, through the young man's reassuring tones, a faint +realization of the trepidation he had exhibited began to dawn on +Meneptah. + +Kenkenes obeyed, reading without emphasis or inflection, for he knew no +expression was needed to convey the force of the message to the already +intimidated king. + +When Kenkenes had finished, Meneptah was standing very close to him, as +if assured of shelter in the heroic shadow of the tall young messenger. +The color had receded from the monarch's face, and his eyes had widened +till the white was visible all around the iris. + +"Call me the guard," he said hoarsely; but when Kenkenes made as if to +obey, the king stayed him in a panic. + +"Nay, heed me not. Mine assassin may be among them." The sound of his +own voice frightened him. "Soft," he whispered, "I may be heard." + +Kenkenes maintained silence, for he was not yet ready. + +Meanwhile, the king turned hither and thither, essayed to speak and +cautiously refrained, grew paler of face and wider of eye, panted, +trembled and broke out recklessly at last. + +"Gods! Trapped! Hemmed like a wild beast in a circle of spears! Nay, +not so honestly beset. Ringed about by vipers ready to strike at every +step! And this from mine own people, whom I have cherished and hovered +over as they were my children--" His voice broke, but he continued his +lament, growing unintelligible as he talked: + +"Not enough that mine enemies menace me, but mine own must stab me in +my straits! Not even is the identity of mine assassin revealed, and +there is none on whom I may call with safety and ask protection--" + +"Nay, nay, Beloved of Ptah," Kenkenes interrupted. "There be true men +among thy courtiers." + +"Not one--not one whom I may trust," Meneptah declared hysterically. + +"Here am I, then." + +Meneptah, with the inordinate suspicion of the hard-pressed, backed +hurriedly away from Kenkenes. + +"Who art thou?" he demanded. "How may I know thou art not mine enemy?" + +"Not so," Kenkenes protested. "Give me ear, I pray thee. Would I have +brought thee thy warning, knowing it such, were I thine enemy? And +further, did not Jambres, the mystic, who readeth men's souls, trust +me?" + +"Aye, so it seems," the king admitted, glad to be won by such physical +magnificence. "But who art thou?" + +"Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, thy murket." + +"It can not be," the king declared with suspicion in his eye. "The +murket had but one son and he must be dead with the first-born." + +"Nay; I was in the land of Goshen, the night of death, and the God of +Israel spared me." + +Meneptah continued to gaze at him stubbornly. Then a conclusive proof +suggested itself to Kenkenes, which, under the stress of an austere +purpose and a soul-trying suspense, he had no heart to use. But the +need pressed him; he choked back his unwillingness, and submitted. +Coming very close to Meneptah, he began to sing, with infinite +softness, the song that the Pharaoh had heard at the Nile-side that +sunrise, now as far away as his childhood seemed. How strange his own +voice sounded to him--how out of place! + +At first, the expression of surprise in the king's face was mingled +with perplexity. But the dim records of memory spoke at the urging of +association. After a few bars, the Pharaoh's countenance had become +reassured. Kenkenes ceased at once. + +"Enough!" Meneptah declared. "The gods have most melodiously +distinguished thee from all others. Thou art he whom I heard one dawn, +and mine heir in Osiris, my Rameses, told me it was the son of Mentu." + +"Then, being of the house of Mentu, thou hast no fear of my +steadfastness, O my Sovereign?" + +"Nay; would that I might be as trustful of all my ministers. Alas, +that a single traitor should lay the stain of unfaith upon all the +court! Ah, who is mine enemy?" + +The sentence, more exclamatory than questioning, seemed to the young +man like a call upon him to voice his impeachments. His inclination +pressed hard upon him and the tokens of his knowledge wrote themselves +upon his open face. When a man is dodging death and expecting +treachery, his perceptions become acute. The king, with his eyes upon +the young man's countenance, caught the change of expression. + +He sprang at Kenkenes and seized his arms. + +"Speak!" he cried violently. "Thou knowest; thou knowest!" + +A sudden ebullition of rage and vengeance sent a tingling current +through the young man's veins. The moment had come. In the eye of a +cautious man, he had been called upon for a dangerous declaration. He +had a mighty man to accuse, no proof and little evidence at his +command, and a weakling was to decide between them. But his cause +equipped him with strength and a reckless courage. He faced the king +fairly and made no search after ceremonious words. He spoke as he +felt--intensely. + +"Nay; it is thou who shalt tell me, O my King. I know thee, even as +all Egypt knows thee. There is no power in thee for great evil, but +behold to what depths of misery is Egypt sunk! Through thee? Aye, if +we charge the mouth for the word the mind willed it to say. Have the +gods afflicted thee with madness, or have they given thee into the +compelling hands of a knave? Say, who is it, thou or another, who +playeth a perilous game with Israel, this day, when its God hath +already rent Egypt and consumed her in wrath? Like a wise man thou +admittest thine error and biddest thy scourge depart, and lo! ere thy +words are cold thou dost arise and recall them and invite the descent +of new and hideous affliction upon thine empire! Behold the winnings +of thy play, thus far! From Pelusium to Syene, a waste, full of +famine, mourners and dead men, and among these last--thy Rameses!--" + +Meneptah did not permit him to finish. Purple with an engorgement of +grief and fury, the monarch broke in, flailing the air with his arms. + +"Har-hat!" he cried. "Not I! Har-hat, who cozened me!" + +The voice rang through the royal inclosure, and the ministers came +running. + +Foremost was Har-hat. + +At sight of his enemy, the king put Kenkenes between him and the +fan-bearer. At sight of Kenkenes, Har-hat stopped in his tracks. + +Behind followed Kephren and Seneferu, the two generals, who, with the +exception of Har-hat, the commander-in-chief, were the only +arms-bearing men away from their places among the soldiers; after +these, Hotep and Nechutes, Menes of the royal body-guard, the lesser +fan-bearers, the many minor attaches to the king's person--in all a +score of nobles. + +They came upon a portentous scene. + +The tumult of preparation had subsided and the hush of readiness lay +over the desert. The orders were to move the army at sunrise, and that +time was past. The pioneers, or path-makers for the army, were already +far in advance. Horses had been bridled and each soldier stood by his +mount. Captains with their eyes toward the royal pavilion moved about +restlessly and wondered. The high commanding officers absent, the next +in rank began to weigh their chances to assume command. Soldiers began +to surmise to one another the cause of the delay, which manifestly +found its origin in the quarters of the king. + +All this was the environment of a hollow square formed by the royal +guard. Within was the Pharaoh, shrinking by the side of his messenger. +The messenger, taller, more powerful, it seemed, by the heightening and +strengthening force of righteous wrath, faced the mightiest man in the +kingdom. Har-hat, though a little surprised and puzzled, was none the +less complacent, confident, nonchalant. Near the fan-bearer, but +behind him, were the ministers, astonished and puzzled. But since the +past days had been so filled with momentous events, they were ready to +expect a crisis at the slightest incident. + +The fan-bearer did not look at the king. It was Kenkenes who +interested him. + +The young man's frame did not show a tremor, nor his face any +excitement. There was an intense quiescence in his whole presence. +Hotep, who knew the provocation of his friend and interpreted the +menace in his manner, walked swiftly over to Kenkenes, as if to caution +or prevent. But the young sculptor undid the small hands of the king, +clinging to his arm, and gave them to Hotep, halting, by that act, all +interference from the scribe. Then he crossed the little space between +him and the fan-bearer. + +"What hast thou done with the Israelite?" he asked in a tone so low +that none but Har-hat heard him. But the fan-bearer did not doubt the +earnestness in the quiet demand. + +"Hast thou come to trouble the king with thy petty loves, during this, +the hour of war?" + +"Answer!" + +"She escaped me," the fan-bearer answered. + +"A lie will not save thee; the truth may plead for thee before Osiris. +Hast thou spoken truly?" + +"I have said, as Osiris hears me. Have done; I have no more time for +thee!" + +"Stand thou there! I have not done with thee." + +The thin nostril of the fan-bearer expanded and quivered wrathfully. + +"Have a care, thou insolent!" he exclaimed. + +Kenkenes did not seem to hear him. He had turned toward Meneptah. + +"I have dared over-far, my King," he said, "because of my love for +Egypt and my concern for thee. Bear with me further, I pray thee." + +Meneptah bent his head in assent. + +"Suffer mine inquiry, O Son of Ptah. Wilt thou tell me upon whose +persuasion thou hast gathered thine army and set forth to pursue +Israel?" + +"Upon the persuasion of Har-hat, my minister." + +"Yet this question further, my King. Wherefore would he have thee +overtake these people?" + +"Since it was foolish to let them go, being my slaves, my builders and +very needful to Egypt. But most particularly to execute vengeance upon +them for the death of my Rameses, and for the first-born of Egypt." + +"Ye hear," Kenkenes said to the nobles. Then he faced Har-hat. The +fan-bearer's countenance showed a remarkable increase of temper, but +there was no sign of apprehension or discomfiture upon it. + +"Thou hast beheld the grace of thy king under question," Kenkenes said +calmly. "Therefore thou art denied the plea that submission to the +same thing will belittle thee. Thy best defense is patience and prompt +answer." + +"Perchance the king will recall his graceful testimony," Har-hat +replied with heat, "when he learns he hath been entangled in the guilty +pursuit of a miscreant after--" + +Kenkenes stopped him with a menacing gesture. + +"Say it not; nor tempt me further! Thou speakest of a quarrel between +thee and me, and of that there may be more hereafter. Now, thou art to +answer to mine impeachment of thee as an offender against the Pharaoh." + +Har-hat received the declaration with a wrathful exclamation. + +"Thou! Thou to accuse me! I to plead before thee! By the gods, the +limit is reached. The ranks of Egypt have been juggled, the law of +deference reversed! A noble to bow to an artisan! Age to give account +of itself to green youth!" + +"And thou pratest of law! The benefits of law are for him who obeys +it; the reverence of youth is for the honorable old. But thou wastest +mine opportunity. Thou shalt silence me no longer. + +"Thy dearest enemy, O Har-hat," Kenkenes continued, "would not impugn +thy wits. He deserves the epithet himself who calls thee fool. But be +not puffed up for this thing I have said. Thou hast made a weapon of +thy wits and it shall recoil upon thee. Thou seest Egypt; not in all +the world is there another empire so piteously humbled. Her fields are +white with bones instead of harvests; her cities are loud with mourning +instead of commerce; the desert hath overrun the valley. And this from +the hands of the Hebrews' God! Who doubts it? Hath Egypt won any +honor in this quarrel with Israel? Look upon Egypt and learn. Hath +the army of the Pharaoh availed him aught against these afflictions? +Remember the polluted waters, the pests, the thunders, the darkness, +the angel of death and tell me. 'Vengeance?' Vengeance upon a God who +hath blasted a nation with His breath? Chastisement of a people whose +murmurs brought down consuming fire upon the land? And yet, for +vengeance and chastisement hast thou urged the king to follow after +Israel. I know thee better, Har-hat! That serviceable wit of thine +hath not failed thee in an hour. Thou hast not wearied of life that +thou courtest destruction by the Hebrews' God. Never hast thou meant +to overtake Israel! Never hast thou thought further to provoke their +God! Rather was it thine intent here, somewhere in the desert, thyself +to be a plague upon Meneptah and wear his crown after him!" + +Confident were the words, portentous the manner as though proof were +behind, astounding the accusation. One by one the ministers had fallen +away from Har-hat and placed themselves by the king. After a long time +of humiliation for them, the supplanter, the insulter, was overtaken, +his villainy uncovered to the eyes of the king. Kenkenes had justified +them, and their triumph had come with a gust of wrath that added +further to their relief. + +Hotep gazed fixedly at Kenkenes. Where had this young visionary, +new-released from prison, found evidence to impeach this powerful +favorite? How was he fortified? What would be his next play? How +much more did he know? And while Hotep asked himself these things, +trembling for Kenkenes, Har-hat put the same questions to himself. The +roll of papyrus, with its seals, still in the young man's hands, was +significant. He folded his arms and forced the issue. + +"Your proof," he demanded. + +"Both the hour and need of my proof are past. Already art thou +convicted." Kenkenes indicated the king and the ministers behind him. +The fan-bearer followed the motion of the arm and for the first time +met the gaze of the angry group. + +Kenkenes had not ventured blindly, nor dared without deep and shrewd +thought. When the artist-soul can feel the fiercer passions it has the +capacity to work them out in action. Kenkenes, having been wronged, +grew vengeful, and therefore had it within him to aspire to vengeance. +He knew his handicap, but had estimated well his strength. With +calmness and deliberation he had studied conditions, assembled all +contingencies and fortified himself against them, gathered hypotheses, +summarized his evidence and brought about that which he had planned to +accomplish--the destruction of Har-hat's rule over Meneptah. + +Har-hat was alone. Before him were all the powers of the land arrayed +against him. Behind him in Tanis was Seti, the heir, who hated him, +and the queen who had turned her back upon him. He had not seen the +need of friends during the days of his supremacy over Meneptah. Now, +not all his denials, eloquence, subtleties could establish him again in +the faith of the frightened king. His ministership had crumbled beyond +reconstruction. What would avail him, then, to defend himself? What +proof had he to offer against this impeachment? The young man's +argument met him at every avenue toward which he might turn for escape. +At best his future in Egypt would be mere toleration; the worst, +condign punishment. + +A flame of feeling surged into his face. With a wide sweep of his arm, +as though to thrust away pretense, he faced the ministers, all the +defiance and audacity of his nature faithfully manifested in his manner. + +"Why wait ye? Would ye see me cringe? Would ye hear me deny, protest, +deprecate? Go to! ye glowering churls, I disappoint you! Flock to the +king; dandle the royal babe a while! Endure the stress a little, for +ye will not serve him long. And thou," whirling upon Kenkenes, +"dreamest thou I fear this bloody God of Israel, or all the gibbering, +incense-sniffing, pedestal-cumbering gods of earth? I will show thee, +thou ranting rabble spawn! See which of us hath the yellow-haired +wanton when I return. For I go to wrest spoil and fighting men from +Israel. Then, by all the demons of Amenti! then, I say! look to thy +crown, thou puny, puling King!" + +With a bound he broke through the cordon of royal guards, leaped into +his chariot, and putting his horses to a gallop, drove at full speed to +his place at the head of the army. There, in an instant, clear and +long-drawn, his command to mount rang over the desert. Front and rear, +wing and wing, the trumpets took up the call, "To horse!" A second +command in the strong voice, a second winding of the many trumpets, and +with a rush of air and jar of earth the great army of the Pharaoh swept +like the wind toward the sea. + +Kenkenes, Menes, Nechutes and those of the royal guard that had started +in pursuit of the traitor, did well to save themselves from +annihilation under the hoofs of twenty thousand horse. Bewildered and +amazed, they were an instant realizing what was taking place. + +"He is running away with the army!" they said to themselves in a daze. +"He is running away with the army!" And they knew that not all the +efforts of the guards and the ministers and the Pharaoh himself would +avail, for the army had received its orders from its great commander +and no man but he might turn it back. + +So the short-poled chariots, multi-tinted and gorgeous, wheel to wheel, +axle-deep in a cloud of dust, glittered out across the desert--sixty +ranks, ten abreast. Far to the left moved the horsemen, the dust of +their rapid passage hiding their galloping mounts up to the stirrup. +To the watchers by the king they seemed like an undulant sea of quilted +helmets and flying tassels, while the sunlight smote through a level +and straight-set forest of spears. They were seasoned veterans, many +of them heroes of a quarter-century of wars. They had followed Rameses +the Great into Asia and had extended the empire and the prowess of arms +to the farthest corners of the known world. They had drunk the sweets +of unalloyed victory from the blue Nile to the Euphrates and had filled +Egypt with booty, scented with the airs of Arabia, gorgeous from the +looms of India, and heavy with the ivory and gold of Ethiopia. + +Now they went in formidable array in pursuit of two millions of slaves +to dye their axes in unresisting blood, to return, not as victors over +a heroic foe, but as drivers of men, herders of sheep and cattle, and +laden with inglorious spoil. + +Behind them, in regular ranks, beaten by their drivers into an awkward +run, came the sumpter-mules, and after them the rumbling carts filled +with provision. + +Meneptah, raging and weeping, saw his army leave him and gallop in an +aureole of dust toward the Red Sea. + +Thus it was that "the Pharaoh drew nigh," but came no farther after +Israel. + + + + +CHAPTER XLIV + +THE WAY TO THE SEA + +Kenkenes did not remain long in the apathy of amazement and +helplessness. Consternation possessed him the instant he roused +himself sufficiently to realize and speculate. He had saved the king +and exposed Har-hat, but the accomplishing of this temporary good had +forced the probable commission of a great evil. If death in some form +did not overtake the fan-bearer he could enrich and strengthen himself +from Israel. Then, even if Meneptah's army did not continue to follow +him, he would be enabled to buy mercenaries and return equipped to do +battle with Meneptah, even as he had vowed. The flower of the military +was with him; the Pharaoh was incapable and Egypt demoralized. The +success of the traitor seemed assured. What then of Rachel, of his own +father, of the faithful ministers, of all whom Kenkenes had loved or +befriended? The thought filled him with resolution and vigor. + +"If the Lord God of Israel overtake him not," he said, returning to the +king, "then must I! For, in my good intent, it seems that I have +undone thee. Hotep," he continued, taking the scribe's hands, "let my +father know that I died not with the first-born. Also, thou seest the +danger into which the nation hath descended in this hour. Help thou +the king! I return not. Farewell." + +He kissed the scribe on the lips, and freeing himself from his clinging +hands, ran through the broken line of the royal guards. + +The army was already a compact cluster in the center of a rolling cloud +of dust to the south. + +When Nechutes had aroused him before daybreak, the cup-bearer had +brought Hotep with him, and while the messenger broke his fast, he had +availed himself of the scribe's presence to learn many things. Not the +smallest part of his information was the fact that the Pharaoh's scouts +had located Israel encamped on a sedgy plain at the base of a great +hill on the northern-most arm of the Red Sea. Meneptah's army had +marched twenty-five miles due south of Pithom and pitched its tents for +the night. It was twenty-five miles from that point to Baal-Zephon or +the hill before which Israel had camped. The fugitives had chosen the +smoothest path for travel, keeping along the Bitter Lakes that their +cattle might feed. Their track led in a southeasterly direction. + +But Har-hat, making off with the army, had struck due south. He had +chosen this line for more than one advantage it offered. The Arabian +desert approached the sea in a series of plateaux or steps. The most +westerly was surmounted by a ridge of high hills, higher probably than +any other chain within the boundaries of Egypt. The most easterly +overlooked the sea-beach and was originally, it may be, the old sea +margin. At points the table-land advanced within sight of the water; +at other localities an intervening space of several miles lay between +it and the sea. The summit was flat, at least smooth enough for the +passage of horsemen, and at all times it was a good field for strategic +manoeuverings by an army arrayed against anything which might be on the +beach below. + +If Meneptah's scouts had reported truly, Israel had behind it a hill, +east of it the sea. West of it the army would approach. South only +could it flee, into a torrid, arid, uninhabited desert. + +The slaves were entrapped. The pursuer had but to follow the pursued +in the only open direction, and overtake the starving, thirsting +multitude at last. But from Har-hat's movement he had meant to +continue along this plateau, out of sight of Israel, until he had +posted part of his army in the way of escape to the south. Kenkenes +reached this conclusion without much pondering. He had his own +manoeuverings in mind. Of the captain of Israel, Prince Mesu, he would +discover, first, if the Lord God had prepared him against Har-hat. +This grave question answered to the repose of his mind concerning the +welfare of Israel, the path of his next duty would be clearly laid for +him. He would join the army and take the life of the fan-bearer, for +the sake of all he loved, and Egypt. In the course of the day's events +his motive had been exalted from the personal desire for revenge to the +high intent of a patriot. He felt most confident that he would forfeit +his own life in the act. + +Not an instant did he hesitate. + +Ahead of him was the narrow bed of a miniature torrent which rolled out +of the desert during the infrequent rains. Now it was dry, packed +hard, free of all obstructions except the great boulders, and led in a +comparatively straight line toward the sea. It was an ideal stretch +for running. + +He summoned all his forces, gathering, in a mighty mental effort, all +that depended on his speed, and took the path with a leap. The dazed +king and his ministers saw him with whom they had that moment talked +stretch a vast and ever-widening breach between them with a bat-like +swoop, and while they watched he was swallowed up in distance. + +The bed of the torrent served him for the first few miles. Then it +turned abruptly toward the Bitter Lakes. He left it and entered the +rougher country. Thereafter no great bursts of speed were possible, +because the runner had to pick his way. He ran, not with a steady +pace, each stride equal to the preceding, but with bounds, aside and +forward, dimly calculating the safety of the footfall. + +Suddenly a column of sand rose under his feet, and he dashed through +it. Blinded and choking, he cleared his eyes, caught his breath and +ran on. A gust of wind, like a breath of flame, met him from the east +and passed. Then he realized that the atmosphere had thickened, as if +an opaque cloud of heat had enveloped the earth. He glanced at the sky +and saw that it was strewn with fragmentary clouds, but a little south +and east of him was the pillar, unmoving and gilded royally. + +There was storm in the air. + +Finally the region began to grow level, proving the proximity to the +sea. In another moment he came upon the old sea bed. It was sandy, +sedge-grown, with here and there a palm, and tremendously trampled. + +Israel had passed this way. + +The clash and ring of meeting metal fell on his ear. He looked and saw +ahead of him two men fighting with a third. Three horses with empty +saddles nervously watched the fray. + +The single combatant was a soldier in the uniform of a common fighting +man. One of the pair was a tall Nubian in a striped tunic; the other +was an Egyptian, short, fat, purple of countenance--Unas! + +With a furious exclamation, Kenkenes slackened his pace only long +enough to undo the falchion at his side and rushed to the fight. It +did not matter to him who the soldier was or what his cause. The fact +that he was fighting the emissaries of Har-hat was sufficient +indorsement of the lone soldier. But even as he sprang forward, Unas +sank on the sand, moved convulsively once or twice and lay still. + +The soldier staggered back from the second servitor and fell. The +Nubian, standing over him, swung his heavy weapon aloft, but Kenkenes +thrust his falchion over the fallen man and caught the blow, as it +descended, upon the broad back of the blade. + +"Set receive your cursed soul," the Nubian snarled. Kenkenes leaped +across the prostrate soldier, and simultaneously the weapons went up, +descended and clashed. Then followed a wild and fearful battle. + +The Egyptian falchion was nothing more than a sword-shaped ax. +Therefore, these were not tongues of steel which would whip their +supple length one across the other and fill the air with the lightning +of their play and the devilish beauty of their music. The vanquished +would not taste the nice death of a spitted heart. There was yet the +method of the stone-ax warriors in this battle, and he who fell would +be a fearful thing to see. + +Perhaps it was because Kenkenes was stronger and more agile; perhaps he +remembered Deborah at that moment, or perhaps he was simply a better +fighter. Whatever the cause his blade went up and descended at last, +before the Nubian could parry, and the second servitor of Har-hat fell +on his face and died. + +Chilled by the instant sobering, which follows the taking of life, the +young man sickened and whirled away from the quivering flesh. Plunging +his falchion in the sand to hide its stain, he went back to the fallen +soldier. + +He knew by the look on the gray face, by the dark pool that had grown +beside him, that the warrior had fought his last fight. Kenkenes +raised the man's head, and heard these words, faintly spoken: + +"He sent them in pursuit. I knew he meant to do it, but I could not +get near to kill him. So I followed them. But thou art her lover; do +thou protect her now." + +"Her! Rachel?" Kenkenes cried. "Who art thou?" + +"Atsu, once her taskmaster, always her--" the voice died away. + +"Where is she?" Kenkenes implored. "In the name of thy gods, go not +yet! Where is she?" + +The lips parted in answer, but no sound came. The arm went up as if to +point, but it fell limp without indicating direction, and with a sigh +the soldier turned his face away. + +Sobbing, wild with anxiety and grief, Kenkenes shook the inert body, +pleading frantically for some sign to guide him to Rachel. But there +was no response, for the dead speak not out of Amenti. + +At last Kenkenes laid the body down and stood up. It had come to him +very plainly that, but for Atsu, already these dead servitors would +have been beyond overtaking in pursuit of his love. Though a worshiper +of Israel's God, Kenkenes was still Egyptian in his instincts. The man +who had died to save Rachel he could not bury uncoffined in a grave of +sand, where the natural processes of dissolution would destroy him +utterly. His and Rachel's debts to Atsu were great, and the demand was +made upon him now to discharge all that was possible in the one act of +caring for the dead soldier's remains. Kenkenes could not bear the +body back to the group he had left about the king, for he had a mission +which concerned all the living who were dear to him. Furthermore the +sky was threatening, the desert was a terrible place during high winds, +and he dared not delay. + +Suddenly a thought struck him. Travelers and sea-faring men had told +him that there were settlements along the Red Sea. Might he not go +forward, on his way after Israel, till he found one of these? + +He led the largest horse past the dead servitors, and persuading it to +stand, lifted the body of Atsu upon its back. With difficulty he +mounted, and supporting the limp burden with one arm, turned again +toward the southeast. + +As he went forward, Kenkenes meditated on the signs of this recent and +tragic event. He had searched throughout the length and breadth of +Goshen for Rachel and none had seen her or heard of her since she had +fled from Har-hat into the desert, eight months before he had seen her +last. Israel was more ignorant of the whereabouts of Rachel than he. +He could not tell whether Har-hat knew where she was, nor could he +guess from the position of the fighters in which direction the servants +had meant to ride. The tracks of their horses were not to be +discovered in the great trampled roadway Israel had made. + +Of this thing Kenkenes was sure. If Rachel were with Israel she had +joined it after he had left Goshen. In that case he was going to her, +to ask after her safety, when he inquired after all Israel. If she +were still in Egypt he would stop Har-hat's search for ever. This +recollection added to his determination and intensified his zeal. + +At the beginning of the great fields of sea-grass he came upon a little +hamlet. It was a considerable distance inland, and the chief industry +of the people could have been only the gathering of sedge for hay, or +the curing of herb and root for medicines. Some of the villagers were +in sight but the most of them were out in the direction of the lakes, +laboring in the marsh grass. + +In the course of the past year's events Kenkenes had learned to be a +cautious and skilful fugitive. He did not care to be caught and taxed +with the death of the man whose body he bore. The village shrine was +the structure nearest to him. It was built of sun-dried brick, with +three walls, the fourth side open to the sunrise. Kenkenes dismounted +and reconnoitered. The shrine was empty, and none of the villagers was +near. + +He lifted the dead man from the horse and bore the body into the +sanctuary. Before the image of Athor was a long table overlaid with a +slab of red sandstone. Here the offerings were left and here Kenkenes +laid Atsu, a true sacrifice to the love deity. Reverently the young +man closed the eyes and straightened the chilling limbs. Going into +his patrimony of jewels sewn in his belt, he took an emerald, and +putting it in the hands, crossed them above the breast. Then he laid +his mantle over the bier. + +At the threshold he found a soft stone and with that he wrote upon the +head of the long table the name of the dead man, and Mendes, his native +city. Under this he wrote further to the villagers, charging them, in +the name of the goddess, to care for the body reverently and return it +to the tomb of Atsu's fathers. Having made note of the emerald as +remuneration for their labors, he completed the inscription without +signature. + +Thus he insured the safety and preservation of the bones of Atsu, and +in the eye of the average Egyptian he had served the soldier well. But +Kenkenes was not satisfied. + +As he left the shrine he muttered with trembling lips: + +"Bless him! The fate is not kind which yields to such goodness no +reward save gratitude. There must be, because of the great God's +justness, some especial blessing laid up for Atsu." + +In the time he had spent in the sanctuary the atmosphere had grown hazy +and the sun shone obscurely. To the east were tumbled and darkening +masses, which gathered even as he looked and joined till they stretched +in a vast and unillumined sweep about the horizon. The wind had died +and the heat bathed him in perspiration. + +Once again his eyes sought the pillar and found it above him, still +somewhat to the east, yet in form unchanged, in hue undimmed. +Something within him associated the column of cloud with Israel and +Israel's God. + +He went to his horse and found him terrified and unmanageable. After +vain efforts to soothe the creature, he walked away a little space, +clasping his hands. + +"O Thou mysterious God! By these tokens Thy hand is upon the earth and +upon the heavens. Even as Thou hast shielded me thus far, withdraw not +Thy sheltering hand from about me, Thy worshiper, in this, Thy latest +hour of mystery." + +He skirted the village, now filling with frightened peasants, and took +the path of Israel. + +It led in a southeasterly direction toward a far-off hill, barely +outlined through the haze of the distance. Meanwhile the darkness +settled and over the sea the somber bastion of cloud heaved its sooty +bulk up the sky. The air stagnated and the whole desert was soundless. + +A round and tumbled mass, blue-black but attended by a copper-colored +rack, detached itself from a shelf-like stratum of cloud, and +elongating, seemed to descend to the surface of the sea. Daylight went +out instantly and a prolonged moan came from the distant east. +Blinding flashes of lightning illuminated the whirling mass and almost +absolute darkness fell after each bolt. Out of the inky midnight +toward the east came an ever-increasing sound of a maddened sea, +gathering in volume and fury and menace. Kenkenes flung himself on his +face and waited. + +He did not have long to wait. + +With a noise of mighty rending, reinforced by a continuous roll of +savage thunder, the storm struck. A spinning cone of wind caught a +great expanse of sand, and lifting the loose covering, carried a huge +twisting column inland--death and entombment for any living thing it +met. With it went a great blast of spray, stones, sea-weed, masses of +sedge uprooted bodily, much wreckage, palm trees, small huts which went +to pieces as they were carried along, wild and domestic animals, +anything and everything that lay in the path of the storm. + +The rotatory movement passed with the first whirl, but a hurricane, +blowing with overcoming velocity, pressed like a wall against anything +that strove to face it. Its hoarse raving filled Kenkenes' ears with +titanic sound. The breath was snatched from his nostrils; his eyelids, +tightly closed, were stung with sharply driven sand. Though he +struggled to his feet and attempted to proceed, he staggered and +wandered and was prone to turn away from the solid breast of the mighty +blast. He could not hope to make headway blinded, yet he dared not +lift his face to the sand. He could make a shelter over his eyes that +he might watch his feet, but he could not discover path and direction +in this manner. + +The day was far advanced, and already the army had outstripped him. +Might not Har-hat at this hour be descending with his veterans, +seasoned against the simoons of Arabia, upon Israel, demoralized in the +storm? + +Desperate, the young man dropped his hands and flung up his head. + +He was standing in a soft light, very faintly diffused about him but +narrowing ahead of him, brightening, as it contracted, into almost +daytime brilliance to the south. The illuminated strip was not wide; +the plateau to the west was dark; the farther east likewise +storm-obscured. Taking courage, he raised his eyes for an instant. +The drifting sand would not permit a longer contemplation, but in that +fleeting glimpse he discovered the source of the supernatural radiance. +The pillar was tinged like a cloud in the sunset, with a mellow and +benign fire. + +Kenkenes did not marvel and was not perplexed. The miracles no longer +amazed him, but he had not become indifferent or unthankful. Each +forward step he took was a declaration of faith; the thrill of relief +in his veins, a psalm of thanksgiving. The stones were as many and as +sharp, the way as untender, and the mighty tempest strove against him +as powerfully, but he followed the ray, trusting it implicitly. + +Night fell unnoticed for it merged with the supernatural darkness of +the day. + +At the summit of the slope which led down to the water's edge, he +paused. Below him was a gentle declivity ending to the south in +darkness. There was not a glimmer of radiance on the sea. Far to the +east could be heard the sound of infuriated surges, storming the rocks, +but dense darkness shrouded all the distance. Only the beach directly +under him was alight. The shadows cast were blacker than daylight +shadows, and the radiance had a touch of gold, which gilded everything +beneath it. The poorest object was enriched, the gaudiest subdued. + +Had the number of Israel been ten thousand or even a hundred thousand, +Kenkenes might have had some conception of the multitude. The millions +massed below him on the sand were not to be looked on except as a vast +unit. + +The tribes were divided, the herds were collected at the rear or inland +side, and the lepers were isolated, but no order in detail was +possible. Tents were down, goods were being gathered, and much +commotion was apparent. Even at a distance Kenkenes could see that +consternation and dismay were rife among Israel. The whole valley was +murmurous with subdued outcry, and a multitudinous lowing and bleating +of the herds swept up, blown wildly by the hurricane. + +The senses, too, are limited in their grasp, even as the brain has +bounds upon its conception. The dimensions, movement and sound of the +multitude over-taxed the eye and ear. + +Was it the storm or the army that had frightened them? + +Slipping and sliding in his haste, he descended the slope without care +for the sound he made. The hillocks and hollows that interposed +irritated him. His impatience made him forget his great weariness. +Israel's helpless ones to the sword, Israel's treasure open to the +enrichment of a traitor, Israel's fighting-men driven to rally to his +standard--Rachel's people, to be mastered by Har-hat! + +Great was his intent and its scope, and how cheaply attained if it cost +but two lives--his enemy's and his own! How much depended upon him! +His enthusiasm and zeal put out of his sight all his young reluctance +to surrender life and the world. He could have explained, truthfully, +from his own feelings, what it is that enables men to suffer an eager +martyrdom. + +Two Hebrews outside the limits of the camp halted him. + +"I bring tidings to your captain," he explained. The answer was swept +from the speaker's lips and carried astray by the wind, but he caught +these words. + +"Thou art an Egyptian. Thy kind hath no friendship for Israel." + +"I am of Egypt, but I am one with you in faith. Conduct me to the +prince, I pray you." + +"Take him," said one to the other. "He is but one." + +The Hebrew, thus addressed, motioned Kenkenes to follow him, and turned +toward the encampment. + +They passed through a lane between two tribes. Kenkenes guessed, +looking first upon one and then the other, that there were one hundred +thousand in the two. Strip a city of her plan and shape, her houses, +her pleasures and commerce; leave only her people, their smallest +possessions, and all their fears; beset such a city with an army on +three sides, the sea on the fourth and a furious hurricane over +all--and in such state and of such appearance were these two tribes. + +Kenkenes fortified himself and resisted with all his might the +contagious panic that seemed about to attack him. As well as he might, +he concentrated his mind upon other things. He noted that the shadows +were long like those of afternoon. Turning his head, he saw that the +pillar stood behind the encampment and that its light was thrown +forward and downward, not backward and outward. Very manifestly, the +benefits of the miracle were only for the believers in Jehovah. The +marvel brought into the young man's mind some natural speculation +concerning the great miracle-worker to whom his guide was leading him. +What manner of man was he about to look upon,--a sorcerer, a trafficker +in horrors, a confounder of men? + +Ahead, particularly illumined by the celestial light, was a group of +elders--great, grave men, misted in the flying fleeces of their own +beards. They bent firmly against the blast and the broad streaming of +their ample drapings added much to the idea of supernatural power and +resistance they inspired. + +The Hebrew leading Kenkenes slackened his step as if hesitating to +approach so venerable a council, when suddenly the group separated, +revealing a majestic man about whom it had been clustered. + +After a word in his own tongue, delivered with bent head and +deferential attitude, the Hebrew stood aside. + +Kenkenes prepared to meet a prince of Egypt, whatever the personality +of the Israelite. He dropped on one knee, bent his head and extended +his hand with the palm toward Moses. The great man took the fingers +and bade the young Egyptian arise. Forty years a courtier, forty years +a shepherd, but the graces of the one had not been forgotten in the +simplicities of the other. When Kenkenes gained his feet, lo! he faced +the wondrous stranger he had seen in the tomb of the Incomparable +Pharaoh. + +At a sign from Moses Kenkenes came near to him, that the howl of the +tempest and the turmoil of Israel might not drown their voices. + +"Thou art weary, my son," the Israelite said, glancing at the tired +face and dusty raiment. "Hast thou come from afar?" + +"From Goshen to Tanis, and hither, O Prince." + +"Afoot?" + +"Even so." + +"Thou hast journeyed farther than Israel, and Israel is most weary. I +trust thy journey is done." + +And this was the confounder of Egypt, the vicar of God--this kindly +noble! + +"Not yet, O Prince; but its dearest mission endeth here. I come of the +blood of the oppressors, but I am full of pity for thy people's wrongs. +Knowest thou that the Egyptians pursue thee? Is thy hand made strong +with resource? Hath the Lord God prepared thee against them?" + +"From whom art thou sent?" the Israelite asked pointedly. + +"I am come of mine own accord." + +"Wherefore?" + +"Because I am one with Israel in faith." + +The great Lawgiver surveyed him in silence for a moment, but the +penetrative brilliance in his eyes softened. + +"Wast thou taught?" he asked at last. + +"In casting away the idols, nay; in finding the true God, I was." + +In the pause that followed, Israel lifted up its voice, and to Kenkenes +it seemed that the people besought their great captain, urgingly and +chidingly. The Lawgiver listened for a little space. His gaze was +absent, the lines of his face were sad. Something in his attitude +seemed to say, "What profiteth all Thy care, O Lord? Behold Thy +chosen--these men of little faith!" + +Then, as if some thought of the young proselyte, the Egyptian, arose in +contrast, his eyes came back to Kenkenes again. + +"Thou hast filled me with gladness, my son," he said simply. + +Kenkenes bowed his head and made no answer. Presently the Israelite +spoke to the panic-stricken people nearest to him. In the tone and the +words he used there was a world of paternal kindliness--a composite of +confidence, reassurance, and implied protection, that should have +soothed. + +"Fear ye not; stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. For the +Egyptians ye have seen this day, ye shall see again no more for ever." + +At the words, Kenkenes lifted his head quickly. The Hebrew had +answered his question, but how enigmatically! Was Israel to escape, or +Har-hat to be destroyed? In either case, the young man wondered +concerning himself. Again the eyes of the Lawgiver returned to him, as +if the sight of the young Egyptian was grateful to him. + +"Abide with us," he said. "Saith not thy faith, 'Fear not; the Lord +shall fight for thee?'" + +Kenkenes' face wore a startled expression; how had the Israelite +divined his purpose? "Saith not thy faith?" Faith? He confessed +faith, but faith had not spoken that thing to him. Slowly and little +by little it began to manifest itself to him, that he had wavered in +his trust; that the purpose of his visit to Israel had questioned the +fidelity of his God's care; that so surely had he doubted, he had +defied danger and fought with death to ask after the intent of the +Lord; that he had meant to perform the duty which the Lord had left +undone. The realization came with a rush of shame. In the asking he +had betrayed his wavering, and Moses had tactfully told him of it. A +surge of color swept over his face. + +"Thou hast recalled my trust to me, my Prince," he said in a lowered +tone. "Till now, I knew not that it had failed me. But remember thou, +it was my love for Israel--O, and my love for mine own--that made me +fear. Forgive me, I pray thee." + +The Lawgiver laid his hand on the young man's shoulder but did not +answer at once. The growing clamor about them had reached the acme of +insistence. The nearest people pressed through the tribal lines and, +rushing forward, began to throw themselves on their knees, tumbling in +circles about the majestic Hebrew. Others kept their feet, and with +arms and clenched hands above their heads, shouted vehemently. Their +cries were partly in Egyptian, partly in their own tongue, but the +cause of their terror and the burden of their supplications were the +same. The Egyptians were upon them! Even the dumb beasts were swept +into the panic and the illuminated beach shook with sound. + +After a little sad contemplation of the clamoring horde about him, the +Lawgiver drew nearer to Kenkenes and said in his ear, because the +tumult drowned his voice: + +"The Lord will fight for thee; thine enemy can not flee His strong +hand. Wait upon Him and behold His triumph." + +Kenkenes bowed his head in acquiescence. + + + + +CHAPTER XLV + +THROUGH THE RED SEA + +The voices of the storm found harmonious tones of different pitch and +swelled in glorious accord from the faintest breath of melody to an +almighty blast that stunned the senses with stupendous harmony. Then +the chord seemed to melt and lose itself in the wild dissonances of the +hurricane. + +The turmoil of Israel began to subside, growing fainter, ceasing among +the ranks nearest the sea, failing toward the rear, dying away like a +sigh up and down the long encampment. The people that had been on +their knees rose slowly. The bleating of the flocks quieted into +stillness. Commotion ceased and Israel held its breath. + +The Lawgiver had passed from among them, and those that followed him +with their eyes saw that he was moving toward the sea, seemingly at the +very limit of the outer radiance and still going on. First to one and +then to another, it became apparent that the extent of the illuminated +beach was widening. Hither and thither over the multitude the +intelligence ran, in whispers or by glances. Having showed his +neighbor each looked again. Ripple-worn sand, shells, barnacle-covered +rocks, slowly came within the pale of the radiance and Moses moved with +it. Eight stalwart Hebrews, bearing a funeral ark, shrouded with a +purple pall, fringed with gold, emerged from among the people and, +taking a place in front of the Lawgiver, walked confidently down the +sand toward the east. + +The radiance progressed step by step. Wet rocks entered the glow, +lines of sea-weed, immense drifts of debris, the brink of a ledge, the +shadow before it, and then a sandy bottom. + +A long line of old men, two abreast, the wind making the picture +awesome as it tossed their beards and gray robes, followed the +Lawgiver. After these several litters, borne by young men, proceeded +in imposing order. + +Except for the raving of the tempest there was no sound in Israel. + +A double file of camels with sumptuous housings moved with dignified +and unhasty tread after the litters. By this time, the foremost ranks +of the procession were some distance ahead, the limit of radiance just +in advance, and lighting with special tenderness the funeral ark. Here +were the bones of that noblest son of Jacob. Having brought Israel +into Egypt, Joseph was leading it forth again. + +Pools, lighted by the ray, glowed like sheets of gold, darkling here +and there with shadow; long ledges of rock, bearded with deep-water +growth, sparkled rarely in the light; stretches of sodden sand, colored +with salts of the waters, and littered with curious fish-life, lay +between. + +Where was the sea? + +After the camels followed a score of mules, little and trim in contrast +to the tall shaggy beasts ahead of them. They were burden-bearing +animals, precious among Israel, for they were laden with the records of +the tribes, much treasure in jewels and fine stuffs, incense, writing +materials, and such things as the people would need, and were not to be +had from among them, or like to be found in the places to which they +might come. These passed and their drivers with them. + +The next moment, Kenkenes was caught in the center of a rushing wave of +humanity. He fought off the consternation that threatened to seize him +and tried to care for himself, but a reed on the breast of the Nile at +flood could not have been more helpless. Behind Israel were the +Egyptians, ahead of it miraculous escape; the one impulse of the +multitude was flight. That any remembered his mate or his children, +his goods, his treasure or his cattle, was a marvel. + +The foremost ranks, moving in directly behind the leaders, had adopted +their pace. Furthermore, as the advance-guard, they had a greater +sense of security, and before them was all the east open for flight. +Not so with the hindmost; they were near the dreaded place from which +the army would descend; ahead of them was a deliberate host; within +them, soul-consuming fear and panic. The rear rushed, the forward +ranks walked, and the center caught between was jammed into a compact +mass. + +Neither halt nor escape was possible. Press as the hindmost might upon +those forward, the pace was slackened, instead of quickened. The +advance grew slower as it extended back through the ranks, for each +succeeding line lost a modicum in the length of the step, till at the +rear they were pushing hard and barely moving. No wonder they sobbed, +prayed, panted, surged, swayed and pressed. How they reviled the +snail-like leaders, not knowing that the sturdy pace lagged in the body +of the multitude. So they hasted and progressed only inch by inch. + +After the first moment of battle against the human sea, Kenkenes +recognized the futility of resistance and suffered himself to be borne +along. There was no turning back now, had he been so disposed. He had +left behind him his purposes, unaccomplished. + +He had received no explicit promise from Moses, and if he had given ear +to the doubts of his own reason, he might have been sorely afraid, much +troubled for Egypt and all he loved therein. But he went with the +multitude passively, even contentedly; he did not speculate how his God +would fight for him; his faith was perfect. + +As for his presence with Israel, no one heeded him. Sometimes it came +his way to be helpful; an old man lost his feet and becoming +panic-stricken was soothed only when the young Egyptian put a strong +arm about him and held him till his feet touched earth again. Children +became heavy in the arms of parents and the little Hebrews had no fear +of the young man who carried them, a while, instead. But no one +stopped to take notice that this was an Egyptian, totally unlike those +among the "mixed multitude" that had come to join Israel; nor did any +wonder what a nobleman of the blood of the oppressors did among the +fleeing slaves. Indeed, if the host had any thought beyond the impulse +of self-preservation, it was only a dim realization that they were +walking over a most rocky, oozy and untender road and that the smell of +the sea was very strong about them. + +In the early hours of the morning, having become so accustomed to the +roar of the wind and the sound of the moving multitude, Kenkenes ceased +to be conscious of it. Other sounds, which hours before would have +failed to reach his ears, became distinct. The crying of tired +children reached him, and he detected even snatches of talk among the +ranks some distance away from him. Thus a clamor of noise, secondary +in force, grew about him. Above it all, at last, came a sound that +would have made him halt if he could. + +He tried to think it one of the many voices of the storm, but the +second time he heard it, he knew what it was. + +Far to the rear, a trumpet-call, beautiful and spirited, rose upon the +air. + +The Egyptian army was in pursuit! + +Israel heard it, and crying aloud in its terror, swept forward, as if +the trumpet-call had commanded it. Kenkenes felt a quickening of +pulse, a momentary tremor, but no more. + +He became conscious finally of a warmth penetrating his sandals. He +knew that he had been struggling up a slope for a long time, and now he +realized that he was again on the dry, sun-heated sand of the desert. +The multitude ceased to crowd, the pressure about him diminished; the +ranks began to widen to his left and right; the leaders halted +altogether, and though there was still much movement among the body and +rear of the host, people turned to look upon their neighbors. + +The overhanging cloud parted from the eastern horizon, leaving a strip +of sky softly lighted by the coming morn. Without any preliminary +diminution of its force, the wind failed entirely. + +Kenkenes, with many others, looked back and saw that the pillar, +illuminated, but no longer illuminating, had halted above a solitary +figure of seemingly super-human stature in the morning gray, standing +on an eminence, overlooking the sea. + +The arm was uplifted and outstretched, tense and motionless. + +From his superior height, Kenkenes saw, over the heads of the immense +concourse, two lines of foam riding like the wind across the sea-bed +toward each other. Between them was a great body of plunging horses; +overhead a forest of fluttering banners; and faint from the commotion +came shouts and wild notes of trumpets. Then the two lines of foam +smote against each other with a fearful rush and a muffled report like +the cannonading of surf. A mountain of water pitched high into the air +and collapsed in a vast froth, which spread abroad over the churning, +wallowing sea. The falling wind dashed a sheet of spray over the +silent host on the eastern shore. Sharp against the white foam, dark +objects and masses sank, arose, and sank again. + +At that moment the sun thrust a broad shaft of light between the +horizon and the lifted cloud. + +It discovered only the sea, raving and stormy, and afar to the west a +misty, vacant, lifeless line of shore. + +"And the waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen, and +all the host of the Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there +remained not so much as one of them." + +So perished Har-hat and the flower of the Egyptian army. + + + + +CHAPTER XLVI + +WHOM THE LADY MIRIAM SENT + +Of the ensuing day, Kenkenes had no very distinct memory. Very fair +and beautiful, one recollection remained--a recollection of another +figure on the eminence, and by the flash of white upthrown arms, and +the blowing of a somber cloud of hair, this time it was a woman. How +the morning sun glittered on the shaken timbrel; how the spotless +draperies went wild in the wind; how the group of lissome maidens on +the sand below wound in and out, in a mazy dance; how the multitude was +swept into transports of beatification; how the men became prophets and +the women, psalmists; how the vast wilderness reverberated with a great +chant of exultation--all this he remembered as a sublime dream. + +Thereafter, Israel moved inland and down the coast some distance, for +the sea began to surrender its dead. Of the stir and method of the +removal he did not remember, but of the encampment and the reassembling +of the tribes he recalled several incidents. He was numb and +sleep-heavy beyond words, and while leaning, in a semi-conscious +condition, against some household goods, he was discovered by the +owner, who was none other than the friendly son of Judah, his assistant +in his search for Rachel in Pa-Ramesu. The man's honest joy over +Kenkenes' safety was good to look upon. A few words of explanation +concerning his very apparent exhaustion were fruitful of some comfort +to the young Egyptian. The Hebrew's wife had a motherly heart, and the +weary face of the comely youth touched it. Therefore, she brought him +bread and wine and made him a place in the shadow of her +tent-furnishings where he might sleep till what time the family shelter +could be raised. + +But Kenkenes did not rest. He fell asleep only to dream of Rachel, and +awoke asking himself why he had abandoned the search for her; why he +had left Egypt without her; and why he had not gone to Moses at once +for aid to further his seeking through Israel. + +He arose from his place, sick with all the old suspense and heartache. +He would begin now to look for Rachel and cease not till he found her +or died of his weariness. + +He stepped forth directly in the path of a party of women. He moved +aside to give them room, and glancing at the foremost, recognized her +immediately as the Lady Miriam. She stopped and looked at him. + +"Thou art he who found Jehovah in Egypt?" she asked. + +He bowed in assent. + +"Thy faith is entire," she commented. "Also, have I cause to remember +thee. Thou didst display a courteous spirit in Tape, a year agone." + +"Thou hast repaid me with the flattery of thy remembrance, Lady +Miriam," he replied. + +"Thy speech publishes thee as noble," she went on calmly. "Thy name?" + +"Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, the murket." + +Her lips parted suddenly and her eyes gleamed. + +"See yonder tent," she said, indicating a pavilion of new cloth, reared +not far from the quarters of Moses. "Repair thither and await till I +send to thee." + +Without pausing for an answer she swept on, her maidens following, damp +of brow and bright of eye. + +Kenkenes turned toward the tent. A Hebrew at the entrance lifted the +side without a word and signed him to enter. + +The interior was not yet fully furnished. A rug of Memphian weave +covered the sand and a taboret was placed in the center. + +Presently the serving-man entered with a laver of sea-water, and an +Israelitish robe, fringed and bound at the selvage with blue. With the +despatch and adroitness of one long used to personal service, he +attended the young Egyptian, and dressed him in the stately garments of +his own people. When his service was complete, he took up the bowl and +cast-off dress and went forth. + +After a time he brought in a couch-like divan, dressed it with fringed +linen and strewed it with cushions; next, he suspended a cluster of +lamps from the center-pole; set a tiny inlaid table close to the couch, +and on the table put a bottle of wine and a beaker; and brought last a +heap of fine rugs and coverings which he laid in one corner. The tent +was furnished and nobly. The man bowed before Kenkenes, awaiting the +Egyptian's further pleasure, but at a sign from the young man, bowed +again and retired. + +Kenkenes went over to the divan and sat down on it, to wait. + +Presently some one entered behind him. He arose and turned. Before +him was the most welcome picture his bereaved eyes could have looked +upon. His visitor was all in shimmering white and wore no ornament +except a collar of golden rings. What need of further adornment when +she was mantled and crowned with a glory of golden hair? Except that +the face was marble white and the eyes dark and large with quiet +sorrow, it was the same divinely beautiful Rachel! + +It may have been that he was beyond the recuperative influence of +sudden joy, or that the unexpected restoration of his love might have +swept away his forces had he been in full strength; but whatever the +cause, Kenkenes sank to his knees and forward into the eager arms flung +out to receive him. Her cry of great joy seemed to come to him from +afar. + +"Kenkenes! O my love! Not dead; not dead!" + +Then it was he learned that she had despaired, grieving beyond any +comfort, for she had counted him with the first-born of Egypt. And +even though thoughts came to him but slowly now, he said to himself: + +"Praise God, I did not think of it, or I had gone distracted with her +trouble." + +How rich woman-love is in solicitude and ministering resource! It made +Rachel strong enough to raise him, and having led him back to the +divan, gently to lay him down among the cushions. The wine was at her +hand, and she filled the beaker, and held it while he drank. Then she +kissed him and, hiding her face in his breast, wept soft tears. And +though he held her very close and had in his heart a great longing to +soothe her, he could not speak. + +After a little she spoke. + +"I had not dreamed that there was such artifice in Miriam. She told me +of a nobleman that had served God and Israel, and was in need of +comfort in his tent. But she bridled her tongue and governed her +expression so cunningly, that I did not dream the hero was mine--mine!" + +Then on a sudden she disengaged herself from his arms and gaining her +feet, cried out with her hands over her blushing face: + +"And now, I know why she and Hur--O I know why they came with me, and +brought me to the tent!" + +"Nay, now; may I not guess, also?" Kenkenes laughed, though a little +puzzled over her evident confusion. "They had a mind to peep and spy +upon our love-making. Perchance they are without this instant; come +hither and let us not disappoint them." + +She dropped her hands and looked at him with flaming cheeks and smiling +eyes. There was more in her look than he could fathom, but he did not +puzzle longer when she came back to her place and hid her face away +from him. + +It is the love of riper years, that makes the lips of lovers silent. +But Kenkenes and Rachel were very young and wholly demonstrative, and +they had need of many words to supplement the testimony of caresses. +They had much to tell and they left no avowal unmade. + +But at last Kenkenes' voice wearied and Rachel noted it. So in her +pretty authoritative way, she stroked his lashes down and bade him +sleep. When she removed her hands and clasped them above his head, his +eyes did not open. + +As she bent over him, she noted with a great sweep of tenderness how +young he was. In all her relations with Kenkenes she had seen him in +the manliest roles. She had depended upon him, looked up to him, and +had felt secure in his protection. Now she contemplated a face from +which content had erased the mature lines that care had drawn. The +curve of his lips, the length of the drooping lashes, the roundness of +cheek, and the softness of throat, were youthful--boyish. With this +enlightenment her love for him experienced a transfiguration. She +seemed to grow older than he; the maternal element leaped to the fore; +their positions were instantly reversed. It was hers to care for him! + +After a long time, his arms relaxed about her, and she undid them and +disposed them in easy position. Lifting the fillet from his brow, she +smoothed out the mark it had made and settled the cushions more softly +under his head. From the heap of coverings she took the amplest and +the softest and spread it over him. Remembering that the wind from the +sea blew shrewdly at night, she laid rugs about the edges of the tent +which fluttered in the breeze and returned again to his side. + +After another space of rapt contemplation of his unconscious face she +went forth and drew the entrance together behind her. + +The next daybreak was the happiest Israel had known in a hundred years. +Egypt, overthrown and humbled, was behind them; God was with them, and +Canaan was just ahead--perhaps only beyond the horizon. Few but would +have laughed at the glory of Babylonia, Assyria and the great powers. + +For had it not been promised that out of Israel nations should be made, +and kings should come? + +The march was to be taken up immediately, and in the cool of the +morning the host was ready to advance. + +Rachel had not permitted herself to be seen until the tent of Miriam +was struck. She knew that Kenkenes was without, waiting for her, and +with the delightful inconsistency of maidenhood, she dreaded while she +longed to meet her beloved again. And when the moment arrived she +slipped across the open space to the camel that was to bear her into +Canaan, but in the shadow of the faithful creature, Kenkenes overtook +her and folded her in his arms. + +"A blessing on thee, my sweet! And I am blest in having thee once +more." + +"Didst thou sleep well?" she asked. + +"Most industriously, since I made up what I lost and overlapped a +little. And yet I was abroad at dawn prowling about thy tent lest thou +shouldst flee me once again. Rachel--" his voice sobered and his face +grew serious--"Rachel, wilt thou wed me this day?" + +"If it were only 'aye' or 'nay' to be said, I should have said it long +ago," she answered with averted eyes, "but there are many things that +thou shouldst know, Kenkenes, before thou demandest the answer from me." + +"Name them, Rachel," he said submissively; "but let me say this first. +Mine eyes are not mystic but most truthfully can I tell this moment, +which of us twain will rule over my tent." + +"And thou art ready for the tent and shepherd life of Israel?" she +asked gravely, but before he could answer she went on. + +"Hear me first. So tender hast thou been of me; so much hast thou +sacrificed for my sake that it were unkind to bind thee to me in the +life-long sacrifice and life-long hardships that I may know. Thine +enemy and mine is dead, and Egypt rid of him. There is much in Egypt +to prosper thee; there, thy state is high; there, thou hast opportunity +and wealth. Israel can offer thee God and me. Even the faith thou +couldst keep in Egypt, so thou wert watchful. And further, thou art +the murket's son, and building takes the place of carving for thee, +now. But, here, O Kenkenes, thou must lay thy chisel down for ever, +for the faith of the multitude, so newly weaned from idolatry, is too +feeble to be tried with the sight of images." + +Kenkenes heard her with a passive countenance. She gave him news, +indeed--facts of a troublous nature, but he held his peace and let her +proceed. + +"And this, yet further. Once in that time when I was a slave and thou +my master and loved me not--" + +His dark eyes reproached her. + +"Didst love me, then, of a truth? But it matters not--and yet"--coming +closer to him, "it matters much! In that time ere thou hadst told me +so, we talked of Canaan, thou and I. I boasted of it, being but newly +filled with it and freshly come from Caleb who taught us. Then, Israel +was enslaved and not yet so vastly helped by Jehovah. But alas! I have +seen Israel freed, and attended by its God, and by the tokens of its +conduct, Israel is far, far from Canaan. I am of Israel and whosoever +weds with me, will be of Israel likewise. It may not be that I shall +escape my people's sorrows. Shall I bring them upon thy head, also, my +Kenkenes?" + +After a little he answered, sighing. + +"Thou dost not love me, Rachel." + +"Kenkenes!" + +"Aye, I have said. Thou wouldst send me away from thee, back into +Egypt." + +"O, seest thou not? I would have thee know thy heart; I would not have +thee choose blindly; I do but sacrifice myself," she cried, +panic-stricken. + +"And yet, thou wouldst deny me that same delight of sacrifice. Can I +not surrender for thee as well?" + +She drooped her head and did not answer. + +"Ah! thou speakest of the benefits of Egypt," he continued. "What were +Egypt without thee, save a great darkness haunted and vacant? Besides, +there is no Egypt beyond this sea. She hath risen and crossed with +Israel--all her beauty and her glory and her beneficence. For thou art +Egypt and shalt be to me all that I loved in Egypt." + +He took her hands. + +"Why may I not as justly doubt thy knowledge of thy heart?" he asked +softly. + +Seeing that she surrendered, he persisted no further in his protest. + +"When wilt thou wed me, my love?" + +She drew back from him a little, though she willingly left her hands +where they were, and Kenkenes, noting the flush on her cheeks, the +pretty gravity of her brow, and the well-known air she assumed when she +discoursed, smiled and said fondly to himself: + +"By the signs, I am to be taught something more." + +"Thou knowest, my Kenkenes," she began, "the Hebrews are married +simply. There is feasting and dancing and the bride is taken to the +house of her father-in-law. Thereafter there is still much feasting, +but the wedding ceremony is done at the home-bringing of the bride." + +"I hear," said Kenkenes when she paused. + +"I am without kindred; thou art here without house. There can be no +wedding feast for us, nor dancing nor singing, for Israel is on the +march." + +"Of a truth," Kenkenes assented. + +"So there is only the essential portion of the ceremony left to us--the +home-bringing of the bride." + +"It is enough," said Kenkenes. + +"Hur and Miriam brought me to thy tent last night." + +With his face lighting, Kenkenes drew her to him and put his arm about +her. + +"So if thou wilt, we shall say--that--from--that moment--" + +Her voice grew lower, her words more unready and failed altogether. + +"From that moment," he said eagerly, reassuring her. "From that +moment--" + +"From that moment, I have been thy wife!" + + + + +CHAPTER XLVII + +THE PROMISED LAND + +One sunset, shortly after his marriage, word came to the tent of +Kenkenes that an Amalekite chieftain on his way to Egypt had paused for +the night just without the encampment of Israel. + +"Here may be an opportunity to speak with thy father," Rachel +suggested. The prospect of talking once again to those he had left +behind was one too full of pleasure for the young Egyptian to receive +calmly. Hurriedly he despatched one of his serving men to the +Amalekite to bid him await a message. But Rachel called the messenger +back. + +"Tell the Amalekite that thou comest from an Egyptian noble. For such +thy master is, and this chieftain is more willing to take command from +Egypt than from Israel." + +The servant in his enthusiasm and the importance of his mission told +the Amalekite that he came from a prince of Egypt. + +The chieftain was a youth who had just succeeded his father over his +people and was on his way to Memphis bearing tribute to Meneptah. To +this tributary nation Egypt was remote, splendid and full of glamour. +The name was synonymous of the world and all the glories thereof, and +particularly had it appealed to the active imagination of this youth. +He had seen many Egyptians, but they were naked prisoners laboring in +the mines of Sinai, or overseers or scribes or the ancient exile who +was governor of the province,--and surely these were not representative +of the land. + +Now he was to get a glance at real Egypt. + +In the early hours of the dawn a follower came to his pallet and told +him in awed tones that the prince was without. Tremulous with +pleasurable trepidation, he went out into the misty daybreak twilight +of the open. And there he met an imperial stranger who towered over +him as a palm over a shrub. At a single glance the Amalekite saw that +there was a circlet of gold about the brow, that the face was fine and +that the garments swept the sands. All this was significant, but when +the stranger delivered him two rolls, one addressed to the chief of the +royal scribes of the Pharaoh, the other to the royal murket, and paid +him with a jewel, the Amalekite, convinced and satisfied, prostrated +himself. + +But we may not know what the youth thought when he found that there +were few in all Egypt like this princely stranger. + +After these writings came, with all fidelity, to the hands of those who +loved him in Egypt, silence fell between them and Kenkenes. + +Meneptah erected no more monuments after the eighth year of his reign, +for in that year Mentu, the murket, died. None could fill his place, +since to his name was attached the title "the Incomparable," as +befitted the artist of that great Pharaoh, likewise titled, who had so +loved him and his genius. Meneptah, in memory of Mentu and his artist +son who had served his king so well, set up no sculptor nor any murket +in his place. It was the one graceful act in the life of the feeble +king, the one resolution to which he held most tenaciously. + +Though Mentu's union with Senci was short, it was most happy, save +perhaps for the absence of Kenkenes. But after the letter came from +the well-beloved son there was more cheer in the heart of the father. +Kenkenes was not dead, only absent, as he would have been had he lived +in Tanis or Thebes. Furthermore, the young man had spoken glowingly +and at length on the future of Israel and the Promised Land, and Mentu +told himself that he might visit Kenkenes one day in that new country. + +Since there were no children in their house, Senci and the murket +spoiled Anubis, and in the eyes of his devoted master the ape had +earned his soft life. Shortly after the departure of Kenkenes Mentu +discovered the ape burying something in the sand of the courtyard +flower-beds. In spite of the favorite's vigorous protests Mentu +overturned the tiny heap of earth and discovered therein the +lapis-lazuli signet. There was but one explanation of the ape's +possession of the gem. He had torn the scarab from about the neck of +Unas when he flew in his face, the moment the light went out. After +his nature, he kept the jewel because it was bright. + +All these things--the discovery of the signet in the tomb, the safety +of Kenkenes when all the other first-born had died, and the testimony +of the miracles to the power of Israel's God--made the good murket +think deeply. Indeed, all Egypt thought deeply after the Exodus of +Israel, and to such extremes was this sober thinking carried that +through very fear many added the name of the Hebrews' God to the +Pantheon. Mentu did not go so far, because he saw the inconsistency in +such procedure, but he shook his head and pondered and was not wholly +satisfied with many things in the Osirian creed. + +Of the love of Hotep and Masanath something yet remains to be told. It +was common to examine the entire family of a traitor as to their +complicity in his misdeeds, and the option lay with the Pharaoh whether +or not they should bear some of his punishment. Har-hat was dead, the +army destroyed at his hands. When the news of the disaster reached +Tanis Meneptah's anger and grief knew no bounds. + +After Rameses had been interred at Thebes beside his fathers, and the +court had returned to Memphis, the king summoned Masanath, the sole +representative of the family of Har-hat, to give reason why she should +not be accused of complicity in the treason of her father. + +Meneptah had taken counsel with none on this step. Perhaps he had an +inkling that it would be unpopular; perhaps he thought he was but +fulfilling the law. Hotep was at On comforting his family, who mourned +over Bettis, and most of the other ministers were scattered over Egypt +lamenting their own dead, and few expected the ungallant act of the +king. + +But one day, when all the court had reassembled, Masanath came into the +great council chamber. Alone and dressed in mourning, she seemed so +little and defenseless that Meneptah stirred uncomfortably in his +throne. Slowly she approached the dais and fell on her knees before +the king. The great gathering of courtiers held its breath, wondering +and pitying. + +Such was the scene upon which Hotep came all unknowing. At a glance he +understood the situation. It was too much for his well-bridled spirit. +With a cry, full of horror, indignation and compassion, he dropped his +writing-case and scroll, and, rushing forward, flung himself on his +knees beside her, one arm about her, the other extended in supplication +to the Pharaoh. + +Meneptah, who, from the moment of Masanath's entrance into the council +chamber, had begun to repent his ill-advised act, was glad to be won +over. At the end of Hotep's impassioned story he came down from the +dais, and raising Masanath, kissed her and put her into the young man's +arms. Supplementing his pardon with command, he ordered his scribe to +marry the sad little orphan at once and take her away from the scene of +her sorrows till Isis restored her in spirits again. + +The alacrity with which this royal command was obeyed proved how +acceptable it was to the lovers. By the next sunset they were going by +a slow and sumptuous boat down the broad bosom of the Nile toward the +sea, but they had no care whether or not they ever reached their +destination. + +After some months spent on the coast, Masanath grew stronger and began +to live with much appreciation of the joys of existence. On their +return to Memphis Hotep was made fan-bearer in Har-hat's place, and for +the remaining fourteen years of Meneptah's reign practically ruled over +Egypt. + +Vastly different, however, was his favoritism from the favoritism of +Har-hat. During the wise administration of the young adviser Egypt +recovered something of her former glory, lost in the dreadful +plague-ridden days preceding the Exodus. The army was reorganized +first, for Ta-user's party began to make demonstrations the hour that +the news of the Red Sea disaster reached the Hak-heb. All public +building and national extravagance were halted, and the surplus +treasure was expended in restocking the fields and granaries and +restoring commerce. Within five years after the Exodus the great check +Egypt had met in her nineteenth dynasty was not greatly apparent. + +So the land recovered from the plagues, but its ruler never. The death +of Rameses lay like a heavy sin and torturing remorse on his +conscience. He wept till the feeble eyes lost their sight, but not +their susceptibility to tears. At last, succumbing to melancholia, he +became a child, for whom Hotep reigned and for whom the queen cared +with touching devotion. + +The story of Seti is history. It is needless to say that his rough +usage at the hands of Ta-user awakened him, but it was long before he +found courage to return to Io, the sweetheart of his childhood. Yet, +when he did, after the manner of her kind, she wept over him and took +him back without a word of reproach. So the fair-faced sister of Hotep +came to be queen over Egypt and took another title with Nefer-ari as +prefix, and the quaint Danaid name, Io, was lost to all lips but Seti's +and Hotep's. + +After Seti came to the throne he continued Hotep in the advisership and +prepared to reign happily. But in a little time the Thebaid, long +disaffected, seceded from the federation of Egypt and crowned +Amon-meses king of Thebes. Seti gathered his army, marched against the +rebellious district, put Amon-meses to the sword and reduced the +Thebaid to submission. Then he returned to Memphis for another space +of prosperity. + +At the end of a year Ta-user and Siptah, after much browbeating of the +Hak-heb, raised funds sufficient to purchase mercenaries. Then, with +Ta-user at the head in barbaric splendor, they descended on Memphis. + +The course Seti pursued has puzzled historians. He gathered up his +family, his court, his treasure, and without so much as lifting a +spear, fled into Ethiopia. After some time Ta-user sent to him and +conferred upon him the title of the Prince of Cush. + +To the friends of the young Pharaoh it was patent that he feared to +meet Ta-user. Having succumbed once to her influence, to his undoing +and the misery of his beloved Io, he dared not come under the +all-compelling eyes of the sorceress again. So he surrendered his +crown and his country for his soul's sake. + +But fifty years after, Seti's son, the formidable Set-Nekt, returned +into Egypt and restored the Rameside house on a basis so solid that +another glorious dynasty arose thereon, second only in brilliance to +that which had gone out in the anarchy of Siptah and Ta-user's reign. +This done, he wreaked personal vengeance upon the usurpers of his +father's throne. He broke open the tomb of Siptah and Ta-user, threw +out their bodies to the jackals, obliterated the inscriptions, enlarged +the crypt, put his own and his father's history on the walls and used +it for his mausoleum when he died. + +And this was the deadliest retaliation he could inflict in his father's +name. + +Much of this Kenkenes learned from the lips of Egyptian merchants whom +he met in Canaan, forty years after the Exodus. + +Kenkenes was a proselyte who had found his God for himself. He +believed as he drew his breath and as his heart beat, involuntarily and +without any lapse. Never could a son of Israel have surrendered +himself more eagerly to the law. Its good and its purposes were ever +before his eyes, and his footsteps led in the paths that it lighted. +Though he saw not the Lord in a burning bush nor talked with Him on +Sinai, he found Him on the lonely uplands of the sheep-ranges and heard +Him in the voiceless night on the limitless desert. The young Egyptian +was not yet twenty years old at the time of the numbering before Sinai, +and he entered the Promised Land with Joshua and Caleb. For verily he +walked with God all the days of his life. + +It must not be supposed that there was no serene life nor any happiness +in the long wandering of forty years. A generation of oriental adults +practically dies out in that time. The passing of the elders of +Israel, though it was accomplished by plagues and sendings for +iniquities, was as the passing of the old in the Orient to-day. The +encampment was not continually filled with calamity and great +mourning--far from it. There were long stretches of peace and plenty, +extending almost uninterruptedly for years, and those who followed the +law escaped the intervals of catastrophe. + +Kenkenes was among the chosen people but not of them, partly because he +was of the execrated race of the oppressors and partly because the most +of Israel had nothing in common with the nobleman. But Moses loved him +and found joy in his company. Joshua loved him and had him by his side +when Israel warred. Caleb and Aaron loved him because he was godly, +and Miriam was proud of him and was mild in his presence. He took no +public part in the people's affairs, yet who shall say that he was not +near when Bezaleel wrought the wondrous angels for the ark? Who shall +say that his purest jewel did not enter the breast-plate of the high +priest? There are many names embraced in that general term, "every +wise-hearted man among them that wrought the work of the tabernacle." + +So when Israel took up the forty years of pasture-hunting in Paran, +Kenkenes made his tent beautiful and pitched it always apart from the +multitude, and here he was contented all the days that Israel tarried +in that place. Under his care his flocks increased, his cattle +multiplied and his camels were not few, and he laid up riches for the +four stalwart sons and the golden-haired daughter who were to live +after him. + +From the moment of his union with his beautiful wife, through the long +years of semi-isolation that he knew thereafter, he grew closer and +closer to Rachel. She filled all his needs as Israel failed to supply +them, and he missed neither friend nor neighbor when she was near. +Rachel knew wherein she was more fortunate than other women and her +content and her devotion were beyond measure. So Kenkenes and Rachel +were lovers all the days of their lives. + +If ever they grew reminiscent there was one name spoken more tenderly +than any other--the name of Atsu. Kenkenes would grow sad of +countenance and he would look away, but there was no jealousy in his +heart for the tears of Rachel weeping over the task-master who died for +her. + +The collar of golden rings became popular in Israel, and, after many +modifications effected by time and fashion, it came at last to be the +insignia of the virtuous woman. For centuries it was worn and no one +knows when the custom died out. + +The genius of Kenkenes did not die. His voice enriched with age, and +the rocky vales wherein his flocks wandered had melodious echoes +whenever he followed the sheep. But he never used chisel upon stone +again. His sons were artists after him, but they were handicapped +also. And so it continued for many generations until the Temple of +Solomon was built. Then, though the plans came from the Lord, and +artisans were brought from Tyre, it was the descendants of Kenkenes who +made the Temple beautiful "with carved figures of cherubim and palm +trees and open flowers, within and without." + + + +THE END + + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +When the Chaldeans prostrated themselves before Nebuchadnezzar, they +cried: "O King, live forever!" When patrician Rome hailed Nero in the +Circus, the acclaim was: "Vivat Imperator!" When the faithful saluted +the Caliph, they said: "May thy shadow never grow less." + +Humanity, living in eternal contemplation of the tomb, offers its +highest tribute in bespeaking immortality for its great. + +But Egypt did not invoke the gift of deathlessness upon the Pharaoh; +she declared it. He was an Immortal and died not. Though he more +nearly justified the confident declaration of his people, he but proved +that there is no sublunar immortality, though in Egypt--almost. + +The Pharaoh lived with a triple purpose: the perpetuity of his empire, +of his dynasty, of his individuality. He steeped his body in +indestructibility and wrote his name in adamant. He employed the +manifold means at the command of his era, and whether his monument were +a colossus, a temple or a city, he builded well. + +While Europe was yet a vast tract of gloomy forests, and morasses, and +plains, while the stone that was to rear Troy was yet scattered on the +slopes of Ida, Mena, the first Pharaoh of the first Dynasty, deflected +the Nile against the Arabian hills and built Memphis in its bed. So +say the writings that are graven in stone. If this be true, this story +deals with a quaint but efficient civilization that was already three +thousand years old, fourteen centuries before Christ. + +An effort has been made to conform to the history of the time as it +comes down to us in the form of biblical accounts and the writings of +contemporaneous chroniclers. The author has taken liberty with +accepted history in the age of Meneptah's first-born and in placing +Hebrews in the quarries at Masaarah. The escape of Kenkenes in the +Passover is not intended to contradict the biblical statement that not +one of the eldest born was spared. Rather, it is offered, as an +hypothesis, that the Angel of Death would have passed over any true +believer in Jehovah, regardless of his nationality. Furthermore, the +author has given the Greek spelling to some names, the Egyptic to +others, the purpose being to present those pronunciations most familiar +to readers. + +For all facts herein set forth, the author is indebted to a multitude +of authorities, chiefly to Wilkinson, Birch, Rawlinson, Ebers, and +Erman. + + + + +LIST OF CHARACTERS AND PLACES + +Abydos,--A-by'-dos, city of Upper Egypt and burial-place of Osiris. + +Amenti,--A-men'-tee, the realm of Death. + +Amon-meses,--A'-mon-mee'-seez, half-brother to Meneptah and hostile to +him. + +Anubis,--A-niu'-bis, pet ape named after the jackal-headed god. + +Apepa,--A-pay'-pah, a Hyksos monarch who befriended Joseph. + +Asar-Mut,--A-sar-Moot', half-brother to Meneptah and high priest to +Ptah. + +Athor,--Ah'-thor, the feminine love-deity. + +Atsu,--At'-soo, a noble Egyptian, vice-commander over the works at +Pa-Ramesu, afterwards degraded. + +Baal-Zephon,--Bay'-al-Zee'-phon, a hill at the northern end of the Red +Sea. + +Bast,--Bahst, the cat-headed goddess, patron deity of Bubastis. + +Besa,--Bee'-sah, a dwarf-like deity similar to the Roman Cupid. + +Bettis,--Bet'-tis, older sister to Hotep and Io. + +Bubastis,--Biu-bast'-is, city in lower Egypt near Goshen. + +Deborah,--Deb'-or-ah, an aged woman of Israel, Rachel's attendant. + +Hak-heb,--Hayk'-heb, a village on the Nile, shipping point for +Nehapehu, fifty miles south of Memphis. + +Har-hat,--Hahr'-hat, fan-bearer, or prime minister to the Pharaoh; +father of Masanath. + +Hathors,--Hah'-thorz, seven personifications of Athor, usually seven +cows, similar to the fates of Roman and Greek mythology. + +Hotep,--Hoe'-tep, the royal scribe, friend of Kenkenes, brother of +Bettis and Io. + +Hyksos,--Hick'-soz, the Shepherd Kings. + +Imhotep,--Eem-hoe'-tep, the physician god. + +Ipsambul,--Ip-sahm'-bool, a temple cut from living rock. + +Io,--Eye'-o, younger sister to Hotep and Bettis, in love with Seti. + +Isis,--Eye'-sis, consort to Osiris and goddess of wisdom. + +Jambres,--Jam'-breez, a priest in disgrace, sometime astrologer to +Rameses II and to Meneptah. + +Kenkenes,--Ken-ken'-eez, son of Mentu, the murket. + +Khem,--Kem, the Egyptian Pan. + +Khu-n-Aten,--Khoon-Ah'-ten, Amenhotep IV, a Pharaoh of the eighteenth +dynasty, who attempted to reform the national faith. + +Loi,--Lo'-ee, high-priest to Amen at Karnak. + +Ma,--Mah, the goddess of truth. + +Masaarah,--Mah-saar'-ah, a limestone quarry opposite Memphis. + +Masanath,--Ma-sayn'-ath, second daughter to Har-hat, beloved of Hotep. + +Meneptah,--Me-nep'-tah, successor to Rameses II, and Pharaoh of the +Exodus. + +Menes,--Meen'-eez, captain of the royal guard. + +Mentu,--Men'-too, the murket or royal architect, father of Kenkenes. + +Merenra,--Mer-en'-rah, commander over the works at Pa-Ramesu. + +Mesu,--May'-soo, Moses, the Law-giver. + +Mizraim,--Miz'-ray-im, the Hebrew name for Egypt. + +Mut,--Moot, the mother goddess. + +Nari,--Nahr'-ee, the handmaiden of Masanath. + +Nechutes,--Nee-koo'-teez, the royal cup-bearer. + +Nehapehu,--Nee-hay'-pe-hiu, a fertile pocket in the Libyan desert, +fifty miles south of Memphis. + +Neferari Thermuthis,--Nef-er-ahr'-ee Ther-moo'-this, first consort to +Rameses II and foster mother of Moses. + +Nomarch,--Nome'-ark, governor of a civil division called a nome. + +On, Heliopolis,--near the site of the modern Cairo. + +Osiris,--Oh-sy'-ris, the great god of Egypt, the principle of good, the +creator. + +Pa-Ramesu,--Pay-Ram'-e-soo, a treasure city begun by Rameses II. + +Paraschites,--Par-a-shy'-teez, embalmers, an unclean class. + +Pentaur,--Pen'-tor, an Egyptian priest and poet of the time of Rameses +II. + +Pepi,--Pay'-pee, servant of Masanath. + +Pharaoh,--Fay'-roe, title given to the Egyptian monarchs. + +Pithom,---Py'-thom, a treasure city built by Rameses II. + +Ptah,--P-tah', the patron deity of Memphis. + +Punt,--Poont, Arabia. + +Ra,--Rah, the sun god, patron deity of On. + +Rachel,--daughter of Maai of Israel, beloved of Kenkenes. + +Rameses,--Ram'-e-seez, a popular name for Egyptian kings; the name of +Meneptah's older son and also the name of Meneptah's father, the +Incomparable Pharaoh. + +Ranas,--Rah'-nas, the servant of Snofru. + +Sema,--See'-mah, an aged servant of Mentu. + +Senci,--Sen'-cee, a lady of noble birth, aunt of Hotep and his sisters. + +Set,--the god of war and evil. + +Seti,--Set'-ee, second son to Meneptah, beloved of Io. + +Siptah,--Sip'-tah, son of Amon-meses and claimant to the Egyptian +throne. + +Snofru,--Sno'-froo, priest of Ra at On. + +Tahennu,--Tah-hen'-niu, a fair-haired tribe on the Mediterranean, which +was exterminated by Seti I. + +Ta-meri,--Tam'-e-ree, daughter of the nomarch of Memphis and beloved by +Nechutes. + +Tanis,--Tay'-nis, the Egyptian name for Zoan. + +Tape,--Tay'-pay, Thebes. + +Ta-user,--Tay'-oo'-ser, a princess of the realm and beloved of Siptah. + +Thebaid,--Thee-bay'-id, civil division embracing Thebes and surrounding +towns. + +Thebes,--Theebz, capital of Upper Egypt and largest city in Egypt. + +Toth,--Tote, the male deity of wisdom and law. + +Tuat,--Tiu'-ayt, the Egyptian Hades. + +Unas,--Yu'nas, servant to Har-hat. + +Wady Toomilat,--Wah'-dee Toom'-ee-laht, great Rameside road leading +into the Orient. + +Zoan,--Zoe'-an, the capital of the Delta. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Yoke, by Elizabeth Miller + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOKE *** + +***** This file should be named 16583-8.txt or 16583-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/5/8/16583/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Yoke + A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children + of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt + +Author: Elizabeth Miller + +Release Date: August 22, 2005 [EBook #16583] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOKE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +THE YOKE + +A ROMANCE OF THE DAYS WHEN THE LORD REDEEMED THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL +FROM THE BONDAGE OF EGYPT + + +BY + +ELIZABETH MILLER + + + + +GROSSET & DUNLAP + +Publishers -:- New York + + + + +COPYRIGHT, 1904 + +THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY + + +JANUARY + + + + +TO + +PERCY MILLER + +MY BROTHER + +WHO CONSTRUCTED + +THE PLOT + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER + + I CHOOSING THE TENS + II UNDER BAN OF THE RITUAL + III THE MESSENGER + IV THE PROCESSION OF AMEN + V THE HEIR TO THE THRONE + VI THE LADY MIRIAM + VII ATHOR, THE GOLDEN + VIII THE PUNISHMENT OF ATSU + IX THE COLLAR OF GOLD + X THE DEBT OF ISRAEL + XI HEBREW CRAFT + XII CANAAN + XIII THE COMING OF THE PHARAOH + XIV THE MARGIN OF THE NILE + XV THE GODS OF EGYPT + XVI THE ADVICE OF HOTEP + XVII THE SON OF THE MURKET + XVIII AT MASAARAH + XIX IN THE DESERT + XX THE TREASURE CAVE + XXI ON THE WAY TO THEBES + XXII THE FAN-BEARER'S GUEST + XXIII THE TOMB OF THE PHARAOH + XXIV THE PETITION + XXV THE LOVE OF RAMESES + XXVI FURTHER DIPLOMACY + XXVII THE HEIR INTERVENES + XXVIII THE IDOLS CRUMBLE + XXIX THE PLAGUES + XXX HE HARDENED HIS HEART + XXXI THE CONSPIRACY + XXXII RACHEL'S REFUGE + XXXIII BACK TO MEMPHIS + XXXIV NIGHT + XXXV LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS + XXXVI THE MURKET'S SACRIFICE + XXXVII AT THE WELL + XXXVIII THE TRAITORS + XXXIX BEFORE EGYPT'S THRONE + XL THE FIRST-BORN + XLI THE ANGEL OF DEATH + XLII EXPATRIATION + XLIII "THE PHARAOH DREW NIGH" + XLIV THE WAY TO THE SEA + XLV THROUGH THE RED SEA + XLVI WHOM THE LADY MIRIAM SENT + XLVII THE PROMISED LAND + + + + +THE YOKE + +A STORY OF THE EXODUS + + +CHAPTER I + +CHOOSING THE TENS + +Near the eastern boundary of that level region of northern Egypt, known +as the Delta, once thridded by seven branches of the sea-hunting Nile, +Rameses II, in the fourteenth century B. C., erected the city of Pithom +and stored his treasure therein. His riches overtaxed its coffers and +he builded Pa-Ramesu, in part, to hold the overflow. But he died +before the work was completed by half, and his fourteenth son and +successor, Meneptah, took it up and pushed it with the nomad +bond-people that dwelt in the Delta. + +The city was laid out near the center of Goshen, a long strip of +fertile country given over to the Israelites since the days of the +Hyksos king, Apepa, near the year 1800 B. C. + +Morning in the land of the Hebrew dawned over level fields, green with +unripe wheat and meadow grass. Wherever the soil was better for +grazing great flocks of sheep moved in compact clouds, with a lank dog +and an ancient shepherd following them. + +The low, shapeless tents and thatched hovels of the Israelites stood in +the center of gardens of lentils, garlic and lettuce, securely hedged +against the inroads of hares and roving cattle. Close to these were +compounds for the flocks and brush inclosures for geese, and cotes for +the pigeons used in sacrifice. Here dwelt the aged in trusteeship over +the land, while the young and sturdy builded Pa-Ramesu. + +Sunrise on the uncompleted city tipped the raw lines of her half-built +walls with broken fire and gilded the gear of gigantic hoisting cranes. +Scaffolding, clinging to bald facades, seemed frail and cobwebby at +great height, and slabs of stone, drawn and held by cables near the +summit of chutes, looked like dice on the giddy slide. + +Below in the still shadowy passages and interiors, speckled with fallen +mortar, lay chains, rubble of brick and chipped stone; splinters, +flinders and odd ends of timber; scraps of metal, broken implements and +the what-not that litters the path of construction. Without, in the +avenues, vaguely outlined by the slowly rising structures on either +side, were low-riding, long, heavy, dwarf-wheeled vehicles and sledges +to which men, not beasts, had been harnessed. Here, also, were great +cords of new brick and avalanches of glazed tile where disaster had +overtaken orderly stacks of this multi-tinted material. In the open +spaces were covered heaps of sand, and tons of lime, in sacks; layers +of paint and hogsheads of tar; ingots of copper and pigs of bronze. +Roadways, beaten in the dust by a multitude of bare feet, led in a +hundred directions, all merging in one great track toward the camp of +the laboring Israelites. + +This was pitched in a vast open in the city's center, wherein Rameses +II had planned to build a second Karnak to Imhotep. Under the gracious +favor of this, the physician god, the great Pharaoh had regained his +sight. But death stayed his grateful hand and Meneptah forgot his +father's debt. Here, then, year in and year out, an angular sea of low +tents sheltered Israel. + +Let it not be supposed that all the sons of Abraham were here. +Thousands labored yet in the perfection of Pithom, on the highways of +the Lower country, and on the Rameside canal, and the greater number +made the brick for all Egypt in the clay-fields of the Delta. +Therefore, within the walls of Pa-Ramesu there were somewhat more than +three thousand Hebrews, men, women and children. + +On a slight eminence, overlooking the camp, were numerous small +structures of sun-dried brick, grouped about one of larger dimensions. +Above this was raised a military standard, a hawk upon a cross-bar, +from which hung party-colored tassels of linen floss. By this sign, +the order of government was denoted. The Hebrews were under martial +law. + +The camp was astir. Thin columns of blue smoke drifted up here and +there between the close-set tents, and the sibilant wearing of +stone-mills, as they ground the wheat, was heard in many households. +The nutty aroma of parching lentils, and the savor of roasting papyrus +root and garlic told the stage of the morning meal. The strong-armed +women, rich brown in tint from the ardent sun, crowned with coil upon +coil of heavy hair, bent over the pungent fires. Sturdy children, +innocent of raiment, went hither and thither, bearing well filled skins +of water. Apart from these were the men of Israel, bearded and grave, +stalwart and scantily clad. They repaired a cable or fitted an +ax-handle or mended a hoe. But they were full of serious and absorbed +discourse, for the great Hebrew, Moses, from the sheep-ranges of +Midian, had been among them, showing them marvels of sorcery, preaching +Jehovah and promising freedom. The first high white light of dawn was +breaking upon the century-long night of Israel. + +Before one of the tents an old woman knelt beside a bed of live coals, +turning a browning water-fowl upon a pointed stick. She was a +consummate cook, and the bird was fat and securely trussed. Now and +again she sprinkled a pinch of crude salt on the embers to suppress the +odor of the burning drippings, and lifted the fowl out of the reach of +the pale flames that leaped up thereafter. Presently she removed the +fowl and forked it off the spit into a capacious earthenware bowl near +by. Then, with green withes as tongs, she drew forth a round tile from +under the coals and set it over the dish to complete the baking. From +another tile-platter at hand she took several round slices of durra +bread and proceeded to toast them with much skill, tilting the hot tile +and casting each browned slice in on the fowl as it was done. When she +had finished, she removed the cover and set the bowl on the large +platter, protecting her hands from its heat with a fold of her habit. +With no little triumph and some difficulty she got upon her feet and +carried the toothsome dish into her shelter, to place it beyond the +reach of stealthy hands. No such meal was cooked that morning, +elsewhere, in Pa-Ramesu, except at the military headquarters on the +knoll. + +There was little inside the tent, except the meagerest essential +furnishing. A long amphora stood in a tamarisk rack in one corner; a +linen napkin hung, pinned to the tent-cloth, over it; a glazed laver +and a small box sat beside it. A mat of braided reeds, the handiwork +of the old Israelite, covered the naked earth. This served as seat or +table for the occupants. Several wisps of straw were scattered about +and a heap of it, over which a cotton cloak had been thrown, lay in one +corner. + +"Rachel," the old woman said briskly. + +Evidently some one slept under the straw, for the heap stirred. + +"Rachel!" the old woman reiterated, drawing off the cloak. + +Without any preliminary pushing away of the straw, a young girl sat up. +A little bewildered, she divested her head and shoulders of a frowsy +straw thatch and stood erect, shaking it off from her single short +garment. + +She was not more than sixteen years old. Above medium height and of +nobler proportions than the typical woman of the race, her figure was +remarkable for its symmetry and utter grace. The stamp of the +countenance was purely Semitic, except that she was distinguished, most +wondrously in color, from her kind. Her sleep had left its exquisite +heaviness on eyes of the tenderest blue, and the luxuriant hair she +pushed back from her face was a fleece of gold. Hers was that rare +complexion that does not tan. The sun but brightened her hair and +wrought the hue of health in her cheeks. Her forehead was low, broad, +and white as marble; her neck and arms white, and the hands, busied +with the hair, were strong, soft, dimpled and white. The grace of her +womanhood had not been overcome by the slave-labor, which she had known +from infancy. + +"Good morning, Deborah. Why--thy bed--have I slept under it?" she +asked. + +"Since the middle of the last watch," the old woman assented. + +"But why? Did Merenra come?" the girl inquired anxiously. + +"Nay; but I heard some one ere the camp was astir and I covered thee." + +"And thou hast had no sleep since," the girl said, with regret in her +voice. "Thou dost reproach me with thy goodness, Deborah." + +She went to the amphora and poured water into the laver, drew forth +from the box a horn comb and a vial of powdered soda from the Natron +Lakes, and proceeded with her toilet. + +"Came some one, of a truth?" she asked presently. + +Deborah pointed to the smoking bowl. Rachel inspected the fowl. + +"Marsh-hen!" she cried in surprise. + +"Atsu brought it." + +"Atsu?" + +"Even so. From his own bounty and for Rachel," Deborah explained. + +Rachel smiled. + +"Thou art beset from a new direction," the old woman continued dryly, +"but thou hast naught to fear from him." + +"Nay; I know," Rachel murmured, arranging her dress. + +The garb of the average bondwoman was of startling simplicity. It +consisted of two pieces of stuff little wider than the greatest width +of the wearer's body, tied by the corners over each shoulder, belted at +the waist with a thong and laced together with fiber at the sides, from +the hips to a point just above the knee. It was open above and below +this simple seam and interfered not at all with the freedom of the +wearer's movements. But Rachel's habit was a voluminous surplice, +fitting closely at the neck, supplied with wide sleeves, seamed, hemmed +and of ample length. Deborah was literally swathed in covering, with +only her withered face and hands exposed. There was a hint of rank in +their superior dress and more than a suggestion of blood in the bearing +of the pair; but they were laborers with the shepherds and +serving-people of Israel. + +"He would wed thee, after the manner of thy people, and take thee from +among Israel," Deborah continued. + +The girl drooped her head over the lacing of her habit and made no +answer. The old woman looked at her sharply for a moment. + +"Well, eat; Rachel, eat," she urged at last. "The marsh-hen will stand +thee in good stead and thou hast a weary day before thee." + +Rachel looked at the old woman and made mental comparison between the +ancient figure and her strong, young self. With great deliberation she +divided the fowl into a large and small part. + +"This," she said, extending the larger to Deborah, "is thine. Take +it," waving aside the protests of the old woman, "or the first taste of +it will choke me." + +Deborah submitted duly and consumed the tender morsel while she watched +Rachel break her fast. + +"What said Atsu?" Rachel asked, after the marsh-hen was less apparent. + +"Little, which is his way. But his every word was worth a harangue in +weight. Merenra and his purple-wearing visitor, the spoiler, the +pompous wolf, departed for Pithom last night, hastily summoned thither +by a royal message. But the commander returns to-morrow at sunset. +This morning, every tenth Hebrew in Pa-Ramesu is to be chosen and sent +to the quarries. Atsu will send thee and me, whether we fall among the +tens of a truth or not. So we get out of the city ere Merenra returns. +He called the ruse a cruel one and not wholly safe, but he would sooner +see thee dead than despoiled by this guest of Merenra's--or any other. +I doubt not his heart breaketh for thy sake, Rachel, and he would rend +himself to spare thee." + +"The Lord God bless him," the girl murmured earnestly. + +"Where dost thou say we go?" she asked after a little silence. + +"To the quarries of Masaarah, opposite Memphis." + +The color in the young Israelite's face receded a little. + +"To the quarries," she repeated in a half-whisper. + +"Fearest thou?" + +"Nay, not for myself, at all, but we may not have another Atsu over us +there. I fear for thee, Deborah." + +The old woman waved her hands. + +"Trouble not concerning me. I shall not die by heavy labor." + +But the girl shook her head and gazed out of the low entrance of the +tent. Her face was full of trouble. Once again the old woman looked +at her with suspicion in her eyes. Presently the girl asked, coloring +painfully: + +"Was Atsu commanded to hold me for this guest of Merenra's--ah!" she +broke off, "did Atsu name him?" + +"Not by the titles by which the man would as lief be known," Deborah +answered grimly, "but I remember he called him 'the governor.'" + +There was a brief pause. + +"Not so," she resumed, answering Rachel's first question. "Atsu but +overheard him say to Merenra to see to it that thou wast taken from +toil and made ready to journey with him to Bubastis." + +"He can not take me by right save by a document of gift from the +Pharaoh," Rachel protested indignantly. + +"Of a truth," the old woman admitted; "but Merenra is chief commander +over Pa-Ramesu and how shall thine appeal to the Pharaoh pass beyond +Merenra if he see fit to humor this ravening lord with a breach of the +law? The message summoning him in haste to Pithom before the order +could be fulfilled was all that saved thee. And if Merenra return ere +thou art safely gone, thou art of a surety undone." + +Rachel moved away a little and stood thinking. The old woman went on +with a note of despondency in her voice. + +"Alas, Rachel! thou art in eternal peril because of thy lovely face. +Beauty is a curse to a bondwoman. What I beheld in truth yesterday I +have seen in dreams--the discourteous hand put forth to seize thee and +the power back of it to enforce its demand. And yet, I would not wish +thee old and uncomely, for that, too, is a curse to the bondwoman," she +added with a reflective shrug of the shoulders. + +"If I but knew his name--" Rachel pondered aloud. + +"What matter?" the old woman answered almost roughly. "Suffice it to +know that he is a knave and a noble and hath evil in his heart against +thee." + +"Now, if I might dye my hair or stain my face--" Rachel began after a +pause. + +"Thou foolish child! It would not wear, nor hide thy charm at all!" + +"But I dread the quarries for thee, Deborah. If only we might be +hidden here, somewhere." + +"Come, dost thou want to marry Atsu?" the old woman demanded harshly. + +The girl turned toward her, her face flushed with resentment. + +"Nay! And that thou knowest. For this very mingling with Egypt is +Israel cursed. The idolatrous have reached out their hands in marriage +and wedded the Hebrews away from the God of Abraham. When did an +Egyptian desert his gods for the faith of the Hebrew he took in +marriage? Not at any time. Therefore have we fed the shrines of the +idols and increased the numbers of the idolaters and behold, the hosts +of Jehovah have dwindled to naught. Therefore is He wroth with us, and +justly. For are there not pitiful shrines to Ra, Ptah and Amen within +the boundaries of Goshen? Nay, I wed not with an idolater," she +concluded firmly. + +Deborah's wrinkled face lighted and she put a tender arm about the girl. + +"Of a truth, then, it is for me that thou wouldst avoid the quarries," +she said. "I did but try thee, Rachel." + +Rachel looked at her reproachfully, but the old woman smiled and drew +her out into the open. + +Without, Israel of Pa-Ramesu made ready to surrender a tenth of her +number to the newest task laid on it by the Pharaoh. Quarrying was +unusual labor for an Israelite and the name carried terror with it. +Long had it meant heavy punishment for the malefactor and now was the +Hebrew to take up its bitter life. The hard form of oppression +following so closely upon the promise of liberty by Moses had +diversified effects upon the camp. There was rebellion among the +optimists, and the less hopeful spirits were crushed. There was the +scoffer, who exasperates; the enthusiast, the over-buoyant, who could +point out favorable omens even in this bitter affliction; and it could +not be divined which of these troubled the people more. But whatever +the individual temper, the entire camp was overhung with distress. + +Israel had gathered in families before her tents--the mothers hovering +their broods, the fathers tramping uneasily about them. In the heart +of each, perhaps, was an indefinable conviction that he should fall +among the tens. Since Israel had died in droves by hard labor in the +brick-fields and along the roadways and canals, in what numbers and +with what dire speed would not Israel perish in the dreaded stone-pits! + +Just outside the doorway of their shelter, Deborah and Rachel +overlooked the troubled camp. + +"Moses comes in time," Rachel said, speaking in a low tone, "for Israel +is in sore straits. The hand of the oppressor assaileth with fury his +bones and his sinews now. How shall it be with him if he is bequeathed +from Pharaoh to Pharaoh of an intent like unto the last three? He +shall have perished from the face of the earth, for the Hebrew bends +not; he breaks." + +Deborah did not answer at once. Her sunken eyes were set and she +seemed not to hear. But presently she spoke: + +"Thou hast said. But the Hebrew droppeth out of the inheritance of the +Pharaohs in thy generation, Rachel. The end of the bondage is at hand. +Thou shalt see it. Of a truth Israel shall perish. If its afflictions +increase for long. But they shall not continue. Have we entered +Canaan as God sware unto Abraham we should? Have we possessed the +gates of our enemies? Shall He stamp us out, with His promise yet +unfulfilled? Behold, we have gone astray from Him, but not utterly, as +all the other peoples of the earth. For centuries, amid the great +clamor of prayers to the hollow gods, there arose only from this +compound of slaves, here, a call to Him. Out of the reek of idolatrous +savors, drifted up now and again the straight column from the altar of +a Hebrew, sacrificing to the One God. Where, indeed, are any faithful, +save in Israel? Shall He condemn us who only have held steadfast? +Nay! He hath but permitted the oppression that we may have our fill of +the glories of Egypt and be glad to turn our backs upon her. He will +cure us of idols by showing forth their helplessness when they are +cried unto; and when Israel is in its most grievous strait and +therefore most prone to attach itself to whosoever helpeth it. He will +prove Himself at last by His power. Aye, thou hast said. Israel can +suffer little more without perishing. Therefore is redemption at hand." + +Rachel had turned her eyes away from the humiliation of Israel to its +exaltation--from fact to prophecy. She was looking with awed face at +Deborah. The prophetess went on: + +"Israel hath been a green tree, carried hither in seed and grown in the +wheat-fields of Mizraim. The herds and the flocks of the Pharaoh +gathered under its branches and were sheltered from the sun by day and +from the wolves by night. The early Pharaohs loved it, the later +Pharaohs used it and the last Pharaohs feared it. For it grew +exceedingly and overshadowed the wheat-fields and they said: 'It will +come between us and Ra who is our god and he will bless it instead of +the wheat. Let us cut it down and build us temples of its timber.' +But the Lord had planted the tree in seed and in its youth it grew +under the tendance of the Lord's hand. And in later years, though it +lent its shadow as a grove for the idols and temples of gods, the most +of it faced Heaven, and for that the Lord loves it still. The Pharaohs +have lopped its branches, unmolested, but lo! now that the ax strikes +at its girth, the Lord will uproot it and plant it elsewhere than in +Mizraim. But the soil will not relinquish it readily, for it hath +struck deep. There shall be a gaping wound in Mizraim where it stood +and all the land shall be rent with the violence of the parting." + +The prophetess paused, or rather her voice died away as if she actually +beheld the scene she foretold, and no more words were needed to make it +plain. Rachel's hands were clasped before her breast. "Sayest thou +these things in prophecy?" she asked finally in an eager half-whisper. +Deborah's eyes seemed to awaken. She looked at Rachel a moment and +answered with a nod. The girl's vision wandered slowly again toward +the camp, and the sorrowful unrest of Israel subdued the inspired +elation that had begun to possess her. Her face clouded once more. +Deborah touched her. + +"Trouble not thyself concerning these people. They go forth to labor, +but their burdens shall be lightened ere long. As for thee and me--" +she paused and looked up toward the eminence on which the military +headquarters were built. + +"As for thee and me--" Rachel urged her. Deborah motioned in the +direction she gazed. "Come, let us make ready," she said; "they are +beginning." + +The Egyptian masters over Israel of Pa-Ramesu were emerging from the +quarters. They were, almost uniformly, tall, slender and immature in +figure. Dressed in the foot-soldier's tunic and coif, they looked like +long-limbed youths compared with the powerful manhood of the sons of +Abraham. + +Among them, in white wool and enameled aprons, was a number of scribes, +without whom the official machinery of Egypt would have stilled in a +single revolution. + +The men advanced, sauntering, talking with one another idly, as if +awaiting authority to proceed. + +That came, presently, in the shape of an Egyptian charioteer. The +vehicle was heavy, short-poled, set low on two broad wheels of six +spokes, and built of hard wood, painted in wedge-shaped stripes of +green and red. The end was open, the front high and curved, the side +fitted with a boot of woven reeds for the ax and javelins of the +warrior. Axle and pole were shod with spikes of copper and the joints +were secured with tongues of bronze. The horses were bay, small, +short, glossy and long of mane and tail. The harness was simple, each +piece as broad as a man's arm, stamped and richly stained with many +colors. + +The man was an ideal soldier of Egypt. He was tall and +broad-shouldered, but otherwise lean and lithe. In countenance, he was +dark,--browner than most Egyptians, but with that peculiar ruddy +swarthiness that is never the negro hue. His duskiness was accentuated +by low and intensely black brows, and deep-set, heavy-lidded eyes. +Although his features were marked by the delicacy characteristic of the +Egyptian face, there was none of the Oriental affability to be found +thereon. One might expect deeds of him, but never words or wit. + +He wore the Egyptian smock, or kamis--of dark linen, open in front from +belt to hem, disclosing a kilt or shenti of clouded enamel. His +head-dress was the kerchief of linen, bound tightly across the forehead +and falling with free-flowing skirts to the shoulders. The sleeves +left off at the elbow and his lower arms were clasped with bracelets of +ivory and gold. His ankles were similarly adorned, and his sandals of +gazelle-hide were beaded and stitched. His was a somber and barbaric +presence. This was Atsu, captain of chariots and vice-commander over +Pa-Ramesu. + +His subordinates parted and gave him respectful path. He delivered his +orders in an impassive, low-pitched monotone. + +"Out with them, and mark ye, no lashes now. Leave the old and the +nursing mothers." + +The drivers disappeared into the narrow ways of the encampment, and +Atsu, with the scribes at his wheels, drove out where the avenue of +sphinxes would have led to the temple of Imhotep. Here was room for +three thousand. He alighted and, with the scribes who stood, tablets +in hand, awaited the coming of the Israelites. + +The camp emptied its dwellers in long wavering lines. Into the open +they came, slowly, and with downcast eyes, each with his remnant of a +tribe. Though the columns were in order, they were ragged with many +and varied statures--now a grown man, next to him a child, and then a +woman. Here were the red-bearded sons of Reuben, shepherds in skins +and men of great hardihood; the seafaring children of Zebulon; a +handful of submissive Issachar, and some of Benjamin, Levi, and Judah. + +"Do we not leave the aged behind?" the scribe asked, indicating Deborah +who came with Judah. + +"Give her her way," Atsu replied indifferently, and the scribe subsided. + +The lines advanced, filling up the open with moody humanity. A scribe +placed himself at the head of each column, and as the hindmost +Israelite emerged into the field the movement was halted. + +If an eye was lifted, it shifted rapidly under the stress of +desperation or suspense. If any spoke, it was the rough and +indifferent, whose words fell like blows on the distressed silence. +Many were visibly trembling, others had whitened beneath the tropical +tan, and the wondering faces of children, who feared without +understanding, turned now and again to search for their elders up and +down the lines. + +The drivers distributed themselves among the Israelites and each with a +scribe went methodically along the files choosing every tenth. + +"Get thee to my house and bring me my lists," Atsu said to the soldier +who was beginning on Judah. "I will look to thy work." The man +crossed his left hand to his right shoulder and hastened away. + +One by one nine Israelites dropped out of line as Atsu numbered them +and returned to camp. He touched the tenth. + +"Name?" the scribe asked. + +"Deborah," was the reply. + +Meanwhile Atsu walked rapidly down the line to Rachel. The Hebrews +fell out as he passed, and the relief on the faces of one or two was +mingled with astonishment. He paused before the girl, hesitating. +Words did not rise readily to his lips at any time; at this moment he +was especially at loss. + +"Thou canst abide here, in perfect security--with me," he said at last. +She shook her head. "I thank thee, my good master." + +"For thy sake, not mine own, I would urge thee," he continued with an +unnatural steadiness. "Thou canst accept of me the safety of marriage. +Nothing more shall I offer--or demand." + +The color rushed over the girl's face, but he went on evenly. + +"A part go to Silsilis, another to Syene, a third to Masaarah. If +thine insulter asks concerning thy whereabouts I shall not trouble +myself to remember. But what shall keep him from searching for +thee--and are there any like to defend thee, if he find thee, seeing I +am not there? And even if thou art securely hidden, thou hast never +dreamed how heavy is the life of the stone-pits, Rachel." + +"Keep Deborah here," the girl besought him, distressed. "She is old +and will perish--" + +"Nay, I will not send thee out alone," was the reply. "If thou goest, +so must she. But--hast thou no fear?" + +Once again she shook her head. + +"I trust to the triumph of the good," she replied earnestly. + +The sound of the scribe's approach behind him, moved him on. + +"Farewell," he said as he went, and added no more, for his composure +failed him. + +"The grace of the Lord God attend thee," she whispered. "Farewell." + +All the morning the work went on, and when the Egyptian mid-winter noon +lay warm on the flat country, three hundred Israelites were ready for +the long march to the Nile. They left behind them a camp oppressed +with that heart-soreness, which affliction added to old afflictions +brings,--the numb ache of sorrow, not its lively pain. Only Deborah, +the childless, and Rachel, the motherless, went with lighter +hearts,--if hearts can be light that go forward to meet the unknown +fortunes of bond-people. + +As they moved out, one of the older Hebrews in the forward ranks began +to sing, in a wild recitative chant, of Canaan and the freedom of +Israel. The elders in the line near him took it up and every face in +the long column lighted and was lifted in silent concord with the +singers. Atsu in his chariot, close by, scanned his lists absorbedly, +but one of the drivers hurried forward with a demand for silence. A +young Hebrew, who had tramped in agitated silence just ahead, worked up +into recklessness by the fervor of the singers, defied him. His voice +rang clear above the song. + +"Go to, thou bald-faced idolater! Israel will cease to do thy bidding +one near day." + +The driver forced his way into the front ranks and began to lay about +him with his knout. Instantly he was cast forth by a dozen brawny arms. + +"Mutiny!" he bawled. + +A group of drivers reinforced him at once. + +"By Bast," the foremost cried, as he came running. "The sedition of +the renegade, Mesu,[1] bears early fruit!" + +But the spirit of rebellion became contagious and the men of Israel +began to throw themselves out of line. At this moment, Atsu seemed to +become conscious of the riot and drove his horses between the +combatants. + +"Into ranks with you!" he commanded, pressing forward upon the Hebrews. +The men obeyed sullenly. + +"I have said there was to be no use of the knouts," he said sharply, +turning upon the drivers. "Forward with them!" + +The first driver muttered. + +"What sayest thou?" Atsu demanded. + +The man's mouth opened and closed, and his eyes drew up, evilly, but he +made no answer. + +"Forward with them," Atsu repeated, without removing his gaze from the +driver. + +Slowly, and now silently, the hereditary slaves of the Pharaoh moved +out of Pa-Ramesu. And of all the departing numbers and of all that +remained behind, none was more stricken in heart than Atsu, the stern +taskmaster over Israel. + + +[1] Moses. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +UNDER BAN OF THE RITUAL + +Holy Memphis, city of Apis, habitat of Ptah! + +Not idly was she called Menefer, the Good Place. Not anywhere in Egypt +were the winds more gentle, the heavens more benign, the environs more +august. + +To the south and west of her, the Libyan hills notched the horizon. To +the east the bald summits of the Arabian desert cut off the traveling +sand in its march on the capital. To the north was a shimmering level +that stretched unbroken to the sea. Set upon this at mid-distance, the +pyramids uplifted their stupendous forms. In the afternoon they +assumed the blue of the atmosphere and appeared indistinct, but in the +morning the polished sides that faced the east reflected the sun's rays +in dazzling sheets across the valley. + +Out of a crevice between the heights to the south the broad blue Nile +rolled, sweeping past one hundred and twenty stadia or sixteen miles of +urban magnificence, and lost itself in the shimmering sky-line to the +north. + +The city was walled on the north, west, and south, and its river-front +was protected by a mighty dike, built by Menes, the first king of the +first dynasty in the hour of chronological daybreak. Within were +orderly squares, cross-cut by avenues and relieved from monotony by +scattered mosaics of groves. Out of these shady demesnes rose the +great white temples of Ptah and Apis, and the palaces of the various +Memphian Pharaohs. + +About these, the bazaars and residences, facade above facade, and tier +upon tier, as the land sloped up to its center, shone fair and white +under a cloudless sun. + +Memphis was at the pinnacle of her greatness in the sixth year of the +reign of the divine Meneptah. She had fortified herself and resisted +the great invasion of the Rebu. Her generals had done battle with him +and brought him home, chained to their chariots. + +And after the festivities in celebration of her prowess, she laid down +pike and falchion, bull-hide shield and helmet, and took up the chisel +and brush, the spindle and loom once more. + +The heavy drowsiness of a mid-winter noon had depopulated her booths +and bazaars and quieted the quaint traffic of her squares. In the +shadows of the city her porters drowsed, and from the continuous wall +of houses blankly facing one another from either side of the streets, +there came no sound. Each household sought the breezes on the +balconies that galleried the inner walls of the courts, or upon the +pillared and canopied housetops. + +Memphis had eaten and drunk and, sheltered behind her screens, waited +for the noon to pass. + +Mentu, the king's sculptor, however, had not availed himself of the +hour of ease. He did not labor because he must, for his house stood in +the aristocratic portion of Memphis, and it was storied, galleried, +screened and topped with its breezy pavilion. Within the hollow space, +formed by the right and left wings of his house, the chamber of guests +to the front, and the property wall to the rear, was a court of +uncommon beauty. Palm and tamarisk, acacia and rose-shrub, jasmine and +purple mimosa made a multi-tinted jungle about a shadowy pool in which +a white heron stood knee-deep. There were long stretches of sunlit +sod, and walks of inlaid tile, seats of carved stone, and a single +small obelisk, set on a circular slab, marked with measures for +time--the Egyptian sun-dial. On every side were evidences of wealth +and luxury. + +So Mentu labored because he loved to toil. In a land languorous with +tropical inertia, an enthusiastic toiler is not common. For this +reason, Mentu was worth particular attention. He towered a palm in +height over his Egyptian brethren, and his massive frame was entirely +in keeping with his majestic stature. He was nearly fifty years of +age, but no sign of the early decay of the Oriental was apparent in +him. His was the characteristic refinement of feature that marks the +Egyptian countenance, further accentuated by self-content and some +hauteur. The idea of dignity was carried out in his dress. The kilt +was not visible, for the kamis had become a robe, long-sleeved, +high-necked and belted with a broad band of linen, encompassing the +body twice, before it was fastened with a fibula of massive gold. + +That he was an artisan noble was another peculiarity, but it was proof +of exceptional merit. He had descended from a long line of royal +sculptors, heightening in genius in the last three. His grandsire had +elaborated Karnak; his father had decorated the Rameseum, but Mentu had +surpassed the glory of his ancestors. In the years of his youth, side +by side with the great Rameses, he had planned and brought to +perfection the mightiest monument to Egyptian sculpture, the +rock-carved temple of Ipsambul. In recognition of this he had been +given to wife a daughter of the Pharaoh and raised to a rank never +before occupied by a king's sculptor. He was second only to the +fan-bearers, the most powerful nobles of the realm, and at par with the +market, or royal architect, who was usually chosen from among the +princes. And yet he had but come again to his own when he entered the +ranks of peerage. In the long line of his ancestors he counted a king, +and from that royal sire he had his stature. + +He sat before a table covered with tools of his craft, rolls of +papyrus, pens of reeds, pots of ink of various colors, horns of oil, +molds and clay images and vessels of paint. Hanging upon pegs in the +wooden walls of his work-room were saws and the heavier drills, chisels +of bronze and mauls of tamarisk, suspended by thongs of deer-hide. + +The sculptor, rapidly and without effort, worked out with his pen on a +sheet of papyrus the detail of a frieze. Tiny profile figures, quaint +borders of lotus and mystic inscriptions trailed after the swift reed +in multitudinous and bewildering succession. As he worked, a young man +entered the doorway from the court and, advancing a few steps toward +the table, watched the development of the drawings with interest. + +Those were the days of early maturity and short life. The Egyptian of +the Exodus often married at sixteen, and was full of years and ready to +be gathered to Osiris at fifty-five or sixty. The great Rameses lived +to the unheard-of age of seventy-seven, having occupied the throne +since his eleventh year. + +This young Egyptian, nearly eighteen, was grown and powerful with the +might of mature manhood. A glance at the pair at once established +their relationship as father and son. The features were strikingly +similar, the stature the same, though the young frame was supple and +light, not massive. + +The hair was straight, abundant, brilliant black and cropped midway +down the neck and just above the brows. There was no effort at +parting. It was dressed from the crown of the head as each hair would +naturally lie and was confined by a circlet of gold, the token of the +royal blood of his mother's house. The complexion was the hue of a +healthy tan, different, however, from the brown of exposure in that it +was transparent and the red in the cheek was dusky. The face was the +classic type of the race, for be it known there were two physiognomies +characteristic of Egypt. + +The forehead was broad, the brows long and delicately penciled, the +eyes softly black, very long, the lids heavy enough to suggest serenity +rather than languor. The nose was of good length, aquiline, the +nostril thin and sharply chiseled. The cut of the mouth and the warmth +of its color gave seriousness, sensitiveness and youthful tenderness to +the face. + +Egypt was seldom athletic. Though running and wrestling figured much +in the pastime of youths, the nation was languid and soft. However, +Seti the Elder demanded the severest physical exercise of his sons, and +Rameses II, who succeeded him, made muscle and brawn popular by +example, during his reign. Here, then, was an instance of +king-mimicking that was admirable. + +Originally the young man had been gifted with breadth of shoulder, +depth of chest, health and vigor. He would have been strong had he +never vaulted a pole or run a mile. To these advantages were added the +results of wise and thorough training, so wise, so thorough, that +defects in the national physique had been remedied. Thus, the calves +were stanch and prominent, whereas ancient Egypt was as flat-legged as +the negro; the body was round and tapered with proper athletic rapidity +from shoulder to heel, without any sign of the lank attenuation that +was characteristic of most of his countrymen. + +The suggestion of his presence was power and bigness, not the +good-natured size that is hulking and awkward, but bigness that is +elegant and fine-fibered and ages into magnificence. + +He wore a tunic of white linen, the finely plaited skirt reaching +almost to the knees. The belt was of leather, three fingers in breadth +and ornamented with metal pieces, small, round and polished. His +sandals were of white gazelle-hide, stitched with gold, and, by way of +ornament, he had but a single armlet, and a collar, consisting of ten +golden rings, depending by eyelets from a flexible band of the same +material. The metal was unpolished and its lack-luster red harmonized +wonderfully with the bronze throat it clasped. + +Diminutive Isis in profile had emerged part-way from the background of +papyrus, and the sculptor lifted his pen to sketch in the farther +shoulder as the law required. The young man leaned forward and +watched. But as the addition was made, giving to the otherwise shapely +little goddess an uncomfortable but thoroughly orthodox twist, he +frowned slightly. After a moment's silence he came to the bench. + +"Hast thou caught some great idea on the wing or hast thou the round of +actual labor to perform?" he asked. + +His attention thus hailed, the sculptor raised himself and answered: + +"Meneptah hath a temple to Set[1] in mind; indeed he hath stirred up +the quarries for the stone, I am told, and I am making ready, for I +shall be needed." + +The older a civilization, the smoother its speech. Age refines the +vowels and makes the consonants suave. They spoke easily, not hastily, +but as oil flows, continuously and without ripple. The younger voice +was deep, soft enough to have been wooing and as musical as a chant. + +"Would that the work were as probable as thou art hopeful," the young +man said with a sigh. + +"Out upon thee, idler!" was the warm reply. "Art thou come to vex me +with thy doubts and scout thy sovereign's pious intentions?" The young +man smiled. + +"Hath the sun shone on architecture or sculpture since Meneptah +succeeded to the throne?" he asked. + +Mentu's eyes brightened wrathfully but the young man laid a soothing +palm over the hand that gripped the reed. + +"I do not mock thee, father. Rather am I full of sympathy for thee. +Thou mindest me of a war-horse, stabled, with his battle-love +unsatisfied, hearing in every whimper of the wind a trumpet call. Nay, +I would to Osiris that the Pharaoh's intents were permanent." + +Somewhat mollified, Mentu put away the detaining hand and went on with +his work. Presently the young man spoke again. + +"I came to speak further of the signet," he said. + +"Aye, but what signet, Kenkenes?" + +"The signet of the Incomparable Pharaoh." + +"What! after three years?" + +"The sanctuary of the tomb is never entered and it is more than worth +the Journey to Tape[2] to search for the scarab again." + +"But you would search in vain," the sculptor declared. "Rameses has +reclaimed his own." + +Kenkenes shifted his position and protested. + +"But we made no great search for it. How may we know of a surety if it +be gone?" + +"Because of thy sacrilege," was the prompt and forcible reply. "Osiris +with chin in hand and a look of mystification on his brow, pondering +over the misdeeds of a soul! Mystification on Osiris! And with that, +thou didst affront the sacred walls of the royal tomb and call it the +Judgment of the Dead. Not one law of the sculptor's ritual but thou +hadst broken, in the sacrilegious fresco. Gods! I marvel that the +rock did not crumble under the first bite of thy chisel!" + +Mentu fell to his work again. While he talked a small ape entered the +room and, discovering the paint-pots, proceeded to decorate his person +with a liberal hand. At this moment Kenkenes became aware of him and, +by an accurately aimed lump of clay, drove the meddler out with a show +of more asperity than the offense would ordinarily excite. Meanwhile +the sculptor wetted his pen and, poising it over the plans, regarded +his drawings with half-closed eyes. Then, as if he read his words on +the papyrus he proceeded: + +"Thou wast not ignorant. All thy life hast thou had the decorous laws +of the ritual before thee. And there, in the holy precincts of the +Incomparable Pharaoh's tomb, with the opportunity of a lifetime at +hand, the skill of thy fathers in thy fingers, thou didst execute an +impious whim,--an unheard-of apostasy." He broke off suddenly, +changing his tone. "What if the priesthood had learned of the deed? +The Hathors be praised that they did not and that no heavier punishment +than the loss of the signet is ours." + +"But it may have caught on thy chisel and broken from its fastening. +Thou dost remember that the floor was checkered with deep black +shadows." + +"The hand of the insulted Pharaoh reached out of Amenti[3] and stripped +it off my neck," Mentu replied sternly. "And consider what I and all +of mine who come after me lost in that foolish act of thine. It was a +token of special favor from Rameses, a mark of appreciation of mine +art, and, more than all, a signet that I or mine might present to him +or his successor and win royal good will thereby." + +"That I know right well," Kenkenes interrupted with an anxious note in +his voice, "and for that reason am I possessed to go after it to Tape." + +The sculptor lifted a stern face to his son and said, with emphasis: +"Wilt thou further offend the gods, thou impious? It is not there, +and vex me no further concerning it." + +Kenkenes lifted one of his brows with an air of enforced patience, and +sauntered across the room to another table similarly equipped for +plan-making. But he did not concern himself with the papyrus spread +thereon. Instead he dropped on the bench, and crossing his shapely +feet before him, gazed straight up at the date-tree rafters and +palm-leaf interbraiding of the ceiling. + +Though the law of heredity is not trustworthy in the transmission of +greatness, Kenkenes was the product of three generations of heroic +genius. He might have developed the frequent example of decadence; he +might have sustained the excellence of his fathers' gift, but he could +not surpass them in the methods of their school of sculpture and its +results. There was one way in which he might excel, and he was born +with his feet in that path. His genius was too large for the limits of +his era. Therefore he was an artistic dissenter, a reformer with noble +ideals. + +Mimetic art as applied to Egyptian painting and sculpture was a curious +misnomer. Probably no other nation of the world at that time was so +devoted to it, and certainly no other people of equal advancement of +that or any other time so wilfully ignored the simplest rules of +proportion, perspective and form. The sculptor's ability to suggest +majesty and repose, and at the same time ignore anatomical +construction, was wonderful. To preserve the features and individual +characteristics of a model and obey the rules of convention was a feat +to be achieved only by an Egyptian. There was no lack of genius in +him, but he had been denied liberty of execution until he knew no other +forms but those his fathers followed generations before. + +All Egypt was but a padding that the structural framework of religion +supported. Science, art, literature, government, commerce, whatever +the member, it was built upon a bone of religion. The processes and +uses of sculpture were controlled by the sculptor's ritual and woe unto +him who departed therefrom in depicting the gods! The deed was +sacrilege. + +In the portrait-forms the limits were less severely drawn. There were +a dozen permissible attitudes, and, the characteristic features might +be represented with all fidelity; but there were boundaries that might +not be overstepped. The result was an artistic perversion that +well-nigh perpetrated a grotesque slander on the personal appearance of +the race. + +After the manner of Egyptians it was understood that Kenkenes was to +follow his father's calling, and ahead of him were years of labor laid +in narrow lines. If he rebelled, he incurred infinite difficulty and +opposition, and yet he could not wholly submit. He had been an apt and +able pupil during the long process of his instruction, but when the +moment of actual practice of his art arrived, he had rebelled. His +first work had been his last and, in the estimation of his father, had +entailed a grievous loss. Thereafter he had been limited to copying +the great sculptor's plans, the work of scribes and underlings. + +Thus, he had passed three years that chafed him because of their +comparative idleness and their implied rebuke. The pressure finally +became too great, and he began to weigh the matter of compromise. If +he could secretly satisfy his own sense of the beautiful he might +follow the ritual with grace. + +His cogitations, as he sat before his table, assumed form and purpose. + +Presently Mentu, raising his head, noted that the shadows were falling +aslant the court. With an interested but inarticulate remark, he +dropped his pen among its fellows in an earthenware tray, his plans +into an open chest, and went out across the court, entering an opposite +door. + +With his father's exit, Kenkenes shifted his position, and the +expression of deep thought grew on his face. After a long interval of +motionless absorption he sprang to his feet and, catching a wallet of +stamped and dyed leather from the wall, spread it open on the table. +Chisel, mallet, tape and knife, he put into it, and dropped wallet and +all into a box near-by at the sound of the sculptor's footsteps. + +The great artist reentered in court robes of creamy linen, stiff with +embroidery and gold stitching. + +"Har-hat passes through Memphis to-day on his way to Tape, where he is +to be installed as bearer of the king's fan on the right hand. He is +at the palace, and nobles of the city go thither to wait upon him." + +"The king was not long in choosing a successor to the lamented Amset," +Kenkenes observed. "Har-hat vaults loftily from the nomarchship of +Bubastis to an advisership to the Pharaoh." + +"Rather hath his ascent been slower than his deserts. How had the Rebu +war ended had it not been for Har-hat? He is a great warrior, hath won +honor for Egypt and for Meneptah. The army would follow him into the +jaws of Tuat,[4] and Rameses, the heir, need never take up arms, so +long as Har-hat commands the legions of Egypt. But how the warrior +will serve as minister is yet to be seen." + +"Who succeeds him over Bubastis?" + +"Merenra, another of the war-tried generals. He hath been commander +over Pa-Ramesu. Atsu takes his place over the Israelites." + +"Atsu?" Kenkenes mused. "I know him not." + +"He is a captain of chariots, and won much distinction during the Rebu +invasion. He is a native of Mendes." + +Left alone, Kenkenes crossed the court to the door his father had +entered and emerged later in a street dress of mantle and close-fitting +coif. He took up the wallet and quitted the room. Passing through the +intramural park and the chamber of guests, he entered the street. It +was a narrow, featureless passage, scarcely wide enough to give room +for a chariot. The brown dust had more prints of naked than of +sandaled feet, for most men of the young sculptor's rank went abroad in +chariots. + +Once out of the passage, he turned across the city toward the east. +Memphis had pushed aside her screens and shaken out her tapestries +after the noon rest and was deep in commerce once again. From the low +balconies overhead the Damascene carpets swung, lending festivity to +the energetic traffic below. The pillars of stacked ware flanking the +fronts of pottery shops were in a constant state of wreckage and +reconstruction; the stalls of fruiterers perfumed the air with crushed +and over-ripe produce; litters with dark-eyed occupants and fan-bearing +attendants stood before the doorways of lapidaries and booths of +stuffs; venders of images, unguents, trinkets and wines strove to +outcry one another or the poulterer's squawking stall. Kenkenes met +frequent obstructions and was forced to reduce his rapid pace. +Curricles and chariots and wicker chairs halted him at many crossings. +Carriers took up much of the narrow streets with large burdens; +notaries and scribes sat cross-legged on the pavement, surrounded by +their patrons and clients, and beggars and fortune-tellers strove for +the young man's attention. The crowd thickened and thinned and grew +again; pigeons winnowed fearlessly down to the roadway dust, and a +distant yapping of dogs came down the slanting street. At times +Kenkenes encountered whole troops of sacred cats that wandered about +the city, monarchs over the monarch himself. By crowding into doorways +he allowed these pampered felines to pass undisturbed. + +In the district near the lower edge of the city he met the heavy carts +of rustics, laden with cages of geese and crates of produce, moving +slowly in from the wide highways of the Memphian nome. The broad backs +of the oxen were gray with dust and their drivers were masked in grime. + +The smell of the river became insistent. In the open stalls the +fishmongers had their naked brood keeping the flies away from the stock +with leafy branches. The limits of Memphis ended precipitately at a +sudden slope. In the long descent to the Nile there were few permanent +structures. Half-way down were great lengths of high platform built +upon acacia piling. This was the flood-tide wharf, but it was used now +only by loiterers, who lay upon it to bask dog-like in the sun. The +long intervening stretch between the builded city and the river was +covered with boats and river-men. Fishers mending nets were grouped +together, but they talked with one another as if each were a furlong +away from his fellow. Freight bearers, emptying the newly-arrived +vessels of cargo, staggered up toward the city. Now and again sledges +laden with ponderous burdens were drawn through the sand by yokes of +oxen, oftener by scores of men, on whom the drivers did not hesitate to +lay the lash. + +River traffic was carried on far below the flood-tide wharf. Here the +long landings of solid masonry, covered with deep water four months of +the year, were lined with vessels. Between yard-arms hanging aslant +and over decks, glimpses of the Nile might be caught. It rippled +passively between its banks, for it was yet seven months before the +first showing of the June rise. Here were the frail papyrus bari, +constructed like a raft and no more concave than a long bow; the huge +cedar-masted cangias, flat-bottomed and slow-moving; the ancient dhow +with its shapeless tent-cabin aft; the ponderous cattle barges and +freight vessels built of rough-hewn logs; the light passenger skiffs; +and lastly, the sumptuous pleasure-boats. These were elaborate and +beautiful, painted and paneled, ornamented with garlands and sheaves of +carved lotus, and spread with sails, checkered and embroidered in many +colors. From these emerged processions of parties returning from +pleasure trips up the Nile. They came with much pomp and following, +asserting themselves and proceeding through paths made ready for them +by the obsequious laboring classes. + +Presently there approached a corps of servants, bearing bundles of +throw-sticks, nets, two or three fox-headed cats, bows and arrows, +strings of fish and hampers of fowl. Behind, on the shoulders of four +stalwart bearers, came a litter, fluttering with gay-colored hangings. +Beside it walked an Egyptian of high class. Suddenly the bearers +halted, and a little hand, imperious and literally aflame with jewels, +beckoned Kenkenes from the shady interior of the litter. + +He obeyed promptly. At another command the litter was lowered till the +poles were supported in the hands of the bearers. The curtains were +withdrawn, revealing the occupant--a woman. + +This, to the glory of Egypt! Woman was defended, revered, exalted +above her sisters of any contemporary nation. No haremic seclusion for +her; no semi-contemptuous toleration of her; no austere limits laid +upon her uses. She bared her face to the thronging streets; she +reveled beside her brother; she worshiped with him; she admitted no +subserviency to her lord beyond the pretty deference that it pleased +her to pay; she governed his household and his children; she learned, +she wrote, she wore the crown. She might have a successor but no +supplanter; an Egyptian of the dynasties before the Persian dominance +could have but one wife at a time; none but kings could be profligate, +openly. So, while Babylonia led her maidens to a market, while +Ethiopia ruled hers with a rod, while Arabia numbered hers among her +she-camels, Egypt gloried in national chivalry and spiritual love. + +This was the sentiment of the nation, by the lips of Khu-n-Aten, the +artist king: + +"Sweet love fills my heart for the queen; may she ever keep the hand of +the Pharaoh." + +Whatever Egypt's mode of worshiping Khem and Isis, nothing could set at +naught this clean, impulsive, sincere avowal. + +Here, then, openly and in perfect propriety was a woman abroad with her +suitor. + +She might have been eighteen years old, but there was nothing girlish +in her gorgeous beauty. She was a red rose, full-blown. + +Her robes were a double thickness of loose-meshed white linen, with a +delicate stripe of scarlet; her head-dress a single swathing of scarlet +gauze. She wore not one, but many kinds of jewels, and her anklets and +armlets tinkled with fringes of cats and hawks in carnelian. Her hair +was brilliant black and unbraided. Her complexion was transparent, and +the underlying red showed deeply in the small, full-lipped mouth; like +a stain in the cheeks; like a flush on the brow, and even faintly on +the dainty chin. Her eyes were large and black, with the amorous lid, +and lined with kohl beneath the lower lash. Her profile showed the +exquisite aquiline of the pure-blooded Egyptian. + +Aside from the visible evidences of charm there was an atmosphere of +femininity that permeated her immediate vicinity with a witchery little +short of enchantment. She was the Lady Ta-meri, daughter of Amenemhat, +nomarch[5] of Memphis. + +The Egyptian accompanying the litter was nearly thirty years of age. +He was an example of the other type of the race, differing from the +classic model of Kenkenes. The forehead retreated, the nose was long, +low, slightly depressed at the end; the mouth, thick-lipped; the eye, +narrow and almond-shaped; the cheek-bones, high; the complexion, dark +brown. Still, the great ripeness of lip, aggressive whiteness of teeth +and brilliance of eye made his face pleasant. He wore a shenti of +yellow, over it a kamis of white linen, a kerchief bound with a yellow +cord about his head, and white sandals. + +He was the nephew of the king's cup-bearer, who had died without issue +at Thebes during the past month. His elder brother had succeeded his +father to a high office in the priesthood, but he, Nechutes, was a +candidate for the honors of his dead uncle. + +Kenkenes gave the man a smiling nod and bent over the lady's fingers. + +"Fie!" was her greeting. "Abroad like the rabble, and carrying a +burden." She filliped the wallet with a pink-stained finger-nail. + +"Sit here," she commanded, patting the cushioned edge of the litter. + +The sculptor declined the invitation with a smile. + +"I go to try some stone," he explained. + +"Truly, I believe thou lovest labor," the lady asserted accusingly. +"Ah, but punishment overtakes thee at last. Behold, thou mightst have +gone with me to the marshes to-day, but I knew thou wouldst be as deep +in labor as a slave. And so I took Nechutes." + +Kenkenes shot an amused glance at her companion. + +"I would wager my mummy, Nechutes, that this is the first intimation +thou hast had that thou wert second choice," he said. + +"Aye, thou hast said," Nechutes admitted, his eyes showing a sudden +light. He had a voice of profound depth and resonance, that rumbled +like the purring of the king's lions. "And not a moment since she +swore that it was I who made her sun to move, and that Tuat itself were +sweet so I were there." + +"O Ma[6]," the lady cried, threatening him with her fan. "Thou +Defender of Truth, smite him!" + +Kenkenes laughed with delight. + +"Nay, nay, Nechutes!" he cried. "Thou dost betray thyself. Never +would Ta-meri have said anything so bald. Now, when she is moved to +give me a honeyed fact, she laps it with delicate intimation, layer on +layer like a lotus-bud. And only under the warm interpretation of my +heart will it unfold and show the gold within." + +Nechutes stifled a derisive groan, but the lady's color swept up over +her face and made it like the dawn. + +"Nay, now," she protested, "wherein art thou better than Nechutes, save +in the manner of telling thy calumny? But, Kenkenes," she broke off, +"thou art wasted in thy narrow realm. They need thy gallant tongue at +court." + +The young sculptor made soft eyes at her. + +"If I were a courtier," he objected, "I must scatter my small eloquence +among many beauties that I would liefer save for one." + +She appropriated the compliment at once. + +"Thou dost not hunger after even that opportunity," she pouted. "How +long hath it been since the halls of my father's house knew thy steps? +A whole moon!" + +"I feared that I should find Nechutes there," Kenkenes explained. + +During this pretty joust the brows of the prospective cup-bearer had +knitted blackly. The scowl was unpropitious. + +"Thou mayest come freely now," he growled, "The way shall be clear." + +The lady looked at him in mock fear. + +"Come, Nechutes," the sculptor implored laughingly, "be gracious. +Being in highest favor, it behooves thee to be generous." + +But the prospective cup-bearer refused to be placated. He rumbled an +order to the slaves and they shouldered the litter. + +Ta-meri made a pretty mouth at him, and turned again to Kenkenes. + +"Nay, Kenkenes," she said. "It was mine to say that the way shall be +clear--but I promise it." + +She nodded a bright farewell to him, and they moved away. The +sculptor, still smiling, continued down to the river. + +At the landing he engaged one of the numerous small boats awaiting a +passenger, and directed the clout-wearing boatman to drop down the +stream. + +Directly opposite his point of embarkation there were farm lands, +fertile and moist, extending inland for a mile. But presently the +frontier of the desert laid down a gray and yellow dead-line over which +no domestic plant might strike its root and live. + +But the arable tracts were velvet green with young grain, the verdant +level broken here and there by a rustic's hut, under two or three +close-standing palms. Even from the surface of the Nile the checkered +appearance of the country, caused by the various kinds of products, was +noticeable. Egypt was the most fertile land in the world. + +However, as the light bari climbed and dipped on the little waves +toward the north the Arabian hills began to approach the river. Their +fronts became abrupt and showed the edges of stratum on stratum of +white stone. About their bases were quantities of rubble and gray dust +slanting against their sides in slides and drifts. Across the +narrowing strip of fertility square cavities in rows showed themselves +in the white face of the cliffs. The ruins of a number of squat hovels +were barely discernible over the wheat. + +"Set me down near Masaarah," Kenkenes said, "and wait for me." The +boatman ducked his head respectfully and made toward the eastern shore. +He effected a landing at a bedding of masonry on which a wharf had once +been built. The rock was now over-run with riotous marsh growth. + +The quarries had not been worked for half a century. The thrifty +husbandman had cultivated his narrow field within a few feet of the +Nile, and the roadway that had once led from the ruined wharf toward +the hills was obliterated by the grain. + +Kenkenes alighted and struck through the wheat toward the pitted front +of the cliffs. Before him was a narrow gorge that debouched into the +great valley over a ledge of stone three feet in height. After much +winding the ravine terminated in a wide pocket, a quarter of a mile +inland. Exit from this cul-de-sac was possible toward the east by a +steep slope leading to the top of one of the interior ridges of the +desert. Kenkenes did not pause at the cluster of houses. The roofs +had fallen in and the place was quite uninhabitable. But he leaped up +into the little valley and followed it to its end. There he climbed +the sharp declivity and turned back in the direction he had come, along +the flank of the hill that formed the north wall of the gorge. The +summit of the height was far above him, and the slope was covered with +limestone masses. There had been no frost nor rain to disturb the +original rock-piling. Only the agencies of sand and wind had +disarranged the distribution on which the builders of the earliest +dynasty had looked. And this was weird, mysterious and labyrinthine. + +At a spot where a great deal of broken rock encumbered the ground, +Kenkenes unslung his wallet and tested the fragments with chisel and +mallet. It was the same as the quarry product--magnesium limestone, +white, fine, close-grained and easily worked. But it was broken in +fragments too small for his purpose. Above him were fields of greater +masses. + +"Now, I was born under a fortunate sign," he said aloud as he scaled +the hillside; "but I fear those slabs are too long for a life-sized +statue." + +On reaching them he found that those blocks which appeared from a +distance to weigh less than a ton, were irregular cubes ten feet high. + +He grumbled his disappointment and climbed upon one to take a general +survey of his stoneyard. At that moment his eyes fell on a block of +proper dimensions under the very shadow of the great cube upon which he +stood. It was in the path of the wind from the north and was buried +half its height in sand. + +Kenkenes leaped from his point of vantage with a cry of delight. + +"Nay, now," he exclaimed; "where in this is divine disfavor?" He +inspected his discovery, tried it for solidity of position and purity +of texture. Its location was particularly favorable to secrecy. + +It stood at the lower end of an aisle between great rocks. All view of +it was cut off, save from that position taken by Kenkenes when he +discovered it. A wall built between it and the north would bar the +sand and form a nook, wholly closed on two sides and partly closed at +each end by stones. All this made itself plain to the mind of the +young sculptor at once. With a laugh of sheer content, he turned to +retrace his steps and began to sing. + +Then was the harsh desolation of the hills startled, the immediate +echoes given unaccustomed sound to undulate in diminishing volume from +one to another. He sang absently, but his preoccupation did not make +his tones indifferent. For his voice was soft, full, organ-like, +flexible, easy with illimitable lung-power and ineffable grace. When +he ceased the silence fell, empty and barren, after that song's +unaudienced splendor. + + +[1] Set--the war-god. + +[2] Thebes. + +[3] Amenti--The realm of Death. + +[4] Tuat--The Egyptian Hades. + +[5] Nomarch--governor of a civil division called a nome. A high office. + +[6] Ma--The goddess of truth. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MESSENGER + +Mentu returned from the session at the palace, uncommunicative and +moody. When, after the evening meal, Kenkenes crossed the court to +talk with him, he found the elder sculptor feeding a greedy flame in a +brazier with the careful plans for the new temple to Set. Kenkenes +retired noiselessly and saw his father no more that night. + +The next day Mentu was bending over fresh sheets of papyrus, and when +his son entered and stood beside him he raised his head defiantly. + +"I have another royal obelisk to decorate," he said, fixing the young +man with a steady eye, "of a surety,--without doubt,--inevitably,--for +the thing is all but ready to be set up at On." + +"I am glad of that," Kenkenes replied gravely. "Let me make clean +copies of these which are complete." + +He gathered up the sheets and took his place at the opposite table. +Then ensued a long silence, broken only by the loud and restless +investigations of the omnipresent and unabashed ape. + +At last the elder sculptor spoke. + +"The eye of heaven must be unblinkingly upon the divine Meneptah," he +observed, as though he had but thought aloud. + +Kenkenes gazed at his father with the inquiry on his face that he did +not voice. The sculptor had risen from his bench and was searching a +chest of rolled plans near him. He caught his son's look and closed +his mouth on an all but spoken expression. Kenkenes continued to gaze +at him in some astonishment, and the elder man muttered to himself: + +"I like him not, though if Osiris should ask me why, I could not tell. +But he hath a too-ready smile, and by that I know he will twirl +Meneptah like a string about his finger." + +The eyes of the young man widened. "The new adviser?" he asked. + +"Even so," was the emphatic reply. + +Before Kenkenes could ask for further enlightenment a female slave +bowed in the doorway. + +"The Lady Senci sends thee greeting and would speak with thee. She is +at the outer portal in her curricle," she said, addressing Mentu. + +The great man sprang to his feet, glanced hurriedly at his ink-stained +fingers, at his robe, and then fled across the court into the door he +had entered to change his dress the day before. + +Kenkenes smiled, for Mentu had been a widower these ten Nile floods. + +The slave still lingered. + +"Also is there a messenger for thee, master," she said, bowing again. + +"So? Let him enter." + +The man whom the slave ushered in a few minutes later was old, spare +and bent, but he was alert and restless. His eyes were brilliant and +over them arched eyebrows that were almost white. He made a jerky +obeisance. + +"Greeting, son of Mentu. Dost thou remember me?" + +The young man looked at his visitor for a moment. + +"I remember," he said at last. "Thou art Ranas, courier to Snofru, +priest of On. Greeting and welcome to Memphis. Enter and be seated." + +"Many thanks, but mine errand is urgent. I have been a guest of my +son, who abideth just without Memphis, and this morning a messenger +came to my son's door. He had been sent by Snofru to Tape, but had +fallen ill on the river between On and Memphis. As it happened, the +house of my son was the nearest, and thither he came, in fever and +beyond traveling another rod. As the message he bore concerned the +priesthood, I went to Asar-Mut and I am come from him to thee. He bids +thee prepare for a journey before presenting thyself to him, at the +temple." + +Kenkenes frowned in some perplexity. + +"His command is puzzling. Am I to become a messenger for the gods?" + +"The first messenger was a nobleman," the old courier explained in a +conciliatory tone, "and the holy father spoke of thy fidelity and +despatch." + +"Mine uncle is gracious. Salute him for me and tell him I obey." + +The old man bowed once more and withdrew. + +When Kenkenes crossed the court a little time later he met his father. + +"The Lady Senci brings me news that makes me envious," Mentu began at +once, "and shames me because of thee!" + +Kenkenes lifted an expressive brow at this unexpected onslaught. "Nay, +now, what have I done?" + +"Nothing!" Mentu asserted emphatically; "and for that reason am I +wroth. The Lady Senci's nephew, Hotep, is the new chief of the royal +scribes." + +"I call that good tidings," Kenkenes replied, a cheerful note in his +voice, "and worth greeting with a health to Hotep. But thou must +remember, my father, that he is older than I." + +"How much?" the elder sculptor asked. + +"Three whole revolutions of Ra." + +The artist regarded his son scornfully for a moment. + +"The Lady Senci wishes me to prepare plans for the further elaboration +of her tomb," he went on, at last, "but the work on the obelisk may not +be laid aside. If I might trust you to go on with them, the Lady Senci +need not wait." + +"But I have, this moment, been summoned by my holy uncle, Asar-Mut, to +go on a journey, and I know not when I return," Kenkenes explained. + +Mentu gazed at him without comprehending. + +"A messenger on his way to Tape from Snofru was overtaken with +misfortune here, and Asar-Mut, getting word of it, sent for me," the +young man continued. "I can only guess that he wishes me to carry on +the message." + +"Humph!" the elder sculptor remarked. "Asar-Mut has kingly tastes. +The couriers of priests are not usually of the nobility. But get thee +gone." + +The pair separated and the young man passed into the house. The ape +under the bunch of leaves in a palm-top looked after him fixedly for a +moment, and then sliding down the tree, disappeared among the flowers. + +When, half an hour later, Kenkenes entered a cross avenue leading to a +great square in which the temple stood, he found the roadway filled +with people, crowding about a group of disheveled women. These were +shrieking, wildly tearing their hair, beating themselves and throwing +dust upon their heads. Kenkenes immediately surmised that there was +something more than the usual death-wail in this. + +He touched a man near him on the shoulder. + +"Who may these distracted women be?" he asked. + +"The mothers of Khafra and Sigur, and their women." + +"Nay! Are these men dead? I knew them once. + +"They are by this time. They were to be hanged in the dungeon of the +house of the governor of police at this hour," the man answered with +morbid relish in his tone. Kenkenes looked at him in horror. + +"What had they done?" he asked. The man plunged eagerly into the +narrative. + +"They were tomb robbers and robbed independently of the brotherhood of +thieves.[1] They refused to pay the customary tribute from their spoil +to the chief of robbers, and whatsoever booty they got they kept, every +jot of it. Innumerable mummies were found rifled of their gold and +gems, and although the chief of robbers and the governor of police +sought and burrowed into every den in the Middle country, they could +not find the missing treasure. Then they knew that the looting was not +done by any of the licensed robbers. So all the professional thieves +and all the police set themselves to seek out the lawless plunderers." + +"Humph!" interpolated Kenkenes expressively. + +"Aye. And it was not long with all these upon the scent until Khafra +and Sigur were discovered coming forth from a tomb laden with spoil, +and in the struggle which ensued they did murder. But the constabulary +have not found the rest of the booty, though they made great search for +it and may have put the thieves to torture. Who knows? They do dark +things in the dungeon under the house of the governor of police." + +"And so they hanged them speedily," said Kenkenes, desirous of ending +the grisly tale. + +"And so they hanged them. I could not get in to see, and these +screaming mothers attracted me, so I am here. But my neighbor's son is +a friend of the jailer, and I shall know yet how they died." + +But Kenkenes was stalking off toward the temple, his shoulders lifted +high with disgust. + +"O, ye inscrutable Hathors," he exclaimed finally; "how ye have +disposed the fortunes of four friends! Two of us hanged, a third in +royal favor, a fourth an--an--an offender against the gods." + +Presently the avenue opened into the temple square. With reverential +hand Memphis put back her dwellings and her bazaars, that profane life +might not press upon the sacred precincts of her mighty gods. Here was +a vast acreage, overhung with the atmosphere of sanctity. The grove of +mysteries was there, dark with profound shadow, and silent save for a +lonesome bird song or the suspirations of the wind. The great pool in +its stone basin reflected a lofty canopy of sunlit foliage, and the +shaggy peristyle of palm-tree trunks. + +The shadow of the great structure darkened its approaches before it was +clearly visible through the grove. The devotee entered a long avenue +of sphinxes--fifty pairs lining a broad highway paved with polished +granite flagging. + +At its termination the two truncated pyramids that formed the entrance +to the temple towered upward, two hundred feet of massive masonry. +Egypt had dismantled a dozen mountains to build two. + +When he reached the gateway that opened like a tunnel between the +ponderous pylons, he was delayed some minutes waiting till the porter +should admit him through the wicket of bronze. At last, a lank youth, +the son of the regular keeper, appeared, and, with an inarticulate +apology, bade him enter. + +Within the overarching portals he was met by a novice, a priest of the +lowest orders, to whom he stated his mission. With a sign to the young +man to follow, the priest passed through the porch into the inner court +of the temple. This was simply an immense roofless chamber. Its sides +were the outer walls of the temple proper, reinforced by stupendous +pilasters and elaborated with much bas-relief and many intaglios. The +ends were formed by the inner pylons of the porch and outer pylons of +the main temple. The latter were guarded by colossal divinities. Down +the center of the court was a second aisle of sphinxes. They had +entered this when the priest, with a startled exclamation, sprang +behind one of the recumbent monsters in time to avoid the frolicsome +salutation of an ape. + +"Anubis! Mut, the Mother of Darkness, lends you her cloak! Out!" +Kenkenes cried, striking at his pet. The wary animal eluded the blow +and for a moment revolved about another sphinx, pursued by his master, +and then fled like a phantom out of the court by the path he came. By +this time the priest had emerged from his refuge and was attempting to +prevent the young man's interference with the will of the ape. + +"Nay, nay; I am sorry!" the priest exclaimed as Anubis disappeared. +"It is an omen. Toth[2] visiteth Ptah; Wisdom seeketh Power! Came he +by divine summons or did he seek the great god? It is a problem for +the sorcerers and is of ominous import!" + +"The pestiferous creature followed me unseen from the house," Kenkenes +explained, rather flushed of countenance. "To me it is an omen that +the idler who keeps the gate is not vigilant." + +The priest shook his head and led the way without further words into +the temple. Here the young sculptor was conducted through a wilderness +of jacketed columns, over pavements that rang even under sandaled feet, +to the center of a vast hall. The priest left him and disappeared +through the all-enveloping twilight into the more sacred part of the +temple. + +In a moment, Asar-Mut, high priest to Ptah, appeared, approaching +through the dusk. He wore the priestly habiliments of spotless linen, +and, like a loose mantle, a magnificent leopard-skin, which hung by a +claw over the right shoulder and, passing under the left arm, was +fastened at the breast by a medallion of gold and topaz. He was a +typical Egyptian, but thinner of lip and severer of countenance than +the laity. The wooden dolls tumbled about by the children of the realm +were not more hairless than he. His high, narrow head was ghastly in +its utter nakedness. + +Kenkenes bent reverently before him and was greeted kindly by the +pontiff. + +"Hast thou guessed why I sent for thee?" he asked at once. + +"I have guessed," Kenkenes replied, "but it may be wildly." + +"Let us see. I would have thee carry a message for the brotherhood." + +Kenkenes inclined his head. + +"Good. Be thy journey as quick as thy perception. I ask thy pardon +for laying the work of a temple courier upon thy shoulders, but the +message is of such import that I would carry it myself were I as young +and unburdened with duty as thou." + +"I am thy servant, holy Father, and well pleased with the opportunity +that permits me to serve the gods." + +"I know, and therefore have I chosen thee. My trusted courier is dead; +the others are light-minded, and Tape is in the height of festivity. +They might delay--they might be lured into forgetting duty, and," the +pontiff lowered his voice and drew nearer to Kenkenes, "and there are +those that may be watching for this letter. A nobleman would not be +thought a messenger. Thou dost incur less danger than the +clout-wearing runner for the temple." + +A light broke over Kenkenes. + +"I understand," he said. + +"Go, then, by private boat at sunset, and Ptah be with thee. Make all +speed." He put a doubly wrapped scroll into Kenkenes' hands. "This is +to be delivered to our holy Superior, Loi, priest of Amen. Farewell, +and fail not." + +Kenkenes bowed and withdrew. + +It was long before sunset, and he had an unfulfilled promise in mind. +He crossed the square thoughtfully and paused by the pool in its +center. The surface, dark and smooth as oil, reflected his figure and +face faithfully and to his evident satisfaction. He passed around the +pool and walked briskly in the direction of another narrow passage +lined by rich residences. + +He knocked at a portal framed by a pair of huge pilasters, which +towered upward, and, as pillars, formed two of the colonnade on the +roof. A portress admitted him with a smile and led him through the +sumptuously appointed chamber of guests into the intramural park. +There she indicated a nook in an arbor of vines and left him. + +With a silent foot he crossed the flowery court and entered the bower. +The beautiful dweller sat in a deep chair, her little feet on a carved +footstool, a silver-stringed lyre tumbled beside it. She was alone and +appeared desolate. When the tall figure of the sculptor cast a shadow +upon her she looked up with a little cry of delight. + +"Oh," she exclaimed, "a god led thee hither to save me from the +solitude. It is a moody monster not catalogued in the list of +terrors." She thrust the lyre aside with her sandal and pushed the +footstool, only a little, away from her. + +"Sit there," she commanded. Kenkenes obeyed willingly. He drew off +his coif and tossed it aside. + +"Thou seest I am come in the garb of labor," he confessed. + +"I see," she answered severely. "Am I no longer worthy the robe of +festivity?" + +"Ah, Ta-meri, thou dost wrong me," he said. "Chide me, but impugn me +not. Nay, I am on my way to Tape. I was summoned hurriedly and am +already dismissed upon mine errand, but I could not use myself so ill +as to postpone my visit for eighteen days." + +She jeered at him prettily. + +"To hear thee one would think thou hadst been coming as often as +Nechutes." + +"How often does Nechutes come?" + +"Every day." + +"Of late?" he asked, with a laugh in his eyes. + +"Nay," she answered sulkily. "Not since the day--that day!" + +Kenkenes was silent for a moment. Then he put his elbow on the arm of +her chair and leaned his head against his hand. The attitude brought +him close to her. + +"All these days," he said at length, "he has been unhappy among the +happy and the unhappiest among the sad. He has summoned the shuddering +Pantheon, to hear him vow eternal unfealty to thee, Ta-meri--and lo! +while they listened he begged their most potent charm to hold thee to +him still. Poor Nechutes!" + +"Thou dost treat it lightly," she reproached him, her eyes veiled, "but +it is of serious import to--to Nechutes." + +"Nay, I shall hold my tongue. I efface myself and intercede for him, +and thou dost call it exulting. And when I am fallen from thy favor +there will be none to plead my cause, none to hide her misty eyes with +contrite lashes." + +"Mine eyes are not misty," she retorted. + +"Thou hast said," he admitted, in apology. "It was not a happy term. +I meant bejeweled with repentant dew." + +She shook her little finger at him. + +"If thou dost persist in thy calumny of me, thou mayest come to test +thy dismal augury," she warned. + +He dropped his eyes and his mouth drooped dolorously. + +"I come for comfort, and I get Nechutes and all the unpropitious +possibilities that his name suggests." + +"Comfort? Thou, in trouble? Thou, the light-hearted?" she laughed. + +"Nay; I am discontented, but I might as well hope to heave the skies +away with my shoulders as to rebel against mine oppression. So I came +to be petted into submission." + +"Nay, dost thou hear him?" the lady cried. "And he came, because he +was sure he would get it!" + +"And he will go away because the Lady Ta-meri means he shall not have +it," he exclaimed. He reached toward his coif and immediately a +panic-stricken little hand stayed him. + +"Nay," she said softly. "I was but retaliating. Hast thou not plagued +me, and may I not tease thee a little in revenge? Say on." + +"My--but now I bethink me, I ought not to tell thee. It savors of that +which so offends thy nice sense of gentility--labor," he said, sinking +back in his easy attitude again. + +"Fie, Kenkenes," she said. "Hath some one put thy slavish love of toil +under ban? Does that oppress thee?" He reproved her with a pat on the +nearest hand. + +"The king toils; the priests toil; the powers of the world labor. None +but the beautiful idle may be idle, and that for their beauty's sake. +Nay, it is not that I may not work, but I may not work as I wish and I +am heart-sick therefore." + +His last words ended in a tone of genuine dejection. His eyes were +fixed on the grass of the nook and his brows had knitted slightly. The +expression was a rare one for his face and in its way becoming--for the +moment at least. The hand he had patted drew nearer, and at last, +after a little hesitancy, was laid on his black hair. He lifted his +face and took cheer, from the light in her eyes, to proceed. + +"Since I may speak," he began, "I shall. Ta-meri, thou knowest that as +a sculptor I work within limits. The stature of mine art must crouch +under the bounds of the ritual. It is not boasting if I say that I +see, with brave eyes, that Egypt insults herself when she creates +horrors in stone and says, 'This is my idea of art.' And these things +are not human; neither are they beasts--they are grotesques that verge +so near upon a semblance of living things as to be piteous. They +thwart the purpose of sculpture. Why do we carve at all, if not to +show how we appear to the world or the world appears to us? Now for my +rebellion. I would carve as we are made; as we dispose ourselves; aye, +I would display a man's soul in his face and write his history on his +brow. I would people Egypt with a host of beauty, grace and +naturalness--" + +"Just as if they were alive?" Ta-meri inquired with interest. + +"Even so--of such naturalness that one could guess only by the hue of +the stone that they did not breathe." + +The lady shrugged her shoulders and laughed a little. + +"But they do not carve that way," she protested. "It is not sculpture. +Thou wouldst fill the land with frozen creatures--ai!" with another +little shrug. "It would be haunted and spectral. Nay, give me the old +forms. They are best." + +Kenkenes fairly gasped with his sudden descent from earnest hope to +disappointment. A flood of half-angry shame dyed his face and the +wound to his sensibilities showed its effect so plainly that the beauty +noted it with a sudden burst of compunction. + +"Of a truth," she added, her voice grown wondrous soft, "I am full of +sympathy for thee, Kenkenes. Nay, look up. I can not be happy if thou +art not." + +"That suffices. I am cheered," he began, but the note of sarcasm in +his voice was too apparent for him to permit himself to proceed. He +caught up the lyre, and drawing up a diphros--a double seat of fine +woods--rested against it and began to improvise with an assumption of +carelessness. Ta-meri sank back in her chair and regarded him from +under dreamy lids--her senses charmed, her light heart won by his +comeliness and talent. Kenkenes became conscious of her inspection, at +last, and looked up at her. His eyes were still bright with his recent +feeling and the hue in his cheeks a little deeper. The admiration in +her face became so speaking that he smiled and ran without pausing into +one of the love-lyrics of the day. Breaking off in its midst, he +dropped the lyre and said with honest apology in his voice: + +"I crave thy pardon, Ta-meri. What right had I to weight thee with my +cares! It was selfish, and yet--thou art so inviting a confidante, +that it is not wholly my fault if I come to seek of thee, my oldest and +sweetest friend, the woman comfort that was bereft me with my rightful +comforter." + +"Neither mother nor sister nor lady-love," she mused. He nodded, but +the slight interrogative emphasis caught him, and he looked up at her. +He nodded again. + +"Nay, nor lady-love, thanks to the luck of Nechutes." + +"Nechutes is no longer lucky," she said deliberately. + +"No matter," Kenkenes insisted. "I shall be gone eighteen days, and +his luck will have changed before I can return." + +"Thine auguries seem to please thee," she pouted. + +He put the back of her jeweled hand against his cheek. + +"Nay, I but comfort thee at the sacrifice of mine own peace." + +"A futile sacrifice." + +"What!" + +"A futile sacrifice!" + +"Ah, Ta-meri, beseech the Goddess Ma to forget thy words!" he cried in +mock horror. She tossed her head, and instantly he got upon his feet, +catching up his coif as he did so. + +"Come, bid me farewell," he said putting out his hand, "and one of +double sweetness, for I doubt me much if Nechutes will permit a welcome +when I return." + +"Nechutes will not interfere in mine affairs," she said, as she rose. + +"Nay, I shall know if that be true when I return," he declared. + +She stamped her foot. + +"Fie!" he laughed. "Already do I begin to doubt it." + +She turned from him and kept her face away. Kenkenes went to her and, +taking both her hands in his, drew her close to him. She did not +resist, but her face reproached him--not for what he was doing, but for +what he had done. With his head bent, he looked down into her eyes for +a moment. Her red mouth with its sulky pathos was almost irresistible. +But he only pressed one hand to his lips. + +"I must wait until I return," he said from the doorway, and was gone. + +On the broad bosom of the Nile at sunset, four strong oarsmen were +speeding him swiftly up to Thebes. Off the long wharves at the +southernmost limits of the city, the rapid boat overtook and passed +low-riding, slowly moving stone-barges laden with quarry slaves. The +unwieldy craft progressed heavily, nearer and within the darkening +shadow of the Arabian hills. Kenkenes watched them as long as they +were in sight, an unwonted pity making itself felt in his heart. For +even in the dusk he distinguished many women and the immature figures +of children; and none knew the quarry life better than he, who was a +worker in stone. + + + +[1] In ancient Egypt burglary was reduced to a system and governed by +law. The chief of robbers received all the spoil and to him the +victimized citizen repaired and, upon payment of a certain per cent. of +the value of the object stolen, received his property again. The +original burglar and the chief of robbers divided the profits. This +traffic was countenanced in Egypt until the country passed into British +hands. + +[2] The ape was sacred to and an emblem of Toth, the male deity of +Wisdom and Law. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +THE PROCESSION OF AMEN + +Thebes Diospolis, the hundred-gated, was in holiday attire. The great +suburb to the west of the Nile had emptied her multitudes into the +solemn community of the gods. Besides her own inhabitants there were +thousands from the entire extent of the Thebaid and visitors even from +far-away Syene and Philae. It was an occasion for more than ordinary +pomp. The great god Amen was to be taken for an outing in his ark. + +Every possible manifestation of festivity had been sought after and +displayed. The air was a-flutter with party-colored streamers. +Garlands rioted over colossus, peristyle, obelisk and sphinx without +conserving pattern or moderation. The dromos, or avenue of sphinxes, +was carpeted with palm and nelumbo leaves, and copper censers as large +as caldrons had been set at equidistance from one another, and an +unceasing reek of aromatics drifted up from them throughout the day. + +For once the magnificence of the wondrous city of the gods was set down +from its usual preeminence in the eyes of the wondering spectator, and +the vastness of the multitude usurped its place. The bari of Kenkenes +seeking to round the island of sand lying near the eastern shore +opposite the village of Karnak, met a solid pack of boats. The young +sculptor took in the situation at once, and, putting about, found a +landing farther to the north. There he made a portage across the flat +bar of sand to the arm of quiet water that separated the island from +the eastern shore. Crossing, he dismissed his eager and excited +boatmen and struck across the noon-heated valley toward the temple. +The route of the pageant could be seen from afar, cleanly outlined by +humanity. It extended from Karnak to Luxor and, turning in a vast loop +at the Nile front, countermarched over the dromos and ended at the +tremendous white-walled temple of Amen. Between the double ranks of +sightseers there was but chariot room. The side Kenkenes approached +sloped sharply from the dromos toward the river, and the rearmost +spectators had small opportunity to behold the pageant. The multitude +here was less densely packed. Kenkenes joined the crowd at this point. + +Here was the canaille of Thebes. + +They wore nothing but a kilt of cotton--or as often, only a cincture +about the loins, and their lean bodies were blackened by the terrible +sun of the desert. They were the apprentices of paraschites,[1] +brewers, professional thieves, slaves and traffickers in the unclean +necessities of a great city, and only their occasional riots, or such +events as this, brought them into general view of the upper classes. +They had nothing in common with the gentry, whom they were willing to +recognize as creatures of a superior mold. Among themselves there were +established castes, and members of each despised the lower and hated +the upper. Kenkenes slackened his pace when he recognized the +character of these spectators, and after hesitating a moment, he hung +the flat wallet containing the message around his neck inside his kamis +and pushed on. Every foot of progress he essayed was snarlingly +disputed until the rank of the aggressive stranger was guessed by his +superior dress, when he was given a moody and ungracious path. But he +finally met an immovable obstacle in the shape of a quarrel. + +The stage of hostilities was sufficiently advanced to be menacing, and +the young sculptor hesitated to ponder on the advisability of pressing +on. While he waited, several deputies of the constabulary, +methodically silencing the crowd, came upon these belligerents in turn +and belabored the foremost into silence. The act decided the young +man. The feelings of the rabble were now in a state sufficiently +warlike to make them forget their ancient respect for class and turn +savagely upon him, should he show any desire to force his way through +their lines. Therefore he gave up his attempt to reach the temple and +made up his mind to remain where he was. At that moment, several +gorgeous litters of the belated wealthy rammed a path to the very front +and were set down before the rabble. Kenkenes seized upon their +advance to proceed also, and, dropping between the first and second +litter, made his way with little difficulty to the front. With the +complacency of a man that has rank and authority on his side he turned +up the roadway and continued toward the temple. He was halted before +he had proceeded ten steps. A litter richly gilded and borne by four +men, came pushing through the crowd and was deposited directly in his +path. + +But for the unusual appearance of the bearers, Kenkenes might have +passed around the conveyance and continued. Instead, he caught the +contagious curiosity of the crowd and stood to marvel. The men were +stalwart, black-bearded and strong of feature, and robed in no Egyptian +garb. They were draped voluminously in long habits of brown linen, +fringed at the hem, belted by a yellow cord with tasseled ends. The +sleeves were wide and showed the wristbands of a white under-garment. +The head-dress was a brown kerchief bound about the brow with a cord, +also yellow. + +While Kenkenes examined them in detail, a long, in-drawn breath of +wonder from the circle of spectators caused him to look at the +alighting owner of the litter. + +He took a backward step and halted, amazed. + +Before him was a woman of heroic proportions, taller, with the +exception of himself, than any man in the crowd. Upon her, at first +glance, was to be discerned the stamp of great age, yet she was as +straight as a column and her hair was heavy and midnight-black. Hers +was the Semitic cast of countenance, the features sharply chiseled, but +without that aggressiveness that emphasizes the outline of a withered +face. Every passing year had left its mark on her, but she had grown +old not as others do. Here was flesh compromising with age--accepting +its majesty, defying its decay--a sublunar assumption of immortality. +There was no longer any suggestion of femininity; the idea was dread +power and unearthly grace. Of such nature might the sexless archangels +partake. + +"Holy Amen!" one of the awed bystanders exclaimed in a whisper to his +neighbor. "Who is this?" + +"A princess from Punt," [2] the neighbor surmised. + +"A priestess from Babylon," another hazarded. + +"Nay, ye are all wrong," quavered an old man who had been looking at +the new-comers under the elbows of the crowd. "She is an Israelite." + +"Thou hast a cataract, old man," was the scornful reply from some one +near by. "She is no slave." + +"Aye," went on the unsteady voice, "I know her. She was the favorite +woman of Queen Neferari Thermuthis. She has not been out of the Delta +where her people live since the good queen died forty years ago. She +must be well-nigh a hundred years old. Aye, I should know her by her +stature. It is of a truth the Lady Miriam." + +At the sound of his mistress' name one of the bearers turned and shot a +sharp glance at the speaker. Instantly the old man fell back, saying, +as a sneer of contempt ran through the rabble at the intelligence his +words conveyed: "Anger them not. They have the evil eye." + +Kenkenes had guessed the nationality of the strangers immediately, but +had doubted the correctness of his surmise, because of their noble +mien. If he suffered any disappointment in hearing proof of their +identity, it was immediately nullified by the joy his artist-soul took +in the stately Hebrew woman. He forgot the mission that urged him to +the temple and, permitting the shifting, restless crowd to surround +him, he lingered, thinking. This proud disdain must mark his goddess +of stone in the Arabian hills, this majesty and power; but there must +be youth and fire in the place of this ancient calm. + +A porter that stood beside him, emboldened by barley beer and the +growing disapproval among the on-lookers, cried: + +"Ha! by the rags of my fathers, she outshines her masters, the +brickmaking hag!" + +Kenkenes, who towered over the ruffian, became possessed of a sudden +and uncontrollable indignation. He pecked the man on the head with the +knuckle of his forefinger, saying in colloquial Egyptian: + +"Hold thy tongue, brawler, nor presume to flout thy betters!" + +The stately Israelite, who had taken no notice of any word against her, +now turned her head toward Kenkenes and slowly inspected him. He had +no opportunity to guess whether her gaze was approving, for the crowd +about him, grown weary of waiting, had become quarrelsome and was +loudly resenting his defense of the Hebrews. The porter, supported by +several of his brethren, was already menacing the young sculptor when +some one shouted that the procession was in sight. + +From his position Kenkenes commanded a long view of the street that +declined sharply toward the river. As yet there was nothing to be seen +of the pageant, but the dense crowds far down the highway swayed +backward from the narrow path between them. Presently, scantily-clad +runners were distinguished coming in a slow trot between the +multitudes. The lane widened before the swing of their maces and there +were cries of alarm as the spectators in the middle were pressed +between the retreating forward ranks and the immovable rear. Running +water-bearers pursued the couriers with gurglets, sprinkling the way. +Directly after these, slim bare-limbed youths came in a rapid pace +strewing the path with flowers and palm-leaves. By this time the +intermittent sound of music had grown insistent and continuous. Solemn +bodies of priests approached, series after series of the shaven, +white-robed ministers of Amen. The murmur had grown to an uproar. The +wild clamor of trumpet, pipe, cymbal and sistrum, with the long drone +of the arghool as undertone, drifted by. The upper orders of priests +followed in the vibrating wake of the musicians. Then came Loi, +high-priest to the patron god of Thebes, walking alone, his ancient +figure most pitifully mocked by the richness of his priestly robes. + +After him the great god, Amen, in his ark. + +The air was rent with acclaim. The crowd was too dense for any one to +prostrate himself, but every Egyptian, potentate or slave, assumed as +nearly as possible the posture of humility. Kenkenes bent reverently, +but he lifted his eyes and looked long at the passing ark. Six priests +bore it upon their shoulders. It was a small boat, elaborately carved, +and the cabin in the center--the retreat of the deity--was picketed +with a cordon of sacred images. The entire feretory was overlaid with +gold and crusted with gems. + +Mentu, his father, had planned one for Ptah, and a noble work it +was,--quite equal to this, Kenkenes thought. + +His artistic deliberations were interrupted by an angry tone in the +clamor about him. The Israelites had called out a demonstration of +contempt before, and he guessed at once that they had further +displeased the rabble. It was even as he had thought. The four +bearers with folded arms contemplated the threatening crowd with a +sidelong gaze of contempt. The stately Israelite stood in a dream, her +brilliant eyes fixed in profound preoccupation on the distance. +Kenkenes knew by the present attitude of the group that they had made +no obeisance to Amen. Hence the mutterings among the faithful. Few +had seen the offense at first, but the demonstration spread +nevertheless, and assumed ominous proportions. + +"Nay, now," Kenkenes thought impatiently, "such impiety is foolhardy." +But he drifted into the group of Hebrews and stood between the woman of +Israel and her insulters. The bearers glanced at him, at one another, +and closed up beside him, but he had eyes only for the majestic +Israelite. Not till he saw her bend with singular grace did he look +again on the pageant, interested to know what had won her homage. + +She had done obeisance before the crown prince of Egypt. He stood in a +sumptuous chariot drawn by white horses and driven by a handsome +charioteer. The princely person was barely visible for the pair of +feather fans borne by attendants that walked beside him. Through +continuous cheering he passed on. Seti, the younger, followed, driving +alone. His eyes wandered in pleased wonder over the multitude which +howled itself hoarse for him. + +Close behind him was a chariot of ebony drawn by two plunging, +coal-black horses. A robust Egyptian, who shifted from one foot to the +other and talked to his horses continually, drove therein alone. As he +approached, the Hebrew woman raised herself so suddenly that one of the +nervous animals side-stepped affrighted. The swaggering Egyptian, with +a muttered curse, struck at her with his whip. The four bearers sprang +forward, but she quieted them with a few words in Hebrew. Reentering +her litter she was borne away, while the Thebans were still lost in the +delights of the procession. + +In the few strange words of the woman of Israel, Kenkenes had caught +the name of Har-hat. This then was the bearer of the king's fan--this +insulter of age and womanhood. And the words of Mentu seemed very +fitting,--"I like him not." + +The Thebans were in raptures. The splendors of the pageant had far +surpassed their expectations. Priests, soldiers and officials came in +companies, rank upon rank, of exalted and ornate dignity. Chariots and +horses shone with gilding, polished metal and gay housings, while the +marching legions clanked with pike and blade and shield. Now that the +chief luminaries of the procession had passed, the rich and lofty +departed with a great show of indifference to the rest of the parade. +But the humbler folk, all unlearned in the art of assumption, had not +reached that nice point of culture, and lingered to see the last +foot-soldier pass. + +Kenkenes, urged by his mission, was departing with the rich and lofty, +when his attention was attracted by the chief leading the section of +royal scribes now passing. His was a compact, plump figure, amply +robed in sheeny linen, and he balanced himself skilfully in his light +shell of a chariot, which bumped over the uneven pavement. He was not +a brilliant mark in the long parade, but something other than his mere +appearance made him conspicuous. Behind him, walking at a respectful +distance, was his corps of subordinates--all mature, many of them aged, +but the years of their chief were fewer than those of the youngest +among them. From the center of the crowd his face appeared boyish, and +the multitude hailed him with delight. But the crown prince himself +was not more unmoved by their acclaim. His silent dignity, +misunderstood, brought forth howls of genuine pleasure, and groups of +young noblemen, out of the great college of Seti I, saluted him by +name, adding thereto exalted titles in good-natured derision. + +"Hotep!" ejaculated Kenkenes aloud, catching the name from the lips of +the students. "By Apis, he is the royal scribe!" + +Not until then had he realized the extent of his friend's exaltation. + +He turned again toward the temple, walking between the crowds and the +marching soldiers, indifferent to the shouts of the spectators--lost in +contemplation. But the procession moved more swiftly than he and the +last rank passed him with half his journey yet to complete. Instantly +the vast throng poured out into the way behind the rearmost soldier and +swallowed up the sculptor in a shifting multitude. For an hour he was +hurried and halted and pushed, progressing little and moving much. +Before he could extricate himself, the runners preceding the pageant +returning the great god to his shrine, beat the multitude back from the +dromos and once again Kenkenes was imprisoned by the hosts. And once +again after the procession had passed, he did fruitless battle with a +tossing human sea. But when the street had become freer, he stood +before the closed portal of the great temple. The solemn porter +scrutinized the young sculptor sharply, but the display of the +linen-wrapped roll was an efficient passport. In a little space he was +conducted across the ringing pavements, under the vaulted shadows, into +the presence of Loi, high priest to Amen. + +The ancient prelate had just returned from installing the god in his +shrine and was yet invested in his sacerdotal robes. At one time this +splendid raiment had swathed an imposing figure, but now the frame was +bowed, its whilom comfortable padding fallen away, its parchment-like +skin folded and wrinkled and brown. He was trembling with the long +fatigue of the spectacle. + +He spelled the hieratic writings upon the outer covering of the roll +which the young man presented to him, and asked with some eagerness in +his voice: + +"Hast thou traveled with all speed?" + +"Scarce eight days have I been on the way. Only have I been delayed a +few hours by the crowds of the festival." + +"It is well," replied the pontiff. "Wait here while I see what says my +brother at On." + +He motioned Kenkenes to a seat of inlaid ebony and retired into a +curtained recess. + +The apartment into which Kenkenes had been conducted was small. It was +evidently the study of Loi, for there was a small library of papyri in +cases against the wall; a deep fauteuil was before a heavy table +covered with loosely rolled writings. The light from a high slit under +the architrave sifted down on the floor strewn with carpets of +Damascene weave. Two great pillars, closely set, supported the +ceiling. They were of red and black granite, and each was surmounted +by a foliated encarpus of white marble. The ceiling was a marvelous +marquetry of many and wondrously harmonious colors. + +In one wall was the entrance leading to another chamber. It was +screened by a slowly swaying curtain of broidered linen, which was tied +at its upper corners to brass rings sunk in the stone frame of the +door. This frame attracted the attention of the young sculptor. It +consisted of two caryatides standing out from the square shaft from +which they were carved, their erect heads barely touching the ceiling. +The figures were of heroic size and wore the repose and dignity of +countenance characteristic of Egyptian statues. The sculptor had been +so successful in bringing out this expression that Kenkenes stood +before them and groaned because he had not followed nature to the +exquisite achievement he might have attained. + +He was deeply interested in his critical examination of the figures +when the old priest darted into the apartment, his withered face +working with excitement. + +"Go! Go!" he cried. "Eat and prepare to return to Memphis with all +speed. Thine answer will await thee here to-night at the end of the +first watch,--and Set be upon thee if thou delayest!" + +Kenkenes, startled out of speech, did obeisance and hastened from the +temple. + +The outside air was thick with dust and intensely hot under the +reddening glare of the sun. It was late afternoon. The city was still +crowded, the river front lined with a dense jam of people awaiting +transportation to the opposite shore. Kenkenes knew that many would +still be there on the morrow, since the number of boats was inadequate +to carry the multitude of passengers. + +He began to think with concern upon the security of his own bari, left +in the marsh-growth by the Nile side, north of Karnak. He left the +shifting crowd behind and struck across the sandy flat toward the arm +of quiet water. Straggling groups preceded and followed him and at the +Nile-side he came upon a number contending for the possession of his +boat. They were image-makers and curriers, equally matched against one +another, and a Nubian servitor in a striped tunic, who remained neutral +that he might with safety join the winning party. The appearance of +the nobleman checked hostilities and the contestants, recognizing the +paternalism of rank after the manner of the lowly, called upon him to +arbitrate. + +"The boat is mine, children," [3] was his quiet answer. He pushed it +off, stepped into it, and turned it broadside to them. + +"See here, the scarab of Ptah," he said, tapping the bow with a paddle, +"and the name of Memphis?" With that he drew away to the sandbar +before the astonished men had realized the turn of events. Then they +looked at one another in silence or muttered their disgust; but the +Nubian went into transports of rage, making such violent demonstrations +that the image-makers and curriers turned on him and bade him cease. + +At the Libyan shore Kenkenes gave his bari into the hands of a +river-man and by a liberal fee purchased its security from +confiscation. Then he turned his face toward the center of the western +suburb of Thebes Diospolis. He had the larger palace of Rameses II in +view and he walked briskly, as one who goes forward to meet pleasure. +Only once, when he passed the palace and temple of the Incomparable +Pharaoh, which stood at the mouth of the Valley of the Kings, he +frowned in discontent. Far up the tortuous windings of this gorge was +the tomb of the great Rameses and there had the precious signet been +lost. As he looked at the high red ridge through which this crevice +led, he remembered his father's emphatic prohibition and bit his lip. +Thereafter, throughout a great part of his walk, he railed mentally +against the useless loss of a most propitious opportunity. + +To the first resplendent member of the retinue at Meneptah's palace, +who cast one glance at the fillet the sculptor wore, and bent suavely +before him, Kenkenes stated his mission. The retainer bowed again and +called a rosy page hiding in the dusk of the corridor. + +"Go thou to the apartments of my Lord Hotep and tell him a visitor +awaits him in his chamber of guests." + +The lad slipped away and the retainer led Kenkenes into a long chamber +near the end of the corridor. The hall had been darkened to keep out +the glare of the day, air being admitted only through a slatted blind +against which a shrub in the court outside beat its waxen leaves. +Before his eyes had become accustomed to the dusk Kenkenes heard +footsteps coming down the outer passage, with now and then the light +and brisk scrape of the sandal toe on the polished floor. The young +sculptor smiled at the excited throb of his heart. The new-comer +entered the hall and drew up the shutter. The brilliant flood of light +revealed to him the tall figure of the sculptor rising from his +chair--to the sculptor the trim presence of the royal scribe. + +The friends had not met in six years. + +For a space long enough for recognition to dawn upon the scribe, he +stood motionless and then with an exclamation of extravagant delight he +seized his friend and embraced him with woman-like emotion. + + +[1] Undertakers--embalmers, an unclean class. + +[2] Punt--Arabia. + +[3] The oriental master calls his servants "children." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE HEIR TO THE THRONE + +Loi was not present at the sunset prayers in Karnak. An hour before he +had summoned the trustiest priest in the brotherhood of ministers to +Amen and bade him conduct the ceremonies of the evening. Then he sent +to the temple stores, put into service another boat and was ferried +over to the Libyan suburb of Thebes. He had himself borne in a litter +to the greater palace of Rameses II, and asked an audience with +Meneptah. + +The king was at prayers in the temple of his father, close to the +palace, and the dusk of twilight was settling on the valley of the +Nile, before Loi was summoned to the council chamber. + +The hall he entered was vast and full of deep shadows. The two windows +set in one wall, many feet above the floor, showed two spaces of +darkening sky. A single torch of aromatics flared and hissed beside +the throne dais. Tremendous wainscoting covered the base of the walls, +more than a foot above a man's height. It was massively carved with +colossal sheaves of lotus-blooms and sword-like palm-leaves. Columns +of great girth, bouquets of conventional stamens, ending in foliated +capitals, supported by the lofty ceiling. The few men gathered in +council were surrounded, over-shadowed, and dwarfed by monumental +strength and solemnity. + +Behind a solid panel of carved cedar, which hedged the royal dais, +stood Meneptah. Above his head were the intricate drapings of a canopy +of gold tissue. On a level with his eyes, at his side, was the single +torch. His vision, like his father's, was defective. He was forty +years old, but appeared to be younger. His person was plump, and in +stature he was shorter than the average Egyptian. His coloring was +high and of uniform tint. The arch of the brow, and the conspicuous +distance between it and the eye below, the disdainful tension of the +nostril and the drooping corners of the mouth, gave his face the +injured expression of a spoiled child. The lips were of similar +fullness and the chin retreated. There was refinement in his face, but +no force nor modicum of perception. + +Below, with the light of the torch wavering up and down his robust +figure, was Har-hat, Meneptah's greatest general and now the new +fan-bearer. In repose his face was expressive of great good-humor. +Merriment lighted his eyes and the cut of his mouth was for laughter. +But the smile seemed to be set and, furthermore, indicated that the +fan-bearer found much mirth in the discomfiture of others. Aside from +this undefined atmosphere of heartlessness, it can not be said that +there was any craft or wickedness patent on his face, for his features +were good and indicative of unusual intelligence. To the unobservant, +he seemed to be a lovable, useful, able man. However, we have seen +what Mentu thought of him, and Mentu's estimation might have +represented that of all profound thinkers. But to the latter class, +most assuredly, Meneptah did not belong. + +Har-hat, taking the place of the king during the Rebu war, had +displayed such generalship that the Pharaoh had rewarded him at the +first opportunity with the highest office, except the regency, at his +command. + +To the king's right, beside the dais, with a hand resting on the back +of a cathedra, or great chair, was the crown prince, Rameses. The old +courtiers of the dead grandsire, visiting the court of Meneptah, flung +up their hands and gasped when they beheld the heir to the double crown +of Egypt. They looked upon the old Pharaoh, renewed in youth and +strength. There were the same narrow temples with the sloping brow, +the same hawked nose, the same full lips, the same heavy eye with the +smoldering ember in its dusky depths. The only radical dissimilarity +was the hue of the prince's complexion. It was a strange, un-Egyptian +pallor, an opaque whiteness with dark shadows that belied the testimony +of vigor in his sinewy frame. + +The old courtiers that were still attached to the court of Meneptah +watched with fascination the development of the heir's character. He +was twenty-two years old now and had proved that no alien nature had +been housed in the old Pharaoh's shape. If any pointed out the +prince's indolence as proving him unlike his grandsire the old +courtiers shook their heads and said: "He does not reign as yet and he +but saves his forces till the crown is his." So Egypt, stagnated at +the pinnacle of power by the accession of Meneptah, began to look +forward secretly to the reign of Rameses the Younger, with a hope that +was half terror. + +To-night he stood in semi-dusk robed in festal attire, for somewhere a +rout awaited him. And of the groups of power and rank about him, none +seemed to fit that majestic council chamber so well as he. It was not +the robe of costly stuffs he wore, nor the trappings of jewels, which +if he moved never so slightly emitted a shower of frosty sparks--but a +peculiar emanation of magnetism that at once repelled and attracted, +and made him master over the monarch himself. He had never met repulse +or defeat; he had never entered the presence of his peer; he had never +loved, he had never prayed. He was a solitary power, who admitted +death as his only equal, and defied even him. + +The other counselors were minor members of the cabinet, who had been +summoned, but expected only to hear and keep silence while the great +powers--the king, the prince, the priest and the fan-bearer--conferred. + +Loi entered, bowing and walking with palsied step. At one time the +three central figures of the hall had been his pupils. He had taught +them from the simplest hieratic catechism to the initiation into the +mysteries. As novices they had kissed his hand and borne him +reverence. Now as the initiated, exalted through the acquisition of +power, it lay with them to reverse conditions if they pleased. But as +the old prelate prepared to do obeisance before Meneptah, he was stayed +with a gesture, and after a word of greeting was dismissed to his +place. Rameses saluted him with a motion of his hand and Har-hat bowed +reverently. The pontiff backed away to the great council table set +opposite the throne and was met there by a courtier with a chair. + +At a sign from the king, who had already sunk into his throne, the old +man sat. + +"Thou bringest us tidings, holy Father?" + +"Even so, O Son of Ptah." + +"Say on." + +The priest moved a little uncomfortably and glanced at the ministers +grouped in the shadows. + +"Save for the worthy Har-hat and our prince, O my King, thou hast no +need of great council," he said. + +Meneptah raised his hand and the supernumerary ministers left the +chamber. When they were gone, Loi unwrapped the roll Kenkenes had +brought and began to read: + + +"To Loi, the most high Servant of Amen, Lord of Tape, the Servant of +Ra, at On, sends greeting: + +"The gods lend me composure to speak calmly with thee, O Brother. And +let the dismay which is mine explain the lack of ceremony in this +writing. + +"It is not likely that thou hast forgotten the good Queen Neferari +Thermuthis' foster-son--the Hebrew Mesu, whom she found adrift in a +basket on Nilus. But lest the years have driven the memory of his +misdeeds from thy mind, I tell again the story. Thou knowest he was +initiated a priest of Isis, and scarce had the last of the mysteries +been disclosed to him, ere it was seen that the brotherhood had taken +an apostate unto itself. + +"By the grace of the gods, he interfered in a brawl at Pithom and +killed an Egyptian. Before he could be taken he fled into Midian, and +the secrets of our order were safe, for a time. + +"One by one our fellows have entered Osiris. The young who knew not +have filled their places. Thou and I, only, are left--and the Hebrew! + +"He hath returned! + +"The gods make strong our hands against him! He went away as a menace, +but he returneth as a pestilence. The demons of Amend are with him, +and his hour is most propitious. He hath sunk himself in the +Israelitish pool here in the north, and he will breathe therefrom such +vapors as may destroy Egypt--faith--state--all! + +"The bond-people are already in ferment. There was mutiny at Pa-Ramesu +recently, when three hundred were chosen to work the quarries. +Moreover, the taskmasters are corrupt. The commander, one Atsu by +name, appointed when the chief Merenra became nomarch over Bubastis, +hath disarmed the under-drivers, removed the women from toil and +restored many privileges which are ruinous to law and order. The whole +Delta is in commotion. The nomad tribes near the Goshen country are +agitated; communities of Egyptian shepherds have been won over to the +Hebrew's cause, and now the Israelitish renegade needs but to betray +the secrets to bring such calamity upon Egypt as never befell a nation. + +"But, Brother, he is within reach of an avenging hand! Commission us, +I pray thee, to protect the mysteries after any manner that to us +seemeth good. + +"Despatch is urgent. He may fly again. Give us thine answer as we +have sent this to thee--by a nobleman--a swift and trusty one, and the +blessings of the Radiant Three be upon thy head. + +"Thy servant, the Servant of Ra, + +"Snofru." + + +When the priest finished, the king was sitting upright, his face +flushed with feeling. + +"Sedition!" he exclaimed; "organized rebellion in the very heart of my +realm!" + +He paused for a space and thrust back the heavy fringes of his cowl +with a gesture of peevish impatience. + +"What evil humor possesses Egypt?" he burst forth irritably. "Hardly +have I overthrown an invader before my people break out. I quiet them +in one place and they revolt in another. Must I turn a spear upon mine +own?" + +"Well," he cried, stamping his foot, when the three before him kept +silence, "have ye no word to say?" + +His eyes rested on Har-hat, with an imperious expectation in them. The +fan-bearer bent low before he answered. + +"With thy gracious permission, O Son of Ptah," he said, "I would +suggest that it were wise to cool an insurrection in the simmering. +The disaffection seems to be of great extent. But the Rameside army +assembled on the ground might check an open insurrection. Furthermore, +thou hast seen the salutary effect of thy visit to Tape when she forgot +her duty to her sovereign. Thy presence in the Delta would undoubtedly +expedite the suppression of the rebellion likewise." + +"O, aye," Meneptah declared. "I must go to Tanis. It seems that I +must hasten hither and thither over Egypt pursuing sedition like a +scent-hunting jackal. Mayhap if I were divided like Osiris[1] and a +bit of me scattered in each nome, I might preserve peace. But it goes +sore against me to drag the army with me. Hast thou any simpler plan +to offer, holy Father?" + +The old priest shifted a little before he answered. + +"The mysteries of the faith are in possession of Mesu," he began at +last. "The writing saith he hath exerted great influence over the +bond-people--in truth he hath entered a peaceful land and stirred it +up--and time is but needed to bring the unrest to open warfare. Thou, +O Meneptah, and thou, O Rameses, and thou, O Har-hat, each being of the +brotherhood--ye know that we hold the faith by scant tenure in the +respect of the people. Ye know the perversity of humanity. Obedience +and piety are not in them. Though they never knew a faith save the +faith of their fathers, we must pursue them with a gad, tickle them +with processions and awe them with manifestations. So if it were to +come over the spirit of this Hebrew to betray the mysteries, to scout +the faith and overturn the gods, he would have rabble Egypt following +at his heels. + +"As the writing saith, he hath the destruction of the state in mind, +and his own aggrandizement. He but beginneth on the faith because he +seeth in that a rift wherein to put the lever that shall pry the whole +state asunder. So with two and a half millions of Hebrews and a horde +of renegade Egyptians to combat, I fear the Rameside army might spill +more good blood than is worth wasting on a mongrel multitude. The +rabble without a leader is harmless. Cut off the head of the monster, +and there is neither might nor danger in the trunk. Put away Mesu, and +the insurrection will subside utterly." + +The priest paused and Meneptah stroked the polished coping of the panel +before him with a nervous hand. There was complete silence for a +moment, broken at last by the king. + +"Mesu, though a Hebrew, an infidel and a malefactor, is a prince of the +realm, my foster-brother--Neferari's favorite son. I can not rid +myself of him on provocation as yet misty and indirect." + +"Nay," he added after another pause, "he shall not die by hand of +mine." The prelate raised his head and met the eyes of the king. +After he read what lay therein, the dissatisfaction that had begun to +show on his ancient face faded. + +The Pharaoh settled back into his seat and his brow cleared as if the +problem had been settled. But suddenly he sat up. + +"What have I profited by this council? Shall I take the army or leave +it distributed over Egypt?" He stopped abruptly and turned to the +crown prince. "Help us, my Rameses," he said in a softer tone. "We +had well-nigh forgotten thee." + +Rameses raised himself from the back of his cathedra, against which he +lounged, and moved a step forward. + +"A word, my father," he said calmly. "Thy perplexity hath not been +untangled for thee, nor even a thread pulled which shall start it +raveling. The priesthood can kill Mesu," he said to Loi, "and it will +do them no hurt. And thou, my father, canst countenance it and seem no +worse than any other monarch that loved his throne. Thus ye will +decapitate the monster. But there be creatures in the desert which, +losing one head, grow another. Mesu is not of such exalted or +supernatural villainy that they can not fill his place. Wilt thou +execute Israel one by one as it raises up a leader against thee? Nay; +and wilt thou play the barbarian and put two and a half million at once +to the sword?" + +The trio looked uncomfortable, none more so than the Pharaoh. The +prince went on mercilessly. + +"Are the Hebrews warriors? Wouldst thou go against a host of +trowel-wielding slaves with an army that levels lances only against +free-born men? And yet, wilt thou wait till all Israel shall crowd +into thy presence and defy thee before thou actest? And again, wilt +thou descend on them with arms now when they may with Justice cry 'What +have we done to thee?' Thou art beset, my father." + +The Pharaoh opened his lips as if to answer, but the level eye of the +prince silenced him. + +"Thou hast not fathomed the Hebrew's capabilities, my father," Rameses +continued. "In him is a wealth, a power, a magnificence that thy +fathers and mine built up for thee, and the time is ripe for the +garnering of thy profit. What monarch of the sister nations hath two +and a half millions of hereditary slaves--not tributary folk nor +prisoners of war--but slaves that are his as his cattle and his flocks +are his? What monarch before thee had them? None anywhere, at any +time. Thou art rich in bond-people beyond any monarch since the gods +reigned." + +The chagrin died on the Pharaoh's face and he wore an expectant look. +The prince continued in even tones. + +"By use, they have fitted themselves to the limits laid upon them by +the great Rameses. The feeble have died and the frames of the sturdy +have become like brass. They have bred like beetles in the Nile mud +for numbers. Ignorant of their value, thou hast been indifferent to +their existence. Forgetting them was pampering them. They have lived +on the bounty of Egypt for four hundred years and, save for the wise +inflictions of a year or two by the older Pharaohs, they have +flourished unmolested. How they repay thee, thou seest by this +writing. Now, by the gods, turn the face of a master upon them. +Remove the soft driver, Atsu, and put one in his stead who is worthy +the office. Tickle them to alacrity and obedience with the lash--yoke +them--load them--fill thy canals, thy quarries, thy mines with them--" +He broke off and moved forward a step squarely facing the Pharaoh. + +"Thou hast thine artist--that demi-god Mentu, in whom there is +supernatural genius for architecture as well as sculpture. Make him +thy murket[2] as well, and with him dost thou know what thou canst do +with these slaves? Thou canst rear Karnak in every herdsman's village; +thou canst carve the twin of Ipsambul in every rock-front that faces +the Nile; thou canst erect a pyramid tomb for thee that shall make an +infant of Khufu; thou canst build a highway from Syene to Tanis and +line it with sisters of the Sphinx; thou canst write the name of +Meneptah above every other name on the world's monuments and it shall +endure as long as stone and bronze shall last and tradition go on from +lip to lip!" + +The prince paused abruptly. Meneptah was on his feet, almost in tears +at the contemplation of his pictured greatness. + +"Mark ye!" the prince began again. His arm shot out and fell and the +flash of its jewels made it look like a bolt of lightning. "I would +not fall heir to Israel--and if these things are done in thy lifetime I +must build my monuments with prisoners of war!" + +The old hierarch, who had been nervously rubbing the arm of his chair +during the last of the prince's speech, broke the dead silence with an +awed whisper. + +"Ah, then spake the Incomparable Pharaoh!" + +Meneptah put out his hand, smiling. + +"No more. The way is shown, I follow, O my Rameses!" + + + +[1] Osiris--the great god of Egypt, was overcome by Set, his body +divided and scattered over the valley of the Nile. Isis, wife of +Osiris, gathered up the remains and buried them at This or Abydos. + +[2] Murket--the royal architect, an exalted office usually held by +princes of the realm. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE LADY MIRIAM + +Meanwhile the scribe of the "double house of life," and the son of the +royal sculptor were taking comfort on the palace-top beneath the subdued +light of a hooded lamp. + +The pair had spoken of all Memphis and its gossip; had given account of +themselves and had caught up with the present time in the succession of +events. + +"Hotep, at thy lofty notch of favor, one must have the wisdom of Toth," +Kenkenes observed, adding with a laugh, "mark thou, I have compared thee +with no mortal." + +Hotep shook his head. + +"Nay, any man may fill my position so he but knows when to hold his +tongue and what to say when he wags it." + +"O, aye," the sculptor admitted in good-natured irony. "Those be simple +qualifications and easy to combine." + +The scribe smiled. + +"Mine is no arduous labor now. During my years of apprenticeship I was +sorely put to it, but now I have only to wait upon the king and look to +it that mine underlings are not idle. If another war should come--if any +manner of difficulty should arise in matters of state, I doubt not mine +would be a heavy lot." + +The young man spoke of war and fellowship with a monarch as if he had +been a lady's page and gossiped of fans and new perfumes. + +Kenkenes looked at him with a full realization of the incongruity of the +youth of the man and the weight of the office that was his. + +But at close range the scribe's face was young only in feature and tint. +He was born of an Egyptian and a Danaid, and the blond alien mother had +impressed her own characteristics very strongly on her son. + +He had a plump figure with handsome curves, waving, chestnut hair and a +fair complexion. Nose and forehead were in line. The eyes were of that +type of gray that varies in shade with the mental state. His temper +displayed itself only in their sudden hardening into the hue of steel; +content and happiness made them blue. They were always steady and +comprehending, so that whoever entered his presence for the first time +said to himself: "Here is a man that discovers my very soul." + +Whatever other blunder Meneptah might have made, he had redeemed himself +in the wisdom he displayed in choosing his scribe. Kenkenes had been led +to ask how Hotep had come to his place. + +"My superior, Pinem, died without a son," the scribe had explained; "and +as my record was clean, and the princes had ever been my patrons, the +Pharaoh exalted me to the scribeship." + +Kenkenes had then set down a mark in favor of the princes. + +"I doubt not," the scribe observed at last, "that my time of ease is +short-lived." + +The sculptor looked at him with inquiry in his eyes. + +"When sedition arises and defies the Pharaoh in his audience chamber," +Hotep went on, "it has reached the stage of a single alternative--success +or death. Dost know the Lady Miriam?" + +"The Israelite?" + +"Even so." + +"I saw her this day." + +"Good. Now, look upon the scene. Thou knowest she is the sister of +Prince Mesu, and the favorite waiting-woman of the good Queen Thermuthis. +She has lived in obscurity for forty years, but this morning she swept +into the audience chamber, did majestic obeisance and besought a word +'with him who was an infant in her maturity,' she said. The council +chamber was filled with those gathered to welcome Har-hat. Meneptah bade +her speak. Hast thou ever heard an Israelitish harangue?" he broke off +suddenly. + +Kenkenes shook his head. + +"Ah, theirs is pristine oratory--occult eloquence," the scribe said +earnestly, "and she is mistress of the art. She told the history of +Israel and catalogued its wrongs in a manner that lacked only measure and +music to make it a song. But, Kenkenes, she did not move us to +compunction and pity. When she had done, we had not looked on a picture +of suffering and oppression, but of insulted pride and rebellion. +Instead of compunction, she awakened admiration, instead of pity, +respect. For the moment she represented, not a multitude of complaining +slaves, but a race of indignant peers. + +"Meneptah--ah! the good king," the scribe went on, "was impressed like +the rest of us. But finally he showed her that the Israelites were what +they were by the consent of the gods; that their unwillingness but +increased the burden. He pointed out the example of his illustrious +sires as justification for his course; enumerated some of their +privileges,--the fertile country given them by Egypt, and the freedom +that was theirs to worship their own God,--and summarily refused to +indulge them further. + +"Then she became ominous. She bade him have a care for the welfare of +Egypt before he refused her. Her words were dark and full of evil +portent. The air seemed to winnow with bat-wings and to reek with vapors +from witch-potions and murmur with mystic formulas. Every man of us +crept, and drew near to his neighbor. When she paused for an answer, the +king hesitated. She had menaced Egypt and it stirreth the heart of the +father when the child is threatened. He turned to Har-hat in his +perplexity and craved his counsel. The fan-bearer laughed good-naturedly +and begged the Pharaoh's permission to send her to the mines before she +bewitched his cattle and troubled him with visions. Har-hat's unconcern +made men of us all once more, but Meneptah shook his head. 'The name of +Neferari Thermuthis defends her,' he said; 'let her go hence'." + +"'And I take no amelioration to my people?' she demanded. 'Nay,' he +replied, 'not in the smallest part shall their labor be lessened.' + +"Holy Isis, thou shouldst have seen her then, Kenkenes! + +"She approached the very dais of the throne and, throwing up her arms, +flung her defiance into the face of her sovereign. It were treason to +utter her words again. I have seen men white and shaking from rage, but +Meneptah never hath so much of temper to display. Far be it from me to +say that the king was afraid, but I tell you, Kenkenes, mine own hair is +not yet content to lie flat. She concentrated all the denunciatory +bitterness of the tongue and pronounced and gloried in the doom of the +dynasty, heaping the blame of its destruction upon the head of Meneptah!" + +The scribe finished his story in a whisper. Kenkenes was by this time +sitting up, his eyes shining with interest and wonder. + +"Gods! Hotep, thou dost make me creep." + +"Creep!" the scribe responded heartily, "never in my life have I so +wanted to flee a royal audience. When she had done, she turned and swept +from the presence and no man lifted a finger to stay her." + +For a moment there was an expressive silence between the two young men. +At last Kenkenes broke it in a voice of intense admiration. + +"What an intrepid spirit! Small wonder that she did not heed the +condemnation of the rabble at mid-day--she who was fresh from a triumph +over the Pharaoh!" + +Hotep's eyes widened warningly and he shook his head. + +"Nay, hush me not, Hotep," Kenkenes went on in a reckless whisper. "I +must say it. Would to the gods I had been there to copy it in stone!" + +"Hush! babbler!" the scribe exclaimed, his eyes twinkling nevertheless, +"thine art will make an untimely mummy of thee yet." + +Kenkenes poured out his first glass of wine and set it down untasted. +The contemplated sacrilege in stone opposite Memphis confronted him. + +"If Egypt's lack of art does not kill me first," he added in defense. + +"Nay," Hotep protested, "why wouldst thou perpetuate the affront to the +Pharaoh?" + +"Because it is history and a better delineation of the Israelitish +character than all the wordy chronicles of the historians could depict," +was the spirited reply. + +"But the ritual," Hotep began, with the assurance of a man that feels he +is armed with unanswerable argument. + +"Sing me no song of the ritual," Kenkenes broke in impatiently. "The +ritual offends mine ears--my sight, my sense. We have quarreled beyond +any treaty-making--ever." + +The other looked at him with amazement and much consternation. + +"Art thou mad?" he exclaimed. + +"Nay, but I am rebellious--as rebellious as the Israelite, for I have +already shaken my fist in the face of the sculptor's canons. And the +time will come when the world will call my revolt just. I would there +were a chronicler, here, now, to write me down, since I would be +remembered as the pioneer. I shall win no justification, in these days, +perhaps only persecution, but I would reap my reward of honor, though it +be a thousand years in coming." + +"Thou hast a grudge against the conventional forms and the rules of the +ritual?" Hotep asked, after a thoughtful silence. + +"I have a distaste for the horrors it compels and am ignorant of their +use," Kenkenes answered stubbornly. + +"Kenkenes," the scribe began, "Law is a most inexorable thing. It is the +governor of the Infinite. It is a tyrant, which, good or bad, can demand +and enforce obedience to its fiats. It is a capricious thing and it +drags its vassal--the whole created world--after it in its mutations, or +stamps the rebel into the dust while the time-serving obedient ones +applaud. So thou hast set up resistance against a thing greater than +gods and men and I can not see thee undone. I love thee, but I should be +an untrue friend did I abet thee in thy lawlessness. Submit gracefully +and thy cause shall have an audience with Law some day--if it have merit." + +The young sculptor's face was passive, but his eyes were fixed sadly on +the remote stars strewn above him. He felt inexpressibly solitary. His +zest in his convictions did not flag, but it seemed that the whole world +and the heavens had receded and left him alone with them. + +Again Hotep spoke. + +"There is more court gossip," he began cheerily, as if no word had been +said that could depress the tone of the conversation. + +Kenkenes accepted the new subject gladly. + +"Out with it," he said. "Within the four walls of my world I hear naught +but the clink of mallet and falling stone." + +"The breach between Meneptah and Amon-meses, his mutinous brother, may be +healed by a wedding." + +"So?" + +"Of a surety--nay, and not of a surety, either, but mayhap. A match +between the niece of Amon-meses, the Princess Ta-user, and the heir, +Rameses." + +Kenkenes sat up again in his earnestness. "Nay," he exclaimed. "Never!" + +"Wherefore, I pray thee?" Hotep asked with a deprecating smile. + +"There is no mating between the lion and the eagle; the stag and the asp! +They could not love." + +"Thou dreamy idealist!" Hotep laughed. "The half of great marriages are +moves of strategy, attended more by Set[1] than Athor.[2] Ta-user is mad +for the crown, Rameses for undisputed power. Each has one of these two +desirable things to give the other." + +"And how shall they appease Athor?" Kenkenes demanded warmly. "Ta-user +loves Siptah, the son of Amon-meses, and Rameses will crown whom he loves +though he had a thousand other crown-loving, treaty-dowered wives!" + +Hotep smiled. "I thought the four walls of thy world hedged thee, but it +seems thou art right well acquainted with royalty." + +"Scoff!" Kenkenes cried. "But I can tell thee this: Rameses will put his +foot on the neck of Amon-meses if the pretender trouble him, and will wed +with a slave-girl if she break the armor over his iron heart." + +Hotep laughed again and suggested another subject. + +"The new fan-bearer," he began. + +"Nay, what of him?" Kenkenes broke in at once. + +"And shall we quarrel about him, also?" + +"Dost thou know him?" Hotep queried. + +"Right well--from afar and by hearsay." + +"Do thou express thyself first concerning him, and I shall treat thee to +the courtier's diplomacy if I agree not." + +"I like him not," Kenkenes responded bluntly. + +Hotep leaned toward him, with the smile gone from his face, the jest from +his manner, and laid his hand on the sculptor's. The pressure spoke +eloquently of hearty concord. "But he has a charming daughter," he said. + +Kenkenes inspected his friend's face critically, but there was nothing to +be read thereon. + +A palace attendant approached across the paved roof and bent before the +scribe. + +"A summons from the Son of Ptah, my Lord," he said. + +"At this hour?" Hotep said in some surprise as he arose. "I shall return +immediately," he told Kenkenes. + +"Nay," the sculptor observed, "my time is nearly gone. Let me depart +now." + +"Not so. I would go with thee. This will be no more than a note. If it +be more I shall put mine underlings to the task." + +He disappeared in the dark. Kenkenes lay back on the divan and thought +on the many things that the scribe had told him. But chiefly he pondered +on Har-hat and the Israelite. + +When Hotep returned he carried his cowl and mantle, and a scroll. "I +too, am become a messenger," he said, "but I am self-appointed. This +note was to go by a palace courier, but I relieved him of the task." + +The pair made ready and departed through the still populous streets of +Thebes to the Nile. There they were ferried over to the wharves of Luxor. + +At the temple the porter conducted them into the chamber in which the +ancient prelate spent his shortening hours of labor. He was there now, +at his table, and greeted the young men with a nod. But taking a second +look at Hotep, he beckoned him with a shaking finger. + +"Didst bring me aught, my son?" he asked as the scribe bent over him. + +"Aye, holy Father; this message to the taskmaster over Pa-Ramesu." + +"Ah," the old man said. "Is that not yet gone?" + +"Nay, the Pharaoh asks that thou insert the name of him whom thou didst +recommend for Atsu's place. The Son of Ptah had forgotten him." + +The old man pushed several scrolls aside and prepared to make the +addition.. + +"But thou art weary, holy Father; let me do it," Hotep protested gently. + +"Nay, nay, I can do it," the old man insisted. "See!" drawing forth a +scroll unaddressed, "I have written all this in an hour. O aye, I can +write with the young men yet." He made the interlineation, rolled the +scroll and sealed it. "I am sturdy, still." At that moment, he dropped +his pen on the floor and bent to pick it up, but was forestalled by +Hotep. Then he addressed the scrolls, carefully dried the ink with a +sprinkling of sand and delivered one to Hotep, the other to Kenkenes. +"This to the king, and that to Snofru. The gods give thee safe journey," +he continued to Kenkenes. "Who art thou, my son?" + +"I am the son of Mentu, holy Father. My name is Kenkenes," the young man +answered. + +"Mentu, the royal sculptor?" + +Kenkenes bowed. + +"Nay, but I am glad. I knew thy father, and since thou art of his blood, +thou art faithful. Let neither death nor fear overtake thee, for thou +hast the peace of Egypt in thy very hands. Fail not, I charge thee!" + +After a reverent farewell, the two young men went forth. + +A slender Egyptian youth went with them to the wharves and awakened the +sleeping crew of a bari. + +Hotep they carried across and set ashore on the western side. + +"May the same favoring god that brought thee hither, grant thee a safe +journey home, my friend. The court comes to Memphis shortly. Till then, +farewell," said Hotep. + +"All Memphis will hail her illustrious son, O Hotep. Farewell." + +It was not long until the sculptor was drifting down toward Memphis under +a starry sky--the shadowy temples of Thebes hidden by the sudden +closing-in of the river-hills about her. + + + +[1] Set--the war-god. + +[2] Athor--the Egyptian Venus; the feminine love-deity. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ATHOR, THE GOLDEN + +At sunrise the morning after his return from On, Kenkenes appeared at +the Nile, attended by a burden-bearing slave. + +The first lean, brown boatman who touched his knee and offered his bari +for hire, Kenkenes patronized. The slave had eased his load into the +boat and Kenkenes was on the point of embarking when a four-oared bari, +which had passed them like the wind a moment before, put about several +rods above them and returned to the group on shore. + +A bent and withered servitor was standing in the bow of the boat, +wildly gesticulating, as if he feared Kenkenes would insist on pulling +away despite his efforts. The young man recognized the servant of +Snofru, old Ranas. + +The large bari was beached and the servitor alighted with agility and, +beckoning to Kenkenes, took him aside. + +"There has been an error--a grave error, concerning the message," the +old man began in excitement; "but thou art in no wise at fault. Yet +mayhap thou canst aid us in unraveling the tangle. See!" + +He displayed the linen-wrapped roll, the covering split where Snofru +had opened it, but the wavering hieratic characters of the address in +Loi's hand, still intact. + +When the young sculptor had gazed, the old servant nervously undid the +roll, and showed within a letter to the commander over Pa-Ramesu, +written in the strong epistolary symbols of the royal scribe. + +Kenkenes frowned with vexation. Innocent and efficient though he had +been, the miscarriage of his mission stung him nevertheless. The +blunder was not long a mystery to him. + +Summoning all the patience at his command, he recounted the events in +the apartments of the ancient hierarch of Amen. + +"There were two Scrolls," he explained; "one to the Servant of Ra at +On, the other to Atsu. The holy father sealed them both before he +addressed them and confused the directions. The one which I should +have brought to thine august master, hath gone to the taskmaster over +Pa-Ramesu." + +"Thou madest all speed?" the servant demanded, trembling with eagerness. + +"A half-day's journey less than the usual time I made in returning. I +doubt much, if the messenger with the other scroll hath passed Memphis +yet, since he may not have been despatched in such hot haste. +Furthermore, because of the festivities in Tape, it would have been +well-nigh impossible for him to hire a boat until the next day." + +This information kindled a light of hope on the old servant's face. + +"Thou givest me life again," he exclaimed. "The blessings of Ra be +upon thee!" + +Without further words he ran back to the boat, and the last Kenkenes +saw of him, he was frantically urging his boatmen to greater speed, +back to On. + +Kenkenes had come to the Nile that morning, rejoicing in the +propitiousness of his opportunity. Mentu was at that moment in On, +seeing to the decoration of the second obelisk reared by Meneptah to +the sun. The great artist had prepared to be absent a month, and had +left no work for his son to do. But the coming of Ranas with the news +of his mission's failure had filled Kenkenes with angry discomfiture. + +He dismissed his slave and rowed down-stream toward Masaarah. + +As he approached the abandoned wharf, a glance showed him that some +effort toward restoring it had been made. The overgrowth of vines had +been cut away and the level of the top had been raised by several +fragments of rough stone. + +The tracks of heavy sledges had crushed the young grain across the +field toward the cliffs. + +Kenkenes stood up and looked toward the terraced front of the hills, in +which were the quarries. + +There were dust, smoke, stir and moving figures. + +The stone-pits were active again after the lapse of half a century. + +"By the grace of the mutable Hathors," the young man muttered as he +dropped back into his seat, "my father may yet decorate a temple to +Set, but by the same favor, it seems that I shall be snatched from the +brink of a sacrilege." + +He permitted his boat to drift while he contemplated his predicament. +Suddenly he smote his hands together. + +"Grant me pardon, ye Seven Sisters!" he exclaimed. + +"I misread your decree. Ye have but covered my tracks toward +transgression." + +After a little thought he resumed his felicitations. + +"Who of Memphis will think I come to Masaarah, save to look after the +taking out of stone? Is it not part of my craft? Nay, but I shall +make offering in the temple for this. And need any of these unhappy +creatures in Masaarah see me except as it pleases me to show myself?" + +He seized his oars and rowed down the river another furlong. Leaving +the craft fixed in the tangle of herbage at the water's edge, he +shouldered his cargo and crossed the narrow plain to the cliffs below +Masaarah. There he made a difficult ascent of the fronts facing the +Nile and reached his block of stone without approaching the hamlet of +laborers. + +Depositing his burden, he set forth to reconnoiter. He descended again +into the Nile valley by the way he had come and wandered toward the +mouth of the gorge. From a little distance he looked upon a scene of +great activity. In the shadow of one of the dilapidated hovels, four +humped oxen stood, their heavy harness still hanging upon them, though +the sledges they drew, covered with stone dust and broken pieces, were +some distance away from them. A company of half a score of children +were ascending in single file, along a slanting plane of planks, into +the hollow in the cliff upon which work had been renewed. Along the +rock-wall ahead of them a scaffold had been erected and here were men +drilling holes in the stone, or driving wooden wedges into the holes +already made, or pouring water on the wedges as the skins the children +bore were passed up to them. + +Kenkenes picked his way through the debris of sticks, stones, dust and +cast-off water-skins, and serenely disregarding the stare of the +laborers, went up to the edge of the stone-pit and watched the work +with interest. A constant stream of broken stone rattled down under +the scaffold and long runlets of water fed an ever increasing pool in +the depression before the cliff. A single slab of irregular dimensions +lay on the sand at the base of a wooden chute, down which it had +descended from the hollow in the cliff the evening before. The cavity +it left bade fair to enlarge by nightfall, for the swelling wedges were +rending another slab from its bedding with loud reports and the sudden +etching of fissures. + +The young sculptor noted with some wonder that the laborers were +Israelites. + +After a time Kenkenes turned away and addressed one of the bearded men +at that moment, ascending the wooden plane. + +"What do ye here?" he asked. + +The man answered in unready Egyptian, but, for an inferior, in a manner +curiously collected. + +"The Pharaoh addeth to the burden of the chosen people. We dig stone +for a temple to the war-god." + +"The chosen people!" Kenkenes repeated inquiringly. + +"The children of Israel," the Hebrew explained. Kenkenes lifted one +eyebrow quizzically and went his way. As he leaped up into the gorge +he vaguely realized that he had seen no trace of an encampment near the +hamlet, which he knew to be uninhabitable. + +"Of a truth, the chosen people seem to follow me of late," he said to +himself as he rambled up the valley. "Meneptah must have scattered +them out of Goshen into all the corners of Egypt." + +As he turned the last winding of the gorge he came upon a cluster of +some threescore tents, spread over the level pocket at the valley's +end. Almost against the northern wall the house of the commander had +been built to receive the earliest shadow of the afternoon. The +military standard was raised upon its roof and a scribe, making entries +on a roll of linen, sat cross-legged on a mat before the door. In one +of the narrow ways between the tents an old woman, very bowed and +voluminously clad, prepared a great hamper of lentils and another of +papyrus root for the noonday meal. One or two children sitting on the +earth beside her rendered her assistance, and a third kept the turf +fire glowing under a huge bubbling caldron. Kenkenes passed through +the camp by this narrow way and paused to look with much curiosity at +the ancient Israelite. Never had he seen any old person so active or a +slave so wrapped in covering. He hoped she would lift her head that he +might see her face; and even as he wished, she pierced him with a look +which, from her midnight eyes, seemed like lightning from a +thunder-cloud. + +"Gods!" he exclaimed as he retreated up the slope behind the camp. And +a moment later he continued his soliloquy in a voice that struggled +between mirth and amazement: "Have I never seen an Israelite until I +beheld these twain, the Lady Miriam and that bent dart of lightning in +the valley? If these be Israelites I never saw one before. If those +cowed shepherds that have strayed now and again out of Goshen be +Hebrews, then these are not. And the gods shield me from the disfavor +of them, be they slaves or sibyls!" + +When he reached his block of stone he unrolled his load of equipments +and set to work without delay. He was remote from any possible +interruption from Memphis, and the slaves in the gorge and in the +stone-pits had no opportunity to come upon his sacrilege in idle hours. +They would be held like prisoners within the limits of the quarries. +His sense of security had been strengthened by the renewed activities +in Masaarah. + +With a shovel of tamarisk he cleared the slab of its drift of sand. He +found that the block broadened at the base and was separate from the +sheet of rock on which it stood. Among his supplies was a roll of reed +matting, and with this cut into proper lengths, he carpeted a +considerable space about the block. Precaution rather than luxury had +prompted this procedure, since the chipped stone falling on the +covering could be carried cleanly and at once from the spot. + +Pausing long enough to eat a thin slice of white bread and +gazelle-meat, and to drink a draft from the porous and ever cooling +water bottle, he turned to the protection and concealment of his statue. + +The place was strewn with tolerably regular fragments, and the building +of a segment of wall to the north at the edge of the matting required +more time than strength or skill. He built solidly against the +penetrative sand, and as high as his head. The early afternoon blazed +upon him and passed into the mellower hours of the later day before he +had finished. He hid his shovel and two cylindrical billets of wood, +such as were used to roll great weights, under the edge of his reed +carpet, and his preparations were complete. He wiped his brow, +congratulating himself on the snugness of his retreat and the +auspicious beginning of his transgression. + +Weary and happy, he rowed himself back to Memphis and slept soundly on +the eve of a great offense against the laws of Egypt. + +But the next day, when the young sculptor faced the moment of actual +creation, he realized that his goddess must take form from an +unembodied idea. The ritual had been his guide before, and his genius, +set free to soar as it would, fluttered wildly without direction. His +visions were troubled with glamours of the old conventional forms; his +idea tantalized him with glimpses of its perfect self too fleeting for +him to grasp. The sensation was not new to him. During his maturer +years he had tried to remember his mother's face with the same yearning +and heart-hurting disappointment. But this time he groped after +attributes which should shape the features--he had spirit, not form, in +mind; and the odds against which his unguided genius must battle were +too heroic for it to succeed without aid. The young sculptor realized +that he was in need of a model. Stoically, he admitted that such a +thing was as impossible as it was indispensable. It seemed that he had +met complete bafflement. + +He took up his tools and returned to Memphis. But each succeeding +morning found him in the desert again, desperately hopeful--each +succeeding evening, in the city disheartened and silent. + +So it followed for several days. + +On the sixth of January the festival in honor of the return of Isis +from Phenicia was celebrated in Memphis. Kenkenes left the revel in +mid-afternoon and crossed the Nile to the hills. He found no content +away from his block of stone--no happiness before it. But he wandered +back to the seclusion of the niche that he might be moody and sad of +eye in all security. + +The stone-pits were deserted. The festivities in Memphis had extended +their holiday to the dreary camp at Masaarah. Kenkenes climbed up to +his retreat and remained there only a little time. The unhewn rock +mocked him. + +He descended through the gorge and found that the Hebrews were but +nominally idle. A rope-walk had been constructed and the men were +twisting cables of tough fiber. The Egyptians lounged in the long +shadows of the late afternoon and directed the work with no effort and +little concern. The young sculptor overlooked the scene as long as it +interested him and continued down the valley toward the Nile. + +Presently a little company of Hebrew children approached, their bare +feet making velvety sounds in the silence of the ravine. Each balanced +a skin of water on his head. The little line obsequiously curved +outward to let the nobleman pass, and one by one the sturdy children +turned their luminous eyes up to him, some with a flash of white teeth, +some with a downward dip of a bashful head. One of them disengaged a +hand from his burden and swept a tangle of moist black curls away from +his eyes. The sun of the desert had not penetrated that pretty thatch +and the forehead was as fair as a lotus flower. + +Kenkenes caught himself looking sharply at each face as he passed, for +it contained somewhat of that for which he sought. As he walked along +looking after them he became aware that some one was near him, He +turned his head and stopped in his tracks. + +He confronted his idea embodied--Athor, the Golden! + +It was an Israelitish maiden, barely sixteen years old, but in all his +life he had never looked upon such beauty. He had gazed with pleased +eyes on the slender blush-tinted throats and wrists of the Egyptian +beauties, but never had he beheld such whiteness of flesh as this. He +had sunk himself in the depths of the dusky, amorous eyes of high-born +women of Memphis, but here were fathomless profundities of azure that +abashed the heavens. He had been very near to loveliest hair of Egypt, +so close that its odorous filaments had blown across his face and his +artist senses had been caught and tangled in its ebon sorcery. But +down each side this broad brow was a rippling wave of gold, over each +shoulder a heavy braid of gold that fell, straightened by its own +weight, a span below the waist. The winds of the desert had roughened +it and the bright threads made a nimbus about the head. Its glory +overreached his senses and besieged his soul. Here was not witchery, +but exaltation. + +Enraptured with her beauty, her perfect fulfilment of his needs, he +realized last the unlovely features of her presence. She balanced a +heavy water pitcher on her head and wore a rough surplice, more +decorous than the dress of the average bondwoman, but the habit of a +slave, nevertheless. He had halted directly in her path, and after a +moment's hesitancy she passed around him and went on. + +Immediately Kenkenes recovered himself and with a few steps overtook +her. Without ceremony he transferred the heavy pitcher to his own +shoulder. The girl turned her perfect face, full of amazement, to him, +and a wave of color dyed it swiftly. + +"Thy burden is heavy, maiden," was all he said. + +The bulk of the jar on the farther shoulder made it necessary for him +to turn his face toward her, but she was uneasy under the intent gaze +of his level black eyes. She dropped behind him, but he slackened his +pace and kept beside her. For the moment he was no longer the man of +pulse and susceptibility but the artist. Therefore her thoughts and +sensations were apart from his concern. The unfamiliar perfection of +the Semitic countenance bewildered him. He took up his panegyric. +Never was a mortal countenance so near divine. And the sumptuousness +of her figure--its faultless curves and lines, its lissome roundness, +its young grace, the beauty of arm and neck and ankle! Ah! never did +anything entirely earthly dwell in so fair, so splendid a form. + +As they neared the camp the girl spoke to him for the first time. He +recognized in her voice the same serene tone he had noted in his talk +with the Hebrew some days before. + +"Give me my burden now," she said. "Thou hast affronted thy rank for +me, and I thank thee many times." + +The sculptor paused and for a moment stood embarrassed. It went sorely +against his gallantry to lay the burden again upon her and he said as +much. + +"Nay, Egypt has no qualms against loading the Hebrew," she said +quietly. "Wouldst thou put thy nation to shame?" + +Kenkenes opened his eyes in some astonishment. + +"Now am I even more loath," he declared. "What art thou called?" + +"Rachel." + +"It hath an intrepid sound, but Athor would become thee better. Now I +am a sculptor from the city, come to study thy women for a frieze," he +continued unblushingly, "and I would go no farther in my search. +Rachel repeated will be beauty multiplied. Let me see thee once in a +while,--to-morrow." + +A sudden flush swept over her face and her eyes darkened. + +"It shall not keep thee from thy labor," he added persuasively. + +The color deepened and she made a motion of dissent. + +"Nay! thou dost not refuse me!" he exclaimed, his astonishment evident +in his voice. + +"Of a surety," she replied. "Give me my burden, I pray thee." + +Dumb with amazement, too genuine to contain any anger, Kenkenes obeyed. +As she went up the shady gorge, walking unsteadily under the heavy +pitcher, he stood looking after her in eloquent silence. + +And in eloquent silence he turned at last and continued down the +valley. There was nothing to be said. His appreciation of his own +discomfiture was too large for any expression. + +In a few steps he met the short captain who governed the quarries. +Kenkenes guessed his office by his dress. He was adorned in festal +trappings, for he had spent most of the day in revel across the Nile. + +"Dost thou know Rachel, the Israelitish maiden?" Kenkenes asked, +planting himself in the man's way. + +"The yellow-haired Judahite?" the man inquired, a little surprised. + +"Even so," was the reply. + +The soldier nodded. + +"Look to it that she is put to light labor," the sculptor continued, +gazing loftily down into the narrow eyes. The soldier squared off and +inspected the nobleman. It did not take him long to acknowledge the +young sculptor's right to command. + +"It does not pay to be tender with an Israelite," the man answered +sourly. + +Kenkenes thrust his hand into the folds of his tunic over his breast +and, drawing forth a number of golden rings strung on a cord, jingled +them musically. + +The soldier grinned. + +"That will coax a man out of his dearest prejudice. I will put her +over the children." + +Kenkenes dropped the money into the man's palm. + +"I shall have an eye to thee," he said warningly. "Cheat me not." + +He went his way. The incident restored to him the power of speech. + +"Now, by Horus," he began, "am I to be denied by an Israelite that +which the favoring Hathors designed I should have? Not while the arts +of strategy abide within me. The children, I take it, will come here +with the water," he cogitated, stamping upon the wet and deserted ledge +which he had reached, "and here will she be, also." + +He raised his eyes to the ragged line of rocks topping the northern +wall of the gorge. + +"I shall perch myself there like a sacred hawk and filch her likeness. +Nay, now that I come to ponder on it, it is doubtless better that she +know naught about it. She might drop certain things to the Egyptians +hereabout that would lead to mine undoing. The gods are with me, of a +truth." + +He descended into the larger valley and went singing toward the Nile. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE PUNISHMENT OF ATSU + +One late afternoon, in the streets of Pa-Ramesu, a curious new-comer +bowed before Atsu, the commander of Israel of the treasure city. The +visitor was old and tremulous from fatigue, and the stains of hard +travel were evident upon him. + +"Greeting, Atsu. The peace of the divine Mother attend thee," he said. +"Snofru, the beloved of Ra at On, sends thee greeting by his servant, +Ranas." + +"Greeting," the taskmaster replied, after he had inspected the +white-browed servant. "The shelter of my roof and the bread of my +board are thine;" adding after a little pause, "and in truth thou +seemest to need these things." + +The old man smiled an odd wry smile and followed lamely after the long +swinging stride of the commander toward the headquarters on the knoll. + +Within the house of Atsu, Ranas delivered into the hands of the soldier +the message that Kenkenes had brought to Snofru. While Atsu undid the +roll the old servant made voluble apologies for the broken seal. The +commander stepped to the doorway for better light and read the writing. + +The old servant back in the dusk of the interior saw the stern face +harden, the heavy brows knit blackly, the dusky red fade from the +cheek. Ranas knew what the soldier read, for he had had the roll with +its broken seal, from On to Memphis and from Memphis back to On again. +But with all his astuteness he could not have guessed what extremes of +wrath and grief the insulted taskmaster suffered. The sheet rolled +itself together again and was broken and crushed in the iron fingers +that gripped it. Presently he tossed it aside. Hardly had it left his +hand before he hastened to pick it up, straightened it out and re-read +it feverishly. He forgot the old servant; but had he remembered the +man's curious gaze, no resolution could have hidden that joy which +slowly wrote itself upon his face. There was balm in the barb for all +the wound it made. This is what he read: + + +"To Atsu, Commander over the Builders of Pa-Ramesu, These: To mine ears +hath come report of mutiny and idleness through thy weak government of +my bond-people. Also that thou hast enforced my commands but feebly, +and so defeated my purposes, which were my sire's, after whose +illustrious example I reign. + +"For these and kindred inefficiencies art thou removed from the +government over Pa-Ramesu. + +"I hereby bestow upon thee another office within the limits of thy +capacity. Thou wilt take up the flagellum over Masaarah when thou hast +surrendered Pa-Ramesu to thy successor. + +"By this thou shalt learn that the Pharaohs will be ably served. + +"Horemheb of Bubastis, thy successor, accompanieth these. + +"Give him honor. MENEPTAH." + + +The diction was manifestly the king's. None other of high estate would +have inspired so spiteful a letter. But the appointment to Masaarah +made Atsu forget the sting in the second reading. To Masaarah! To +Masaarah and Rachel! He folded the broken sheet and thrust it into his +bosom. Meeting the keen eye of his guest, the color rushed back to the +taskmaster's face and he summoned two attendant Hebrews to wait upon +the old man while he went forth to gain composure in the air. + +After the old man had been fed and given such other comfort as the +soldier's house afforded, the taskmaster returned. Then Ranas shifted +his position so that he might watch his host's face most intelligently, +and turned to the real purpose of his visit. + +"Thou canst see, my master, that if thy message bore the wrapping for +the epistle to Snofru, the message to the holy father must have borne +thy name. Thou hast received no letter as yet which was not intended +for thee?" + +The question was delivered politely, but the old man thrust his curious +face forward and shook his head with a combination of interrogation and +dissent, which was highly insincere. + +"I have received naught which was not intended for me," the taskmaster +replied warmly. + +After a moment's intent contemplation of Atsu's face the courier went +on: "Nay, so had I thought. The messenger came to Snofru with all +speed and out-stripped the courier bound for Pa-Ramesu. It is even as +I had thought. He may arrive shortly, but I must tarry till he comes." + +Atsu assented bluntly, and after that if they talked it was of +impersonal things and in a desultory manner. When night came Atsu +called his attendants and had the weary old man put to bed in a +curtained corner of the house. For himself there was no sleep. + +At midnight there came the beat of hoofs on the dust-muffled ways of +Pa-Ramesu. A sentry knocked at the door of the commander and announced +a visitor. Atsu, who still sat under the unextinguished reed light, +greeted the new-comer with an exclamation of concern. The man was +covered with dust, his dress was torn and bloody, his right hand +swathed in cloths, and his lip, right cheek and eye were swollen and +discolored. + +"By Horus, friend, thou lookest ill-used," the taskmaster exclaimed. +"What has befallen thee?" + +"Naught--naught of any lasting hurt," the newcomer replied carelessly. +"We were set upon by a troop of murdering Bedouins this side of +Bubastis and had a pretty fight." + +"Aye, thou hast the stamp of its beauty upon thy face. A slave, here, +with some balsam," Atsu continued, addressing the sentry, "and a +captain of the constabulary next. We will cure these Bedouins and +their hurt at once." + +"Nay," the visitor protested. "It is only a spear-slit in my hand, and +a flying stirrup marred my face. I am well. Look to the Bedouins, +however; they ran our messenger through--Set consume them!" + +"Doubt not, we shall look to them. They grow strangely insolent of +late." + +"Small wonder," the other responded heartily. "Is not the whole north +a seething pot of lawlessness; and by the demons of Amenti, is not the +Israelite the fire under the caldron? Nay, but I shall have especial +joy in damping him!" + +The man laughed and dropped into the chair Atsu had offered him. + +"Then thou art Horemheb, the new taskmaster over Pa-Ramesu?" + +"So! has my news outridden me?" the man exclaimed in very evident +amazement. + +Ranas, indifferently clad in a hastily donned kamis, at this moment +parted the curtains of his retreat and came forth with an apologetic +courtesy. + +"And thy messenger, sir? What of him?" he asked eagerly. + +"Dead, and left at a wayside house." + +"And the message?" the old man persisted. + +Horemheb surveyed him with increasing astonishment. + +"Where hast thou these tidings?" he demanded. "They are scarce three +hours old. Who reached thee with them before me?" + +Atsu interposed and explained the interchange of letters. + +"Oh," said Horemheb. "So the correct message came to thee, +nevertheless, good Atsu. But I can not tell thee aught of the other. +It is lost." + +"Lost!" Ranas shrieked. + +"Gods! old man. It was only pigment and papyrus, not gold or jewels. +A kindly disposed Hebrew came to our help with some of his people, and +we put the Bedouins to flight. But after the struggle, search as we +might with torches which the Hebrew brought, the message was not to be +found. A Bedouin made off with it, I doubt not." + +Ranas stood speechless for an instant, and then he rushed up to the new +taskmaster. + +"His name?" he demanded fiercely. "The Hebrew! What was he like? +Where does he dwell?" + +"A murrain on the maniac!" Horemheb exploded. + +"He called himself Aaron!" + +Ranas staggered against the wall for support and beat the air with his +arms. + +"Aaron, the brother of Mesu! O ye inscrutable Hathors!" he babbled. +"A Bedouin made off with it! Oh! Oh! What idiocy!" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE COLLAR OF GOLD + +The next morning after his meeting with the golden-haired Israelite, +Kenkenes came early to the line of rocks that topped the north wall of +the gorge and, ensconced between the gray fragments, looked down unseen +on her whenever she came to the valley's mouth. All day long the +children came staggering up from the Nile, laden with dripping hides, +or returned in a free and ragged line down the green slope of the field +to the river again. + +Vastly more simple and time-saving would have been one of the capacious +water carts. But what would have employed these ten youthful Hebrews +in the event of such improvement? There was to be no labor-saving in +the quarries. Therefore, through the dust, up the weary slanting +plane, again and again till the day's work amounted to a journey of +miles, the Hebrew children toiled with their captain and co-laborer, +Rachel. + +At the summit of the wooden slope the beautiful Israelite, who had +preceded her charges, passed up the burden of each one to the Hebrews +on the scaffold. From his aery Kenkenes watched this particular phase +of her tasks with interest. She was not too far from him for the +details of her movements to be distinguishable, and the posture of the +outstretched arms and lifted face fulfilled his requirements. He +abandoned the modeling of her features for that day and copied the +attitude. Once in the morning and once in the afternoon a countryman +of hers, strong, young and but lightly bearded, stepped down from his +place on the scaffold and relieved her. The sculptor noted the act +with some degree of disquiet, hoping that the graceful protests of the +girl might prevail. When the stalwart Hebrew overrode her +remonstrances, and motioned her toward a place at the side of the +frame-work where she might rest, the young sculptor frowned +impatiently. But his humane heart chid him and he waited with some +assumption of grace till she should take up her burden again. + +At sunset he retired cautiously, but several dawns found him among the +rocks, with reed pen, papyri and molds of clay. When he climbed to his +retreat within the walls of stone, on the hillside in the late +afternoon, he hid several studies of the girl's head and statuettes of +clay under the matting. + +At last he began the creation of Athor the Golden. For days he labored +feverishly, forgetting to eat, fretting because the sun set and the +darkness held sway for so long. Having overstepped the law, he placed +no limit to the extent of his artistic transgression. + +After choosing nature as his model, he followed it slavishly. On the +occasion of his initial departure from the accepted rules, he had never +dreamed it possible to disregard ritualistic commandments so +absolutely. He even ignored the passive and meditative repose, +immemorial on the carven countenances of Egypt. + +The face of Athor, as she put forth her arms to receive the sun, must +show love, submission, eagerness and great appeal. + +As Kenkenes said this thing to himself, he lowered chisel and mallet +and paused. Posture and form would avail nothing without these +emotions written on the face. He began to wonder if he might carve +them, unaided. He had not found them in the Israelite, and he +confessed to himself, with a little laugh, a doubt that he should ever +see them on her countenance. + +Then a vagabond impulse presented itself unbidden in his mind and was +frowned down with a blush of apology to himself. And yet he remembered +his coquetry with the Lady Ta-meri as some small defense in the form of +precedent. + +"Nay," he replied to this evidence, "it is a different woman. Between +myself and Ta-meri it is even odds, and the vanquished will have +deserved his defeat." + +That evening--it was several days after the face of the goddess had +begun to emerge from the block of stone--he went to the upper end of +the gorge and passed through the camp on his way home, that he might +meet his model. + +The laborers had not returned from the quarries, though the evening +meal bubbled and fumed over the fires in the narrow avenue between the +tents. Kenkenes passed by on the outskirts of the encampment and went +on. + +Deep shadow lay on the stone-pits when Kenkenes reached the mouth of +the gorge, and a cool wind from the Nile swept across the grain. The +day's work had been prolonged in the lowering of a huge slab from its +position in its native bed. The monolith was already on the brink of +the wooden incline, and every man was at the windlasses by which the +cables controlling its descent were paid out. Kenkenes saw at a glance +that none of the water-bearers was present, and he knew the lovely +Israelite was with them. He did not pause. + +Before the sound of the quarry stir had been left behind he heard a +sharp report, the frightened shrieks of women and shouts of warning. +He looked back in time to see the huge stone turn part way round on the +chute and rush, end first, earthward. Expectant silence fell, broken +only by the vicious snarl of a flying windlass crank. But in an +instant the great slab struck the earth with a thunderous sound that +reverberated again and again from the barren hills about. A vast +all-enveloping cloud of dust and earth filled the hollow quarry like +smoke from an explosion. But there was no further outcry, and through +the outskirts of the lifting cloud men were seen making deliberate +preparations to repair the parted cable. Assured that no calamity had +occurred, Kenkenes went on. + +In a few steps he met the children water-bearers flying to the scene of +the accident. Not one of them bore a water-skin. The excited young +Hebrews did not stop to question the sculptor, but ran on, and were +swallowed up in dust. + +Half-way to the Nile he came upon her whom he sought. She was standing +alone in the midst of ten sheepskins, and the grain was wetted with the +spilled water. He pointed to the discarded hides about her. + +"The camp will go thirsty if the runaways do not return," he said. +"Thy burden is too heavy for even me to-night." + +"They will return," she answered. + +"Aye, it was naught but a parting cable and a falling rock. I was near +and saw no evidence of disaster. Had the children asked me, I should +have told them as much." + +"They will return," she repeated, and Kenkenes fancied that there was a +dismissal in this quiet repetition. But he did not mean to see it. He +went on, with a smile. + +"I am glad they did not stop, for I wanted to see thee, with that +frightened longing of a man who hath resolved on confession and meeteth +his confessor on a sudden. Now that the moment hath arrived I marvel +how I shall make my peace with Athor, whose command I most deliberately +broke." + +She raised her beautiful eyes to his face and waited for him to +proceed. The pose of the head was exactly what he wanted. Rapidly he +compared every detail of her face with his memory of the statue of +Athor, noting with satisfaction that his studies had been happily +faithful. His scrutiny was so swift and skilful that there seemed to +be nothing unusual in his gaze. + +"I am culpable but impenitent," he continued. "I shall not forswear +mine offense. Neither is there any need of a plea to justify myself, +for my very sin is its own justification. Behold me! I perched myself +like a sacred hawk at the mouth of the valley and filched thy likeness. +Do with me as thou wilt, but I shall die reiterating approval of my +deed." + +His extravagant speech wrought an interesting change on the face before +him. There was a pronounced curve of her mouth, a slight tension in +the chiseled nostril--in fact, an indefinable disdain that had not been +there before. It would become Athor well. Kenkenes understood the +look but he did not flinch. Instead he let his head drop slowly until +he looked at her from under his brows. Then he summoned into his eyes +all the wounded feeling, pathos, soft reproach and appeal, of which his +graceless young heart was capable, and gazed at her. + +Khufu might have been as easily melted by the twinkle of a rain drop. +Never in his life had he faced such comprehensive contemplation. Calm, +monumental and icy disdain deepened on every feature. + +Kenkenes stood motionless and suffered her to look at him. Being a man +of fine soul, the eloquent gaze spoke well-deserved rebuke. He knew +that his color had risen, and his eyes fell in spite of heroic efforts +to keep them steady. His sensations were unique; never had he +experienced the like. When he recovered himself her blue eyes were +fixed absently on the distant quarries. + +Every impulse urged him to set himself right in the eyes of this most +discerning slave. + +"Wilt thou forgive me?" he asked earnestly. "I would I could make thee +know I crave thy good will." + +There was no mistaking the honesty in these words. + +Her face relaxed instantly. + +"But I fear I have not set about it wisely," he added. "Let me give +thee a peace-offering to prove my contrition." + +He slipped from about his neck the collar of golden rings and moved +forward to put it about her throat. + +She drew back, her face flushing hotly under an expression of positive +pain. + +Kenkenes dropped his hands to his sides with a limpness highly +suggestive of desperate perplexity. Was not this a slave? And yet +here was the fine feeling of a princess. He stood, for once in his +life, at a loss what to do. He could not depart without the greatest +awkwardness, and yet, if he lingered, he sacrificed his comfort. +Presently he exclaimed helplessly: + +"Rachel, do thou tell me what to say or do. It seems that I but sink +myself the deeper in the quicksand of thy disapproval at every struggle +to escape. Do thou lead me out." + +He had met a slave, justed with an equal and flung up his hands in +surrender to his better. He did not confess this to himself, but his +words were admission enough. Never would his high-born spirit have +permitted him to make such a declaration to one slavish in soul. + +The straightforward acknowledgment of defeat and the genuine concern in +his voice were irresistible. She answered him at once, distantly and +calmly. + +"Thou, as an Egyptian, hast honored me, a Hebrew, with thy notice. I +have deserved neither gift nor fee." + +"Nay, but let us put it differently," he replied. "I, as a man, have +given thee, a maiden, offense, and having repented, would appease thee +with a peace-offering. Believe me, I do not jest. By the gentle +goddesses, I fear to speak," he added breathlessly. + +The Israelite's blue eyes were veiled quickly, but the Egyptian guessed +aright that she had hidden a smile in them. + +"Am I forgiven?" he persisted. + +"So thou wilt offend no further," she said without raising her eyes. + +"I promise. And now, since the goddess hath refused mine offering, I +may not take it back. What shall I do with this?" he asked, holding up +the collar of gold. + +"Put it about thy statue's neck," she said softly. + +Kenkenes gasped and retreated a step. Instantly she was imploring his +pardon. + +"It was a forward spirit in me that made me say it. I pray thee, +forgive me." + +"Thou hast given no offense, but how dost thou know of this--tell me +that." + +"I came upon it by accident three days ago. Several of the children +had gone fowling for the taskmaster's meal, and were so long absent +that I was sent to look for them. The path down the valley is old, and +I have followed it with the idea of labor ever in my mind. And this +was a moment of freedom, so I thought to spend it where I had not been +a slave, I went across the hills, and, being unfamiliar with them, lost +my way. When I climbed upon one of the great rocks to overlook the +labyrinth, lo! at my feet was the statue. I knew myself the moment I +looked, and it was not hard to guess whose work it was." + +She paused and looked at him with appeal on her face. + +"Thou hast told no one?" + +"Nay," was the quick and earnest answer. + +"Thou hast caught me in a falsehood," he said. The statement was +almost brutal in its directness. + +But the question that came back swiftly was not less pointed. + +"There was no frieze of bondmaidens--naught of anything thou hast told +me?" + +"Nay, not anything. I am carving a statue against the canons of the +sculptor's ritual for the sake of my love of beauty. Until thou didst +come upon it, I alone possessed the secret. Thou knowest the +punishment which will overtake me?" + +"Aye, I know right well. Yet fear not. The statue is right cunningly +concealed and none will ever find it, for the children were +unsuccessful and the meals for the overseer will be brought him from +the city hereafter. And I will not betray thee--I give thee my word." + +Her tone was soft and earnest; her assurances were spoken so +confidently, her interest was so genuine, that a queer and +unaccountable satisfaction possessed the young artist at once. + +At this moment the runaway water-bearers came in sight and in obedience +to very evident dismissal in the Israelite's eyes, Kenkenes bade her +farewell and left her. + +But he had not gone two paces before she overtook him. + +"Approach thy work from various directions," she cautioned, "else thou +wilt wear a path which may spy on thee one day." + +The moment the words passed her lips, Kenkenes, who still held the +collar, put it about her neck, passing his hands under the thick +plaits, and snapped the clasp accurately. + +The act was done instantly, and with but a single movement. He was +gone, laughing on his way, before she had realized what he had done. + +There was revel in the young man's veins that evening, but the great +house of his father was silent and lonely. If he would find a +companion he must leave its heavy walls. His resolution was not long +in making nor his instinct slow in directing him. An hour after the +evening meal, when he entered the chariot that waited, he had laid +aside the simple tunic, and in festal attire was, every inch of his +many inches, the son of the king's favorite artist. His charioteer +drove in the direction of the nomarch's house. + +The portress conducted him into the faintly lighted chamber of guests +and went forth silently. Kenkenes interpreted her behavior at once. + +"There is another guest," he thought with a smile, "and I can name him +as promptly as any chanting sorcerer might." When the serving woman +returned she bade him follow her and led the way to the house-top. + +There, under the subdued light of a single lamp, was the Lady Ta-meri; +at her feet, Nechutes. + +"I should wear the symbol-broidered robe of a soothsayer," the sculptor +told himself. + +"You made a longer sojourn of your visit to Tape than you had +intended," the lady said, after the greetings. + +"Nay, I have been in Memphis twenty days at least." + +"So?" queried Nechutes. "Where dost thou keep thyself?" + +"In the garb of labor among the ink-pots and papyri of the sculptor +class," the lady answered. "I warrant there are pigment marks on his +fingers even now." + +Kenkenes extended his long right hand to her for inspection. She +received it across her pink palm and scrutinized it laughingly. + +"Nay, I take it back. Here is naught but henna and a suspicion of +attar. He has been idle these days." + +"Hast thou forgotten the efficacy of the lemon in the removal of +stains?" the sculptor asked with a smile. + +The lady frowned. + +"Give us thy news from Tape, then," she demanded, putting his hand away. + +"The court is coming to Memphis sooner. That is all. O, aye, I had +well-nigh forgot. There is also talk of a marriage between Rameses and +Ta-user." + +"Fie!" the lady scoffed. "Nechutes hath more to tell than that, and he +hath stayed in Memphis." + +"Thou wilt come to realize some day, Ta-meri, that I am fitted to the +yoke of labor, when I fail thee in all the nicer walks thou wouldst +have me tread. Come, out with thy gossip, Nechutes." + +"I had a letter from Hotep to-day--a budget of news, included with +official matters with which the king would acquaint me. Ta-user, with +Amon-meses and Siptah, hath joined the court at Tape--" + +"And Siptah, she brought with her--" the sculptor interrupted softly. + +Nechutes cast an expressive look at Kenkenes and went on. + +"And the courting hath begun." + +Silence fell, and the lady looked at the two young men with wonder in +her eyes. + +"Nay, but that is interesting," Kenkenes admitted, recovering himself. +"Tell me more." + +"The offices of cup-bearer and murket are to be bestowed in Memphis," +Nechutes continued. + +"And the one falls to Nechutes," the lady declared triumphantly. + +"Of a truth thou hast a downy lot before thee, Nechutes," the young +sculptor said heartily. "And never one so deserving of it. I give +thee joy." + +"And the other goes to the noble Mentu," Nechutes added in a meek voice. + +"Sphinx!" Ta-meri cried, tapping him on the head. "You did not tell me +that." + +The surprised delight of Kenkenes was not so bewildering as to blind +him to the reason why Nechutes had withheld this news from Ta-meri. +The blunt Egyptian was not anxious to speed his rival's cause. + +"Does my father know of this?" he asked. + +"I doubt not. The same messenger that brought me news of mine own +appointment departed for On when he learned that Mentu was there." + +"Nay, but that will be wine in his veins," Kenkenes mused happily. "It +will make him young again. His late inactivity hath chafed him sorely." + +"You have come honestly by your labor-loving," Nechutes commented. +"Hotep adds further that Mentu is the only one of the king's new +ministers that is no longer a young man." + +"It is Rameses who counsels him, I doubt not," the sculptor replied. +"He hath great faith in the powers of youth. And behold what a cabinet +he hath built up for his father. First," Kenkenes continued, +enumerating on his fingers, "there is Nechutes--" + +The new cup-bearer waved his hand, and Kenkenes went on. + +"There is my father, the murket. He needs no further praise than the +utterance of his name. There is Hotep, on whose lips Toth abideth. +There is Seneferu, the faithful, whom the Rebu dreads. Next is +Kephren, the mohar,[1] who would outshine his father, the right hand of +the great Rameses, had he but nations to conquer. After him, Har-hat--" + +"Hold! He is not appointed of the prince. He was Meneptah's +choice--and his alone," Nechutes interrupted. "It is rumored that +Rameses is not over-fond of him." + +"He will be put to it to hold his high place in the face of the +prince's disfavor," Kenkenes cogitated. + +"Nay, but he presses the prince hard for generalship. It must be so, +since he could win the king's good will over the protest of Rameses. +So I doubt not he can hold his own at court by prudence and strategy." + +Meanwhile Ta-meri, in the depths of her chair, gazed at the pair +resentfully. They had grown interested in weighty things and had +seemingly forgotten her. So she sighed and bethought her how to punish +them. + +"What a relief it will be when the Pharaoh returns to Memphis!" she +murmured in the pause that now followed. "He will be more welcome to +me than the Nile overflow. The city has been a desert to me since he +departed." + +Nechutes looked at her with reproach in his eyes. + +"Consider the desert, O sweet Oasis," Kenkenes said softly. "Is not +its portion truly grievous if its single palm complain?" + +The lady dropped her eyes and her cheeks glowed even through the dusk. +After the long interval of Nechutes' blunt love-making the sculptor's +subtleties fell most gratefully on her ear. + +Nechutes scowled, sighed and finally spoke. + +"Tape is afflicted in anticipation of the king's departure," he +observed disjointedly. + +"Tape does not love Meneptah as Memphis loves him," Kenkenes answered. +"Hast thou not this moment heard Memphis pine for him? Tape would not +have spoken thus. She would have said: 'Would that the king were here +that I might ask a boon of him.' Memphis is the cradle of kings; Tape, +their tomb. Memphis is full of reverence for the Pharaohs; Tape, of +pride; Memphis of loyalty; Tape, of boon-craving. Meneptah returns to +the bosom of his mother when he returns to Memphis." + +"But he will not remain here long," Nechutes went on. "He goes to +Tanis to be near the scene of the Israelitish unrest." + +"Alas, Ta-meri, and wilt thou droop again?" Kenkenes asked. + +"I fear," she assented with a little sigh. Then, after a pause, she +asked: "Does the murket follow the court?" + +Kenkenes shook his head. "Not when the Pharaoh travels. But should he +depart permanently from Memphis my father would go. Many of the court +returning hither will not proceed to Tanis. The city will not be so +desolate then as now." + +"Nay, but I am glad," she said. "Those who remain will suffice." + +"Of a truth?" Nechutes demanded angrily. + +"Have I not said?" she replied. + +Nechutes rose slowly and made his way to a chair some distance away +from her. Kenkenes immediately guessed why the cup-bearer was hurt, +but the lady was innocent. He knew that he had but to speak to restore +Nechutes to favor. + +Meanwhile the lady, amazed and deeply offended at the desertion of the +cup-bearer, had turned her back on him. Kenkenes arose. + +Ta-meri sat up in alarm. + +"O, do not go. You have but this moment come," she said. + +"Already have I stayed too long," he replied. "But thy hospitality +makes one forget the debt one owes to a prior guest." + +She looked at him from under silken lashes. + +"Nechutes has misconducted himself," she objected, "and I would not be +left alone with him." + +"Wouldst thou have me stay and see him restored to favor under my very +eyes? Ah, Ta-meri, where is thy womanly compassion?" + +She smiled and extended her hand. Kenkenes took it and felt it relax +and lie willingly in his palm. + +"Nay, do not go," she pleaded softly. + +"Give me leave to come again instead." + +"To-morrow," she said, half questioning, half commanding. He did not +promise, but as he bent over to kiss her hand, he said in a low tone: + +"Hast thou forgotten that Nechutes leaves Memphis with the going of the +king?" + +The lady started and flung a conscience-stricken glance at the scowling +cup-bearer. And while her face was turned, Kenkenes departed like a +shadow. But the portals of the nomarch's house had hardly closed +behind him before he demanded of himself, impatiently, why he had made +Nechutes' peace, why he kept the cup-bearer for ever between himself +and Ta-meri. And as if to evade this catechism something arose in him +and asked him why he should not. + +And to this he could give no answer. + + + +[1] Mohar--The king's pioneer, an office that might be defined as +minister of war. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE DEBT OF ISRAEL + +For an instant after the sculptor had put the collar about her throat, +Rachel stood motionless, her face flushing and whitening with +conflicting emotions. + +But her indecision was only momentary. Rebellion was in the ascendant. + +She thrust her fingers under the band and essayed to wrench off the +offending necklace, but the stout fastening held and the flexible braid +printed its woof on the back of the soft neck. Almost in tears she +undid the clasp and flung the collar away. + +It struck the earth with a musical ring, and the green of the wheat hid +all but a faint ray of the red metal. + +The rout of children descended on her, each clamoring a story of the +accident. But without a word she marshaled them and turned once again +toward the river to refill the hides. At the water's edge she kept her +eyes resolutely from the broad dimpling breast of the Nile toward the +south. She feared that she might see the light bari that was driving +back to Memphis against that slow but mighty current as easily as if +wind and water went with it. + +But even before she turned again toward Masaarah, her better nature +began to chide her. She remembered her impetuous act with a flush of +shame. + +"His peace-offering--a proof of his good will, and thou didst mistreat +it, as if he had meant it for a purchase or a fee. The indignity thou +hast petulantly fancied, Rachel." + +After a time another thought came to her. + +"The act was not womanly. Wherein hast thou rebuked him, in casting +away the trinket? Thou hast the dignity of Israel to uphold in thy +dealings with this young man." + +When she reached the spot where the collar had fallen, she sought for +it furtively, and having found it, thrust it into the bosom of her +dress. + +"I shall not keep it," she said, quieting the protests of her pride. +"I shall make him take it back to-morrow." + +Entering her low shelter in the camp some time later, she found Deborah +absent. Impelled by an unreasoning desire to keep secret this event, +she hastily hid the collar in the sand of the tent floor and laid the +straw matting of her bed smoothly over its burial place. Again she +struggled with her pride and demanded of herself why she had become +secretive. + +"Fie!" she replied. "How couldst thou tell this story to Deborah? +Why, it is well-nigh unbecoming." + +The dusk settled down over the valley. Deborah came in like a phantom +from the camp-fires with the evening meal, and the pair sat down +together to eat, Rachel silent, Deborah thoughtful. + +"Another Egyptian comes to govern Masaarah," the old woman observed. +"Agistas departed but now, leaving the camp in charge of the +under-drivers." + +"It makes little odds with us--this change of taskmasters, Deborah--be +he Agistas or any other Egyptian. They are masters and we continue to +be slaves," Rachel answered after a little silence. + +"Nay, art thou losing spirit?" Deborah asked with animation. "How +shall the elders keep of good heart if the young surrender?" + +"I despair not," the girl protested. "I did but remark this thing; and +I have spoken truly, have I not?" + +"Even so. But this evening there must be more recognition in thee of +thy lot since it overflows in words. I, too, have spoken truly, have I +not?" + +Rachel smiled. "It may be," she said. + +When they had supped, they went out before the tent to get the cooling +air. It was Deborah again that first broke the silence. + +"Elias is smitten with blindness from the stone-dust," she said +absently. + +"For all time?" Rachel asked anxiously. + +"Nay, if he could but rest them and bathe them in the proper simples." + +"Alas--" Rachel began, but she checked herself hurriedly. "He was my +father's servant," she said instead--"the last living one. Jehovah +spare him. One by one they fall, until I shall be utterly without tie +to prove I once had kindred." + +Deborah looked at the girl fixedly for a moment. Then she put up her +hand and leaned on the soft young shoulder. + +"Am I not left?" she asked. + +Rachel passed her arm about the bowed figure, with some compunction for +her complaint. + +"My mother's friend!" she exclaimed lovingly. "I know she died in +peace, remembering that I was left to thy care." + +"I mind me," she continued after a little silence, "how tender and +frail she was. Thou wast as a strong tree beside her. I seem to +myself to be mighty compared to my memory of her." + +Deborah took the white hand that lay across her shoulder. "Thou art +like to thy father. Thy mother was black-eyed and fragile--born to the +soft life of a princess. Misfortune was her death, though she +struggled to live for thee. Praise God that thou art like to thy +father, else thou hadst died in thine infancy." + +"Nay, hath my lot been sterner than the portion of all Israel?" + +"Of a surety, thou canst guess it, for are there many of thy tribe like +thee--without a kinsman?" + +Rachel shook her head, and the old woman continued absently: "Of thy +mother's family there were four, but they died of the heavy labor. Thy +father, Maai, surnamed the Compassionate, was the eldest of six. They +were mighty men, tawny like the lion and as bold--worthy sons of Judah! +But there is none left--not one." + +"Ten!" Rachel exclaimed, "and not one remaineth!" + +"Aye, and they died as though they were plague-smitten--in pairs and +singly, in a little space." + +Deborah felt a strong tremor run through the young figure against which +she leaned, and the arm across her shoulder was withdrawn, that the +hand might clear the eyes of their tears. + +The old woman discreetly held her peace till the girl should recover. + +"Thou must bear in mind, Rachel," she began, after a long silence, +"that Egypt had an especial grudge against thy house,--hence, its +especial vengeance. Seti, the Pharaoh, began the oppression of the +children of Israel, but the bondage was not all-embracing, in the +beginning. There were Hebrews to whom Egypt was indebted and chief +among these was thy father's grandsire, Aram. Seti paid the debt to +him by sparing his small lands and his little treasure and himself when +he put Israel to toil. Thy father's father, thy grandsire, Elihu, +younger brother to Amminadab, who was father-in-law to Aaron, came to +his share of his father's goods when Aram was gathered to his fathers. +This was in the latter days of Seti. Thy grandsire sent his little +treasure into Arabia and bought lands with it. After many trials he +caused to grow thereon a rose-shrub which had no period of +rest--blooming freshly with every moon. And there he had the Puntish +scentmaker on the hip, for the Arabic rose rested often. The attar he +distilled from his untiring flower, had another odor, wild and sweet +and of a daintier strength. When he was ready to trade he sent in a +vial of crystal to Neferari Thermuthis and to Moses, then a young man +and a prince of the realm, a few drops of this wondrous perfume. Doubt +not, the Hebrew prince knew that the gift came from a son of Israel. +The queen and Moses used the attar. Therefore all purple-wearing Egypt +must have it or die, since the fashion had been set within the +boundaries of the throne. Then did Elihu name a price for his sweet +odor that might have been small had each drop been a jewel. But Egypt +opened her coffers and bought as though her idols had broken their +silence and commanded her." + +The old woman paused and reflected with grim satisfaction on the remote +days of an Israelitish triumph. + +"Meanwhile," she continued finally, "thy grandsire lived humbly in +Goshen. None dreamed that this keeper of a little flock, lord over a +little tent and tiller of a few acres, was the great Syrian merchant +who was despoiling Mizraim. + +"Next he became a money-lender, through his steward, to the Egyptians, +and wrested from them what they had saved in putting Israel to toil +without hire. So his riches increased a hundredfold and the half of +noble Egypt was beholden to him. Then he turned to aid his oppressed +brethren. + +"He bribed the taskmasters or kept watch over them and discovered +wherein they were false to the Pharaoh, and held their own sin over +their heads till they submitted through fear of him. He filled +Israel's fields with cattle, the hills with Hebrew flocks, the valleys +with corn. Alas! Had it not been--but, nay, Jehovah was not yet +ready. He had chosen Moses to lead Israel." + +The old woman paused and sighed. After a silence she continued: + +"Thy father fell heir to the most of his wealth, but not to his +immunity. With a heart as great as his sire's he continued the good +work. He wedded thy mother, the daughter of another free Israelite, +and in his love for her, never was man more happy. In the midst of his +hope and his peace an enemy betrayed him to Rameses, the Incomparable +Pharaoh. And Rameses remembered not his father's covenant. So Maai's +lands, his flocks, his home, were taken; thou, but new-born, and thy +mother with her people were sent to the brick-fields--himself and his +brothers to the mines; and in a few years thou wast all that was left +of thy father's house." + +The effect of this recital on the young Israelite was deep. Anguish, +wrath, and the pain that intensifies these two, helplessness, inflamed +her soul. The story was not entirely new to her; she had heard it, a +part at a time, in her childhood; but now, her understanding fully +developed, the whole history of her family's wrongs appealed to her in +all its actual savagery. Egypt, as a unit, like a single individual, +had done her people to death. Between her and Egypt, then, should be +bitter enmity, rancor that might never be subdued, and eternal warfare. +Her enemy had conquered her, had put her in bondage, and made sport of +her as a pastime. The accumulation of injury and insult seemed more +than she could bear, and the vague hope of Israel in Moses seemed in +the face of Egypt's strength a folly most fatuous. + +"O Egypt! Egypt!" she exclaimed with concentrated passion. "What a +debt of vengeance Israel owes to thee!" + +The old woman laid her shriveled hands on the arm of her ward. + +"Aye, and it shall be paid," she said fiercely. "Thou canst not get +thy people back, nor alleviate for them now the pangs that killed them; +but to the mortally wronged there is one restitution--revenge!" + +At this moment some one over near the western limits of the camp cried +out a welcome; a commotion arose, noisy with cheers and rapid with +running. Presently it died down and the pair before the tent saw a +horseman ride through the gloom toward the empty frame house of the +overseer. + +The two women lapsed immediately into their absorbed communion again. + +"Lay it not to Egypt alone, but to all the offenders against Jehovah. +Midian and Amalek, passing through to do homage to the Pharaoh, sneer +at Israel; Babylon in her chariot of gold flicks her whip at the sons +of Abraham as she bears her gifts of sisterhood to Memphis. We suffer +not only the insults of a single nation, but despiteful use by all +idolaters. Let but the world gather before Jehovah's altar and there +shall be no more affronts to Israel." + +"Must we bide that time?" Rachel asked. "Or shall we bring it about?" + +"Nay," Deborah replied scornfully. "Even my mystic eyes are not potent +enough to see so far into the future. We throw off the bondage sooner +than thou dreamest, daughter of Judah, but if the nations bow at the +altar of Jehovah, it will take a stronger hand than Israel's to bring +them there." + +After a silence Rachel murmured, as though to herself: "We shall go, +and soon, and leave no debt behind. Will the vengeance befall all +Egypt, the good as well as the bad?" + +"Hast thou forgotten God's promise to Abraham concerning the wicked +cities of the plain? If there were ten righteous therein He had not +destroyed them utterly." + +"Nay, but if there be but one therein?" + +"One? Now, for what one dost thou concern thyself? Atsu?" + +Rachel, startled out of her dream, hesitated, her face coloring hotly, +though unseen, beneath the kindly dusk of night. + +"Yea," she said in a low tone, wondering gravely if she spake the +truth. Somebody beside her laughed the short unready laugh of one slow +at mirth. + +"Of a truth?" he asked. Rachel turned about and faced Atsu. He took +her hands and drew her near him. + +"Nay, Deborah," he said sadly; "pursue her not into the secret chambers +of her young heart. I doubt not there is 'one' therein, but why shall +we demand what manner of 'one' it is when she may not even confess it +to herself?" + +Confused and a little guilty by reason of the necklace, and wondering +why she admitted any guilt, Rachel drew away from him. + +"Nay," he went on, retaining his clasp. "Let there be perfect +understanding between us twain, thou Radiant One. I shall not plague +thee with my love, nor even let it be apparent after this. Men have +lived in constant fellowship, but no nearer to the women whom they +love, and am I less able than my kind? So I be not hateful to thee, +Rachel, I am content." + +"Hateful to me!" she cried reproachfully. + +"Nay? No more then. I have spoken the last with thee concerning my +love. And thus I seal the pact." + +He drew her, unresisting, to him, and kissed her forehead. + +"For my gentleness to the Hebrews of Pa-Ramesu," he continued in a +calmer tone as he released her, "they have stripped me of my rank and +sent me to govern Masaarah. So they thought to punish me, never +dreaming that they joined me to Rachel, and hid me away in a nook with +a handful to whom I may be merciful and none will spy upon me! They +thwarted their end." + +"Happy Masaarah!" Rachel said earnestly. + +Atsu laughed again and disappeared in the dark. + +Rachel drew her hand furtively across the place on her brow that the +taskmaster's lips had touched. The keen eyes of the old Israelite saw +the motion and understood it. + +"It is not Atsu," she said astutely. + +"Nay," the girl protested, "and yet it is Atsu, in mine own meaning, or +any one in Egypt who is fair to Israel. The grace of that one would be +sufficient in God's sight to save all Egypt from doom. That was my +meaning." + +The light in the frame quarters of the taskmaster was extinguished and +at that moment a shadowy figure emerged from the dark and approached +the pair. + +"A courier from Mesu speaketh without the camp, even now," the visiting +Israelite said in a half-whisper. "Atsu hath put out his light, to +sleep, but even if he sleep not, the people may go without fear and +listen to the speaker. Come ye and give him audience." + +"We come," Deborah replied. + +As the old woman and her ward walked down through the night in the +direction taken by the entire population of the quarries, Deborah said +quietly: + +"Thy cloud of depression hath rifted somewhat since sunset, daughter." + +Rachel pressed her hand repentantly. + +At the side of an open space, now closely filled with sitting +listeners, stood a Hebrew, not older than thirty-five. A knot of +flaming pitch, stuck in a crevice of rock near him, lighted his face +and figure. His frame had the characteristic stalwart structure of the +Israelitish bondman. The black hair waved back from a placid white +forehead; the eyes were serene and level, the mouth rather wide but +firm, the jaw square. The beard would have been light for a much +younger man, and it was soft, red-brown and curling. It added a +mildness and tenderness to the face. Whoever looked upon him was +impressed with the unflinching piety of the countenance. + +This was Caleb the Faithful, son of Jephunneh, the Kenezite. + +He was talking when Rachel and her ancient guardian entered the hollow, +and he continued in a passive tone throughout the several arrivals +thereafter. He spoke as one that believes unfalteringly and has +evidence for the faith. He did not recount Israel's wrongs--he would +have worked against his purpose had he wrought his hearers into an +angry mood. Besides, the story would have been superfluous. None knew +Israel's wrongs better than Israel. + +He talked of redemption and Canaan. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +HEBREW CRAFT + +When Mentu returned from On a light had kindled in his eyes and his +stately step had grown elastic. The man that withdraws from a busy +life while in full vigor has beckoned to Death. Inactivity preys upon +him like a disease. The great artist, forced into idleness by the +succession of an incapable king, had been renewed by the prospect of +labor which his exaltation into the high office had afforded. With +pleasure in his heart, Kenkenes watched his father grow young again. + +"Who was thy good friend in this?" the young man asked one evening +after a number of contented remarks concerning the market's +appointment. "Who said the word in the Pharaoh's ear?" + +"So to raise me to this office it is needful that something more than +my deserts must have urged the king?" Mentu retorted. + +"Nay! that was not my meaning," Kenkenes made haste to say. "But thou +knowest, my father, that Meneptah must be for ever directed. Who, +then, offered him this wise counsel? Rameses?" + +"It was never Har-hat," Mentu replied, but half placated. + +"If he had, thou and I must no longer call him a poor counselor." + +"Bribe--" the murket began, ruffled once more. + +"Nay," Kenkenes interrupted smiling. "He had but proved himself worthy +and wise." + +Mentu shook his head, but there was no more temper evident in his face. + +"Now is a propitious hour for a good counselor," Kenkenes pursued. + +"What knowest thou?" Mentu asked with interest. + +"Tape," the young man replied briefly. + +"Nay, the sedition in Tape is old and vitiated." + +"And the Hak-heb." + +"That breach may be healed. But we have sedition to fear among the +bond-people--" + +"The bond-people!" + +"Even so. Open and organized sedition." + +"The Israelites?" Kenkenes exclaimed with an incredulous note in his +voice. + +"The Israelites." + +"I would sooner fear a rebellion among the draft-oxen and the mules of +Nehapehu." [1] + +"The elder Seti's fears and the fears of the great Rameses were other +than yours." + +"O, aye, they had cause for fear then, but since Seti yoked the +creatures--" + +"The Pharaohs did not begin in time," the elder man interrupted. "Had +that royal fiat, the decimation of Hebrew children, continued, we +should not have had the Israelite to-day, but gods!" he shuddered with +horror. "I hope that is a horrid slander--tradition, not fact. I like +not to lay the slaughter or babes at the door of any Egyptian dynasty. +But had an early Pharaoh of the house of Tothmes enforced the +absorption of the Hebrew by his same rank among the Egyptian, we should +not have the menace of a hostile alien within our borders to-day. The +heavy hand of oppression has made a wondrous race of them for strength. +Theirs is no mean intellect; great men have come from among them, and +they will be a hardy foe arrayed against us." + +"They are not warriors; they are poor and unequipped for hostilities; +they are thoroughly under subjection," the young man pursued. "What +can they do against us?" + +"Do!" Mentu exclaimed with impatience in the repetition. "They have +only to say to the banished Hyksos: 'Come ye, let us do battle with +Egypt. We will be your mercenaries.' They have only to send greeting +to that lean traitor Amon-meses, thus: 'Give us the Delta to be ours +and we will help you win all Egypt,' and there will be enough done." + +"They must have a pact among themselves and a leader, first," Kenkenes +objected. + +"Have I not said they are organized? And their leader is found. He is +a foster-brother to Meneptah; an initiated priest of Isis; a sorcerer +and an infidel of the blackest order. He is Prince Mesu, a Hebrew by +birth." + +"Dost thou know him?" Kenkenes asked with interest. + +"Nay, he has dwelt in Midian these forty years. He returned some time +ago and hath dwelt passively in Goshen till--" + +The artist dropped his voice and came nearer to his son. + +"He hath dwelt passively in Goshen till of late, and it is whispered +that some secret work against him inaugurated by the priesthood, or +mayhap the Pharaoh, hath given him provocation to revolt against +Meneptah." + +After a silence Kenkenes asked in a lowered tone: + +"Hath he made demonstration?" + +"O, aye, he is clamoring to lead his people a three days' journey into +the wilderness to make sacrifice to their god." + +"Shades of mine ancestors! If that is all, let them, so they return," +Kenkenes said amicably. + +"Let them!" the sculptor exploded. "Dost thou believe that they would +return?" + +"I apprehend that the Rameside army would be capable of thwarting them +if they were disposed to depart permanently." + +"Thou dost apprehend--aye, of a truth, I know thou dost! Halt all our +works of peace for an indefinite time; mass the vast army of the +Pharaoh and spend days and good arrows in retrieving the runaways, +merely that a barbarian god may smell the savor of holy animals +sacrificed! Gods! Kenkenes, thou art as trustworthy a counselor as +Har-hat!" + +Thereafter there was a silence in the work-room. But a peppery man is +seldom sulky, and Kenkenes was fully prepared for the mildness in his +father's voice when he spoke again. + +"Thou shouldst see the pretense in his demand, Kenkenes. He must have +provocation to urge him to rebellion, and he knows full well that +Meneptah will not grant that petition." + +"But hath he not provocation--thou hast but a moment ago told--" + +"But that was only an offense against him. The whole people would not +go into revolt because some one had conspired against one of their +number. Therefore he telleth Israel that its God would have Israel +make a pilgrimage, promising curses upon the people if they obey not. +Then he putteth the appeal to the Pharaoh and the Pharaoh denieth it. +Wherefore the whole people is enraged and hath rallied to the +conspirator's cause. Seest thou, my son?" + +"It is strategy worthy the Incomparable Pharaoh--" + +"It is Hebrew craft!" + +"Perhaps thou art right. But what personal grudge hath Mesu against +Egypt or the priesthood or Meneptah?" + +"It is said that he was wanted out of the way, and by an unfortunate +sum of accidents, the miscarriage of a priest's letter and a fight +between a messenger and Bedouins in front of a Hebrew tent, gave the +information into the hands of Mesu himself." + +By this time Kenkenes was on his feet. + +"A miscarriage of a priest's letter," he repeated slowly. + +The artist nodded. + +After the silence the young man spoke again: + +"And thou believest truly that because of this letter--because of this +Israelite's grievance against the powers of Egypt, we shall have +uprising and serious trouble among our bond-people?" + +"I have said," Mentu answered, raising his head as though surprised at +the earnestness in his son's voice. Kenkenes did not meet his father's +eyes. He turned on his heel and left the work-room. + +Had the spiteful Seven, the Hathors, used him as a tool whereby +mischief should be wrought between the nation and her slaves? + + + +[1] The Fayum. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +CANAAN + +When the imperative necessity of harmonious expression became apparent, +the young artist laid aside his chisel and mallet, and the Arabian +desert knew his footsteps no more for many days after the rough-hewing +of Athor's face. Instead, he mingled with the people of Memphis in +quest of the expression. The pursuit became fascinating and +all-absorbing. With the most deliberate calculation, he studied the +faces of the betrothed and of newly wedded wives, and finding too much +of content therein, he sought out the unelect for study. And with +these, his search ended. + +Thereafter he made innumerable heads in clay, and covered linen scrolls +with drawings. But it was the semblance he gained and not the spirit. +The light eluded him. + +On the day after Mentu's return from On, Kenkenes paid the first visit +to Masaarah since the incident of the collar,--and the last he thought +to make until he had won that for which he strove. He went to bury the +matting in the sand and to hide other evidences of recent occupancy +about the niche. He left the block of stone undisturbed, for the +transgression was not yet apparent on the face of Athor. The scrolls, +which had been concealed under the carpeting, were too numerous for his +wallet to contain, but he carried the surplus openly in his hand. + +It was sunset before he had made an end. To return to the Nile by way +of the cliff-front would have saved him time, but there was a boyish +wish in his heart to look again on the lovely face that had helped him +and baffled him. So he descended into the upper end of the ravine and +slowly passed the outskirts of the camp, but the bond-girl was nowhere +to be seen. The spaces between the low tents were filled with feeding +laborers and there was an unusual amount of cheer to be noted among +Israel of Masaarah. Kenkenes heard the talk and laughter with some +wonderment as he passed. He admitted that he was disappointed when, +without a glimpse of Rachel, he emerged into the Nile valley. But he +leaped lightly down the ledge, crossed the belt of rubble, talus and +desert sand, and entered the now well-marked wagon road between the +dark green meadow land on either side. Egypt was in shadow--her sun +behind the Libyan heights,--but the short twilight had not fallen. +Overhead were the cooling depths of sky, as yet starless, but the river +was breathing on the winds and the sibilant murmur of its waters began +to talk above the sounds of the city. To the north, the south and the +east was pastoral and desert quiet; to the west was the gradual +subsidence of urban stir. Frogs were beginning to croak in the +distance, and in the long grain here and there, a nocturnal insect +chirred and stilled abruptly as the young man passed. + +Within a rod of the pier some one called: + +"My master!" + +The voice came from a distance, but he knew whom he should see when he +turned. Half-way across the field toward the quarries Rachel was +coming, with a scroll in her lifted hand. He began to retrace his +steps to meet her, but she noted the action and quickened her rapid +walk into running. + +"Thou didst drop this outside the camp," she said as she came near. "I +feared it might have somewhat pertaining to the statue on it, and I +have brought it, with the permission of the taskmaster." She stopped, +and putting her hand into the folds of her habit on her breast, +hesitated as if for words to speak further. Kenkenes interrupted her +with his thanks. + +"How thou hast fatigued thyself for me, Rachel! Out of all Egypt I +doubt if I might find another so constant guardian of my welfare. The +grace of the gods attend thee as faithfully. I thank thee, most +gratefully." + +The purpose in her face dissolved, the hand that seemed to hold +somewhat in the folds of her habit relaxed and fell slowly. While +Kenkenes waited for her to speak, he noted that a dress of unbleached +linen replaced the coarse cotton surplice she had worn before, and her +feet were shod with simple sandals--an extravagance among slaves. But +the garb was yet too mean. The sculptor wondered at that moment how +the sumptuous attire of the high-born Memphian women would become her. +He shook his head and in his imagination dressed her in snow-white +robes with but the collar of rings about her throat, and stood back to +marvel at his picture of splendid simplicity. + +"Hast thou not something more to tell me?" he asked kindly. "Do thou +rest here on the wharf while we talk. Art thou not quite breathless?" + +"Nay, I thank thee," she faltered. "I may not linger." The hand once +again sought the folds over her breast. + +"Then let me walk with thee on thy way. It will be dark soon." + +"Nay," she protested flushing, "and again, I thank thee. It is not +needful." She made a movement as if to leave him, but he stepped to +her side. + +"Out upon thee, daughter of Israel, thou art ungracious," he +remonstrated laughingly. "I can not think thee so wondrous brave. For +it is a long walk to the camp and the night will be pitch-black. Why +may I not go with thee?" + +"There is naught to be feared." + +"Of a truth? Those hills are as full of wild beasts as Amenti is of +spirits. And even if no hurt befell thee, the trepidation of that long +journey would be cruel. Nay; Ptah, the gallant god, would spurn my +next offering, did I send thee back to camp alone. Wilt thou come?" + +She bowed and dropped behind him. Her resolution to maintain the forms +of different rank between them was not characteristic of other slaves +he had known. There was no presumption or humble gratitude in her +manner when he would offer her the courtesies of an equal, but he had +met the disdain of a peer once when he thought he talked with a slave. +There was something mocking in her perfunctory deference, but her pride +was genuine. Her conduct seemed to say: "I would liefer be a Hebrew +and a slave than a princess of the God-forgotten realm of Egypt." + +The young sculptor was unruffled, however. He was turning over in his +mind, with interest, the evidence that tended to show that the +Israelite had something more to tell him, that her courage had failed +her, and that her hand had sought something concealed in her dress. He +recalled the former meetings with her and arrived at a surmise so +sudden and so conclusive that with difficulty he kept himself from +making outward demonstration of his conviction. "The collar, by Apis! +I offended her with the trinket. And she came to make me take it back, +but her courage fled. Pie upon my clumsy gallantries! I must make +amends. I would not have her hate me." + +He broke the silence with an old, old remark--one that Adam might have +made to Eve. + +"Look at the stars, Rachel. There is a dark casement in the heavens--a +blink of the eye and the lamp is alight." + +"So I watch them every night. But they are swifter here in Memphis. +At Mendes, where Israel toiled once, they are more deliberate," she +answered readily. + +"Aye, but you should see them at Philae. They ignite and bound into +brilliance like sparks of meeting metal and flint. Ah, but the tropics +are precipitate!" + +"I know them not," she ventured. + +"Their acquaintance is better avoided. They have no mean--they leap +from extreme to extreme. They are violent, immoderate. It is instant +night and instant day; it is the maddest passion of summer always. +Nature reigns at the top of her voice and chokes her realm with the +fervor of her maternity. Nay, give me the north. I would feel the +earth's pulse now and then without burning my fingers." + +"There is room for choice in this land of thine," she mused after a +little. + +"Land of mine?" he repeated inquiringly, turning his head to look at +her. "Is it not also thine?" + +"Nay, it is not the Hebrews' and it never was," the clear answer came +from the dusk behind him. + +"So!" he exclaimed. "After four hundred years in Egypt they have not +adopted her!" + +"We have but sojourned here a night. The journey's end is farther on." + +"Israel hath made a long night of the sojourn," he rejoined laughingly. + +"Nay," she answered. "Thou hast not said aright. It is Egypt that +hath made a long night of our sojourn." + +There was a silence in which Kenkenes felt accused and uncomfortable. +It would require little to make harsh the temper of the talk. It lay +with him, one of the race of offenders, to make amends. + +"It is for me to admit Egypt's sin and ask a truce," he said gently. +"So be thou generous to me, since it is I who am abashed in her stead." + +Again there was silence, broken at last by the Israelite in a voice +grown wondrously contrite. + +"I do not reproach thee. Nor, indeed, is all Egypt at fault. The sin +lies with the Pharaohs." + +"Ah! the gods forbid!" he protested. "Lay it on the shoulders of +babes, if thou wilt, but I am party to treason if I but give ear to a +rebuke of the monarch." + +"I am not ignorant of the law. I shall spare thee, but I have +purchased my right to condemn the king." + +"Thou indomitable! And I accused thee of fear. I retract. But tell +me--what is the journey's end? Is it the ultimate goal of all flesh?" + +"Not so," she answered proudly. "It is Israel's inheritance promised +for four hundred years. The time is ripe for possession. We go +forward to enter into a land of our own." + +"Thou givest me news. Come, be the Hebrews' historian and enlighten +me. Where lies the land?" + +Rachel hesitated. To her it was a serious problem to decide whether +the lightness of the sculptor's tone were mockery or good fellowship. +Kenkenes noted her silence and spoke again. + +"Perchance I ask after a hieratic secret. If so, forgive the blunder." + +"Nay," she replied at once. "It is no secret. All Egypt will know of +it ere long. God hath prepared us a land wherein we may dwell under no +master but Jehovah. We go hence shortly to enter it. The captain of +Israel will lead us thither and Jehovah will show him the way. Abraham +was informed that it was a wondrous land wherein the olive and the +grape will crown the hills; the corn will fill the valleys; the cattle +and sheep, the pasture lands. There will be many rivers instead of one +and the desert will lie afar off from its confines. The sun will shine +and the rain will fall and the winds will blow as man needeth them, and +there will be no slavery and no heavy life therein. The land shall be +Israel's and its enemies shall crouch without its borders, confounded +at the splendor of the children of God. And there will our princes +arise and a throne be set up and a mighty nation established. Cities +will shine white and strong-walled on the heights, and caravans of +commerce will follow down the broad roadways to the sea. There will +the ships of Israel come bowing over the waters with the riches of the +world, and our wharves will be crowded with purple and gold and +frankincense. Babylon shall do homage on the right hand and Egypt upon +the left, and the straight smoke from Jehovah's altar will rise from +the center unfailing by day or by night." + +They had reached the ledge and Kenkenes sat down on it, leaning on one +hand across Rachel's way. She paused near him. Even in the dark he +could see the light in her eyes, and the joy of anticipation was in her +voice. As yet he did not know whether she talked of the Israelitish +conception of supernal life, or of a belief in a temporal redemption. + +"And there shall be no death nor any of the world-sorrows therein?" he +asked. + +"Since we shall dwell in the world we may not escape the world's +uncertainties," she replied, looking at his lifted face. "But most men +live better lives when they live happily, and I doubt not there will be +less unhappiness, provident or fortuitous, in Israel, the nation, than +in Israel, enslaved." + +So the slave talked of freedom as slaves talk of it--hopefully and +eloquently. A pity asserted itself in the young sculptor's heart and +grew to such power that it tinctured his speech. + +"Is thy heart then so firmly set on this thing?" he asked gently. + +"It is the hope that bears Israel's burdens and the balm that heals the +welt of the lash." + +And in the young man's heart he said it was a vain hope, a happy +delusion that might serve to make the harsh bondage endurable till time +dispelled it. The simple words of the girl were eloquent portrayal of +Israel's plight, and Kenkenes subsided into a sorry state of helpless +sympathy. She was not long in interpreting his silence. + +"Vain hope, is it?" she said. "And how shall it come to pass in the +face of the Pharaoh's denial and the might of Egypt's arms? Thou art +young and so am I, but both of us remember Rameses. There has been +none like him. He overthrew the world, did he not? And it was a hard +task and a precarious and a long one, when he but measured arms with +mortals. Is it not a problem worthy the study to ponder how he might +have fared in battle with a god?" + +Kenkenes lifted his head suddenly and regarded her. + +"Aye," she continued, "I have given thee food for thought. Futile +indeed were Israel's hopes if it set itself unaided against the +Pharaoh. But the God of Israel hath appointed His hour and hath +already descended into fellowship with His chosen people. He hath +promised to lead us forth, and the Divine respects a promise. So a God +against a Pharaoh. Doth it not appear to thee, Egyptian, that there +approaches a marvelous time?" + +"Give me but faith in the hypothesis and I shall say, of a surety," he +replied. + +"Thou hast said. Shall we not go on, my master?" + +"I am Kenkenes, the son of Mentu," he told her. + +She bent her head in acknowledgment of the introduction and moved +forward as if to climb up by the projecting edges of the strata. But +he put a powerful arm about her and lifted her into the valley. With a +light bound he was beside her. Ahead of them was profound darkness, +hedged by black and close-drawn walls and canopied by distant and +unillumining stars. She resumed her place behind him though he was +moved to protest, but her deliberate manner seemed to demand its way. +So they continued slowly. + +"Thou givest me interest in the God of Israel," he said, to reopen the +subject. "The Egyptian dwells in his gods, but thou sayest that the +God of Israel dwells in Israel." + +"Even so. But thou speakest of Israel's God, even after the fashion of +my people. They are jealous, saying that the true God hath but one +love and that is Israel. If they would think it, let them, but He is +the all-God, of all the earth, the One God--thy God as well as mine." + +"Mine!" Kenkenes exclaimed. + +"Thou hast said." + +"Now, by all things worshipful, this is news. I had ever thought that +our gods are those to whom we bow. Either thou sayest wrong or I have +been remiss in my devotions." + +"Nay, listen," she said earnestly, stepping to his side. "Already have +I told thee of the captain of Israel. He was reared among princes in +the house of the Pharaoh, and he is learned in all the wisdom of Egypt. +He instructeth the elders concerning Jehovah, and from mouth to mouth +his wisdom traverseth till it reacheth the ears of the young. This, +then, I have from the lips of Moses, who speaketh naught but the truth. +In early times all on earth had perished for wickedness by the sending +of the One God, save a holy man and his three sons. These men +worshiped the God of Abraham, who was the father of Israel. One of the +sons founded thy race, saith Moses, and one established mine. The +tribes that went into Egypt worshiped the same God. Lo, is it not +written in the early tombs? So Moses testifieth, but if thou doubtest, +go question thy historians. And some of the tribes called that God Ra, +others, Ptah, and yet others, Amen. But in time they quarreled and +each tribe refused to admit the identity of the three-named One God, +saying, 'Thy god sendeth plague and affliction, and ours sendeth rich +harvests and the Nile floods.' Did not the same God do each of these +things in His wisdom? Even so. But when they were at last united into +one great people, they had forgotten the quarrel, forgotten that in the +beginning they had worshiped one God, and they bowed down to three +instead. Nay, if there were but one among you who dared, there are +loose threads fluttering, which, if drawn, might unravel the whole +fabric of idolatry and disclose that which it hides--the One God--the +God of Abraham." + +Kenkenes had walked in silence, looking down into the luminous eyes, +lost in wonder. Rachel suddenly realized at what length she had talked +and stopped abruptly, dropping back to her place again as if chidden. + +"Come," said Kenkenes, noting her action, "walk beside me, priestess. +I would hear more of this. It is like all forbidden things--wondrously +alluring." + +"I did forget," she answered stubbornly. "There is nothing more." + +Kenkenes stopped. + +"Come," he insisted. "The teacher rather precedes the pupil. At +least, thou shalt walk beside me." + +"I pray thee, let us go on. We are not yet at the camp--we have walked +so slowly," she answered. At that moment several fragments of rock, +loosening, slid down in the dark just behind her. She caught her +breath and was beside the young artist in an instant. He laughed in +sheer delight. + +"Thou hast assembled the spirits by thy blasphemy," he said. "And +remember, I must soon return to this haunted place alone." + +"Thou canst get a brand of fire or a cudgel at the camp," she said with +some remorse in her voice, "and run for the river bank." With that she +resumed her place behind him. + +Kenkenes laughed again. It gave him uncommon pleasure to know that his +model was concerned for him. He put out his hand and deliberately drew +her up to his side. Not content with that he bent his arm and put her +hand under it and into his palm, so that she could not leave him again. +She submitted reluctantly, but her fingers, lost in his warm clasp, +were cold and ill at ease. He felt their chill and released her to +slip about her shoulders the light woolen mantle he had worn. Her +apprehension lest he take her hand again was so evident that he +refrained, though he slackened his step and kept with her. + +But she spoke no more until they were beside the outermost circle of +coals that had been a cooking fire for the camp. Here they met a man, +whom, by his superior dress, Kenkenes took to be the taskmaster. They +were almost upon him before he was seen. + +"Rachel!" he exclaimed. + +"Here am I," she answered, a little anxiously. + +"Thou wast gone long--" he began. + +The sculptor interposed. + +"She hath done me a service and it was my pleasure to talk with her," +he said complacently. "Chide her not." + +The glow from the fire lighted the young man's face, and the +taskmaster, standing in deep shadow, scanned it sharply but did not +answer. Kenkenes turned and strode away down the valley. + +Rachel snatched a thick sycamore club which had been left over in the +construction of the scaffold and ran after him. But the young sculptor +had disappeared in the dark. + +"Kenkenes," she cried at last desperately. He answered immediately. + +She slipped off the mantle. + +"This, thy mantle," she said when he approached, "and this," thrusting +the club into his hands. "There is as much danger in the valley for +thee as for me." + +And like a shadow she was gone. + +As he hurried on again through the dense gloom of the ravine, the young +man thought long on the Israelite and her words. She had offered him +theories that peremptorily contradicted the accepted idea among +Egyptians, that Moses was inspired by a personal motive of revenge. +The argument put forth by his father began to show sundry weaknesses. +Furthermore Rachel's version gave him a much coveted opportunity to +slip from his shoulders the discomforting blame that had rested there +since he had heard that a miscarried letter might effect a national +disturbance. Much as the practical side of his nature sought to decry +the great Hebrew's motive, a sense of relief possessed him. + +"I fear me, Kenkenes, thou durst not boast thyself an embroiler of +nations," he said to himself. "The Hebrew prince is a zealot, and +zealots have no fear for their lives. Truly those Israelites are an +uncommon and a proud people. But, by Besa, is she not beautiful!" + +He enlarged on this latter thought at such exhaustive length that he +had traversed the valley and field, found his boat, crossed the Nile +and was at home before he had made an end. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE COMING OF THE PHARAOH + +On the first day of February, runners, dusty, breathless and excited, +passed the sentries of the Memphian palace of Meneptah with the news +that the Pharaoh was but a day's journey from his capital. They were +the last of a series of couriers that had kept the city informed of the +king's advance. For days before, public drapers were to be seen +clinging cross-legged to obelisk and peristyle; moving in spread-eagle +fashion, hung in a jacket of sail-cloth attached to cables, across the +fronts of buildings, looping garlands, besticking banners and spreading +tapestries. Scattering sounds of hammer and saw continued even through +the night. The city's metals were polished, her streets were sprinkled +and rolled, her stone wharves scoured, her landings painted, her +flambeaux new-soaked in pitch. The gardens, the storehouses and the +wine-lofts felt unusual draft for the festivities, and the great +capital was decked and scented like a bride. + +Now, on the eve of the Pharaoh's coming, the preparations were +complete. The city was full of excitement and pleasant expectancy. +Only once before during the six years of Meneptah's reign had such +enthusiasm prevailed. When the Rebu horde descended upon Egypt, +Meneptah had sent his generals out to meet the invader, but he, +himself, had remained under cover in Memphis because he said the stars +were unpropitious. And this was the son of Rameses II, than whom, if +the historians and the singer Pentaur say true, there was never a more +puissant monarch! But when the marauder was overthrown and routed, and +his generals turned toward Memphis with their captives in chains, +Meneptah hastened to meet them, decked his chariot with war trophies +and entered his capital in triumph. He was hailed with exultant +acclaim. + +"Hail, mighty Pharaoh! who smites with his glance and annihilates with +his spear. He overthrew companies alone, and with his lions he routed +armies. His enemies crumbled before him like men of clay, for he +breathed hot coals in his wrath and flames in his vengeance." And the +enthusiasm that inspired the eulogy was sincere. Meneptah was none the +less loved because Memphis understood him. The Pharaoh was the apple +of her eye and she worshiped him stubbornly. + +Now he was returning from a bloodless campaign--one that neither +required nor brought forth any generalship--but it was a victory and +had been personally conducted by Meneptah, so Memphis was preparing to +fall into paroxysms of delight, little short of hysteria. + +An hour after sunrise on the day of the Pharaoh's coming a gorgeous +regatta assembled off the wharves of Memphis. It was a flotilla of the +rank and wealth of the capital, with that of On, Bubastis, Busiris, and +even Mendes and Tanis. The boats were high-riding, graceful and +finished at head and stern with sheaves of carved lotus. Hull and +superstructure were painted in gorgeous colors with a preponderance of +ivory and gold. Masts, rigging and oars were wrapped with lotus, roses +and mimosa. Sails and canopies were brilliant with dyes and undulant +with fringes. Troops of tiny boys, innocent of raiment, were posted +about the sides of the vessels holding festoons. Oarsmen wore chaplets +on the head or garlands around the loins, and half-clad slave-girls +were scattered about with fans of dyed plumes. Bridges of boats had +been hastily run out between the vessels, and over these the embarking +voyagers or visitors passed in a stream. On shore was a great +multitude and every advantageous point of survey was occupied. And +here were catastrophes and riots, panics and love-making, gambling and +gossip and all the other things that mark the assembly of a crowd. But +these incidents drew the attention of the populace only momentarily +from the revel of the nobility on the Nile. For there were laughter +and songs, strumming of the lyre, shouts, polite contention and the +drone of general conversation among such numbers that the sound was of +great volume. + +At the head of the pageant were the boats of the nomarch and the +courtiers to Meneptah who remained in Memphis. Near the forefront of +these was the pleasure-boat of Mentu. + +Kenkenes dropped from its deck to the walk rising and falling at its +side, and made his way through the crowd in search of a vessel bearing +a winged sun and the oval containing the symbols of On. As he passed +the prow of a tall pleasure-boat he was caught in a rope of flowers let +down from above and looped about him with a dexterous hand. He turned +in the pretty fetters and looked up. Above him was a row of a dozen +little girl-faces, set like apple-blossoms along the side of the +vessel. The youngest was not over twelve years of age, the oldest, +fourteen. Each rosy countenance was rippled with laughter, but the +sound was lost in the great turmoil about them. In the center of the +group, a pair of hands put forth under the chin of an older girl, held +the ends of the garland with a determined grip. Her eyes were gray, +her hair was chestnut, her face very fair. Kenkenes recognized her +with a sudden warmth about his heart. The others were strangers to +him. A glance at the plate on the side of the boat showed him that +this was the one he sought. Most willingly he obeyed the insistent +summons of the garland and permitted himself to be drawn to the barge. +There, the same hands showed him the ladder against the side, and a +dozen pretty arms were extended to haul him aboard as he climbed. + +But the instant he planted foot on the deck the lovely rout retreated +to shelter at the side of a smiling woman seated in the shadow of fans. +Only his fair-faced captor stood her ground. + +"Hail, Hapi," [1] she cried, doing obeisance. "Pity the desert." She +flung wide her hands. With the exception of the youths at the oars +there was no other man on the boat. + +"Ye may call me forth," Kenkenes replied, "but how shall ye return me +to my banks? Hither, sweet On," he continued, catching the hand of the +fair-faced girl, "submit first to submergence." She took his kisses +willingly. "This for Seti, thy lover; this for Hotep, thy brother, and +this for me who am both in one. How thou art grown, Io!" + +"But she hath not denied thee the babyhood privileges for all that, +Kenkenes," the smiling woman said. + +"It is an excellent example of submission she hath set, Lady Senci," he +replied, advancing toward the young girls about her. "Let us see if it +prevail." + +But the troop scattered with little cries of dismay. + +"Nay," he observed, as he bent over Senci's hand, "never were two maids +alike, and I shall not strive to make them so." + +"Thy father hath most graciously kept his word in sending us a +protector," Senci continued, "My nosegay of beauties drooped last night +when they arrived from On with my brother sick, aboard. They feared +they must stop with me in Memphis for want of a man." + +"It was the first word I heard from my father this morning and the last +when I left him even now: 'Io's father hath failed her through +sickness, so do thou look after the Lady Senci--and the gods give thee +grace for once to do a thing well!'" + +The lady smiled and patted his arm. "He did not fear; he knew whom he +chose. But behold our gallant escort--the nomarch ahead, beside us the +new cup-bearer and behind us all the rank of the north." + +"Aye, and when we cast off thou mayest look for the new murket on thy +right." + +The lady blushed. "I have not seen thy father yet, this morning." + +"So? His robes must fit poorly." + +At that moment a gang-plank was run across from the broad flat stern of +the nomarch's boat to the prow of Senci's, a carpet was spread on it, +and Ta-meri, with little shrieks and tottering steps, came across it. +Kenkenes put out his arms to her and lifted her down when she arrived. + +"Wonder brought me," she cried. "I dreamed I saw thee kiss a maiden +thrice and I came to see if it were true." + +"O most honest vision! It is true and this is she," Kenkenes answered, +indicating Io. + +Ta-meri flung up her hands and gazed at the blushing girl with wide +eyes. + +"Enough," she said at last. "It is indeed a marvel. Never have I seen +such a thing before, and never shall I see it again." + +"And if that be true, fie and for shame, Kenkenes," Senci chid +laughingly. + +"Ta-meri always shuts her eyes," the sculptor defended himself stoutly. +The nomarch's daughter caught his meaning first and covered her face +with her hands. The chorus of laughter did not drown her protests. + +"Kenkenes, thou art a mortal plague!" she exclaimed behind her defense. + +"Truce," he said. "Thou didst accuse me and I did defend myself. We +are even." + +"Nay, but am I also even with Ta-meri?" Io asked shyly. + +"Now," Senci cried, "which of ye will say 'aye' or 'nay' to that!" + +Ta-meri retreated protesting to the prow again, but the gang-plank had +been withdrawn. An army of slaves were breaking up the bridges of +boats. The oars of the nomarch's barge rose and fell and the vessel +bore away. Ta-meri cried out again when she saw it depart but she made +no effort to stay it. + +"Come back, Ta-meri," Io called. "I shall not press thee for an +accounting." + +The lanes of water between the boats cleared, the scented sails filled, +the bristling fringes of oars dipped and flashed, a great shout arose +from the populace on shore and the shining pageant moved away toward +Thebes. The barge of Nechutes swung into position on the left of +Senci--the oars on Mentu's boat rose and halted and the vessel drifted +till it was alongside her right. Kenkenes put his arm about Io, who +stood beside him and whispered exultantly or irreverently concerning +the vigilance of the cup-bearer and the murket. + +"And," he continued oracularly, "there will be a third attending us +when we return, if thou hast been coy with the gentle Seti during his +long absence." + +"Nay, I have sent him messages faithfully and in no little point have I +failed him in constancy. But I can not see why he should love me, who +am to the court-ladies as a thrush to peafowls. He writes me such +praise of Ta-user." + +"Now, Io! Art thou so little versed in the ways of men that thou dost +wonder why we love or how we love or whom we love? The very fact that +thou art different from Seti's surroundings is like to make him love +thee best." + +"I am not jealous; only he hath so much to tell of Ta-user." + +"Aye, since she is like to become his sister, it is not strange. But +what says he of her?" + +Io thrust her hand into the mist of gauzes over her bosom and with a +soft flush on her cheeks drew forth a small, flattened roll of linen. +Kenkenes made a place for her on his chair and drew her down beside +him. Together the pair undid the scroll and Kenkenes, following the +tiny pink finger, came upon these words: + +"Ah, thou shouldst see her, my sweet. Thou knowest she was born of a +prince of Egypt and a lovely Tahennu, and the mingling of our dusky +blood with that of a fair-haired northern people, hath wrought a +marvelous beauty in Ta-user. Her hair is like copper and like copper +her eyes. There is no brownness nor any flush in her skin. It is like +thick cream, smooth, soft and cool. And when she walks, she minds me +of my grandsire's leopardess, which once did stride from shadow to +shadow in the palace with that undulatory, unearthly grace. In nature, +she is world-compelling. When first she met me, she took my face +between her palms and gazed into mine eyes. Ai! she bewitched me, then +and there. My individuality died within me--I felt an unreasoning +submission, strangely mingled with aversion. I was compelled--divorced +from mine own forces, which vaguely protested from afar. . . . And +yet, thou shouldst see her meet Rameses. He makes me marvel. He +knows--she knows--aye, all Egypt knows why she hath come to court, and +yet they meet--she salutes him with bewildering grace--he inclines his +proud head with never a tremor and they pass. Or, if they tarry to +talk, it is an awesome sight to see the determined encounter of two +mighty souls--tremendous charm against tremendous resistance--and Io, I +know that they have sounded to the deepest the depth of each other's +strength. I long to see Ta-user conquer--and yet, again I would not." + +Thereafter followed matters which Kenkenes did not read. He rolled the +letter and gave it back to Io. The little girl sat expectantly +watching his face. + +"Nay, I would not take Seti's boyish transports seriously," he said +gently. "His very frankness disclaims any heart interest in Ta-user. +Besides, she is as old as I--three whole Nile-floods older than the +prince. She thinks on him as Senci looks on me--he regards her as a +lad looks up to gracious womanhood. Nay, fret not, thou dear jealous +child." + +Io's lips quivered as she looked away. + +"It is over and over--ever the same in every letter--Ta-user, Ta-user, +till I hate the name," she said at last. + +"Then when thou seest him at midday up the Nile, be thou gracious to +some other comely young nobleman and see him wince. Naught is so good +for a lover as uncertainty. It is a mistake to load him with the great +weight of thy love. Doubt not, thou shalt carry all the burden of +jealousy and pain if thou dost. Divide this latter with him, and he +shall be content to share more of the first with thee. But thou hast +condemned him without trial, Io. Spare thy heart the hurt and wait." + +The young face cleared and with a little sigh she settled back in the +chair and said no more. + +It was noon when the royal flotilla was sighted. There were nineteen +barges approaching in the form of two crescents like a parenthesis, the +horns up and down the Nile, and in the center of the inclosed space was +Meneptah's float. Here was only the royal family, the king, queen, +Ta-user, and the two princes, who took the place of fan-bearers in +attendance on their father. The vessel was manned by two reliefs of +twelve oarsmen from Theban nobility. + +If magnificence came to conduct Meneptah, it met splendor as its +charge. The pastoral solitude of the Middle country was routed for the +moment by an assemblage of the brilliance and power of all Egypt. + +With a shout that made the remote hills reply again and again, the +convoy divided, a half retreating to either side of the Nile and the +home-coming fleet entered the hollow. The nomarch's boat detached +itself from its following and took up a position in the center, beside +the royal barge. The advance was delayed only long enough for the +escort to turn, take in the sails--for they went against the wind +now--and form an outer parenthesis. Then with another shout the +triumphant return began. + +The other fleet absorbed the attention of each voyager. Every barge +had a new-comer alongside and near enough to talk across the water. +Therefore a great babel and confusion arose in which rational +conversation became impossible. Then vessels essayed to approach +nearer one another and the formation began to break. The right oars of +one boat and the left of another would be withdrawn and the vessels +lashed together. Then they were permitted to drift, with some poling +to keep them in the proper direction. When this proceeding was +impracticable because of the construction of the barges, one boat would +take another in tow until the occupants of one had joined those of the +other by a gang-plank laid from prow to stern. By sunset the +merrymaking had developed into indiscriminate boarding. Only the +vessels of the king and the nomarch and the barge of Senci were not +involved in the uproarious revel that followed. The fates were amiable +and no mishaps occurred in spite of the recklessness of the pastime. +Men and women alike took part in the play, and the general temper of +the merrymakers was good-natured and innocent. + +The dusk fell and the shadows of night were made seductive by the dim +lamps that began to burn from mast-top and prow. On the barge of Senci +only a single and subdued light was swung from a bronze tripod in the +bow, and the fourteen charges of the young sculptor, wearied with the +long day's excitement, were disposed in graceful abandon under its +glow. Senci sat with Ta-meri's head in her lap, and three or four +drowsy little girls were tumbled about her feet. Only Io was wide +awake, and even her sweet face wore a pensive air. Kenkenes had +retired to the stern, where, under the high up-standing end, stood a +long wooden bench. The young sculptor had flung himself on this, and +with the whole of the boat and its freight within range of his vision, +he listened to the riot about him. + +Suddenly the sound of cautiously wielded oars attracted his attention. +In the end of the boat was a hawser-hole, painted and shaped like the +eye of Osiris. Kenkenes turned about on his couch and watched through +this aperture. + +A barge, judiciously darkened, emerged into the circle of faint +radiance about Senci's boat. There were probably a dozen Theban nobles +of various ages grouped in attitudes of hushed expectancy in the bow. +One robust peer, with a boat-hook in his hand, leaned over the prow. +Another, barely older than fourteen, had mounted the side of the boat, +and steadying himself by the shoulder of a young lord, gazed ahead at +the group in the bow of Senci's boat. + +"By the horns of Isis," he whispered in disgust, "the most of them are +babes!" + +The robust noble turned his head and jeered good-naturedly under his +breath. + +"Mark the infant sneering at the buds. But be of cheer. One is there, +ripe enough to sate your green appetite." + +"Nay! do you distribute them now? Let me make my choice, then." + +But a general chorus of whispered protests arose. + +"Hold, not so fast. The fan-bearer first. 'Twas he who hit upon the +plan." + +The nose of the pursuing boat crept alongside the stern of the one +pursued, and the oars rested in obedience to a whispered order. The +diagonal current which moved out from the Arabian shore, and the +backward wash of water from the oars of the forward boat, heaved the +head of the nobles' barge toward its object. The robust courtier +leaned forward and made fast to his captive with the hook. A sigh of +approval and excitement ran through the group. + +"Gods! how they will scatter!" the young lord tittered nervously. + +"Nay, now, there must be no such thing," the robust noble said, +addressing them all. "Mind you, we but come as guests. It shall be +left to the ladies to say how we shall abide with them. Show me a +light." + +The instant brilliance that followed proved that a hood had been lifted +from a lamp. One of the men held a cloak between it and the group on +Senci's boat. Kenkenes raised himself. The lamp discovered to his +angry eyes the face of Har-hat. + +"Now, hold this hook for me while I get aboard," the fan-bearer +chuckled. + +With a single step the young sculptor crossed to the side of the barge +and wrenched the hook from the hands of the man that held it. For a +moment he poised it above him, struggling with a mighty desire to bring +it down on the head of the startled fan-bearer. The youthful lord +dropped from his point of vantage and half of the group retreated +precipitately. Har-hat drew back slowly and raised himself, as +Kenkenes lowered the weapon. For a space the two regarded each other +savagely. The contemplation endured only the smallest part of a +moment, but it was eloquent of the bitterest mutual antagonism. There +was no relaxing in the rigid lines of the young sculptor's figure, but +the fan-bearer recovered himself immediately. + +"Forestalled!" he laughed. "Retreat! We would not steal another man's +bliss though it be fourteen times his share!" + +The oars fell and the boat darted back into the night, the affable +sound of Har-hat's raillery receding into silence with it. + +Kenkenes flung the boat-hook into the Nile and returned to his bench, +puzzled at the inordinate passion of hate in his heart for the +fan-bearer. + +At the end of the first watch the flotilla drifted into Memphis. +Bonfires so vast as to suggest conflagrations made the long water-front +as brilliant as day. Far up the slope toward the city the red light +discovered a great multitude, densely packed and cheering tumultuously. +Amid the uproar one by one the barges approached and discharged their +occupants along the wharves. Soldiery in companies drove a roadway +through the mass from time to time, by which the arrivals might enter +Memphis, though few of these departed at once. When the Lady Senci's +barge drew up, Mentu forced his way through the increasing crowd to +meet and assist its occupants to alight. Kenkenes, still on deck, was +handing his charges down the stairway one by one, when he saw Io, who +stood at the very end of the line, lean over the side, her face aglow +with joy. Kenkenes guessed the cause of her delight and, deserting his +post, went to her side. Below stood Seti, on tiptoe, his hands +upstretched against the tall hull. + +"O, I can not reach thee," he was crying. Kenkenes caught up the +trembling, blushing, repentant girl and lowered her plump into the +prince's eager arms. + +When Kenkenes saw her an hour later, he lifted her out of her curricle +before the portals of Senci's house. + +"What did I tell thee?" he said softly. + +But the little girl clung to his arms and leaned against him with a sob. + +"O Kenkenes," she whispered, "he came but to drag me away to look upon +her!" + +"Didst go?" he asked. + +"Nay," she answered fiercely. + +After a silence Kenkenes spoke again: + +"He does not love her, Io. Believe me. I doubt not the sorceress hath +bewitched him, but he would not rush after a whilom sweetheart to have +her look upon a new one. Rather would he strive to cover up his +faithlessness. But he hath been untrue to thee in this--that he shares +a thought with the witch when his whole mind should be full of thee. +Bide thy time till he emerges from the spell, then make him writhe. +Meantime, save thy tears. Never was a man worth one of them." + +He kissed her again and set her inside Senci's house. + +But one remained now of the procession he had escorted from the river. +This was the Lady Ta-meri's litter, and his own chariot stood ahead of +it. She had lifted the curtains and was piling the opposite seat with +cushions in a manner unmistakably inviting. He hesitated a moment. +Should he dismiss his charioteer and journey to the nomarch's mansion +in the companionable luxury of the litter? But even while he debated +with himself, he passed her with a soft word and stepped into his +chariot. + + + +[1] The inundation, more properly Nilus--the river-god. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE MARGIN OF THE NILE + +Meneptah having come and the old regime of life resumed, Memphis +subsided into her normal state of dignity. Mentu remained in his house +preparing for his investiture with the office of murket. His hours +were spent in study, and the coming and going of Kenkenes crossed his +consciousness as swiftly as the shadows wavered under his young palms. +His son might work for hours near him on mysterious drawings, but so +deep was the great artist in the writings of the old murkets that he +did not think to ask him what he did. It might not have won his +attention even had he seen the young man burn the sheets of papyrus +thereafter, and grow restless and dissatisfied. He remarked, however, +that Kenkenes was absent during the noon-meal, but when the sundown +repast was served and the young man was in his place, Mentu had +forgotten that he had not been there at midday. + +Kenkenes had visited his niche in the Arabian desert. On his way to +the statue he came to the line of rocks where he had hidden himself to +get Athor's likeness, and looked down into the quarry opposite him. He +was astonished to see at the ledge, just below, a great water-cart with +three humped oxen attached. The water-bearers were grouped about it +and a Hebrew youth was drawing off the water in skins and jars. The +children received their burdens from his hands and passed up the wooden +incline to the scaffold. There Kenkenes saw that the incline had been +extended to the level of the platform, and the children were able to +deliver the hides directly into the hands of the laborers. Then it +occurred to Kenkenes that there was not a woman in sight about the +quarries. While he wondered, Rachel emerged from the windings of the +valley into the open space below. + +She carried a band of linen and a small box of horn in her hand. When +the young bearers saw her, one of them, who had been rubbing his eye, +came to her. She set her box upon an outstanding edge of stone and +devoted herself to him. Drawing his head back until it rested against +her bosom, with tender hands she dressed the injured optic with balm +from the box. + +Kenkenes from his aery watched her, noting with a softening countenance +the almost maternal love that beautified her face. Now and then she +spoke soothingly as the boy flinched, but her words were so softly said +that the sculptor did not catch them. The eye dressed, she covered it +with the bandage and the pair separated. It was with some regret that +Kenkenes saw her turn to leave the spot. But at that moment the +taskmaster rode into the open space. She made a sign of salutation and +paused at a word from him. Kenkenes fancied that her face had sobered +and he looked down on the cowled head and shoulders of the overseer, +wrathfully wondering if the Egyptian had played the master so harshly +that Rachel dreaded him. Presently the man dismounted; and though his +back was turned toward Kenkenes, the young sculptor knew by his stature +that he was not the soldier who had first governed the quarries. The +young man watched him excitedly but there was no display of tyranny or +even authority in the taskmaster's manner. They talked, and by the +motion of the man's hand Kenkenes fancied that he described something +growing near the Nile. Presently they walked together toward the +outlet of the valley. The taskmaster leaped down the ledge and, +turning, put up his arms and lifted Rachel down. It was plain that +something more than courtesy inspired the act, for the man's hands fell +reluctantly. Kenkenes faced sharply about and proceeded up the hill to +his statue with a queer discomfort tugging at his heart. + +That night in his effort to bring forth the coveted expression in his +drawings of Athor, Kenkenes all but satisfied himself. + +The next day, without any apparent cause, he went back to the niche in +the desert, stayed without purpose, and departed when no tangible +reason urged him. When the day declined he climbed down the front of +the hill and crossed the narrow field toward his boat, which was buried +in the rank vegetation of the water's edge. At the Nile he noted, a +little distance up the river, a familiar figure among the reeds. For a +moment he hesitated and then rambled through the riotous growth in that +direction. As he drew near, Rachel raised herself from a search in a +thicket of herbs, her arms full of them and her face a little flushed. + +"Idler!" said Kenkenes. + +"Nay," she answered with a smile, "I am at work--learned work." + +"Gathering witch-weeds for an incantation, sorceress?" + +"Not so. I am hunting herbs to make simples for the sick." + +"Of a truth? Then never before now have I craved for an illness that I +might select my leech." + +Again she smiled and made a sheaf of the herbs, preparatory to binding +it. The bundle was unruly, and several of the plants dropped. She +bent to pick them up and others fell. Kenkenes came to her rescue and +gathered them all into his large grasp. + +"Now, while I hold it," he suggested. + +With the most gracious self-possession she smoothed out the fiber, put +it twice, thrice about the sheaf and knotted it, her fingers, cool and +moist after their contact with the marsh sedge, touching the sculptor's +more than once. + +"There! I thank thee." + +"Are there any sick in the camp?" + +"Only those who have been blinded by the stone-dust. But I prepare for +sickness during health." + +"A wise provision. Would we might prepare for sorrow during +contentment." + +"We may lay up comfort for us against the coming of misfortune." + +"How?" + +"In choosing friends," she answered. + +His mind went back to the scene of that morning. Did she speak of the +taskmaster? + +"Thou hast found it so?" he asked. + +"Thou hast said." She added no more, though the sculptor was eager for +an example. + +"How goes it with the statue?" she asked, seeing that he did not move +out of her path. + +"Slowly," he answered. "But it shall hasten to completeness when I +once begin." + +"What wilt thou do with it when it is done? Destroy it?" + +He shook his head with a smile. + +"Leave it there to betray thee to the vengeance of the priesthood one +day?" + +"I have no fear of discovery." + +"Nay, but fear or unfear never yet warded off misfortune," she said +gravely. "It is better to entertain causeless concern than unwise +confidence." + +He eagerly accepted this establishment of equality between them, and +overshot his mark. + +"Advise me, Rachel. What should I do?" + +She gazed at him for a moment distrustfully, wondering if he mocked her +and asking herself if she had not deserved it in assuming comradeship +with him. + +"Nay, it is not my place, my master," she said. "I did forget." + +He put his hand on hers with considerable determination in his manner. + +"Let us make an end to this eternal emphasis of different rank. I +would forget it, Rachel. Wilt thou not permit me? I am thy friend and +nothing harsher--above all things, not thy master." + +Never before had he spoken so to her. She ventured to look at him at +last. His face was grave and a little passionate and his eyes demanded +an answer. + +"Aye, I shall gladly be thy friend," she answered; "but never hast thou +been so much of a master as in the denial that thou art." The first +gleam of girlish mischief danced in her blue eyes. The young sculptor +noted it with gladness. He took the free hand and pressed it, and when +she turned toward the roadway through the wheat he turned with her and +hand in hand they went. As they neared it he spoke again. + +"Again would I ask, when wilt thou advise me concerning the statue? +Here is my boat. Let us turn it into a high seat of council and I will +sit at thy feet and learn." + +"Nay, if I sit I shall linger too long, and there is a +taskmaster--albeit a gentle one--waiting with other things for me to +do." + +Kenkenes kicked the turf and frowned. + +"It sounds barbarous--this talk of master upon thy lips, Rachel. Thou +art out of thy place," he answered. + +"I am no more worthy of freedom than my people," she replied with +dignity. + +"Thy people! They should be lawgivers and advisers among Egypt's high +places, rather than brick-makers and quarry-slaves, if thou art a +typical Israelite." + +"Aye!" she exclaimed, "and thou hast given tongue to the same estimate +of Israel, which hath wrought consternation among the powers of +Mizraim. And for that reason are we enslaved. Think of it, thou who +art unafraid to think. Think of a people in bondage because of its +numbers, its sturdiness and its wisdom. Thou who art in rebellion +against ancient law dost feel somewhat of Israel's hurt. Behold, am I +not also oppressed because I may think to the upsetting of idolatry and +the overthrow of mine oppressors? Thou and I are fellows in bondage; +but mark me! I am nearer freedom than thou. The Pharaohs began too +late. Ye may not dam the Nile at flood-tide." + +Her face was full of triumph and her voice of prophecy. She seemed to +declare with authority the freedom of her people. Kenkenes did not +speak immediately. His thoughts were undergoing a change. The pity he +had felt that night a month agone for her sanguine anticipation of +freedom seemed useless and wasted. Her confidence was no longer +fatuous. He admitted in entirety the truth of her last words. If all +Israel--nay, if but part, if but its leaders were as able and +determined as she, did Meneptah guess his peril? Was not Egypt most +ominously menaced? He remembered that he had been amused at his +father's perturbation over the Israelitish unrest, but he vindicated +Mentu then and there. Furthermore, if all Israel were like unto her, +what heinous injustice had been perpetrated upon an able people? He +found himself hoping that they would assert themselves and enter +freedom, whether it be in Canaan or in Egypt. + +"If ever Israel come to her own," he said impulsively, "I pray thee, +Rachel, remember me to her powers as her partizan in her darker days. +And take this into account when thou comest to judge Egypt. The half +of the nation know not thy people, even as I have been ignorant; and +Osiris pity the hand that would oppress them if all Egypt is made +acquainted with them as I have been in these past days. Art thou +indeed typical of thy race?" + +"Hast thou not been among us often enough to discover?" she parried +smilingly. + +He shook his head. "Nay, I have known but one Israelite, and she keeps +me perpetually aghast at Egypt." + +Rachel's eyes fell. + +"We did speak of the statue," she began. + +"O, aye! I meant to tell thee how I had fortified myself against +mischance. I can not break up the statue; sooner would I assail sweet +flesh with a sledge; but when it is done I shall bury it in the sands. +It will wrench me sorely to do even that. During the carving I feel +most secure, for Memphis and Masaarah think I come hither to look after +the removal of stones, since I am a sculptor. But if an Egyptian +should come upon it by mischance before it is complete, I have left no +trace of myself upon it. Most of all I trust to the generosity of the +Hathors, who have abetted me so openly thus far." + +Rachel heard him thoughtfully. + +"What a pity it is that thou must follow after the pattern of God and +sate thy love of beauty by stealth under ban and in fear. Till what +time Mizraim sets this law of sculpture aside she may not boast her +wisdom flawless. It is past understanding why she exacts obedience to +this law most diligently, which fathers these ill-favored images of her +gods, when their habitations are most splendidly and most beautifully +built. She robeth herself in fine linen, decketh herself with jewels, +anointeth her hair and maketh her eyes lovely with kohl, and lo! when +she would picture herself she setteth her shoulders awry and slighteth +the grace of her joints and the softness of her flesh. O, that thy +brave spirit had arisen long ago, ere the perversion had become a +heritage, dear to the Egyptian sculptor as his bones! But now, artist +though he be, his eye is so befilmed by ancient use that he sees no +monstrousness in his work. So thou hast nation-wide, nation-old, +nation-defended custom to fight. And alas! thou art but one, Kenkenes, +and I fear for thee." + +For once the young sculptor's ready speech failed him. He drew near +her, his eyes shining, his lips parted, drinking every word as if it +were authoritative privilege for him to indulge his love of beauty +without limit and openly. Here was that which he had sought in vain +from those nearest to him--that which he had ceased to believe was to +be found in Egypt--comfort, sympathy, perfect understanding. What if +it came from the lips of an hereditary slave of the Pharaoh--a toiler +in the quarries, an infidel, an alien nomad? If an alien, a slave, an +unbeliever thought so deeply, felt so acutely and responded so +discerningly to such delicate requirements--the slave, the nomad for +him! + +"Rachel," he began almost helplessly, "I am beyond extrication in debt +to thee--thou golden, thou undecipherable mystery!" + +She flushed to her very brows and her eyes fell quickly. + +"I have appealed to all sources from which I might justly expect +sympathy--to men of reason, of power, of mine own kin, and to women of +heart--and not once have I found in them the broad and kindly +understanding which thou hast displayed for me out of the goodness of +thy beautiful heart. Behold! thou hast given speech to my own hidden +longings, summarized my difficulties, foreshadowed my misfortunes, +deplored them--aye, of a truth, heaved my very sighs for me!" His +voice fell and grew reverent. "I would call thee an immortal, but +there is a better title for thee--woman--a true woman--and thou dost +even uplift the name." + +For the first time in the history of their acquaintance she laughed, +not mirthfully, but low and very happily, and the fleeting glimpse she +gave him of her eyes showed them radiant and glad. He caught her +hands, the bundle of herbs fell, and drawing her near him, he lifted +the pink palms to his lips and pressed them there. + +"Nay," she said, recovering herself and withdrawing her hands, "I am +not an Egyptian but a Hebrew, unbiased by the prejudices of thy nation. +It is not strange that I can understand thy rebellion, which is but a +rift in thine Egyptian make-up through which reason shows. Any alien +could comfort thee as well." + +"And thou hast no more sympathy for me than any alien would have?" he +asked, somewhat piqued. + +"Is there any other sympathizing alien with whom I may compare and +learn?" she asked with a smile. + +She took up her bundle of herbs again and seemed to be preparing to +leave him. + +"How dost thou know these things," he asked hurriedly; "all these +things--sculpture, religion, history?" + +"I was not born a slave," she answered simply. + +"Nay, cast out that word. I would never hear thee speak it, Rachel." + +"Then, I was born out of servitude. My great grandsire was exempted by +Seti when Israel went into bondage. His children and all his house +were given to profit by the covenant. But the name grew wealthy and +powerful to the third generation. My father was Maai the +Compassionate, who loved his brethren better than himself. Them he +helped. Rameses the Great forgot his father's promise when he found he +had need of my father's treasure--" she paused and continued as if the +recital hurt her. "There were ten--four of my mother's house, six of +my father's. To the mines and the brick-fields they were sent, and in +a little space I was all that was left." + +Horrified and conscience-stricken, Kenkenes made as if to speak, but +she went on hurriedly. + +"My mother's nurse, Deborah, who went with us into servitude, is +learned, having been taught by my mother, and I have been her pupil." + +"And there is not one of thy blood--not one guardian kinsman left to +thee?" Kenkenes asked slowly. + +"Not one." + +Up to this moment, during every interview with Rachel, Kenkenes had +forsworn some little prejudice, or sacrificed some of his blithe +self-esteem. But the tragic narrative swept all these supports from +him and left him solitary to face the charge of indirect complicity in +murder. He was an Egyptian--a loyal supporter of the government and +its policies; he had profited by Israel's toil, and if he succeeded to +his father's office, Israel would serve him directly in his labor for +the Pharaoh to be. He had known that Israel was oppressed, that Israel +died of hard labor, and he had pitied it, as the humane soul in him had +felt for the overworked draft-oxen or the sacrifices that were led +bleating to the altars. Perhaps he had even casually decried the +policy that sent women into the brick-fields and did men to death in a +year in the mines. But his own conscience had not been hurt, nor had +he taken the misdeed home to himself. + +Now his sensations were vastly different. He felt all the guilt of his +nation, and he had nothing to offer as amends but his own humiliation. +Of this he had an overwhelming plenitude and his eloquent face showed +it. With an effort he raised his head and spoke. + +"Rachel, if my humiliation will satisfy thee even a little as vengeance +upon Egypt, do thou shame me into the dust if thou wilt." + +"I do not understand thee," she said with dignity. + +"Believe me. I would help thee in some wise, and alas! there is no +other way by deed or word that I could prove my sorrow." + +Tears leaped into her eyes. + +"Nay! Nay!" she exclaimed. "Thou dost wrong me, Kenkenes. What +wickedness were mine to make the one contrite, guiltless heart in Egypt +suffer for all the unrepentant and the wrong-doers of the land!" + +Once again he took her hand and kissed it, because the act was more +eloquent than words at that moment. + +"It is near sunset," she said softly, "give me leave to depart." + +"Farewell, and the divine Mother attend thee." + +She bowed and left him. + +That night in the dim work-room Kenkenes brought forth upon papyrus a +face of Athor, so full of love and yearning that he knew his own heart +had given his fingers direction and inspiration. He sought no further. + +To-morrow in the niche in the desert he would carve the want of his own +soul in the countenance of the goddess. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE GODS OF EGYPT + +It was Kenkenes' first love and so was most rapturous, but it did not +cast a glamour over the stern perplexities that it entailed. He knew +the suspense that is immemorial among lovers, and further to trouble +him he had the harsh obstacle of different society. Rachel was a +quarry-slave, a member of the lowest rank in the Egyptian scale of +classes. She was an Israelite, an infidel and a reviler of the gods. + +He was a descendant of kings, a devout Osirian and welcomed in Egypt's +high places. + +Never could extremes have been greater. But Kenkenes would not have +given any of these obstacles a moment's consideration had not the +weight of their neglect fallen on the shoulders of Rachel. If he had +been a sovereign he could have taken her freely, and purple-wearing +Egypt would have kissed her sandal; but he occupied a place that could +provide with honor only him who was born to it. + +To lift Rachel to that position would be to expose her to the affronts +of an undemocratic society. On the other hand he might sacrifice name +and station and go down to her; but he was not to be judged harshly +because he hesitated at this step. + +Rachel had given him no sign of preference beyond a pretty fellowship. +In the beginning this realization had hurt him, but as he tossed night +after night, troubled beyond expression, he remembered this thing with +some melancholy comfort. It was a sorry solution of his problem to +feel that he was unloved, and even while he recognized its efficacy, he +prayed that it might not be so. + +His heavy heart did not retard the progress of his statue or make its +beauty indifferent. The more he suffered the greater the passion in +the face. He labored daily and tirelessly. + +But day by day he looked, unseen, on his love in the valley, and the +oftener he looked the more irresolute he grew. The conflict between +his heart and his reason was gradually shifting in favor of his love. + +His longing, as it continued to crave, grew from hunger to starving, +and though his reason pointed to disastrous results, his heart +justified itself in the blind cry, "Rachel, Rachel!" + +He had endured a month before his fortitude succumbed entirely. Once +near sunset, as Rachel was proceeding toward the camp from some helpful +mission to the quarries, she caught the fragments of a song, so +distantly and absently sung that she could not locate it. There were +singers among the Israelites, but they sang with wild exultation and +more care for the sense than the melody. They had cultivated the chant +and forgotten the lyric, because they had more heart for prophecy than +passion. Rachel had revered her people's song, but there was something +in this half-heard music that touched her youth and her love of life. +She stopped to hear it well. + +It had all the power and profundity of the male voice, but it was as +subdued, as flawless and sympathetic as a distant, deep-toned bell. +There was not even a breath of effort in it, nor an insincere +expression, and it pursued a theme of little range and much simplicity. +The singer sang as spontaneously as a bird sings. She did not catch +the words, but something in the fervor of the music told her it was a +song of love--and a song of love unsatisfied. There was a pathos in it +that touched the fountain of her tears and awoke to willingness that +impulse in her womanhood that longs to comfort. + +As she stood in an attitude of rapt attention. Kenkenes rounded a +curve in the valley just ahead of her. The song died suddenly on his +lips and the color deepened in his cheeks. + +"Fie!" he exclaimed. "Here thou art, O Athor, catching me in the +imperfection of my practice. Now will the keen edge of their perfect +beauty be dulled upon thine ear when I come to lift my tuneful +devotions to thee." + +"And it was thou singing?" she asked. + +"It was I--and Pentaur; mine the voice; Pentaur's the song." + +"Together ye have wrought an eloquent harmony, but such a voice as +thine would gild the pale effort of the poorest words," she said +earnestly. "What dost thou with thy voice?" + +"Once I won me a pretty compliment with it," he said softly, bending +his head to look at her. She flushed and her eyes fell. + +"Nay, it is but my pastime and at the command of my friends," he +continued. "See. This is what has made me sing." + +He unslung his wallet and took out of it a statuette of creamy chalk. + +"Thus far has the Athor of the hills progressed." He put it into her +hands for examination. The face was complete, the minute features as +perfect as life, the plaits of long hair and all the figure exquisitely +copied and shaped. The pedestal was yet in rough block. Rachel +inspected it, wondering. Finally she looked up at him with praise in +her eyes. + +"Dost thou forgive me?" he asked. + +"It is for me to ask thy forgiveness," she answered. "So we be equally +indebted and therefore not in debt." + +"Not so. I know the joy of creating uncramped, and the joy of copying +such a model far outweighs any small delight thy little vanity may have +experienced. Thy vanity? Hast thou any vanity?" + +"Nay, I trust not," she replied laughingly. "Vanity is self-esteem run +to seed." + +"Sage! Let me make haste to carve the pedestal that I may know how low +to do obeisance to wisdom. Hold it so, I pray thee." + +He took the statue and set it on a flat cornice jutting from the stone +wall. Rachel obediently steadied it. He selected from his tools a +knife with a rounded point of wonderful keenness and smoothed away the +chalk in bulk. They stood close together, the sculptor bending from +his commanding height to work. From time to time he shifted his +position, touching her hand often and saying little. + +The pedestal given shape, he began its elaboration. Pattern after +pattern of graceful foliation emerged till the design assumed the +intricate complexity of the Egyptic style. + +Rachel watched with absorbed interest, her head unconsciously settling +to one side in critical contemplation. Kenkenes, pressing the blade +firmly upon the chalk, felt her cheek touch his shoulder for a fraction +of a second; his fingers lost their steadiness and direction, but not +their strength; the blade slipped, and the fierce edge struck the white +hand that held the statuette. + +With a cry he dropped the knife, flung one arm about her and drew her +very close to him. The image toppled down and was broken on the rock +below, but he saw only the fine scarlet thread on the soft flesh. + +Again and again he pressed the wounded hand to his lips, his eyes +dimmed with tears of compunction. + +"O, Rachel, Rachel!" he exclaimed in a sudden burst of passionate +contrition. "Must even the most loving hand in Egypt be lifted against +thee?" + +The great content on the glorified face against his breast was all the +expression of pardon that he asked. + +"My love! My Rachel!" he whispered. "Ah, ye generous gods! indulge me +still further. Let this, your richest gift, be mine." + +The gods! + +Stunned and only realizing that she must undo his clasp, she freed +herself and retreated a little space from him. + +And then she remembered. + +Slowly and relentlessly it came home to her that this was one of the +abominable idolaters, and she had forsworn such for ever. These very +arms that had held her so shelteringly had been lifted in supplication +to the idols, and the lips, whose kiss she had awaited, would swear to +love her, by an image. The pitiless truth, once admitted, smote her +cruelly. She covered her face with her hands. + +Kenkenes, amazed and deeply moved, went to her immediately. + +"What have I said?" he begged. "What have I done?" + +What had he done, indeed? But to have spoken, though to explain, would +have meant capitulation. She wavered a moment, and then turning away, +fled up the valley toward the camp--not from him, but from herself. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +TEE ADVICE OF HOTEP + +If Mentu, looking up from the old murkets, noted that the face of his +son was weary and sad, he laid it to the sudden heat of the spring; for +now it was the middle of March and Ra had grown ardent and the marshes +malarious. The old housekeeper, to whom the great artist mentioned his +son's indisposition, glanced sharply at the young master, touched his +hand when she served him at table, and felt his forehead when she +pretended to smooth his hair. And having made her furtive examination, +the astute old servant told the great artist that the young master was +not ill. If she had further information to impart, Mentu did not give +her the opportunity, for had she not said that Kenkenes was well? So +he fell to his work again. + +Senci noted it, and sorrowful Io, but they, like Mentu, ascribed it to +the miasmas and said nothing to the young man about himself. + +But Hotep was a penetrative man, and more hidden things than his +friend's ailment had been an open secret to his keen eye. He did not +care to know which one of the butterflies was the fluttering object of +Kenkenes' bounteous love, for Hotep knew that those high-born Memphian +women, who were openly partial to the handsome young sculptor, loved +him for his comeliness and his silken tongue alone. It would take a +profounder soul than any they had displayed to understand and +sympathize with the restive genius hidden under the smooth exterior +they saw. + +Therefore, with some impatience, Hotep conceded that his friend was in +love, and presumably throwing himself away. So the scribe purposed, +even though the attempt were inevitably fruitless, to win Kenkenes out +of his dream. + +One faint dawn he entered the temple to pray for his own cause at the +shrine of the lovers' goddess. + +In the half-night of the vast interior, at the foot of the sumptuous +pedestal of Athor, he distinguished another supplicant, kneeling. But +there was a hopelessness in the droop of the bowed head and a tenseness +in the interlaced fingers of the clasped hands, which proved that +Athor's answer had not been propitious. + +Hotep knew at once who besought the goddess. Setting his offering of +silver and crystal on the altar, the scribe departed with silent step. +But without, he ground his teeth and execrated the giver of pain to +Kenkenes. + +In mid-afternoon of the same day Hotep's chariot drew up at the portals +of Mentu's house, and the scribe in his most splendid raiment was +conducted to Kenkenes. The young sculptor was alone. + +"What was it, a palsy or the sun which kept thee at home this day?" was +Hotep's greeting. "Nine is a mystic number and is fruitful of much +gain. Eight times within a month have I come for thee. The ninth did +supply thee. Blessed be the number." + +Kenkenes smiled. "But there are seven Hathors, and five days in the +epact--and the Radiant Three. To me it seemeth there are many good +numbers." + +Hotep plucked his sleeve. + +"Come, I will show thee the best of all--One, the One." + +Kenkenes arose. "Let me robe myself befittingly, then." + +"Not too effectively," the scribe cried after him. "I would not have +thee blight my chances with the full blaze of thy beauty." + +When Kenkenes returned Hotep looked at him with another thought than +had been uppermost in his mind since he had noted his friend's +dejection. This time, he was impatient with Kenkenes. + +"And such a man as this will permit a woman to break his heart!" + +Then was the young sculptor taken to the palace of the Pharaoh. On its +roof, in the great square shadow of its double towers, he was presented +to a dainty little lady, whose black eyes grew large and luminous at +the coming of the scribe. She was Masanath, the youngest and only +unwedded child of Har-hat, the king's adviser. Her oval face had a +uniform rose-leaf flush, her little nose was distinctly aquiline, her +little mouth warm and ripe. Her teeth were dazzlingly white, and, like +a baby's, notched on the edges with minute serrations. But with all +her tininess, she planted her sandal with decision and scrutinized +whosoever addressed her in a way that was eloquent of a force and +perception larger by far than the lady they characterized. + +And this was the love of Hotep. Kenkenes smiled. The top of her +pretty head was not nearly on a level with his shoulders, and the small +hand she extended had the determined grip with which a baby seizes a +proffered finger. A vision of the golden Israelite rose beside her and +the smile vanished. + +The day was warm and the courtiers in search of a breeze were scattered +about the palace-top in picturesque groups. Masanath occupied a +diphros, or double chair, and a female attendant, standing behind her, +stirred the warm air with a perfumed fan. The lady was on the point of +sharing her seat with one of her guests, when Har-hat, who had been +lounging by himself on the parapet, sauntered over to his daughter's +side. + +"My father," she said, "the son of Mentu, the first friend of the noble +Hotep." + +Kenkenes had noticed, with a chill, the approach of the fan-bearer, +and, angry with himself for his unreasoning perturbation, strove to +greet him composedly. But he could not force himself into +graciousness. The formal obeisance might have been made appropriately +to his bitterest enemy. + +"The son of Mentu and I have met before," the fan-bearer declared +laughingly. "But I scarce should have recognized him in this man of +peace had not his stature been impressed upon me in that hour when +first I met him." The fan-bearer paused to enjoy the wonder of his +daughter and the scribe, and the hardening face of Kenkenes. + +"But for the agility the gods have seen fit to leave me in mine +advancing years," he continued, "this self-same courteous noble would +have brained me with a boat-hook on an occasion of much merrymaking, a +month agone." + +He sat down on the arm of Masanath's chair and shouted with laughter. +With a great effort Kenkenes controlled himself. + +"Shall I give the story in full?" he asked with an odd quiet in his +voice. + +"Nay! Nay!" Har-hat protested; "I have told the worst I would have +said concerning that defeat of mine." Again he laughed and returned to +the young man's identity once more. + +"Aye, I might have known that thou wast somewhat of kin to Mentu. Ye +are as much alike as two owlets--same candid face." + +He sauntered away, leaving an awkward silence behind him. + +"Sit beside me?" asked Masanath, drawing the folds of her white robes +aside to make room for the scribe. But Hotep did not seem to hear. +Instead, he wandered away for another chair, became interested in a +group of long-eyed beauties near by and apparently forgot Masanath. +Kenkenes did not permit any lapse between the invitation and its +acceptance. He dropped into the place made for Hotep, as if the offer +had been extended to him. + +"From Bubastis to Memphis, from Bast to Ptah," he said. "Dost thou +miss the generous levels of the Delta in our crevice between the hills?" + +She shook her head. "Memphis is the lure of all Egypt, and he who hath +been transplanted to her would flout the favor of the gods, did he make +homesick moan for his native city." + +"And thou hast warmer regard for the stir of Memphis than the quiet of +the north?" + +"There is no quiet in the north now." + +"So?" + +"Nay; hast thou not heard of the Israelitish unrest?" + +"Aye, I had heard--but--but hath it become of any import?" + +"It is the peril of Egypt that she does not realize her menace in these +Hebrews," the lady answered. "The north knows it, but it has sprung +into life so recently, and from such miserable soil, that even my +father, who has been away from the Delta but a few months, does not +appreciate the magnitude of the disaffection." + +"Thou hast lived among them, Lady Masanath. What thinkest thou of +these people?" Kenkenes asked after a little silence. + +"Of the mass I can not speak confidently," she answered modestly. +"They are proud--they pass the Egyptian in pride; they have kept their +blood singularly pure for such long residence among us; they are +stubborn, querulous and unready. But above all they are a contented +race if but the oppression were lifted from their shoulders. They are +an untilled soil--none knows what they might produce, but the +confidence of their leader, who is a wondrous man, bespeaks them a +capable people. To my mind they are mistreated beyond their deserts. +I would have the powers of Egypt use them better." + +"Is it known in the north what Mesu's purpose is? The Israelites among +us talk of their own kingdom, and I wonder if the Hebrew means to set +up a nation within us, or assail the throne of the Pharaohs, or go +forth and settle in another country." + +The lady shrugged her shoulders. "The Hebrews talk in similitudes. +The prospect of freedom so uplifts them that they chant their purposes +to you, and bewilder you with quaint words and hidden meanings. But +these three facts, my Lord, are apparent and most potent in results +when combined; they are oppressed beyond endurance; they are many; they +are captained by a mystic. They have but to choose to rebel, and it +would tax the martial strength of Egypt to quiet them." + +The magisterial dignity of the little lady was most delightful. The +young sculptor's sensations were divided between interest in the grave +subject she discussed and pleasure in her manner. Happening to glance +in the direction of the scribe, he found the gray eye of his friend +fixed upon him from the group of beauties. Presently Hotep rambled +back with an ebony stool and sat a little aloof in thoughtful silence +until the visit was over. + +When Kenkenes alighted at the door of his father's house some time +later, Hotep leaned over the wheel of the chariot and put his hand on +the sculptor's shoulder. + +"Thou hast met Har-hat and, by his own words, thou hast had some +unpleasant commerce with him. What he did to thee I know not, but I +shall let thee into mine own quarrel with him. He lays the curb of +silence on my lips and enforces the indifference in my mien. If I +revolt the penalty is humiliation and disaster for Masanath and for me. +I love her, but I dare not let her dream it. The fan-bearer hath +greater things in store for her than a scribe can promise. I am thy +brother in hatred of him." + +The next dawn, even before sunrise, Hotep found Kenkenes once again in +the temple before the shrine of Athor. But this time the scribe knelt +silently beside his friend. + +When they emerged into the sunless solemnity of the grove he turned to +Kenkenes. + +"With the licensed forwardness of an old friend, I would ask what thou +hast to crave of the lovers' goddess, O thou loveless?" + +"Favor and pardon," Kenkenes answered. + +"So? But already have I reached the limit. Not even a friend may ask +an accounting of a man's misdeeds." + +Kenkenes smiled. "Ask me," he said, "and spare me the effort of +voluntary confession." + +"Then, what hast thou done?" + +"Come and look upon mine offense. Thine eyes will serve thee better +than my tongue." + +The pair were in costume hardly fitted for the dust of the roadway, but +Memphis was not astir. They went across the city toward the river and +at the landings found an early-rising boatman, who let them his bari. + +Kenkenes took the oars and moved out into the middle of the swiftest +current of the Nile. There he headed down-stream and permitted the +boat to drift. + +The clear heavens, blue and pellucid as a sapphire, were still cool, +but from the lower slope down the east a radiance began to crawl +upward. The peaks of the Libyan desert grew wan. + +The young men did not resume their talk. The dawn in Egypt was a +solemn hour. Kenkenes raised his eyes to the heights of the west. On +the shore a group approached the Nile edge, and Hotep guessed by the +cluster of fans and standards that it was the Pharaoh at his morning +devotions to Nilus. The white points on the hilltops reddened and +caught fire. + +Softly and absently Kenkenes began to sing a hymn to the sunrise. +Hotep rested his cheek on one hand and listened. More solemn, more +appealing the notes grew, fuller and stronger, until the normal power +of the rich voice was reached. The liquid echo on the water gave it a +mellow embellishment, and Hotep saw the central figure of the group on +shore lift his hand for silence among the courtiers. + +But Kenkenes sang on unconscious even of his nearest auditor. After +the nature of humanity he was nearer to his gods in trouble than in +tranquillity. + +The white fronts of Memphis receded slowly, for neither took up the +oars. Hotep hesitated to break the silence that fell after the end of +the hymn. The shadow on the singer's face proved that the heart would +have flinched at any effort to soothe it. It was the young sculptor's +privilege to speak first. + +After a long silence, Kenkenes roused himself. + +"Look to the course of the bari, Hotep, and chide it with an oar if it +means to beach us. I doubt me much if I am fit to control it with the +wine of this wind on my brain." + +Hotep took up the oars and rowed strongly. "Thine offense does not sit +heavily on thy conscience," he said. + +"I have made my peace with Athor." + +"Hath she given thee her word?" + +"Nay, no need. For I did not offend her. Rather hath she abetted +me--urged me in my trespass. She persuaded me to become vagrant with +her, and I followed the divine runaway into the desert. I doubt not I +was chosen because I was as lawless as her needs required. Athor is +beautiful and would prove herself so to her devotees. And to me was +the lovely labor appointed." + +Hotep looked at him mystified. + +"By the gods," he said at last, "thou hadst better get in out of this +wind." + +Kenkenes laughed genuinely. "My babble will take meaning ere long. If +thou questionest me, I must answer, but I am determined not to betray +my secret yet." + +"Go we to On?" Hotep asked plaintively, after a long interval of +industry for him and dream for Kenkenes. The young sculptor sat up and +looked at the opposite shore. "Nay," he cried, "we are long past the +place where we should have landed. Yonder is the Marsh of the +Discontented Soul. Let me row back." + +He turned and pulled rapidly toward the eastern shore. Away to the +south, behind them, were the quarries of Masaarah. But they were still +a considerable distance above Toora, a second village of +quarry-workers, now entirely deserted. The pitted face of the mountain +behind the town was without life, for, as has been seen, Meneptah was +not a building monarch. Directly opposite them the abrupt wall of the +Arabian hills pushed down near to the Nile and the intervening space +was a flat sandy stretch, ending in a reedy marsh at the water's edge. +The line of cultivation ended far to the south and north of it, though +the soil was as arable as any bordering the Nile. A great number of +marsh geese and a few stilted waders flew up or plunged into the water +with discordant cries and flapping of wings as the presence of the +young men disturbed the solitude. The sedge was wind-mown, and there +were numberless prints of bird claws, but no mark of boat-keel or human +foot. The place should have been a favorite haunt of fowlers, but it +was lonely and overshadowed with a sense of absolute desertion. + +"But," Hotep began suddenly, "thou hast spoken of offense and pardon, +and now thou boastest that Athor abetted thee." + +"Why is this called the Marsh of the Discontented Soul?" + +The scribe smiled patiently. "Of a truth, dost thou not know?" + +"As the immortals hear me, I do not. I have never asked and the +chronicles do not speak of it." + +"Nay; the story is four hundred years old, and the chroniclers do not +tell it because it is out of the scope of history, I doubt not. But it +has become tradition throughout Egypt to shun the spot, though few know +why they must. A curse is laid upon the place. An unfaithful wife +whom the priests denied repose with her ancestors is entombed yonder." +He pointed toward an angle between an outstanding buttress and the +limestone wall. "Her soul haunts him who comes here with the plea that +her mummy be removed to On, where she dwelt in life, and laid with the +respected dead, in the necropolis." + +Kenkenes shrugged his shoulders. "I trust the unhappy soul will not +trouble us. We came here by way of misadventure--not to disturb her. +But how came it they did not entomb her nearer On?" + +"She betrayed one great man and tempted another. She offended against +the lofty. Therefore, her punishment was the more heavy--her isolation +in death like to banishment in life." + +"So; if she had slighted a paraschite and tempted a beer brewer, her +fate would have been less harsh. O, the justness of justice!" + +The morning was well advanced when they reached the niche on the +hillside--Hotep, wondering; Kenkenes, silent and expectant. + +The sculptor led the way into the presence of Athor, and stepped aside. +The scribe halted and gazed without sound or movement--petrified with +amazement. + +Before him, in hue and quiescence was a statue in stone--in all other +respects, a human being. The figure was of white magnesium limestone, +and stood upon rock yet unhewn. + +The ritual had been trampled into the dust. + +The eye of the most unlearned Egyptian could detect the sacrilege at a +single glance. + +It was the image of a girl, draped in an overlong robe, fastened over +each shoulder by a fibula, ornamented with a round medallion. Through +the vestments, intentionally simple, there was testimony of the +exquisite lines of the figure they clothed. + +The sole observance of hieratic symbol were the horns of Athor set in +the hair. + +The figure was posed as if in the act of a forward movement. The knee +was slightly bent in an attitude of supplication. The face was +upturned, the eyes lifted, the arms extended to their fullest, forward +and upward, the fingers curved as if ready to receive. The hair was +separated into two heavy plaits, which fell below the waist down the +back. + +One sandaled foot was advanced, slightly; the other hidden by the hem +of the robe. + +Every physical feature visible upon the living form so disposed and +draped had been carved upon this grace in stone. Egypt had never +fashioned anything so perfect. Indeed, she would not have called it +sculpture. + +The glyptic art of Greece had been paralleled hundreds of years before +it was born. + +On the face there was the light of overpowering love together with the +intangible pride so marked on the representations of profane deities. +But the most manifest emotions were the great yearning and entreaty. +They were marked in the attitude of the head thrown back, in the +outstretched arms and in the bent knee. That there was more hopeful +expectancy than despairing insistence, was proved by the curve of the +ready fingers and the uncertain smile on the lips. It was Athor, +eternally young, eternally in love, eternally unsatisfied, receiving +the setting sun as she had done since the world began. None of the +rapturous impatience and uncertainty of the moment had been lost since +the first sunset after chaos. And yet, with all the pulse and fervor, +here was womanhood, immaculate and ineffable. + +Never did face so command men to worship. + +"Holy Amen!" the scribe exclaimed, his voice barely audible in its +earnestness. "What consummate loveliness! But what--what unspeakable +impiety!" + +"Hast thou seen Athor? She is before thee." + +"Athor! The golden goddess in the image of a mortal! Kenkenes, the +wrath of the priests awaits thee and thereafter the doom of the +insulted Pantheon!" The scribe shuddered and plucked at his friend's +robe as if to drag him away from the sight of his own creation. + +Firmly fixed were the young artist's convictions to resist the +impelling force of Hotep's consternation. + +"Nay, nay, Hotep," he answered soothingly. "The wrath of the gods for +an offense thus flagrant is exceedingly slow, if it is to fall. Lo! +they have propitiated me at great length if they mean to accomplish +mine undoing at last. Thus far, and the statue is well-nigh complete, +I have met no form of obstacle." + +But Hotep shook his head in profound apprehension. He looked at the +statue furtively and murmured: + +"O Kenkenes, what madness made thee trifle with the gods?" + +"Have I not said? The goddess herself lured me. Is she not the +embodied essence of Beauty? The ritual insults her. Ah, look at the +statue, Hotep. How could Athor be wroth with the sculptor who called +such a face as that, a likeness of her!" + +"It startles me," the scribe declared. "It is supernaturally human. +That is not art, but creation. O apostate, thine offense is of +two-fold seriousness. Thou hast stolen the function of the divine +Mother and made a living thing!" + +Kenkenes laughed with sheer joy at his comrade's genuine praise. The +more dismayed Hotep might be, the more sincere his compliment. But the +scribe, plunged into a stupor of concern lest the authorities discover +the sacrilege, went on helplessly. + +"What wilt thou do with it when it is done?" + +"I have left no mark of myself upon it." + +"Nay, but the priesthood can scent out a blasphemer as a hound scents a +jackal." + +"Thou wilt not betray me, Hotep; I shall not publish myself, and the +other--the only other who possesses my secret--the Israelite, who was +my model, is fidelity's self. I would trust her with my soul." + +"An Israelite! Thy nation's most active foe at this hour!" + +"She is no enemy to me, Hotep." + +Slowly the scribe's eyes traveled from the face of Athor to the face of +Kenkenes. The young sculptor turned away and leaned against the great +cube that walled one side of the niche. He was not prepared to meet +his friend's discerning eyes. Hotep surveyed him critically. A +momentous surmise forced itself upon him. He went to Kenkenes and, +laying an affectionate arm across his shoulder, leaned not lightly +thereon. + +"Thou hast said, O my Kenkenes, that I should understand thy meaning +when thou spakest mysteriously a while agone. May I not know, now? +Thou didst plead offense to Athor and didst boast her pardon. Later +thou calledst her thy confederate. And earliest of all, thou didst +confess to asking favor of her. How may all these things be?" + +"Look thou," Kenkenes began at once. "On one hand, I have my new +belief concerning sculpture--on the other, the beliefs of my fathers. +I practise the first and make propitiation for the second. No harm +hath overtaken me. Am I not pardoned? Furthermore, Athor is beauty, +and beauty guided my hand in creating this statue. Therefore, Athor +being beauty, Athor was my confederate. Is it not lucid, O Son of +Wisdom?" + +Hotep laughed. "Nay, thou wilt not prosper, Kenkenes. Thou servest +two masters. But there is one thing still unexplained--the favor of +Athor." + +"That is not mine to boast. I have but craved it," Kenkenes replied +hesitatingly. + +"Where doth she live?" Hotep asked, by way of experiment. + +"In the quarries below." + +There was no more doubt in the mind of Hotep. Here was a duty, plain +before him, and his dearest friend to counsel. His must be tender +wisdom and persuasive authority. Not a drop of the scribe's blood was +democratic. He could not understand love between different ranks of +society, and, as a result, doubted if it could exist. Kenkenes must be +awakened while it was time. + +"Do thou hear me, O my Kenkenes," he said after some silence. "If I +overstep the liberty of a friend, remind me, but remember +thou--whatsoever I shall say will be said through love for thee, not to +chide thee. No man shapeth his career for himself alone, nor does +death end his deeds. He continues to act through his children and his +children's children to the unlimited extent of time. Seest thou not, O +Kenkenes, that the ancestor is terribly responsible? What more heavy +punishment could be meted to the original sinner, than to set him in +eternal contemplation of the hideous fruitfulness of his initial sin! + +"I have said sin, because sin, only, is offense in the eyes of the +gods. But sin and error are one in the unpardoning eye of nature. +Thus, if thou dost err, though in all innocence, though the gods +absolve thee, thou wilt reap the bitter harvest of thy misguided +sowing, one day--thou or thy children after thee. The doom is spoken, +and however tardy, must fall--and the offense is never expiated. There +is nothing more relentless than consequence. + +"If thou weddest unwisely thou dost double thy children's portion of +difficulty, since thou art unwise and their mother unfit. If, +perchance, thy only error lay in thy choice of wife, the result is +still the same. Let her be most worthy, and yet she may be most +unfitting. She must fit thy needs as the joint fits the socket. +Virtue is essential, but it is not sufficient. Beauty is good--I +should say needful, but certainly it is not all. Love is indispensable +and yet not enough." + +"I should say that these three things are enough," put in Kenkenes. + +"They would gain entrance into the place of the blest--the bosom of +Osiris--but they are not sufficient for the over-nice nobility of +Egypt," the scribe averred promptly. "Thou must live in the world and +the world would pass judgment on thy wife. If thou art a true husband, +thou wouldst defend her, and be wroth. Yet, canst thou be happy being +wroth and at odds with the world?" + +Kenkenes slipped from under the affectionate arm and busied himself +with the statue, marking with a sliver of limestone where his chisel +must smooth away a flaw. But the voice of the scribe went on steadily. + +"The nobility of Egypt will not accept an unbeliever and an Israelite. +That monarch who favored the son of Abraham, Joseph, is dead. The +tolerant spirit died with him. Another sentiment hath grown up and the +loveliest Hebrew could not overthrow it. Henceforward, there is +eternal enmity between Egypt and Israel." + +The sliver of stone dropped from the fingers of the artist and his eyes +wandered away, dreamy with thought. He remembered the story of the +wrong of Rachel's house, and it came home to him with overwhelming +force that the feud between Egypt and Israel was the barrier between +him and his love. He was punished for a crime his country had +committed. + +"Oh!" he exclaimed to himself. "Am I not surely suffering for the sins +of my fathers? How cruelly sound thy reasoning is, O thou placid +Hotep!" + +The scribe saw that as the sculptor stood, the pleading hands of Athor +all but touched his shoulders. Hotep went to him and turned him away +from the statue. He knew he could not win his friend with the beauty +of that waiting face appealing to him. + +"Thus far thou hast borne with me, Kenkenes--and having grown bold +thereby, I would go further. Return with me to Memphis and come hither +no more. She will soon be comforted, if she is not already betrothed. +Egypt needs thee--the Hathors have bespoken good fortune for thee--and +thou art justified in aspiring to nothing less than the hand of a +princess. Come back to Memphis and let her heal thee with her +congruous love." + +"Nay, my Hotep, what a waste of words! I will go back to Memphis with +thee, not for thy reasoning, but for mine own--nay, hers." + +"Hast thou--did the Israelite--" the scribe began in amazement, and +paused, ashamed of his unbecoming curiosity. + +"Aye; and let us speak of it no more. Thou hast my story, my +confidence and my love. Keep the first and the rest shall be thine for +ever." + +"And this?" questioned Hotep, nodding toward the statue, though he +resolutely kept the face of Kenkenes turned from it. + +"Let it be," Kenkenes replied. Hotep hesitated, dissatisfied, but +feared to insist on its destruction, so he went arm in arm with his +friend down to the river, without a word of protest. "I will at him +again when he is better," he told himself, "and we will bury the +exquisite sacrilege." + +There was an animated group of Hebrew children at the Nile drawing +water, and among them was a golden-haired maiden. Hotep had but to +glance at her to know that he looked on the glorious model of the pale +divinity on the hill above. At the sound of their approach through the +grain, she looked up. As she caught sight of Kenkenes, she started and +flushed quickly and as quickly the color fled. + +Since she was near the boat, Kenkenes stood close beside her for a +moment while he pushed the bari into the water. + +"Gods! What a noble pair!" Hotep ejaculated under his breath. But he +saw Kenkenes bend near the Israelite, as if to make his final plea; a +spasm of anguish contracted her white face, and she turned her head +away. The incident, so eloquent to Rachel and Kenkenes, had been so +swift and subtile in its enactment, that only the quick eye of Hotep +detected it. Again he called on the gods in exclamation: + +"She is saner than he!" + +On the way back to Memphis he maintained a thoughtful silence. Since +he had seen Rachel, he began to understand the love of Kenkenes for her. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +THE SON OF THE MURKET + +March and April had passed and now it was the first of May. Five days +before, the ceremony of installation had been held for the murket and +the cup-bearer and for four days thereafter the new officers passed +through initiatory formalities. But on the fifth day the rites of +investiture had been brought to an end, and Mentu and Nechutes entered +on the routine of service. + +To Mentu fell the dignified congratulations of his own world of sedate +old nobles and stately women. But Nechutes was younger and well +beloved by youthful Memphis, so on the night of the fifth day, the +house of Senci was aglow and in her banquet-room there was much young +revel in his honor. + +Aromatic torches flaring in sconces lighted the friezes of lotus, the +painted paneling on the walls, and the clustered pillars that upheld +the ceiling of the chamber. The tables had been removed; the musicians +and tumblers common to such occasions were not present, for the rout +was small and sufficient unto itself for entertainment. + +Gathered about a central figure, which must needs be the one of highest +rank--and in this instance it was the crown prince--were the young +guests. They were noblemen and gentlewomen of Memphis, freed for an +evening from the restraint of pretentious affairs and spared the +awesome repression of potentates and monitors. + +Hotep was host and these were his guests. + +First, there was Rameses, languid, cynical, sumptuous, and enthroned in +a capacious fauteuil, significantly upholstered in purple and gold. + +Close beside him and similarly enthroned was Ta-user. She wore a +double robe of transparent linen, very fine and clinging in its +texture. The over-dress was simply a white gauze, striped with narrow +lines of green and gold. From the fillet of royalty about her +forehead, an emerald depended between her eyes. Her zone was a broad +braid of golden cords, girdling her beneath the breast, encompassing +her again about the hips, and fastened at last in front by a +diamond-shaped buckle of clustered emeralds. Her sandals were mere +jeweled straps of white gazelle-hide, passing under the heel and ball +of the foot. She was as daringly dressed as a lissome dancing-girl. + +On a taboret at her right was Seti, the little prince. Although he was +nearly sixteen he looked to be of even tenderer years. In him, the +charms of the Egyptian countenance had been so emphasized, and its +defects so reduced, that his boyish beauty was unequaled among his +countrymen. + +At his feet was Io, playing at dice with Ta-meri and Nechutes. Ta-meri +was more than usually brilliant, and Nechutes, flushed with her favor, +was playing splendidly and rejoicing beyond reason over his gains. + +Opposite this group was another, the center of which was Masanath. She +sat in the richest seat in the house of Senci. It was ivory tricked +with gold; but small and young as the fan-bearer's daughter was, there +was none in that assembly who might queen it as royally as she from its +imperial depths. By her side was the boon companion of Rameses. He +was Menes, surnamed "the Bland," captain of the royal guard, a most +amiable soldier and chiefly remarkable because, of all the prince's +world, he was the only one that could tell the truth to Rameses and +tell it without offense. + +On the floor between Masanath and Menes was the son of Amon-meses, the +Prince Siptah. He was a typical Oriental, bronze in hue, lean of +frame, brilliant of eye, white of teeth, intense in temperament and +fierce in his loves and hates. Religion comforted him through his +appetites; in his sight craft was a virtue, intrigue was politics, and +love was a fury. His eyes never left Ta-user for long, and his every +word seemed to be inspired by some overweening emotion. + +Aside from these there were others in the group. Some were sons and +daughters of royalty, cousins of the Pharaoh's sons and of Ta-user and +Siptah; many were children of the king's ministers, and all were noble. + +Senci and Hotep's older sister, the Lady Bettis, a dark-eyed matron of +thirty, presided in duenna-like guardianship over the rout. They sat +in a diphros apart from the young revelers. + +Kenkenes was momently expected. For the past two months he had been +seen every evening wherever there was high-class revel in Memphis. But +he had laughed perfunctorily and lapsed into preoccupation when none +spoke to him, and his song had a sorry note in it, however happy the +theme. But these were things apparent only to those that saw deeper +than the surface. + +"Where is Kenkenes?" Menes demanded. "Hath he forsworn us?" + +"I saw him to-day," Nechutes ventured, without raising his eyes from +the game, "when we were fowling on the Nile below the city. He was +alone, pulling down-stream, just this side of Masaarah." + +Hotep frowned and gave over any hope that Kenkenes would join the +merrymaking that night. But at that moment, Ta-meri, who sat facing +the entrance to the chamber, poised the dice-box in air and drew in a +long breath. The guests followed her eyes. + +Kenkenes stood in the doorway, the curtain thrust aside and above him. +His voluminous festal robes were deeply edged with gold, but his arms, +bare to the shoulder, and his strong brown neck were without their +usual trappings of jewels. The omission seemed intentional, as if the +young man had meant to contrast the ornament of young strength and +grace with the glitter and magnificence of the other guests. He had +succeeded well. + +Perhaps to most of those present, the young man's presence was not +unusual, but Hotep was not blind to a manifest alteration in his +manner. There was cynicism in the corners of his mouth, and a hint of +hurt or temper was evident in the tension of his nostril and the +brilliance of his eyes. Hotep had no need of seers and astrologers, +for his perception served him in all tangible things. He knew +something untoward had set Kenkenes to thinking about himself, and +guessing where the young artist had gone that evening, he surmised +further how he had been received. + +And though he was sorry in his heart for his friend's unhappiness, he +confessed his admiration for Rachel. + +"Late," cried Hotep, rising. + +"Thy pardon, Hotep," Kenkenes replied, advancing into the chamber, "I +had an errand of much importance to Masaarah and it was fruitless. It +shall trouble me no more." + +Hotep lifted his brows, as though he exclaimed to himself, and made no +answer. Kenkenes greeted the guests with a wave of his hand and did +obeisance before Rameses. + +"Thou speakest of Masaarah, my Kenkenes," the crown prince commented +after the salutation, "and it suggests an inquiry I would make of thee. +Dost thou go on as sculptor, or wilt thou follow thy father into the +art of building?" + +"Since the Pharaoh chose for my father, he shall choose for me also." + +"Nay, the Pharaoh did not choose," Rameses objected dryly. "It was I." + +"Of a truth? Then thou shalt choose for me, O my generous Prince." + +"Follow thy father. I would have thee for my murket. Nay, it is ever +so. I mold the Pharaoh and he gets the credit." + +"And thou, the blame, when blame accrues from the molding," Menes put +in very distinctly, though under his breath. + +"But be thou of cheer, O Son of the Sun," Kenkenes added. "When thou +art Pharaoh, thou canst retaliate upon thine own heir, in the same +fashion." + +"Thou givest him tardy comfort, O Son of Mentu," Siptah commented with +an unpleasant laugh. "He will lose all recollection of the grudge, +waiting so long." + +Rameses turned his heavy eyes toward the speaker, but Kenkenes halted +any remark the prince might have made. + +"Nay, let it pass," he said placidly, dropping into a chair. "All this +savors too much of the future and is out of place in the happy +improvidence of the present." + +"Let it all pass?" Ta-user asked. "Nay, I would hold the prince to the +promise he made a moment agone, when the choosing of the new murket +comes round again." + +"Do thou so, for me, then, when that time comes," Kenkenes interrupted. + +Ta-user laughed very softly and delivered the young artist a level look +of understanding from her topaz eyes. "I fear thou art indeed +improvident," she continued, "if thou leavest thy future to others." + +"Then all the world is improvident, since it belongeth to others to +shape every man's future. But Hotep, the lawgiver, denies this thing. +He holds that every man builds for himself." + +"Right, Hotep!" Rameses exclaimed. "It was such belief that made a +world-conqueror of my grandsire." + +"Nay, thy pardon, O my Prince. Hotep's counsel will not always hold," +Kenkenes objected. + +"Give me to know wherein it faileth," the prince demanded. + +"Alas! in a thousand things. In truth a man even draws his breath by +the leave of others." + +"By the puny god, Harpocrates!" the prince cried, scoffing. "That is +the weakest avowal I have heard in a moon!" + +Kenkenes flushed, and Rameses, recovering from his amusement, pressed +his advantage. + +"Let me give thee a bit of counsel from mine own store that thou mayest +look with braver eyes on life. Take the world by the throat and it +will do thy will." + +"Again I dispute thee, O Rameses." + +"Name thy witness," the prince insisted. Kenkenes leaned on his elbow +toward him. + +"Canst thou force a woman to love thee?" he asked simply. + +Ta-user glanced at the prince and the sleepy black eyes of the heir +narrowed. + +"Let us get back to the issue," he said. "We spoke of others shaping +the future of men. You may not force a woman to love you, but no love +or lack of love of a woman should misshape the destiny of any man." + +"That is a matter of difference in temperament, my Prince," Ta-user put +in. + +"It may be, but it is the expression of mine own ideas," he answered +roughly. + +The lashes of the princess were smitten down immediately and Siptah's +canine teeth glittered for a moment, one set upon the other. Kenkenes +patted his sandal impatiently and looked another way. His gaze fell on +Io. She had lost interest in the game. The color had receded from her +cheeks and now and again her lips trembled. Kenkenes looked and saw +that Seti's eyes were adoring Ta-user, who smiled at him. With a +sudden rush of heat through his veins, the young artist turned again to +Io, and watched till he caught her eye. With a look he invited her to +come to him. She laid down the dice, during the momentary abstraction +of her playing-mates, and murmuring that she was tired, came and sat at +the feet of her champion. + +"Wherefore dost thou retreat, Io?" Ta-user asked. "Art vanquished?" + +"At one game, aye!" the girl replied vehemently. + +Kenkenes laid his hand on her head and said to her very softly: + +"If only our pride were spared, sweet Io, defeat were not so hard." + +The girl lifted her face to him with some questioning in her eyes. + +"Knowest thou aught of this game, in truth?" she asked. + +He smiled and evaded. "I have not been fairly taught." + +Ta-meri gathered up the stakes and Nechutes, collecting the dice, went +to find her a seat. But while he was gone, she wandered over to +Kenkenes and leaned on the back of his chair. + +"Let me give thee a truth that seemeth to deny itself in the +expression," Io said, turning so that she faced the young artist. + +"Say on," he replied, bending over her. + +"The more indifferent the teacher in this game of love, the sooner you +learn," said Io. Kenkenes took the tiny hand extended toward him in +emphasis and kissed it. + +"Sorry truth!" he said tenderly. As he leaned back in his chair he +became conscious of Ta-meri's presence and turned his head toward her. +Her face was so near to him that he felt the glow from her warm cheek. +His gaze met hers and, for a moment, dwelt. + +All the attraction of her gorgeous habiliments, her warm assurance and +her inceptive tenderness detached themselves from the general fusion +and became distinct. Her beauty, her fervor, her audacity, were not +unusually pronounced on this occasion, but the spell for Kenkenes was +broken and the inner working's were open to him. Different indeed was +the picture that rose before his mind--a picture of a fair face, +wondrously and spiritually beautiful; of the quick blush and sweet +dignity and unapproachable womanhood. His eyes fell and for a moment +his lids were unsteady, but the color surged back into his cheeks and +his lips tightened. + +He took Io's hands, which were clasped across his knee, and rising, +gave the chair to Ta-meri. He found a taboret for himself, and as he +put it down at her feet, he saw Nechutes fling himself into a chair and +scowl blackly at the nomarch's daughter. Kenkenes sighed and +interested himself in the babble that went on about him. + +The first word he distinguished was the name of Har-hat, pronounced in +clear tones. Menes, who sat next to Kenkenes, put out his foot and +trod on the speaker's toes. The man was Siptah. + +"Choke before thou utterest that name again," the captain said in a +whisper, "else thou wilt have Rameses abusing Har-hat before his +daughter." + +"What matters it to me, his temper or her hurt?" Siptah snarled. + +"Churl!" responded Menes, amiably. + +"What is amiss between the heir and the fan-bearer?" Kenkenes asked. + +"Everything! Rameses fairly suffocates in the presence of the new +adviser. The Pharaoh is sadly torn between the twain. He worships +Rameses and, body of Osiris! how he loves Har-hat! But sometime the +council chamber with the trio therein will fall--the walls outward, the +roof, up--mark me!" + +Again, clear and with offensive emphasis, Siptah's voice was heard +disputing, in the general babble. + +"Magnify the cowardice of the Rebu if you will, but it was Har-hat who +made them afraid," he was saying. + +The slow eyes of Rameses turned in the direction of the tacit +challenge. Menes' black brows knitted at Siptah, but Kenkenes came to +the rescue. A lyre, the inevitable instrument of ancient revels, was +near him and he caught it up, sweeping his fingers strongly across the +strings. + +A momentary silence fell, broken at once by the applause of the +peace-loving, who cried, "Sing for us, Kenkenes!" + +He shook his head, smiling. "I did but test the harmony of the +strings; harmony is grateful to mine ear." + +Menes' lips twitched. "If harmony is here," he said with meaning, "you +will find it in the instrument." + +Again, a voice from the general conversation broke in--this time from +Rameses. + +"Kenkenes hath outlasted an army of other singers. I knew him as such +when mine uncles yet lived and my father was many moves from the +throne. It was while we dwelt unroyally here in Memphis. They made +thee sing in the temple, Kenkenes. Dost thou remember?" + +"Aye," Ta-user took it up. "They made thee sing in the temple and it +went sore against thee, Kenkenes. Most of the upper classes in the +college here were hoarse or treble by turns, and the priests required +thee by force from thy tutors because thou couldst sing. Thou wast a +stubborn lad, as pretty as a mimosa and as surly as a caged lion. I +can see thee now chanting, with a voice like a lark, and frowning like +a very demon from Amenti!" + +The princess laughed musically at her own narration and received the +applause of the others with a serene countenance. She had repaid +Kenkenes for his implied championship of her cause earlier in the +evening. + +"Art still as reluctant, Kenkenes?" the Lady Senci called to him. + +Kenkenes looked at the lyre and did not answer at once. There was no +song in his heart and a moody silence seemed more like to possess his +lips. His audience, too, was not in the temper for song. He took in +the expression of the guests with a single comprehensive glance. +Siptah's hands were clenched and his face was blackened with a frown. +Ta-user's silken brows were lifted, and even the pallid countenance of +the prince was set and his eyes were fixed on nothing. Seti was +entangled by the princess' witchery and he saw no one else. Io, +blanched and miserable, forgotten by Seti, forgot all others. In his +heart Kenkenes knew that Nechutes was unhappy and Hotep and Masanath; +and even if there were those in the banquet-room who had no overweening +sorrow, the evident discontent of the troubled oppressed them. + +Far from finding inspiration for song in the faces of the guests, +Kenkenes felt an impulse to rush out of the atmosphere of unrest and +unhappiness into the solitary night, where no intrusion of another's +sorrow could dispute the great triumph of his own grief. The bitter +soul in him longed to laugh at the idea of singing. + +The hesitation between Senci's invitation and his answer was not +noticeable. He put the instrument out of his reach, tossing it on a +cushion a little distance away. + +"Not so reluctant," he said, turning his face toward the lady, "as +unready. I have exhausted my trove of songs for this self-same +company,--wherefore they will not listen to reiteration, which is ever +insipid." + +Senci wisely accepted his excuse, and pressed him no further. One or +two of the more observant members of the company looked at him, with +comprehension in their eyes. Seldom, indeed, had Kenkenes refused to +sing, and his reluctance corroborated their suspicions that all was not +well with the young artist. + +The irrepressible Menes observed to Io in one of his characteristic +undertones, but so that all the company heard it: "What makes us surly +to-night? Look at Kenkenes; I think he is in love! What aileth thee, +sweet Io? Hast lost much to that gambling pair--Ta-meri and Nechutes? +And behold thy fellows! What a sulky lot! I am the most cheerful +spirit among us." + +"Boast not," she responded; "it is not a virtue in you. You would be +blithe in Amenti, for one can not get mournful music out of a timbrel." + +The soldier's eyes opened, and he caught at her, but she eluded him and +growled prettily under her breath. + +"Come, Bast," he cried, making after her. "Kit, kit, kit!" + +She sprang away with a little shriek and Kenkenes, throwing out his +arm, caught her and drew her close. + +"Menes is malevolent--" he began. + +"Aye, malevolent as Mesu!" she panted. + +"What!" the soldier cried. "Has the Hebrew sorcerer already become a +bugbear to the children?" + +"If he become not a bugbear to all Egypt, we may thank the gods," +Siptah put in. + +Rameses laughed scornfully, but Ta-user and Seti spoke simultaneously: + +"Siptah speaks truly." + +"Yea, Menes," the heir scoffed; "he hath already become a bugbear to +the infants. Hear them confess it?" + +Siptah buried his clenched hand in a cushion on the floor near him. + +"O thou paternal Prince," he said, "repeat us a prayer of exorcism as a +father should, and rid us of our fears." + +"And pursuant of the custom bewailed an hour agone, we shall return +thanks to the Pharaoh, for the things thou dost achieve, O our +Rameses," Menes added. + +"If there are any prayers said," the prince replied, "the Hebrews will +say them. Mine exorcism will be harsher than formulas." + +The rest of the company ceased their undertone and listened. + +"Wilt thou tell us again what thou hast said, O Prince?" Kenkenes asked. + +"Mine exorcism of the Hebrew sorcerer, Mesu, will be harsher than +formulas. I shall not beseech the Israelites and it will avail them +naught to beseech me." + +"Thou art ominous, Light of Egypt," Kenkenes commented quietly. "Wilt +thou open thy heart further and give us thy meaning?" + +"Hast lived out of the world, O Son of Mentu? The exorcism will begin +ere long. In this I give thee the history of Israel for the next few +years and close it. I shall not fall heir to the Hebrews when I come +to wear the crown of Egypt." + +"Are they to be sent forth?" Kenkenes asked in a low tone. + +Rameses laughed shortly. + +"Thou art not versed in the innuendoes of court-talk, my Kenkenes. +Nay, they die in Egypt and fertilize the soil." + +"It will raise a Set-given uproar, Rameses," Menes broke in with meek +conviction; "and as thou hast said--to the king, the credit--to his +advisers, the blame." + +"Nay; the process is longer and more natural," the prince replied +carelessly. "It is but the same method of the mines. Who can call +death by hard labor, murder?" + +The full brutality of the prince's meaning struck home. Kenkenes +gripped the arm of Ta-meri's chair with such power that the sinews +stood up rigid and white above the back of the brown hand. Luckily, +all of the guests were contemplating Rameses with more or less horror. +They did not see the color recede from the young artist's face or his +eyes ignite dangerously. + +Masanath sat up very straight and leveled a pair of eyes shining with +accusation at the prince. + +"Of a truth, was thine the fiat?" she demanded. + +"Even so, thou lovely magistrate," he answered with an amused smile. +"Was it not a masterful one?" + +Hotep delivered her a warning glance, but she did not heed it. Austere +Ma, the Defender of Truth, could have been as easily crushed. + +"Masterful!" she cried. "Nay! Menes, lend me thy word. Of all +Set-given, pitiless, atrocious edicts, that is the cruelest! Shame on +thee!" + +At her first words, Rameses raised himself from his attitude of languor +into an upright and intensely alert position. The company ceased to +breathe, but Kenkenes heaved a soundless sigh of relief. Masanath had +uttered his denunciations for him. + +Meanwhile the prince's eyes began to sparkle, a rich stain grew in his +cheeks and when she made an end he was the picture of animated delight. +For the first time in his life he had been defied and condemned. + +But his gaze did not disturb Masanath. Her eyes dared him to resent +her censure. The prince had no such purpose in mind. + +"O by Besa! here is what I have sought for so long," he exclaimed, at +last. "Hither! thou treasure, thou dear, defiant little shrew! Thou +art more to me than all the wealth of Pithom. Hither, I tell thee!" + +But she did not move. The company was breathing with considerable +relief by this time, but not a few of them were casting furtive glances +at Ta-user. + +"Hither!" Rameses commanded, stamping his foot. "Nay, I had forgot she +defies my power. Behold, then, I come to thee." + +Masanath anticipated his intent, and rising with much dignity, she put +the ivory throne between her and the prince. Cool and self-possessed +she gathered up her lotuses, as fresh after an evening in her hand as +they were when the slaves gathered them from the Nile; found her fan +and made other serene preparations to depart. Rameses, fended from her +by the chair, stood before her and watched with a smile in his eyes. + +Presently he waved his hand to the other guests. + +"Arise; the princess is going," he commanded. + +In the stir and rustle, laughter and talk of the guests, getting up at +the prince's sign--for it was customary to permit the highest of rank +to dismiss a company--Masanath slipped from among them and attempted to +leave unnoticed. But Rameses was before her and had taken possession +of her hand before she could elude him. As Kenkenes passed them on his +way to the door her soft shoulders were squared; she had drawn herself +as far away from the prince as she might and was otherwise evincing her +discomfort extravagantly. + +Before them was Hotep, outwardly undisturbed, smiling and complacent. +At one side was Ta-user, at the other Seti, and Io hung on Hotep's arm. + +The young artist walked past them hurriedly, moved to leave all the +ferment and agitation behind him. If he had thought to forget his +sorrows among the light-hearted revel of those that did not sorrow, he +misdirected his search. + +At the doors the Lady Senci met him and drew him over to the diphros, +now vacated by Bettis. + +And there she took his face between her hands and kissed him. + +"Hail! thou son of the murket!" she said. + +"Having much, I am given more," he responded. "Behold the prodigality +of good fortune. The Hathors exalt me in the world and add thereto a +kiss from the Lady Senci." + +"I was impelled truly," she confessed, "but by thine own face as well +as by the Hathors. Kenkenes, if I did not know thee, I should say thou +wast pretending--thou, to whom pretense is impossible." + +He did not answer, for there was no desire in his heart to tell his +secret; his experience with Hotep had warned him. Yet the unusual +winsomeness of his father's noble love was hard to resist. + +"Thy manner this evening betrays thee as striving to hide one spirit +and show another," she continued, seeing he made no response. + +"Thou hast said," he admitted at last; "and I have not succeeded. That +is a sorry incapacity, for the world has small patience with a man who +can not make his face lie." + +"Bitter! Thou!" she chid. + +"Have I not spoken truly?" he persisted. + +"Aye, but why rebel? No man but hides a secret sorrow, and this would +be a tearful world did every one weep when he felt like it." + +"But I am most overwhelmingly constrained to weep, so I shall stay out +of the world and vex it not." + +She looked at him with startled eyes. + +"Art thou so troubled, then?" she asked in a lowered tone. + +"Doubly troubled--and hopelessly," he replied, his eyes away from her. + +She came nearer and, putting up her hands, laid them on his shoulders. + +"You are so young, Kenkenes---so young, and youth is like to make much +of the little first sorrows. Furthermore, these are troublous days. +Saw you not the temper of the assembly to-night? Egypt is a-quiver +with irritation. Every little ripple in the smooth current of life +seems magnified--each man seeketh provocation to vent his causeless +exasperation. And when such ferment worketh in the gathering of the +young, it is portentous. It bodeth evil! You are but caught in the +fever, my Kenkenes, and your little vexations are inflamed until they +hurt, of a truth. Get to your rest, and to-morrow her smile will be +more propitious." + +Kenkenes looked at the uplifted face and noted the laugh in the eyes. + +"What a tattling face is mine," he said, "Is her name written there +also?" He drew his fingers across his forehead. + +"No need; I have been young and many are the young that have wooed and +wed beneath mine eyes. I know the signs." She nodded sagely and +continued after a little pause: + +"I shall not pry further into your sorrow, Kenkenes; but you are good +and handsome, and winsome, and wealthy, and young, and it is a stony +heart that could hold out long against you. I would wager my mummy +that the maiden is this instant well-nigh ready to cast herself at your +feet, save that your very excellence deters her. Go, now, and let your +dreams be sweeter than these last waking hours have been." + +Again she kissed him and let him go. + +In the corridor without, he received his mantle and kerchief from a +servant and continued toward the outer portals. But before he reached +them, Ta-meri stepped out of a cross-corridor and halted. Never before +did her eyes so shine or her smile so flash within the cloud of gauzes +that mantled and covered her. Kenkenes wondered for a moment if he +must explain the change in his countenance to her also. But the beauty +had herself in mind at that moment. + +"Kenkenes, thou hast given me no opportunity to wish thee well, as the +son of the murket." + +"Ah, but in this nook thy good wishes will be none the less sincere nor +my delight any less apparent." + +"Most heartily I give thee joy!" + +Kenkenes kissed her hand. "And wilt thou say that to Nechutes and put +him in the highest heaven?" + +"Already have I wished him well," she responded, pretending to pout, +"but he repaid me poorly." + +"Nay! What did he?" + +"Begged me to become his wife." + +"And having given him the span, thou didst yield him the cubit also +when he asked it?" he surmised. + +"Nay, not yet. But--shall I?" she lifted her face and looked at him, +smiling and bewitchingly beautiful. Her eyes dared him; her lips +invited him; all her charms rose up and besought him. For a moment, +Kenkenes was startled. If he had believed that Ta-meri loved him +never so slightly, his sensations would have been most distressing. +But he knew and was glad to know that he awakened nothing deeper than a +superficial partiality, which lasted only as long as he was in her +sight to please her eye. In spite of his consternation, he could think +intelligently enough to surmise what had inspired her words. The Lady +Senci had guessed the nature of his trouble; even Menes had hinted a +suspicion of the truth in a bantering way. What would prevent the +beauty from seeing it also and preempting to herself the honors of his +disheartenment? But he was in no mood for a coquettish tilt with her. +His sober face was not more serious than his tone when he made answer: + +"Do not play with him, Ta-meri. He is worthy and loves thee most +tenderly. Thou lovest him. Be kind to thine own heart and put him to +the rack no more. Thou art sure of him and I doubt not it pleases thee +to tantalize thyself a little while; but Nechutes, who must endure the +lover's doubts, is suffering cruelly. Thou art a good child, Ta-meri; +how canst thou hurt him so?" + +He paused, for her eyes, growing remorseful, had wandered away from +him. He knew he had reasoned well. The guests in the banquet-room +began to emerge, talking and laughing. The voice of Nechutes was not +heard among them. Kenkenes glanced toward the group and saw the +cup-bearer a trifle in advance, his sullen face averted. + +"He comes yonder," Kenkenes added in a whisper, "poor, moody boy! Go +back to him and take him all the happiness I would to the gods I knew. +Farewell." + +He pressed her hand and continued toward the door. + +Once again he was hailed, this time by Rameses. He halted, stifling a +groan, and returned to the prince. Nechutes and Ta-meri had +disappeared. + +"One other thing, I would tell thee, Kenkenes," the prince said, "and +then thou mayest go. The Pharaoh heard a song to the sunrise on the +Nile some time ago and I identified the voice for him. He would have +thee sing for him, Kenkenes." + +"The Pharaoh's wish is law," was the slow answer. + +"Oh, it was not a command," Rameses replied affably, for he was still +holding Masanath's hand and therefore in high good humor with himself. +"In truth he said the choice should be thine whether thou wilt or not. +He would not insist that a nobleman become his minstrel. But more of +this later; the gods go with thee." + +Kenkenes bowed and escaped. + +In his room a few moments later, he lighted his lamp of scented oils +and contemplated the comforts about him. His conscience pointed a +condemning finger at him. Here was luxury to the point of uselessness +for himself; across the Nile was the desolate quarry-camp for his love. +In Memphis he had robed himself in fine linen and reveled, had eaten +with princes and slept sumptuously--in his strength and his manhood and +unearned idleness. And she, but a tender girl, had toiled for the +quarry-workers and fasted and now faced death in the hideous +extermination purposed for her race. + +He ground his teeth and prayed for the dawn. + +He forgot that he had come away from the Arabian hills because she +repelled him; he remembered his scruples concerning their social +inequality, only to revile himself; Hotep's caution was more than ever +a waste of words to him. He forgot everything except that he was here +in comfort, she, there in want and in peril, and he had not rescued her. + +He did not sleep. He tossed and counted the hours. + +"Sing for the Pharaoh!" he exclaimed, "aye, I will sing till the throat +of me cracks--not for the reward of his good will alone, but for +Rachel's liberty. That first, and the unraveling of this puzzle +thereafter." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +AT MASAARAH + +Since the day Kenkenes had wounded her hand with the knife, Rachel had +seen him but twice in many weeks. + +One mid-morning, the oxen were unyoked from the water-cart and led +ambling up to the pit where a monolith, too huge to be moved by men +alone, had been taken forth and was to be transferred to the Nile. The +bearers carried water directly from the river during this time, and it +was given Rachel to govern them in the departure from the routine. + +Suddenly she became aware that some one approached through the grain, +and when she raised her head, she looked up into the face of Kenkenes. +It was Kenkenes, indeed, but Kenkenes in robes of rustling linen and +trappings of gold. Never had she seen so stately an Egyptian, nor any +so entitled to the name of nobleman. In quick succession she +experienced the moving sensations of surprise, pride in him, and +depression. The last fell on her with the instant recollection of +duty, when his face bent appealingly over hers. Trembling, she turned +away from him, and when she looked again, he was returning to Memphis. + +Now, her days had ceased to be the dreamy lapses of time in which she +lived and walked. The glamour that had made the quarries sufferable +had passed; all the realization of her enslavement, with the +accompanying shame, came to her, and her hope for Israel was lost in +the destruction of her personal happiness. + +Still, the longing to look on Kenkenes once again made the dawns more +welcome, the days longer and the sunsets more disheartening. Vainly +she summoned pride to her aid; vainly she exhorted herself to +consistency. + +"How long," she would say, "since thou didst reject the good Atsu +because he is an idolater and an Egyptian? How long since thou wast +full of wrath against the chosen people who wedded Egyptians and became +of them? And now, who is it that is full of sighs and strange conduct? +Who is it that hath forgotten the idols and the abominations and the +bondage of her people and mourneth after one of the oppressors? And +how will it be with thee when the chosen people go forth, or the +carving is complete and the Egyptian cometh no more; or how will it be +when he taketh one of the long-eyed maidens of his kind to wife?" + +In the face of all this, her intuition rose up and bore witness that +the Egyptian loved her, and was no less unhappy than she. + +So time came and went and weeks passed and he came not again. Late, +one sunset, while there yet was daylight, she left the camp merely that +she might wander down the valley to the same spot where, at the same +hour, she had met Kenkenes on that last occasion of talk between them. + +Moving slowly down the shadows, she saw a figure approaching. The +stature of the new-comer identified him. The head was up, the step +slow, the bearing expectant. In the one scant lapse between two throbs +of her heart, Rachel knew her lover, remembered all the power of his +attraction, and realized that her joy and love could carry her beyond +her fortitude and resolution. + +Just ahead of her, not farther than three paces, a long fragment of +rock had fallen from above and leaned against the wall. There was an +ample space formed by its slant against the cliff and almost before she +knew it, she had crept into this crevice. Cowering in the dusk, she +clutched at her loud-beating heart and listened intently. + +There was no sound of his steps on the rough roadway of the valley and +though she watched eagerly from her hiding-place, she did not see him +pass. After a long time she emerged. He was gone. + +When she looked in the dust she found that his footprints turned not +far from her hiding-place and led toward the Nile. + +She knew then that he had seen her when she had caught sight of him, +and failing to meet her as he had expected, had guessed she had hidden +from him. + +This was the sunset of the night of the revel at Senci's house. It was +this incident that had made Kenkenes late at the festivities, and +cynical when he came. + +On her way back to the camp Rachel met Atsu, mounted and attended by a +scribe, the taskmaster's secretary. The two officials were on their +way to Memphis to worship in the great temple and to spend a night +among free-born men. Once every month, no oftener, did Atsu return to +his own rank in the city. Recognizing Rachel, he drew up his horse; +the scribe rode on. + +"Hast been in search of the Nile wind, Rachel? The valley holds the +day-heat like an oven," he said. + +"Nay, I did not go so far. The darkness came too quickly." + +"Endure it a while. I shall move the people into the large valley +where they may have the north breeze and the water-smell after sunset, +now that the summer is near. I am glad I met thee. Deborah tells me +the water for the camp-cooking is turbid, and I doubt not the children +draw it from some point below the wharf where the drawing for the +quarry-supply stirs up the ooze. Do thou go with the children in the +morning when they are sent for the camp supply, and get it above the +wharf." + +"I hear," she answered. + +"The gods attend thee," he said, riding away. + +"Be thy visit pleasant," she responded, and turned again up the valley. + +The taskmaster was forgotten at her second step, and her contrition and +humiliation came back with a rush. There was little sleep for her that +night, so heavy was her heart. + +The next morning Rachel obeyed Atsu and followed the children to the +Nile. Crossing the field, absorbed in her trouble, she did not hear +the beat of hoofs or the grind of wheels until she was face to face +with the attendants of a company of charioteers. The troop of +water-carriers had scattered out of the road-way and each little +bronzed Israelite was bending with his right hand upon his left knee in +token of profound respect. Rachel hastily joined them. + +When she looked again the retinue of servants had passed. After them +came a gilded chariot with a sumptuous Egyptian within. By the +annulets over his temples and the fringed ribbons pendent therefrom, +the Israelite knew him to be royal. + +Behind, a second chariot was driven by a single occupant, who wore the +badges of princehood also. + +The third was a chariot of ebony drawn by two prancing coal-black +horses whose leathers and housings shone and jingled. Rachel's eyes +met those of the driver and the life-current froze in her veins. +Har-hat, fan-bearer to the Pharaoh, late governor of Bubastis, drew up +his horses and calmly surveyed her. The action halted the chariots of +a dozen courtiers following him. One by one they came to a stand-still +and each man peered around his predecessor until the fan-bearer became +conscious of the pawing horses behind him. He drove out of line and +alighted. With an apologetic wave of his hand, he motioned the +procession to proceed and busied himself with the harness as if he had +found a breakage. Those that had passed were by this time some +distance ahead and, missing the grind of wheels in their wake, looked +back. The fan-bearer beckoned to one of the attendants who had gone +before, and the man returned. + +Meanwhile the procession moved on and the nobles glanced first at the +fan-bearer, and next, at the Israelite. But Athor in the niche on the +hillside was not more white and stony than its living model in the +valley. There was no retreat. The fan-bearer stood between her and +the Nile, his servant between her and the quarries. She felt the +sickening numbness that stupefies one who realizes a terrible strait, +from which there is neither succor nor escape. + +The procession passed and the servant, halting, bowed to his master. +He was short and fat, thick of neck and long of arm--a most unusual +Egyptian. Har-hat tossed him the reins and, walking around his horses, +approached Rachel. The smallest Hebrew--too small to be awed and yet +old enough to realize that the beloved Rachel was in danger, dropped +the hide he bore, and flinging himself before her, clasped her with his +arms, and turned a defiant face at Har-hat over his shoulder. The +fan-bearer paused. + +"It is the very same," he said laughingly. "The hard life of the +quarries hath not robbed thee in the least of thy radiance. But by the +gambling god, Toth, thou didst take a risk! Dost dream what thou didst +miss through a malevolent caprice of the Hathors? Five months ago I +would have taken thee out of bondage into luxury but for an industrious +taskmaster and the unfortunate interference of a royal message. But +the Seven Sisters repent, and I find thee again." + +Rachel had fixed her eyes upon the white walls of Memphis shining in +the morning sun, and did not seem to hear him. + +"Nay, now, slight me not! It was the fault of the taskmaster and not +mine. I confess the charm of distant Memphis, but it is more glorious +within its walls. I am come to take thee thither. Thank me with but a +look, I pray thee." + +Seeing she did not move nor answer, he tilted his head to one side and +surveyed her with interest. + +"Hath much soft persuasion surfeited thee into deafness?" The color +surged up into Rachel's face. + +"Ha!" he exclaimed, "not so! Perhaps thou art but reluctant, then." +He whirled upon the other children, cowering behind him. + +"Is she wedded?" he demanded. + +Frightened and trembling, they did not answer till he repeated the +question and stamped his foot. Then one of them shook his head. + +"It is well. I need not delay till a slave-husband were disposed of in +the mines. Hither, Unas!" + +The fat servitor came forward. + +"I know this taskmaster not, nor can I coax or press him into giving +her up without the cursed formality of a document of gift from the +Pharaoh. Get thee back to Memphis with this," he drew off a signet +ring and gave it to the servitor, "and to the palace. There have my +scribe draw up a prayer to the Pharaoh, craving for me the mastership +over the Israelite, Rachel,--for household service." The fan-bearer +laughed. "Forget not, this latter phrase, else the Pharaoh might fancy +I would take her to wife. Haste thee! and bring back Nak and Hebset +with thee to row the boat back, and help thee fetch her. She may have +a lover who might make trouble for thee alone. Get thee gone." + +He took the reins from his servitor's hands and turned again toward +Rachel. + +"I go forth to hunt, and there is danger in that pastime. I may not +return. It would be most fitting to bid me a tender farewell, but thou +art cruel. Nevertheless, I shall care for myself most diligently this +day, and return to thee in Memphis by nightfall. Farewell!" He sprang +into his chariot and, urging his horses, pursued the far-away +procession at a gallop. + +Unas was already at the Nile-side, preparing to return to Memphis. To +Rachel it seemed as if she had been set free for a moment, that her +efforts to escape and her inevitable capture might amuse her tormentor. +And after the manner of the miserable captive so beset, she seized upon +the momentary release and sought to fly. The three little Hebrews +clung to her--the one that had answered Har-hat weeping bitterly and +remorsefully. + +"Nay, weep not," she said in a hurried whisper. "It would have ended +just the same. Heard ye not what he said concerning a husband? But +let me go! Let Rachel hide ere the serving men return!" + +She undid their arms and ran back toward the quarries. For a moment +the children hesitated and then they pursued her, crying in an +undertone as they ran. Past the stone-pits, up the winding valley she +fled until she reached the encampment and her own tent. + +The women saw her come and old Deborah, who was preparing vegetables +for the noonday meal, left the fires and hastened to the shelter. +There, Rachel, choking with terror and tears, gave the story of the +morning. + +Deborah made no interruption and after the disjointed and unhappy +recital was complete, she sat for some moments, motionless and silent. +Then she arose and made as if to leave the tent, but Rachel caught at +her hand in affright. + +"Nay, be not so frightened," the old woman said soothingly. "I go to +look for Atsu. He will come in a little while." + +With that, she went forth. After a time--more than two hours, in +truth, but infinitely longer to Rachel, the voice of the taskmaster was +heard without, talking with Deborah. He was permitting no curb to the +expression of his rage. + +"The gods rend his heart to ribbons!" he panted after a tempest of +anathema. "Curse the insatiate brute! Is there not enough of Egypt's +women who are willingly loose that he must destroy the purest spirit on +earth? He shall not have her, if I take his life to save her!" + +After a moment's savage rumination, he broke out again. + +"He has us on the hip! We shall be put to it to hide her away from him +now. Do thou go to her--nay, I will go." + +Rachel heard him enter the tent and walk across the matting on the +floor. She flung her arm over her face and huddled closer to the +linen-covered heap of straw against which she had thrown herself. Even +the eyes of the taskmaster were intolerable, in her shame. Atsu +plunged into the heart of his subject at once. + +"There is no escape in the choosing of the tens, now, Rachel. I have +said that I would not vex thee again with my love. Once I offered thee +marriage as refuge. My love and the shelter of my name are thine to +take or leave. I will urge thee no more." + +He paused for a space and, as she made no answer, he went on as though +she had rejected him explicitly. + +"Then I shall hide thee somewhere in Egypt. The ruse is not secure, +but it may serve." + +She sat up and put the hair back from her face. + +"Thou good Atsu," she said in a voice subdued with much weeping, "Wilt +thou add more to mine already hopeless indebtedness to thee? Art thou +blind to the ill-use thou invitest upon thine own head in thy care for +me? Let me imperil thee no more. Is there no other way?" + +He shook his head. Slowly her face fell, and she sighed for very +heaviness of spirit. Atsu stooped and took her hand. + +"Make ready and let us leave this place," he said kindly, "and thou +canst decide in the securer precincts of Memphis what thou wilt do. +Lose no time." He turned away and, signing to Deborah to follow him, +left the tent. + +Rachel arose and began her preparations to depart. The formidable +blockade in the way to safety seemed to clear and her heart leaped at +the anticipation of freedom or stopped at the suggestion of failure. +She hastened slowly, for her excitement made most of her movements +vain. Her hands trembled and held things insecurely; she forgot the +place of many of her belongings, in that humble, orderly house. +Alternately praying and fearing, she stopped now and then to be sure +that the sounds of the camp were not those of the returning servants. +The simple apparel gathered together, she collected the remaining +mementoes of her family,--saved with so much pain and guarded with such +diligence by old Deborah. These were trinkets of gold and ivory, bits +of frail gauzes in which a wondrous perfume lingered, and a scroll of +sheep-skin bearing the records of the house. And after all these had +been found and gathered together, she furtively put the straw aside and +drew forth the collar of golden rings. + +With the first glint of light on the red metal, the hope and animation +in her heart went out. What of Kenkenes? No thought came to her now, +but the most unhappy. The obligations which she would have gladly laid +on him had fallen to Atsu. She dared not confess to him her love, and +she could not give him gratitude. He had entered her life like a +bewildering radiance, but it was Atsu who had saved her and emancipated +her and would save her again. + +She thrust the collar into her bosom with a sob and went on +mechanically with her preparations. But during one of her movements +the coins clinked musically. She clutched them, and they rang again, +softly. They reproached her, and in that irresistible way,--gently. +They made a sound even as she breathed. As she walked they chafed. +They took weight and crushed her breast. And with every sound from +them, she felt Kenkenes' arm about her, her hand lost in his, the +warmth of his young cheek against hers. Never so long as his gift were +in her possession might she hope to put these memories from her, and +she could not cherish them hopefully now. Desperate grief stirred her +into action. She went quickly to the door of the tent and there met +Deborah. + +"This is not mine," she said, holding up the necklace. "It belongs to +the young nobleman who brought me back to camp that night." + +"Leave it with the tribe and it shall be given him." + +"Nay, he may not return to camp. I know where he comes and I can leave +it there. It is not far--only a little way." + +Deborah stood in her path. + +"Will he be there?" she demanded. + +"Nay, that I can pledge thee." She slipped past her guardian, out of +the tent and sped up the valley, determined that Deborah's prohibition, +however just, should not stay her. + +The old Israelite turned to look after her, and her eyes fell on Atsu, +his face black with rage, his arms folded, talking with a fat, wildly +gesticulating servitor. At that moment the courier caught sight of +Rachel flying up the valley and, flinging a document at Atsu's feet, +started to pursue. Atsu halted him with an iron hand, and Deborah +paused to see no more. With a prayer she ran up the valley the way +Rachel had taken. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN THE DESERT + +In the early morning of the next day after the rout at Senci's, +Kenkenes wandered restlessly about the inner court of his father's +house. He had slept but little the preceding night, and now, dizzy and +irritable, the freshness of the morning did not invigorate him and the +haunting perplexities were with him still. + +There was no need of haste to the Arabian hills and yet he could not +wait patiently in Memphis for an appropriate hour to visit Masaarah. +He paced hither and thither, flung himself on the benches in the shade, +only to rise and resume his uneasy walk. Anubis was omnipresent and +particularly ungovernable. If his young master were in motion he +vibrated and oscillated like a shuttle. If Kenkenes sat, he paced the +tessellated pavement slowly and with a foot-fall lighter than a birds. +The sculptor eyed him understandingly, and finally arose. + +"Come, Anubis! Tit, tit, tit!" he called, backing toward the +work-room. Anubis bounded after him, but as Kenkenes paused just over +the threshold, the ape also halted. His master retreated to the rear +of the room still calling, but to the ape there was something +portentous familiar in this proceeding. It hinted of imprisonment. +Turning as though pursued, he disappeared up an acacia tree from which +he could not be dislodged. With a vexed exclamation, Kenkenes passed +out of the court into the house, slamming the swinging door so sharply +that it sprang open again after him. As the old portress put back the +outer doors leading into the street, that her young master might go +forth, a shadow quick as thought slipped out after him. The old +portress clapped her hands with a shrill command but the shadow was +gone. + +Once more in his work-day dress, his wallet of tools and provisions +across his shoulder, the young sculptor passed toward the Nile, moody +and unhappy but determined. At the river-side he hired the shallow +bari that had given him faithful service for so long, and receiving the +oars from Sepet, the boatman, prepared to push away. At that moment, +Anubis, tremulous but unrepentant, bounded in beside him. + +"Anubis!" Kenkenes exclaimed. "Of a truth I believe thou art possessed +of the arts of magic. Now, if thou art lost in the hills and devoured +by a wolf, upon thine own head be it. Pull in that paw, before thou +becomest a foolish sacrifice to the sacred crocodile. I wonder thy +self-respect does not keep thee from coming when thou art unwelcome." +And subsiding into silence, the sculptor turned toward Masaarah. + +He made a landing below the stone wharf, for there a two-oared bari was +already drawn up, and the tangle of herbage was a safe hiding-place for +his own boat. He looked toward the quarry and hesitated. He had no +heart yet to face her, who had laid his cruelest sorrow on him. He +would continue his work on Athor until he had gathered assurance from +that unforbidding face. + +His light foot made no sound and he entered the niche silently. +Kneeling on the chipped stone at the base of the statue, her face +against the drapings, her arms clasping its knees, was Rachel. In one +hand was the collar of rings. She had not heard the sculptor's +approach. + +For an instant his surprise transfixed him. Had she repented? A great +wave of compassion and tenderness swept over him and he drew her face +away between his palms. With a terrified start, the girl turned a +swift glance upward. When she recognized Kenkenes her tearful face +colored vividly. Her posture was such that she could not rise, and +with infinite gentleness he lifted her to her feet. + +"What is it, Rachel? Art thou in trouble?" + +Joy and maidenly confusion took away her voice. + +"Alas," he went on sadly. "Am I so fallen from thy favor, shut out and +denied thy confidence?" + +"Nay, nay," she protested. "Think not so harshly of me. I am--I +came--" she faltered and paused. He did not help or spare her. He had +come to learn why she had done this thing, why she had said that, and +why she had repulsed him without explanation, when there was +unmistakable preference for him in her unstudied acts. He held his +peace and waited for her to proceed. Meanwhile Rachel suffered +cruelly. She had no thought in her mind concerning her conduct toward +him. It was the shameful event of the morning, which must be told to +explain her presence before Athor, that made her cover her crimson face +at last. Kenkenes silenced the protests of his gallantry, and drawing +her hands away, lifted her face on the tips of his fingers and waited. + +While they stood thus, Deborah, exhausted and praying, staggered into +the inclosure. + +"Rachel!" she panted. "The serving-men--thou art pursued!" The fat +courier, purple of countenance and breathing hard, appeared in the +opening. Rachel shrank against Kenkenes and Deborah dropped on her +knees between the pair and the servitor. + +"Out of the way, hag!" the man puffed. "Let me at yon slave. Out!" +He struck at Deborah with a short mace but Kenkenes caught his arm and +thrust him aside. + +"Go, go back to the camp," he said to the old woman. "No harm shall +befall Rachel." Raising her, he put her behind him, and advanced +toward the courier. + +"Hast thou words with me?" he said coolly. "What wilt thou?" + +"The girl. Give her up!" + +"Nay, but thou art peremptory. What wilt thou with her?" + +"For the harem of the Pharaoh's chief adviser," the man retorted. + +The blood in Kenkenes' veins seemed to become molten; flashes of fierce +light blinded him and his sinews hardened into iron. He bounded +forward and his fingers buried themselves in soft and heated flesh. + +The first glimmer of reason through his murderous insanity was the +consciousness of a rain of blows upon his head and shoulders, and a +blackening face settling back to the earth before him. + +He released his grip on the throat of the strangling servitor and flung +off his other assailants. For a moment, stunned by the hard usage at +the hands of the reinforcing men, he staggered, and seemed about to +succumb. The men pursued him to finish their work, but as he eluded +them, it seemed that a third person--a woman all in white with extended +arms--came into their view. + +Kenkenes saw the foremost, a tall Nubian in a striped tunic, stop in +his tracks, and the second, smaller and lighter but a Nubian also, +following immediately behind, bumped against his fellow. + +Mouths agape, eyes staring, they stood and marveled. The strange +presence, they discovered at once, was neither a human being nor an +apparition. It was stone--a statue. + +"Sacrilege!" the first exploded. "A--a--by Amen, it is the slave +herself!" + +In the little pause, Kenkenes recovered himself, but he knew that he +gave Rachel to her fate, if the pair overcame him. He caught her hand +and with the whispered word, "Run!" fled with her toward the front of +the cliff facing the Nile. It was a desperate chance for escape but he +seized it. + +Immediately they were pursued and at the brink of the hill, overtaken. +The stake was too large for the young artist to risk its loss by +adhering to the unwritten rules of combat. He released Rachel, whirled +about, and as the foremost descended on him, ducked, seized the man +about the middle, and pitched him head-first down into the valley. The +second, the tall Nubian that wore the striped tunic, halted, dismayed, +and Kenkenes, catching Rachel's hand, prepared to descend. But she +checked him with a cry. "Look!" + +His eyes followed her outstretched arm. At regular intervals along the +Nile, the distant figures of men were seen posted. Escape was cut off. +He mounted to the top of the cliff and led Rachel out of view from the +river. The second man retreated, and raged from afar. The sculptor +turned up the shingly slope toward the sun-white ridge of higher hills +inland. Here, he would hide with Rachel, till his strength returned +and the ache left his head clear to plan a safe escape. The Nubian +called on all the gods to annihilate them and started in pursuit. The +sculptor did not pause, and, emboldened by the indifference of the man +he dogged, the pursuer drew near and made menacing demonstrations. +Kenkenes had no desire to be followed. He bade Rachel wait for him and +approached the Nubian. + +"Now," he began coolly, "thou art unwelcome, likewise, insolent. Also +art thou a fool, but it is an arch-idiot indeed that lacketh caution. +This maiden is beloved of all the Israelites. Thou art one man, and +alone. It would not be safe for thee to attempt to take her without +help even across that little space between Masaarah and the Nile. I +should harass thee with others within call. Do thou save thyself and +send the chief adviser after her. I would treat with him also." + +The Nubian backed away and Kenkenes followed him relentlessly until the +man, overcome with trepidation, took to his heels and fled. + +Even then, Kenkenes did not lessen his vigilance. He caught up Anubis, +who had bounded beside him during the entire time, and running back to +Rachel, turned into the limestone wastes. + +Kenkenes had risked his suggestions to the single Nubian, and their +effect upon him gave the young sculptor some hope that the pursuing +force had been limited to these three. Though the men along the Nile +were not within call, they would prevent flight into Memphis, and the +camp of the Israelites, if not similarly picketed, would offer security +only for the moment. Why had not the Hebrews protected her in the +beginning? He would get to a place of perfect safety first and learn +all concerning this matter. + +After an hour's cautious dodging from shelter to shelter, through the +masses of rocks, they toiled up the great ridge of hills deep into the +desert. Rachel would have gone on and on, but Kenkenes drew her into +the shadow of a great rock and stopped to listen. The oppressive +silence was unbroken. Far and near only gray wastes of hills heaved in +heated solitude about them. + +"Sit here in the shadow and rest," he said, turning to the weary girl +beside him. "I shall keep watch." + +He cleared a space for her among the debris at the base of the great +fragment and pressed her down in the place he had made. Next he undid +his belt and fastened Anubis to a boulder, too heavy for the ape to +move. The animal resented the confinement, and Kenkenes, tying him by +force, found in the forepaws the collar of golden rings. With a murmur +of satisfaction, the young man reclaimed the necklace and thrust it +into the bosom of his dress. + +When he arose the day grew dark before him, and he was obliged to +steady himself against the rock till the vertigo passed. His +assailants had hurt him more than he had thought. But he took up his +vigil and maintained it faithfully till all sense of danger had +vanished. + +Rachel, who had been watching his face, touched his hand at last, and +bade him rest. The invitation was welcome and with a sigh he sank down +beside her. + +"Lie down," she said softly. "Thou hast been most cruelly misused. +And all for me!" + +Obediently, he slipped from a sitting to a recumbent posture. She put +out her arm, and supporting him, seemed about to take his head into her +lap. Instead, she slipped the mantle from the strap that bound it +across his shoulders, and rolling it swiftly, made a pillow of it for +his head. + +The wallet that had hung by the same strap over his shoulder, attracted +her attention and she guessed that it had been used as a carrier for +provision. She laid it open and took out the water-bottle. The +pith-stopper had held, during all the violent motion, and the dull +surface of the porous and ever-cooling pottery was cold and wet. + +She put the bottle to his lips and, after he had drunk, bathed his +bruises most tenderly. + +Succumbing to the gentle influence of her fingers, he put up his hands +to take them, but they moved out of his reach in the most natural +manner possible. He could not feel that she had purposely avoided his +touch, but he made no further attempt when the soothing fingers +returned. Finally he raised himself on his elbow and supported his +head in his hand. + +"Now am I new again," he said; "once more ready to help thee. Let us +take counsel together and get into safety and comfort." He paused a +moment till his serious words would not follow with unseeming +promptness upon his light tone. + +"I know thy trouble, Rachel," he began again soberly. "There is no +need that thou shouldst hurt thyself by the telling. But there are +details which would be helpful in aiding thee if I had them in mind. +Thou knowest better than I. Wilt thou aid me?" + +Her golden head drooped till her face was bowed upon her hands. After +a little silence she answered him, her voice low with shame. + +"This man sought to take me before, at Pa-Ramesu, but Atsu learned of +it in time and sent me to Masaarah. This morning I met him again--" +She paused, and Kenkenes aided her. + +"Aye, I can guess--poor affronted child!" + +"Atsu meant to escape with me again, but the servants of the nobleman +came before we could get away." + +Kenkenes knew by her choice of words that she did not know the name of +her persecutor, and he did not tell her what it was. He could not bear +the name of Har-hat on her lips. She went on, after a little silence. + +"I came--" she began, coloring deeply, "to leave thy collar with the +statue--I did not expect to find thee there." + +How little it takes to dispirit a lover! How could he know that any +thought had led her to do that thing save an impulse actuated by +indifference or real dislike? His hope was immediately reduced to the +lowest ebb. The mention of the taskmaster's name brought forward the +probability of a rival. + +"I can take thee back to Atsu," he said slowly. "These menials will +not remain in the hills after sunset, and under cover of night I can +slip thee, by strategy, past any sentries they may have set and get +thee to Atsu. I, by my sacrilege, and he by his insubordination, are +both under ban of the law, but danger with him will be sweeter danger +than peril with me, I doubt not." + +She looked at him, and the hurt that began to show on her face gave +place to puzzlement. + +"Is it not so?" he asked with a bitter smile. "The companionship of +ones beloved works wonders out of heavy straits!" + +"But--. Dost thou--? Atsu is naught to me," she cried, her grave face +brightening. + +The blood surged back to his cheeks and the life into his eyes. He +leaned toward her, ready to ask for more enlightenment concerning her +conduct, when she went on dreamily: "But he is wondrous kind and hath +made the camp bright with his humanity. Israel loveth Atsu." + +Kenkenes turned again to the perplexity in hand. + +"I came this morning to ask thy permission to give thee thy freedom. I +doubt not Israel of Masaarah, hidden in a niche in the hills, does not +dream that it is the plan of the Pharaoh--nay, the heir to the crown of +Egypt by the mouth of the Pharaoh--to exterminate the Hebrews." Rachel +recoiled from him. + +"What sayest thou?" she exclaimed, her voice sharp with terror. + +"Nay, forgive me!" he said penitently. "So intent was I on thy rescue +that I forgot to soften my words. Let it be. It is said; I would it +were not true." + +Her affright was only momentary, for her faith restored her ere his +last words were spoken. + +"It will not come to pass," she declared. "Jehovah will not suffer it. +Thou shalt see--and let the Pharaoh beware!" Her words were vehement +and she offered no argument. She saw no need of it, since her belief, +merely expressed, had the force of fact with her. + +"I am committed to the cause of Israel--that thou knowest, Rachel," +Kenkenes made answer. After another silence he took up the thread of +his talk. + +"If thy danger from this man were set aside I should not return thee to +the camp, even if there were no doom spoken upon Israel. I would have +thee free; I would have thee in luxury, sheltered in my father's +house--I would--" + +"Thou dost paint a picture that mocks me now, O Kenkenes," she broke in +on his growing fervor. "Doubly am I enslaved, and the safety of +Masaarah and Memphis is no more for me." + +"Thou hast said," he answered in a subdued voice. "It was given me +last night to win favor with the Pharaoh for thy sake, but the need of +that favor fell before it was won. But I despair not. What is thy +pleasure, Rachel? Shall I take thee to Atsu, or wilt thou stay with +me?" + +"This nobleman will know of a surety that Atsu is my friend, but he +must guess the other Egyptian who hath helped me. If I go to Atsu I +take certain danger to him; if I stay with thee the peril must wander +ere it overtakes us. But I would not burden either. Is there no other +way?" + +He shook his head. "It lies between me and Atsu to care for you, and +the peril for you and for us is equal. My name is as good as +published, for I am gifted with a length of limb beyond my fellows. I +was found before the statue and they, describing me to the priests, +will prove to the priests, who know my calling, that the son of Mentu +has committed sacrilege. And the priesthood would not wait till dawn +to take me." + +"I will stay with thee, Kenkenes," she said simply. + +He became conscious of the collar on his breast and drew it forth. + +"With this," he began, assuming a lightness, "I fear I gave thee +offense one day and thou hast held it against me. Now let me heal that +wound and sweeten thy regard for me with this same offending trinket. +Wilt thou take it as a peace-offering from my hands and wear it +always?" She bent toward him and, with worshiping hands, he put aside +the loosened braids and clasped the necklace about her throat. + +"There are ten rings," he continued. "Let them be named thus," telling +them off with his fingers, "This first of all--Hope--it shall be thy +stay; this--Faith--it shall comfort thee; this--Good Works--it shall +publish thee; this--Sacrifice--it shall win thee many victories; +this--Chastity--it shall be thy name; the next--Wisdom--it shall guide +thee; after it--Steadfastness--it shall keep thee in all these things; +Truth--it shall brood upon thy lips; Beauty--it shall not perish; this, +the last, is Love, of which there is naught to be said. It speaketh +for itself." + +Their eyes met at his last words and for a moment dwelt. Then Rachel +looked away. + +"Are the fastenings secure?" she asked. + +"Firm as the virtues in a good woman's soul." + +"They will hold. I would not lose one of them." + +A long silence fell. The curious activity of desert-life, interrupted +for the time by the presence of the fugitives, resumed its tenor and +droned on about them. The rasping grasshopper, the darting lizard, the +scorpion creeping among the rocks, a high-flying bird, a small, +skulking, wild beast put sound and movement in the desolation of the +region. The horizon was marked by undulating hills to the west; to the +east, by sharper peaks. The scant growth was blackened or partly +covered with sand, and it fringed the distant uplands like a stubbly +beard. The little ravines were darkened with hot shadows, but the bald +slopes presented areas, shining with infinitesimal particles of quartz +and mica, to a savage sun and an almost unendurable sky. From +somewhere to the barren north the wind came like a breath of flame, +ash-laden and drying. There was nothing of the cool, damp river breeze +in this. They were in the hideous heart of the desert to whom death +was monotony, resisting foreign life, an insult. + +The two in the shortening shadow of the great rock were glad of the +water-bottle. The necessity of comfortable shelter for Rachel began to +appeal urgently to Kenkenes. He put aside his dreams and thought aloud. + +"What cover may I offer thy dear head this night?" he began. "We may +not return to the camp, for there of a surety they lie in wait for us. +Toora is deserted and so tempting a spot for fugitives that it will be +searched immediately. Not a hovel this side of the Nile but will be +visited. I would take thee to my father--" + +"Nay," she said firmly. "I will take affliction to none other. +Already have I undone two of the best of Egypt. I will carry the +distress no further." + +After a silence he began again. + +"How far wilt thou trust in me, Rachel?" + +She raised her face and looked at him with serious eyes. + +"In all things needful which thou wilt require of me." + +"And thou canst sleep this night in an open boat?" + +She nodded. + +"To-morrow, then," he continued, taking her hand, "we shall reach +Nehapehu, where I can hide thee with some of the peasantry on my +father's lands. And there thou canst abide until I go to Tape and +return. + +"Thou must know," he continued, explaining, "the Athor of the hills is +not my first sacrilege. Once I committed a worse. My father was the +royal sculptor to Rameses and is now Meneptah's murket." Rachel +glanced at him shyly and sought to withdraw her hand, for she +recognized the loftiness of the title. But he retained his clasp. "He +is a mighty genius. He planned and executed Ipsambul. For that, which +is the greatest monument to Rameses, the Incomparable Pharaoh loved +him, and while the king lived my father was overwhelmed with his +favors. Nor did the royal sculptor's good fortune wane, as is the +common fate of favorites, for the great king planned that my father's +house should be honored even after his death though the dynasties +change. So Rameses gave him a signet of lapis lazuli, and its +inscription commanded him who sat at any time thereafter on the throne +of Egypt to honor the prayer of its bearer in the unspeakable name of +the Holy One. + +"After the death of Rameses," the narrator went on, "we went to Tape, +my father and I, to inscribe the hatchments and carve the scene of the +Judgment of the Dead in the tomb of the great king. Now, I am my +father's only child and have been taught his craft. I have been an apt +pupil, and he had no fear in trusting me with the execution of the +fresco. I had long been in rebellion, practising in secret my lawless +ideas, and I was seized with an uncontrollable aversion to marring +those holy walls with the conventional ugliness commanded by the +ritual. I assembled my ideas and dared. I worked rapidly and well. +The work was done before my father discovered it." Kenkenes paused and +laughed a little. + +"Suffice it to say the fresco was erased. And the solemnity of the +crypt was hardly restored before my father found that his sacred +signet, which he always wore, was gone. Nay, nay, I might not search +for it more than the fruitless once, for he declared, and of a truth +believed firmly, that the great king had reclaimed his gift. I did not +and never have I believed it. Now I need the signet and I shall go +after it on the strength of that belief. + +"Having found it, I shall appeal to Meneptah for thy liberty and safety +and whatever boon thou wouldst have and for myself. What thinkest +thou? Shall I go on?" + +Rachel smiled and looked up at him gratefully. + +"I will go with thee, Kenkenes," she said. + +Her ready confidence and the easiness of his name on her lips filled +him with joy. "Ah! ye ungentle Hathors!" he mourned to himself, "why +may I not tell her how much I love her?" + +But the white hand which he pressed against his breast asked its +release with gentle reluctance, and he set it free. + +Once again the silence fell and was not frequently broken thereafter. + +There was no invitation in her manner, and he could not speak what he +would. + +The sun dropped behind the Libyan hills and the heights filled with +shadow. At length he said: + +"It is time." + +Lifting her to her feet, the ape attending them, he went toward the +Nile, hand in hand with Rachel, his love all untold. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE TREASURE CAVE + +The sudden night had just fallen, and there was an incomplete moon in +the west. But already the desert was full of feeble shadows and silver +interspaces, and all that tense silence of evening upon unpeopled +localities. + +Kenkenes stood upon the top of a huge monolith, listening. Below, with +only her face in the faint moonlight, was Rachel, looking up to him. +Anubis, oppressed by the voiceless expectancy of the two young people, +crouched at his master's feet. For a while there was only the ringing +turmoil of his own quickened blood in the young man's ears. But +presently, up from the southern slope, rose the sound he had heard some +minutes before--a long, quavering note, ending in a high eery wail. + +Kenkenes was familiar with the screams of wild beasts, and he knew the +irreconcilable differences between them and the human voice. Instantly +he sent back across the hollow a strong reply that the startled echoes +repeated again and again. Almost immediately the first cry was +repeated, but a desperate power had entered into it. Kenkenes dropped +from his point of vantage. + +"Some one calleth, of a surety," he said, "and by the voice, it is a +woman." + +"It is Deborah come up from the camp to seek for me!" Rachel exclaimed. + +"I doubt not. But the gods are surely with her, to fend the beasts +from her in this savage place. It is well we came this way." + +With all the haste possible on the rough slope, they descended. The +ground was familiar to Kenkenes, for the niche was near the foot of the +declivity. + +Half-way down he called again, and the answer came up from the +hiding-place of Athor. In another moment they were within and beside +the prostrate form of the old Israelite. Rachel dropped on her knees, +crying out in her solicitude. Her words were in the soft language of +her own people and unintelligible to Kenkenes, but her voice trembled +with concern. The old woman answered soothingly and at some length. +The narrative was frequently broken by low exclamations from Rachel, +and at its end the girl turned to Kenkenes with a sob of anger. + +"The Lord God break them in pieces and His fury be upon them!" she +cried. "They set upon her and beat her and left her to the jackals!" + +"Set consume them!" Kenkenes responded wrathfully. "How came they upon +you? Did you not return to camp?" + +"Nay, the mother heart in me would not suffer me to desert Rachel. I +stayed without this place, and ye outstripped me when ye fled. After a +time the fat servitor, rousing out of his swoon, came forth from here, +and another, who had been lurking in the rocks, joined him, and the +pair, in searching for you, discovered me and beat me with maces, +leaving me for dead." + +After a grim silence, broken only by the low weeping of Rachel, +Kenkenes bade her continue. + +"The search they made for you was not thorough, for one was ill and +both were afraid. But they came upon the statue again, and the sight +of it mocked them, so they overthrew it and broke it." + +Kenkenes drew a sharp breath and glanced at the place where Athor +should have been. Except for themselves, the niche was evidently +vacant. The old woman continued: + +"Then they descended into the camp of Israel. After a time I heard the +sound of voices as if there were many men in the hills, and the heart +of me was afraid. With much pain and travail I crept into this place, +and here sounds come but faintly. But I heard sufficient to know that +there were many who sought diligently, but whether they were our own +people or the minions of thine enemy, Rachel, I could not with safety +discover." + +"Said they aught concerning their intents--this pair, who set upon +you?" Kenkenes asked. + +"O, aye, they blustered, and if they bring half of their threats to +pass, it will go ill with thee, Egyptian. They will set the priests +upon thee immediately; the hills will be searched; the Nile will be +picketed. It behooves thee to have a care for thyself. As for Rachel, +I know not what will become of her. She is penned out in the desert, +for the camp is to be watched, and they boast that the hunt will end +only with her capture." + +"Let them look to it that it does not end with the choking of the swine +who inspired it! I long to put him beyond the cure of leeches." + +He made no answer to Deborah's words concerning Rachel's plight. +Deborah had disarranged his plans. He could not take the old woman, +grievously wounded, on the long journey to Nehapehu, and, indeed, had +she been well, his small boat might not hold together with a burden of +three for a distance of half a hundred miles. For a moment his +perplexity baffled his ingenuity. + +It occurred to him that he might cross to the Memphian shore and +procure a larger boat; but what would protect his helpless charges +during the hours of absence, or in case he were taken? He realized +that he dare not run a risk; his every movement must be safe and sure. +He could not ask the wounded Israelite to return to the camp now, +seeing that she had suffered mistreatment at the hands of Har-hat's +servants and deserted not. + +"If there were but a grotto in the rocks--a cave or a tomb--" he +stopped and smote his hands together. + +"By Apis! I have it--the Tomb of the Discontented Soul!" + +He turned to the two women, who had talked softly together in Hebrew, +and spoke lightly in his relief. + +"We have shelter for this night--safer than any other place in all +Egypt. Trouble no more concerning that. Let me hide my sacrilege and +rob them of indisputable evidence against me, and then we shall get to +our refuge." + +He lifted Deborah in his arms, and bearing her out into the open, left +her with Rachel. + +Then he reentered the shadowy niche. The night was not too dark to +show the interior. Athor, a torso, broken in twain, headless, armless, +was prostrate. It had been pushed over against the great cube that +sheltered it and the fall against the hard limestone had ruined it. +Kenkenes clenched his hands and choked back the angry tears. To the +artist the destruction partook of the heinousness of murder, of the +pathos of death. He set about concealing the wreck with all speed, for +he wished to be merciful to his eyes. + +He collected the fragmentary members, and carrying them down the slope +a little way, dug a grave for them in the sand. To the trench he +rolled the trunk on the tamarisk cylinders, and buried all that was +left of Athor the Golden. Over the grave he laid a flat stratum of +rock that the wind might not uncover the ruin. + +Returning to the niche, he took up the matting with its weight of +chipped stone, and went down through the dark to the line of rocks +opposite the quarries. There he permitted the rubble to slide with a +mixture of earth, like a natural displacement, into the talus, of a +similar nature, at the base of the cliff. The matting he shook and +laid aside. It would serve for a bed in the tomb that night. + +Then he destroyed the north wall. In the four months of its existence +the sand had banked against it more than half its height. Each stone +removed in the dismantling was carried away to a new place, until the +whole fortification was, as once it had been, scattered up and down the +slope. The light, dry sand he pitched with his wooden shovel against +the great cube until it all lay where the wind would have piled it had +no second wall stood in its way. By dawn the strong breeze from the +north would cover every footprint and shovel-mark to a level once more. +He went again to the line of rocks and threw the shovel with a sure aim +and a strong arm into the quarries across the valley. To-morrow it +would seem that an Israelite had forgotten one of his tools. + +The work was done. + +With an ache in his heart, Kenkenes returned to Deborah and Rachel. + +"The shelter for us is in the cliff to the north, near Toora," he began +immediately. "It is a tomb, but others before us have partaken of the +dead's hospitality." [1] + +"How am I to reach it?" Deborah asked. "Is the place far?" + +"A good hour's journey, but we go by water. Still, we must walk to the +Nile." + +"That I can not do," the old woman declared. + +"Nay, but I can carry you," Kenkenes replied, bending over her. She +shrank away from him. + +"Thou hast forgotten," she protested. + +"Not so," he insisted stoutly. Taking her up, he settled her on one +strong arm against his breast. The free hand he extended to Rachel, +who had taken the matting, and together they went laboriously down the +steep front of the hill. They proceeded cautiously, watching before +and behind them lest they be surprised. + +He had covered his boat well with the tangle of sedge and marsh-vines, +and after a long space of search, he found it. + +Once again he lifted Deborah and laid her in the bottom of the boat. +With its triple burden, the bari sank low in the water, but Kenkenes +wielded the oars carefully. The faint moonlight showed him the way. +Now and then a red glimmer across the grain marked the location of a +farmer's hut, but there was no other sign of life. Even at the +Memphian shore there was little activity. + +When the line of cultivation ended Kenkenes knew he was in the +precincts of the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. He rowed across what +he believed to be one-half of its width and drew into the reeds. The +sound and movement awoke many creatures, which hurried away in the +dark, and something slid off into the river with a splash. The lapping +of the ripples sounded like a drinking beast. Kenkenes put a bold foot +on the soggy sand and stepped out. Rachel followed him with bated +breath. Anubis unceremoniously mounted his shoulder. He dragged the +bari far up on the shore, once more lifted Deborah and started up the +warm sand. + +At the base of the limestone cliff he deposited his burden and brought +together a little heap of dried reeds and flag blades. This he fired +after many failures by striking together his chisel and a stone. +Rachel hid the blaze from the Nile while he made and lighted a torch of +twisted reeds and stamped out the fire. In the feeble moonlight he +discerned a stairway of rough-hewn steps leading into a cavity in the +wall. The southern side of the ascent was sheltered by an outstanding +buttress of rock. + +He put the torch into Rachel's hand, and, taking up Deborah, climbed a +dozen steps to a dark opening half-closed by a fallen door. Pushing +the obstruction aside with his foot, he entered. When they were all +within he closed the entrance and unrolled the reeds. + +There was a helter-skelter of mice past them and a rustle of retiring +insects. The torch blazed brightly and showed him a squat copper lamp +on the floor of the outer chamber. The vessel contained sandy dregs of +oil and a dirty floss of cotton. With an exclamation of surprise +Kenkenes lighted the wick, and after a little sputtering, it burned +smokily. + +"Nay, now, how came a lamp in this tomb?" he asked without expecting an +answer. + +The chamber was low-roofed and small--the whole interior rough with +chisel-marks. To the eyes of the sculptor, accustomed to the gorgeous +frescoes in the tombs of the Memphian necropolis, the walls looked bare +and pitiful. There were several prayers in the ancient hieroglyphics, +but no ancestral records or biographical paintings. Several strips of +linen were scattered over the floor, with the customary litter of dried +leaves, dust, refuse brought by rodents, cobwebs and the cast-off +chrysalides of insects. In one corner was a bronze jar, Kenkenes +examined it and found it contained cocoanut-oil for burning. + +"Of a truth this is intervention of the gods," he commented, a little +dazed, but filling his lamp nevertheless. + +Ahead of him was a black opening leading into the second chamber. He +stooped, and entering, held the lamp above his head. He cried out, and +Rachel came to his side. + +In the center of the room was a stone sarcophagus of the early, broad, +flat-topped pattern. In one corner was a two-seated bari, in another a +mattress of woven reeds. Leaning against the sarcophagus was a wooden +rack containing several earthenware amphorae; on the floor about it was +a touseled litter of waxed outer cerements torn from mummies. All +these things they observed later. Now their wide eyes were fixed on +the top of the coffin. At one time there had been a dozen linen sacks +set there, but the mice and insects had gnawed most of them away. The +bottoms and lower halves yet remained, forming calyxes, out of which +tumbled heaps of gold and silver rings, zones, bracelets, collars and +masks from sarcophagi--all of gold; images of Isis in lapis lazuli and +amethyst; scarabs in garnets and hematite, Khem in obsidian, Bast in +carnelian, Besa in serpentine, signets in jasper, and ropes of diamonds +which had been Babylonian gems of spoil. + +"The plunder of Khafra and Sigur, by my mummy!" Kenkenes ejaculated. + +"Will they return?" Rachel asked, in a voice full of fear. + +"They are gathered to Amenti for their misdeeds many months agone," he +explained. "See how thickly the dust lies here without a print upon +it. They were tomb-robbers. None of the authorities could discover +their hiding-place, and lo! here it is." + +He walked round the sarcophagus and found at the head, on the floor, +several bronze cases sealed with pitch. He opened one of them with +some difficulty. Flat packages wrapped with linen lay within. + +"Dried gazelle-meat,--and I venture there is wine in those amphorae. +They lived here, I am convinced, and fed upon the food offerings they +filched from the tombs. Was there ever such intrepid lawlessness?" + +"Here is a snare and net," Rachel reported. + +"Did they not profit by superstition? As long as they were here they +were safe. They did not fear the spirit." + +"The spirit?" Deborah, still in the outer chamber, repeated with +interest. + +"The spirit of this tomb," Kenkenes explained, returning to her. In a +few words he told her the story as Hotep had told it to him. + +"Canst thou discover the name?" she asked when he had finished. + +"The sarcophagus is plain. There is no inscription within yonder +crypt, for I have this moment looked. But let me examine this writing +here by the door." + +After a while he spoke again. "The name is not given. It says only +this: + + 'The Spouse to Potiphar, + Captain of the Royal Guard to + Apepa, Child of the Sun, + In the Twelfth Year of Whose Luminous Reign + She Died. + Rejected by the Forty-two at On, because of + Unchastity, + She Lies Here, + Until Admitted to the Divine Pardon of Osiris.'" + + +"Aye, I know," Deborah responded. "It is history to the glory of a son +of Abraham. Him, who brought our people here, she would have tempted, +but he would have none of her. Therefore she bore false witness +against him and he was thrust into prison. + +"But the God of Israel does not suffer for ever His chosen to be +unjustly served, and he was finally exalted over Upper and Lower +Mizraim. And honor and long life and a perfumed memory are his, and +she--lo! she hath done one good thing. Her house hath become a shelter +for the oppressed and for that may she find peace at last." + +Kenkenes looked at the old woman with admiring eyes. The quaint speech +of the Hebrews had always fascinated him, but now it had become melody +in his ears. In this, the first moment of mental idleness since +midday, he had time to think on Deborah. He knew that he had seen her +before, and now he remembered that it was she who had transfixed him +with a look on an occasion when Israel had first come to Masaarah. + +But he did not remind her of the incident. Instead, he set about +counteracting any effect that might follow should her memory, unaided, +recall the occurrence. He had put her down on the matting, and the +running spiders and slower insects worried her. + +"A murrain on the bugs," he said. "We shall have a creepy night of it. +Let us bottle this treasure and lay the mattress out of their reach on +the sarcophagus. Endure them a while, Deborah, till we make thee a +refuge." + +He set the lamp in the opening from the outer into the inner crypt and +entered the second chamber. Rachel followed him, and the old Israelite +watched them with brilliant eyes. + +Kenkenes swept the jewels as if they had been almonds into an empty +amphora and returned it to the rack. The mattress he laid upon the +broad top of the sarcophagus. + +"A line of oil run around the coffin will keep the insects away," +Rachel ventured. Kenkenes returned to the outer chamber for the jar of +oil; but Rachel took it from him. + +"Let me be thy handmaid," she said softly. + +He did not protest, and she reentered the crypt. + +"Luckily the mattress is large enough for the two of you," Kenkenes +observed to Deborah, "but it will be hard sleeping." + +"The Hebrews are not spoiled with couches of down," she replied. + +"There are enough of the wrappings in yonder to take off the hardness, +but even with the matting over them they will be gruesome things to +sleep upon. They would bewitch your dreams. But mayhap ye will not +suffer from one night's discomfort." + +"Where go we to-morrow?" + +Kenkenes did not answer immediately. Another plan for Rachel's +security had been growing in his mind, and his heart leaped at the +prospect of its acceptance by her. + +"There is a large boat here, and we might go to On," he began at last. +"There is one way possible to save Rachel from this man as long as I +live, and I would she were to be persuaded into accepting the +conditions." + +"Name them and let me judge." + +He hesitated for proper words and his cheeks flushed. Deborah looked +at him with comprehension in her gaze. + +"Rachel is not blind to my love for her, and thou, too, art discerning. +Yet I would declare myself. I love Rachel, and I would take her to +wife. Then, not even the Pharaoh could take her from me by law." + +Deborah raised herself with difficulty, and after peering into the +inner chamber to see where Rachel was, approached him softly. + +"Thou lovest Rachel. Aye, that is a tale I have heard oftener than I +have fingers to count upon. From the first men of her tribe I have +heard it, from the best of Egypt and the worst. But she kept her heart +and stayed by my side. Now thou comest, young, comely, gifted with +fair speech and full of fervor. Thou lovest as she would be loved, and +her heart goes out to thee, even as thou wouldst have it--in love." + +Kenkenes' face glowed and his fine eyes shone with joy. + +"But mark thou!" she continued passively. "If thou wouldst save her, +think upon some other way, for thou mayest not wed her. Jehovah +planteth the faith of Abraham anew in Israel. In Rachel and in +Rachel's house it died not during the hundred years of the bondage. +Therefore the name is godly. Of her, what would thy heart say? Hath +she not beauty, hath she not wisdom, hath she not great winsomeness? +There is none like her in these days among all the children of Abraham. +To her Israel looketh for example, for, since she compelleth by her +grace, those who behold her will consider whatever she doeth as good. +Great is the reward of him who can direct and directeth aright, but +shall he not appear abominable in the sight of the Lord if he useth his +power to lead astray? Lo! if she wed thee, to her people it will seem +that she would say: 'Behold, this man is fair in my sight, and it is +good for the chosen of the Lord to take the idolater into his bosom.' +There is a multitude in Israel, which, like sheep, follow blindly as +they are led. Great will be the labor to engrave the worship of the +Lord God in their hearts, when all the powers of Israel shall strive to +do that thing for them. How shall there be any success if Moses and +the appointed of the Lord bid them worship, while the husband or wife +that dwelleth in their tent saith 'Worship not'? To these, Rachel's +marriage with thee would be justification and incentive to incline +toward idolaters and idols. Then there are the wise and discerning who +know that Rachel hath turned away from the best among her people. How, +then, shall she be fallen in their sight if she wed with an idolater? + +"She knoweth all these things and she keepeth a firm hold upon herself, +but she hath not said these things to thee lest her strength fail her." + +And thus was the mystery explained to him. + +"Thou bowest down to a beetle," she went on without pausing. "Thou +worshipest a cat; thou offerest up sacrifice to an image and conservest +abominable and heathen rites. Thou art an idolater, and as such thou +art not for Rachel. And yet, this further: if thou canst become a +worshiper of the true God, thou shalt take her. Never have I seen an +Egyptian won over to the faith of Abraham, but there approacheth a time +of wonders and I shall not marvel." + +To Egypt its faith was paramount. Israel in its palmiest days was not +more vigilantly, jealously fanatical than Egypt. Every worshiper was a +zealot; every ecclesiast an inquisitor. Church and State were +inseparably united; law was fused with religion; science and the arts +were governed by hieratic canons. + +The individual ate, slept and labored in the name of the gods, and +national matters proceeded as the Pantheon directed by the +ecclesiastical mouthpiece. + +Life was an ephemeral preface to the interminable and actual existence +of immortality. Temporal things were transient and only of +probationary value. The tomb was the ultimate and hoped-for, infinite +abiding-place. + +To the ideal Osirian his faith was the essential fiber in the fabric of +his existence, to withdraw which meant physical and spiritual +destruction. The forfeiture of his faith for Rachel, therefore, +appealed to Kenkenes as a demand upon his blood for his breath's sake. +His plight was piteous; never were alternatives so apparently +impossible. + +At first there was no coherent thought in the young man's mind. His +consciousness seemed to be full of rebellion, longing and amazement. +Never in his life had he been refused anything he greatly desired, when +he had justice on his side. Now he was rejected, not for a +shortcoming, but, according to his religious lights, for a virtue +instead. His gaze searched the visible portion of the other chamber +and found Rachel. In the half-light he saw that she had cast herself +down against the sarcophagus, face toward the stone, her whole attitude +one of weary depression. + +Piteous as was the sight, there was comfort in it for him. Rachel +loved him so much that she was bowed with the conflict between her love +and her duty. His manhood reasserted itself. Love in youth bears hope +with it in the face of the most hopeless hindrances. With the blood of +the Orient in his veins and the fire of youth to heighten its ardor, he +was not to be wholly and for ever cast down. Furthermore, there was +Rachel to be comforted. + +He turned to Deborah. + +"Let it pass, then. Deny me not the joy of loving her, nor her the +small content of loving me. If there should be change, let it be in +thy prohibitions, not in our love. Enough. Art thou weary? Wouldst +thou sleep?" + +"Nay," she answered bluntly. + +"Then I would take counsel with thee. Thou knowest the end of Israel?" +he asked. + +"I know the purpose of the Pharaoh, but there is no end to Israel." + +"Not yet, perchance," he said calmly, "or never. But we shall not put +trust in auguries. The oppression of the people is already begun at +Pa-Ramesu and the brick-fields. Ye shall not return to those dire +hardships. Ye can not return to Masaarah. In Memphis I offer my +father's house, but Rachel refuses it. In Nehapehu there is safety +among the peasantry on the murket's lands. My father lost an +all-powerful signet in the tomb of the Incomparable Pharaoh at Tape, +and did not search for it because he believed that Rameses had taken it +away from him. The king will honor it and grant whatever petition I +make to him. If ye are unafraid to abide in this tomb for the few +remaining hours of this night I shall take you to Nehapehu at dawn. +There ye can abide till I go to Tape and return. What sayest thou?" + +The old woman looked at him quietly for a moment. + +"Is this place safe?" she asked. + +"The forty-two demons of Amenti could not drive an Egyptian into this +tomb." + +"How comes it that thou art not afraid?" + +"I have no belief in spirits." + +"Nor have we. Why need we go hence? We shall abide here till thou +shalt return." + +"In this place!" Kenkenes exclaimed, recoiling. "Nay! I shall be gone +sixteen days at least." + +"We shall not fear to live in a tomb, we who have defied untombed death +daily. We shall remain here." + +"This hole--this cave of death!" + +"We have shelter, and by thine own words, none will molest us here. We +are not spoiled with soft living, nor would we take peril to any. +Without are fowls, herbs, roots, water--within, security, meat and +wine. We shall not fear the dead whom, living, Joseph rebuked. We +shall be content and well housed." + +"But thou art wounded," he essayed. + +She scouted his words with heroic scorn. "Nay, let us have no more. +If thou canst accomplish this thing for Rachel, do it with a light +heart, for we shall be safe. If thou art successful, Israel will rise +up and call thee blessed; if thou failest, the sons of Abraham will +still remember thee with respect." + +No humility, no cringing gratitude in this. Queen Hatasu, talking with +her favorite general, could not have commended him in a more queenly +way. + +To Kenkenes it seemed that their positions had been reversed. He +craved to serve them and they suffered him. + +"I shall go then to-night," he said simply. + +"Nay, bide with us to-night, for thou art weary. There is no need for +such haste." + +He opened his lips to protest, his objections manifesting themselves in +his manner. But she waved them aside. + +"Thou hast the marks of hard usage upon thee," she said; "thou hast +slaved for us since midday, and now the night is far spent. Thine eyes +are heavy for sleep, thy face is weary. And before thee is a task +which will require thy keenest wit, thy steadiest hand. Thou owest it +to Rachel and to thyself to go forth with the eye of a hawk and the +strength of a young lion." + +Because of Rachel's name in her argument he yielded and turned +immediately to the subject of their lonesome residence in the haunted +tomb. "If aught befall me," he said, "for I am in the unknowable hands +of the Hathors, disguise thyself and Rachel. If thou art skilled in +altering thou canst find pigment among the roots of the Nile. Dye her +hair and stain her face, take the boat and go to my father's house in +Memphis. He is Mentu, the murket to the Pharaoh--a patriot and a +friend to the kings. He knows not the Hebrew, but he is generous, +hospitable and kind to the oppressed of whatever blood. Tell him +Rachel's trouble and of me. I am his only child, and my name on thy +lips will win thee the best of his board, the shelter of his roof, the +protection of his right arm. Wait for me, however, in this place till +a month hath elapsed. + +"Keep the amphorae filled with water, fresh every day, and preserve a +stock of food within the tomb always to stand you in good stead if +Rachel's enemy discover her hiding-place and besiege it." + +His eyes ignited and his face grew white. + +"Starve within this cave," he went on intensely, approaching her, "but +deliver her not into his hands, I charge thee, for the welfare of thy +immortal soul. If thou art beset and there is no escape, before she +shall live for the despoiler--take her life!" + +Deborah scanned him narrowly, and when he made an end she opened her +lips as though to speak. But something deterred her, and she moved +away from him. + +"Come, spread the matting, Rachel," she said. "The master will stay +with us to-night." + +Obediently the girl came, still white of face, but composed. She made +a pallet of one roll of the matting, generously sprinkled the floor +about it with oil to keep away the insects, put the lamp behind the +amphora rack, hung her scarf over the frame that the light might not +shine in her guest's eyes, and set the door a little aside to let the +cool night air enter from the river. Having completed her service, she +bade him a soft good-night and disappeared into the inner crypt, where +Deborah had gone before her. + +Kenkenes immediately flung himself upon the pallet because Rachel's +hands had made it, and in a moment became acutely conscious of all the +ache of body and the pain of soul the day had brought him. The first +deprived him of comfort, the second of his peace, and there was the +smell of dawn on the breeze before he fell asleep. + +After sunset the next day Deborah roused him. He awoke restored in +strength and hungry. The old Israelite had prepared some of the +gazelle-meat for him, and this, with a draft of wine from an amphora, +refreshed him at once. Provisions had been put in his wallet, and a +double handful of golden rings, with several jewels, much treasure in +small bulk, had been wrapped in a strip of linen and was ready for him. +By the time all preparations were complete the night had come. + +He bade Deborah farewell and took Rachel's hand. It was cold and +trembled pitifully. Without a word he pressed it and gave it back. He +had reached the entrance, when it seemed that a suppressed sound smote +on his ears, and he stopped. Deborah, her face grown stern and hard, +had moved a step or two forward and stood regarding Rachel sharply. +Neither saw her. + +"Did you speak, Rachel?" Kenkenes asked. He fancied that her arms had +fallen quickly as he turned. + +"Nay, except to bid thee take care of thyself, Kenkenes," she faltered, +"more for thine own sake than for mine." + +He returned and, on his knee, pressed her hand to his lips. + +"God's face light thee and His peace attend thee," she continued. The +blessing was full of wondrous tenderness and music. He knew how her +face looked above him; how the free hand all but rested on his head, +and for a moment his fortitude seemed about to desert him. But she +whispered: + +"Farewell." + +And he arose and went forth. + + + +[1] The tombs of the Orient in ancient times were common places of +refuge for fugitives, lepers and outcasts. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +ON THE WAY TO THEBES + +The moon was ampler and its light stronger. The Nile was a vast and +faintly silvered expanse, roughened with countless ripples blown +opposite the direction of the current. The north wind had risen and +swept through the crevice between the hills with more than usual +strength, adding its reedy music to the sound of the swiftly flowing +waters. + +After launching his bari, Kenkenes gazed a moment, and then, with a +prayer to Ptah for aid, struck out for the south, rowing with powerful +strokes. + +At the western shore lighted barges swayed at their moorings or +journeyed slowly, but the Nile was wide, and the craft, blinded by +their own brilliance, had no thought of what might be hugging the +Arabian shore. Yet Kenkenes, with the inordinate apprehension of the +fugitive, lurked in the shadows, dashed across open spaces and imagined +in every drifting, drowsy fisher's raft a pursuing party. He prayed +for the well-remembered end of the white dike, where the Nile curved +about the southernmost limits of the capital. The day had not yet +broken when he passed the last flambeau burning at the juncture of the +dike with the city wall. He rowed on steadily for Memphis, and +immediate danger was at last behind him. + +The towers of the city had sunk below the northern horizon when, +opposite a poor little shrine for cowherds on the shore, a brazen gong +sounded musically for the sunrise prayers. The Libyan hilltops were, +at that instant, illuminated by the sun, and Kenkenes, in obedience to +lifelong training, rested his oars and bent his head. When he pulled +on again he did not realize that he had been, with the stubbornness of +habit, maintaining the breach between him and Rachel. There was no +thought in his mind to give over his faith. + +At noon, weary with heat, hunger and heavy labor, he drew up at +Hak-heb, on the western side of the Nile, fifty miles above Memphis. +The town was the commercial center for the pastoral districts of the +posterior Arsinoeite nome--Nehapehu. Here were brought for shipment +the wine, wheat and cattle of the fertile pocket in the Libyan desert. +Being at a season of commercial inactivity, when the farmers were +awaiting the harvest, the sunburnt wharves were almost deserted. + +Few saw Kenkenes arrive. Most of the inhabitants were taking the +midday rest, and every moored boat was manned by a sleeping crew. He +made a landing and went up through the sand and dust of the hot street +to the only inn. Here he ate and slept till night had come again. +Refreshed and invigorated, he continued his journey. At noon the next +day he stopped to sleep at another town and to buy a lamp, materials +for making fire, ropes and a plummet of bronze sufficiently heavy to +anchor his boat. He was entering a long stretch of distance wherein +there was no inhabited town, and he was making ready to sleep in the +bari. Then he began to travel by day, for he was too far from Memphis +to fear pursuit, and rest in an open boat under a blazing sun would be +impossible. + +The third evening he paused opposite a ruined city on the eastern bank +of the Nile. Hunters not infrequently went inland at this point for +large game, and although the place was in a state of partial +demolishment, Kenkenes hoped that there might be an inn. He tied his +boat to a stake and entered Khu-aten,[1] the destroyed capital of +Amenophis IV, self-styled Khu-n-Aten. + +Here under a noble king, who loved beauty and had it not, the barbarous +rites of the Egyptian religion were overthrown and sensuous and +esthetic ceremonies were established and made obligatory all over the +kingdom. In his blind groping after the One God, the king had directed +worship to the most fitting symbol of Him--the sun. + +He appeased the luminous divinity by offerings of flowers, regaled it +with simmerings from censers, besought it with the tremulous harp and +had it pictured with grace and vested with charm. And since the power +of the national faith was all-permeating, its reconstruction was +far-reaching in effect. Egypt was swept into a tremendous and +beautiful heresy by a homely king, whose word was law. + +But at his death the reaction was vast and vindictive. The orthodox +faith reasserted itself with a violence that carried every monument to +the apostasy and the very name of the apostate into dust. Now the +remaining houses of Khu-ayen were the homes of the fishers--its ruins +the habitation of criminals and refugees. + +The hand of the insulted zealot, of the envious successor, of the +invader and conqueror, had done what the reluctant hand of nature might +not have accomplished in a millennium. The ruins showed themselves, +stretching afar toward and across the eastern sky, in ragged and +indefinable lines. The oblique rays of the newly risen moon slanted a +light that was weird and ghostly because it fell across a ruin. +Kenkenes climbed over a chaos of prostrate columns, fallen architraves +and broken colossi, and the sounds of his advance stirred the rat, the +huge spider, the snake and the hiding beast from the dark debris. Here +and there were solitary walls standing out of heaps of wreckage, which +had been palaces, and frequent arid open spaces marked the site of +groves. In complex ramifications throughout the city sandy troughs +were still distinguishable, where canals had been, and in places of +peculiarly complete destruction the strips of uneven pavement showed +the location of temples. + +There was not a house at which Kenkenes dared to ask hospitality. +Those that lived so precariously would have little conscience about +stripping him of his possessions. + +He retraced his steps to the wharves and drew away, prepared to spend +the night in his boat. + +After leaving Khu-aten, the Nile wound through wild country, the hills +approaching its course so closely as to suggest the confines of a +gorge. The narrow strip of level land on the eastern side lay under a +receding shadow cast by the hills, but the river and the western shore +were in the broad brilliance of the moon. The night promised to be one +of exceeding brightness and Kenkenes shared the resulting wakefulness +of the wild life on land. + +The half of his up-journey was done and the conflict of hope and doubt +marshaled feasible argument for and against the success of his mission. +In some manner the destruction of Khu-aten offered, in its example of +Egypt's fury against progress, a parallel to his own straits. + +In his boyhood he had heard the Pharaoh Khu-n-Aten anathematized by the +shaven priests, and in the depths of his heart he had been startled to +find no sympathy for their rage against the artist-king. + +Ritual-bound Egypt had resented liberty of worship--a liberalism that +lacked naught in zeal or piety, but added grace to the Osirian faith. +In his beauty-worship, Kenkenes was not narrow. He would not confine +it to glyptic art, nor indeed to art alone--all the uses of life might +be bettered by it. His appreciation of Khu-n-Aten's ambition had been +passive before, but when his own spirit experienced the same fire and +the same reproach, his sympathy became hearty partizanship. + +His mind wandered back again to the ruin. How fiercely Egypt had +resented the schism of a Pharaoh, a demi-god, the Vicar of Osiris! The +words of Rachel came back to him like an inspiration: + +"Thou hast nation-wide, nation-old, nation-defended prejudice to +overcome, and thou art but one, Kenkenes." + +But one, indeed, and only a nobleman. Could he hope to change Egypt +when a king might not? Behold, how he was suffering for a single and +simple breach of the law. At the thought he paused and asked himself: + +"Am I suffering for the sacrilege?" + +The admission would entail a terrifying complexity. + +If he were suffering punishment for the statue, what punishment had +been his for the sacrilegious execution of the Judgment of the Dead in +the tomb of Rameses II? What, other than the reclamation of the signet +by the Incomparable Pharaoh, even as Mentu had said? If the hypothesis +held, he had committed sacrilege, he had offended the gods, and might +not the accumulated penalty be--O unspeakable--the loss of Rachel? + +On the other hand, if the signet were still in the tomb, Rameses had +not reclaimed it--Rameses had not been offended. The ritual condemned +his act, but if Rameses in the realm of inexorable justice and supernal +wisdom did not, how should he reconcile the threats of the ritual and +the evident passiveness of the royal soul? If he found the signet and +achieved his ends, aside from its civil power over him, what weight +would the canonical thunderings have to his inner heart? + +Once again he paused. The deductions of his free reasoning led him +upon perilous ground. They made innuendoes concerning the stability of +the other articles of hieratical law. He was startled and afraid of +his own arguments. + +"Nay, by the gods," he muttered to himself, "it is not safe to reason +with religion." + +But every stroke of his oar was active persistence in his heresy. + +He believed he should find the signet. + +Thereafter he could turn a deaf ear to any renegade ideas such an event +might suggest. + +It was an unlucky chance that befell the theological institutions of +Egypt as far as this devotee was concerned, that Kenkenes had landed at +the capital of the hated Pharaoh. + +But he shook himself and tried to fix his attention on the night. The +stars were few--the multitude obliterated by the moon, the luminaries +abashed thereby. The light fell through a high haze of dust and was +therefore wondrously refracted and diffused. The hills made high +lifted horizons, undulating toward the east, serrated toward the west. +In the sag between there was no human companionship abroad. + +Throughout great lengths of shore-line the tuneless stridulation of +frogs, the guttural cries of water-birds and the general movement in +the sedge indicated a serene content among small life. But sometimes +he would find silence on one bank for a goodly stretch where there was +neither marsh-chorus nor cadences of insects. The hush would be +profound and an affrighted air of suspense was apparent. And there at +the river-brink the author of this breathless dismay, some lithe +flesh-eater, would stride, shadow-like, through the high reeds to +drink. Now and then the woman-like scream of the wildcat, or the harsh +staccato laugh of the hyena would startle the marshes into silence. +Sometimes retiring shapes would halt and gaze with emberous eyes at the +boat moving in midstream. + +Kenkenes admitted with a grim smile that the great powers of the world +and the wild were against him. But Rachel's face came to him as +comfort--the memory of it when it was tender and yielding--and with a +lover's buoyancy he forgot his sorrows in remembering that she loved +him. He dropped the anchor and, lying down in the bottom of his boat, +dreamed happily into the dawn. + +During the day he landed for supplies at a miserable town of +pottery-makers, leaving his boat at the crazy wharves. + +When he returned the bari was gone. A negro, the only one near the +river who was awake, told him that a dhow, laden with clay, in making a +landing had struck the bari, staved in its side, upset it and sent it +adrift. + +The mischance did not trouble Kenkenes. + +After some effort he aroused a crew of oarsmen, procured a boat, and +continued at once to Thebes. + + + +[1] Khu-aten--Tel-el-Amarna. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE FAN-BEARER'S QUEST + +At sunset on the day after the festivities at the Lady Senci's, Hotep +deserted his palace duties and came to the house of Mentu. He had in +mind to try again to persuade his friend from his folly, for the scribe +was certain that Kenkenes was once more returning to his sacrilege and +the Israelite. + +The old housekeeper informed him that the young master was not at home, +though he was expected even now. + +Hotep waited in the house of his aunt, neighbor to the murket, and +about the middle of the first watch asked again for Kenkenes. + +Nay, the young master had not returned. But would not the noble Hotep +enter and await him? + +The scribe, however, returned to the palace, and put off his visit +until the next day. + +The following noon a page brought him a message from his aunt, the Lady +Senci. It was short and distressed. + +"Kenkenes has not returned, Hotep, and since he is known to have gone +upon the Nile, we fear that disaster has overtaken him. Come and help +the unhappy murket. His household is so dismayed that it is useless. +Come, and come quickly." + +The probability of the young artist's death in the Nile immediately +took second place in the scribe's mind. Kenkenes had displayed to +Hotep the effect of Rameses' savage boast to exterminate the Hebrews. +It was that incident which had convinced the scribe that the Arabian +hills would claim the artist on the morrow. He had not stopped to +surmise the extremes to which Kenkenes would go, but his mysterious +disappearance seemed to suggest that the lover had gone to the +Israelitish camp to remain. + +He made ready and repaired to the house of the murket. Mentu met him +in the chamber of guests. By the dress of the great artist it would +seem that he had returned at that moment from the streets. + +Hotep sat down beside him, and with tact and well-chosen words told his +story and summarized his narration with a mild statement of his +suspicions. + +There was no outbreak on the part of Mentu. But his broad chest heaved +once, as though it had thrown off a great weight. + +"But Kenkenes has been a dutiful son," he said after a silence, "I can +not think he would use me so cruelly--no word of his intent or his +whereabouts." + +The objection was plausible. + +"Then, let us go to Masaarah and discover of a surety," the scribe +suggested. + +When Atsu emerged from the mouth of the little valley into the quarries +some time after the midday meal, he was confronted by the murket and +the royal scribe. Neither of the men was unknown to him. + +Hotep halted him. + +"Was there a guest with the fair-haired Israelite maiden last night?" +the scribe asked. + +Atsu's face, pinched and darker than usual, blazed wrathfully. + +"Have ye also joined yourselves with Har-hat to run that hard-pressed +child to earth?" he exclaimed. "Do ye call yourselves men?" + +"The gods forbid!" Hotep protested. "We do not concern ourselves with +the maiden. It is the man who may be with her that we seek." + +The taskmaster made an angry gesture, and Hotep interrupted again. + +"I do not question her decorum, and the man of whom I speak is of +spotless character. He is lost and we seek him." + +"I can not help you; my wits are taxed in another search." + +Hotep's face showed light at the taskmaster's words. + +"Is she also gone?" he asked mildly. "Then let me give you my word, +that the discovery of one will also find the other." + +Atsu gazed with growing hope at the scribe. + +"How is he favored?" he asked at last. + +"He is tall, half a palm taller than his fellows; comely of +countenance; young; in manner, amiable and courteous--." + +Atsu interrupted him with a wave of his hand. "I saw him once--good +three months agone, but not since." + +The reply baffled Hotep for a moment. He realized that to find +Kenkenes he must begin a search for Rachel. + +"Good Atsu, he whom we seek is a friend to the maiden. He is much +beloved by me--by us. Whomsoever he befriendeth we shall befriend. +Wilt thou tell us when and from whom the maiden fled?" + +Atsu had become willing by this time. This amiable young noble might +be able to lift the suspense that burdened his unhappy heart. + +"Har-hat--Set make a cinder of his heart!--asked her at the hands of +the Pharaoh for his harem--" + +Mentu interrupted him with a growling imprecation and Hotep's fair face +darkened. + +"Yesterday morning he sent three men to me," the taskmaster continued, +"with the document of gift from the Son of Ptah, but she saw them in +time and fled into the desert. At that hour there were only women in +the camp, and the three men made short work of me when I would have +held them till she escaped. In three hours, two of them returned--one, +sick from hard usage, and the third, they said, had been pitched over +the cliff-front into the valley of the Nile. They had not captured her +and they were too much enraged to explain why they had not. During +their absence I emptied the quarries of Israelites and posted them +along the Nile to halt the Egyptians, if they came to the river with +Rachel. But we let them return to Memphis empty-handed, and thereafter +searched the hills till sunset. The maiden's foster-mother, it seems, +fled with her, but neither of them, nor any trace of them, was to be +found." + +"Does it not appear to thee," Hotep asked, after a little silence, +"that the same hand which so forcibly persuaded the Egyptians to +abandon the pursuit may have led the maiden to a place of safety? My +surmises have been right in general, O noble Mentu, but not in detail," +he continued, turning to the murket. "There is, however, the element +of danger now to take the place of the gracelessness we would have laid +to him. Thou knowest Har-hat, my Lord." + +He thanked the dark-faced taskmaster. "Have no concern for the maiden. +She is safe, I doubt not." + +He took Mentu's arm and passing up through the Israelitish camp, +climbed the slope behind it. + +"It is my duty and thine to hide this lovely folly up here, ere these +searching minions of Har-hat or frantic Israelites come upon it." + +The scribe's sense of direction and location was keen. It was one of +the goodly endowments of the savage and the beast which the gods had +added to the powers of this man of splendid intellect. He doubled back +through the great rocks, his steps a little rapid and never hesitating, +as though his destination were in full view. Mentu followed him, +silent and moodily thoughtful. At last Hotep stopped. + +Before them was a narrow aisle leading down from the summit of the +hill. It was hemmed in on each side by tumbled masses of stone. The +aisle terminated at its lower end in a long white drift of sand against +a great cube. Instinct and reason told Hotep that here had been the +hiding-place of Athor, but there was no sign that human foot had ever +entered the spot. After a space of puzzlement, Hotep smiled. + +"He hath made way with the sacrilege himself," he said with relief in +his voice; "I had not credited him with so much foresight. Nay, now, +if the runaway will but come home, we will forgive him." + +Mentu said nothing. Indeed, since Hotep had told him of the recent +doings of Kenkenes, the murket had had little to say. He had felt in +his lifetime most of the sorrows that can overtake a man of his +position and attainments--but he had never known the chagrin of a +wayward child. The fear that he was to know that humiliation, now, +made his heart heavy beyond words. + +As they turned away the sound of voices smote upon their ears. + +"Near this spot, it must be, my Lord," one said. + +"Find the sacrilege, lout. We seek not the neighborhood of it." + +Hotep caught the murket's arm and drew him out of the aisle into hiding +behind another great stone. + +"This is the place; this is the place," the first voice declared, and +his statement was seconded by another and as positive a voice. + +There was the sound of the new-comers emerging into the aisle, and +immediately the first speaker exclaimed in a tone full of astonishment +and disappointment: + +"O, aye; I see!" the master assented with an irritating laugh. + +"Har-hat!" Hotep whispered. + +Another of the party broke in impatiently: "Make an end to this chase. +Saw you any sacrilege, or was it a phantom of your stupid dreams?" + +"Asar-Mut," Mentu said under his breath. + +The first voice and its second protested in chorus. + +"As the gods hear me, I saw it!" the first went on. "It was a statue +most sacrilegiously wrought and the man stood before it. It was +cunningly hidden between two walls, and there is no spot on the desert +that looks so much like the place as this. And yet, no wall--no +statue--no sign of--" + +"How did you find it yesterday?" the fan-bearer asked. + +"We followed the hag, and she, the girl. The pair of them were in +sight of each other, as they ran." + +"How did they find it?" + +"Magic! Magic!" + +"There were three of you and one man overthrew you all?" the high +priest commented suspiciously. + +"Holy Father!" the servant protested wildly, "he was a giant--a monster +for bigness. Besides, there were but two of us, after he had all but +throttled me." + +Har-hat laughed again. "Aye, and after he pitched Nak over the cliff, +there was but one. But tell me this: was he noble or a churl?" + +"He wore the circlet." + +Mentu's long fingers bent as if he longed for a throat between them. + +"The craven invented his giant to salve his valor," the priest said. + +"It may be," the fan-bearer replied musingly, "but thy nephew, holy +Father, is conspicuously tall and well-muscled. Likewise, he is a +sculptor. Furthermore, the two slaves came home badly abused. Unas +has some proof for his tale--" + +"Kenkenes is the soul of fidelity," the high priest retorted warmly. +"He has had unnumbered opportunities to betray the gods and he has ever +been steadfast." + +"Nay, I did not impugn him. The similarity merely appealed to me. Let +us get down into the valley and question that villain Atsu. I would +know what became of the girl." + +"Mine interests are solely with the ecclesiastical features of the +offense, my Lord," Asar-Mut replied. "I would get back to Memphis." + +"Bear us company a little longer, holy Father. The taskmaster may tell +us somewhat of this blaspheming sculptor-giant." + +When the last sound of the departing men died away, Mentu turned across +the hill toward the Nile-front of the cliff. + +"Nay, I will go back to Memphis first," he said grimly. "Mayhap +Kenkenes hath returned. If Asar-Mut should question him, he would not +evade nor equivocate, so I shall send him away that he may not meet his +uncle. I would not have him lie, but he shall not accomplish his own +undoing." + +But days of seeking followed, growing frantic as time went on, and +there was no trace of the lost artist. Even his pet ape did not +return. Asar-Mut questioned Mentu closely concerning the fidelity of +Kenkenes to the faith and the ritual. + +"I ask after his soul," he explained. But he gained no evidence from +Mentu. + +On the fourteenth day after the disappearance of the young sculptor, +Sepet, the boatman that had hired his bari to Kenkenes, found the boat +among the wharf piling. It was overturned, its bottom ripped out, one +side crushed as if a river-horse had played with it. In the small +compartment at the tiller were provisions for a light lunch; a wallet, +empty; a rope and a plummet of bronze used to moor a boat in midstream +while the sportsman fished; the light woolen mantle worn as often for +protection against the sun as against the cold, and other things to +prove that Kenkenes had met with disaster. + +The fate of the young man seemed to be explained. The great house of +Mentu was darkened; the servants went unkempt and the artist wore a +blue scarf knotted about his hips. The high priest dismissed the +subject of the sacrilege from his mind, now that his nephew was dead. +The people of Memphis who knew Kenkenes mourned with Mentu; the +festivities were dull without him, and there were some, like Io and the +Lady Senci, who went into retirement and were not to be comforted. + +But Har-hat presented jeweled housings to Apis for the prospering of +his search after Rachel, and set about assisting the god with all his +might. He sent couriers, armed with a description and warrant for the +arrest of Kenkenes and the Israelite, into all the large cities of +Egypt. He ransacked Pa-Ramesu and the brick-fields, Silsilis, Syene, +where there were quarries, and especially Thebes, which was large and +remote, a tempting place for fugitives. + +When he heard the news of the young sculptor's death, he actually sent +a message of condolence to Mentu, much to the tearful and unspeakable +rage of the heart-broken murket. Yet, with all the limitless resources +placed at the command of a bearer of the king's fan, Har-hat continued +to search for the young artist, until word came to him from Thebes +several days later. + +His next move was to bring to the notice of the Pharaoh that the +taskmaster Atsu was pampering the Israelites of Masaarah and defeating +the ends of the government. Furthermore, the overseer had treated with +contempt the personal commands of the fan-bearer. So Atsu was removed +entirely from over the Hebrews, reduced to the rank of a common +soldier, and returned to the nome from which he came, in the coif and +tunic of a cavalryman. + +Thus it was that Har-hat avenged himself for the loss of Rachel, put +all aid out of her reach, and kept up an unceasing pursuit of her. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +THE TOMB OF THE PHARAOH + +It was far into the tenth night that Kenkenes arrived in Thebes. On +the sixteenth day Rachel would begin to expect him, and he could not +hope to reach Memphis by that time. She should not wait an hour longer +than necessary. He would get the signet that night and return by the +swiftest boat obtainable in Thebes. The dawn should find him on the +way to Memphis. + +He entered the streets of the Libyan suburb of the holy city, and +passed through it to the scattering houses, set outside the +thickly-settled portion, and nearer to the necropolis. At the portals +of the most pretentious of these houses he knocked and was admitted. + +He was met presently in the chamber of guests by an old man, +gray-haired and bent. This was the keeper of the tomb of Rameses the +Great. + +"I am the son of Mentu," he said, "thy friend, and the friend of the +Incomparable Pharaoh. Perchance thou dost remember me." + +"I remember Mentu," the old man replied, after a space that might have +been spent in rumination, or in collecting his faculties to speak. + +"He decorated the tomb of Rameses," the young man continued. + +"Aye, I remember. I watched him often at the work." + +"Thou knowest how the great king loved him." + +The old man bent his head in assent. + +"He was given a signet by Rameses, and on the jewel was testimony of +royal favor which should outlive the Pharaoh and Mentu himself." + +"Even so. A precious talisman, and a rare one." + +"It was lost." + +"Nay! Lost! Alas, that is losing the favor of Osiris. What a +calamity!" The old man shook his head and his gray brows knitted. + +"But the place in which it was lost is small, and I would search for it +again." + +"That is wise. The gods aid them who surrender not." + +By this time the old man's face had become inquiring. + +"There is need for the signet now--" + +"The noble Mentu, in trouble?" the old man queried. + +"The son of the noble Mentu is in trouble--the purity of an innocent +one at stake, and the foiling of a villain to accomplish," Kenkenes +answered earnestly. + +"A sore need. Is it-- Wouldst thou have me aid thee?" + +"Thou hast said. I come to thee to crave thy permission to search +again for the signet." + +"Nay, but I give it freely. Yet I do not understand." + +"The signet was lost in the tomb of the Incomparable Pharaoh. May I +not visit the crypt?" + +The old man thought a moment. "Aye, thou canst search. If thou wilt +come for me to-morrow--" + +"Nay, I would go this very night." + +The keeper's face sobered and he shook his head. + +"Deny me not, I pray thee," Kenkenes entreated earnestly. "Thou, who +hast lived so many years, hast at some time weighed the value of a +single moment. In the waste or use of the scant space between two +breaths have lives been lost, souls smirched, the unlimited history of +the future turned. And never was a greater stake upon the saving of +time than in this strait--which is the peril of spotless womanhood." + +The old man rubbed his head. "Aye, I know, I know. Thy haste is +justifiable, but--" + +"I can go alone. There is no need that thou shouldst waste an hour of +thy needed sleep for me. I pledge thee I shall conduct myself without +thee as I should beneath thine eye. Most reverently will I enter, most +reverently search, most reverently depart, and none need ever know I +went alone." + +The ancient keeper weakened at the earnestness of the young man. + +"And thou wilt permit no eye to see thee enter or come forth from the +valley?" + +"Most cautious will I be--most secret and discreet." + +"Canst thou open the gates?" + +"I have not forgotten from the daily practice that was mine for many +weeks." + +"Then go, and let no man know of this. Amen give thee success." + +Kenkenes thanked him gratefully and went at once. + +The moon was in its third quarter, but it was near midnight and the +valley of the Nile between the distant highlands to the east and west +was in soft light. On the eastern side of the river there was only a +feeble glimmer from a window where some chanting leech stood by a +bedside, or where a feast was still on. But under the luster of the +waning moon Thebes lost its outlines and became a city of marbles and +shadows and undefined limits. + +On the western side the vision was interrupted by a lofty, +sharp-toothed range, tipped with a few scattered stars of the first +magnitude. In the plain at its base were the palaces of Amenophis III, +of Rameses II, and their temples, the temples of the Tothmes, and far +to the south the majestic colossi of Amenophis III towered up through +the silver light, the faces, in their own shadow, turned in eternal +contemplation of the sunrise. Grouped about the great edifices were +the booths of funeral stuffs and the stalls of caterers to the populace +of the Libyan suburb of Thebes. But these were hidden in the dark +shadows which the great structures threw. The moon blotted out the +profane things of the holy city and discovered only its splendors to +the sky. + +At the northwest limits of the suburb, the hills approached the Nile, +leaving only a narrow strip a few hundred yards wide between their +fronts and the water. Here the steep ramparts were divided by a +tortuous cleft, which wound back with many cross-fissures deep into the +desert. The ravine was simply a chasm, with perpendicular sides of +naked rock. + +At its upper end, it was blocked by a wall of unscalable heights. +Nowhere in its length was it wider than a hundred yards, and across the +mouth a gateway wide enough for three chariots abreast had been built +of red granite. + +This was the valley of the Tombs of the Kings. + +In chambers hewn in solid rock, the monarchs of the eighteenth and +nineteenth dynasties were entombed. All along the walls of the gorge, +nature had secured the sacred resting-place of the sovereigns against +trespass from the end and sides of the chasm, and Egypt had dutifully +strengthened the one weak point in the fortification--the entrance--by +the gateway of granite. But there was no vigilance of guards. +Whosoever knew how to open the gates might enter the valley. The +secret of the bolts was known only among the members of the royal +family and the court. To Kenkenes, whose craft as a sculptor had +taught him the intricate devices used in closing tombs, the opening of +these gates was simple. Even the mighty portals of Khufu and Menka-ra +would yield responsive to his intelligent touch. + +He let himself into the valley and, closing the valves behind him, went +up the tortuous gorge, darkened by the shadows of its walls. He +continued past the mouth of the valley's southern arm wherein were +entombed the kings of the eighteenth dynasty. Here, in this open +space, he could see the circling bats, which before he could only hear +above his head. Somewhere among the rocks up the moonlit hollow an owl +hooted. But the tombs he sought were in the upper end of the main +ravine. + +Here lay Rameses I, the founder of that illustrious dynasty--the +nineteenth. Near-by was his son, Seti I, and next to him the splendid +tyrant, Rameses the Great, the Incomparable Pharaoh. + +By the time Kenkenes had reached the spot, all lightness in his heart +had gone out like the extinguishing of a candle, and the weight of +suspense, the fear of failure, fell on him as suddenly. He approached +the elaborate facade of the solemn portals, climbed the pairs of steps, +and paused at each of the many landings with a prayer for the success +of his mission, not for the repose of the royal soul, after the custom +of other visitors. With trembling hands he pushed the doors, rough +with inscriptions, and the great stone valves swung ponderously inward, +the bronze pins making no sound as they turned in the sockets. +Kenkenes entered and closed the portals behind him. + +Instantly all sound of the outside world was cut off--the sound of the +wind, the chafing of the sands on the hills above, the movement and +cries of night-birds, beasts and insects. Absolute stillness and +original night surrounded him. + +With all speed he lighted his lamp, but the flaring name illuminated +only a little space in the brooding, hovering blackness about him. + +The atmosphere was stagnant and heavily burdened with old aromatic +scent, and the silence seemed to have accumulated in the years. Even +the soft whetting of his sandal, as he walked, made echoes that shouted +at him. The little blaze fizzed and sputtered noisily and each throb +of his heart sounded like a knock on the portal. + +He did not pause. The darkness might cloud and tinge and swallow up +his light as turbid water absorbs the clear; the silence might resent +the violation. This was the habitation of a royal soul in perpetual +vigil over its corpse and vested with all the powers and austere +propensities of a thing supernatural. But not once did the impulse +come to him to fly. Rachel's face attended him like a lamp. + +He moved forward, his path only discovered to him step by step as the +light advanced, the sumptuous frescoes done by the hand of his father +emerging, one detail at a time. The solemn figures fixed accusing eyes +upon him from every frieze; the passive countenance of the monarch +himself confronted him from every wall. One wondrous chamber after +another he traversed, for the tomb penetrated the very core of the +mountain. + +The innermost crypt contained the altars. This was the sanctuary, the +holy of holies, never entered except by a hierarch. + +When Kenkenes reached the final threshold he paused. Thus far, his +presence had been merely a midnight intrusion. If he entered the +sanctuary his coming would be violation. He thought of the distress of +Rachel and dared. + +The first alabaster altar glistened suddenly out of the night like a +bank of snow. Kenkenes' sandal grated on the sandy dust that lay thick +on the floor. Not even the keeper had entered this crypt to remove the +accumulated dust of six years. + +Under this floor of solid granite was the pit containing the sarcophagi +of the dead monarch, of his favorite son and destined heir, Shaemus, +and his well-beloved queen, Neferari Thermuthis. The opening into the +pit had been sealed when Rameses had descended to emerge no more. The +chamber over it was brilliant with frescoing and covered with +inscriptions. There were three magnificent altars of alabaster and +over each was an oval containing the name of one of the three sleepers +in the pit below. + +In this chapel the signet had been lost. + +Kenkenes set his light on the floor and began his search. The first +time he searched the floor, he laid the lack of success to his excited +work. The second time, the perspiration began to trickle down his +temples. Thereafter he sought, lengthwise and crosswise, calling on +the gods for aid, but there was no glint of the jewel. + +At last, sick with despair, he sat down to collect himself. Suddenly +across the heavy silence there smote a sound. In a place closer to the +beating heart of the world, the movement might have escaped him. Now, +though it was but the rustle of sweeping robes, it seemed to sough like +the wind among the clashing blades of palm-leaves. + +For a moment Kenkenes sat, transfixed, and in that moment the sound +came nearer. He remembered the injunction of the old keeper. Human or +supernatural, the new-comer must not find him there. He leaped behind +the altar of Shaemus, extinguishing the light as he did so. He flung +the corner of his kamis over the reeking wick that the odor might not +escape, but his fear in that direction was materially lessened when he +saw that the stranger bore a fuming torch. + +On one end of the short pole of the torch was a knot of flaming pitch, +on the other was a bronze ring fitted with sprawling claws. The +stranger set the light on the floor and the device kept the torch +upright. He crossed the room and stood at the altar of Neferari +Thermuthis. + +By the deeply fringed and voluminous draperies, and by the venerable +beard, rippling and streaked with gray, the young sculptor took the +stranger to be an Israelite. As Kenkenes looked upon him, he was +minded of his father, the magnificent Mentu. There was the bearing of +the courtier, with the same wondrous stature, the same massive frame. +But the delicate features of the Egyptian, the long, slim fingers, the +narrow foot, were absent. In this man's countenance there was majesty +instead of grace; in his figure, might, instead of elegance. The +expression had need of only a little emphasis in either direction to +become benign or terrible. Kenkenes caught a single glance of the eyes +under the gray shelter of the heavy brows. Once, the young man had +seen hanging from Meneptah's neck the rarest jewel in the royal +treasure. The wise men had called it an opal. It shot lights as +beautiful and awful as the intensest flame. And something in the eyes +of this mighty man brought back to Kenkenes the memory of the fires of +that wondrous gem. + +The stranger stood in profound meditation, his splendid head gradually +sinking until it rested on his breast. The arms hung by the sides. +The attitude suggested a sorrow healed by the long years until it was +no more a pain, but a memory so subduing that it depressed. At last +the great man sank to his knees, with a movement quite in keeping with +his grandeur and his mood, and bowed his head on his arms. + +Pressed down with awe, Kenkenes followed his example, and although he +seemed to kneel on some rough chisel mark in the floor, he did not +shift his position. The discomfort seemed appropriate as penitence on +that holy occasion. + +After a long time the stranger arose, took up the torch and quitted the +chamber. He went away more slowly than he had come, with reluctant +step and averted face. + +When night and profound silence were restored in the crypt, Kenkenes +regained his feet and, examining the irritated knee, found the +offending object clinging to the impression it had made in the flesh. +The shape of the trifle sent a wild hope through his brain. Groping +through the dark, he found his lamp and lighted it with trembling hands. + +He held the lapis-lazuli signet! + +He did not move. He only grasped the scarab tightly and panted. The +sudden change from intense suspense to intense relief had deprived him +of the power of expression. Only his physical make-up manifested its +rebellion against the shock. + +As the tumult in his heart subsided, his mind began to confront him +with happy fancies. Rachel was already free. In that moment of +exuberance he thrust aside, as monstrous, the bar of different faith. +He believed he could overcome it by the very compelling power of his +love and the righteousness of his cause. He spent no time picturing +the method of his triumph over it. Beyond that obstacle were tender +pictures of home-making, love and life, which so filled him with +emotion that, in a sudden ebullition of boyish gratitude, he pressed +the all-potent signet to his lips. + +Then, his cheeks reddening with a little shame at his impulsiveness, he +examined the scarab. The cord by which it had been suspended passed +through a small gold ring between the claws of the beetle. This had +worn very thin and some slight wrench had broken it. + +"Ah!" he exclaimed aloud. "It is even as I had thought. But let me +not seem to boast when I tell my father of it. It will be victory +enough for me to display the jewel, and abashment enough for him to +know he was wrong." + +He ceased to speak, but the echoes talked on after him. He shivered, +caught up his light and raced through the sumptuous tomb into the world +again. + +It was near dawn and the skies were pallid. He was hungry and weary +but most impatient to be gone. He would repair to Thebes and break his +fast. Thereafter he would procure the swiftest boat on the Nile and +take his rest while speeding toward Memphis. + +The inn of the necropolis was like an immense dwelling, except that the +courts were stable-yards. The doors, opening off the porch, were +always open and a light burned by night within the chamber. So long +and so murkily had it burnt, that the chamber Kenkenes entered was +smoky and redolent of it. Aside from a high, bench-like table, running +half the length of the rear wall, there was nothing else in the room. +Kenkenes rapped on the table. In a little time an Egyptian emerged +from under the counter, on the other side. Understanding at last that +the guest wished to be fed, he staggered sleepily through a door and, +presently reappearing, signed Kenkenes to enter. + +The room into which the young sculptor was conducted was too large to +be lighted by the two lamps, hung from hooks, one at each end of the +chamber. Down either side, hidden in the shadows, were long benches, +and from the huddled heap that occupied the full length of each, it was +to be surmised that men were sleeping on them. Above them the slatted +blinds had been withdrawn from the small windows and the morning breeze +was blowing strongly through the chamber. At the upper end was another +table, similar to the one in the outer room, except for a napkin in the +middle with a bottle of water set upon it. An Egyptian woman stood +beside this table and gave the young man a wooden stool. + +As Kenkenes walked toward the seat a stronger blast of wind puffed out +the light above his head. The woman climbed up to take the lamp down +and set it on the table while she relighted it. The skirt of her dress +caught on the top of the stool she had mounted and pulled it over on +the wooden floor with a sharp sound. + +One of the sleepers stirred at the noise and turned over. Presently he +sat up. + +Kenkenes righted the stool and sat down on it, the light shining in his +face. He saw the guest in the shadow shake off the light covering and +walk swiftly through the door into the outer chamber. + +Meanwhile the silent woman served her guest with cold baked water-fowl, +endives, cucumbers, wheat bread and grapes, and a weak white wine. +Kenkenes ate deliberately, and consumed all that was set before him. +When he had made an end, he paid his reckoning to the woman and +returned into the outer chamber. + +At the doors, he was confronted by four members of the city +constabulary and a Nubian in a striped tunic. + +"Seize him!" the Nubian cried. Instantly the four men flung themselves +upon Kenkenes and pinioned his arms. + +"Nay, by the gods," he exclaimed angrily. "What mean you?" + +"Parley not with him," the Nubian said in excitement. "Get him in +bonds stronger than the grip of hands. He is muscled like a bull." + +The young sculptor looked at the Nubian. He had seen him before--had +had unpleasant dealings with him. And then he remembered, so suddenly +and so fiercely that his captors felt the sinews creep in his arms. + +"Set spare thee and thine infamous master to me!" he exclaimed +violently. + +The Nubian retreated a little, for Kenkenes had strained toward him. + +"Get him into the four walls of a cell," the Nubian urged the guards. +"I may not lose him again, as I value my head." + +The guards started out of the doors and Kenkenes went with them, +unresisting, but not passively. All the thoughts were his that can +come to a man, on whose freedom depend another's life and happiness. +Added to these was an all-consuming hate of her enemy and his, new-fed +by this latest offense from Har-hat. With difficulty he kept the +tumult of his emotions from manifesting themselves to his captors. +They feared that his calm was ominous, and held him tightly. + +The necropolis was not astir and the streets were wind-haunted. The +tread of the six men set dogs to barking, and only now and then was a +face shown at the doorways. For this Kenkenes thanked his gods, for he +was proud, and the eye of the humblest slave upon him in his +humiliating plight would have hurt him more keenly than blows. + +The prison was a square building of rough stone, flat-roofed, three +stories in height. The red walls were broken at regular intervals by +crevices, barred with bronze. There was but one entrance. + +Herein were confined all the malefactors of the great city of the gods, +and since the population of Thebes might have comprised something over +half a million inhabitants, the dwellers of that grim and impregnable +prison were not few in number. + +Kenkenes was led through the doors, down a low-roofed, narrow, +stone-walled corridor to the room of the governor of police. + +This was a hall, with a lofty ceiling, highly colored and supported by +loteform pillars of brilliant stone. Toth, the ibis-headed, and the +Goddess Ma, crowned with plumes, her wings forward drooping, were +painted on the walls. A long table, massive, plain and solid like a +sarcophagus, stood in the center of the room. A confused litter of +curled sheets of papyrus, and long strips of unrolled linen scrolls +were distributed carelessly over the polished surface. At one side +were eight plates of stone--the tables of law, codified and blessed by +Toth. + +The governor of police was absent, but his vice, who was jailer and +scribe in one, sat in a chair behind the great table. + +When the party entered, he sat up, undid a new scroll, wetted the reed +pen in the pigment, and was ready. + +"Name?" he began, preparing to write. + +"That, thou knowest," Kenkenes retorted. The Nubian bowed respectfully +and approaching, whispered to the scribe. The official ran over some +of the scrolls and having found the one he sought, proceeded to make +his entries from the information contained therein. + +When the man had finished Kenkenes nodded toward the eight volumes of +the law. + +"If thou art as acquainted with the laws of Egypt as thine office +requires, thou knowest that no free-born Egyptian may be kept ignorant +of the charge that accomplished his arrest. Wherefore am I taken?" + +"For sacrilege and slave-stealing," the scribe replied calmly. + +"At the complaint of Har-hat, bearer of the king's fan," Kenkenes added. + +"Until such time as stronger proof of thy misdeeds may be brought +against thee," the scribe continued. + +"Even so. In plainer words, I shall be held till I confess what he +would have me tell, or until I decay in this tomb. Let me give thee my +word, I shall do neither. Unhand me. I shall not attempt to escape." + +At a sign from the scribe the four men released him and took up a +position at the doors. Kenkenes opened his wallet and displayed the +signet. The scribe took it and read the inscription. There was no +doubting the young man's right to the jewel for here was the name of +Mentu, even as the chief adviser had given it in identifying the +prisoner. The official frowned and stroked his chin. + +"This petitions the Pharaoh," he said at last. "I can not pass upon +it." + +"Send me to my cell, then, and do thou follow," Kenkenes said. "I have +somewhat to tell thee." + +"Take him to his cell," the official said to the men as he returned the +signet to the prisoner. "I shall attend him." + +Kenkenes was led into a corridor, wide enough for three walking side by +side. There was no light therein, but the foremost of the four stooped +before what seemed a section of solid wall and after a little fumbling, +a massive door swung inward. + +The chamber into which it led was wide enough for a pallet of straw +laid lengthwise, with passage room between it and the opposite wall. +The foot of the bed was within two feet of the door. Between the +stones, in the opposite end near the ceiling, was a crevice, little +wider than two palms. This noted, the interior of the cell has been +described. + +The jailer entered after him, and let the door fall shut. + +"I have but to crave a messenger of thee--a swift and a sure one--one +who can hold his peace and hath pride in his calling. I can offer all +he demands. And this, further. Keep his going a secret, for I am +beset and I would not have my rescue by the Pharaoh thwarted." + +"I can send thee a messenger," the jailer answered. + +"Ere midday," Kenkenes added. + +"I hear," the passive official assented. + +The solid section of wall swung shut behind him and the great bolts +shot into place. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +THE PETITION + +Some time later the bar rattled down again, and the jailer stood +without, a scribe at his side. At a sign from the jailer, the latter +made as though to enter, but Kenkenes stopped him. + +"I have need of your materials only," he said, "but the fee shall be +yours nevertheless." The man set his case on the floor and Kenkenes +put a ring of silver in the outstretched palm. + +"Fail me not in a faithful messenger," the prisoner repeated to the +jailer. The official nodded, and the door was closed again. + +Kenkenes sat on the floor beside the case, laid the cover back and +taking out materials, wrote thus: + +"To my friend, the noble Hotep, greeting: + +"This from Kenkenes, whom ill-fortune can not wholly possess, while he +may call thee his friend. + +"I speak to thee out of the prison at Tape, where I am held for +stealing a bondmaiden and for executing a statue against the canons of +the sculptor's ritual. The accumulated penalty for these offenses is +great--my plight is most serious. + +"The pitying gods have left me one chance for escape. If I fail I +shall molder here, for my counsel is mine and the demons of Amenti +shall not rend it from me. + +"The tale is short and miserable. But for the necessity I would not +repeat it, for it publishes the humiliation of sweet innocence. + +"Suffice it to say that the offended is she of whom we talked one day +on the hill back of Masaarah; the offender is Har-hat who hath buried +me here in Tape. + +"One morning he saw her at the quarries and, taken with her beauty, +asked her at the hands of the Pharaoh, for the hatefullest bondage pure +maidenhood ever knew. + +"She fled from the minions he sent to take her, and came to me in that +spot on the hillside where thou and I did talk. + +"There the minions found us, and by the evidence they looked upon, I am +further charged with sacrilege. + +"Thou dost remember the all-powerful signet, which my father had from +the Incomparable Pharaoh. He lost it in the tomb of the king, three +years ago, abandoning the search for it before I was assured that it +was not to be found. + +"So strong was my faith that the signet was in the tomb, that when this +disaster overtook her, I came to Tape at once to look again for the +treasure. I found it. + +"But by some unknowable mischance mine enemy discovered my whereabouts +and a third minion, who escaped my wrath before the statue that +morning, appeared in the city and caused me to be delivered up to the +authorities on the charges already named. + +"She is hidden, and I have provided for her protection, as well as I +may, against the wishes of the strongest man in the land. For her +immediate welfare I am not greatly troubled. But, alas! I would be +with her--thou knowest, O my Hotep, the hunger and heartache of such +separation. + +"If the Pharaoh honor not the signet herein inclosed, tell my father of +my plight, let me know the decision of the king, and then I shall trust +to the Hathors for liberty. + +"Of this contingency, I would not speak at length. It may be tempting +the caprice of the Seven Sisters to presuppose such misfortune. + +"Let not my father intervene for me. He shall not endanger himself +further than I have already asked of him. + +"But remember thou this injunction, most surely. That it shall be last +and therefore freshest in thy memory, I put this at the end of the +letter. + +"Put the petition herein inclosed into the Pharaoh's hands! For my +life's sake let it not come into the possession of any other. + +"I shall write no more. My scant eloquence must be saved for the king. + +"Gods! but it is good to have faith in a friend. I salute thee. + +"KENKENES." + + +The letter to Hotep complete, Kenkenes took up another roll and wrote +thus to Meneptah: + + +"To Meneptah, Beloved of Ptah, Ambassador of Amen, Vicar of Ra, Lord +over Upper and Lower Egypt, greeting:" + + +At this point he paused. His power of expression, aghast at the +magnitude of the stake laid on its successful use, became +panic-stricken and fled from him. He feared that words could not be +chosen which would justify his sacrilege or prove his claims to Rachel +greater than Har-hat's. Meneptah would be hedged about with prejudice +against his first cause, and deterred by the prior right of Har-hat, in +the second. The last man that talked with the king molded him. +Flattery alone might prevail against coercion. It was the one hope. + +Kenkenes seized his pen and wrote: + + +"This from thy subject, Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, thy murket. + +"I give thee a true story, O Defender of Women. + +"There is a maiden whose kinsmen died of hard labor in the service of +Egypt. Not one was left to care for her. Of all her house, she alone +remains. They died in ignominy. Shall the last remnant of the unhappy +family be stamped out in dishonor? + +"If one came before thee seeking to insult innocence, and another +begging leave to protect it, thou wouldst choose for him who would keep +pure the undefiled. Have I not said, O my King? + +"Before thee, even now is such a choice. + +"Already thou hast given over the mastership of Rachel, daughter of +Maai the Israelite, to thy fan-bearer, Har-hat. By the lips of his own +servants, I am informed that he would have put her in his harem. + +"She fled from him and I hid her away, for I could not bear to deliver +her up to the despoiler. + +"I love her--she loveth me. Wilt thou not give her to me to wife? + +"Thine illustrious sire bespeaketh thy favor, out of Amenti. Behold +his signet and its injunction. + +"Furthermore, I confess to sacrilege against Athor, in carving a statue +which ignored the sculptor's ritual. For this, and for hiding the +Israelite, am I imprisoned in the city stronghold of Tape. + +"I would be free to return to my love and comfort her, but if it shall +overtax thy generosity to release me, I pray thee announce my sentence +and let me begin to count the hours till I shall come forth again. + +"The Israelite hath a nurse, a feeble and sick old woman, Deborah by +name, whom the minions of Har-hat abused. She can be of no further use +in servitude, and I would have thee set her free to bear company to her +love, the white-souled Rachel. + +"But if these last prayers imperil the first by strain upon thy +indulgence, O Beloved of Ptah, do thou set them aside, and grant only +the safety of the oppressed maiden. + +"These to thy hand, by the hand of the scribe, Hotep. + +"KENKENES." + + +The letter complete, he summoned the messenger. + +"How swift art thou?" he asked. + +"So swift that my service is desired beyond mine opportunities to +accept," was the answer. + +"How is it that thou art ready to serve me? Thou seest my plight." + +"The jailer spoke of thee as petitioning the Pharaoh. The king is in +the north where I have not been in all the reign of Meneptah. Thou +offerest me a pleasure and the fee shall be in proportion to the length +of the journey." + +"Nay, but thou art a genius. Thou dost move me to imitate the Hathors, +since they add fortune to the already fortunate. Mark me. I will give +thee thy fee now. If thou dost return me a letter showing that thou +hast carried the message with all faith and speed, I shall give thee +another fee on thy home-coming. What thinkest thou?" + +The man smiled and nodded. "Naught but the darts of Amenti shall delay +me." + +Kenkenes gave him the message, and a handful of rings. The man +expressed his thanks, after which he went forth, and the door was +barred. + +Kenkenes stood for a while, motionless before the tightly fitted portal +of stone. Then through the high crevice that was his window the sounds +of life outside smote upon his ear. The noise of the city seemed to +become all revel. Some one under the walls laughed--the hearty, +raucous laugh of the care-free boor. + +He turned about and flung himself face down in the straw of his pallet. + +He had begun to wait. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE LOVE OF RAMESES + +By the twentieth of May, the court of Meneptah was ready to proceed to +Tanis. + +The next week the Pharaoh would depart. To-night he received noble +Memphis for a final revel. + +His palace was aglow, from its tremendous portals to the airy hypostyle +upon its root and from far-reaching wing to wing, with countless +colored lights. From every architrave and cornice depended garlands +and draperies, and tinted banners waved unseen in the dark. The great +loteform pillars supporting the porch were festooned with lotus +flowers, and the approaches were strewn with palm-leaves. + +The guests came in chariots with but a single attendant or in litters +accompanied by a gorgeous retinue and much authority. Charioteers +swore full-mouthed oaths and smote slaves; horses reared and plunged +and bearers hurried back through the dark with empty chairs. Meanwhile +the pacing sentries made frank criticism and gazed at each alighting +new-comer with eyes of connoisseurs. + +When the portals opened, a broad shaft of light shot into the night, a +multitude of attendants was seen bowing; gusts of reedy music and +babble and the smell of wilting flowers and Puntish incense swept into +the outer air. + +Within, the great feast began and proceeded to completeness. The +tables were removed and the stage of the revel was far advanced. The +levels of scented vapor from the aromatic torches undulated midway +between the ceiling and the floor and belted the frescoes upon the +paneled walls. Far up the vaulted hall, the Pharaoh and his queen, in +royal isolation, were growing weary. + +The lions chained to their lofty dais slept. The guardian nobles that +stood about the royal pair leaned heavily upon their arms. + +Out in the sanded strip across the tessellated floor, tumblers were +glistening with perspiration from their vaguely noticed efforts. Apart +from the guests the painted musicians squatted close together and made +the air vibrant with the softly monotonous strumming of their +instruments. + +The company, which was large, had fallen into easy attitudes; an +exciting game of drafts, or a story-teller, or a beauty, attracting +groups here and there over the hall. + +Before one table, whereon the scattered pawns of a game yet lay, +Rameses lounged in a deep chair, a semi-recumbent figure in marble and +obsidian. Beside him, where she had seated herself at his command, was +Masanath. + +There was Seti at Ta-user's side, but Io was not at the feast. She +mourned for Kenkenes. Ta-meri was there, the bride of a week to +Nechutes, who hovered about her without eye or ear for any other of the +company. Siptah, Menes, Har-hat, all of the group save Hotep and +Kenkenes, were present and near enough to be of the crown prince's +party, yet scattered sufficiently to talk among themselves. + +The game of drafts, prolonged from one to many, had ended disastrously +for the prince in spite of his most gallant efforts to win. Masanath, +against whom he had played, finally thrust the pawns away and refused +to play further with him. + +"Thou dost make sport for the Hathors, O Prince," she said. "Have +respect for thyself and indulge their caprice no more." + +"Hast thou not heard that we may compel the gods?" he asked. "Perhaps +I do but indulge them, of a truth. But let me set mine own will +against fate and there shall be no more losing for me." + +"It is a precarious game. Perchance there is as strong a will as +thine, compelling the Hathors contrarily to thine own desires. What, +then, O Rameses?" + +"By the gambling god, Toth, I shall try it!" he exclaimed. "The +opportunity is before me even now." + +He took her hand. + +"I catch thy meaning. Beloved of Isis! Thou didst challenge me long +ago, and long ago I took it up. Thus far have we fenced behind +shields. Down with the bull-hide, now, and bare the heart!" + +"Thou dost forget thyself," she retorted, wrenching her hand from him. +"The eyes of thy guests are upon thee." + +He laughed. "The prince's doings become the fashion. Let me be seen +and there shall be no woman's hand unpossessed in this chamber." + +"Thou shalt set no fashion by me. Neither shalt thou rend the Hathors +between thy wishes and mine. Furthermore, if thou dost forget thy +princely dignity, thy power will not prevent me if I would remind thee +of thy lapse." + +"War!" he exclaimed. "Now, by the battling hosts of Set, never have I +met a foe so worthy the overcoming. Listen! Dost thou know that I +have sorrows? Dost thou remember that I may have sleepless nights and +unhappy days--discontents, heartaches and oppressions? I am not less +human because I am royal, but because I am royal I am more unhappy. +Sorry indeed is a prince's lot! Wherefore? Because he is sated with +submission; because he hath drunk satiety to its very dregs; because he +hath been denied the healing hunger of appetite, ambition, conquest. +How hath my miserable heart longed to aspire--to conquer! I have +starved for something beyond my reach. But lo! in thee I have found +what I sought. Thou hast defied me, rebuffed me, thwarted me till the +surfeited soul in me hath grown fat upon resistance. Now shall the +longing to conquer that racketh me be fed! Go on in thy rebellion, +Masanath! Gods! but thou art a foe worthy the subduing! I would not +have thee give up to me now. I would earn thee by defeats, losses and +many scars. And thy kiss of submission, in some far day, will give me +more joy than the instant capitulation of many empires." + +"Thou hast provided thyself with lifelong warfare, and triumph to thine +enemy at the end," she answered serenely. + +Her reply seemed to awaken a train of thought in the prince. He did +not respond immediately. He leaned his elbows on his knees, and +clasping his hands before him, thought a while. In the silence the +talk of the others was audible. + +"The festivities of Memphis have lost two, since they lost one," Menes +mused. + +"Give us thy meaning," Nechutes asked. + +"Hast seen Hotep in Memphian revels since Kenkenes died?" the captain +asked, by way of answer. + +Nechutes shook his head. "The gods have dealt heavily with Mentu," he +said after a little silence. "Not even the body of his son returned to +him for burial!" + +Har-hat, who had been perched on the arm of Ta-meri's chair, broke in. + +"Mayhap the young man is not dead," he surmised. + +"All the Memphian nome hath been searched, my Lord," Menes protested. + +"Aye, but these flighty geniuses are not to be measured by doings of +other men. Perhaps he hath gone to teach the singing girls at Abydos +or Tape." + +"Ah, my Lord!" protested Ta-meri, horrified. + +"Nay, now," Har-hat responded, bending over her. "I but give his +friends hope. To prove my sincerity I will wager my biggest diamond +against thy three brightest smiles that thou wilt hear of Kenkenes +again, alive and dreamy as ever, led into this strange absence by some +moonshine caprice." + +"I would give more than my biggest diamond to believe thee," Nechutes +muttered, turning away. + +"Wilt thou wager?" the fan-bearer demanded with animation. + +"Nay!" was the cup-bearer's blunt reply. Har-hat shrugged his +shoulders and lapsed into silence. Rameses leaned toward Masanath +again. The expression on his face during the talk and the tone he +chose now showed that he had not heard, nor was even conscious of the +silence that had fallen. His words were low-spoken, but each of his +companions heard. + +"In warfare it is common for a foe to hedge his adversary about so that +fight he must. Thou art a woman and cunning, and lest thou join +thyself to another and elude me ere the battle is on, I would better +treat thee to a strategy. I shall wed thee first and woo thee +afterward." + +Ta-user leaned across the table, and sweeping the pawns away with her +arms, said, with a smile: + +"Quarreling over a game of drafts! Which is in distress--in need of +allies?" + +"Come thou and be my mercenary, Ta-user," Masanath said with impulsive +gratitude. "Rameses hath lost and demands restitution beyond reason." + +Har-hat had risen the instant the words had passed the prince's lips +and left the group. He did not wish to let his face be seen. A dash +of dark color grew in the heir's pallid cheeks, partly because he knew +he had been heard, partly because he was angry at the princess' +interruption. + +"Strange," mused Menes once again, "that the phrases of war mark the +babble of even the maidens these days. And half the revels end in +quarrels. Though I be young in war experience, I would say the omens +point to conflict in which Egypt shall be embroiled." + +"Aye, Menes; and perchance thou wilt be measuring swords with a Hebrew +ere the summer is old," Siptah said, speaking for the first time. + +"Matching thy good saber-metal with a trowel or a hay-fork, Menes," +Rameses sneered. + +"Hold, thou doughty pride of the battling gods!" Menes cried laughingly +to Rameses. "For once, I scout thy prophecies. The Hebrews are +stirred up beyond any settling, save thou dost put them all to the +sword, and that is a task that I would go to Tuat to escape. Thou wilt +not work the Israelite to death. I can tell thee that!" + +"Hast caught the infectious terror of the infant-scaring, bugbear +Hebrew?" Rameses asked. + +Menes leaned against the nearest knee and smiled lazily. + +"If the gray-beard sorcerer did meet me in open field, protected only +with bull-hide and armed with a spear, I would fight him till he said +'enough'; but who wants to go against an incantation that would mow +down an army at the muttering? Not I; yea, Rameses, I am a craven in +battle with a sorcerer." + +"If he means to blast us, wherefore hath he not spoken the cabalistic +word ere this?" the prince demanded. + +"He had no personal provocation until late," the captain replied. + +"Hath the taskmaster set him to making brick?" the prince laughed. + +"Nay; but the priesthood plotted against his head, and he is angry." + +Rameses raised himself and looked fixedly at the soldier. Again Menes +laughed. + +"Spare me, my Prince! It is no longer a state secret. It is out and +over all Egypt. Why it came not to thine ears I know not. Perchance +every one is afraid to gossip to thee save mine unabashed self." + +"Waster of the air!" Rameses exclaimed. "What meanest thou?" + +"It seems that the older priests have a hieratic grudge against the +Israelite, and when he returned into Egypt they set themselves, with +much bustle, importance and method to silence him. Hither and thither +they sent for advice, permission and aid, till all the wheels of the +hierarchy were in motion, and the air quivered with portent and intent. +Vain ado! Superfluous preparation! The very letter which gave them +explicit and formal permission to begin to get ready to commence to put +away the Hebrew, fell--by the mischievous Hathors!--fell into the hands +of the victim himself!" + +Rameses fell back into his chair, his lips twitching once or twice, a +manifestation of his genuine amusement. + +"As it follows, the Israelite is angry. So the witch-pot hath been put +on, and in council with a toad and a cat and an owl, he thinketh up +some especial sending to curse us with," the captain concluded. + +"A proper ending," Rameses declared after a little. "Let men kill each +other openly, if they will, but the methods of the ambushed assassin +should recoil upon himself." + +At this point it was seen that the Pharaoh and his queen were preparing +to leave the hall. All the company arose, and after the royal pair had +passed out the guests began to depart. Rameses left his party and, +joining Har-hat, led the fan-bearer away from the company. + +"It seems that thou, with others, heardest my words with Masanath," the +prince began at once. "It is well, for it saves me further speech now. +I want thy daughter as my queen." + +Har-hat seemed to ponder a little before he answered. "Masanath does +not love thee," he said at last. + +"Nay, but she shall." + +"That granted, there are further reasons why ye should not wed," the +fan-bearer resumed after another pause. "Masanath would come between +Egypt and Egypt's welfare. Thou knowest what thy marriage with the +Princess Ta-user is expected to accomplish. At this hour the nation is +in need of unity that she may safely do battle with her alien foes. If +thou slightest Ta-user thou wilt add to the disaffection of Amon-meses +and his party. Furthermore, thine august sire would not be pleased +with thee nor with Masanath, nor with me. It is not my place to show +thee thy duty, Rameses, but of a surety it is my place to refuse to +join thee in thy neglecting of it." + +Rameses contemplated the fan-bearer narrowly for a moment. "Come, thou +hast a game," he said finally. "Out with it! Name thy stake." + +"O, thou art most discourteous, my Prince," the fan-bearer +remonstrated, turning away. But Rameses planted himself in his path. + +"Stay!" he said grimly. "Dost thou believe me so blind as to think +thee sincere? Thou canst use thy smooth pretenses upon the Pharaoh, +but I understand thee, Har-hat. Declare thyself and vex me no further +with thy subtleties." Har-hat measured the prince's patience before he +answered. + +"When thou canst use me courteously, Rameses," he said with dignity, "I +shall talk with thee again. Meanwhile do not build on wedding with +Masanath. I shall mate her with him who hath respect for her father." + +For a moment Rameses stood in doubt. Could it be that this soulless +man had scruples against giving him Masanath? But Har-hat, allowed a +chance to leave the prince if he would, had not moved. Rameses +understood the act. The fan-bearer was awaiting a propitious +opportunity to name his price gracefully. The momentary warmth of +respect died in the prince's heart. + +"Out with it," he insisted more calmly. "What is it? Power, wealth or +a wife? These three things I have to give thee. Take thy choice." + +"I would have thee use me respectfully, reverently," Har-hat retorted +warmly. "I would have thee speak favorably of me; I would have thee do +me no injustice by deed or word, nor peril my standing with the king! +This I demand of thee--I will not buy it!" + +"To be plain," Rameses continued placidly, "thou wouldst insure to +thyself the position of fan-bearer. Say on." + +"I am fan-bearer to the king," Har-hat continued with a show of +increasing heat, "and I would fill mine office. If thou art to be his +adviser in my stead, do thou take up the plumes, and I will return to +Bubastis." + +"Once again I shall interpret. I am to keep silence in the council +chamber and resign to thee the molding of my plastic father. It is +well, for I am not pleased with ruling before I wear the crown. But +mark me! Thou shalt not advise me when I rule over Egypt. So take +heed to my father's health and see that his life is prolonged, for with +its end shall end thine advisership. What more?" + +"So thou observest these things I am satisfied." + +"Gods! but thou art moderate. Masanath is worth more than that. Do I +take her?" + +"She does not love thee." + +The prince waved his hand and repeated his question. + +"I shall speak with her," Har-hat responded, "and give thee her word." + +For a moment the prince contemplated the fan-bearer, then he turned +without a word and strode out of the chamber. In a corridor near his +own apartments he overtook the daughter of Har-hat. Her woman was with +her. + +The prince stepped before them. + +The attendant crouched and fled somewhere out of sight. Masanath drew +herself to the fullest of her few inches and waited for Rameses to +speak. + +"Come, Masanath," he said, "thou canst reach the limit of thy power to +be ungracious and but fix me the firmer in my love for thee. I am come +to tell thee that I have won thee from thy father." + +"Thou hast not won me from myself," she replied. + +"Nay, but I shall." + +"Thou dost overestimate thyself," she retorted. Catching up the fan +and chaplet that her woman had let fall she made as though to run past +him. But he put himself in her way, and with shining eyes, caught her +in his arms. + +"There, there! my sweet. I shall do thee no hurt," he laughed, +quieting her struggles with an iron embrace. + +"Thou art hurting me beyond any cure now," she panted wrathfully. + +"It is thy fault. Have I not said I am sated with submission? If thou +wouldst unlock mine arms, kiss me and tell me thou wilt be my queen." + +"Let me go," she exclaimed, choking with emotion. + +"Better for thee to tell me 'yes'; thou wilt save thy father a lie." + +She looked at him speechless. + +"I have said. To-morrow he will tell me that thou hast promised to wed +me--whether thou sayest it or not. Spare him the falsehood, Masanath, +and me a heartache." + +"Wilt thou slander my father to me?" she demanded. "Art thou a knave +as well as a tyrant?" + +"Nay, I have spoken truly. Sad indeed were thy fate, my Masanath, did +the gods mate thee with a knave, having fathered thee with a villain. +So I am come to know of a truth what is thy will." + +"And I can tell thee most truly. Sooner would I sit upon the peak of a +pyramid all my life than upon a throne with thee; sooner would I be +crowned with fire than wear the asp of a queen to thee. My father may +wed me to thee, but I will never love thee, nor say it, nor pretend it. +Thou wilt not win a wife if thou dost take a queen by violence. +Release me!" + +"Thou dost rivet mine arms about thee." + +She stiffened herself and savagely submitted to her imprisonment. + +Rameses laughed and, bending her head back, kissed her repeatedly and +with much tenderness. She struggled madly, but he held her fast. + +"This is but the beginning," he said in a low voice, "and I have won. +The end shall be the same. I am a lovable lover, am I not, Masanath? +Am I not good to look upon? Dost thou know a more princely prince, and +is my father more of a king than I shall be? Where do I fail thee in +thy little ideals? Am I harsh? Aye, but I am a king. Am I +rough-spoken? Aye, because most of the world deserve it. Thou hast +never felt the sting of my tongue, and never shalt thou unless thou +breakest my heart. I have much to give thee; not any other monarch +hath so much as I to give his queen. And yet I ask only thy love in +return." + +This was earnest wooing, which contained nothing that she might flout. +So she strained away from him and sulked. Again he laughed. + +"Khem and Athor and Besa have combed my heart and created a being of +the desires they found therein! O, thou art mine, for the gods +ordained it so." Again he kissed her, holding her in spite of her +efforts to get away. + +"There! carry thy hate of me only to the edge of sleep and dream +sweetly of me." + +He released her and continued down the hall. + +As he turned out of the smaller passage into the larger corridor, +Ta-user stepped forth from the shadow of a pillar. The huge column +dwarfed her into tininess. The hall was but dimly lighted by a single +lamp and that flared above her head. + +Rameses paused, for she stood in his path. + +"Not yet gone to thy rest?" he asked. + +"Rest!" she said scornfully. "Gone to a night-long frenzy of +relentless consciousness--weary tossing, wasted prayers. I have not +rested since I left the Hak-heb." + +Her voice sounded hollow in the great empty hall. + +"So? Thou art ready for the care of the physicians by this, then, O my +Sister." + +"I am not thy sister." + +"What! Hast quarreled with the gentle Seti?" + +"Rameses, do not mock me. Seti does not even stir my pulses. He could +not rob me of my peace." + +"What temperate love! Mine makes my temples crack and fills mine hours +with sweet distress." + +Ta-user looked at him for a moment, then raising her hands, caught the +folds of his robe over his breast. + +"Rameses, how far wilt thou go in this trifling with the Lady Masanath?" + +"To the marrying priests." Without looking at her, he loosed her +hands, swung them idly and let them go. + +"She does not love thee," she said after a little silence. + +"Thy news is old. She told me that not a moment since." + +Ta-user drew a freer breath. "Thou wilt not wed her, then." + +"That I will. I have vowed it. Go, Ta-user, the hour is late. Have +thy woman stir a potion for thee, and sleep. I would to mine own +dreams. They yield me what the day denies." + +"Stay, Rameses," she urged, catching at his robes once more. "I would +have thee know something. But am I to tell thee in words what I would +have thee know? Surely I have not let slip a single chance to show +thee by token. Art thou stubborn or blind, that thou dost not pity me +and spare me the avowal?" + +Rameses looked down at her upturned face without a softening line on +his pallid countenance. + +"Ta-user," he said deliberately, "had I been mummied and entombed I +should have known thine intent. I marvel that thou couldst think I had +not seen. Now, hast thou not guessed my mind by this? Have I not been +sufficiently explicit? Must I, too, lay bare my heart in words?" + +She did not speak for a moment. Then she said eagerly: + +"Let not thy jealousy trouble thee concerning Seti--he is naught to +me--I love him not--a boy, no more." + +"Seti!" he exclaimed contemptuously. "I have no feeling against Seti +save for his unfealty to the little child who loves him,--whose heart +thou hast most deliberately broken." + +"Not so," she declared vehemently. "I can not help the boy's +attachment to me. She is a child, as thou hast said, and is easily +comforted. Not so with maturer hearts like mine." + +She put her arms about his neck, and flinging her head back, gazed at +him with a heavy eye. + +"O, wilt thou put me aside for Masanath? What is her little dark +beauty compared to mine? How can she, who is not even a stately +subject, be a stately queen? Wilt thou set the crown upon her unregal +head, invest her with the royal robes, and yield thy homage to a scowl +and a bitter word? And me, in whom there is no drop of unroyal blood, +in whom there is all the passion of the southlands and all the fidelity +of the north, thou wilt humiliate. The gods made me for thee--schooled +me for thy needs and shifted the nation's history so that thou shouldst +have need of me. Look upon me, Rameses. Why wilt thou thrust me +aside?" + +She was not dealing with Seti, or Siptah, or any other whom she had +bewitched. There was no spell in the topaz eyes for Rameses. If her +sorcery affected him at all, it won no more than a cursory interest in +her next move. + +"The night is too short to recount my reasons," he replied calmly, as +he put her arms away. "But I might point out the snarling cur, Siptah, +for one, and a few other comely lords of Egypt." + +"What hast thou done in thy life?" she cried. "I am no more wicked +than thou; thou hast found delight in others beside whom I am all +innocence." + +"It may be. Who knows but there is somewhat of the vulture-nostril in +man, tickled with a vague taint? But, even then, the sense is +fleeting, more or less as the natures of men vary. A man hath his +better moments, and how shall they be entirely pure in the presence of +shame? Nay, I would not mate and live for ever with mine own sins." + +"Then as thou dost permit her spotlessness to cover her hate, let my +love for thee hide my sins. From the first I have loved thee unasked. +She is all unwon." + +"Thou hast said it. She is unwon. But doth the lion prey upon the +carcass? Nay. His kill must be fresh and slain by his own might. +Thou didst stultify thyself by thine instant acquiescence. Come, let +us make an end to this. The more said the more thou shalt have of +which to accuse thyself hereafter." + +But she dropped before him, her white robes cumbering his path, her +arms clasping his knees. + +"What more have I to do of which to accuse myself, O Rameses? Egypt +knows why I came to court. Egypt will know why I shall leave it. What +have I not offered and what hast thou given me? Where shall I find +that refuge from the pitying smile of the nation? Spare my womanhood--" + +"Ah, fie upon thy pretense, Ta-user! Art thou not shrewd enough to +know how well I understand thee? Thou dost not love me. No woman who +loves pleads beyond the first rebuff. Love is full of dudgeon. Thou +dost betray thyself in thy very insistence. Thou beggest for the crown +I shall wear, and if I were over-thrown to-morrow thou wouldst kneel +likewise to mine enemy. Thou hast no womanhood to lose in Egypt's +sight. As thy caprice turned from Siptah to me, let it return thee to +Siptah once again. And if thy heart doth in truth wince with jealousy, +think on Io." + +He undid her arms, flung her from him and disappeared into the dark. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +FURTHER DIPLOMACY + +Masanath, suffocating with wrath and rebellion and overpowered with an +exaggerated appreciation of her shame, tumbled down in the shadows of +the narrow passage and wrapped her mantle around her head. + +When she had wept till the creamy linen over her small face was wet and +her throat hurt under the strain of angry sobs, and until she was sure +that Rameses was gone, she picked herself up and went cautiously to the +end of the passage to reconnoiter. + +The prince stood under the single lamp in the great corridor, between +her and the refuge of her chamber. Another was close to him, her hands +upon his shoulders. + +Masanath retired into the dusk and waited. When she looked again the +hands were clasped about the prince's neck. Back into the shadows she +shrank, pressing her tiny palms together in a wild prayer for Ta-user's +triumph. After an interval she looked again in time to see Rameses +undo the arms about his knees and fling the princess from him. Cold +with dismay and shaking with her sudden descent from hope to despair, +Masanath watched him disappear into the dark. + +"O most ill-timed, iron continence!" she wailed under her breath. But +the change which had come over Ta-user interested her immediately. +Fascinated, she forgot to hide again, but the light of the single lamp +did not penetrate to her position. + +The princess kept the posture of abandoned humiliation, into which +Rameses had flung her, until the heir's footsteps died away up the +corridor. Then she raised herself and faced the direction the prince +had taken. Her lithe body bent a little, her rigid arms were thrust +back of her, and the hands were clenched hard. Her head was forced +forward, the long neck curved sinuously like a vulture's. She began to +speak in a whisper that hissed as though she breathed through her +words. Masanath felt her flesh crawl and her soft hair take on life. +Not all the words of the sorceress were intelligible. At first only +her ejaculations were distinct. + +"Puny knave!" Masanath heard. "Well for thee I do not love thee, else +thou shouldst sleep this night in the reeking cave of a paraschite, +with the whine of feeding flies about thee for dreams. Well for me +that I do not love thee, for thine instant death would rob me of the +long revenge that I would liefer have! Share thy crown with me! When +Ta-user hath done with thee thou shalt have no crown to share! Turned +from Siptah for thee! How thou wilt marvel when thou learnest that I +never turned from Siptah nor wooed thee with a single glance but for +Siptah's sake. Go on! Sleep well! Have no regrets, for thy doom was +spoken long before this night's haughty work. Rather do I thank thee +for thy scorn. It robs me of qualms and adds instead a dark delight in +that which I shall do!" + +She turned toward Masanath, walking swiftly. The fan-bearer's +daughter, stricken with panic, fled, nor paused until she had passed +far beyond the chamber of Ta-user. + +Cowering in a friendly niche, she waited until the princess had +disappeared, and then only after a long time was she sufficiently +reassured to reach her own apartments. + +It was the next day's noon before Masanath saw her father. Then he +came with light step as she sat in her room. Approaching from behind +her, he took her face between his hands, and tilting it back, kissed +her. + +"I give thee joy, Masanath. Thou hast melted the iron prince." + +She rose and faced him. "Did Rameses tell thee I loved him?" she +demanded, a faint hope stirring in her heart. + +"Nay, far from it. He told me, and laughed as he said it, that if thy +soft heart had any passion for him it was hate." + +"Said he that? Nay, now, my father, thou seest I can not marry him." +There was relief in her voice, and she drew near to the fan-bearer and +invited his arms. He sat down instead, and drawing up a stool with his +foot, bade her sit at his feet. + +"Listen! It is a whim of the Hathors to conceal one's own feelings +from him at times, that he may accomplish his own undoing, being blind. +Much is at stake on thy love for the prince. Awake, Masanath! Thou +dost love him; thou wilt wed him--and it shall go well with--all others +whom thou lovest." + +"Wouldst use me for a price, my father--wouldst barter thy daughter for +something?" she asked in a tone low with apprehension. + +"Ah, what inelegant words," he chid. "Thou dost miscall my purpose. +Look, my daughter. Have I not served thee with hand and heart all thy +life, asking nothing, sacrificing much? I, for one, have a debt +against thee, and thou canst pay it in thy marriage to Rameses. Dost +thou not love me enough to make me secure with the prince, and so, +secure in mine advisership to the king?" + +Masanath arose slowly, as if her movements kept pace with the progress +of her realizations. Thus far she had been a loving and a believing +child. The genial knavishness of her father had never appeared as such +to her. In her sight he was cheery, great and lovable. Most of all +she had flattered herself that he loved her better than life, and that +his nights were sleepless in planning for her happiness. Now, a +terrifying lapse in his care, or a more terrifying display of his real +character, appalled her. + +He had placed his demand in the most irresistible form, by calling upon +her dutifulness. Being obedient, she felt constrained to submit, but +being spirited, with her heart already bestowed, she resisted. + +She floundered wildly for testimony that would justify her rebellion in +his sight. The memory of Ta-user's threats came to her as unexpected +and unbidden as all inspirations come. + +"Shall I hold thee in thy position at the expense of Egypt's peace, if +not at the expense of the dynasty?" she cried. + +"By the heaven-bearing shoulders of Buto!" he responded laughingly, +"thou dost put a high estimate on the results of thine acts. Add +thereto, 'if not at the expense of the Pantheon,' and thou shalt have +all heaven and earth at thy mercy." + +"Nay, my father, hear me! Thou knowest Ta-user--" + +"O, aye, I know Ta-user--all Egypt knows her--more particularly, +Rameses." + +"Thou dost not fathom the evil in her--" + +"Her fangs are drawn, daughter." + +"Hear me, father. Last night, after Rameses--after he--after he left +me, he met Ta-user. And the talk between them was of such nature that +she knelt to him and he flung her off. They were between me and mine +apartments, and I could not but know of it. When he left her she made +such threats that it were treason for me to give them voice again. +What she asked of him I surmise. It could not have been other than a +prayer to him, to fulfil what was expected of him concerning her. Thou +knowest the breach between the Pharaoh and his brother, Amon-meses, is +but feebly bridged till Rameses shall heal the wound in marriage with +Ta-user. His failure, added to the vehement contempt he displayed for +her last night, shall make that breach ten times as deep and ever +receding, so there can be no healing of it." + +Har-hat flung his head back and laughed heartily. + +"Thou timid child! frightened with the ravings of a discarded wanton. +She and her following of churls can do nothing against the Son of Ptah. +The moles in the necropolis are richer than they. None of loyal Egypt +will espouse their cause, and without money how shall they get them +mercenaries? Nay, why vex thee with matters of state? All that is +required of thee is thy heart for Rameses, no more." + +"Judge not for Rameses, I pray thee," she insisted, coming near him. +"Knowing that I love him not, perchance he might be gentler with +Ta-user did he see his peril." + +Again Har-hat laughed. + +"I am not blind, O little reluctant," he said. "I know the secret +spring of thy concern for Egypt--for Ta-user--for Rameses. I have not +told thee all the stake upon thy love for the prince. Does it not seem +that since a maiden will not love one winsome man there must be another +already installed in her heart?" + +She drew back, changing color. + +"How little of the court-lady thou art, Masanath," he broke oft, +looking at her face. "Thy sensations are too near the surface. Thou +must teach thy face to dissemble. It was this very eloquence of +countenance that betrayed thy foolish preferences. Mind thee, I know +it to be but a maiden fancy which, discouraged, dies. But have a care +lest it bring disaster upon him whom thou hast put in jeopardy of the +fierce power of the prince." + +Masanath's eyes widened with terror. The fan-bearer continued: "I have +but to mention the name of Hotep--" + +She clutched at her heart. + +"Ah?" he observed with mild interrogation in the word. "How foolish +thy caprice! Hotep does not thank thee. His marble spirit hath set +its loves upon ink-pots and papyri and such pulseless things. How I +should reproach myself if I must undo him--" + +"Nay, bring no disaster on the head of the noble Hotep," she begged. +"He--I--there is naught between us." + +"It is even as I had thought. I shall tell Rameses and send him to +thee," he said, moving away. + +With a bound she was between him and the door. + +"If he ask tell him there is naught between me and the royal scribe, +but send him not hither," she commanded with vehemence. + +"If thou art rebellious, Masanath, I must chasten thee." + +"Threaten me not!" she cried, thoroughly aroused, "or by the Mother of +Heaven, I shall demand audience with Meneptah and tell him what thou +wouldst do." + +"Bluster!" he answered with an irritating laugh. + +"Hast won the sanction of the Pharaoh for this betrothal?" she demanded. + +"Meneptah's will is clay in my hands," he replied contemptuously. + +"Vex me further and I shall tell him that!" + +He caught her arm, and though the fierce grasp pinched her, she knew by +that she had gained a point. + +"And further," she continued, gathering courage at each word, "I shall +ask him why thou shouldst be so anxious to keep the breach between him +and his brother and defeat his aims at peace." + +His face blazed and he shook her, but she went on in wild triumph. "I +have a confederate in Rameses. He loves thee not. And I have but to +hint and ruin thee beyond the restoring power of the marriages of a +thousand daughters!" + +Har-hat's forte had been polished insult, but when the evil in him +would have expressed itself in its own brutal manner he was helpless. + +"Hotep--Hotep--" he snarled. + +The name was potent. Again she recoiled. + +"I shall yield him up to Rameses," he went on. + +"And in that very hour thou dost, in that same hour will I charge thee +with treason before the throne of Meneptah!" she returned recklessly. + +The pair gazed at each other, breathless with temper. + +"Wilt thou wed Rameses?" he demanded. + +"So thou wilt avoid the name of Hotep in the presence of Rameses and +wilt shield him as if his safety were to bring thee gain," she replied, +thrusting skilfully, "I will wed the prince in one year. Furthermore, +in that time I shall be free to go where and when I please, to dwell +where I please and to be vexed with the sight of thee or that royal +monster no more than is my desire. Say, wilt thou accept?" + +He had twitted her about her frank face. He could not tell now but +that she was fearless and had measured her strength. He did not know +that within she trembled and felt that her threats were empty. But, +being guilty in his soul, and facing righteousness, Har-hat succumbed. + +"Have it thy way, then, vixen," he exclaimed; "but remember, I hold a +heavy hand above thy head and Hotep's!" + +He strode out of her presence, and when she was sure he was gone, she +fell on her face and wept miserably. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +THE HEIR INTERVENES + +At Tanis, the next day after the arrival of Meneptah, there came a +messenger from Thebes to Hotep, and the royal scribe retired to his +apartments to read the letter. + +And after he had read he was glad that he had secluded himself, for his +demonstrations of relief at the news the message imparted were most +extravagant and unrestrained. For the moment he permitted no reminder +of Kenkenes' present plight to subdue his joy in the realization that +his friend was not dead. + +Having exulted, he read the letter again, and then he summoned all his +shrewdness to his aid. + +He would wait till the confusion of the court's settling itself had +subsided before he presented the petition to Meneptah. Furthermore, he +would relieve his underlings and write the king's communications with +his own hand till he knew that the reply to Kenkenes had been sent. +Har-hat should be watched vigilantly. + +But order and routine were not restored in the palace of Meneptah. The +unrest that precedes a national crisis had developed into irritability +and pugnacity. + +Tanis was within hearing of the plaints of Israel, and the atmosphere +quivered with omen and portent. Moses appeared in this place and that, +each time nearer the temporary capital, and wherever he came he left +rejoicing or shuddering behind him. + +Meanwhile the fan-bearer laughed his way into the throne. Meneptah's +weakness for him grew into stubborn worship. The old and trusted +ministers of the monarch took offense and sealed their lips; the new +held their peace for trepidation. The queen, heretofore meek and +self-effacing, laid aside her spindle one day and, meeting her lord at +the door of the council chamber; protested in the name of his dynasty +and his realm. + +But the king was beyond help, and the queen, angry and hurt, bade him +keep Har-hat out of her sight, and returned to her women. Thereafter +even Meneptah saw her rarely. + +The rise of the fan-bearer was achieved in an incredibly short time. +It proved conclusively that until this period an influence against +Har-hat had been at work upon Meneptah, and seeing that Rameses had +subsided, having cause to propitiate the father of the woman he would +wed, the courtiers began to blame the prince and talk of him to one +another. + +He seemed lost in a dream. In the council chamber he lounged in his +chair with his eyes upon nothing and apparently hearing nothing. But +the slow shifting of the spark in his sleepy eyes indicated to those +who observed closely that he heard but kept his own counsel. If +Meneptah spoke to him he but seconded Har-hat's suggestions. But once +again the observant ones noted that the fan-bearer did not advise at +wide variance with any of the prince's known ideas. Thus far the most +caviling could not see that Har-hat's favoritism had led to any +misrule, but the field of possibilities opened by his complete +dominance over the Pharaoh was crowded with disaster, individual and +national. + +The betrothal of Rameses to Har-hat's daughter gave further material +for contention. It seemed to indicate that the fan-bearer had builded +for himself for two reigns. + +Hotep's situation was most poignantly unhappy. He was fixed under the +same roof with the man that had taken his love by piracy; he must greet +him affably and reverently every day; he must live in daily +contemplation of the time when he must meet Masanath also as his +sovereign--the wife of the prince, whom he must serve till death. +Hardest of all, he must wear a serene countenance and cover his sorrow +most surely, for his own sake and for Masanath's. + +Ta-user still remained at court. Seti, in a fume of boyish indignation +at Rameses, attended her like a shadow. Among the courtiers there were +others who were not alive to the true nature of the princess and who +joined Seti in his resentment against the heir. + +Amon-meses and Siptah, snarling and malevolent, had left the court +abruptly on the morning of its departure for Tanis. The Hak-heb +received them once again, and an ominous calm settled over that little +pocket of fertility in the desert--Nehapehu. + +Thus the court was torn with factions; old internal dissensions made +themselves evident again, but the vast murmur in Goshen was heard above +the strife. + +All this had come to pass in the short space of a month. When half of +that time had elapsed, Hotep, fearing to delay the petition of Kenkenes +longer, lest conditions should become worse rather than better, met the +Pharaoh in the hall one day and gave him the writing. Earnestly the +scribe impressed Meneptah with the importance of the petition and +begged him to acquaint himself in an hour of solitude with its contents +and the identity of the supplicant. + +Meneptah promised and continued to his apartments. There Har-hat came +in a few moments, and Meneptah, after his custom, gave over to him the +state communications of the day, and after some little hesitation, +tossed the petition of Kenkenes among them. + +"Thou canst attend to this matter as well, good Har-hat. Why should I +take up the private concerns of my subjects when I am already burdened +with heavy cares? But do thou look to this petition faithfully. It +may be important, and I know not from whom it is. I promised Hotep it +should be given honest attention." + +For seven days thereafter every letter sent by the king was written by +Hotep. At the end of that time he met Meneptah again, and bending low +before him, asked pardon for his insistence, and begged to know what +disposition the Son of Ptah had made of the petition of his friend. He +was irritably informed that the matter had been given over to the +fan-bearer for attention, since the Pharaoh had been too oppressed with +heavier matters to read the letter. + +The state of the scribe's mind, after receiving the information, was +indescribable. + +He controlled himself before Meneptah, but he suffered no curb upon his +feelings when he had returned to his own apartments. After a long time +he succeeded in choking his anger, disgust and grief, realizing that +each moment must be turned to account rather than wasted in railing. + +He viewed the situation with enforced calm. Har-hat was in full +possession of the facts. He had the signet and was absolute master of +Meneptah. The Hathors had surrendered Kenkenes wholly into the hands +of his enemy. Furthermore, the fate of the Israelite seemed to be +sealed. At the thought Hotep gnashed his teeth. + +In his sympathy for his friend's strait, the scribe gave over his +objections to Rachel. Kenkenes had suffered for her, and, if he would, +he should have her. + +Between the king and persuasion was Har-hat, vitally interested in the +defeat of any movement toward the aid of Kenkenes. The one hope for +the sculptor was the winning over of the Pharaoh, and only one could do +it. And that was Rameses, who was betrothed to the love of Hotep, and +against her will. + +Nothing could have appeared more distasteful to the scribe than the +necessity of prayer to the man for whom he cherished a hate that +threatened to make a cinder of his vitals. But the more he rebelled +the more his conscience urged him. + +He flung himself on his couch and writhed; he reviled the Hathors, +abused Kenkenes for the folly of sacrilege which had brought on him +such misfortune; he execrated Meneptah, anathematized Har-hat and +called down the fiercest maledictions on the head of Rameses. Having +relieved himself, he arose and, summoning his servant, had his +disordered hair dressed, fresh robes brought for him, and a glass of +wine for refreshment. On the way to the palace-top he met Ta-user, +walking slowly away from the staircase. Rameses, solitary and +luxurious, was stretched upon a cushioned divan in the shadow of a +canopy over the hypostyle. + +"The gods keep thee, Son of the Sun," Hotep said. + +"So it is thou, Hotep. Nay, but I am glad to see thee. Methought +Ta-user meant to visit me just now. Is there a taboret near?" + +"Aye, but I shall not sit, my Prince." + +"Go to! It makes me weary to see thee stand. Sit, I tell thee!" + +Hotep drew up the taboret and sat. + +"I come to thee with news and a petition," he began. "It is more +fitting that I should kneel." + +"Perchance. But exertion offends mine eyes in such delicious hours as +these, and I will forego the homage for the sake of mine own sinews. +Out with thy tidings." + +"Thou dost remember thy friend and mine, that gentle genius, Kenkenes." + +"I am not like to forget him so long as a bird sings or the Nile +ripples make music. Osiris pillow him most softly." + +"He is not dead, my Prince." + +"Nay!" Rameses cried, sitting up. "The knave should be bastinadoed for +the tears he wrung from us!" + +"Thou wouldst deny my petition. I am come to implore thee to intercede +for him." + +Rameses bade him proceed. + +"Thou art acquainted with the nature of Kenkenes, O Prince. He is a +visionary--an idealist, and so firmly rooted are his beliefs that they +are to his life as natural as the color of his eyes. He is a +beauty-worshiper. Athor possesses him utterly, and her loveliness +blinds him to all other things, particularly to his own welfare and +safety. + +"In the beginning he fell in love, and a soul like his in love is most +unreasoning, immoderate and terribly faithful. The maiden is +beautiful--I saw her--most divinely beautiful. She is wise, for I saw +that also. She is good, for I felt it, unreasoning, and when a man +hath a woman intuition, a god hath spoken the truth to his heart. But +she is a slave--an Israelite." + +"An Israelite!" + +Hotep bowed his head. + +"By the gods of my fathers, I ought not to marvel! Nay, now, is that +not like the boy? An Israelite! And half the noble maids of Memphis +mad for him!" + +"He is not for thee and me to judge, O Rameses," Hotep interrupted. +"The gods blew another breath in him than animates our souls. For thee +and me such conduct would be the fancies of madmen; for Kenkenes it is +but living up to the alien spirit with which the gods endowed him. It +might be torture for him to wed according to our lights." + +"Perchance thou art right. Go on." + +"It seems that Har-hat looked upon the girl, and taken by her beauty, +asked her at the Pharaoh's hands for his harem." + +"Ah, the--! Why does he not marry honorably?" + +"It is not for me to divine," Hotep went on calmly. "The fan-bearer +sent his men to take her, but she fled from them to Kenkenes, and he +protected her--hid her away--where, none but Kenkenes and the maiden +know. Har-hat is most desirous of owning her, but Kenkenes keeps his +counsel. Therefore, Har-hat overtook him in Tape, where he went to get +a signet belonging to his father, and imprisoned him till what time he +should divulge the hiding-place of the Israelite." + +"Never was there a true villain till Har-hat was born! What poor +feeble shadows have trodden the world for knaves before the fan-bearer +came. Go on. Hath he put him to torture yet?" + +"Aye, from the beginning, though not by the bastinado. He rends him +with suspense and all the doubts and fears for his love that can haunt +him in his cell. But I have more to tell. There was a signet, an +all-potent signet, which belonged to the noble Mentu--" + +"Aye, I remember," Rameses broke in. "My grandsire gave it to the +murket in recognition of his great work, Ipsambul. It commands royal +favor in the name of Osiris. That should help the dreamer out of his +difficulty." + +"Aye, it should, my Prince, but it did not. Kenkenes sent it to the +Pharaoh, with a petition for his own freedom, but the cares of state +were so pressing that the Son of Ptah gave the letter, unopened, to +Har-hat for attention." + +Rameses laughed harshly. + +"Kenkenes would better content himself. The Hathors are against him," +he cried. "Was there ever such consummate misfortune? What more?" + +"Is it not enough, O Rameses?" Hotep answered sternly. "He hath +suffered sufficiently. Now is it time for them, who profess to love +him, to bestir themselves in his behalf. Thou knowest how near the +fan-bearer is to the Pharaoh. Persuasion can not reach the king that +worketh against Har-hat. Thou alone art as potent with the Son of +Ptah. Wilt thou not prove thy love for Kenkenes and aid him?" + +Rameses did not answer immediately. Thoughtfully he leaned his elbow +on his knee and stroked his forehead with his hand. His black brows +knitted finally. + +"My hands are tied, Hotep," he began bluntly. "I permit the sway of +this knave over my father because I am constrained. Till he begins to +achieve confusion or bring about bad government I must let him alone. +There is no love between us. We have no quarrel, but I despise him for +that very spirit in him which makes him do such things as thou hast +even told me. If his offense had been against Egypt or the king or +myself, I could balk him. But this is a matter of personal interest to +him, which would be open and flagrant interference--" + +Hotep broke in earnestly. + +"Surely so small a matter of courtesy--if such it may be called--should +not stand between thee and this most pressing need." + +"Aye, thou hast said--if it were only a small matter of courtesy. But +the breach of that same small courtesy entails great disaster for me. +Thou knowest, O my Hotep, that I am betrothed to the daughter of +Har-hat." + +With great effort Hotep kept a placid face. + +"The Lady Masanath would abet him who would aid Kenkenes," he said. + +"Even so. But hear me, I pray thee, Hotep. This most rapacious +miscreant would hold his favor with the king. He knew I loved +Masanath, and he held her out of my reach till I should consent to +countenance his advisership to my father. I consented--and should I +lapse, I lose Masanath." + +Hotep was on his feet by this time, his face turned away. Rameses +could not guess what a tempest raged in his heart. + +"But be thou assured," the prince continued grimly, "that only so long +as Masanath is not yet mine, shall I endure him. After that he shall +fall as never knave fell or so deserved to fall before. Aye,--but +stay, Hotep. I have not done. I have some small grain of hope for +this unfortunate friend of ours. The marriage hath been delayed. I +shall press my suit, and wed Masanath sooner, if she will, and Kenkenes +need not decay in prison--" + +Hotep did not stay longer. He bowed and departed without a word. + +"Out upon the man, I offered all I could," Rameses muttered, but +immediately he arose and hurried to the well of the stairway. + +"Hotep!" he called. The scribe, half-way down, turned and looked up. + +"Return to me in an hour. Give me time to ponder and I may more +profitably help thee," the prince commanded. Hotep bowed and went on. + +The hour was barely long enough for the smarting soul of the scribe to +soothe itself. Deep, indeed, his love for Kenkenes that he returned at +all. Masanath's name, spoken so familiarly, so boastingly, by the +prince was fresh outrage to his already affronted heart. It mattered +not that Rameses did not know. His talk of marriage with Masanath was +exultation, nevertheless. Once again, Hotep flung himself on his couch +and wrestled with his spirit. + +At the end of the hour, he went once again to Rameses. He was calm and +composed, but he made no apology for his abrupt departure, when last he +was there. Perhaps, however, he gained in the respect of Rameses by +that lapse. The blunt prince was more patient with the sincere than +with the diplomatic. + +"Thou hast said," the prince began immediately, "that Har-hat hath +imprisoned Kenkenes till what time he shall divulge the hiding-place of +the Israelite?" + +Hotep bowed. + +"The fan-bearer charges him with slave-stealing?" + +"And sacrilege," the scribe added. The prince opened his eyes. "Aye, +Kenkenes carried his beauty-love into blasphemy. He executed a statue +of Athor in defiance of the sculptor's ritual. For this also, Har-hat +holds a heavy hand over him." + +"A murrain on the lawless dreamer!" Rameses muttered. "Is there +anything more?" + +Hotep shook his head. + +"He deserves his ill-luck. Mark me, now. He will not go mad with a +year's imprisonment, and he will profit by it. Furthermore, he can not +be persuaded into betraying the Israelite, if he knows how long and how +much he will have to endure. Once sentenced, Har-hat can add nothing +more thereto. Has he confessed?" + +"To me, he did. I know not what he said to the Pharaoh. But the +Goddess Ma broodeth on the lips of Kenkenes." + +Rameses nodded, and clapped his hands. The attendant that appeared he +ordered to bring the scribe's writing-case and implements. When the +servant returned, Hotep, at a sign from Rameses, prepared to write. + +"Write thus to the jailer at Tape: + +"'By order of the crown prince, Rameses, the prisoner, Kenkenes, held +for slave-stealing and sacrilege, is sentenced to imprisonment for one +year--'" + +Hotep lifted his pen, and looked his rebellion. + +"Write!" the prince exclaimed. "I do him a kindness, with a lesson +added. Were it in my power to free him I would not--till he had +learned that the law is inexorable and the power of its ministers +supreme. Go on--'at such labor as the prisoner may elect. No further +punishment may be added thereto.' Affix my seal and send this without +fail. Thou canst write whatever thou wilt to Kenkenes. For the +Israelite, I shall not concern myself. The nearer friends to Kenkenes +may look to her. Mine shall be the care only to see that they are not +harassed by the fan-bearer. In this, I fulfil the law. Let Har-hat +help himself." + +He dropped back on his divan and Hotep slowly collected his writing +materials and made ready to depart. Having finished, he lingered a +little. + +"A word further, O Rameses. Kenkenes is proud. He would liefer die +than suffer the humiliation of public shame. Memphis believes him +dead. None but thyself, Har-hat, the noble Mentu and I know of his +plight. Har-hat hath no call to tell it. Mentu will not; I shall not. +Wilt thou keep his secret also, my Prince?" + +"Far be it from me to humiliate him publicly. Let him have a care, +hereafter, that he does not humiliate himself." + +"I thank thee, O Rameses." + +Saluting the prince, Hotep departed. + +That night he wrote to Kenkenes and to Mentu, and the two messengers +departed ere midnight. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +THE IDOLS CRUMBLE + +Meanwhile Kenkenes seldom saw a human face. Food and water in red clay +vessels, bearing the seal of Thebes, were set inside his door by +disembodied hands. At intervals he saw the keeper, always attended by +the inevitable scribe, but the visit was a matter of inspection and +rarely was the prisoner addressed. + +Though he grew to expect these visits, each time the bar rattled down +he trembled with the hope that the jailer brought him freedom. Each +successive disappointment was as acute as the last, made more poignant +by the torturing certainty that his hopes were vain. The effect of one +was not at all counteracted by the other. + +Some time after dawn the sun thrust a golden bar, full of motes, across +the door, a foot above his head. In a space the beam was withdrawn. +The heat and dust of the midday came, instead. Gnats wove their mazes +in the narrow casement that opened on the outside world, and now and +then the twitter of birds sounded very close to it. Kenkenes knew how +they flashed as they flew in the sun. They were prodigal of freedom. +At nightfall, if he stood at full height against the door, he could see +a thread of cooling sky with a single star in its center. + +This was all his knowledge of the world. Hour after hour he paced the +narrow length of the cell, till the circumscribed round made him dizzy. +If he flung himself on his straw pallet, he did not rest. The mind has +no charity for the body. If there is to be no mental repose it is vain +to hope for physical. When the inactivity of his uneasy pallet became +intolerable, he resumed his pace. + +He expected the return of his messenger in twenty days after the man's +departure. At the expiration of that time his suspense and +apprehension became more and more desperate at the passing of each new +day. In rapid succession he accepted and rejected the thought that the +messenger had played him false, had been assassinated and robbed; that +Meneptah had recalled the signet, or had added the penalty of suspense +to his indorsement of Har-hat's fiat of imprisonment. + +When the climax of his sensations was reached, his self-sufficiency +collapsed and he entered into ceaseless supplication of the gods. He +vowed costly sacrifices to them, adding promises of self-abnegation +which became more comprehensive as his distress increased. At the end +of a month he had consecrated everything at his command. Then he +subsided into a numb endurance till what time his prayers should be +answered. + +Eight days later, about mid-afternoon, while he lay on his pallet, the +door was flung open and his messenger stood without. With a cry, +Kenkenes leaped to his feet and wrenched the scroll from the man's +hand. With unsteady fingers he ripped off the linen cover and read. + +The letter was from Hotep, conveying such information regarding his +imprisonment as we already know. If was couched in the gentlest terms, +and contained that essence of hope which loving spirits can extract +from the most desperate situation, for another's sake. But for all the +kindly intent of the scribe, his news was none the less unhappy. The +dreaded had come to pass, and the war between hope and fear was at an +end. Kenkenes read the missive calmly, and paid the messenger +according to his promise. The jailer, who had come with the man, read +the sentence and bade the prisoner make his choice of labor. + +"Anything, so it will but give me a glimpse of the horizon," he said. + +"Thou wilt pay dearly for thy sky," the keeper cautioned him. "The +softest labor is within doors." + +"Give me my wish according to the command of the prince." + +The jailer shrugged his shoulders. "As thou wilt. Make ready to +follow the canal-workers, to-morrow." + +When the door fell shut again, Kenkenes returned to his pallet and +re-read the scroll. + +A year's imprisonment! The sentence defined was the sum of daily +shame, sorrow, homesickness and misanthropy. Shame in the proud man +admits of no degrees of intensity. If it exist at all, it is +superlative. To this was added the loss of Rachel. How little it +would take to satisfy him, now that she was wholly denied to his eyes! +Only to look down on her again, unseen, from his aery in the rocks over +the valley! + +Hotep had offered him hope, based on circumstantial evidence and fact. +Har-hat could not add to his sentence. That was the only indisputable +cheer he could give. But would Rameses stay the chief adviser's hand, +seeing that the winning of Masanath depended on the prince's +neutrality, as Hotep had explained? If Rachel fled to Mentu, as +Kenkenes had bidden her, could the murket protect her, even at his own +peril? Might not the heavy hand of the powerful favorite fall also on +the head of the king's architect? Wherein was the murket more immune +than his son? Rachel's destruction seemed to be decreed by the Hathors. + +Such was his thought, and he raised himself to curse the Seven Sisters, +and growing reckless, he included the unhelpful gods in his +maledictions. The blasphemy comforted him strangely, and he persisted +till his heated brain was cooled. + +At dawn the next day he laid aside his fillet of gold, his trappings +and noble dress, and donning the kilt or shenti of the prisoners, was +handcuffed to another malefactor and taken forth to the sun-white plain +between Thebes Diospolis and the Arabian, hills, to labor in the canals +of the nome. + +Here, looking continually upon crime, brutality and misery, he asked +himself the divine motive in creating man, and having found no answer, +he began to question man's debt to the gods. + +He was going the way of all the weak in faith. He had pleaded with his +deities, and they had not heard him. He asked himself what he had done +to deserve their disfavor. The sacrilege of Athor was too slight an +offense--if offense it were--and here again he paused, set his teeth +and swore that he had done no wrong and the god or man that accused him +was impotent, unjust and ignorant. Once again he asked himself what he +had done to deserve ill-use at the hands of the Pantheon. They had +turned a deaf ear to him, and why should he render them further homage? +The doctrine of divine Love, displayed through chastisement, was not in +the Osirian creed. + +His eyes grew bold through rebellion and he attacked the wild +inconsistencies of the faith with the destructive instrument of reason. +Each deduction led him on, fascinated, in his apostasy. Each crumbling +tenet started another toward ruin. Finding no sound obstacle to stay +him, he fell with avidity to rending the Pantheon. + +But he found no cheer nor any hope that day when he told himself +bitterly, "There is no God." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +THE PLAGUES + +The court was gone and Masanath was making the most of each day of her +freedom. Memphis was in a state of apathy, worn out by revel and +emptied of her luminaries, Ta-meri, intoxicated with the importance of +her position as lady-in-waiting to the queen, had departed with her +husband, the cup-bearer. Io had returned to her home in On, with an +ache in her brave little heart that outweighed even Masanath's for +heaviness. The last of Seti's lover-like behavior toward her dated +back to a time before the court had gone to Thebes--long, long ago. + +Ta-user, also, had gone, but the fan-bearer's daughter did not regret +her. The other ladies who remained in Memphis, frightened at the +loftiness of Masanath's future, were uneasy in her presence and seemed +more inclined to bend the knee before her than to continue the girlish +companionship that had once been between them. + +So she must entertain herself, if she were entertained at all. + +For a time after the departure of Meneptah, Masanath had given herself +up to tears and gloom. When she had worn out her grief, the elastic +spirit of youth reasserted itself and once again she was as cheerful as +she felt it becoming to be under the circumstances. + +The fan-bearer had taken a house for his daughter's use, during her +year of solitary residence, and her own servants, a lady-in-waiting, +the devoted Nari, Pepi, a courier and upper servant, lean, brown and +taciturn, and several slaves, both black and white, had been left with +her. The older daughter of the fan-bearer lived with her husband in +Pelusium. Her home could have been an asylum for the younger, but +Masanath was determined to know one year of absolute independence +before she entered the long bondage of queenship. + +It was now the middle of June, the height of Egyptian summer. In a +little space the marshes, which had been, for eight months, favorite +haunts of fowlers, would be submerged, for the inundation was not far +away. + +Masanath would hunt for wild-duck and marsh-hen, while there was yet +time. + +It was an hour after sunrise. Her raft, built of papyrus, was +boat-shaped and graceful as a swan. Pepi was at the long-handled sweep +in the stern. Masanath sat in the middle, which was heaped with nets, +throw-sticks, and bows and arrows. A pair of decoy birds, tame and +unfettered, stood near her, craning their small heads, puzzled at the +movement of the boat which was undecipherable since they were +motionless. Nari sat in the prow, her hands folded, her face quite +expressionless. The service of the day was out of the routine, but as +a good servant, she was capable of adapting herself to the change. + +The little craft darted away from the painted landing for pleasure +boats, and reaching midstream, was turned toward the north. The +current caught it and swept it along like a leaf. + +As they passed the stone wharf at Masaarah, Nari looked toward the +quarries with a show of interest on her face. She even caught her +breath to speak. Masanath noted her animation. + +"What is it, Nari?" + +"Naught but a bit of gossip that came to mine ears, last night, and the +sight of Masaarah urged me to tell it again. It is said the Hebrews of +these quarries rose against the new driver and drove him out of the +camp, crying, 'Return us our Atsu, return us our Atsu.'" + +"What folly!" Masanath exclaimed. "If they had been the host which +crowds Goshen to her bounds, it might serve. But this handful in +rebellion against Egypt! The military of the Memphian nome will crush +them as if they had been so many ants." + +"I know," the serving-woman admitted. "The soldier I had it from, said +that the city commandant would move against them by noon this day." + +"The gods help them!" Pepi put in. + +"Thy prayer is too late, Pepi," Masanath answered. "The gods should +have cautioned them ere they took the step. And yet," she continued, +musing, "straits may become so sore that aught but endurance is +welcome." + +Her servants looked at her and at each other, understanding. + +Nari went on: + +"But the soldier told me further that the Israelites had spent the +night chanting and dancing before their God, and it seems from this +spot that the quarries are empty. They do not fear, boasting their +God's care." + +Masanath shook her head. "He must look to them at once, ere the +soldiery fall upon them. His time for aid is short," she said. + +A silence fell, and the raft passed below Masaarah. Again Nari spoke, +proving that she had heard and thought upon the last words of her +mistress. + +"Are not the gods omnipotent and everywhere?" + +"Aye, so hast thou been taught, Nari." + +"Our gods, and the gods of every nation like them?" the serving-woman +persisted. + +"The gods of Egypt are so, and each nation boasts its gods equally +potent." + +"Mayhap the Hebrews' God will help them," Nari ventured. + +Masanath was silent for a moment. "He hath deserted them for long," +she said at last, "but they are hard-pressed. Mayhap their loud +supplications will reach Him in His retreat." + +"They boast that He hath returned." + +"Let Him prove Himself," Masanath insisted stoutly. + +When next she spoke there was no hint of the past serious talk in her +voice. + +"A pest on the ban," she exclaimed. "Look at the Marsh of the +Discontented Soul. It fairly swarms with teal and coot, and see the +snipe on the sand." She stood up and watched the sandy strip they were +nearing. They were a goodly distance out from the shore, but Pepi +poled nearer midstream. "The pity of it," she sighed; "but I doubt not +the place swarms with crocodile, also." + +She sat down again, and looked at the decoy birds. Their timidity had +increased into actual fear. Masanath reached a soothing hand toward +one of them and it fled. The motion of the poling-arm of Pepi +frightened it again, and with a flirt of its wings it retreated toward +Masanath. + +"Stop a moment, Pepi," she said. "Let me quiet this frightened thing. +I can not fathom its terror." + +"The unquiet soul, my Lady," Nari whispered, in awe. + +"Strange that the gods gifted the creatures with keener sight than +men," Masanath answered, somewhat disturbed. She moved toward the +bird, talking softly, but the persuasion was as useless as if the decoy +had been a wild thing. At the nearer approach of the small hand it +took wings and flew. The mate followed, unhesitating. The shining +distance toward the west swallowed them up. + +The trio on the raft looked at one another. + +"Nay, now, saw ye the like before?" Masanath exclaimed, the tone of her +voice divided between astonishment and irritation at the loss of her +pets. + +"Let us leave this vicinity," Pepi said, suiting the action to the +word, "it is unholy." He seized the sweep and drove the raft about, +poling with wide strokes. At that moment, a cry, which was more of a +hoarse whisper, broke from his lips. + +"Body of Osiris! The river! the river!" + +Masanath leaned on one hand and looked over the side of the raft. With +a bound and a shivering cry, Nari was cowering beside her, the little +craft tossing on the waves at the force of the leap. Instantly, Pepi +was at her other side, on his knees, praying and shaking. And together +the trio huddled, but only one, Masanath, was brave enough to watch +what was happening. + +From the bottom of the Nile a turbid convection was taking place, as if +the river silt had been stirred up, but the fuming current was assuming +a dull red tinge. The action had been rapid. Already the stain had +predominated, streaks of clear water, only here and there, clarifying +the opaque coloring. The boat rode half its depth in red, the paddle +dripped red, the splashes of water within on the bottom were red, the +sun shone broadly into the mirroring red, a sliding, reeking red! A +lavender foam broke its bubbles against the drifting raft and a tepid, +invisible vapor, like a moist breath, exhaled from the ensanguined +surface. + +Schools of fish, struggling and leaping, filled the space immediately +above the water, and cumbered the raft with a writhing mass. +Numberless crocodiles bounded into the air, braying, snorting, rending +one another and churning the river into froth by their hideous battle. +Dwellers of the deep water drifted into the upper tide--monsters of the +muck at the Nile bottom, turtles, huge crawfish, water-newts, spotted +snakes, curious bleached creatures that had never seen the day, great +drifts of insects, with frogs, tadpoles--everything of aquatic animate +life, came up dead or dying terribly. Along either bank water-buffalo +and wallowing swine, which had been in the pools near the river, +clambered ponderously, snorting at every step. + +Vessels were putting about and flying for the shore. From the prow of +one tall boat, with distended sails, a figure was seen to spring high +and disappear under the red torrent. Rioting crews of river-men fought +for first landing at the accessible places on the banks. Memphis +shrieked and the pastures became compounds of wild beasts that deafened +heaven with their savage bellowing. + +Pepi and Nari had no thought of saving themselves. It was Masanath who +must save them. They clung to her, dragging her down with their arms +when she attempted to rise. Bereft of reason, they made the liquid +echoes of the river ring with wild cries of mortal terror. + +Masanath had sufficient instinct left to urge her to fly. With a +mighty effort she shook off her servants and sprang to the sweep. +Instantly they made to follow her, but she threatened them with a +hunting-stick. The combined weight of the three in the stern would +have swamped the frail boat. + +Seizing the sweep she poled with superhuman strength toward the nearest +shore--the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. If she remembered the +spirit, she forgot her fear of it. Any terror was acceptable other +than isolation on this mile-wide torrent of blood. + +The raft grounded, and as a viscous wash of red lapped across it, she +leaped forth, landing with both feet in the horror. She floundered out +and crying to her servants to follow her, fled like a mad thing up the +sandy stretch toward the distant wall of rock. + +The boat, lightened of her weight, received a backward thrust as she +leaped, and drifted out of the reeds. The heavy current caught it and +swept it across the smitten river to the Memphian shore. It bore two +insensible figures. + +Masanath ran, thinking only to leave the ghastly flood behind. Her wet +over-dress flapped about her ankles. It, too, was stained, and she +tore if off as she ran. Ahead of her was a sagging limestone wall, +with no gap, but Masanath, hardly sane, would have dashed herself +against it, if hands had not detained her. + +"Blood! Blood!" she shrieked. "Holy Ptah save us!" + +"Peace!" some one made answer. "God is with us." + +The voice was calm and reassuring, the hands firm. Here, then, was one +who was strong and unafraid, and therefore, a safe refuge. No longer +called upon to care for herself, Masanath fell into the arms of the +brave unknown and ceased to remember. + +Consciousness returned to her slowly and incompletely. Horror had +dazed her, and her surroundings, but faintly discovered in an +all-enveloping gloom, were not conducive to mental repose and clearness. + +She became aware, first, that she was somewhere hidden from the +sunshine and beyond reach of the strange odor from the Nile. + +Next she realized that she was sheltered in a cave; that slender lines +of white daylight sifted through the interstices of a door; that a lamp +was burning somewhere behind a screen; that a hairy thing sat in a +corner and looked at her with half-human eyes, and that, as she shrank +at the sight, the warm support under her head moved and a fair face, +framed with golden hair, bent over her. + +Then her eyes, becoming clearer as her recollection returned, wandered +away toward the walls of her shelter. They had been hewn by hands. +There was an opening in one side, leading into another and a darker +crypt. Was not this a tomb? She was in the Tomb of the Discontented +Soul! Terrified, she struggled to gain her feet and fly, but the awful +memory of the plague without returned to her overwhelmingly. Gentle +hands restrained her, and the same voice that had sought to soothe her +before, continued its soft comforting now. + +"Thou art safe and sheltered," she heard. "No evil shall befall thee." + +Was this the spirit of the tomb? If so, it was most lovely and kindly. +But a solemn voice issued out of the dark cell beyond. This was the +spirit, of a surety. She cowered against her fair-haired protector and +shuddered. But the maiden answered the voice in a strange tongue. +Masanath would have known it to be Hebrew, had she been composed. But +now it was mystic, cabalistic. + +Presently the maiden addressed her. + +"Deborah asks after thee, Lady. How shall I tell her thou findest +thyself?" + +"Oh, I can not tell," Masanath answered. "What has happened? Is it +true or did I go mad?" + +The Israelite smoothed her hair. "It is a plague," she said. + +"Then the hand of Amenti is on us," the Egyptian shuddered. "Whither +shall we flee?" + +"Ye can not flee from the One God," the voice from the crypt said +grimly. + +"Nay, but what have I done to vex the gods?" Masanath insisted. "O let +me go hence. Where are my servants?" + +"It is better for thee to bide here," the voice went on relentlessly. +"For outside the sheltering neighborhood of the chosen people, the hand +of the outraged God shall overtake Egypt and scorch her throat with +thirst and make her veins congeal for want of water." + +Masanath gained her feet, crying out wildly: + +"My servants! Where are they? Let me forth." + +The Israelite put an assuring arm about her. "Thou wilt not dare to +face the Nile again," she warned. "Stay with us." + +"To starve! To perish of thirst! To die of pestilence! The gods have +left us. We are undone!" + +"Aye, the gods have left you," the voice continued harshly. "Ye are +given over to the vengeance of the God of Abraham. Howl, Egypt! Rend +thyself and cover thy head with ashes. Thy destruction is but begun. +For a hundred years thou hast oppressed Israel. Now is the hour of the +children of God!" + +Masanath wrung her hands, but the voice went on. + +"As the Nile flows, so hath the blood of Israel been wasted by the hand +of Egypt. Now shall the God of Abraham drain her veins, even so, drop +for drop. For the despoiling of Israel shall her pastures and stables +be filled with stricken beasts--for the heavy hand of the Pharaohs +shall the heavens thunder and scourges fall. And the wrath of God +shall cool not till Egypt is a waste, shorn of her corn and her +vineyards and her riches, and foul with dead men." + +Nothing could have been more vindictive than this disembodied voice. +Masanath thrust her fingers through her hair, and drawing her elbows +forward, sheltered her face with them. + +"When have I offended against the Hebrew?" she cried, sick with terror. +"Why should your awful God destroy the innocent and the friend of +Israel among the people of Egypt?" + +Rachel, who had stood beside her, with an increasing cloud on her face, +now spoke in Hebrew. There was mild protest in her tones. + +"The plague will pass," the voice from the inner crypt continued. +"Seven days will it endure, no more." + +"Deborah is mystic," Rachel added softly, "and is gifted with prophetic +eyes. Much hath she suffered at Egypt's hands, and her tongue grows +harsh when she speaks of the oppression." + +"Nay, but let me go," Masanath begged. "Where are my servants? Came +they not after me when I fled?" + +"None followed thee, Lady, and thy raft went adrift." + +"Let me out of this hideous place, then, for I must seek them. They +may be dead." + +Her tone was imperious, and Rachel, silently obedient, led her to the +entrance and pushed aside the door. Instantly the terrible turmoil +over Egypt smote upon her ears; next she saw the Nile, moving slowly, +black where its clear surfaces had been green, scarlet and froth-ridden +where the sun had shone upon transparent ripples and white foam; after +that, the strange odor came to her, recalling the smell of the altars, +but now magnified till it was overpoweringly strong. She sickened and +turned away. + +Setting the door in place, Rachel led her back into a corner of the +outer chamber and laid her down on the matting there. + +"The Lord God will care for thy servants. Fret thyself no further, but +be content here until the horror shall pass. I shall attend thee, so +thou shalt not miss their ministrations." The Israelite spoke with +gentle authority, smoothing the dark hair of her guest. Command in the +form of persuasion is doubly effective, since it induces while it +compels. Masanath was most amenable to this manner of entreaty, since +it disarmed her pride while it governed her impulses. Thus, though her +inclination urged against it, she ate when the Israelite brought her a +bit of cold fowl and a beaker of wine at midday and again at sunset. +And at night, she slept because the Israelite told her she was safe and +bade her close her eyes. + +But once she awoke. The lamp burned behind a wooden amphora rack and +the interior of the stone chamber was not dark. The voice in the inner +chamber was still and the human-eyed beast in the corner was now only a +small hairy roll. In the silence she would have been dismayed, but +close beside her sat the Israelite. One hand toyed absently with the +golden rings of a collar about her throat. The face was averted, the +hair unplaited and falling in a shower of bright ripples over the bosom +and down the back. The beauty of the picture impressed itself on +Masanath, in spite of her drowsiness. But as well as the beauty, the +dejection in the droop of the head, the unhappiness on the face, were +apparent even in the dusk. Here was sorrow--the kind of sorrow that +even the benign night might not subdue. Masanath was well acquainted +with such vigils as the golden Israelite seemed to be keeping. + +Her love-lorn heart was stirred. She spoke to Rachel softly. + +"Come hither and lie down by me," she said. "I am afraid and thou art +unhappy. Give me some of thy courage and I will sorrow with thee." + +The Israelite smiled sadly and obeyed. + +It was dawn when the fan-bearer's daughter awoke again. + +The door had been set aside, and on the rock threshold a squat copper +lamp was sending up periodic eruptions of dense white vapor. Rachel +was feeding the ember of the cotton wick with bits of chopped root. +The breeze from the river blew the fumes back into the cave, filling +the dark recesses with a fresh and pungent odor. + +Masanath, wondering and remembering, raised her head to look through +the opening. Day was broad over Egypt, and the turmoil had subsided. +The silence was heavy. But the Nile was still a wallowing torrent of +red. + +She sank back and drew the wide sleeves of her dress over her face. +Rachel put the lamp aside, set the door in place and came to her. + +"Thou art better for thy long sleep," she said. "Now, if thou canst +bear, as well, with the meager food this house affords, the plague will +not vex thee sorely." Then, in obedience to the Israelite's offer, +Masanath sat up and suffered Rachel to dress her hair and bathe her +tiny hands and face with a solution of weak white wine. + +"The water which we had stored with us is also corrupted. I fear we +shall thirst, if we have but wine to wet our lips," Rachel explained. + +"Thou dost not tell me that ye abide in this place?" the fan-bearer's +daughter asked, taking the piece of fowl and hard bread which Rachel +offered her. + +"Even so," Rachel responded after a little silence. + +"Holy Isis! guests of a spirit! What a ghastly hospice for women! How +came ye here?" + +For a moment there was silence, so marked that Masanath ceased her +dainty feeding and drew back a little. + +"Are ye lepers?" she asked in a frightened voice. + +"Nay, we are fugitives," Rachel answered. + +"Fugitives! What strait brought you to seek such asylum as this?" + +Again a speaking pause. + +"Who art thou, Lady?" Rachel asked, at last. + +"I am Masanath, daughter of Har-hat, fan-bearer to the Pharaoh." + +"And thou art a friend of the oppressed?" the Israelite continued. + +"It is my boast before the gods," the Egyptian answered with dignity. + +"I am Rachel, of Israel, daughter of Maai, and I have fled from shame. +In all Egypt, this is the one and only refuge for such as I. If my +hiding-place were published, no help could save me from the despoiler. +My one protector is she who lies within. She is my foster-mother, old +and ill from abuse at the hands of brutal servants. Thou hast my +story." + +As Rachel ceased, Deborah called from within. + +"There is more," she said. "Come hither. I am moved to tell thee." + +Masanath obeyed with hesitation and, pausing in the doorway of the +inner chamber, heard the story of the Israelites. Great was her +perplexity and her sorrow when she heard the name of Kenkenes spoken +calmly and without grief. They did not know he was dead! She held her +peace till the story was done, How much more would her heart have been +tortured could the old woman have given her the name of the offending +noble! Instead, all unsuspecting, she heard the story of Har-hat's +wrong-doing with now and then an exclamation of indignation, condemning +him heartily in her soul. + +"The time for the Egyptian's return is long past, but he will come +soon," Deborah concluded. + +Masanath slowly turned her head and looked at Rachel. This, then, was +the love of that dear, dead artist, for whom Memphis mourned and had +ceased to wait. How doubly grievous his loss, for Rachel was undone +thereby! How heart-breaking to see her wait for him who would come no +more! Masanath choked back her tears and said, when she was composed +again: + +"Ye need not molder in this cave, I can hide you in Memphis." + +"Nay, we will await him here." + +"But the Nile will be upon your refuge in three weeks. Ye would starve +if ye drowned not," the Egyptian protested earnestly. + +"It may be we shall not wait so long," Rachel put in. + +Masanath looked at her while she thought busily. "If I tell it, I +break a heart. But if they bide here, they die. None other will come +to them by chance or on purpose." + +"I would not risk it," she answered. Returning to the pallet of +matting she finished her breakfast in silence. After a little sigh she +glanced at the wine in one of the small amphoras which Rachel had +brought to her as a drinking-cup. "Mayhap the plague is past," she +said, hinting, "and I am athirst." + +Rachel took up another jar and went forth. The hairy creature in the +corner, tethered to the amphora rack, slipped his collar and followed +her. + +As soon as the Israelite was gone, Masanath went into the inner +chamber. Standing by the old woman, who lay upon a mattress, set on +the top of the sarcophagus, she said hurriedly: + +"Ye may not remain here. Kenkenes is known to me and he will not +return." + +"Thou dost not tell me he was false to us," Deborah exclaimed. "Nay, I +will not believe it," she declared. + +"Nay, he was the soul of honor, but he is dead." + +"Dead!" the old woman cried, catching at her dress. + +"Hush! Tell her not!" + +"Aye, thou art right. Tell her not! But--but how did he die?" + +"By drowning. His boat was discovered battered and overturned among +the wharf-piling at Memphis, some weeks agone." + +The old woman was silent for a moment and then she shook her head. + +"He is a resourceful youth and he may have procured another boat and +set this one adrift to deceive his enemies. Yet, the time has been so +long, it may be; it may be." + +"None in Memphis doubts it. His father hath given him up and his house +and his people are in mourning. But we may not lose this moment in +surmises. Wilt thou go with me into Memphis--if this sending is +withdrawn?" + +"There is no other choice," Deborah answered after some pondering. +"Kenkenes offered us refuge with his father--alas! that the young man +should die!" After shaking her head and muttering to herself in her +own tongue, she went on. "But Rachel hesitated to accept, at first +from maiden shyness, though now she hath a secret fear, I doubt not, +that the Egyptian may have played her false. The sorry news must be +told her ere she would go." + +"Nay, keep it from her yet a while. Tell her not now." + +"How may we?" Deborah asked helplessly. + +"Listen. I am a householder in Memphis for a year. The place is +secure from much visiting and only my trusted servants are there. They +will not tell her--none else will--thou and I shall keep discreet +tongues, but if the fact creep out, in the way of such things, we need +not accuse ourselves of killing her hope. As thou sayest, the young +man may not be dead. But let us not risk anything. + +"And furthermore," she caught up the line of her talk before Deborah +could answer, "I may as well work good out of an evil I can not escape. +I am betrothed to the heir of the crown of Egypt--" + +Deborah flung up her hand, drawing away in her amazement. + +"Thou! A coming queen over the proud land of Mizraim--a guest in the +retreat of enslaved Israel!" + +Masanath bent her head. "Ye, in your want and distress, are not more +poor or wretched than I." + +The old Israelite's brilliant eyes glittered in the dark. + +"Hold!" she exclaimed. "Thou art not a slave--" + +"Nay, am I not?" Masanath rejoined swiftly. "A slave, a chattel, +doubly enthralled! But enough of this, I would have said that if I wed +the prince, I can ask Rachel's freedom at his hands." + +"So thou canst," Deborah said eagerly--but before she could continue, +Rachel appeared at the outer opening, the amphora held by one arm, the +ape by the other. Her face was alight with a smile that seemed +dangerously akin to tears. + +"Here is water, clean and fresh, but the Nile is bank-full of the +plague. It was Anubis that showed me!" She lowered the amphora into +the rack and took up the linen band the ape had slipped. "Oh, it is +ungrateful to tie thee, Anubis," she went on, "but thou must not betray +us, thou good creature." + +"It was Anubis!" Deborah repeated inquiringly. + +"Aye. Not once did the hideous sight disturb him. He was athirst and +he made me a well in the sand with his paws. See how Jehovah hath sent +us succor by humble hands." She stroked the hairy grotesque and +tethered him reluctantly. + +Deborah muttered under her breath. "I liked the creature not, since he +made me think of the abominable idolatries of Mizraim, but he hath +served the oppressed. He shall be more endurable to me." + +The night fell and the dawn came again and again, but holy Hapi was +denied. Hour by hour the fuming lamp was set before the entrance, the +door was put a little aside, that the entering air might be purified +for those within. When the aromatic was exhausted, Rachel sought for +the root once more, among the herbs at the river-bank; for the +atmosphere, unsweetened, was beyond endurance. + +Never a boat appeared on the water, nor was any human being seen +abroad. Egypt retired to her darkest corner and shuddered. + +But after the seven days were fulfilled, the horror on the waters was +gone. It went as miasma is dispelled by the sun and wind--as +pestilence is killed by the frost--unseen, unprotesting. The lifting +of the plague was as awesome as its coming, but it was not horrible. +That was the only difference. Egypt rejoiced, but she trembled +nevertheless and went about timidly. + +The Israelite and the Egyptian carried the punt, the boat of Khafra and +Sigur, and launched it on the clean waters. Then they prepared +themselves and Deborah and Anubis for a journey, and ere they departed, +Masanath, at Rachel's bidding, wrote with a soft soapstone upon the +rock over the portal of the tomb, the whereabouts of its whilom +dwellers: + +"Her, whom thou seekest, thou wilt find at the mansion of Har-hat in +the city." + +At sunset, Rachel, all unsuspecting, was sheltered in the house of her +enemy. + +Masanath's servants had sought for her, frantically and without system +or method. Pepi and Nari had been saved by the gods. They did not +know where she had gone, and nothing human or divine could have driven +them over the Nile to search for her in the Arabian hills. And for +that reason likewise, they did not notify Har-hat of his daughter's +loss. The messenger would have had to cross the smitten river. They +intended to send for the fan-bearer, but they waited for the plague to +lift. When it was gone, Masanath returned to them. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +"HE HARDENED HIS HEART" + +The Nile rose and fell and the seasons shifted until eight months had +passed. The period was inconsiderable, but its events had never been +equaled in a like space, or a generation, or a whole dynasty, or in all +the history of Egypt. + +When the ancient Hebrew shepherd from Midian first demanded audience +with Meneptah, Egypt was autocrat of the earth and mistress of the +seas. Her name was Glory and Perpetual Life and her substance was all +the fullness of the earth and the treasures thereof. But eight months +after the Hebrew shepherd had gone forth from that first audience, how +had the mighty fallen! She was stripped of her groves and desolated in +her wheat-fields; her gardens were naked, her vineyards were barren, +and the vultures grew fat on the dead in her pastures. About the +thrice-fortified walls of her cities her gaunt husbandmen were camped, +pensioners upon the granaries of the king. Her commerce had stagnated +because she had no goods to barter; her society ceased to revel, for +her people were called upon to preserve themselves. Her arts were +forgotten; only religion held its own and that from very fear. Egypt +was on her knees, but the gods were aghast and helpless in the face of +the hideous power of the unsubstantial, unimaged God of Israel. + +Never had a monarch been forced to meet such conditions, but in all the +mighty line of Pharaohs no feebler king than Meneptah could have faced +them. In treating with the issue he had fretted and fumed, promised +and retracted, temporized with the Hebrew mystic or stormed at him, +hesitated and resolved, and reconsidered and deferred while his realm +descended into the depths of ruin and despair. + +It would seem that the dire misfortunes would have pressed the timid +monarch into immediate submission. But a glance at conditions may +explain the cause of his obduracy. + +At this period in theological chronology, human attributes for the +first time were eliminated from the character of a god. Moses depicted +the first purely divine deity. Omnipotence was ascribed to the gods, +but Pantheism being full of paradoxes, the gods were not omnipotent. +Loud as were the panegyrics of the devout, the devout recognized the +limitations of their divinities. None had ever dreamed of a deity that +was actually omnipotent, actually infinite. Meneptah measured the God +of Israel by his own gods. Furthermore, the miracles did not amaze him +as they appalled Egypt. He was exceedingly superstitious; in his eye +the most ordinary natural phenomenon was a demonstration of the occult. +No matter that the advanced science of his time explained rainfall, +unusual heat or cold, over-fruitful or unproductive years, pestilence +and sudden death, eclipses, comets and meteors,--he believed them to be +the direct results of sorcery. Calamitous as the effects may have been +upon other people, he had ever escaped harm from these sources. It was +not strange that in time he ceased to fear miracles, and the +demonstrations of Moses were not so terrifying, inasmuch as they did +not greatly affect him. + +His horses died, but Arabia was near to replenish his stables; the +pests annoyed him, but his servants fended them from him; the blains +troubled him, but his court physicians were able and gave him relief; +the thunders frightened him, but his fright passed with the storm. +Whenever the sendings became unendurable he had but to yield to gain a +respite, and then he forgot the experience in a day. Meanwhile he ate, +slept and walked in the same luxury he had known in happier years. + +Therefore, Meneptah neither realized his peril nor was personally much +aggrieved by the troublous times. + +It did not occur to him that all the people of his realm were not +sheltered against the plagues by wealth and many servants. He could +not understand why Egypt should be restive under the same afflictions +that he had borne with fortitude. Summoning all evidence from his +point of view, he was able to present to himself a case of personal +persecution and ill-use. The Hebrews belonged to him, and because he +held them their God afflicted Egypt. Egypt complained and would have +him sacrifice his private property, his slaves, for its sake. To the +peevish king the demand was unreasonable. Yet he was not extraordinary +in his behavior. Unselfishness was not an attribute of ancient kings. + +Meneptah was a man that wished to be swayed. He craved approbation and +was helpless without an abettor. His puny ideas had to be championed +by another before they became fixed convictions. After the plague of +locusts, the Hebrew question reached serious proportions. Har-hat had +estranged most of the ministers, and in his strait Meneptah felt +vaguely and for the first time that he needed the acquiescence of +others in addition to the fan-bearer's ready concord. + +One early morning, in a corridor leading from the entrance, he met +Hotep. A sudden impulse urged him to consult his scribe. + +"Where hast thou been?" he asked, noticing Hotep's street dress. + +"To the temple, O Son of Ptah." + +"What hast thou to ask of the gods that thy king can not give thee?" + +Hotep hesitated, and the color rushed into his cheeks. The Hathors +tortured him with an opportunity he dared not seize. How could he ask +for Masanath? + +"I went to pray for that which all Egyptians crave at this hour--the +succor of Egypt," he said, instead. + +Meneptah signed his scribe to follow him to a seat near by. + +"Why may I not require of thee the services of a higher minister?" he +began, after he had seated himself. "Never hast thou failed me, and I +can not say so much of the great nobles above thee. Serve me well in +this, Hotep, and thou mayest take the place of some one of these." + +"Let me but serve thee," the scribe returned placidly; "that is reward +in itself." + +"Thou knowest," the king began, plunging into the heart of the +question, "that I yielded to these ravening wolves, Mesu and Aaron. I +have consented to release the Israelites. But other thought hath come +to me in the night. Thou knowest that no evil hath befallen the land +of Goshen. Har-hat explaineth this strange thing by the location of +the strip. The Nile toucheth it not and rains fall there. Furthermore +the winds blow differently in that district, and withal the hand of +Rannu of the harvests hath sheltered it. It may be, but to me it +seemeth that the Hebrew sorcerer hath cast a protecting spell over the +spot. But whatever the cause, the race of churls and their riches have +escaped misfortune. Thinkest thou not, good Hotep, that, if they must +go, we may by right require their flocks of them to replenish the +pastures of Egypt?" + +Surely the Hathors were exploiting themselves this day. Another +opportunity for good and what would come of it? Hotep knew the man +with whom he dealt. Still it were a sin to slight even an unprofitable +chance that seemed to offer alleviation for Egypt. He would proceed +cautiously and do his best. + +"Be the little lamp trimmed never so brightly, O Son of Ptah, it may +not help the sun. Thou art monarch, I am thy slave. How can I mold +thee, my King?" + +"Others have swayed me, thou modest man." + +"In that hour when thou wast swayed, O Meneptah, another than thyself +ruled over Egypt." + +Meneptah looked in amazement at his scribe. He had never considered +the influence of Har-hat in that light, but, by the gods, it seemed +strangely correct. He straightened himself. + +"Be thou assured, Hotep, that I weigh right well whatever counsel mine +advisers offer me before I indorse it." + +Hotep bowed. "That I know. And for that reason do I hesitate to give +thee my little thoughts. It would hurt the man in me to see them +thrust aside." + +"Thou evadest," Meneptah contended smiling. + +"Wherefore?" + +"Because, O King, I should advise against thine inclinations." + +"Wherefore?" Meneptah demanded again, this time with some asperity. + +"We hold the Hebrews," was the undisturbed reply; "through destruction +and plague we have held them. They boast the calamities as sendings +from their God. Egypt's afflictions multiply; every resort hath failed +us. One is left--to free the slaves and test their boast." + +Meneptah's face had grown deprecatory. + +"Dost thou espouse the cause of thy nation's enemy?" he asked. + +"I espouse the cause of the oppressed, and which, now, is more +oppressed--Egypt or the Hebrew?" + +This was different sort of persuasion from that which the king had +heard since Har-hat took up the fan. The scribe was compelling him by +reason; the man's personality was not entering at all into the +argument. Meneptah's high brows knitted. He felt his feeble +resolution filter away; his inclination to hold the Hebrews stayed with +him, but the power to withstand Hotep's strong argument was not in him. + +"What wouldst thou have me do?" he asked querulously. + +"I am but a mouthpiece for thy realm; I counsel not for myself. The +strait of Egypt demands that thou set the Hebrew free, yield his goods +and his children to him, and be rid of him and his plagues for ever." + +Hotep spoke as if he were reciting a law from the books of the great +God Toth. His tone did not invite further contention. He had read the +king his duty, and it behooved the king to obey. A silence ensued, and +by the signs growing on Meneptah's face, Hotep predicted acquiescence. +It can not be said, however, that he noted them hopefully. Much time +would elapse in which much contrary persuasion was possible before +Israel could depart from Egypt. + +Rameses came out of the dusk at the end of the corridor. The king +raised himself eagerly and summoned his son. + +"Hither, my Rameses!" + +With suspense in his soul, Hotep saw the prince approach. Rameses had +never expressed himself upon the Hebrew question, and the scribe knew +full well that neither himself nor Har-hat, nor all the ministers, nor +heaven and earth could militate against the counsel of that grim young +tyrant. Meneptah spoke with much appeal in his voice. + +"Rameses, I need thee. Awake out of thy dream and help me. What shall +I do with the Hebrews?" + +"I have trusted to my father's sufficient wisdom to help him in his +strait, without advice of mine," was the indifferent reply. + +"Aye; but I crave thy counsel, now, my son." + +"Then, neither god nor devil could make me loose my grasp did I wish to +hold the Hebrews!" + +Hotep sighed, inaudibly, and was moved to depart, had not lack of the +king's permission made him stay. + +"But consider the losses to my realm," Meneptah made perfunctory +protest. The prince's full lip curled. + +"This is but a new method of warfare," he answered. "Instead of going +forth with thy foot-soldiers and thy chariots, thy javelins and thy +shields, thou sufferest siege within thy borders. Wilt thou fling up +thy hands and open thy gates to thine enemy, while yet there is plenty +within the realm and men to post its walls? Let it not be written down +against thee, O my father, that thou didst so. Losses to Egypt!" the +phrase was bitter with scorn. "Dost thou remember how many dead the +Incomparable Pharaoh left in Asia? How many perished of thirst in the +deserts and of cold in the mountains, and of pestilence in the marshes? +Ran not the rivers of the Orient with Egyptian blood, and where shall +the souls of those empty bodies dwell which rotted under the sun on the +great plains of the East? The Incomparable Pharaoh cast out the word +'surrender' from his tongue. Wilt thou restore it and use it first in +this short-lived conflict with a mongrel race of shepherds? Nay, if +thou dost give over now, it shall not be an injustice to thee if it +come to pass that thou shalt bow to a brickmaker as thy sovereign, +sacrifice to the Immaterial God and swear by the beard of Abraham!" + +Meneptah winced under the acrid reproach of his son. + +"It hath ever been mine intent to keep the Hebrews, but I would not act +unadvised," he explained apologetically. + +"Wherefore, then, these frequent consultations with the wolf from +Midian?" was the quick retort. "Thou art unskilled in the ways of war, +my father. The king who would conquer treats not with his enemy. Thou +dost risk the respect of thy realm for thee. Strengthen thy +fortifications and exhaust the cunning of thy besieger. And if he +invade thy lines again with insolence and threats, treat him to the +sword or the halter. If thou art a warrior, prove thy deserts to the +name. And if Egypt backs thee not in thy stand against the Hebrew, +then it is not the same Egypt that followed Rameses the Great to glory!" + +The king put up his hand. + +"Enough! They shall not go; they shall not go!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +THE CONSPIRACY + +One morning early in March Seti stood beside the parapet on the palace +of the king in Tanis. His eyes were fixed on the shimmering line of +the northern level, but he did not see it. Some one came with silent +footfall and laid a hand on his arm. + +He turned and looked into Ta-user's eyes. His face softened and he +took the hand between his own. + +"Alas! this day thou returnest into the Hak-heb," he said. + +She nodded. "Would I could take thee with me, but not yet, not yet. +Wait till thou art a little older." + +He sighed and looked away again. "What weighty things absorb my +prince?" she asked. "What especial labors is he planning?" + +His face clouded. "Dost thou mock me, Ta-user?" he returned. + +"Hadst thou no thought at all?" she persisted. + +"I merely pondered on mine own uselessness," he answered. + +"Fie!" + +"Nay, even thou must see it. I live on my father's bounty; I accept my +people's homage; I adore the gods. I bear no arms; I neither prepare +to reign nor expect to serve. I am a thing set above the healthy labor +of the world and below the cares of the exalted. I am nothing." + +"Fie! I say." + +Seti looked at her reproachfully. + +"Thou hast wealth," she began and paused. + +"Wherein doth that make me useful?" + +"Much can be done with gold. Is there none in need?" + +"None who asks has been denied. Yet what right have I to deal alms to +them from whom my riches come? If I yielded up everything, to my very +cloak, should I have done more than return to them what they have given +me? I should still be a penniless prince, more useless than ever." He +sat down on the broad lintel capping the parapet, but retained her hand. + +"Ta-user," he continued, as she opened her lips to speak, "what wouldst +thou have me do?" + +"I would have thee be useful." + +"I shall throw away my lordly trappings," he said, "and become a lifter +of the shadoof[1] this day." + +"Seti," she said sternly, putting his hand away, "with thy people +imperiled by the sorcery of a wizard, with thy realm desolated by the +plagues of his sending, canst thou, on whom I have built so much, thus +lightly consider thy uses and ignore the things set at thy very hand to +do?" + +The prince looked at her with not a little discomfiture showing on his +young face. But the interrogation was emphatic, and she awaited an +answer. + +"I have no weight with my father," he said soberly. "Thou knowest that +Egypt will never have peace until the Hebrews depart. But I can not +persuade my father to release them and I can not persuade the Israelite +to content himself to stay. Thou dost demand much of me if thou dost +demand of me the impossible." + +As much of contempt as it was wise to show glimmered in her eyes. + +"And thou art at thy wits' end?" she asked. + +"A little way to go. Help me, Ta-user. Bear with me." + +She moved closer to him and absently smoothed down the fine locks, +disordered by the wind. Presently she lifted his face and said with +sudden impulsiveness: + +"Dost, of a truth, believe everything that is told thee?" + +"Am I over-credulous?" he asked. + +"Thou art. Thou believest this Hebrew to be honest in his show of +interest in his people?" + +"I can not doubt him, Ta-user. One has but to see him to be convinced." + +"One has but to see him to know that he might be coaxed into +passiveness with that for which an Israelite would sell his +mummy--gold!" + +"Nay! Nay!" Seti exclaimed. "Thou dost wrong him! He is the soul of +misdirected zeal. His is an earnestness not to be frightened with +death nor abated with bribes." + +She laughed a cool little laugh. + +"Deliver to him but the price he names, and the Israelitish unrest will +settle like a swarm of smoked bees." + +"Ta-user, it is thou that art deceived," Seti remonstrated. "Even the +Pharaoh does not hesitate to assert that Mesu is terribly upright. Not +even he would dream of offering the wizard Hebrew a peace-tribute." + +Once again she laughed. "Mind me, I speak reverently of the divine +Meneptah, the Shedder of Light, but I do not marvel that he is no more +willing to deliver over to Mesu one color of gold than another." + +Seti looked at her with a puzzled expression. Gazing down into his +eyes, she said with sudden solemnity: + +"My Prince, may I give my life into thy hands?" + +Impulsively he pressed her hand to his lips. + +"The gods overtake me with their vengeance if I guard it not," he +exclaimed. + +She drew him from his place on the parapet and led him to a seat in a +corner near the double towers. There she sat, and he dropped down at +her feet. He crossed his arms over her lap and lifted his face to her. +For a moment she was silent, contemplating the young countenance. What +were the thoughts that came to her then? Did she applaud or rebuke +herself? Did she pity or despise him? + +Is there more of evil than of good wrought by the mind working silently? + +Seti was ripe to be plucked by treachery. His was the faith that is +insulted by a suggestion of wariness. + +"While I dwelt obscurely in the Hak-heb," she began, "I was much among +the partizans of Amon-meses. They are friends of the Pharaoh now, so +what I tell is dead sedition. But I heard it when it lived, and thou +knowest the penalty invited by him who listens to criticism of the +king. Attend me, then, for the story is short. + +"The history of Mesu is an old tale to thee. Thy noble grandsire's +first queen, Neferari Thermuthis, adopted the Hebrew, and when she died +he shared in the allotment of her treasure. But Mesu was an exile in +Midian at the time, and his share was left with Shaemus, then the heir, +to be given over to the foster-son when he should return. But Shaemus +died, and all thy father's older brothers, so the gracious Meneptah +came to wear the crown. To him fell the guardianship of the Hebrew's +treasure till what time he should return out of Midian. Mesu hath +returned. Hath thy father delivered to him his inheritance?" + +Seti's face flamed, but, before he could speak, she went on. "Not so; +not one copper weight. It lies untouched in the treasury. Thine +august sire does not use it, because he hath wealth more than he can +spend. But it is the Hebrew's, and if it were delivered into his hands +it would redeem Egypt. I know it. There, it is done. My life is in +thy hands." + +The prince looked at her with wide eyes, his cheeks flushed, his lips +silent. + +"Wouldst thou have proof?" she continued recklessly. "Seek out Hotep, +who hath been keeper of the records at Pithom and ask him." + +"Did he tell thee?" Seti demanded. + +"Nay; I learned it from another source, not in the palace." The prince +lapsed into silence, his eyes averted. Ta-user regarded him intently. +Suddenly he raised his head. + +"Dost thou know the amount of his share?" he asked. + +"It is but a moderate part of the queen's fortune, since each of the +king's children by his many women was included." + +Seti winced, for there was something dimly offensive in the calm way +she stated the bald fact. + +"It is not much, as princely dowers go," she added casually. + +"He shall have it," Seti said almost impatiently. "Out of mine own +wealth he shall have it--not as a bribe--he would not have it so--but +because it is his." + +She caught his hands to her breast and cried out in delight. + +"And I shall be thy lieutenant, and none shall know of it, save thee +and me." + +He smiled up at her. + +"Nay, there is danger in this," he said gently, "and I would not +imperil thee. Already thou hast overstepped safety for Egypt's sake +and mine. More than this I will not let thee do." + +An expression of panic swept over her face. He interpreted it as hurt. + +"Thou hast been my guide for so long, Ta-user. Let me choose this once +for thee." + +She pouted, and putting him away from her, arose and left him. He +followed her and took her hands. + +"A confederate thou must have," she complained; "and whom dost thou +trust more than Ta-user?" + +"It is not a matter of trust," he explained, "but of thine immunity +should the Hathors frown upon my plan." + +"It matters not," she protested. "Whom wilt thou trust and imperil +instead of Ta-user?" + +"Thou dost hurry me in my plan-making," he remonstrated mildly. +"Mayhap I shall choose Hotep." + +She flung up her head, her face the picture of dismay. + +"Nay, nay! not Hotep! Of all thy world, not Hotep!" she exclaimed. + +He lifted his brows in amazement. + +"Surely thou dost not question his fidelity--his power?" + +"Nay! but dost thou not guess what he will do? Thou child! Abet thee! +Nay! he would set his foot upon thy plan and foil thee at once with his +politic hand." + +"Hotep will obey as I command; that thou knowest," he said with dignity. + +"Thou wilt not reach the point of command with him," she vehemently +insisted. "He would catch thine intent ere thou hadst stated it and +would make thee aghast at thyself in a twinkling by his smooth +reasoning and vivid auguries. Nay, if thou art to have thy way in +this, I wash my hands of it. We are as good as undone." + +She turned away from him, but he followed her contritely. + +"I submit," he said helplessly. "Advise me, but I--nay, ask me not to +endanger thee, Ta-user." + +She shook her head and moved on. He advanced a step or two after her, +stopped, and wheeling about, resumed his place at the parapet. + +After a little pause she was beside him again. + +"Shall we forego this thing?" she asked. + +"Nay," he answered quietly. "I can achieve it without help." She drew +a breath as if to speak but held her peace. They stood in silence side +by side for a while. + +Presently she slipped between him and the parapet. + +"Hast thou not called me wise in thy time?" she asked. "I believed +thee, then." + +"I told thee a truth, but I might have added that thou art over-brave," +he said, catching her drift. + +"Listen, then, to me. Thou, in thy young credulity, seest in this only +justice to an enemy. I, in the wisdom of riper years and the +discernment bred of experience with knaves, see in it the redemption of +Egypt. If the heaviest penalty overtook us is it not a result worth +achieving at any cost? Seti, believe me; grant me my belief! It is +the one hope of thy father's kingdom. Shall it fail because thou wast +envious for my safety above Egypt's? I can aid thee to success. That +thou hast said. If thou failest, though thou dost attempt it alone, +dost thou dream that I could see thee punished without crying out, 'It +was I who urged him!' If thou art undone, likewise am I. If thou art +to succeed, wilt thou selfishly keep thy success to thyself?" + +She slipped her arm about his neck and pressed close to him. + +"Nay, Seti, thou dost overestimate the peril. The Hebrew will not +betray us, and who else will know of it? I shall make a journey into +Goshen, find Mesu and bid him meet thee at a certain place. There thou +shalt come at a certain time with the treasure, and the feat is done. +But if we fail--" she flung her head back and bewitched him with a +heavy eye--"will it be hard for me to persuade the king?" + +Seti contemplated her with bewilderment in his face. The youth and +innocence in his young soul revolted, but there was another element +that yielded and was pleased. + +"Have it thy way, Ta-user," he said, with hesitation in his words, +while he continued to gaze helplessly into her compelling eyes. + +She laughed and kissed him. "I will see thee again soon." Putting him +back from her, she descended the stairway. + +In the shadow at the foot she came upon two figures, walking close +together, the taller of the two bending over the smaller. The pair +started apart at sight of the princess. + +"A blessing on thy content, Ta-meri," the princess said. "And upon +thine, Nechutes." + +The cup-bearer bowed and rumbled his appreciation of her courtesy. + +"Dost thou leave us, Ta-user?" his wife asked. + +"Aye, I return to the Hak-heb. O, I am glad to go. Would I could +leave the same quiet here in Tanis that I hope to find in Nehapehu." + +"Aye, I would thou couldst. But is it not true, my Princess, that one +may make his own content even in the sorriest surroundings?" Nechutes +asked. + +"For himself, even so. But the very making of one's selfish content +may work havoc with the peace of another. That I have seen." + +"Aye," Nechutes responded uncomfortably, wondering if the princess +meant to confess her disappointment to them. + +"It makes me quarrel at the Hathors. The most of us deserve the ills +that overtake us. But he--alas--none but the good could sing as he +sang!" + + +The cup-bearer dropped his indifference immediately. + +"Ha! Whom dost thou mean?" he demanded. + +"Oh!" the princess exclaimed. "Perchance I give thee news." + +"If thou meanest Kenkenes, indeed thou dost give us news. What of him? +We know that he is dead. Is there anything further?" + +"Of a truth, dost thou not know? Nay, then, far be it from me to tell +thee--anything." She passed round them and started to go on. In a few +paces, Nechutes overtook her. + +"Give us thy meaning, Ta-user," he said earnestly. "Kenkenes was near +to me--to Ta-meri. What knowest thou?" + +"The court buzzes with it. Strange indeed that ye heard it not. It is +said, and of a truth well-nigh proved, that the heart of the singer +broke when Ta-meri chose thee, Nechutes, and that--that the disaster +which befell him may have been sought." + +Nechutes seized her arm, and Ta-meri cried out, + +"He sent Ta-meri to me," the cup-bearer said wrathfully. "Thy news +is--" + +"Alas! Nechutes," the princess said sorrowfully, "it was sacrifice. +He knew that Ta-meri loved thee and he nobly surrendered, but was the +hurt any less because he submitted?" + +Nechutes released her and turned away. Ta-meri covered her face with +her hands and followed him. He did not pause for her, and she had to +hasten her steps to keep up with him. The princess looked after them +for a space and went on. + +Straight through the corridors toward the royal apartments she went. +Her copper eyes had taken on a luminousness that was visible in the +dark. There was an elasticity in her step that spoke of exultation. + +The Hathors were indulging her beyond reason. + +A soldier of the royal guard paced outside the doorway of the king's +apartments. Ta-user flung him a smile and, passing him without a word +of leave-asking, smiled again and disappeared through the door. + +Meneptah, who sat alone, raised his head from the scroll he was +laboriously spelling. If he had meant to resent the intrusion, the +impulse died within him at the charming obeisance the princess made. + +As she rose at his sign, Har-hat entered. Ta-user came near to the +king, smiling triumphantly at the fan-bearer. + +"The gods sped my feet," she said, "and I am here first. Hold thy +peace, noble Har-hat. Mine is the first audience." + +Having reached the king's side, she dropped on her knees and folded her +hands on the arm of his chair. + +"A boon, O Shedder of Light! So much thou owest me. Behold, I came to +thee on the hope of thy promises. What have I won therefrom? Naught +save, perchance, the smiles of Egypt at my disappointment." + +Meneptah's face flushed. + +"Say on, O my kinswoman," he said, moving uncomfortably. + +"Kinswoman! And a year agone, I thought to hear, 'O my daughter.'" + +The color in the king's face deepened. + +"Wilt thou reproach me, Ta-user, for my son's wilfulness?" was his +tactless reply. + +Ta-user shot an amused glance at the discomfited countenance of Har-hat +and went on. + +"Nay, O my Sovereign. I do but wish to incline thine ear to me. Say +first thou wilt grant me my boon." + +He looked at her doubtfully, but she drew nearer and lifted her face to +his. + +"I do not ask for thy crown, or thy son, or for an army, or treasure, +or anything but that which thou wouldst gladly give me, because of thy +just and generous heart." + +The doubt faded out of his face. + +"Thou hast my word, Ta-user." + +"And for that I thank thee." She bent her head and touched her lips to +the hand lying nearest her. + +"Give me ear, then," she continued. "Thou hast among thy ministers a +noble genius, the murket, Mentu--" + +The king broke in with a dry smile. "Wouldst have him for a mate?" + +She shook her head till the emeralds pendent from the fillet on her +forehead clinked together. Nothing could have been more childlike than +the pleased smile on her face. + +"Nay, nay, he would not have me," she protested. "But he hath a son." + +Har-hat moved forward a pace. She noted the movement and playfully +waved him back. "Encroach not. This hour is mine." Har-hat's face +wore a dubious smile. + +"He hath a son," she repeated. + +"He had a son, but he is dead," the king answered. + +"Not so! He is in prison where thy counselor, the wicked, unfeeling, +jealous, rapacious Har-hat hath entombed him!" + +Har-hat sprang forward as the king lifted an amazed and angry face. + +"Back!" she cried, motioning at him with her full arm. "It is time the +Hathors overtook thee, thou ineffable knave!" + +"I protest!" the fan-bearer cried, losing his temper. + +"Enough of this play," Meneptah said sternly. "Go on with thy tale, +Ta-user. I would know the truth of this." + +"Thou wilt not learn it from the princess," Har-hat exclaimed. + +"Ah!" Ta-user ejaculated, a world of innocence, surprise and wounded +feeling in the word. + +"Thy words do not become thee, Har-hat," Meneptah said. The fan-bearer +closed his lips and gazed fixedly at the princess. + +She drooped her head and went on in a voice low with hurt. + +"The gods judge me if my every word is not true! Har-hat imprisoned +him because the gallant young man loved the maiden whom Har-hat would +have taken for his harem." + +Meneptah's face blazed. "Go on," he said sharply. + +"The fan-bearer had some little right on his side, for the young man +had committed sacrilege in carving a statue, and had stolen the maiden +away and hidden her when Har-hat would have taken her. The maiden is +an Israelite, and her hiding-place is known to this day only by herself +and her unhappy lover. Now comes thy villainy, O thou short of +temper," she continued, looking at the fan-bearer. + +"Thy father, O Shedder of Light, the Incomparable Pharaoh who reigns in +Osiris, gave Mentu a signet--" + +The king interrupted. "I know of that. Go on." + +"When Kenkenes was overtaken and thrust into prison he sent this signet +to thee, O my Sovereign, with a petition for his release and for the +maiden's freedom. The writing and the signet came into Har-hat's hands +and he ignored them, though the signet commanded him in the name of the +holy One." Her voice lowered with awe and dismay at his unregeneracy. +"Kenkenes is still in prison." + +"Now, by the gods, Har-hat!" Meneptah exclaimed angrily. "I would not +have dreamed such baseness in thee!" + +The fan-bearer was stupefied with wrath and astonishment. Words +absolutely refused to come to him. Ta-user accused him with the wide +eyes of fearless righteousness. Presently she went on: + +"Already hath he languished eight months in prison. His offense +against the gods and against the laws of the land hath been expiated. +I would have thee set him free now, O Meneptah, that he may return to +his love and comfort her." + +Meneptah reached for the reed pen. + +"Hold!" cried Har-hat. + +"Thou dost forget thyself, good Har-hat," the princess said with +dignity. "Thou speakest with thy sovereign." + +"But I will be heard!" he exclaimed violently. "Hear me! I pray thee, +Son of Ptah!" + +Meneptah removed the wetted pen and waited. + +"Thou didst give the maiden to me thyself!" he began precipitately. +"Thy document of gift I have yet. He stole her, hid her away, +committed sacrilege and abused two of my servants nigh unto death when +they sought for her. Hath he any more right to her than I? Art thou +assured that he hath an honorable purpose in mind for her? She is +comely and well instructed in service, and I would have put her in my +daughter's train, even as the Hebrew Miriam was lady-in-waiting to +Neferari Thermuthis. If thou dost examine the records of the petitions +to thee thou wilt find that I asked her expressly for household +service. It is false that I had any other purpose in mind. + +"As to the signet," he continued breathlessly, "there is no word upon +it concerning the palliation of a triple crime! Shall we invoke the +king in the blameless name of the holy One, and demand forgiveness in +the name of Him who forgiveth no sin? Furthermore, thou didst give the +writing into my hands, and in obedience to thy command, I acted as I +thought best. My purposes have been wilfully distorted!" + +Meneptah frowned with perplexity. But while he pondered, Ta-user drew +near to him and said to him very softly: + +"If his words be true, O my Sovereign, one lovely Israelite is as +serviceable as another. The young man loves this maiden. Doubt it +not! He is a worthy off-spring of that noble sire, Mentu. If he +offended, he hath suffered sufficiently. Let him go, I pray thee." + +"It is my word against her surmises, O Meneptah," Har-hat insisted. + +The king frowned more and stroked his cheek. + +"Thine anger should be abated by this time, Har-hat," he said feebly. + +"His rebellion is not yet broken. I have not the slave yet," the +fan-bearer retorted. + +"Mayhap he is ready to surrender her now." + +"Not so!" the princess put in. "He hath endured eight months. If it +were eight hundred years his silence would be the same. It is proof of +my boast that he loves her. No man who would comfort his flesh alone +would suffer such lengths of mortification of flesh! Let him go, my +King, and give the clean-souled fan-bearer another Israelite for his +daughter." + +"Why camest thou not sooner with this to the king?" Har-hat demanded. + +"I have but this moment learned of it, and I could not leave the court +without one last act for the good of the oppressed," she replied. + +"Have it thy way, Ta-user. Come to me in an hour," Meneptah began. + +"Nay, write it now." + +"Thou art insistent." + +"Thou didst promise," she whispered, her face so close to his that the +light from the facets of her emeralds turned on his cheek. + +He took up his pen and wrote. + +"Now promise that the signet shall go back to Mentu," she continued. + +"As thou wilt, Ta-user," the king replied. + +She caught up the roll, hesitated for a moment, and then kissed his +cheek deliberately and was gone. + +A moment later Har-hat overtook her in the hall. + +"Hyena!" he exclaimed. "What is thy game?" + +She laughed and shook the scroll in his face. + +"It is my turn at the pawns now. Thou didst play between me and the +crown. Now I shall harass thee for the joy of it. Thinkest thou I +cared aught for the dreamer and his loves? Bah! I heard this tale +eight months agone while I had naught to do but eavesdrop. Nay, it was +but my one chance to vex thee." + +Again she laughed and ran away to the queen's apartments. + +"I am come to bid thee farewell," she said, kneeling before the pale +little woman who loved the king. The princess put up her face to be +kissed. + +"Not my lips!" she cried warningly. "They yet tingle with the kiss of +Meneptah, thy husband. I would not have the ecstasy spoiled by +another's touch." + +The queen flushed and kissed the cheek. + +"Farewell, and peace go with thee," she said quietly. + +The princess retained her composure until she reentered the hall. +There she flung her arms above her head and laughed silently. + +"Of a truth, I take peace with me, and I leave discord behind!" + + + +[1] Shadoof--a pole with a bucket attached, like the old well-sweep, +used by rustics to dip water from the Nile. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +RACHEL'S REFUGE + +Rachel stood by the parapet on the top of the Memphian house of +Har-hat. About her were no evidences of her former serfdom. She wore +an ample robe of white linen, with blue selvages heavily fringed. +About her neck was the collar of gold. The costume was distinctly +Israelitish, elaborated somewhat at the suggestion of Masanath, to whom +Rachel's golden beauty was a never-lessening wonder. Compared to the +tiny gorgeous lady, Rachel was as a tall lily to a mimosa. + +Masanath was comfortably pillowed on cushions, close to the Israelite. +The rose-leaf flush on her little face was subdued and her dark eyes +were larger than usual. The physical discomforts of the plagues had +overtaken her; and Rachel, the only one of all the household who had +passed unscathed through the troublous time, had been so tender a nurse +that Masanath recovered with reluctance. + +This was the Egyptian's first day on the housetop, and she was not +happy. The great pots of glazed earthenware, each a small garden in +size, were filled with baked earth. The locusts had taken her flowers. +In the park below the grass was gone and the palm trees were +shadowless. Her chariot horses had died in the stables; her pets had +drooped and perished; her birds were missing one morning, and Rachel +said they had flown to Goshen, where there were grain and grasses. +Furthermore, the year of freedom had almost expired and she began to +anticipate sorrowfully. + +The period of the Israelite's residence with Masanath had been +uneventful save for those grim, momentous days of plague and loss. +Deborah had survived the removal to comfort in Memphis only a month. +The brutal injuries inflicted by the servants of Har-hat had been too +severe for her age-enfeebled frame to repair. So she died, blessing +the two young girls who had attended her, and promising peace and +happiness to come. Then they laid her in a new tomb cut in the rock +face of the Libyan hills and wrote on her sarcophagus: + +"She departed out of the land of Mizraim before her people." + +And this was prophecy. + +Thus was Rachel left, but for Masanath, entirely alone. None of the +afflictions had overtaken her. A mysterious Providence shielded her. +Anubis, which she formally claimed as hers, was the only one of the +numerous dumb dwellers in the fan-bearer's house that had escaped. And +of him there is something to be told. + +Shortly after the arrival of the Israelites in Memphis, Anubis +disappeared for days. + +"He is gone to visit the murket," Masanath explained. + +One noon Rachel, resting on the housetop with her hostess, saw him +leisurely returning, by starts of interest and recollection. Behind +him, walking cautiously, was a man. + +"Anubis returneth," Rachel said, sitting up. + +Masanath raised herself and looked. + +"Imhotep[1] plagues mine eyes, or that is the murket following him," +she exclaimed. + +Immediately Rachel began to tremble and, sinking back on her cushions, +hid her face. Masanath continued to watch the approaching man. + +"If he comes shall I send for thee?" she asked in a half-whisper. + +The Israelite shook her head. "Only if he asks for me," she answered. + +"A pest on the creature!" Masanath exclaimed impatiently after a little +silence. "He is torturing the man! Hath he forgot the place?" + +She leaned over the parapet and called the ape. The murket looked up. + +"Anubis is my guest, noble Mentu," she replied. "Wilt thou not come up +with him?" + +The murket looked at her a moment before he answered. + +"Nay, I thank thee, my Lady. I left the noonday meal that I might be +led at the creature's will. He is restless since my son is gone." + +Every word of the murket's fell plainly on Rachel's ears. The tones +were those of Kenkenes, grown older. The statement came to her as a +call upon her knowledge of the young artist's whereabouts. + +"Tell him--tell him--" she whispered desperately. + +"What?" asked Masanath, turning about. + +"Tell him where Kenkenes went!" + +The Egyptian leaned over the parapet. "Fie! he is gone!" she said. +"Nay, but I shall catch him;" and flying down through the house, out +into the narrow passage, she overtook the murket. + +This is what she told Rachel when she returned: + +"I said to him: 'My Lord, I know where Kenkenes went.' And he said: +'Of a truth?' in the calmest way. 'Aye,' said I. 'It hath come to +mine ears that he went to Tape,' 'That have I known for long,' he +answered, after he had looked at me till I wished I were away. 'That +have I known for long, and why he went and why he came not back,' and +having said, he smoothed my hair and told me I was not much like my +father, and departed without another word. To my mind he hath +conducted himself most strangely. I doubt not he knows more than you +or I, Rachel." + +To Masanath's dismay the Israelite flung herself face down on the rugs +and wept. "He is not dead; he is not dead," she cried. + +The collapse of a composure so strong and bridled filled Masanath with +consternation. Had Rachel's spirit been of weaker fiber the Egyptian's +own forceful individuality would have longed to sustain it, but when it +broke in its strength she knew that here was a stress of emotion too +deep for her to soothe. + +"Then if he is not dead," she said, searching for something to say, +"why weepest thou?" + +"Alas! seest thou not, Masanath? He hath not returned to me; his +father knows his story, and if he be not dead how shall I explain his +absence save that he hath forgotten or repented?" + +"Not so!" Masanath declared. "He is the soul of honor, and there is a +mystery in this that the gods may explain in time. Comfort thee, +Rachel, for there stirreth a hope in me." Then with the utmost tact +she told the story of the finding of Kenkenes' boat and the theory +accepted in Memphis. + +"I can offer thee hope," she concluded, "but I can not even guess what +should keep him so long. Of this be assured, however, he did not +desert thee, Rachel." + +Enigmatical as it was, the incident was comforting to Rachel. + +So the Nile rose and subsided, the winter came and went, and now it was +near the middle of March, Masanath forgot Kenkenes and remembered her +own sorrow now that its consummation was surely approaching. During +the hours that darkened gradually Rachel was to her an ever-responsive +comforter. Even in the dead of night, if the weight of her care +burdened her dreams so that she stirred or murmured, she was instantly +soothed till she slept again. Usually the day did not harass her with +oppression, but if she grew suddenly afraid, Rachel was at her side to +comfort her--never urging, either to rebellion or submission, but ever +offering hope. + +So the little Egyptian came to love the Israelite with the love that +demands rather than gives--the love of a child for the mother, of the +benefited for the benefactor. Gradually Rachel lost sight of her own +trouble in her devotion to Masanath. She had no time for her own +thoughts. Each passing day brought the Egyptian's martyrdom nearer, +and Rachel's uses hourly increased. + +This day Masanath, who had been ill, was unusually downcast. + +"It may be," she said with more cheer in her tones than had been in her +previous remarks, "that I shall die before they can wed me to Rameses." + +"Nay, why not say that the Lord God will interfere before that time?" + +"Evil and power have joined hands against me, and even the gods are +helpless against such collusion," Masanath answered drearily. + +"The sorrows of Egypt are not yet at an end; mayhap the hand of the God +of Israel will overtake the prince." + +"Thy God is afflicting, not helping; He will not spare me." + +"The hand of the Lord is lifted against Egypt. Will He bless the land, +then, with such a queen as thou wouldst be?" + +"Nay, but thine is a strange God! Mark thou, I doubt Him not! But ai! +I should face Him for ever in sackcloth and ashes lest He smite me for +smiling and living my life without care." + +"Hath an ill befallen Israel?" + +"If thou art Israel, nay! Thou hast flourished in this dread time like +a palm by a deep well." + +"So he prospereth all his chosen." + +Masanath shook her head and looked away. From the stairway Nan +approached. + +"Unas hath come from Tanis, my Lady," she said with suppressed +excitement. Masanath sat up, trembling. + +"Isis grant he hath not come to take thee to marriage," the waiting +woman breathed. Rachel laid an inquiring hand on the little Egyptian's +arm. + +"My father's courier," she explained. "Let him come up," she continued +to Nari. The waiting woman bowed and left her. + +Rachel arose and took a place on the farther side of the hypostyle, +with the screens of matting between her and Masanath. She was still in +hiding. + +The fat servitor came up presently. + +"The gracious gods have had thee under their sheltering wings during +these troublous times," he said, bowing. "It is worth the trip from +Tanis to look upon thee." + +"Thy words are fair, Unas. How is it with my father?" Masanath asked +with stiff lips. + +"The gods are good to the Pharaoh. They permit the wise Har-hat to +continue in health to render service to his sovereign." + +Masanath, dreading the news, asked after it at once. Men have killed +themselves for fear of death. + +"Thou hast come to conduct me to court?" + +"That is the gracious will of my master." + +Masanath half rose from her seat. "When?" she asked almost inaudibly. + +"In twenty days; no more. I have a mission to perform and shall go +hence immediately. But I shall return in twenty days, never fear, my +Lady." + +Masanath saw that he mocked her. Her wrath was an effective +counter-irritant for her trouble. She was calm again. + +"Then, if thy message is delivered, go!" + +He backed out and descended the stairway. + +When she was sure he was gone she flung herself, in a paroxysm of wild +grief and despair, face down on her cushions. At that moment a cold +hand caught her arm. She looked up and saw Rachel. All the blue had +gone from the Israelite's eyes, leaving them black with dreadful +conviction. The color had receded from her cheeks and her figure was +rigid. + +"Who was that man?" she demanded in a voice low with concentrated +emotion. + +"Unas, my father's man. What is amiss, Rachel?" + +The Israelite stood for a moment as though she permitted the +intelligence to assemble all the further facts that it entailed. Then +she turned away and walked swiftly toward the well of the stair. + +"Rachel! Thou--what--thou hast not answered me," Masanath called. + +"There is naught to be said. I--it were best that I go to my people +now, since thou goest to marriage," was the unready reply. + +"Thou wilt return to thy people! Rachel! Nay, nay I Thou art all I +have. Come back! Come back!" Masanath cried, running after her. + +Rachel hesitated, trembling with a multitude of emotions. + +"It were better I should go," she insisted, trying to escape Masanath's +clasp. "If I go now I can reach my people and be hidden safely." + +The little Egyptian flung herself upon the Israelite, weeping. + +"Art thou, too, deserting me--thou, who art the last to befriend me? +What have I done that thou shouldst desert me?" + +"Naught! Naught! Thou dear unfortunate!" was the passionate reply. +"But I must go! I must!" + +"Thou must flee from sure safety to only possible security!" Masanath +demanded through her tears. "If I must wed this terrible prince, I +shall put my misery to some use. I shall ask thy liberty at his hands +and thou shalt live with me for ever, my one comfort, my one support." + +"But Israel departeth shortly--" + +"Thou shalt not go," Masanath declared hysterically. "I will not +suffer thee! The doors shall be barred against thy departure!" + +Rachel turned her head away and pushed back her hair. Her plight was +desperate. Meanwhile Masanath went on. + +"It is not like thee, Rachel, to desert me! I had not dreamed thee so +selfish--so cruel!" + +"Sister!" Rachel cried, "thou torturest me!" On a sudden Masanath +raised her head and gazed at the Israelite. + +"What possessed thee to go?" she demanded. "Is it Rameses who hath +beset thee?" + +Rachel shook her head and avoided Masanath's eye. + +"Tell me," the Egyptian insisted. "There is mystery in this. What had +my father's man to do with thy hasty resolution to depart?" + +There was no answer. Masanath put the Israelite back from her a little +and repeated her question. + +"I can not tell thee," Rachel responded slowly. + +Silence fell, and Masanath spoke at last, in a decided voice. + +"Thou art within my house, and so under my command. Thou shalt not +leave me! I have said!" She turned to go back to her cushions. +Rachel followed her. + +"I pray thee, Masanath--" + +"Hold thy peace. Let us have no more of this." + +Rachel grew paler, and she clasped her hands as though praying for +fortitude. At last she broke out: + +"Masanath! Masanath! That man--that Unas--attended the noble who +halted me on the road to the Nile, that morning; he was the one sent +back to Memphis for the document of gift; he pursued me into the hills. +He is the servant of the man who follows me!" + +The Egyptian recoiled as though she had been struck. + +"Nay, nay," she cried, throwing up her hands as though to ward off the +conviction. "Not my father! Not he! Thou art wrong, Rachel!" + +"Would to the Lord God that I were, my sister! But I am not mistaken +in that face. He was the one that disputed with Kenkenes--was the one +Kenkenes choked. Never was there another man with such a voice, such a +face, such a figure! It is he!" + +Masanath wrung her hands. + +"Tell it over again. Describe the noble to me." + +"He was third in the procession and drove black horses--" + +"Holy Mother Isis! his horses were black. The first two would have +been the princes of the realm, the next the fan-bearer. Nay, I dare +not hope that it is not true. Since he would barter his own daughter +for a high place, he would not hesitate to take by force the daughter +of another. O Mother of Sorrows, hide me! my father! my father!" she +wailed. + +Under the combined weight of her griefs, she dropped on the carpeted +pavement and wept without control. All of Rachel's fear and horror +were swept away in a wave of compunction and pity. She lifted the +little Egyptian back upon her cushions again and, kneeling beside her, +took the bowed head against her heart. Her hair fell forward and +framed the two sorrowing faces in a shower of gold. + +"Lo! I have been a guest under thy roof and at thy board, a pensioner +upon thy cheer, and now, even while my heart was full of gratitude, +have I encroached upon thy happiness and broken thine overburdened +heart. Forgive me, Masanath. Let me not come between thee and thy +father, sister! Let me return to my people, for Israel shortly goeth +forth. Doubt it not. Then shall I be out of his reach, and the Lord +will not lay up the sin against him. Furthermore, dost thou not +remember Deborah's words while the spirit of prophecy was upon her? +Promised she not peace for us, and happiness and long tranquillity to +follow these days of sorrow? Do thou have faith, Masanath. Cease not +to hope, for the forces of evil have never yet triumphed wholly." + +"Nay, but how shall that restore my pride in my father?" Masanath +sobbed. "How shall I ever think of him without the bitterness of +shame? What must the world think of him--of me? Now I know what the +murket meant. He knew, and Kenkenes knew and all-- Alas! alas!" she +broke forth in fresh grief, "and Hotep knows!" + +Rachel could say no more, for in this sorrow no comfort could avail. + +She stroked the little Egyptian's hair and let the wounded heart soothe +itself. + +Presently Masanath's mind wandered from the new villainy of her father +to the memory of the older offense and she wept afresh. + +"If thou goest, Rachel, there is none left to comfort me," she mourned. +"I am alone--desolate, and the powers of Egypt are arrayed against me!" +Rachel was hearing her own plight given expression. She put aside any +thought of herself and applied herself to Masanath's need. + +"Nay, there is Hotep," she whispered. "He loves thee, and if there is +aught in prophecy, he will comfort thee when I am gone." + +"But thou shalt not go," Masanath cried. "Stay with me, Rachel." + +"Thy father's servant returneth in twenty days. As I have said, if I +go now, I can reach my people and be hidden safely." + +The Egyptian held fast to the Israelite and wept. + +"Nay, Rachel. Stay with me. Thou art all I have!" + +Rachel turned her head and gazed toward the south. Across the +housetops, the far-off sickle of the Nile curved into a crevice between +the hills and disappeared. Somewhere beyond that blue and broken +sky-line her last claim to Egypt had been lost. Why should she stay +when Kenkenes was gone? Meanwhile Masanath went on pleading. + +If she departed, the next day's sun might dawn upon him in Memphis, +searching and sorrowing because he found her not. The hour of +separation might be delayed for twenty days--in that time he might come. + +"I will stay till my people go--if they depart within twenty days," +Rachel made answer. "But I must be gone ere thy father's servant +returns." + +Masanath rebelled, sobbing. + +"Nay, weep not. The hour is distant. In that time, since these are +days of miracles, thy sorrows and mine may have faded like a mist. +Come, no more. Let us bide the workings of the good God." + + + +[1] Imhotep--The physician-god. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII + +BACK TO MEMPHIS + +The valley in which Thebes Diospolis was situated was wide and the +overflow of the Nile did not reach the arable uplands near the Arabian +hills. Three thousand years before, Menes had established a system of +irrigation which had added hundreds of square miles to the agricultural +area of Egypt, and every monarch after him had unfailingly preserved +the institution. From Syene to Pelusium the country was ramified with +canals, and vast sums and great labor were expended yearly upon their +keeping. + +Since the work was heavy and the demand for it constant, it became a +punitive part of each nome's administration. Therefore, the convicts +whose misdeeds were too serious to be punished adequately by the +bastinado or the fine, and yet not grave enough to merit a sentence to +the quarries or the mines, were sent to the canals. + +So here in the canals of the eastern Thebaid, was Kenkenes, a prisoner +known only by a number. His fellows were unjust public weighers, +usurers, rioters, habitual tax-evaders, broken debtors, forgers and +housebreakers. + +The season of toil had been unusually severe. The native convicts had +more to endure than the lash, the bitter fare, the terrible sun by day, +and a bed of dust by night, for the afflictions that befell all Egypt +were theirs also. The strange prisoner among them suffered these +things and had further the drawback of his own physical strength to +combat. The plagues overcame the weaker convicts and decimated the +number of laborers, so Kenkenes was put, alone, to the work that two +men had done before. + +However, the accumulation of toil came upon him gradually and his +supple frame toughened as the demand upon it increased. Nor was he +sensible of pain or great weariness, for his mind was far away from the +sun-heated desert of the eastern Thebaid. He spoke seldom, and held +himself aloof from his fellow prisoners. He regarded his taskmasters +as if they were written authority no more animate than watered scrolls +of papyrus. No one doubted from the beginning that he was high-born, +and this mark of a great fall might have exposed him to abuse; but his +great strength and unusual deportment did not invite mistreatment. In +short, he was looked upon as mildly mad. + +When Kenkenes had rejected the gods, hope, sundered from faith, groped +wildly and desperately. In his rare moments of cheer he could not +anticipate freedom without trusting to something, and in his +misanthropy his doubt had placed no limit on its scope, questioning the +honor of king or slave. In these better moments he wanted to believe +in something. + +So constantly had his sorrows attended him that he had come to dread +the night, when there was neither event nor labor to interrupt their +dominance over his mind. He caught eagerly at any less troublous +problem that might suggest itself, for he felt that he had been +conquered by his plight. + +As he lay by night, apart from the rest of the prisoners, he gazed at +one glittering star that stood in the north. About it were +scintillating clusters, single stars and faint streaks of +never-dissipated mists. Night after night that one brilliant point had +remained unmoved in its steady gaze from the uppermost, but the +clusters rotated about it; the single stars were westward moving; the +mists shifted. And a question began to trouble him: What hand had +marshaled the stars? Seb,[1] whom Toth had supplanted? Osiris, whom +Set destroyed? The young man put them aside. They were feeble. +Nothing so weak had created the mighty hosts of heaven. So he began to +weigh the question. + +What hand had marshaled the stars? An accident? Since man must +worship something supernal, what more tremendous than the cataclysm, if +such it were, that evolved the stars. Had the same or a series of such +events brought forth the earth and man? Was the accident continuously +attendant? Did it spread the Nile over Egypt and call it again within +its banks every year? Did it clothe the fields and bring them to +harvest every revolution of the sun? Did it hang the moon like a +sickle in the west or lift it over the Arabian hills like a bubble of +silver every eight and twenty days? + +If it were omnipotent, infinite and omnipresent, could it be an +accident? If it were, why not worship it and call it God? + +The reasoning led him again in the direction of the gods, but he saw no +reason for a multiplicity of deities. Each member of the Egyptian +Pantheon presided over some special field of human interest or human +environment. To him, who had lived next to nature till her study had +become a worship, there were no flaws in her chronology, no +shortcomings or plethora. The earth responded to the skies; the waters +were in harmony with the earth, the harvests with all. There was unity +in the control over the universe and the hand that was powerful enough +to swing the moon was mighty enough to flood the Nile, was tender +enough to nourish the harvests, was wise enough to govern men. Where, +then, was any need of a superfluity of powers? + +But behold, something had thrust a dread hand between the tender +ministrations of this other Thing and the benefits to men. By this +time it had reached the remotenesses of Egypt that it was the God of +the Hebrews. The young man arrived at this alternative in his +reasoning: There was a minister of good and another of evil--two powers +presiding over the earth,--or,--the sole minister was offended and had +deserted its charge, or had loosed upon Egypt the evil at its command. +Here Kenkenes paused. He could not arrive at any conclusion on the +matter or convince himself that he had not reasoned well. + +Night after night, he fell asleep upon his ponderings, but they +returned to him with fresh food for thought after every sunset. The +reconstruction of something worshipful was more fascinating than had +been the demolition of the gods. It took many a night's meditation for +the evolution of any fixed idea from the bewildering convection of +thought. And at last he had concluded only that there was one +thing--Power--Purpose, which was greater than man. + +This was not a great achievement. He had simply permitted the +universal, indefinable claim to piety, inherent in every reasoning +thing, to assert itself. + +Great and sincere and beyond expression was his amazement and his joy +when a taskmaster called him from the canal-bed one day and informed +him that he was free. + +The order was shown him at his request, and the name of the Princess +Ta-user as his champion filled him with puzzlement. State news +filtered slowly down even to the level he had occupied for the past +eight months. He had heard that it was Masanath whom the Hathors had +destined to wear the crown of queen to Rameses; the convicts had known +of the supremacy of Har-hat. He could not understand how it came that +Ta-user, lately discarded, could prevail upon the crown prince to +persuade Meneptah, or could herself persuade the king to the overthrow +of the fan-bearer's wishes in the matter. Furthermore, why should the +princess have taken up his cause? But he did not tarry while he +pondered. + +His raiment and his money, conscientiously preserved for him by the +authorities, had been sent to him, and a little way outside the camp he +stepped from the lowest to his rightful rank, swifter than he had +descended from it. Covering his sun-burnt shoulders with his robes, +assuming the circlet once again, he went toward the distant city of +Thebes, once more in spirit and dress the son of the royal murket. + +At the heavy-walled prison across the Nile he asked after the signet. +It had not been returned with the writing. Neither was there any word +to him concerning his prayer to Pharaoh for the liberty of Rachel. It +began to dawn on him that he had been released only after he had been +sufficiently punished; that he had failed in the most vital aims of his +mission; that the signet, having been found, seemed now to be lost +irretrievably. For a space his relief at his freedom was overshadowed +by chagrin, but after a little he recovered himself. "At least I am +free to care for her, now," he reflected. + +Just as he emerged from the imposing doorway of the house of the +governor of police, he was jostled by a half-grown boy. To Kenkenes, +it seemed that the youth had been on the point of entering, but instead +he apologized inaudibly and walked away. + +A great rush of impatience, suspense, eagerness and heart-hunger fell +on the young artist the instant he knew his footsteps were turned +toward Memphis and Rachel. The six days that must intervene between +the present time and the moment he entered the old capital seemed +insufferable. Never did a lover so fume against the inexorable +deliberation of time and the obstinate length of distance. The +preliminaries to departure seemed to accumulate and lengthen--and +lessen in importance. Haste consumed him. Under a momentary impulse, +with all seriousness he began to consider his own fleetness of foot as +more expedient than travel by boat. But he put the thought aside, and +summoning as much patience as was possible, set about with all speed +preparing to depart. + +Thebes had not awakened from the coma of horror into which it had +lapsed during the great plagues. It was Kenkenes' first visit to the +city since he had left it for the desert, eight months before. Now, +the change in the great capital of the south impressed itself upon him, +in spite of his haste and his all-absorbing thought of Memphis. The +activities of life seemed to be suspended. The call to prayers could +be heard hourly from the great gongs of the temple at Karnak, when in +happier days the sound had been lost in the city's noises within the +very shadow of the pylons. He could hear strains of music in religious +processions, when the wind was fair, but he missed the acclaim of the +populace. Besides these sounds, silence had settled over Thebes. +Booths were closed in many instances; the streets, which ordinarily +were quiet, were now deserted; there were no carpets swinging from +balconies and housetops, and the citizens he saw were sober of +countenance and of garb. So few, indeed, he met, that he noted each +passer-by as an event. Once, some distance away from him, he saw again +the youth whom he had met in the doorway of the prison. + +At a caterer's he purchased supplies for a day's journey and looked +about him for a carrier. Catching the boy's eye, he beckoned him, but +the youth turned on his heel and disappeared. The son of the merchant +offering himself, Kenkenes continued rapidly toward the river where he +engaged a vessel to take him to Memphis. + +He roused the boatmen into immediate activity by promises of reward for +every mile gained over the average day's journey. Their passenger and +cargo shipped, the men fell to their oars and the craft shot out of the +still waters by the landings into midstream and turned toward the north. + +As they cleared, the private passage boat belonging to a nobleman swept +up near to them and crossing their track took the same direction +several hundred yards nearer the Libyan shore. Kenkenes noted that it +was a bari of elegant pattern, deep draft and more numerously manned +than his. He noted further that one of the boat's crew was the youth +he had met thrice in a short space at Thebes. + +"Small wonder that he was not willing to serve me," he commented to +himself. + +If he observed the companion boat during the next five days it was to +remark that since his own vessel kept sturdily alongside one of +superior rowing force his men were of a surety earning the promised +reward. When they entered the long straight stretches of the Middle +country the elegant stranger dropped behind and attended Kenkenes and +his crew more distantly thereafter. + +Except for these few occasions, Kenkenes had no thought of his +surroundings. He stood in the prow and looked down the shimmering +width of river, in the direction his heart had taken long before him. +And when the white cliffs that proved him close to Memphis came +shouldering up from the northern horizon, he had forgotten the stranger +in the eager, trembling anticipations that possessed him. + + + +[1] Seb--The Egyptian Chronos. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV + +NIGHT + +On the morning of the eighteenth day, immediately after sunrise, Rachel +came to the curtains over Masanath's door, and put them aside. + +Within, she saw her hostess yet in her bed-gown, her hair disordered +and her tiny feet bare. She stood before a shrine of silver, the +statue of Isis in turquoise displayed therein, and an offering of +pressed dates before it. But there was no sign of devotion or humility +in the attitude of the Egyptian. One plump arm was stretched toward +the image and the hand was tightly clenched. Neither was there any +reverence in her voice. + +Rachel dropped the curtain and waited. The words came distinctly +through the linen hangings. + +"Thou false one![1] thou ingrate! Is it for this that every day I have +sent two fat ducks to the altar in thy name? Is it that I must be +separated from my beloved and wedded to the man I hate, that I have +prayed to thee day and night? Who hath been more faithful to thee and +whom hast thou served more cruelly? Mark thou! If thou darest to +cause this thing to come to pass, night nor day shall I rest until I +have found the bones of Osiris and scattered them to the four winds of +heaven! So carefully shall I hide them, so widely shall I scatter +them, that no help of Nepthys, Toth or Anubis shall let thee gather +them up again! Aye, I will do it, though I die in the doing and remain +unburied, I swear by Set! Remember thou!" + +Rachel went softly away. + +After a time she returned. She had covered her white dress with a +mantle of brown linen and over her head she wore a wimple of the same +material. Her hair had been coiled and secured with a bodkin. When +she put her hand under the wimple and drew it across her mouth, only +her fair skin and blue eyes distinguished her from any other Egyptian +lady dressed for a long journey. + +She lifted the curtains and entered, and it was long before she came +forth again. Then her eyes were hidden and her head bowed, for she had +bidden farewell to Masanath. She was returning to Goshen. + +In the street before the house she entered her litter and with Pepi +walking beside her went to the Nile. And there they were joined by +Anubis. He had been absent for days, so his greeting was extravagant, +his loyalty inalienable. He entered the bari Pepi had loaded with +Rachel's belongings, and would not be coaxed or menaced into +disembarking. + +"Nay, let him come," Rachel said at last. "Thou canst set him on the +shore opposite the tomb. He will leave us willingly there." + +So they pushed away. + +Rachel wrapped her wimple about her face and removed it once only to +gaze at the quarries of Masaarah. They were deserted. Months before, +directly after the affliction of the Nile, the Israelites had been +returned to Goshen. + +After the bari had passed below the stone wharf, Rachel covered herself +and neither spoke nor moved. Her heart was heavy beyond words. + +Pepi broke the silence once. + +"Shall we drop the ape first, my Lady?" + +Rachel shook her head. Anubis was her last hold on Kenkenes. + +At the Marsh of the Discontented Soul, the bari nosed among the reeds +and grounded gently. Rachel stood for a moment gazing sadly across the +stretch of sand toward the abrupt wall against which it terminated +inland. Pepi, already on shore, reached a patient hand toward her and +awaited her awakening. Anubis landed with a bound and made in a series +of wide circles for the cliff. His escape aroused Rachel and she +stepped out of the boat. After a moment's thought, she bade Pepi pull +away from the shore and await her at a safe distance. + +"I shall stay no longer than to write my whereabouts on the tomb, but +thy boat here may attract the attention of others on the river, and +hereafter they might ask what thou didst in this place. And I am not +afraid." + +The slow Egyptian obeyed reluctantly, shaking his head as he stood away +from shore. + +With a sigh that was almost a sob, Rachel walked back over the sand +toward the cave that had been her only shelter once. + +She did not fear it. Kenkenes had crossed this gray level of sand in +the night and its wet border at the river had borne the print of his +sandal. He had made the tomb a home for her, he had knelt on its rock +pavement and kissed her hands in its dusk and had passed its threshold, +like a shadow, to return no more. And here, too, was the other +faithful suggestion of her lost love--the pet ape. How his fitful +fidelities had directed themselves to her! She caught him up as he +passed her. He struggled, turned in her arms, and then became passive, +breathing loudly. + +She climbed the rough steps and sat down on the topmost one to think. + +She was surrounded with old evidences of her sorrow. Nor was there any +cheer before her. Escape was in prospect, but it was liberty without +light or peace--a gray freedom without hope, purpose or fruit. Her +retrospect gradually brightened, never to brilliance but to a soft +luminance, brightest at the farthermost point and sad like the dying +daylight. She summarized her griefs--danger, death, suspense, shame +and long hopelessness. The lonely girl's stock of unhappiness took her +breath away and she pushed back the wimple as if to clear away the +oppression. + +Anubis realized his moment of freedom was short and with an instant +bound he was out and gone. + +In no little dismay Rachel started in pursuit, but she had not moved +ten paces from the bottom of the steps before she paused, transfixed. + +An Egyptian, not Pepi, was hauling a boat into the reeds. The craft +secure, he turned up the slant, walking rapidly. + +There was no mistaking that commanding stature. + +Anubis descended on him like an arrow. The man saw the ape, halted a +fraction of an instant, caught sight of Rachel, and with a cry, his +arms flung wide, broke into a run toward her. + +The ape bounded for his shoulder, but missed and alighted at one side, +chattering raucously. The running man did not pause. + +The world revolved slowly about Rachel, and the sustaining structure of +her frame seemed to lose its rigidity. She put out her hands, blindly, +and they were caught and clasped about Kenkenes' neck. And there in +the strong support of his tightening arms, her face hidden against the +leaping heart, all time and matters of the world drifted away. In +their place was only a vast content, featureless and full of soft dusk +and warmth. + +Gone were all the demure resolutions, the memory of faith or unfaith. +Nothing was patent to her except that this was the man she loved and he +had returned from the dead. + +Presently she became vaguely aware that he was speaking. Though a +little unsteady and subdued, it was the same melody of voice that she +seemed to have known from the cradle. + +"Rachel! Rachel!" he was saying, "why didst thou not go to my father +as I bade thee? Nay, I do not chide thee. The joy of finding thee +hath healed me of the wrench when I found thee not, at my father's +house, at dawn to-day. But tell me. Why didst thou not go?" + +"I--I feared--" she faltered after a silence. + +"My father? Nay, now, dost thou fear me? Not so; and my father is but +myself, grown old. He was only a little less mad with fear than I, +when he discovered that thou shouldst have come to him so long ago, and +camest not. It damped his joy in having me again, and I left him pale +with concern. Did I not tell thee how good he is?" + +"Aye, it was not that I feared him, but that I feared that thou--" And +she paused and again he helped her. + +"That I was dead? That I had played thee false? Rachel! But how +couldst thou know? Forgive me. Since the tenth night I left thee I +have been in prison." + +"In prison!" she exclaimed, lifting her face. "Alas, that I did not +think of it. It is mine to beg thy forgiveness, Kenkenes, and on my +very knees!" + +"So thou didst think it, in truth!" She hid her face again and craved +his pardon. + +But he pressed her to him and soothed her. + +"Nay, I do not chide thee. Had I been in thy place, I might have +thought the same. But it is past--gone with the horrors of this +horrible season--Osiris be thanked!" + +"Thanks be to the God of Israel," she demanded from her shelter. + +"And the God of Israel," he said obediently. + +"Nay, to the God of Israel alone," she insisted, raising her head. + +He laughed a little and patted her hands softly together. + +"It was but the habit in me that made me name Osiris. There is no god +for me, but Love." + +"So long, so long, Kenkenes, and not any change in thee?" she sighed. +"How hath Egypt been helped of her gods, these grievous days?" + +"The gods and the gods, and ever the gods!" he said. "What have we to +do with them? Deborah bade me turn from them and this I have done with +all sincerity. Much have I pondered on the question and this have I +concluded. Egypt's holy temples have been vainly built; her worship +has been wasted on the air. There was and is a Creator, but, Rachel, +that Power whose mind is troubled with the great things is too great to +behold the petty concerns of men. My fortunes and thine we must +direct, for though we implored that Power till we died from the fervor +of our supplications, It could not hear, whose ears are filled with the +murmurings of the traveling stars. Why we were created and forgotten, +we may not know. How may we guess the motives of anything too great +for us to conceive? Whatsoever befalls us results from our use at the +hands of men, or from the nature of our abiding-place. We must defend +ourselves, prosper ourselves and live for what we make of life. After +that we shall not know the troubles and the joys of the world, for the +tombs are restful and soundless. Is it not so, my Rachel?" + +She shook her head. "Thou hast gone astray, Kenkenes. But thou wast +untaught--" + +"I have reasoned, Rachel, and the Power I have found in my ponderings, +makes all the gods seem little. Thy God must manifest himself more +fearfully; he must overthrow my reasoning before I can bow to him. And +if, of a surety, he is greater than the Power I have made, will he need +my adoration or listen to my prayers? Nay, nay, my Rachel. If thou +wilt have me worship, let me fall on my face to thee--" + +She interrupted him with a quick gesture. + +"Kenkenes, have I prayed in vain for the light to fall on thee?" she +asked sadly. + +He smiled and moved closer, looking down into her face as he had done +when he studied it as Athor. + +"Nay, hast thou done that, and hast thou not been heard? Thou dost but +fix me in mine unbelief. Did any god exist he would have heard thy +supplications. Come, let us make an end of this. There are sweeter +themes I would discuss. Where hast thou been, these many months? Not +here in this haunted cave?" + +His lightness sank her hope to the lowest ebb. A sudden hurt reached +her heart. His unregeneracy suggested unfaithfulness to her. Their +positions had been reversed. It was she that had been denied. Duty +reasserted itself with a chiding sting. + +"I have been a guest with Masanath--" + +"The daughter of Har-hat!" he cried, retreating a step. + +"The daughter of mine enemy," she went on. "She found me here by +accident and took me to her home in Memphis. There Deborah died. And +there, eighteen days agone, I discovered who it was that sheltered me, +and now I return to my people." + +"The fan-bearer did not find thee?" he demanded at once. + +"Nay. Unseen, I looked upon his man. Alas! the wound to the +daughter-love in Masanath! On the morrow she departeth for Tanis where +she will wed with the Prince Rameses." + +Kenkenes' hands fell to his sides. "Nay, now! Of a surety, this is +the maddest caprice the Hathors ever wrought. In the house of thine +enemy! Well for me I did not know it! I should have died from very +apprehension. And all these months thou wast within sight of my +father's doors!" + +"I saw him once," she said. + +"And discovered not thyself! How cruelly thou hast used thyself, +Rachel. He would have told thee, long ago, why I came not back." + +"Aye, now I know; but, Kenkenes, I could not go, fearing--" + +"Enough. I forgot. Come, let us go hence. Memphis and my father's +house await thee now." + +"But I go to my people, even now," she answered, with averted face and +unready words. + +Kenkenes whitened. + +"And leave me?" he asked quietly. + +"Think me not ungrateful," she said. "I have said no words of thanks +since there is none that can express a tithe of my great indebtedness +to thee." + +"I have achieved nothing for thee. Not even have I won thy freedom. I +have failed. But shameless in mine undeserts, I am come to ask my +reward nevertheless." He was very near to her, his face full of +purpose and intensity, his voice of great restraint. + +"That which once thou didst refuse to hear, thou hast known for long by +other proof than words," he went on. "Let me say it now. I love thee, +Rachel." Taking her cold hands he drew her back to him. + +"Once I forbore," he continued, the persuasive calm in his manner +heightening, "because I knew it would hurt thee to say me 'nay,' I told +myself that I was brave, then, when the actual loss of thee was +distant. But thou wilt leave me now and my fortitude for thy sake is +gone. I am selfish because I love thee so. The extreme is reached. I +can withstand no more. Dost thou love me, Rachel?" + +What need for him to wait for the word that gave assent? Was there not +eloquent testimony in her every feature and in every act of that hour +he had been with her? But his hands trembled, holding hers, till she +told him "aye." + +"Then ask what thou wilt of me," he said, the restraint gone, +desperation taking its place. "I submit, so thou dost yield thyself to +me. Shall I pray thy prayers, kneel in thy shrines? Shall I go with +thee into slavery? Shall I learn thy tongue, turn my back on my +people, become one of Israel and hate Egypt? These things will I do, +and more, so I shall find thee all mine own when they are done." + +But she freed her hands to cover her face and weep. Kenkenes sighed +from the very heaviness of his unhappiness. + +"Thou shouldst hate me, if, to win thee, I bowed in pretense to thy +God," he said weakly. + +Perhaps his words awakened a hope or perhaps they made her desperate. +Whatever the sensation, she raised her head and spoke with a sudden +assumption of calm: + +"Naught could make me hate thee, Kenkenes, but I should know if thou +didst pretend. Thou art as transparent as air. Thou art honest, +guileless--too good to be lost to the Bosom that must have thrilled +with joy when he beheld what a beautiful soul His hands had wrought. +Few of His believers have conceived the greatness of Jehovah as thou +hast, O my Kenkenes. In that art thou proved ripe for His worship. +Thou hast found His might to be so limitless that thou thinkest thyself +as naught in His sight. In that hast thou gone astray. The mind is +gross that can not heed the weak and small. Shall we say that the +spinner of the gossamer, the painter of the rose is not fine? Shall He +forget His daintiest, frailest works for His mightiest? Thou, artist +and creator thyself, Kenkenes, answer for Him. Nay; not so! He, who +hath an ear to the lapse between an hour and an hour, hath counted His +song-birds and numbered His blossoms. For are they, being small, less +wondrous than the heavens, His handiwork? Shall He then fail to hear +the voice of His sons in whom He hath taken greater pains?" + +She paused for a moment and looked at him. His expression urged her on. + +"Does it not trouble thee when I, whom thou hast but lately known, am +in sorrow? How much more then does thine unhappiness vex His holy +heart, who fashioned thee, who blew the breath of life into thy +nostrils! Wilt thou deny the Hand that led thee to me, here, in this +hour--that cared for me during the season of distress and peril? Nay, +my beloved, there is no greater virtue than gratitude. It is an +essential in the make-up of the great of heart--wilt thou put it out of +thy fine nature?" + +Again she paused, and this time he answered in a half-whisper: + +"Thou dost shake me in mine heresy." + +"It is but newly seated in thy credence," she said eagerly, "and is +easy to be put aside--easier to cast off than was the idolatry. Put it +away in truth from thee and grieve thy Lord God no more." + +"Would that I could, now, this hour. We may discipline the soul and +chasten the body, but how may we govern the mind and its disorderly +beliefs? It laughs at the sober restraint of the will; my heart is +broken for its sake, but it is reprobate still." + +"And I have not won thee?" she asked, shrinking from him. + +"Give me time--teach me more--return not to Goshen. Come back to +Memphis with me!" he begged in rapid words, pressing after her. "No +man uncovered so great a problem, alone, in a moment. How shall I find +God in an hour?" + +"O had I the tongue of Miriam!" she exclaimed. + +"Go not yet. Wilt thou give me up, after a single effort? Miriam +could not win me, nor all thy priests. I shall be led by thee alone. +A day longer--an hour--" + +"But after the manner of man, thou wilt put off and wait and wait. +Thou art too able, Kenkenes, too full of power for aid of mine--" + +"Rachel, if thou goest into Goshen--" he began passionately, but she +clutched him wildly, as if to hold him, though death itself dragged at +her fingers. + +"Hide me!" she gasped in a terrified whisper. "The servant of Har-hat!" + +At the mention of his enemy's name, Kenkenes turned swiftly about. + +Two half-clad Nubians were at the river's edge, hauling up an elegant +passage boat. It was deep of draft and had many sets of oars. +Approaching over the sand, hesitatingly, and with timid glances toward +the tomb beyond, were four others. The foremost was the youth he had +seen in Thebes. The next wore a striped tunic. Fourth and last was +Unas. + +"Now, by my soul," Kenkenes exclaimed aloud, "there is no more mystery +concerning the boy." He turned and took Rachel in his arms. + +"Now, do thou test the helpfulness of thy God! I have been tricked and +I see no help for us. Enter the tomb and close the door, and since +thou lovest honor better than liberty, let this be thine escape." + +He put his only weapon, his dagger, into her hands. For an instant he +gazed at her tense white face; then bending over her, he kissed her +once and put her behind him. + +"Go," he said. + +"What want ye?" he demanded of the men. + +"A slave," Unas answered evilly, stepping to the fore. + +"Your authority?" The fat courier flourished a document and held up a +blue jewel, hanging about his neck. Meneptah had forgotten his promise +to return the lapis-lazuli signet to Mentu. + +"Thou art undone, knave!" the courier added with a short laugh. He +clapped his hands and the four Nubians advanced rapidly upon Kenkenes. +There was to be no parley. + +Kenkenes glanced at the youth. He was not full grown,--spare, light +and small in stature. + +"I am sorry for thee, boy," Kenkenes muttered. "Thy gods judge between +thee and me!" + +The Nubians, two by two, each man ready to spring, rushed. + +With a bound, Kenkenes seized the youth by the ankles and swung him +like an animate bludgeon over his head. The attacking party was too +precipitate to halt in time and the yelling weapon swung round, +horizontally mowing down the foremost pair of men like wooden pins. +The weight of the boy, more than the force of the blow, jerked him from +the sculptor's hands. Kenkenes recovered himself and retreated. As he +did so, he stumbled on a fragment of rock. He wrenched it from its bed +and balanced it above his head. + +The powerful figure with the primitive weapon was too savage a picture +for the remaining pair to contemplate at close quarters. Unas had made +no movement to help in the assault. He had felt the weight of the +sculptor's hand and had evidently published the savagery of the young +man to his assistants. They had come prepared to capture an athletic +malefactor, but here was a jungle tiger brought to bay. They retired +till their fallen fellows should arise. + +The vanquished were struggling to gain their feet, and Kenkenes noted +it with concern. He was not gaining in this lull. There were other +stones about him. He hurled the fragment with a sure aim, and a +Nubian, who had been overthrown, dropped limply and stretched himself +on the sand. + +With a howl the remaining three charged. They were too close for the +second missile of Kenkenes to do any slaughter, and he went down under +the combined attack, fighting insanely. + +"Slit his throat," Unas shrieked, tumbling on the captive, as Kenkenes' +superhuman struggles threatened to shake them off. One of the men +raised himself and made ready to obey. Holding to Kenkenes with one +hand, he drew a knife from his belt and prepared to strike. + +At that instant, the captive caught sight of a pale woman-face, the +eyes blazing with vengeance. There was a flash of a white-sleeved arm +and the thump and jolt of a dagger driven strongly through flesh. The +murderous Nubian yelled and tumbled, kicking, on the sand. He carried +a knife at the juncture of the neck and shoulder. + +Instantly there was a chorus of yells. + +"She-devil! Hyena!" + +Unas detached himself from the struggle and plunged after Rachel, now +in full sight of Kenkenes. He saw her retreat, warding off the fat +courier with her hands; he saw her stumble and fall; he saw Anubis fly, +with a chatter of rage, in the face of the courier, and struggling +mightily, he threw off his captors, and leaped to his feet. + +And then the light went out in Egypt! + + + +[1] It was not uncommon for Egyptians to threaten their gods. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV + +LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS + +A water-carrier in Syene was carrying a yoke across his shoulders and +the great earthen jars swung ponderously as he walked. His bare feet +disturbed the red dust of the path down to the granite-basined river, +and tiny clouds puffed out on each side of the way at every footfall. + +On a housetop in Memphis, a gentlewoman, in a single gauze slip and +many jewels, lounged on a rug and gazed at nothing across the city. A +flat-shanked Ethiopian fanned her listlessly and dreamed also. + +A little boy, innocent of raiment, stood before a new tomb, opposite +Tanis and awaited his father who labored within. + +The water-carrier collapsed in his tracks; the lady shrieked; the +Ethiopian dropped the fan; the little boy fell on his face--all at the +same instant. + +From the sea to the first cataract, from the deepest recess in the +Arabian hills to the remotest peak in the Libyan desert, Egypt was +blinded and muffled and smothered in a dead, black night--even darkness +that could be felt. + +Kenkenes stood still. Harsh hands were no longer on him and for an +instant no sound was to be heard. Profound gloom enveloped him. His +every sense was frustrated. + +Some one of his assailants had found his heart with a knife and this +was death, he thought. + +Then strange, far-off murmurings filled his ears. From the river and +beside him went up wild, hoarse cries of men in mortal terror. Memphis +began to drone like a vast and troubled hive. The distant pastures +became blatant and the poultry near the huts of rustics cackled in wild +dismay. In the hills about beasts whimpered and the air was full of +the screaming of bewildered birds. + +With the awakening of sound, Kenkenes knew that another plague had +befallen Egypt. + +The dread that might have transfixed him was overcome by the instant +recollection of Rachel's peril. No restraining hands were upon him, +but he stood yet a space attempting to catch some rift in the thick +night. There was not one ray of light. + +While he waited it was more distinctly borne in upon him that during +that space Rachel might suffer. He would go to her. + +The night made a wall ahead of him which was imminent and +indiscernible. It was like a great weight upon his shoulders and a +pitfall at his feet. + +He crouched and fumbled before him. His apprehension was physical; his +mind urged him; his body rebelled. He would have run but he could +barely force one foot ahead of the other. Illusory obstacles +confronted him. He waved his arms and put forward a foot. The ground +was lower than he thought, and he stepped weightily. He brought up the +other foot laboriously, hesitatingly. This was not advance, but +time-losing. + +Meanwhile, what might not be happening to Rachel in this chaos of gloom +and clamor? Why need he hide his escape? None of these near-by +assailants had any care now save for his own safety. + +He called her name loudly and listened. + +There was no answer in her voice. + +He forced himself to move, but had the next step led into an abyss his +feet could not have been more reluctant. He flailed the air with his +arms and accomplished another pace. He realized that he could not +reach, in an hour, at this rate, the spot in which he had last seen +her. Again he called, using his full lung power, but the only reply +was an echo, or the hoarse supplications of men, near him and on the +river. The river! Had Rachel gone that way too far and beyond +retreat? The thought chilled him with terror and horror. + +He execrated himself for his trepidation and strove wildly to proceed; +but strive as he might he could not advance. How long since the +darkness had fallen, and he had moved but two paces from the spot in +which it had overtaken him! The outcry near him subsided into low +murmurs of terror, and none lifted a voice in answer to his distracted +call. + +If Rachel had been near she would have replied to him. The +alternatives he had to choose as her possible fate were death in the +Nile or capture by Unas. The one he fought away from him wildly, the +other made him frantic. And the realization of his own helplessness, +with the picture of her distress at that moment, crushed him. + +A tangle of wind-mown reeds tripped him and pitched him to his knees +among the high marsh growth. + +He did not rise. + +The babe in pain cries to his mother; the man in his maturity may +outgrow the susceptibility to tears, but he never outwears the want of +a stronger spirit upon which to call in his hour of distress. + +For Kenkenes it had been a far cry, from his careless days and his +empyrean populous with deities, to this utter and unhappy night and one +unseen Power. In that time he had run the gamut of sensations from a +laugh to a wail. Now was his need the sorest of all his life. The +most helpful of all hands must aid him. His fathers' gods were in the +dust. What of that unapproachable, unfeeling Omnipotence he had +created in their stead? + +He fell on his face and prayed. + +"O Thou, who art somewhere behind the phantom gods that we have raised! +To whom all prayer ascends by many-charted paths; Thou who canst spread +this sooty night across the morning skies and turn to milk the bones of +men! Thou who didst undo my surest plans, who dost mock my boasted +power, who hast stripped me till my feeble self is bared to me even in +this dreadful night; Thou who wast a fending hand about her; who art +her only succor now--to whom she prays--and by that sign, Thou Very +God! I bow to Thee. + +"My lips are stiff at prayer to such as Thou. But what need of my +tongue's abashed interpretation of that which I would say, since even +the future's history is open unto Thee? + +"I have run my course without craving Thine aid, and lo! here have I +ended--a voice appealing through the night--no more. + +"Now, wilt Thou heed an alien's plea; wilt Thou know a stranger +petitioning before Thy high and holy place? How shall I win Thine ear? +Charge me with any mission, weight me with a lifetime of penances, +strip me of power everlastingly, but grant me leave to supplicate Thy +throne. + +"Not for myself do I pray, O Hidden God! Not one jot would I overtax +Thy bounty toward me beyond the sufferance of my devotion. But for her +I pray--for her, out somewhere in this unlifting gloom, her tender +maidenhood uncomforted--with night, with death, with long dishonor +threatening her. Attend her, O Thou august Warden! Let her not cry +out to Thee in vain! Be Thou as a wall about her, as a light before +her, as a firm path beneath her feet. Do Thou as Thou wilt with me. +Lo! I offer up myself as ransom for her--myself--all I have! Take her +from me, deny mine eyes the sight of her for ever, blot me wholly out +of her heart, yield me over to the wrath of mine enemies, and to Thine +unknowable vengeance thereafter; but save her, Great God! save her from +her enemy! + +"Dost Thou hear me, O Holy Mystery? Is there no sign, no manifestation +that Thou dost attend? + +"Nay, but I know that Thou hearest me! By my faith in Thy being I know +it, Lord!" + +Peace fell on him and he slept. + +In after years Kenkenes remembered only vaguely the long hours of that +black and lonely vigil. This climax to a calamitous space eight months +in length might have crushed a less sturdy spirit, but he was +mystically sustained. + +With the exception of a few intervals of short duration most of the +time was spent in sleep, so profound and dreamless as to border on +coma. The reeds had received him on a bed of crushed herbage and the +upstanding ranks about him sheltered him from the blowing sand. The +whilom assailants of the young man were not so kindly served by the +gods to whom they appealed loudly and frequently. The city in the +distance moaned and complained and the hills were full of fear. + +In one of his profound lapses of slumber a hairy paw felt of Kenkenes' +face. Later a drifting boat nosed about among the reeds at the water's +edge. Presently one of the crew cried out, and a second voice said: + +"Nay, fear not; it is an ape, by the feel of him. Toth is with us. It +is a good omen; let him not go forth." + +Silence fell again, for the boat drifted on. + +At last dawn-lights reddened about the horizon; stars faded out of the +uppermost as naturally as if they had been there during the three days +of unlifting night. All Egypt showed up darkly in the coming day. + +Kenkenes, in his couch of reeds, slept on peacefully. The mid-morning +sun shone in his face before he awakened. + +He leaped to his feet, cramped and stiffened by his long inactivity, +and looked about him. Near by was a disturbed spot of wide +circumference. Here had the struggle taken place. Here, also, some of +the sand was stained with the blood of the Nubian, who had been wounded +by Rachel. Fresh footprints led toward the water. He followed them +with a wildly beating heart. There were no marks of a little sandal. +At the Nile edge the deep line cut by a keel was still visible in the +wet sand. His own boat and the other were gone. All other signs had +been obliterated, for the wind had been busy during the darkness. + +Across the cultivated land, or rather the land which would have been +wheat-covered but for the locusts, he saw the huts of rustics, and to +each of these he went, asking of the pallid and terror-stricken tenants +if Rachel had come to them. Gaining no information, he went next to +Masaarah, appeasing his hunger with succulent roots plucked from the +loam beside the river. The quarries were deserted, the pocket in the +valley, where the Israelites had pitched their tents, was as solitary +as it had ever been. There was no place here to shelter the lost girl. + +There were the huts to the north of the Marsh and the deserted village +of Toora to search. He retraced his steps. + +As he came again before the tomb he went to it. Half-way up the steps +he stopped. + +On a blank face of the rock, sheltered by a jutting ledge above it, was +an inscription, a little faint, but he ascribed that to the poor +quality of the pencil and roughness of the tablet. This is what he +read: + + +"Her whom thou seekest thou wilt find in the palace of Har-hat, in the +city." + + +Perhaps under other circumstances Kenkenes would have understood +correctly the origin and intent of the writing. Already, however, his +fears pointed to the palace of Har-hat as the prison of Rachel, and +this faint inscription was corroboration. It appealed to him as +villainy worthy of the fan-bearer. It was like his exquisite +effrontery. + +Kenkenes whirled away with an indescribable sound, rather like the +snarl of an infuriated beast than an expression of a reasoning +creature. Dashing down the sand, he plunged into the Nile and swam +with superhuman speed for the Memphian shore. + +He defied death as a maniac does. The river was a mile in width and +teeming with crocodiles. But the same saving Providence that shields +the adventurous child attended him. He clambered up the opposite bank +and struck out for Memphis on a hard run. + +He had but one purpose and that was to find Har-hat and strangle him +with grim joy. The rescue of Rachel did not occur to him, for in his +excited mind the simple touch of the fan-bearer's hand was sufficient +to kill her with its dishonor. + +He did not remember anything that Rachel had told him concerning her +life in Memphis, or that Har-hat was in Tanis, and Masanath like to be +the only resident in the fan-bearer's palace. His reasoning powers +abandoned their supremacy to all the fierce impulses toward revenge and +bloodletting of which his nature was capable. + +Though it was day when he entered the great capital of the Pharaohs, +the streets were almost deserted, and every doorway and window showed +interiors brilliant with a multitude of lamps. Memphis was prepared +against a second smothering of the lights of heaven. + +The few pedestrians Kenkenes met fell back and gave room to the +dripping apparition which ran as if death-pursued. One told him on +demand where the mansion of Har-hat stood, and after a few slow minutes +he was within its porch. He flung himself against the blank portal and +beat on it. He did not pause to await a response. He felt within him +strength to batter down the doors if they did not open. + +Presently an old portress came forth from a side entry and Kenkenes +seized her. Fearing that she might cry out and defeat his purpose, he +put his hand over her mouth. + +"Your master," he demanded hoarsely. "Where is he? Answer and answer +quietly!" + +For a moment she was dumb with terror. + +"Gone," she gasped at last when Kenkenes shook her. + +"Where? When?" he insisted. + +"To Tanis, eight months since!" + +"Was an Israelite maiden brought here? Answer and truly, by your +immortal soul!" + +"Many months ago, aye, but she departed three days ago for Goshen," the +old woman answered falteringly. + +"And she came not back?" + +"Nay." + +"Swear, by Osiris!" + +"By Osiris--" + +"And the Lady Masanath?" + +"Gone, also, to Tanis with Unas, this morning." + +"Thou liest! In the dark?" + +"Nay, I swear by Osiris," she protested wildly. "The light came in +with the hour of dawn." + +Kenkenes released her and hurried away. He did not doubt that the old +woman had told the truth. He had overslept the light. Unas could not +have taken Rachel and Masanath to Tanis together. The Israelite would +have been sent on before. + +There was yet Atsu to question, and then--on to Tanis to rescue Rachel +or to avenge her. + +He met no one until he reached a bazaar of jewels near the temple +square. An armed watchman stood before the tightly closed front of the +lapidary's booth, above the portal of which a flaring torch was stuck +in a sconce. + +"The house of Atsu?" the watchman repeated after Kenkenes. "Atsu is no +longer a householder in Memphis." + +"When did he depart?" + +"Eight or nine months ago, at the persuasion of the Pharaoh." + +The lightness of the man's manner irritated the already vexed spirit of +the young artist. + +"Be explicit," he demanded sharply. "What meanest thou?" + +"He was stripped of his insignia and reduced to the rank of ordinary +soldier," the man answered, "for pampering the Israelites. He is with +the legions in the north." + +"Hath he kin in the city?" + +"Nay, he is solitary." + +Kenkenes walked away unsteadily. The nervous energy that had upborne +him during his intense excitement was deserting him. His hunger and +weariness were asserting themselves. + +He turned down the narrow passage leading to his father's house. And +suddenly, in the way of such vagrant thoughts, it occurred to him that +the inscription on the tomb had been pointedly denied by the old +woman's statements. + +"Ah, I might have known," he said impatiently. "Rachel put the writing +there for me when she left the tomb for the shelter Masanath offered +her in Memphis." + +The admission cheered him somewhat, but it did not repair his exhausted +forces. By the time he reached his father's door he was unsteady, +indeed, and beyond further exertion. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI + +THE MURKET'S SACRIFICE + +The murket sat at his place in the work-room, but no papyrus scrolls +lay before him; his fine implements were not in sight; the ink-pots and +pens were put away and the table was clear except for a copper lamp +that sputtered and flared at one end. The great artist's arms were +extended across the table, his head bowed upon them, his hands clasped. +The attitude was not that of weariness but of trouble. + +Kenkenes hesitated. For the first time since the hour he left Memphis +for Thebes, months before, he felt a sense of culpability. He +realized, with great bounds of comprehension, that the results of his +own trouble had not been confined to himself. He began to understand +how infectious sorrow is. + +He crossed the room and laid a trembling hand on the murket's shoulder. +Instantly the great artist lifted his head and, seeing Kenkenes, leaped +to his feet with a cry that was all joy. + +The young man responded to the kiss of welcome with so little composure +that Mentu forced him down on the bench and summoned a servant. + +The old housekeeper appeared at the door, started with a suppressed cry +and flung herself at her young master's feet. He raised her and +touched her cheek with his lips. + +"Bring me somewhat to eat and drink, Sema," he said weakly. "I have +fasted, since I returned here, well-nigh four days agone." + +The stiff old creature rose with a murmur half of compassion, half of +promise, and went forth immediately. + +The murket stood very close to his son, regarding him with +interrogation on his face. + +"Memphis was full of famishing at the coming of dawn this morning," he +said. "For the first time in my life I knew hunger, and it is a +fearsome thing, but thou--a shade from Amenti could not be ghastlier. +Where hast thou been--what are thy fortunes, Kenkenes?" + +"Rachel--thou knowest--" Kenkenes began, speaking with an effort. + +"Aye, I know. Didst find her?" + +"Aye, and lost her, even while I fought to save her!" + +"Alas, thou unfortunate!" Mentu exclaimed. "Of a surety the gods have +punished thee too harshly!" + +Kenkenes was not in the frame of mind to receive so soft a speech +composedly. A strong tremor ran over him and he averted his face. The +murket came to his side and smoothed the damp hair. + +The old housekeeper entered with broth and bread and a bottle of wine. +Mentu broke the bread and filled the beaker, while Sema stood aloof and +gazed with troubled eyes at the unhappy face of the young master. +Silent, they watched him eat and drink, grieved because of the visible +effort it required and because no life or strength returned to him with +the breaking of his fast. When he had finished, the bowl and platter +were taken away, but at a sign the old housekeeper left the wine with +the murket. After she had gone Mentu glanced at the draggled dress of +his son. + +"Thou needest, further, the attention of thy slave, Kenkenes," he +suggested. + +The young man shook his head. "Not yet," he said. "My time is short, +and it is thy help I need." + +The murket sat down beside his son. + +Without further introduction Kenkenes plunged into his story. He had +had no time to tell it four days before. Then he had asked for Rachel +with his second word, and finding her not, had rushed immediately to +the search for her. + +Mentu heard without comment till the story was done. Most of it he had +known from Hotep, and only the recent events at the tomb excited him. + +When Kenkenes made an end the murket brought his clenched hand down on +the table with a force that made the lamp wink and the implements +rattle in their boxes above him. + +"Curse that smooth villain Har-hat!" he cried in a tempest of wrath. +"A murrain upon his greedy, crafty lust! The gods blast him in his +knavery! Now is my precious amulet in his hands. Would it were +white-hot and clung to him like a leech!" + +Kenkenes said nothing. The murket's wrath was more comforting to him +than tender words could have been. + +"Who hath the ear of Meneptah?" the murket continued with increasing +vehemence. "Har-hat! And behold the miseries of Egypt! Shall we put +any great sin past the knave who sinneth monstrously, or divine his +methods who is a master of cunning? The land is entangled in +difficulty! Give me but a raveling fiber to pull, and, by the gods, I +know that we shall find Har-hat at the other end of it! He is +destroying Egypt for his ambition's sake! And that a son of mine--me! +the right hand of the Incomparable Pharaoh--should furnish meat for his +rending!" His voice failed him and he shook his clenched hands high +above his head in an abandon of fury. + +"Did I not tell thee?" he burst forth again, pointing a finger at his +son. "Did I not warn thee from the first?" + +Kenkenes raised his head. + +"Can you avoid a knave if he hath designs on you?" he asked. "Have I +erred in crossing his will? Have I sinned in loving and protecting her +whom I love?" + +Mentu's hands fell down at his sides. The simple questions had +silenced him. His son was blameless now that he had expiated his +offenses against the law, and from the moral standpoint his persistence +in his claim on Rachel was just--praiseworthy. + +"Nay," he said sullenly, "but since thou didst love the girl, how came +it that thou didst not wed her long ago and save her this shame and +danger?" + +He saw the face of his son grow paler. + +"The bar of faith lay between us," Kenkenes answered. "I was an +idolater, she a worshiper of the One God. She would not wed with me, +therefore." + +The murket looked at his son, stupefied with amazement. + +"Thou--thou--" he said at last, his words coming slowly by reason of +his emotions. "The Israelite rejected thee!" + +Kenkenes bent his head in assent. + +"Thou! A prince among men--a nobleman, a genius--a man whom all +women--Kenkenes! by Horus, I am amazed! And thou didst endure it, and +continue to love and serve and suffer for her! Where is thy pride?" + +Kenkenes stopped him with a motion of his hand. + +"A maid's unwillingness is obstacle enough," he said. "Shall a man +summon further difficulty in the form of his self-esteem to stand in +the way of his love? Nay, it could not be, and that thou knowest, my +father, since thou, too, hast loved. When a man is in love it is his +pride to be long-suffering and humble. But there is naught separating +us now save it be the hand of Har-hat." + +"So much for Israelitish zeal! Thou hast been a pawn for her to play +during these months. Long ago had she surrendered if thou hadst been--" + +Kenkenes smiled. "She did not surrender. It was I." + +"Thy faith?" the murket asked in a voice low with earnestness. + +"Thou hast said!" + +A dead silence ensued. Kenkenes may have awaited the outbreak with a +quickening of the heart, but it did not come. Instead, the murket sat +down on the bench and gazed at his son intently. + +After a long interval he spoke. + +"Thus far had I hoped that thou wast taken by the Israelite but in thy +fancy. The hope was vain. Thou art in love with her." + +Kenkenes endured the steady gaze and waited for Mentu to go on. + +"There is no help for thee now," the murket continued stoically. "If +the gods will but tolerate thee till the madness leaves thee after thou +art wedded and satisfied, it may be that thou wilt turn again to the +faith of thy fathers. But if I would fix thee in thine apostasy I +should try to persuade thee now." + +"Aye, and further, I should be moved to urge thee into heresy," calmly +responded Kenkenes. + +The murket flung up one hand in a gesture of dissent, and arising, +walked toward the door of the workroom. There he leaned his shoulder +against the frame and looked out at the night. Presently Kenkenes went +to him and laid his hand on his sleeve. + +The murket spoke first, proving what thoughts had been his during the +little space of silence. + +"There is little patriotism in thee, Kenkenes. Thou wouldst wed with +one of Egypt's enemies and bow down to the God which has devastated thy +country." + +The hand on his sleeve fell. + +"What did Egypt to Israel for a hundred years before these miseries +came to pass?" Kenkenes asked. "Let me tell thee how Egypt hath used +Rachel. She is free-born, of noble blood, even as thou art and as I +am. Her house was wealthy, the name powerful. There were ten of her +family--four of her mother's, six of her father's. Rameses, the +Incomparable Pharaoh, had use for their treasure and need of their +labor in the brick-fields and mines. This day Rachel possesses not +even her own soul and body, nor one garment to cover herself, nor a +single kinsman to shield her from the power of her masters! Well for +Egypt that the God of Israel hath not demanded of Egypt treasure for +treasure seized, toil for toil compelled, lash for lash inflicted, +blood for blood outpoured! This desolation had been thrice desolate +and Egypt's glory gone like the green grass in the breath of the +Khamsin! And yet would such justice restore to Rachel the love she +lost, the comfort that should have been hers? Nay, not even the +sorcery of Mesu might do that. The debt of Egypt to Rachel is most +cheaply discharged by the service of one life for the ten which were +taken from her!" + +"Let be; Israel shall cumber Egypt no longer," the murket muttered +after a little; "and the quarrel between them shall be at an end. The +hour approacheth when every Hebrew shall leave Egypt--shall be driven +forth if he leave it not willingly." + +"Thinkest thou so of a truth?" Kenkenes asked earnestly. + +"Of a truth. Thou seest the plight of the nation. Can it endure +longer? And if thou takest this Israelite to wife--" He paused +abruptly, for he had pressed the problem and a solution opened itself +so suddenly that it staggered him. Kenkenes understood the pause. +Again he laid his hand on the murket's sleeve. + +"On this very matter would I take counsel with thee, my father," he +said gently. "The night grows, and my time is short." + +Mentu turned an unhappy face toward his son and followed him back to +the bench they had left. He felt, intuitively, that there was further +grave purpose in the young man's mind and there was dread in his +paternal heart. + +"Thou knowest, my father," Kenkenes began, "that I may not give over my +love for Rachel. I am free to love her and she to love me. There is +no obstacle between us. Such love, therefore, in the sight of heaven, +becometh a duty and carrieth duty with it. In the spirit I am as +though I had been bound to her by the marrying priests. Her griefs are +mine to comfort, her wrongs mine to avenge. + +"She is gone and there are these three surmises as to her whereabouts. +She may have escaped and returned to Goshen; she may have wandered to +death in the Nile; she may have been taken by Har-hat." + +He paused, and Mentu gazed fixedly at the lamp. + +"I am going to Tanis," Kenkenes began, with forced restraint. + +"Wherefore?" Mentu demanded. + +"To discover if Har-hat hath taken her!" + +"Go on." + +"If he hath the Lord God make iron of my hands till I strangle him!" + +"Madman!" Mentu exclaimed. "Thou wilt be flayed!" + +"Be assured that I shall earn the flaying! The punishment shall be no +more savage than the deed that invites it! But enough of that. If I +go to Tanis and find her the spoil of the fan-bearer, thine augury will +hold, I return not to Memphis. . . . If she was lost in the Nile--!" + +"Nay! Nay! put away the thought if it wrench thee so. No man removed +from his place during that night. We were caught and transfixed at +what we did. For three days I sat in the court, where I was overtaken +by the darkness, and in that time I stirred not except to slip down on +the bench and sleep. The palsy seized all Memphis likewise--not one of +my neighbors moved. But the resident Hebrews of the city seemed to +have been warned, or else the favor of their strange God was with them. +For it is said they came and went as they willed, carrying lamps." + +Kenkenes looked at his father with growing hope. + +"If that be true," he said eagerly, "if the palsy fell upon Egypt and +not upon Israel, Rachel may have fled safely--she may have escaped +them!" Mentu assented with a nod. + +"She may have returned to her people," Kenkenes went on. "And if she +be in Goshen I must reach her, find her, before her people depart. +Having found her--" but Kenkenes stopped and made no effort to resume. +Mentu set his teeth, his hands clenched and his whole figure seemed to +denote intense physical restraint. Suddenly he whirled upon his son. + +"Thou wilt go with her, out of Egypt?" he demanded. + +"I shall go with her, out of Egypt." + +Mentu gained his feet. "And dost thou remember that while I live my +commands are yet law over thee?" he continued in a tone of increasing +intensity. "Mine it is to say whether thou shall do this thing or do +it not!" + +He turned away and strode back to his post against the door-frame, his +face toward the night. Kenkenes had slowly risen to his feet. Not for +an instant did his father's authority appear to him as an obstacle. He +knew that the murket's outburst was a final stand before capitulation. +Kenkenes was troubled only for what might follow after his father had +surrendered. + +He followed the murket to the door and laid his arm across the broad +shoulders. + +"Father," he said persuasively. Mentu did not move. + +"Look at me, father," Kenkenes insisted. Still no movement. The young +man put his arm closer about the shoulders, and lifting his hand, would +have turned the face toward him. But the palm touched a wet cheek. + +The murket had consented. + + * * * * * * + +An hour later, when it was far into the second watch, Kenkenes changed +his dress and made himself presentable. Then, without further counsel +with the murket, he went silently and unseen to the portal of Senci's +house. After a long time, for her household had been asleep, he was +admitted, and the Lady Senci, perplexed and surprised, joined him in +the chamber of guests. + +With few and simple words he told his story, pictured his father's +loneliness and, while she wept silently, begged her to become his +father's wife--on the morrow. + +There was no long persuasion; the need of the occasion was sufficient +eloquence for the murket's noble love. + +An hour after the next day's sunrise Mentu and Senci repaired together +to the temple, and when they returned Senci went not again into her own +house. + +In preparing for his departure, Kenkenes asked at the hands of his +father, not his patrimony, for that would have been an embarrassment of +wealth, but such portion of it as might be carried in small bulk. In +mid-afternoon Senci brought him a belt of gazelle-hide and in this had +been sewed a fortune in gems. The murket had given his son his full +portion and more. + +At the close of day, with his face set and colorless, Kenkenes stepped +into the narrow passage before his father's house. The great portal +closed slowly and noiselessly behind him. He did not pause, but sprang +into his chariot and was driven rapidly away. + +At a landing near the northern limits of Memphis he took a punt, bade +farewell to his sad-faced charioteer and pushed off. + +The broken bluffs about Memphis, the temples, the obelisks, the Sphinx, +the pyramids melted into night behind him. He kept his head down that +he might not look his last on his native city. + +He had reached that point where endurance must conserve itself. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII + +AT THE WELL + +Once out of its confines the Nile divided its flood over and over again +and hunted the sea in long meanderings over the flat Delta. A few +miles above On the separation began and continued to the marshy coast +far to the north. From the summit of the great towers of Bubastis and +Sais the glistening sinuosities of its branches might be discerned for +many miles. + +There was no thirst in the Delta. Nowhere did the capillary, the +irrigation canal, fail to reach, even now in the season of desolation +and loss. Half-green stubble, hail-mown and locust-eaten, showed where +a wheat-field had been. Regular, barren rows were the only evidences +of the lentil and garlic gardens in happier days, and the location of +pastures might be guessed by the skeletons that whitened the uplands. +Through fringes of leafless palm trees, stone-rimmed pools, like +splashes of quicksilver or facets of sapphire, reflected the sky. + +Half-way between On and Pa-Ramesu was one of these basins, elliptical +in shape and walled with rough limestone. Moss grew in the crevices of +the masonry and about it had been a sod of velvet grass. Black beetles +slipped in and out among the stones; dragon-flies hung over the surface +of the water and large ants made erratic journeys about the rough bark +of the naked palms. Whoever came dipped his goblet deep, for there the +water was cold. If he gazed through to the bottom he detected a +convection in the sand below. This was not a reservoir, but a well. + +Once only had it failed, but then Hapi, the holy river, had been +smitten also. + +The spring bubbled up at the division of a road. One branch led along +the northern bank of the Rameside canal, eastward to Pa-Ramesu. The +other crossed the northwestern limits of Goshen and went toward Tanis, +in the northeast. Round about the little oasis were the dark circles +where the turf fires of many travelers had been. The merchants from +the Orient entering Egypt through the great wall of Rameses II, across +the eastern isthmus, passed this way going to Memphis. Here +Philistine, Damascene, Ninevite and Babylonian had halted; here +Egyptian, Bedouin, Arabian and the dweller of the desert had paused. +The earth about the well was always damp, and the top-most row of the +curb was worn smooth in hollows. This, therefore, was a point common +to native and alien, the home-keeping and the traveler, the faithful +and the unbeliever. + +The strait of Egypt was sore and the aid of the gods essential. The +priests had seized upon the site as a place of prayers, placed a tablet +there, commanding them, and a soldier to see that the command was +obeyed. + +The soldier was in cavalry dress of tunic and tasseled coif, with pike +and bull-hide shield and a light broadsword. He was no ordinary bearer +of arms. He walked like a man accustomed to command; he turned a cold +eye upon too-familiar wayfarers and startled them into silence by the +level blackness of his low brows. Wealth, beauty, age nor rank won +servility or superciliousness from him. The Egyptian soldier was not +obliged to cringe, and this one abode by the privilege. + +He was a man of one attitude, one mood and few words. The Memnon might +as well have been expected to smile. The earliest riser found him +there; the latest night wanderer came upon him. When the day broke, +after the falling of the dreadful night, the brave or the thirsty who +ventured forth saw him at his post, silent, unastonished, unafraid. + +Once only the soldier had been seen to flinch. Merenra, now nomarch of +Bubastis, but whilom commander over Israel at Pa-Ramesu, paused one +noon with his train at the well. The governor glanced at the soldier, +glanced again, shrugged his shoulders and rode away. The man-at-arms +winced, and often thereafter stood in abstracted contemplation of the +distance. + +Just after sunrise on the second day following the passing of the +darkness, four Egyptians, lank, big-footed and brown, came from the +northeast. By their dress they had been prosperous rustics of the +un-Israelite Delta. But the healthful leanness, characteristic of the +race, had become emaciation; there was the studious unkemptness of +mourning upon them, and they, who had ridden once, before the plagues +of murrain and hail, traveled afoot. + +They were evidently journeying to On, where the benevolence of Ra would +feed them. + +They said nothing, looking a little awed at the soldier and puzzled at +the stela. The warrior read the command and the unlettered men fell on +their knees, each to a different god. The Egyptian was not ashamed of +his piety nor did he closet himself to pray. + +"Incline the will of the Pharaoh to accord with the needs of the hour, +O thou Melter of Hearts!" + +"Rescue the kingdom, O thou Controller of Nations, for it descendeth +into death and none succoreth it!" + +"Deal thou as thou deemest best with the destroyer of Egypt, O thou +Magistrate over Kings!" + +Thus, in these fragments of prayers was it made manifest that the worm +was turning, apologetically, it is true, but surely. For once the +prescribed defense of the Pharaoh was ignored. "It is not the fault of +the Child of the Sun, but his advisers, who are evil men and full of +guile." And in the odd perversity of fate for once its observance +would have been just. + +Having fulfilled the command and relieved their souls, the four arose +and went their way, soft of foot and stately of carriage, after the +manner of all their countrymen. + +Next, descending with a volley of yells, a rout of the nomad tribes, +mounted on horses, came from the southwest. + +They were chiefly Bedouins, their women perched behind them with the +tiniest members of their broods. But every child that could bestride a +horse was mounted independently. Whatever worldly possessions the +nomads owned were bound in numerous flat rolls on other horses which +they led. + +"Hail!" they shouted to the warrior, for the desert races are prankish +and unabashed. A younger among them, without wife or goods, drew his +gaunt horse back upon its scarred haunches and saluted the soldier. + +"Greeting, bearer of many arms!" he said, and then addressed a near-by +companion as if he were rods away. "Behold leaden-toed Egypt, cumbered +with defense! Bull-hide for shield instead of the safe remoteness of +distance, blade and pike for vulgar intimacy in combat instead of the +nice aloofness of the launched spear--" + +"Go to, thou prater!" interrupted a companion. "If thou lovest Bedouin +warfare so well, wherefore dost thou join thyself to the Israelite who +fights not at all?" + +"Spoil!" retorted the first, "and new fields, O waster of the air! +Hast thou not heard of Canaan?" + +"Nay," shouted a third, "he hath an eye only to some heifer-eyed +brickmaker among them!" + +The soldier moved forward to the group and grounded his pike. His +attitude interested them, and in the expectant silence he repeated the +writing on the tablet. + +"So saith the writing," the first speaker began, but the warrior +interrupted him. + +"It behooves thee to obey. Thou art yet within the reach of the +awkward arms of Egypt." + +"One against a troop of Bedouins," the trifler laughed. + +"And there are a thousand within sound of my beaten shield," was the +harsh answer. + +"Come," said an elder complacently, "it does no harm to ask the +alleviation of any man's hurt, and it may keep us whole for the journey +into Canaan." He dismounted, and in a twinkling the company, even to +the babes, had followed his example. Each dropped to his haunches, his +hands spread upon his knees, and there was no sound for a few minutes. + +Then they rose simultaneously and, flinging themselves upon their +horses, departed as they came, like the whirlwind, over the road to +Pa-Ramesu and the heart of Goshen. + +These were part of the mixed multitude that went with Israel. + +The dust of their going had hardly settled before a drove of +hosannahing Israelites approached from the direction of the Nile. The +soldier saw them without seeming to see and, moving toward the tablet, +a four-foot stela of sandstone, planted himself against its inscribed +face, and, resting his pike, contemplated the west. + +The ragged rout approached, singing and shouting, noisy and of doubtful +temper. A cloud of dust came with them and the odor of stall and of +quarry sweat. + +Want plays havoc with the Oriental's appearance. It acutely +accentuates his already aggressive features and reduces his color to +ghastliness. The approaching Hebrews were studies of sharp angularity +in monochrome, and the soul which showed in the eyes was no longer a +spiritual but a ravenous thing. + +Being something distinctly Egyptian, the soldier brought their actual +temper to the surface. They had suffered long, but their time had come. + +The foremost flung themselves into his view and halted, hushed and +amazed. When those behind them tried to press forward with jeers, they +turned with a frown and a significant jerk of the head in the direction +of the man-at-arms. These, also, subsided and passed along the sign of +silence. A leader in the front rank walked away and took a drink, +using his hands as a cup. The whole silent herd followed and did +likewise, solemnly and thoughtfully. + +Presently the bolder began to whisper and conjecture among themselves, +hushing the sibilant surmises of the humbler with a cautioning frown. +An old man, who could not lower his voice, quavered a resolve to "ask +and discover," and started toward the soldier to put his resolution +into effect. A wiry old woman seized him and drew him back. + +"Wilt thou humiliate him with thy notice, meddler?" she demanded in a +fierce whisper. "See him not, and it will be a mercy to him in his +hour of abasement,--him who hath been balsam to the wound of Israel!" + +She turned about and took the road toward Pa-Ramesu, the unprotesting +old man trotting after her. The crowd followed, silent at first, then +softly talkative, and finally, in the distance, singing and noisy once +again. + +A careening camel, almost white in the early morning sunshine, broke +the sky-line far up the road leading from Tanis in the north. Very +much nearer, to the west, two single litters, with a staff-bearing +attendant, were approaching. + +The camel rider was a Hebrew by the beast that bore him. Egypt had no +liking for the bearer of the Orient's burdens and small acquaintance +with him. Likewise the litters were Hebraic, for the attendant was +bearded. The soldier kept his place before the stela and contemplated +the distance. + +The time was not long, though in that land of distances the camel had +far to come from the horizon to the well, until by the soft jarring of +the earth the motionless sentinel knew that the swifter traveler had +arrived. Haste is not common in tropical countries, and the camel had +been put to his limit of speed. A commoner spirit than the soldiers +could not have resisted the impulses of curiosity concerning this hot +haste. But he did not turn his eyes. + +The traveler alighted before his mount ceased to move, and undoing his +leathern belt with a jerk, he struck the camel a smart blow on the +shoulder. There was the protesting buzz of a large fly and an angry, +disabled blundering on the sand, silenced by the stamp of a sandal. + +"Thou wouldst have it, pest!" the traveler exclaimed. "Thy kind is not +to be persuaded from its blood-sucking by milder means. Ye mind me of +the Pharaoh!" + +He turned toward the well, and his glance fell on the man-at-arms for +the first time. He started a little to find himself not alone, and a +second time he started with sudden recognition. The well was between +him and the soldier. He leaned upon his hands on the top of the curb +and gazed at his opposite. Once he seemed about to speak, but the +studious disregard of the soldier deterred him. Slowly his eyes fell +until they were directed thoughtfully through his own reflection into +the green depths of the well. + +Although there were ten years in favor of the Egyptian, there was a +certain similarity between the two men. Both were soldiers, both black +and stern. But one was a Hebrew, no less than forty-five years of age. +He wore a helmet of polished metal, equipped with a visor, which, when +raised, finished the front with a flat plate. The top of the +head-piece was ornamented with a spike. His armor was complete--shirt +of mail, shenti extending half-way to the knees, greaves of brass and +mailed shoes. + +He was as tall as the Egyptian and as lean, but his structure was +heavy, stalwart and powerful. His forehead was broad and bold, his +eyes deep-set, steel-blue and keen. He had the fighting nose, +over-long and hooked like an eagle's beak. The inexorable character of +his features was borne out by the mouth, thin-lipped and firm in its +closing. Even his beard, scant and touched with gray, was intractable. +Here was an Israelite who was a warrior, a rare thing--but splendid +when found. + +After a pause he turned, and the camel knelt at his command. The +litters had halted a little distance away under two palms that leaned +their leafless crowns together. The attendant was hastening toward the +well. + +"Joshua!" he cried joyously. + +"Even I," the Hebrew soldier said, walking around the kneeling beast. +"Peace to thee, Caleb." + +The two men embraced; the warrior imperturbably, the attendant +tearfully. + +"What dost thou away from Goshen?" Joshua asked, disengaging himself. +"The faithful of Israel have been summoned thither from the +remotenesses of Mizraim." + +But Caleb did not hear, having caught sight of the Egyptian. The +recognition startled him as it had all the others, but he did not hold +his peace. + +"Atsu!" he exclaimed. Joshua checked him. + +"Vex him not with attention," he said in a lowered tone. "His fall +hath been great, but it hath not killed his pride. He would speak if +it hurt him to be unremembered." + +"Hath he a grudge against us?" Caleb asked in astonishment. + +"Nay, look thou at the writing on the tablet. He would hide its +command from us. Is he not a friend to Israel still?" + +He indicated the characters on either side of the soldier. The words +were disconnected, but the sense was easily guessed. The command for +prayers to the Pantheon of Egypt was not hidden, beyond conjecture, +from the discerning. Caleb saw the meaning of the inscription, but +looked to Joshua for further enlightenment. + +"He would spare us," the abler Israelite said. "Let us return the +kindness and see him not." + +All this had the Egyptian heard, but his eyes, fixed so absently on the +horizon, seemed to indicate that he was not conscious of his +surroundings. + +Joshua repeated his question. + +"I was sent forth with Miriam," Caleb made answer. "She hath been +abroad, gathering up the scattered chosen." + +His eyes brightened and he clasped his hands with the gesture of a +happy woman. + +"Deliverance is at hand! Doubt it not, O Son of Nun! We go forth!" he +exclaimed. + +On the camel were hung a shield, a javelin and a quiver of arrows. +Joshua jostled the arrows in their case before answering. + +"Not as the moon changes," he said grimly. "The time for mild +departure is past and the word of the Lord God unto Moses must be +fulfilled." + +"So we but go," Caleb assented, "I care not. And such is the temper of +all Israel--nay," he broke off, conscientiously; "there is an +exception, an unusual exception." + +"There may be more," Joshua replied. "There is much in Egypt to hold +the slavish. But the captain of Israel hath called me, out of peaceful +shepherd life, to the severe fortunes of a warrior, and I go, no mile +too short, no moment too swift, that shall speed me into Pa-Ramesu." + +"And thou takest up arms for Israel?" Caleb cried. "Ah! but Moses hath +gloved his right hand in mail, in thee, O Son of Nun! But," he +continued, uneasy with his story untold, "this was no slavish content +under a master. Rather did it come from one of the best of Israel." + +"Strange that the lofty of Israel should regret a departure from the +land of the oppressors." Joshua settled himself on the camel and the +tall beast rose to its feet with a lurch. + +"Even so," Caleb answered, patting the nose of the camel and arranging +the tassels of its halter. "It was a quarry-slave, a maiden and of +gentle blood among the nobility of Israel. She is in the bamboo +litter, Miriam is in the other. + +"We are come from farthest Egypt, fifty of us in three barges," he +began. "To Syene have we been and all the Nilotic towns. To Nehapehu, +and even deep into the Great Oasis were messengers sent, for we would +not leave a single son of Abraham behind. And the masters surrendered +them to a man! Was it the face of Miriam or the fear of Moses or the +might of the Lord that tamed them? Hath Miriam a compelling glance, or +Moses a power that came not from Jehovah? Nay, not so. Praised be His +holy name!" + +The mild Israelite clasped his hands and raised his eyes devoutly. But +fearful lest his pause might furnish an opportunity for Joshua's +escape, he continued at once: + +"We were descending the Nile, below Memphis; the river sang and the +hills lifted up their voices. There was rejoicing in the meadows and +clapping of hands in the valleys. We possessed the gates of our +enemies and Mizraim sat upon the shores and wept after us. + +"Below Masaarah, the darkness fell; the sun perished in the morning and +the stars were not summoned in the night, for the Lord had withdrawn +the lights of heaven. But His hand was upon the waters and His glory +stood about us and we feared not. + +"And lo! there came a call upon Him from the shores to the east. The +barge of Miriam paused and from the land we succored an Israelitish +maiden. But when we would have moved on, she flung herself before +Miriam and besought her: + +"'Depart not yet, for there is another.' + +"'Of the chosen?' the prophetess asked. + +"'Nay, an Egyptian, but better and above his kind.' + +"'Of the faith?' Miriam asked further. And the maiden faltered and +said, 'Nay, not yet--but worthy and kindly.' + +"But the prophetess bade the men at the poles to continue, saying: +'Shall we cheat Jehovah in his intent and rescue an oppressor?' + +"But the maiden clung about the knees of Miriam and prayed to her, +while the prophetess said, 'Nay, nay' and 'Peace,' and sought to soothe +her, and when at that moment some one called out of the darkness, she +put her hand over the maiden's mouth and would not let her answer. And +the barge went swiftly away. Then the maiden fell on her face, like +one dead, and she will not be comforted." + +Joshua drew himself into securer, position on the camel and shook its +harness. + +"Love!" he said with a frown. "The evilest tie and the strongest +between Israel and Mizraim!" + +"Nay," Caleb protested, "thou hast loved." + +"A daughter of Israel," the warrior answered bluntly. "Dost thou +follow me into Goshen, Caleb?" + +"Nay, we go on to Tanis, where we shall join Moses and Aaron who lie +there awaiting the Pharaoh's summons." + +"The parting shall not be long between thee and me, then. Peace to +thee, Caleb. To Miriam, greeting and peace." + +The warrior urged his camel and, rounding the stela-guarding soldier +who had stood within ear-shot of the narrative, he was gone in a long +undulating swing up the road that led to Pa-Ramesu. + +Caleb gazed after him until he was only a tall shape like the stroke of +a pen in the distance. Then the mild Israelite looked longingly at the +Egyptian, and finally returned to the litters. These in a moment were +shouldered by the bearers and moved out up the road toward Tanis. +Caleb walked before them, dotting every other footprint with the point +of his staff. He sighed gustily and sank his bearded chin on his +breast. + +The soldier turned his head as soon as the attendant had passed and +gazed at the litters. + +The Hebrew bearers of the foremost were four in number, dressed in the +garb of serving-men to noble Israel. The hangings of blue linen had +been thrust aside and within was the semi-recumbent figure of a woman. +One knee was drawn up, the hands clasped behind the head, but the +majesty of the august countenance belied the youth of the posture. The +eyes of the woman met those of the Egyptian and lighted with +recognition. She lowered her arms and crossed the left to the shoulder +of the right. It was the old attitude of deference from Israel to +Atsu. A dusky red dyed the man's cheeks and he touched his knee in +response. + +The litter of Miriam passed. + +The next was a light frame of jungle bamboo, borne by a pair of young +men. Its sides were latticed, with the exception of two small +window-like openings on either side. These were hung with white linen, +but the drapings had been put aside to admit the morning air. + +The soldier looked and the shock of recognition drew him a pace away +from the stela. + +The head of a young girl, partly turned from him, was framed in the +small window. The wimple had been thrown back and a single tress of +golden hair had escaped across the forehead. The countenance was +unhappy, but beautiful for all its misery. The lids were heavy, as if +weighted down with sorrow; the cheeks were pallid, the lips colorless +and pathetically drooped. A white hand, resting on the slight frame of +the small opening, was tightly clenched. + +The picture was one of weary despair. + +The soldier, blanched and shaken, took a step forward as if to speak, +but some realization brought him back to rigid attention against the +stela. + +The light litter passed on. + +The regular tread of the men grew fainter and fainter and silence +settled again about the well. + +The soldier stood erect, gray-faced and immovable, his eyes fixed, his +teeth set, his hand gripping the pike, till the insects, reassured, +began to chirr close about him. Then his lids quivered; the pike +leaned in his grasp; his jaw relaxed, weakly. He shifted his position +and frowned, flung up his head and resumed his vigil. The moments went +on and yet he retained his tense posture. The hour passed and with it +his physical endurance. + +Then his emotion gathered all its forces, all the compelling sensations +of disappointment, rebuff, heart-hurt, jealousy, hopelessness, and +stormed his soul. He turned about and, stretching his arms across the +top of the stela, hid his face and surrendered. + +Around him was the unbroken circle of the earth and above the blue +desert of sky, solitary, soundless. And the union of earth and heaven, +like a mundane and spiritual collusion, lay between him and the little +litter. + +The beat of a horse's hoofs in the distance roused him after a long +time, and hastily turning his back toward the new-comer, he resumed at +once his soldierly attitude. + +The traveler bore down on him from the west and reined his horse at the +intersection of the two roads. He looked up the straight highway +toward Pa-Ramesu, then turned in the saddle and gazed toward Tanis. +His indecision was not a wayfarer's casual hesitancy in the choice of +roads. By the anxiety written on his face, life, fortune or love might +be at stake upon the correct selection of route. Once or twice he +looked at the soldier, but showed no inclination to ask advice, even +had the man-at-arms turned his way. + +It was one of fate's opportunities to be gracious. Here was Kenkenes +seeking for the maiden whom he and the soldier loved, and it lay in the +power of the unelect to direct the fortunate. But Kenkenes did not +know the warrior, and Atsu had no desire to turn his unhappy face to +the new-comer. The young man grew more and more troubled, his +indecision more marked. Suddenly he dropped the reins, and without +guiding the horse, urged the animal forward. + +Kenkenes was relying on chance for direction. + +Confused and unready the horse awaited the intelligent touch on the +bridle. It did not come. He flung up his head and smelt the wind. +Nervously he stamped and trod in one place, breathing loudly in protest. + +The low voice of his rider continued to urge him. Perhaps the wind +from Goshen brought the smell of unblighted pastures. Whatever the +reason, the horse turned, with uncertainty in his step and took the +road eastward to Pa-Ramesu. + +Having chosen, he went confidently, and as he was not halted and was +young and swift, he increased his pace to a long run. + +Meanwhile far to the north the little litter was borne toward Tanis. +And Atsu, the warrior, did not move his eyes from the distant point +where it had disappeared over the horizon. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII + +THE TRAITORS + +The morning of the second day after the lifting of the darkness lay +golden over Egypt, blue-shadowed before the houses and trees to the +west and shimmering and illusory toward the east. A slow-moving, +fragmentary cloud had gathered in the zenith just after dawn and for +many minutes over the northern part of Goshen there had been a +perpendicular downpour of illuminated rain. Now the sky was as clear +and blue as a sapphire and the little wind was burdened with odorous +scents from the clean-washed pastures of Israel. + +Seti had crossed the border into Goshen at daybreak and was now well +into the grazing-lands, yet scintillating with the rain. The hoofs of +his fat little horse were patched with wet sand of the roadway and +there was no dust on the prince's modest raiment. Behind the youth +plodded two heavy-headed, limp-eared sumpter-mules, driven by a +big-boned black. + +Seti was not far from his destination, an obscure village of +image-makers directly south of Tanis and situated on the northern +border of Goshen. The same region that furnished clay to Israel for +Egypt's bricks afforded material for terra-cotta statuettes. + +Ahead of him were fields with clouds of sheep upon the uplands and +cattle standing under the shade of dom-palms. Here and there hovels +with thatches no higher than a man's head, or low tents, dark with long +use, and lifted at one side, stood in a setting of green. About them +were orderly and productive gardens. Nowhere was any sign of the +desolation that prevailed over Egypt. + +Seti looked upon the beautiful prosperity of Goshen at first with the +natural delight loveliness inspires, and then with as much savage +resentment as his young soul could feel. Belting this garden and +stretching for seven hundred miles to the south, was Egypt, desolate, +barren and comatose. The God of the Hebrews had avenged them fearfully. + +"They had provocation," he muttered to himself; "but they have overdone +their vengeance." + +A figure appeared on the road over the comb of a slight ridge, and Seti +regarded the wayfarer with interest. + +He was a Hebrew. His draperies were loose, voluminous, heavily +fringed, and of such silky texture of linen that they flowed in the +light wind. His head was covered with a wide kerchief, which was bound +with a cord, and hid the forehead. + +He was of good stature and upright, but his drapings were so ample that +the structure of his frame was not discernible. His eyes were black, +bright and young in their alertness, but the beard that rippled over +his breast to his girdle was as white as the foam of the Middle Sea. + +The Hebrew walked in the grass by the roadside and came on, his face +expectant. At sight of the prince he stepped into the roadway. Seti +drew up. + +"Thou art Seti-Meneptah?" the ancient wayfarer asked. + +"Even so," the prince answered. + +The Hebrew put back his kerchief and stood uncovered. + +"Dost thou know me, my son?" he asked. + +"Thou art that Aaron, of the able tongue, brother to Mesu. Camest thou +forth to meet me?" + +The Hebrew readjusted the kerchief. + +"Thou hast said." + +"Wast thou, then, so impatient? Where is thy brother?" + +"Nay. The village of image-makers is not safe. Moses hath departed +for Zoan." [1] + +"And named thee in his stead. But his mission to my father's capital +bodes no good. He might have stayed until I could have persuaded him +into friendship." + +"Not with all thy gold!" said Aaron gravely. + +"Nay, I had not meant that," Seti rejoined with some resentment. "If +Egypt's plight can not win mercy from him by its own piteousness, the +treasure I bring is not enough." + +The Hebrew waved his hand as if to dismiss the subject. + +"Let us not dispute so old a quarrel," he said. "We have a new sorrow, +thou and I." + +"Of Mesu's sending?" + +"Nay, of thine own misplaced trust." + +"What!" the prince exclaimed. "Have I clothed thy kinsman with more +grace than he owns?" + +"Thou hast put faith in thine enemy. A woman hath deceived thee." + +"What dost thou tell me?" Seti cried, leaping to the ground and angrily +confronting Aaron. + +"A truth," the Hebrew answered calmly. "The Princess Ta-user is a +fugitive charged with treason." + +Seti turned cold and smote his forehead. "Undone through me!" he +groaned. + +"Not so, my son. Thou art undone through her. She betrayed thee." + +Seti turned upon him with a fierce movement. + +"Peace!" the Hebrew interrupted the furious speech on the prince's +lips. "I bear thee no malice." + +"I will give ear to no tales against the princess," Seti avowed with +ire. + +"Thy blind trust hath already wrought havoc with thee. Let it not +bring heavy punishment upon thy head. Thou hast dealt kindly with me, +and I am beholden to thee. Give me leave to discharge my debt." + +The prince looked stubbornly at Aaron for a moment, but the doubt that +had begun to assert itself in his mind clamored for proof or refutation. + +"Say on," he said. + +"The story is long," the Hebrew explained mildly, "and the sun is +ardent. There are friends in yonder house. Let us ask the shelter of +their roof for an hour." + +Gathering his robes about him with peculiar grace, he went through the +grass toward a low, capacious tent, pitched by a trickling branch of +the great canal. Seti followed moodily. + +A black-haired Israelitish woman, sitting on the earth before the +lifted side of the tent, arose, and reverently kissed the hem of +Aaron's robes. Her dark-eyed brood appeared at various angles of the +tent, and at a sign and a word from the woman they did obeisance and +hailed the ancient visitor in soft Hebrew. + +After a short colloquy between Aaron and the woman of Israel, the +children were dismissed to play in the fields and the woman carried the +bowl and basket of lentils out of ear-shot of her house. + +"Let us enter," Aaron said, with an inclination of his head toward +Seti. He stooped and preceded the young man into the home of the +Hebrew. + +The prince saw the black dispose himself on the grass outside, with his +eyes upon the sumpter-mule. + +Aaron sat upon one of the rugs, and Seti, following his example, took +another. + +"Say on," the prince urged. + +The Hebrew began at once. + +"What I tell thee, O my son, will soon be talked abroad over the land. +But if thou hast a doubt in thy heart, and art like to question my +truth-speaking, there are witnesses I may summon, such as no wise man +will deny. And these be Jambres, and the twelve priests of the cities +of the north, and the innkeeper at Pithom, also the governor over the +treasure-city, his soldiers, and others, who know the secret by now. + +"I will give thee the tale now, and the proof thereafter, if thou +believest me not. + +"Last night, I lay under the tent of a son of Israel, at Pithom. When +I arose, two hours before dawn, horsemen began to gallop through the +city toward the south. The inhabitants were aroused; there was much +running to and fro, and the inn was full of lights. + +"We approached, and when the tumult had died and the Egyptians were so +full of the tidings that they were glad to relieve themselves even to +an Israelite, I asked and learned this story. Many times afterward, on +my way hither, I heard it from the lips of men whom I passed, so I am +not deceived. + +"Seven days agone, under an evil star, a veiled woman came to the +temple of Bast, in the village of image-makers, and made offerings to +the idol. She remained in the shrine, praying, for a time without +reason, as though she pretended to worship, until a certain space +should elapse. At the end of the hour in which she came, another +woman, closely covered, her mouth hidden, entered and knelt near her. +In a little they arose and went forth together, and Jambres, who is +priest at the little temple, grown suspicious by reason of their +behavior, looked after them. The wind swayed the garments of the +second stranger, and showed the foot and ankle of a man. Filled with +wonderment, Jambres laid aside his priest's robes and garbing himself +like a wayfarer, followed. They left the village, going east where the +road leadeth along the canal, which is hidden by the sprouts of young +trees. Farther up the way were servitors who waited for the man and +woman, but the two stepped out of ear-shot, and sat by the road to talk. + +"Jambres, hidden in the fringe of bushes behind, heard them. + +"They laid a snare. And thou, O Prince, wast to be trapped therein." + +Seti's eyes were veiled and his face showed a heightening of color. + +"Thou wast to come to the temple in the village of image-makers with +treasure to give into the hands of Moses. Thy message to my brother +was to be delivered by the Princess Ta-user. She delivered it not. +The word she should have brought came to Moses by a son of Belial, a +godless Hebrew, sent by Jambres, for the brotherhood of priests would +have had Moses come to the temple, for their own ends. But the +servants of the Lord God of Israel are keen-eyed and they know a jackal +from a hare. However, these matters I did not hear from the people. +Such secret things are not discussed upon the streets. All that I +heard in Pithom may be talked openly over Egypt. + +"The man and the woman laid their plans, and they were these: Last +night, the man and his servants were to lie at Pithom, and to-day they +were to meet thee at the temple of Bast, overpower thee, take thy +treasure and, with the woman, fly to some secure place. With the +treasure they were to hire them soldiers--mercenaries, and take arms +against the king, thy father." + +The speaker paused again. Seti's breast labored and his gaze was fixed +upon the Hebrew. + +"The ire of Jambres was kindled against the plotters, and he called an +assembly of the priests within short distances from the village of +image-makers and laid his discoveries before them. They pledged +themselves to proceed to Pithom last night, which was the night they +came together in council, and take the traitors. But one among their +number, a young priest who knew the woman, played them false, entered +the city before his fellows and warned the plotters. They had fled, +with the priests in pursuit. + +"My son, the man was Siptah, son of Amon-meses; the woman, the Princess +Ta-user." + +The prince's face took on an insane beauty. In each cheek was a +scarlet stain--his lips smiled without parting and his eyes glittered. +He did not question the Hebrew's story. Something within him +corroborated every word. He sprang to his feet and with an unnatural +laugh flung his hand above his head. + +"Now, by Horus," he cried, "I must get back to Tanis. I would ask the +pardon of Rameses!" + +Aaron arose and laid detaining hands upon him. + +"I did not tell thee this, that I might be a bearer of evil tidings. I +came forth to meet thee, that thou mayest save thyself. Far be it from +me to bring misfortune upon Israel's one friend in Egypt's high places. +Return to Tanis with all speed and take the treasure with thee. Then +only will the intent rest against thee--" + +"Not so," Seti interrupted harshly. "Wilt thou rob me of the one balm +to my humiliation? Wilt thou defeat me also in the one good deed I +would do? Take thou the treasure and be glad that it fell not into the +hands of the wanton. Let me depart." + +But Aaron was planted in his way. + +"Knowest thou not what they will do with thee? Thou wouldst have given +aid to the enemy of Egypt. Thou knowest the penalty. Sooner would +Israel make it a garment of sackcloth and feed upon alms, than yield +thee up to thine enemies for thy gold's sake--" + +But Seti would not hear him. "I care not what they do with me," he +said. "The gods grant they lay upon me the extreme weight of the law. +I go back to Tanis as one returneth to his beloved." + +He shook off the Israelite's hands and ran into the open. There, he +ordered the black to give the treasure over to the Hebrew, and flinging +himself upon his horse, galloped furiously toward Tanis. + +Of the remainder of the day Seti had little memory. Once or twice as +he proceeded headlong through hamlets, he caught from the lips of +natives a denunciation of Siptah, a vicious epithet applied to Ta-user, +or, like a fresh thrust in an old wound, a pitying groan for himself. +His shame had preceded him on fleet wings. He hoped he might as +swiftly run his sentence down. + +None knew him in the roadways and the towns did not expect him. The +pickets on the outer wall of Tanis halted him, but when they beheld his +face, their pikes fell and with hands on knees, they bade him pass. +The palace sentries started and gave him room. + +He was running, sobbing, through the dark and capacious corridors of +the palace and no man had stayed him yet. Were they to make his shame +more poignant by pitying him and punishing him not at all? He flung +himself through the doors of the council chamber and halted. + +The great hall was crowded and full of excitement. Meneptah had +summoned the court to the royal presence. + +In his loft above the throng stood the king, purple with rage. The +queen, in her place at his side, was staying his outstretched hand. +Below at his right stood Rameses, the kingliest presence that ever +graced a royal sitting. At the left of Meneptah, was Har-hat, +complacent and serene. + +Out in the center of a generous space stood Moses. The great Hebrew +was alone and isolated, but his personality was such that a throng +could not have obscured him. + +In his massive physique was an insistent suggestion of immovability and +superhuman strength; in the shape of his imperial head, there was +illimitable capacity; in his face, the image of a nature commanding the +entire range of feeling, from the finest to the fiercest. There was +nothing of the occult in his atmosphere. His intense human force would +have commanded, though Egypt had not known him as the emissary of God. + +As it was, when he moved the assembly swayed back as if blown by a +wind. A motion of his hand sent a nervous start over the hall. The +nearest courtiers seemed prepared to crouch. Meneptah did not win a +glance from his court. Every eye, wide and expectant, was fixed upon +the Israelite. + +The pale and troubled queen strove in vain. Meneptah thrust her aside +and shaking his clenched hand at the solitary figure before him, ended +the audience in a voice violent with fury. + +"Get thee from me! Take heed to thyself; see my face no more. For in +that day thou seest my face, thou shalt die!" + +After the speech, the silence fell, deepened, grew ominous. None +breathed, and the overwrought nerves of the court reached the limit of +endurance. + +Then Moses answered. His tones were quiet, his voice full of a calm +more terrifying than an outburst had been. + +"Thou hast spoken well," he said. "I will see thy face no more." + +Another breathless silence and he turned, the courtiers shrinking from +his way, and passed out of the hall. + +At the doors, his eyes fell upon Seti. He made no sign of surprise. +Indeed his glance seemed to indicate that he expected the prince. He +raised his hand and extended it for a moment over the boy's head, and +went forth. + +The strength went from Seti's limbs, the passion from his brain, and +when Rameses with grim purpose in his face beckoned him, he obeyed +meekly and prostrated himself before the angry king. + + + +[1] Zoan--The Hebrew name for Tanis. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX + +BEFORE EGYPT'S THRONE + +The distance by highway between Memphis and Tanis was eighty miles, a +little more than two days' journey by horseback. + +Masanath had required two weeks to accomplish that distance. She refused +to travel except in the cool of the morning and of the afternoon; if she +felt the fatigue of an hour's journey, she rested a day at the next town; +she consulted astrologers, and moved forward only under propitious signs; +she insisted on following the Nile until she was opposite Tanis, instead +of taking the highway at On and continuing across the Delta. + +The most of her following walked, and she proceeded at the pace of her +plodding servants. + +She spoke of her freedom as though she went to meet doom; she gazed on +the sorry fields and pastures of Egypt as though the four walls of a +prison were soon to shut out heaven and earth from her eyes. + +She was now within ten miles of Tanis, fourteen days after her departure +from Memphis. + +Four solemn Ethiopians bore her litter upon their shoulders, and another +waved a fan of black ostrich plumes over her. The litter was of +glittering ebony, hung with purple, tasseled with gold. At her right, +was Unas; at her left, Nari. Behind her were dusky attendants and sooty +sumpter-mules. + +Her robes were white, and very fine, but there was no henna on her nails, +nor kohl beneath her lids, nor jewels in her hair. So she would prove +that, though she was a coming queen, she was not glad of it. Hers was +not the spirit that hides its trouble and enamels the exterior with false +flushes and smiles. She enveloped herself in her feelings. She +tinctured her voice with them; she made her eyes languid with them; and +the touch of her hand, the curve of her lips and the droop of her head +were eloquent of them. + +By this time, she had despaired. There was yet an opportunity to spend +another day covering the remaining ten miles, but she would loiter no +longer. She was tired, of a truth. + +It was near sunset when a company of royal guards, under Menes, rode up +from the north. + +The captain flung himself from his horse and hurried to Masanath's litter. + +"Holy Isis! Lady Masanath," he exclaimed; "where in all Egypt hast thou +hidden thyself these fourteen days? The whole army of the north hath +been searching after thee, and Rameses hath raved like a madman since +that day long past on which thou shouldst have arrived in Tanis." + +"I have been on the way," she answered loftily. "The haste of the prince +is unseemly. I would not fatigue myself nor court disaster by +incautiousness, these perilous days." + +Menes bowed. "I am reproved, and contrite. I forgot that I spoke with +my queen. But I am most grateful that thou didst permit me to find thee, +for Rameses sent me forth an hour since, with the hard alternative of +fetching thee to him or losing my head. But that he was sure of my +success is proved by the litter he sent between two horses for thee. +Wilt thou leave this and proceed in the other?" + +Masanath answered by extending her hand to him. Three of the soldiers +laid their cloaks on the earth for her feet; six others let down the +litter and Menes assisted her into the sumptuous conveyance Rameses had +sent. + +Another soldier, after rapid and low-spoken instructions from the +captain, whirled his horse about, saluted and took the road toward Tanis +at a gallop. + +The six shouldered the litter of the crown princess-to-be, Menes mounted +his horse and rode beside her; Unas, her Memphian train, and the +riderless horses were left to bring up the rear, and Masanath continued +to the capital. + +"Perchance, thou hast been famished these fourteen days in the matter of +court-gossip," the captain said. "Wherefore I am come as thy informant +with such news as thou shouldst know. For, being ignorant of the +infelicities in the household of the king, it may be that thou wouldst +ask after the little prince, Seti, and wherefore the queen appears no +more at the side of the Pharaoh, nor speaks with thy lord nor sees thy +noble father; and furthermore, where Ta-user hath taken herself and other +things which would embarrass thee to hear answered openly." + +Masanath roused herself and prepared to listen. Serious words from the +lips of the light-hearted captain were not common, and when he spoke in +that manner it was time to take heed. + +"I had heard of the little prince's misfortune and of the treason of +Ta-user and her party, and the placing of a price upon her head; but +nothing more hath come to mine ears. Is there more, of a truth?" + +"Remember, I pray thee," the captain replied, riding near to her, "that I +bring thee this for thine own sake--not for the love of tale-bearing. On +the counsel of Rameses, this day the Pharaoh sentenced Seti to banishment +for a year to the mines of Libya--" + +"To the mines!" Masanath cried in horror. + +"Not as a laborer. Nay, the sentence was not so harsh. But as a scribe +to the governor over them." + +"It matters little!" she declared indignantly. "The boy-prince--the +poor, misguided young brother sent to a year of banishment--a lifelong +humiliation! Libya, the death-country! Now, was anything more brutal? +Nay, it is like Rameses!" + +"Aye," the captain replied quickly, leaning over her with a cautioning +motion of his hand. "Aye, and it is like thee to say it. But hear me +yet further. The queen and the Son of Ptah have quarreled, violently, +over Seti," he continued in a low tone. "The little prince merited thy +father's disfavor, because Seti espoused the cause of Ta-user in thy +place, though he loves thee, and for that--we can find no other +reason--the noble Har-hat also urged the king into the harsh sentence of +the little prince. For this the queen hath publicly turned her back upon +the crown prince and the fan-bearer, and the atmosphere of the palace is +most unhappy." + +He lowered his voice to a whisper. "Hotep championed Seti,--for the +young sister's sake, it would appear,--but to me it seemeth that the +scribe hath lost his wits." + +"It would seem that he courteth a sentence to the mines likewise, and he +needs but to go on as he hath begun to succeed most thoroughly. And it +behooveth his friends to prevent him." + +He took Masanath's hand and, leaning from the saddle, whispered: + +"Ye are under the same roof--thou and Hotep. Avoid him as though he were +a pestilence." + +He straightened himself and drew his horse away from her so that she +could not answer. + +The captain's meaning, though obscure to any other that might have heard +him, was very clear to Masanath. Har-hat was still holding a threat of +Hotep's undoing over his daughter's head, lest, at the last moment, she +rebel against her marriage. She trembled, realizing how desperately she +was weighted with the safety of the scribe. Her fear for him brought the +first feeling of willingness to wed with Rameses that she had ever +experienced. Distasteful as marriage was to her, it was a species of +sacrifice to be catalogued with the many self-abnegations of which +womanhood is capable when the welfare of the beloved is at stake. + +She sank back in the shadows of her litter, covered her face with her +hands and shuddered because of the imminence of her trial. + +So they journeyed on, till at last Masanath fell asleep--not from +indifference, for her fears exhausted her--but because her mind still +retained babyhood's way of comforting itself when too roughly beset. + +She was aroused in the middle of the first watch by the passage of her +litter between bewildering stretches of lights. She was within the +palace. The soldiers that bore her were tramping over a Damascene +carpet, and between long lines of groveling attendants, through an +atmosphere of overwhelming perfume. The messenger had been swift and the +court had had time to prepare to greet the coming crown princess with +propriety. + +After the first spasm of terror, Masanath set her teeth and prepared to +endure. She was borne to the doors of the throne-room and two nobles +gorgeously habited set the carved steps beside the litter for her feet. + +Without hesitation she descended. + +The great hall was ablaze with light and lined with courtiers. The +Pharaoh, with the queen by his side again, was in his place under the +canopy. + +How tiny the little bride seemed to those gathered to greet her! In that +vast chamber, with its remote ceiling, its majestic pillars, its +distances and sonorous echoes, her littleness was pathetically +accentuated. + +Outside the shelter of her litter, she felt stripped of all protection. +She dared not look at the ranks of courtiers, lest her gaze fall on the +fair face of the royal scribe. She reminded Isis of her threat and moved +into the open space, which extended down the center of the hall. + +Har-hat, glittering with gems, and rustling in snow-white robes, +approached with triumph in his face to embrace her. But within three +steps he paused as suddenly as though he had been commanded. Masanath +had not spoken, but her pretty chin had risen, her mouth curved +haughtily, and the gaze she fixed upon him from under her lashes was cold +and forbidding. + +She extended the tips of her fingers to him. The action clamored its +meaning. Not in the face of that assembly dared he disregard it, but his +black eyes hardened and flashed threateningly. The warning given, he +bent his knee and kissed the proffered hand. He had become the subject +of his daughter. + +She suffered him to lead her to the royal dais where she knelt. The +queen descended, raised her and led her to the throne. Meneptah met +them, kissed Masanath's forehead, and blessed her. The queen embraced +her and returned to her place beside the Pharaoh. + +Masanath turned to the right of the royal dais and faced the prince. +Thus far, her greetings had not been hard. Now was the supreme test. +Har-hat conducted her within a few paces of the prince and stepped aside. +What followed was to prove Masanath's willingness. + +Rameses stood in the center of a slightly raised platform, which was +carpeted with gold-edged purple. Behind him was his great chair. But +for the badge of princehood, the fringed ribbon dependent from a +gem-crusted annulet over each temple, his habiliments were the same as +the Pharaoh's. + +Masanath gave him a single comprehensive glance. She was to wed against +her will, but she noted philosophically that she was to wed with no +puppet, but a kingly king. With all that, admitting herself a peer to +this man, it wrenched her sorely to acknowledge subserviency to him. + +Hope dead--the hour of her trial at hand--nothing was left to uphold her +but the memory of the good she might do for Hotep. Her face fell and she +approached the prince with slow steps. Within three paces of the +platform she paused and sank to her knees. + +It was done. She had acknowledged the betrothal and knelt to her lord. +Somewhere in that assembly Hotep had seen it, and she wondered numbly if +he understood why she had submitted; wondered if she had saved him; +wondered if she could endure for the long life they must spend under the +same roof; wondered if the gods would take pity on her and kill her very +soon. + +By this time, Rameses had raised her. He lifted the badge of princehood +from his forehead, shortened the fillet from which it hung, so that it +would fit her small head and set it on her brow. + +The great palace shook with the acclaim of the courtiers. Organ-throated +trumpets were blown; the clang of crossed arms, and sound of beaten +shields arose from all parts of the king's house; all the ancients' +manifestations of joy were made,--and the pair that had brought it forth +looked upon each other. + +Masanath was trembling, and filled with a great desire to cry out. All +this was manifest on her small, white face. The light had died in the +prince's eyes, the exultation was gone from his countenance. He knew +what thoughts were uppermost in the mind of Masanath, and the tyrant had +spoken truly to her long ago, when he said his heart might be hurt. His +brow contracted with an expression of actual pain and he turned with a +fierce movement as if to command the rejoicings to be still. But a +thought deterred him and taking Masanath's hand he led her down the hall +through the bending ranks of purple-wearing Egyptians to the great +portals of the hall. There, he gave her into the hands of a troop of +court-ladies, lithe as leopards and gorgeous as butterflies, who led her +with many sinuous obeisances to her apartments. She had not far to go. +The suite given over to the new crown princess was within the wing of the +palace in which the royal family lived. Masanath noted with a little +trepidation that her door was very near to the portals over which was the +winged sun, carven and portentous. Here were the chambers of her lord, +the heir. + +Within her own apartments, she was attended multitudinously. +Ladies-in-waiting bent at her elbow; soft-fingered daughters of nobility +habited her in purple-edged robes; flitting apparitions, in a distant +chamber, glimpsed through a vista, laid a table of viands for her, to +which she was led with many soft flatteries; her every wish was +anticipated; all her trepidation conspicuously overlooked; her rank +religiously observed in all speech and behavior. And of all her retinue, +she was the least complacent. + +After her sumptuous meal, she was informed that a member of her private +train had come to Tanis from Memphis, ten days agone, in a state of great +concern and had awaited all that time in the palace till she should +arrive. Now that she had come, the servitor insisted on seeing the +princess and would not be denied. Troubled and wondering, Masanath +ordered that he be brought. In a few minutes, Pepi stood before her. +The taciturn servant was visibly frightened. + +"Pepi!" she cried. "What brings thee here?" + +"I have lost the Israelite," he faltered. + +"Thou hast lost Rachel!" + +"Hear me, my Lady, I pray thee. Thou knowest we were to stop at the +Marsh of the Discontented Soul to leave a writing on the tomb for the son +of Mentu. So we did. The Israelite bade me stand away from the shore +lest we be seen. I put out into midstream and while mine eyes were +attracted for a space toward the other shore, a boat drew up at the +Marsh. I started to return, but before I could reach the place, the +Israelite--the man--they were in--each other's arms." + +Masanath clasped her hands happily, but the servant went on, in haste. +"It was the son of Mentu, I know, my Lady. He was wondrous tall, and the +Israelite was glad to see him--" + +"O, of a surety it was Kenkenes," Masanath interrupted eagerly. + +"Nay, but hear me, my Lady," the serving-man protested, his distress +evident in his voice. "I moved away and turned my back, for I knew they +had no need of me. Once, twice, I looked and still they talked together. +But, alas! the third time I looked, it was because I heard sounds of +combat, and I saw that the son of Mentu and several men were fighting. +One, whom by his fat figure I took to be Unas, was pursuing the +Israelite. I would have returned to help her, but the dreadful night +overtook me before I could reach her--and as thou knowest,--none moved +thereafter. + +"When the darkness lifted, I was off the wharves at On, where my boat had +drifted. I halted only long enough to feed, for I was famished, and with +all haste I returned to the Marsh. None was there. I went to the house +in Memphis, but it was dark and closed. Next I visited the home of Mentu +and asked if Rachel were there, but the old housekeeper had never heard +of such a maiden. But when I asked if the young master had returned, she +asked me where I had been that I had not heard he was dead. And having +said, she shut the door in my face. I think he was within, and she would +not answer me 'aye' or 'nay,' but I know that she told the truth +concerning the Israelite." + +Masanath, who had stood, the picture of dismay and apprehension during +the last part of the recital, seized his arm. + +"Hast thou had an eye to the master?" she demanded in a fierce whisper. + +"Aye," he answered quickly. "I have followed him like a shadow, and this +I know. Nak and Hebset were here when I came, but they went that same +night, each in a different direction, to search further for her. They +returned to-night, but I know not whether they brought one with them." + +Masanath clasped her hands and thought for a moment, a mental struggle +evidenced on her little face by the rapid fluctuations of color. + +"Get thee down to the kitchens, Pepi," she said presently, "and if Nari +hath come, send her up to me. Give thyself comfort and remain in the +palace. It may be that I shall need thee." + +She surveyed herself with a swift glance in a plate of polished silver +which was her mirror, and then, darting out of her door, ran down the +corridor as though she would outstrip repentance before it overtook her. + +The flight was not long, but she had lost her composure before she +started. Outside her doors, she trembled as if unprotected. Soldiers of +the royal guard paced along the hall before her chambers. The lamps that +burned there were of gold; the drapings were of purple wrought with the +royal symbols; the asp supported the censers; the head of Athor +surmounted the columns. She was a dweller of the royal house. Far, far +away from her were the unimperial quarters in which, once, she would have +lived. There was her father--there was Hotep-- + +She came upon him whom she sought. He was on the point of entering his +apartments. He paused with his hands on the curtains and waited for her. + +"A word with thee, my Lord," she panted, chiefly from trepidation. + +"I have come to expect no more than a word from thee," he said. + +The answer would have sent her away in dudgeon, under any other +circumstances, but her pride could not stand in the way of this very +pressing duty. + +"A boon," she said, choking back her resentment. + +"A boon! Thou wouldst ask a boon of me! Nay, I will not promise, for it +may be thou comest to ask thy freedom, and that I will not grant for +spleen." + +Still she curbed herself. "Nay, O Prince; I am come to ask naught of +thee which--a wife--may not justly ask of--her--lord." + +He left the curtain and came close to her. "Had the words come smoothly +over thy lips, they would have meant any wife--any husband. But thy very +faltering names thee and me. What is the boon that thou mayest justly +ask of me?" + +"My father--." + +"Hold! There, too, I make a restriction. Already have I suffered thy +father sufficiently." + +Tears leaped into her insulted eyes, and in the bright light, shining +from a lamp above her head, her emotion was very apparent. + +"Thou hast begun well in thy siege of my heart, Rameses," she said. "I +am like to love thee, if thou dost woo me with affronts!" + +"I am as like to win thee with rough words as I am with soft speeches. I +had thought thee above pretense, Masanath." + +"I pretend not," she cried, stamping her foot. "And if thou wouldst know +how I esteem thee, I can tell thee most truthfully." + +He laughed and caught her hands. "Nay, save thy judgment. Thou hast a +long life with me before thee, and the minds of women can change in the +blink of an eye. Furthermore, I love thee none the less because thou art +so untamed. Thou art the world I would subdue. So thou dost not give +allegiance to another conqueror, I shall not grieve over thy rebellion. +Is there another?" he asked. + +"I would liefer wed with well-nigh any other man in Egypt than with thee, +Rameses," she replied deliberately. + +The declaration swept him off his feet. + +"Gods! but thou dost hate me," he cried. Panic possessed her for a +moment, remembering Hotep, but it was too late. She returned the +prince's gaze without wavering, though her hands shook pitifully. After +what seemed to her an interminable time, he spoke again. + +"Perchance I am unwise in taking thee," he said. "Perchance I but give +thee opportunity to spit me on a dagger in my sleep." + +The tears brimmed over her lashes this time. + +"Thou dost slander me!" she exclaimed passionately. + +"Then I do not understand thee, Masanath," he asserted. + +"Of a surety," she declared, withdrawing a hand that she might dry the +evidences of her indignation from her cheeks. "Take the example home to +thyself! Thou hast been loved in thy time, and if ever there was +awakened any feeling in thy heart in response it was repugnance. What if +one of these women had it in her power to take thee against thy will? By +this time thou hadst been dead of thy frantic hate of her, if self-murder +had not been done!" + +"Even so," he answered with a short laugh; "but I will not set thee free, +Masanath, if thou didst convict me a monster in mine own eyes. If thou +art good thou wilt love me or do thy duty by me. If thou art base, I +have wedded mine own deserts." + +He took the hand she had withdrawn and prepared to go on, but she +interposed. + +"Not yet have I asked my boon." + +"I am no longer in debt to thy father." + +"I ask no favor for my father at thy hands. Rather am I come to crave a +boon for myself." + +"Speak." + +"My father asked an Israelite maiden at the hands of the Pharaoh a year +agone, and she was beloved by my friend and thine. She fled from my +father and was hidden by the man she loved--" + +"Aye, I know the story. Hotep brought it to mine ears months ago. The +man was Kenkenes, and thy father overtook him and threw him into prison +in Tape. What more?" + +"The gods keep me in my love for thee, O my father! for thou dost strain +it most heavily," Masanath thought. After an unhappy silence she went on. + +"Thou hast given me news. I know little of the tale save that the day +the darkness fell Kenkenes met his love on the eastern shore of the Nile +opposite Memphis, and there my father's servants came upon them and +fought with him for the possession of the Israelite. The Israelite is +gone, and my father's servants are still seeking for her, and I would not +have her taken." + +"Thou art a queen. What is she, a slave, to thee?" + +"A sister, my comforter, my one friend!" + +"Thou canst find sisters and comforters and friends among high-born women +of Egypt. I had laid Kenkenes' folly concerning this Israelite to the +moonshine genius in him. But the slave is a sorceress, for the madness +touches whosoever looks upon her. Behold her worshipers--first, thy +father, Kenkenes, Hotep and thyself, and the gods know whom else. She +would better be curbed before she bewitches Egypt." + +"It is her goodness and her grace that win, Rameses. If that be sorcery, +let it prevail the world over. Give her freedom and save her +spotlessness." + +"Har-hat shall not take her, I promise thee. I shall send her back to +her place in the brick-fields." + +Masanath recoiled in horror. "To the brick-fields!" she cried. "Rachel +to the brick-fields!" + +"I have said. Her Israelitish spotlessness will be secure there, and the +reduction of her charms will be the saving of Kenkenes." + +"Alas! what have I done?" she cried. "I am as fit for the brick-fields +as Rachel. O, if thou but knew her, Rameses!" + +"Nay, it is as well that I do not; she might bewitch me. And seeing that +she is born of slaves, how shall she be pampered above her parents? Put +the folly from thy mind, Masanath, and trouble me not concerning a single +slave. Shall I let one go, seeing that I am holding the body at the +sacrifice of Egypt?" + +Great was Masanath's distress to make her seize him so beseechingly. + +"Turn not away, my Lord," she begged. "See what havoc I have wrought for +Rachel when I sought to help her. And behold the honesty of thy boast of +love for me. My first boon and thou dost deny it!" + +He laughed, and slipping an arm about her, pressed her to him. + +"First am I a king--next a lover," he said. "Thy prayer seeketh to come +between me and my rule over the Israelites. Ask for something which hath +naught to do with my scepter." + +"Surely if thou sendest her to the brick-fields Kenkenes will go into +slavery with her," she persisted, enduring his clasp in the hope that he +might soften. + +"Then it were time for the dreamer to be awakened by his prince." + +"Thou wilt not come between them!" she exclaimed. + +"Nay, no need. Seven days of the lash and the sun of the slave-world +will heal Kenkenes." + +"Thou shalt see!" Masanath declared, endeavoring to free herself. "And +the gods judge thee for thy savage use of maidenhood!" + +Again he laughed, and this time he kissed her in spite of her resistance. + +"The gods judge me rather for this sweeter use of maidenhood," he said. +"Let them continue to prosper me in it and hasten the day of her +willingness. Meanwhile," he continued, still holding her, as if he +enjoyed the mastery over her, "get thee back to thy sleep and put the +thought of slaves out of thy mind. To-morrow thou settest thy feet in +the path to the throne; to-morrow there will be ceremonies and prayers +and blessings out of number; and to-morrow sunset thou art no longer +betrothed but a bride! My bride! Go now, and be proud of me if thou +canst not love me!" + +He released her and, as he entered his apartments, lifted the curtain and +stood for an instant looking back at her. + +Masanath saw him through her despairing tears--strong, immovable, +terrible--in his youth and his purposes and his capabilities. + +Then the curtain fell behind him. + +Crushed and stunned with despair and horror, she made her way to her +apartments in a mist of tears. + +There was no help for the beloved Rachel or for the young lover. All +whom she might ask to approach the king in their favor were helpless or +prejudiced. Seti was disgraced; the queen, useless; Hotep, already too +imminently imperiled; Rameses, Har-hat, against the lovers; and the +king--the poor, feeble king, hopelessly beyond any appeal that she might +direct to him. + +A sorry resolve shaped itself in her mind. To-morrow at dawn she also +would put forth searchers, and finding Rachel, send her out of Egypt, and +Kenkenes after her. + + + + +CHAPTER XL + +THE FIRST-BORN + +At the door of her apartments Masanath was met by the faithful Nari, +who drew her within and showed her triumphantly that the usurping +ladies-in-waiting had departed. The unhappy girl was grateful for the +change. The relief for her sorrow was its expression, and she dreaded +the restraint put upon her by the presence of discerning and unfamiliar +eyes. + +All desire for sleep had left her. Nari, weary and heavy-headed, +begged her to retire, but she would not. So at last the waiting woman, +at her mistress' command, lay down and slept. + +The apartment consisted of two chambers running the width of the +palace. The outer chamber had a window opening on the streets of +Tanis, the inner looked into the palace courtyard. + +Masanath wrapped a woolen mantle about her and sat at the window +overlooking the park. + +Without was the wide hollow, walled by the many-galleried stories of +the king's house. Below a fountain of running water, issuing from an +ibis-bill of bronze, and falling into a pool, purled and splashed and +talked on and on to itself. + +Above, the mighty constellations were dropping slowly down the west. +The wild north wind from the sea strove against her cheek. The gods +were too absorbed in great things, the shifting of the heavens, the +flight of the wind and the rocking of the waters, to care for her great +burden of trouble. Or, indeed, were they not prejudiced against her as +all the world was? They had heard every prayer but hers. They had +harkened to Rameses when he asked for her at their hands; they had +harkened to her father and yielded him power at her sacrifice; they had +even pitied Rachel; they had returned her love from Amenti, and yet had +not Rachel reviled them? Nay, there was conspiracy laid against her by +the Pantheon, and what had she done to deserve it? + +In some one of the many windows that looked into the court another +dragged at his chestnut locks and execrated gods and men because of +their hardness of heart. + +So the night wore on to its noon. + +Masanath was becoming drowsy in spite of her determination to keep a +sleepless vigil until dawn, when she was aroused by a commotion in the +vicinity of the palace. There were indoor cries and shouts for help. + +"A brawl," she thought. But the noise seemed to emerge into the +street, and there came the sound of flying footsteps and frantic knocks +upon doors without. The sound seemed to swell and spread abroad, +widening and heightening. Wild shrieks and husky broken shouts swept +up from all quarters of the town, and the whole air was full of a vast +murmur of many voices, calling and wailing, excited, tremulous and full +of fear. + +Masanath passed into the outer room to the window that looked upon the +city. + +Every house had a light, which flickered and appeared at this window +and that, and the streets were full of flying messengers, who cried out +as they ran. Now and then a chariot, drawn at full speed, dashed past, +and by the fluttering robes of the occupants Masanath guessed them to +be physicians. All Tanis was in uproar, and its alarm possessed her at +once. + +She turned to awaken Nari, when she heard inside the palace excited +words and hurrying feet. Some one ran, barefoot, past her door, +calling under his breath upon the gods. At that moment an incisive +shriek cut the increasing murmur in the palace and died away in a long +shuddering wail of grief. + +"Awake, awake, Nari!" Masanath cried, shaking the sleeping woman. +"Something has befallen the city. It is in the palace and everywhere." + +Meanwhile a chorus of screams smote upon her ears and the wild outcries +of men filled the great palace with terrifying clamor. + +Masanath, shaking with dread, wrung her hands and wept. Nari, stupid +with fear, sat up and listened. + +Presently some one came running and beat, with frenzied hands, upon the +door. + +"Open! Open! In the name of Osiris!" cried a voice which, though it +quaked with consternation, Masanath recognized as her father's. + +She flew to the door and wrenched it open. Har-hat, half-dressed, +stood before it. + +"Father, what manner of sending is this?" she cried. + +"Death!" he panted. "Come with me!" He caught her arm and ran, +dragging her after him down the corridor, half-lighted, but murmurous +with sound. + +"What is it, father?" she begged as he hurried her on. + +"The gods only know. Rameses hath been smitten and is dying, or even +now is dead!" + +"Rameses!" she breathed in a terrified whisper. "Rameses! And an hour +ago I talked with him--so strong, so resolute, so full of life--O Holy +Isis!" + +"It is a pestilence sent by Mesu. The whole city is afflicted. Ptah +shield us!" + +The hangings that covered the entrance to each suite of chambers had +been thrown aside and the interiors were vacant. But the farther end +of the hall was filled with terrified courtiers in all attitudes and +degrees of extravagant demonstration of grief. Men and women were +fallen here and there on the pavement or supporting themselves by +pillar and wall, wailing, tearing their hair, wounding their faces, +rending their garments. + +All the dwellers of the palace were flocked about the apartments of +Rameses. From the entrance into these chambers issued sounds of the +wildest nature. Masanath heard and attempted to draw away from the +fan-bearer. + +"Take me not into that awful place!" she pleaded. "How canst thou +force me, my father!" + +But Har-hat did not seem to hear and pushed his way, still dragging her +through the crush of shaking attendants that crowded into the outer +chambers. + +The sleeping-room of the heir was the focal spot of violent sorrow. + +The royal pair, the king's ministers, the immediate companions of +Rameses, the high priest from the Rameside temple to Set at Tanis and a +corps of leeches were present. The couch was surrounded. + +Seti was not present, for only in the last moment had some one realized +that the young prince should be brought. Hotep had gone to conduct him +to the chamber. + +The queen, inert and lifeless, lay on the floor at the foot of the +prince's bed. Most of the physicians bent over her. Her women, +chiefly the wives of the ministers, were hysterical and helpless. + +But it was Meneptah who froze the hearts of his courtiers with horror. + +Because of his obstinacy Egypt had gone down into famine, pestilence +and destruction. Without more than ordinary concern he had watched the +hand of the scourge pursue it into ruin till what time he should +relent, and he had not relented. + +But now that dread Hand had entered within the boundaries of his loves +and had smitten Rameses, his heir, his idol! + +The effect upon him was terrible. The death chamber rang like a +torture dungeon. Nechutes and Menes, by united efforts, barely +prevented him from doing self-murder. The earnest attempts of the +priest to quiet him were totally useless. Nothing could have been more +shocking. + +The violent scene wrought Masanath's already over-strained nerves to +the highest pitch of distress. The blood congealed in her veins and +her steps lagged, but Har-hat, for some purpose not apparent to any who +looked upon his daughter's anguish, drew her to the very side of the +couch. The leeches, who had been vainly seeking for some flicker of +life, stepped aside and the eyes of the cowering girl fell on the +prince. + +Rameses had seen the Hand that smote him. + +The look on the frozen features completed the undoing of Masanath's +self-control and she collapsed beside the bed, utterly prostrated. + +Hotep entered with Seti. The boy prince's face was inflamed with much +weeping, and he flung himself upon the cold clay of Rameses, forgetting +wholly that the older brother had urged the passage of a harsh sentence +upon his young head. + +The courtiers, who had stoically witnessed Meneptah's frantic grief, +turned now and hid their blinded eyes. Hotep went to the Pharaoh and +laid his hand on the monarch's shoulder. The action commanded. +Exhausted by his frenzy, Meneptah leaned against his scribe. The +cup-bearer and the captain released him and Hotep spoke quietly. + +"Seest thou, O my King, the sorrow of thy people? Behold thy young son +and pity him. Look upon thy queen and comfort her. If thou, their +staff, art broken, who shall bear them up in their sorrow? Break not. +Be thou as the strong father of thy great son, so that from the bosom +of Osiris he may look upon Egypt and sleep well, seeing that in his +loss his kingdom lost not her prop and stay, her king, also." + +The scanty manhood of the monarch, thus ably invoked, responded +somewhat. He raised himself and permitted Hotep to conduct him to the +side of the boy prince. Seti fell down at his father's feet, and Hotep +took Meneptah's hand and laid it on the bowed head. + +"Thou dost pardon him, O Son of Ptah," the scribe said in the same +quiet voice. The king nodded weakly and wept afresh. After the prince +had clasped his father's knees and covered the hand with kisses, he +obeyed the scribe's sign and went away to his mother's side. Again +Hotep, compelling by his low voice, spoke to the king and the assembly +listened. + +"The gods have not limited the darts of affliction to thee, O Son of +Ptah. Rameses journeyed not alone into Amenti. He took a kingdom with +him. Behold, the Hebrew hath loosed his direst plague upon Egypt, and +by the lips of an Israelite, in the streets, every first-born in thy +realm perished in the home of his father this night!" + +The entire assembly cried out, and most of them ran sobbing and praying +from the chamber. Instantly the outcry and clamor in the palace broke +forth again, for the inhabitants knew that the blow which had smitten +Rameses had fallen on one of their own. + +Meneptah staggered away from Hotep, his frenzy upon him again. + +"Send them hither," he cried hoarsely, waving his arms toward a +white-faced courtier that had stood his ground. "Send them hither--the +Hebrews, Mesu and Aaron! Israel shall depart, before they make me sink +the world! For they have sent madness upon me! I condemned my gentle +son, I punished those who gave me wise counsel, I have ruined Egypt, I +have slain mine heir, and now the blood of the first-born of all my +kingdom is upon my head!" His voice rose to a shriek, and Hotep, +putting an arm about him, hushed him with gentle authority and signed +the courtier to obey. + +The physicians lifted the queen and bore her away. Seti stopped at +Masanath's side and looked at her with compassion in his eyes. Har-hat +came to him. + +"Seeing that thou hast won the pardon of thy father, am I not also +included in the restoration of good feeling? Have I won thine enmity, +my Prince?" + +"I hold naught against thee, O Har-hat, but thou hast not been a +profitable counselor to my father in these days of his great need." +The young prince spoke frankly and returned the comprehending gaze of +the fan-bearer. Har-hat's eyes fell on his daughter, and again on the +prince. Slow discomfiture overspread his features. Rameses was dead +and with him died the fan-bearer's hold upon his position. Seti was +arisen in the heir's place, with all the heir's enmity to him. But +from Seti he could not purchase security with Masanath. + +Hotep supported Meneptah out of the death chamber, for the court +paraschites were already hiding in the shadows of the great halls +without. The bed-chamber slowly emptied. Har-hat lifted Masanath and +followed the last out-going courtier. + +Another tumult had arisen in the great corridor, an uproar of another +nature that advanced from the entrance hall of the palace. There were +cries of supplication, persuasion, urging, that were frantic in their +earnestness. The whole palace seemed to be on its knees. + +Hotep, with the king, had paused, and several courtiers went before him +and looked down the cross corridor. Instantly they fell on their +knees, crying out: + +"Ye have the leave of the powers of Egypt! Go! Make haste! Take your +flocks, all that is yours! Aye, strip us even, if ye will! But let +not the sun rise upon you in Egypt! For we be all dead men!" + +A murmur ran through the ministers. "The Hebrews!" + +They came slowly, side by side, the two brothers. Egyptians in all +attitudes of entreaty cumbered their path--Egyptians, born to the +purple, rich, proud, powerful, on their faces to enslaved Israel! + +Meneptah wrenched himself from Hotep's sustaining arms and, staggering +forward, all but on his knees, met them. + +"Rise up and get you forth from among my people," he besought them, +"both ye and the children of Israel, and go and serve the Lord as ye +have said. Also take your flocks and your herds as ye have said, and +be gone; and bless me also!" + +Great was the fall for a Pharaoh to pray a blessing from the hands of a +slave; great was his humility to kneel to them. But there was no +triumph, no exultation on the faces of the Hebrews. Aaron, with his +bearded chin on his breast, looked down on the head of the shuddering, +pleading monarch; but Moses, after sad contemplation of the humbled +king, raised his splendid head and gazed with kindling eyes at Har-hat. + +Then with the words, "It is well," spoken without animation, he turned +and, with his brother, disappeared into the dusk of the long corridor. +The expression, the act, the mode of departure seemed to indicate that +the Israelites doubted the stability of the king's intent. In a +moment, therefore, the courtiers were pursuing the departing brothers, +urging and praying with all their former wild insistence. + +Har-hat put Masanath on her feet and started to leave her, but she +flung her arms about his neck. + +"Forgive me, my father," she sobbed. "For my rebellion the gods may +absolve me, but I have been unfilial and for that there is no +justification. If aught should befall thee in these awful days, how I +should reproach myself! Sawest thou not the Hebrew's gaze upon thee? +Say thou dost forgive me!" + +"Nay, nay," he said hastily; "thou hast not done me to death by thine +undutifulness. And the Hebrew fears me. Get back to thy chamber and +rest." He kissed her and undid her clinging arms. Going to the king, +he put aside Hotep, who was striving to raise the monarch, and lifted +Meneptah in his arms. + +"Masanath is better now, good Hotep, and I would take my place beside +my king." + +Without summoning further aid, he half carried the limp monarch up the +hall and into the royal bed-chamber. + +Weak, shaking, sated with horror and numb with fear, Masanath attempted +to return to her apartments, but at the second step she reeled. Hotep +saw her. The fan-bearer was not in sight. In an instant the scribe +was beside the fainting girl, supporting her, nor did he release her +until she was safe in the ministering arms of Nari. + +As he was leaving her he commended her most solemnly to the gods. + +"Death hath wrenched a scepter from the gods and ruled the world this +night," he said. "We may not delude ourselves that we have escaped, my +Lady. As sure as there is a first-born in thy father's house and in +mine, that one is dead. And think of those others whom we love, the +eldest born of other houses! Do thou pray for us, thou perfect spirit. +I can not, for there is little reverence for my gods in me this night." + +He turned away and disappeared down the corridor. + +Within her chamber Masanath knelt and dutifully strove to pray, but her +petition resolved itself into a repeated cry for help. In that hour +she did not think of the relief to her and to many that the death of +Rameses had brought about, for in her heart she counted it sin to be +glad of benefit wrought by the death of any man. + +Through the fingers across her face she knew that dawn was breaking, +but quiet had not settled on the city. Surging murmurs of unanimous +sorrow rose and fell as if blown by the chill wind to and fro over +Egypt. The nation crouched with her face in the dust. There was no +perfunctory sorrow in her abasement. She was bowed down with her own +woe, not Meneptah's. Never before had a prince's going-out been +attended by such wild grief. There was no comfort in Egypt, and the +air was tremulous with mourning from the first cataract to the sea. + + + + +CHAPTER XLI + +THE ANGEL OF DEATH + +Kenkenes had spent two weeks in Goshen in systematic search for Rachel. + +The labor had been time-consuming and fruitless. + +More than two million Israelites were encamped about Pa-Ramesu, and +among this host Kenkenes had searched thoroughly and fearlessly. He +was an Egyptian and a noble, and Israel did not make his way easy. But +all Judah knew Rachel and loved her, and the first the young man came +upon was a quarryman who had known of Rachel's flight from Har-hat and +of her protection at the hands of an Egyptian. Therefore when Kenkenes +bore witness, by his stature, that he was the protecting Egyptian, and +by his testimony concerning the God of Israel, that he was worthy, this +friendly son of Judah began to suspect that Rachel would be glad to see +the young noble, and he joined Kenkenes in his search. Furthermore, he +softened the hearts of the tribe toward the Egyptian and they tolerated +him with some assumption of grace. + +The other tribes gave him no heed except to glower at him in the +camp-ways or to mutter after him when he had passed. Seeing that Judah +suffered him, they did not fall on him. Thus the young man was safe. +As for the notice Kenkenes took of Israel, it began and ended with his +inquiry after Rachel, the daughter of Maai the Compassionate, a son of +Judah. His earnestness absorbed him. Otherwise he was but partly +conscious of great preparations making in camp, of tremendous +excitement, heightening of zeal and vast meetings after nightfall, when +he had withdrawn to a far-off meadow to sleep in the grass. + +When he had searched throughout the length and breadth of Israel and +found Rachel not, he led his horse from the distant meadow, where he +had been pastured, and turned his head toward Tanis. + +While he was binding the saddle of sheep's wool about the Arab's narrow +girth he was surprised to find that the friendly son of Judah had +followed him to the pasture. The man approached, as though one spirit +urged him and another held him back, and offered Kenkenes the shelter +of his tent for the night. + +Somewhat gratified and astonished, Kenkenes, thanked him and declined. +Still the Hebrew lingered and urged him with strange persistence. +Kenkenes expressed his gratitude, but would not stay. + +Having taken the road toward Tanis where Rachel might be in the hands +of Har-hat, his heart seemed to turn to iron in his breast. All the +energies and aims of his youth seemed to resolve into one grim and +inexorable purpose. + +It was far into the second watch when he left Pa-Ramesu. But the great +city of tents was not yet sleeping. + +The horse was anxious for a journey after a fortnight of idleness and +he bade fair to keep pace with his rider's impatience. The Arabian +hills had sunk below the sky-line and the Libyan desert was not marked +by any eminence. With Pa-Ramesu behind him, a wide unbroken horizon +belted the dusky landscape. The lights winked out over Goshen and the +hamlets were not visible except as Kenkenes came upon them. The +shepherd dogs barked afar off, or now and then a wakened bird cheeped +drowsily, or the waters in the canals rippled over a pebbly space. + +But these sounds ceased unaccountably, at last, and a silence settled +down till the atmosphere was tense with stillness. A deadening hand +seemed to cover the night. + +The silence roused Kenkenes and he realized the solemnity of the earth, +the vastness of the sky and the majesty of the solitude. Mysteriously +affected, he withdrew within himself and humbly acknowledged the One +God. + +At midnight a chill struck the breeze and he drew his mantle about him +while he rode. The wind freshened and a heated counter-current from +the desert met it and they whirled away, rustling through the grassy +country. + +The Arab reduced his gallop so suddenly that Kenkenes was jolted. The +small peaked ears of the horse went up and he showed a disposition to +move sidewise into the meadow growth beside the way. + +"A wild beast hath taken the road," Kenkenes thought. + +The horse brought up, with a start, his prominent muscles twitching, +and sniffed the air strongly. + +A high oscillation in the atmosphere descended on Kenkenes. + +The Arab reared, snorting, and then crouched, quivering with wild +terror in every limb. + +Unconscious, even of the movement, Kenkenes threw up his arm as if to +ward off the blow and bent upon his horse's neck. + +Gust after gust of icy air swept down on his head, as if winnowed by +frozen wings. Then with a backward waft, colder than any wind he had +ever known, the hovering Presence passed. + +Instantly the horse plunged and took the road toward Tanis as if stung +by a lash. Kenkenes, shaken and full of solemn dread, did well to keep +his saddle. He grasped the stout leather bridle with strong hands, but +he might have curbed the hurricane as easily. The Arab stretched his +gaunt length, running low, and the haunted night reechoed with the +sound of his hoofs. The land of Goshen lay east and west, with a +slight divergence toward the north. The road to Tanis ran due north. +It was not long until Kenkenes' flying steed brought him in sight of +the un-Israelite Goshen. Illuminated windows starred the plain and the +wind shrilling in Kenkenes' ears bore uncanny sounds. A turf-thatched +hovel at the roadside showed a light as they swept by and a long scream +clove the air, but the Arab was not to be halted. + +The murmurous wind did not soothe him, and the wakeful night had a +terror for him that he could not outrun. He veered sharply and +galloped through the pastures to avoid a roadside hamlet that shrieked +and moaned. He leaped irrigation canals and brush hedges, swept +through fields and gardens, until, at last, by dint of persuasion, +coupled with the animal's growing fatigue, Kenkenes succeeded in +drawing the horse down into a milder pace. + +The young man made no effort to fathom the mysterious visitation. +Instead, he bowed his head and rode on, awed and humbled. + +The night wore away and the gray of the morning showed him, +strange-featured, the misty levels, meadows, fields and gardens of +northern Goshen. The wind faltered and died; the stars, strewn down +the east, paled and went out, one by one. Fragmentary clouds toward +the sunrise became apparent, tinted, silvered and at last, like flakes +of gold, scattered down to a point of intensest brilliance on the +horizon. A lark sprang out of the wet, wind-mown grass of a meadow and +shot up, up till it was lost in radiance and only a few of its +exquisite notes filtered down to earth again. + +A brazen rim showed redly on the horizon and the next instant the sun +bounded above the sky-line. + +It was the morning after the Passover, and Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, +was the only Egyptian first-born that lived to see it break. + + + + +CHAPTER XLII + +EXPATRIATION + +At sunrise, Kenkenes drew up his horse and took counsel with himself. +By steady riding he could reach Tanis shortly, but once within the +capital of the Pharaoh, he was near to Har-hat and within reach of the +fan-bearer's potent hand. When he entered the city he must be mentally +and physically alert. He had not slept since the last daybreak, and he +was weary and heavy-headed. + +Ahead of him was a squat hamlet, set on the very border of Goshen. It +was the same village that Seti had designated in his appointment with +Moses. Here he might have found a hospitable roof and a pallet of +matting, but the accompanying gratuity of curiosity and comment would +have outweighed the small advantage of a bed indoors over a bed in the +meadows. + +He dismounted and, leading his horse some distance from the road, into +the fringe of water-sprouts which lined the canal, picketed him within +shade, out of view from the highway. Usually the meadow growth within +reach of the seepage from the canals was most luxuriant, and here the +flocks of the Israelites had come for sweet grass. They had kept the +underbrush down, and the herbage closely cropped. But for two months +Israel had been near Pa-Ramesu with its cattle, and the canal-borders +were again riotous with growth. The place Kenkenes came upon was most +tempting, odorous and cool. He rolled his mantle for a pillow and +flung himself into the grass, where he lay, half-buried in green, and +slept. + +The April sun, hot as a torrid July noon in northern lands, discovered +the sleeper and stared into his upturned face. He flung his arm across +his eyes and slept on. Shadows fell and lengthened; the afternoon +passed, and still he slept. + +Mounted couriers riding at a dead gallop, passed over the road, toward +Tanis. Following them, war-chariots thundered by with a castanet +accompaniment of jingling harness and jarring armor. Kenkenes stirred +during the tumult, but when it had receded he lay still again. Three +mounted soldiers leading a score of horses passed. The Arab in the +copse whinnied softly. A second trio of soldiers, following with a +smaller drove, heard the call from the bushes and drew up. The +foremost man spoke to another, tossed the knotted bridles to him and, +dismounting, came through the copse to the Arab. There he found the +young nobleman, sleeping. + +For a moment he hesitated, but no longer. Silently he untied the +horse, led him forth, attached him with the others and speedily took +the road toward Tanis. + +After these had passed the road was deserted and no more came that way. +In a little time the sun set. The wind from the north freshened and +swayed the close-standing bushes so that their branches chafed one +against another. At the sound Kenkenes, ready to wake, stirred and +opened his eyes. After a moment he sat up and looked for the Arab. +The horse was gone. + +Kenkenes arose and searched industriously. The trampled space in the +road convinced him that the horse had departed with a number of others. +Hoping that he might find some trace of the lost animal among the +inhabitants, he went to the hamlet. + +Two ragged lines of huts, built of sun-dried brick, formed a single +straggling street. A low shed, the first building Kenkenes came upon, +showed a flickering red light. A spare figure darted into it, just +ahead of the young man. + +From the threshold, the whole of the small interior was visible. + +The light came from a small annealing oven. At a table, overlaid with +a thin slab of stone, a man was modeling a cat in clay. On the +opposite side of the room was a younger man, painting an image, +preparatory to burning it in the oven. The walls were black with +smoke, the floor strewn with broken images and dried crumbs of clay. + +In the center of the room was the spare figure, in white robes. +Kenkenes had opened his lips to speak when the conversation among the +trio stopped him. + +"Cowards! Dastards!" the spare man vociferated. "Is there not a +patriot in Egypt? The Pharaoh in danger and not a man in the hamlet +who will raise a heel to save him!" + +"Holy Father," the short man protested, "the way is long, the horses +have been required at our hands by the Pharaoh and were taken from us, +and if there be evil omens, the king's sorcerers will discover them." + +"King's sorcerers!" the spare man repeated indignantly. "There is not +one of them who can tell a star from a fire-fly or read the events of +yesterday! Horses! Must ye go mounted, in litters, in chariots, +afraid of the harsh earth and a rough mile? In my youth, the young men +went barefoot and traveled the desert for the joy of effort. Oh, for +one of mine own best days! Horses!" + +"Is the son of Hofa away?" the younger man asked. "He is a runner as +well as a soldier." + +The spare man broke out afresh. + +"A runner! Aye, of a truth he is a runner. When the tidings came that +the Pharaoh was to pursue the Israelites he ran his best--for the +hay-fields--and is hidden safe under a swath somewhere--the craven!" + +Kenkenes stepped into the shed. + +"What is this concerning the Israelites?" he demanded. + +The spare man turned and the two artisans gazed at the young sculptor +with open mouths. + +"The news is not to be cried abroad," the spare man replied shortly. + +"Thou hast become cautious too late," Kenkenes retorted. "The most of +thy talk have I heard. I would know the rest of it." + +"By Bast, thou art imperious! In my great days the nobles groveled to +me. Now, am I commanded by them. How thou art fallen, Jambres! + +"The Israelites, my Lord," he continued mockingly, "departed out of the +land of Goshen, in the early morning hours of this day, but the Pharaoh +hath repented, and will pursue them--to turn them back, or to destroy +them." The old man's voice lost its sarcasm and became anxious. + +"But the signs are ominous, the portents are evil. I know, I know, for +I am no less a mystic because I have fallen from state. His seers are +liars, they can not guide the king. He must not pursue them, for death +shadows him the hour he leaves the gates of Tanis. He must not go! I +love him yet, and I can not see him overthrown." + +"Thou art no more eager to stay him than I," Kenkenes answered quickly. +"Thou art in need of a runner. I am one." + +The eye of the sorcerer fell on the young man's dress. + +"A runner among the nobility?" he commented suspiciously. + +"Is a man less likely to be a patriot because he is of blood, or less +fleet of foot because he is noble?" + +"Nay; nor less useful because he is sharp of tongue. Come with me!" +Jambres seized his arm and, hurrying him out of the shed, went through +the ragged street to the shrine at the upper end of the village. + +From the tunnel-like entrance between the dwarf pylons a light was +diffused as though it came through thin hangings. The pair entered the +porch and passed into the sanctuary. + +Entering his study, Jambres made his way to the heavy table and, +fumbling about the compartments under it, drew forth a wrapped and +addressed roll. Taking up a lighted lamp, he scrutinized the messenger +sharply. + +While he gazed, Kenkenes took the opportunity of inspecting the priest. +He had been a familiar figure about the palaces of two monarchs. For +thirty years he had read the stars for the great Rameses, six for +Meneptah, but he had measured rods with Moses and had fallen. From the +pinnacle of power he had declined precipitately to the obscurest office +in the priesthood. This bird-cote shrine was his. + +"Art thou seasoned? Canst thou endure? Nay, no need to ask that," he +answered himself, surveying the strong figure before him. "But who art +thou?" + +"I am the son of Mentu, the murket." + +"The son of Mentu? Enough. If a drop of that man's blood runneth in +thy veins, thou art as steadfast as death. Surely the gods are with +me." + +He opened a second compartment in the end of the table, but before he +found what he sought he raised himself, suddenly. + +"If thou art that son of the murket," he asked, "how is it thou art not +dead?" + +Kenkenes looked at him, wondering if the news of his supposed death had +penetrated even to this little hamlet. + +"Art thou not thy father's eldest born?" the priest asked further. + +"His only child." + +"What sheltered thee in last night's harvest of death?" + +"Thou speakest in riddles, holy Father." + +"Knowest thou not that every first-born in Egypt died last night at the +Hebrew's sending?" the sorcerer demanded. + +"The first-born of Egypt," Kenkenes repeated slowly. "At the Hebrew's +sending?" + +"Aye, by the sorcery of Mesu. Save for the eldest of Israel, there is +no living first-born in Egypt to-day. From that most imperial Prince +Rameses to the firstling of the cowherd, they are dead!" + +The young man heard him first with a chill of horror, half-unbelieving, +barely comprehending. He was not of Israel and yet he had been spared. +Then he remembered the dread presence above him in the night,--the +chill from its noiseless wing. A light, instant and brilliant as a +revelation, broke over him. Unconsciously, he raised his eyes and +clasped his hands against his breast. He knew that his God had +acknowledged him. + +When his thoughts returned to earth, he found the glittering eyes of +the sorcerer fixed upon him. + +"Seeing that thou dost live, tell me what sheltered thee in this +harvest of death?" Jambres repeated. + +"The Lord God of Israel, who reaped it." + +The answer was direct and fearless. To the astonished priest who heard +it, it seemed triumphant. + +Each of the many emotions the sorcerer experienced, displayed itself, +in turn, on his face,--amazement, anger, censure, irresolution, +distrust. After a silence, he took up the scroll and made as if to +return it to its hiding-place in the compartments under the table. + +"Stay," Kenkenes said, laying his hand on the sorcerer's. "Put it not +away, for I shall carry it. Shall I, being a believer in Israel's God, +be willing for the Pharaoh to pursue Israel?" + +"Nay," Jambres replied bluntly; "but thou wouldst stay him for Israel's +sake; I would prevent him for his own." + +"So the same end is accomplished, wherefore quarrel over the motive? +But when thou speakest of Israel's sake, which, by the testimony of +past events, is now the more imperiled, Egypt or Israel?" + +"Egypt! But it shall not be wholly overthrown through mine incautious +trust of a messenger." + +The young man still retained his hold on the sorcerer's hand. + +"Thou dost impugn my fidelity. Now, consider this. I could have +defeated thee and accomplished the Pharaoh's undoing by refusing to +carry the message, by keeping silence in yonder shed of image-makers. +Is it not so?" + +Jambres assented. + +"Even so. Instead, I offered and now I insist. Now, if thou deniest +me, there is none to carry the warning and thou, thyself, hast undone +the Pharaoh." + +The sorcerer put away the hand and showed no sign of softening. + +"Nay, then," Kenkenes said, "there is no need of the writing. I shall +warn the king by word of mouth." He turned away and walked swiftly +toward the portals of the shrine. Jambres beheld him recede into the +dusk and wavered. + +"Stay!" he called. + +Kenkenes stopped. + +"Wilt thou swear fidelity by the holy Name?" + +"Aye, and by that holier Name of Jehovah, also." + +He returned and faced the priest. "Thou art mystic, Father Jambres," +he said persuasively; "what does thy heart tell thee of me?" + +"The supplication of the need indorses thee, as it indorses any +desperate chance. If thou art false, thou art the instrument of Set, +whom the Hathors have given to overthrow Egypt. If thou art true, the +Pharaoh shall return safe to his capital in Memphis. The gratitude of +Egypt will be sufficient reward." + +"And I take the message?" + +Jambres nodded. "Art thou armed?" he asked, bending again to look into +the compartment he had opened. + +"Except for my dagger, nay." + +The sorcerer brought forth a falchion of that wondrous metal that could +carve syenite granite and bite into porphyry; also, a pair of +horse-hide sandals and a flat water-bottle. + +"Put on these." + +Kenkenes undid his cloak and untying his broidered sandals, wrapped +them in his mantle and bound the roll, crosswise, on his back. Over +this he slung the water-bottle, which the priest had filled in the +meantime, fixed the falchion at his side and put on the horse-hide +sandals. + +"When hast thou broken thy fast?" the priest asked next. + +"At sunset yesterday." + +The priest turned with a sign to the young man to follow him and, +passing through the shrine, led the way out of the sanctuary into the +house of the sorcerer. Here, shortly, Kenkenes was served by a slave, +with a haunch of gazelle-meat, lettuce, white bread and wine. + +While he ate, the priest informed him of the situation he might expect +to find at the end of his journey. + +"The Israelites departed in the early hours of this morning taking the +Wady Toomilat, east, toward the gates of the Rameside wall. It was the +going forth of a multitude,--the exodus of a nation! And they will +travel at the pace of their slowest lambs. Thus Meneptah can gather +his legions and make ready to pursue ere they have reached the wall." +The priest had begun calmly, but the thought of pursuit excited him. + +"He must not follow!" he continued. "They are unarmed, but the Pharaoh +deals with a wizard and a strange God--no common foe. And if these +were all who have evil intents against him, but there is +another--another!" + +He came to the young man's side, saying in an excited whisper: + +"There is another, I say, within the king's affections--a scorpion +cherished in his bosom!" + +The old man's vehemence and his words fired Kenkenes. He arose and +faced Jambres with kindling eyes. The sorcerer went on with increasing +excitement. + +"Better that his slaves depart increased, enriched threefold by Egypt, +better that never again one stone be laid upon another, nor monument +bear the king's name, than that Meneptah should leave the precincts of +shelter! For his enemy would lead him outside the pale of protection, +and there put him to death, and wear his crown after him!" + +During this impetuous augury, the young man naturally searched after +the identity of the offender. Not Ta-user, nor Siptah, nor Amon-meses, +for the sorry tale of Seti and the outlawing of the trio had reached +him at Pa-Ramesu. Furthermore, they had never had a place in the +affections of the king. There was a new conspirator! At this point +the blood heated and went charging through the young man's veins. + +"If the king's enemy be mine enemy," he declared passionately, "thou +hast this hour commissioned and armed that enemy's dearest foe! Name +him." + +The priest shook his head. His excitement had not carried him beyond +the limits of caution. + +"Save for my mystic knowledge, I have no proof against him, and if I +balk him not and offend him, he hath a heavy and a vengeful hand." + +"And thou hast not named him in the writing?" + +Again the priest shook his head. + +"Then," said the young man firmly, "then will I name him to the +Pharaoh!" + +Jambres looked at Kenkenes with profound admiration, not unmixed with +apprehension. + +"Let not thy youthful zeal undo thee," he cautioned. "Perchance thou +dost mistake the man." + +"The gods did not bestow all the art upon the mystics when they endowed +thee with divining powers. They gifted every man with a little of it, +and it speaketh no less truthfully because it is small. Come, thy +board has been generous and I am satisfied. I have another and a +fiercer hunger I would appease. Give me the message and let me be +gone." + +Silent, the priest led the way again into the sanctuary. Taking the +scroll from its hiding-place once more he said, as he gave it into the +messenger's hands: "Go first to Tanis, and if thou findest not the king +in his capital, seek until thou dost find him. And have a care to +thyself." + +Kenkenes hesitated a moment, and said at last: + +"It may be that I shall not return, but I would have my father know +that I died not with the first-born. Wilt thou tell him, when thou +canst?" + +"The word shall go to him by sunset to-morrow if I carry it myself." + +Kenkenes expressed his thanks and the priest went on. + +"Be not rash, I charge thee. Farewell, and thy father's gods attend +thee." + +Without the dwarf pylons, Kenkenes bent for the old man's blessing and +turned away. Walking rapidly to the northern limits of the town, he +took the dusty highway again, and struck into an easy run. + +The road sloped up toward the north, but the rise was gradual and the +ascent was not wearying. The miles slipped behind swiftly, for he +covered them as naturally as the unloitering bird traverses the air. + +In two hours he had reached the pinnacle of the upland. To the north +the road led continuously down to the sea. He paused and looked back +over the long gentle declivity toward the south and west. + +A sharp pain pierced him. In that moment, he realized that he was +expatriated. After he had warned Meneptah, Egypt dropped out of his +aims. Thereafter he had the rescue of Rachel, or her avenging to +accomplish, and the results following upon the necessity of either of +these alternatives would not permit him to return into the land of his +fathers. There was no turning back now, nor any desire in him to do +so. His conscience had been witness to the renunciation of his nation +and his faith, and it did not chide him. + +Still he stretched out his arms to the limitless, featureless, velvety +dusk that was Egypt by day, and wept. + +He entered Tanis in the middle of the third watch, and there he learned +that the Pharaoh had departed, but whither, the solemn, haggard +citizens he met could not tell. He repaired to the inn, a house of +mourning, also, and awaited the dawn. Then he looked on the funereal +capital of Meneptah. The city no longer cried out; it sighed or +sobbed, exhausted with its grief; it went the heavy round of labor +demanded by the necessities of life, bowed, disheveled and blinded with +woe. Kenkenes, humbled, sorrowful, and helpless, averted his eyes and +hurried to the palace. + +There he found that the queen and Seti, with all the queen's retinue, +had departed on a pilgrimage to the temple of the sacred ram at Mendes +for the welfare of the soul of Rameses. Masanath was in Pelusium +mourning for her sister who died with the first-born. The +others,--Har-hat, Hotep, Nechutes, Menes, Seneferu, Kephren the +mohar,--all except the palace attendants had accompanied the king. The +great house of the Pharaoh was empty, solitary and haunted. + +The destination of the king was a state secret that had not been +imparted to the chamberlains. Kenkenes returned into the unhappy +streets again. + +He went to the square in which the loiterers were congregated, even +though there was one dead in the household, and seeking out the most +intelligent, questioned him concerning the departure of the Pharaoh. + +He learned that the king and the ministers had left Tanis, and driven +south, the afternoon after the night of death. At nightfall, sixteen +chariots from the nome followed him. And though the young man inquired +of many sources in the capital, he discovered nothing further. + +Avowedly, it was Meneptah's intent to overtake the Hebrews, turn them +back, or destroy them. He could not accomplish that thing with a score +of ministers and sixteen picked chariots. It was evident that he meant +to collect an army near the track of the Hebrews, and that he had +departed for the rendezvous. + +If the Israelites traveled but two miles an hour, they could cover the +distance between Pa-Ramesu and the Rameside wall by the sunset of this, +the second day after the death of the first-born. It would have been +the first act of the Pharaoh to close the gates of the wall against +them. The army of the north could gather from the remotest nomes by +the close of this day also. Therefore, the hour to proceed against the +Israelites was not far away. Kenkenes knew that he might not delay, +even for a short sleep, in Tanis. + +He fixed upon Pithom as the chosen spot for the rendezvous, since it +was situated on the Wady Toomilat. + +He refreshed himself with a beaker of sour wine in which a recuperative +simple had been stirred, and took the road to the south. + +Immediately outside of the city walls he came upon the track of the +departing king, and followed it faithfully as long as there was light +to show it to him. A dozen miles out of Tanis he ceased to run, and +thereafter his progress became slower as his fatigue increased. Toward +the end of the first watch, at the northern borders of the district +known as Succoth, at the extreme east of Goshen, he came upon a mighty +track. + +Even in the dark he could see that a diaphanous gauze of dust overhung +it and the air was heavy with the most volatile particles. The sandy +earth had been ground and worked to the depth of over a foot. How +difficult had it been for the rearmost ranks to cover this ploughed +soil! The track was a mile in width, and by the nature of the marks +upon it, Kenkenes knew that husbandmen, not warriors, had passed over +this spot. It was the path of Israel, leading east to the Rameside +wall. + +Kenkenes tightened his sandal straps and continued toward the south. +Ahead of him, the horizon began to glow and then an edge,--a half,--all +of a perfect moon lifted a vast orange disk above the world. At its +first appearance it was sharply cut by a tower of the city of Pithom. + +"Now, the God of Israel be thanked," he said to himself, "for another +mile I can not cover." + +The gates were tightly closed and a sentry from the wall challenged him. + +"I bring a message to the Pharaoh," he answered. + +"The Son of Ptah is not within the walls." + +"Hath he departed," Kenkenes wearily asked, "or came he not hither?" + +"He came not to Pithom." + +"Come thou down, then, and let me in, friend, for I am spent." + +In a little time, he entered the inn of the treasure city, was given a +bed, upon which he flung himself without so much as loosening the +kerchief on his head, and slept. + + + + +CHAPTER XLIII + +"THE PHARAOH DREW NIGH" + +In mid-afternoon of the following day, Kenkenes awoke and made ready to +take up his search again. He was weary, listless and sore, but his +mission urged him as if death threatened him. + +The young man's athletic training had taught him how to recuperate. +Most of the process was denied him now, because of his haste and the +little time at his command, but the smallest part would be beneficial. +He stepped into the streets of the treasure city, and paused again, +till the recollection of the sorrow upon Egypt returned to him to +explain the gloom over Pithom. The great melancholy of the land, +attending him hauntingly, oppressed him with a sense of culpability. +And he dared not ask himself wherein he deserved his good fortune above +his countrymen, lest he seem to question the justice of the God of his +adoption. + +At a bazaar he purchased two pairs of horse-hide sandals, for the many +miles on the roads had worn out the old and he needed foot-wear in +reserve. From the booth he went straight to the baths, now wholly +deserted; for when Egypt mourned, like all the East, she neglected her +person. + +When he came forth he was refreshed and stronger. Of the citizens, +haggard and solemn as they had been in Tanis, he asked concerning the +Pharaoh. None had seen him, nor had he entered the city. The last one +he questioned was a countryman from Goshen, and from him he learned +that the army was assembling in a great pasture on the southern limits +of the Israelitish country. + +At sunset he was again upon the way, taking the level highway of the +Wady Toomilat for a mile toward the west, and turning south, after that +distance, as the rustic had directed him. + +The road was good and he ran with old-time ease. At midnight he came +upon the spot where the army had camped, but the Pharaoh had already +moved against Israel. He had left his track. The great belt of +disturbed earth wheeled to the south, and as far as Kenkenes could see +there was the same luminous veil of dust overhanging it, that he had +noted over the path of Israel. + +The messenger drank deep at an irrigation canal, for he turned away +from water when he followed the army, and leaving the level, +dust-cushioned road behind, plunged into a rock-strewn, rolling land, +desolate and silent. The growing light of the moon was his only +advantage. + +The region became savage, the trail of the army wound hither and +thither to avoid sudden eminences or sudden hollows. Kenkenes dogged +it faithfully, for it found the smoothest way, and, besides, the wild +beasts had been frightened from the track of a multitude. + +In the early hour of the morning, Kenkenes emerged from a high-walled +valley with battlemented summits. Before him was the army encamped, +and wild, indeed, was the region chosen for the night's rest. The +glistening soil was thickly strewn with rocks, varying in size from +huge cubes to sharp shingle. Every abrupt ravine ahead was accentuated +with profound shadow, and the dim horizon was broken with hills. The +locality maintained an irregular slope toward the east. The camp +stretched before the messenger for a mile, but the great army had +changed its posture. It squatted like a tired beast. + +Kenkenes approached it dropping with weariness, and after a time was +passed through the lines and conducted to the headquarters of the king. +In the center of the great field were pitched the multi-hued tents of +Meneptah and his generals. Above them, turning like weather-vanes upon +their staves, were the standards bearing the royal and divine device, +the crown and the uplifted hands, the plumes and the god-head. + +About the royal pavilion in triple cordon paced the noble body-guard of +the Pharaoh. + +Of one of these Kenkenes asked that a personal attendant of the king be +sent to him. + +In a little time, some one emerged from the Pharaoh's tent, and came +through the guard-line to the messenger. It was Nechutes. + +The cup-bearer took but a single glance at Kenkenes and started back. + +"Thou!" he exclaimed in a hoarse whisper. "Out of Amenti!" + +"And nigh returning into it again," was the tired reply. + +In a daze, Nechutes took the offered hands and stared at Kenkenes +through the dark. + +"Where hast thou been?" he finally asked. + +"In the profoundest depths of trouble, Nechutes, nor have I come out +therefrom." + +The cup-bearer's face showed compassion even in the dusk. + +"Nay, now; thine was but the fortune a multitude of lovers have +suffered before thee," he said, with a contrite note in his deep voice. +"It was even odds between us and I won. Hold it not against me, +Kenkenes." + +It was the sculptor's turn to be amazed. But with one of the instant +realizations that acute memory effects, he recalled that he had +disappeared immediately after Nechutes had been accepted by the Lady +Ta-meri. And now, by the word of the apologetic cup-bearer, was it +made apparent to Kenkenes that a tragic fancy concerning the cause of +his disappearance had taken root in the cup-bearer's mind. With a +desperate effort, Kenkenes choked the first desire to laugh that had +seized him in months. + +"Nay, let it pass, Nechutes," he said in a strained voice. "Thou and I +are friends. But lead me to the king, I pray thee." + +"To the king?" the cup-bearer repeated doubtfully. "The king sleeps. +Will thine interests go to wreck if thou bidest till dawn?" + +"I carry him a message," Kenkenes explained. + +"A message!" + +"Even so. Hand hither a torch." + +A soldier went and returned with a flaming knot of pitch. In the +wavering light of the flambeau, Nechutes read the address on the linen +scroll. + +"The king could not read by the night-lights," he said after a little. +"Much weeping is not helpful to such feeble eyes as his. Wait till +dawn. My tent is empty and my bed is soft. Wait till daybreak as my +guest." + +"Where is Har-hat?" + +"In his tent, yonder," pointing to a party-colored pavilion. + +"Dost thou keep an unsleeping eye on the Pharaoh?" + +"By night, aye." + +Kenkenes had a thought to accept the cup-bearer's hospitality. He knew +that the expected climax would follow immediately upon the king's +perusal of the message, and that the nature of that climax depended +upon himself. He needed mental vigor and bodily freshness to make +effective the work before him. His cogitations decided him. + +"Let the unhappy king sleep, then, Nechutes; far be it from me to bring +him back to the memory of his sorrows. Lead me to thy shelter, if thou +wilt." + +With satisfaction in his manner Nechutes conducted his guest into a +comfortably furnished tent, and showed him a mattress overlaid with +sheeting of fine linen. + +"Shame that thou must defer this soft sleeping till the noisy and +glaring hours of the day," Kenkenes observed as he fell on the bed. + +"By this time to-morrow night, I may content myself in a bed of sand +with a covering of hyena-fending stones," the cup-bearer muttered. + +"Comfort thee, Nechutes," the artist said sententiously, "But do thou +raise me from this ere daybreak, even if thou must take a persuasive +spear to me." + +So saying, he fell asleep at once. + +After some little employment among his effects, the cup-bearer came to +the bedside on his way back to the king's tent, and bent over his guest. + +"Holy Isis! but I am glad he died not!" he said to himself. "Aye, and +there be many who are as glad as I am. Dear Ta-meri! She will be +rejoiced, and Hotep. What a great happiness for the old murket--" he +paused and clasped his hands together. "He is Mentu's only son! Now, +in the name of the mystery-dealing Hathors, how came it that he died +not with the first-born?" After a silence he muttered aloud: "Gods! +the army would barter its mummy to have the secret of his safety, this +day!" + +At the first glimmerings of the dawn, the melody of many winded +trumpets arose over the encampment of the Egyptians. Now the notes +were near and clear, now afar and tremulous; again, deep and sonorous; +now, full and rich, and yet again, fine and sweet. There is a pathos +in the call of a war-trumpet that no frivolous rendering can subdue--it +has sung so long at the death of men and nations. + +Outlined in black silhouette against the whitening horizons, the +sentries, tiny and slow-moving in the distance, tramped from post to +post in a forward-leaning line. Soldiers began to shout to each other. +The clanking of many arms made another and a harsher music. The tumult +of thousands of voices burdened the wind and above this presently arose +the eager and expectant whinnyings of a multitude of war-horses. + +While the army broke its fast and prepared to move the king stood in +the open space before his tent, with his eyes on the east. The Red Sea +lay there beyond the uplifted line of desert sand, and it was the +birthplace of many mists and unpropitious signs. + +Would the sun look upon the king through a veil, or openly? Would he +smile upon the purposes of the Pharaoh? + +There were striations, watery and colorless, in the lower slopes of the +morning sky, and these were taking on the light of dawn without its +hues. Long wind-blown streaks crossed the zenith from east to west and +the setting stars were blurred. The moon had worn a narrowing circlet +in the night. Meneptah shook his head. + +Suddenly some one in the ranks of the royal guard exclaimed to a mate: + +"Look! Look to the southeast!" + +Meneptah turned his eyes in that direction, as though he had been +commanded. There, above the spot where he had guessed the Israelites +to be, a straight and mighty column of vapor extended up, up into the +smoky blue of the sky. The tortuous shapes of the striations across +the zenith indicated that there was great wind at that height, but the +column did not move or change its form. It was further distinguished +from the clouds over the dawn, by a fine amber light upon it, deepening +to gold in its shadows. So vivid the tint, that steady contemplation +was necessary to assure the beholders that it was not fire, climbing in +and out of the pillar's heart. Egypt's skies were rarely clouded and +never by such a formation as this. + +Meneptah turned his troubled eyes hurriedly toward the east. He must +not miss the sunrise. At that moment, unheralded, the disk of the sun +shot above the horizon as if blown from a crater of the +under-world--blurred, milky-white, without warmth. + +He turned away and faced Nechutes, bending before him; behind the +cup-bearer, a stately stranger--Kenkenes. + +"A message for thee, O Son of Ptah," Nechutes said. + +At a sign from the king, the messenger came forward, knelt and +delivered the scroll. The king looked at the writing on the wrapping. + +"From whom dost thou bring this?" he asked. + +"From Jambres, the mystic, O Son of Ptah." + +"Ah!" It was the tone of one who has his surmises proved. "Now, what +is contained herein?" + +Kenkenes took it that the inquiry called for an answer. + +"A warning, O King." + +"How dost thou know?" + +"The purport of the message was told me ere I departed." + +"Wherefore? It is not common to lead the messenger into the secret he +bears." + +"I know, O Son of Ptah," Kenkenes replied quietly; "but the messenger +who knew its contents would suffer not disaster or death to stay him in +carrying it to thee." + +As if to delay the reading of it, the king dismissed Nechutes and +signed Kenkenes to arise. Then he turned the scroll over and over in +his hands, inspecting it. + +"Age does not cool the fever of retaliation," he said thoughtfully, +"and this ancient Jambres hath a grudge against me. Come," he +exclaimed as if an idea had struck him, "do thou open it." + +Kenkenes took the scroll thrust toward him, and ripped off the linen +wrapping. Unrolling the writing he extended it to the king. + +"And there is naught in it of evil intent?" Meneptah asked, putting his +hands behind him. + +"Nay, my King; naught but great love and concern for thee." + +"Read it," was the next command. "Mine eyes are dim of late," he added +apologetically, for, through the young man's reassuring tones, a faint +realization of the trepidation he had exhibited began to dawn on +Meneptah. + +Kenkenes obeyed, reading without emphasis or inflection, for he knew no +expression was needed to convey the force of the message to the already +intimidated king. + +When Kenkenes had finished, Meneptah was standing very close to him, as +if assured of shelter in the heroic shadow of the tall young messenger. +The color had receded from the monarch's face, and his eyes had widened +till the white was visible all around the iris. + +"Call me the guard," he said hoarsely; but when Kenkenes made as if to +obey, the king stayed him in a panic. + +"Nay, heed me not. Mine assassin may be among them." The sound of his +own voice frightened him. "Soft," he whispered, "I may be heard." + +Kenkenes maintained silence, for he was not yet ready. + +Meanwhile, the king turned hither and thither, essayed to speak and +cautiously refrained, grew paler of face and wider of eye, panted, +trembled and broke out recklessly at last. + +"Gods! Trapped! Hemmed like a wild beast in a circle of spears! Nay, +not so honestly beset. Ringed about by vipers ready to strike at every +step! And this from mine own people, whom I have cherished and hovered +over as they were my children--" His voice broke, but he continued his +lament, growing unintelligible as he talked: + +"Not enough that mine enemies menace me, but mine own must stab me in +my straits! Not even is the identity of mine assassin revealed, and +there is none on whom I may call with safety and ask protection--" + +"Nay, nay, Beloved of Ptah," Kenkenes interrupted. "There be true men +among thy courtiers." + +"Not one--not one whom I may trust," Meneptah declared hysterically. + +"Here am I, then." + +Meneptah, with the inordinate suspicion of the hard-pressed, backed +hurriedly away from Kenkenes. + +"Who art thou?" he demanded. "How may I know thou art not mine enemy?" + +"Not so," Kenkenes protested. "Give me ear, I pray thee. Would I have +brought thee thy warning, knowing it such, were I thine enemy? And +further, did not Jambres, the mystic, who readeth men's souls, trust +me?" + +"Aye, so it seems," the king admitted, glad to be won by such physical +magnificence. "But who art thou?" + +"Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, thy murket." + +"It can not be," the king declared with suspicion in his eye. "The +murket had but one son and he must be dead with the first-born." + +"Nay; I was in the land of Goshen, the night of death, and the God of +Israel spared me." + +Meneptah continued to gaze at him stubbornly. Then a conclusive proof +suggested itself to Kenkenes, which, under the stress of an austere +purpose and a soul-trying suspense, he had no heart to use. But the +need pressed him; he choked back his unwillingness, and submitted. +Coming very close to Meneptah, he began to sing, with infinite +softness, the song that the Pharaoh had heard at the Nile-side that +sunrise, now as far away as his childhood seemed. How strange his own +voice sounded to him--how out of place! + +At first, the expression of surprise in the king's face was mingled +with perplexity. But the dim records of memory spoke at the urging of +association. After a few bars, the Pharaoh's countenance had become +reassured. Kenkenes ceased at once. + +"Enough!" Meneptah declared. "The gods have most melodiously +distinguished thee from all others. Thou art he whom I heard one dawn, +and mine heir in Osiris, my Rameses, told me it was the son of Mentu." + +"Then, being of the house of Mentu, thou hast no fear of my +steadfastness, O my Sovereign?" + +"Nay; would that I might be as trustful of all my ministers. Alas, +that a single traitor should lay the stain of unfaith upon all the +court! Ah, who is mine enemy?" + +The sentence, more exclamatory than questioning, seemed to the young +man like a call upon him to voice his impeachments. His inclination +pressed hard upon him and the tokens of his knowledge wrote themselves +upon his open face. When a man is dodging death and expecting +treachery, his perceptions become acute. The king, with his eyes upon +the young man's countenance, caught the change of expression. + +He sprang at Kenkenes and seized his arms. + +"Speak!" he cried violently. "Thou knowest; thou knowest!" + +A sudden ebullition of rage and vengeance sent a tingling current +through the young man's veins. The moment had come. In the eye of a +cautious man, he had been called upon for a dangerous declaration. He +had a mighty man to accuse, no proof and little evidence at his +command, and a weakling was to decide between them. But his cause +equipped him with strength and a reckless courage. He faced the king +fairly and made no search after ceremonious words. He spoke as he +felt--intensely. + +"Nay; it is thou who shalt tell me, O my King. I know thee, even as +all Egypt knows thee. There is no power in thee for great evil, but +behold to what depths of misery is Egypt sunk! Through thee? Aye, if +we charge the mouth for the word the mind willed it to say. Have the +gods afflicted thee with madness, or have they given thee into the +compelling hands of a knave? Say, who is it, thou or another, who +playeth a perilous game with Israel, this day, when its God hath +already rent Egypt and consumed her in wrath? Like a wise man thou +admittest thine error and biddest thy scourge depart, and lo! ere thy +words are cold thou dost arise and recall them and invite the descent +of new and hideous affliction upon thine empire! Behold the winnings +of thy play, thus far! From Pelusium to Syene, a waste, full of +famine, mourners and dead men, and among these last--thy Rameses!--" + +Meneptah did not permit him to finish. Purple with an engorgement of +grief and fury, the monarch broke in, flailing the air with his arms. + +"Har-hat!" he cried. "Not I! Har-hat, who cozened me!" + +The voice rang through the royal inclosure, and the ministers came +running. + +Foremost was Har-hat. + +At sight of his enemy, the king put Kenkenes between him and the +fan-bearer. At sight of Kenkenes, Har-hat stopped in his tracks. + +Behind followed Kephren and Seneferu, the two generals, who, with the +exception of Har-hat, the commander-in-chief, were the only +arms-bearing men away from their places among the soldiers; after +these, Hotep and Nechutes, Menes of the royal body-guard, the lesser +fan-bearers, the many minor attaches to the king's person--in all a +score of nobles. + +They came upon a portentous scene. + +The tumult of preparation had subsided and the hush of readiness lay +over the desert. The orders were to move the army at sunrise, and that +time was past. The pioneers, or path-makers for the army, were already +far in advance. Horses had been bridled and each soldier stood by his +mount. Captains with their eyes toward the royal pavilion moved about +restlessly and wondered. The high commanding officers absent, the next +in rank began to weigh their chances to assume command. Soldiers began +to surmise to one another the cause of the delay, which manifestly +found its origin in the quarters of the king. + +All this was the environment of a hollow square formed by the royal +guard. Within was the Pharaoh, shrinking by the side of his messenger. +The messenger, taller, more powerful, it seemed, by the heightening and +strengthening force of righteous wrath, faced the mightiest man in the +kingdom. Har-hat, though a little surprised and puzzled, was none the +less complacent, confident, nonchalant. Near the fan-bearer, but +behind him, were the ministers, astonished and puzzled. But since the +past days had been so filled with momentous events, they were ready to +expect a crisis at the slightest incident. + +The fan-bearer did not look at the king. It was Kenkenes who +interested him. + +The young man's frame did not show a tremor, nor his face any +excitement. There was an intense quiescence in his whole presence. +Hotep, who knew the provocation of his friend and interpreted the +menace in his manner, walked swiftly over to Kenkenes, as if to caution +or prevent. But the young sculptor undid the small hands of the king, +clinging to his arm, and gave them to Hotep, halting, by that act, all +interference from the scribe. Then he crossed the little space between +him and the fan-bearer. + +"What hast thou done with the Israelite?" he asked in a tone so low +that none but Har-hat heard him. But the fan-bearer did not doubt the +earnestness in the quiet demand. + +"Hast thou come to trouble the king with thy petty loves, during this, +the hour of war?" + +"Answer!" + +"She escaped me," the fan-bearer answered. + +"A lie will not save thee; the truth may plead for thee before Osiris. +Hast thou spoken truly?" + +"I have said, as Osiris hears me. Have done; I have no more time for +thee!" + +"Stand thou there! I have not done with thee." + +The thin nostril of the fan-bearer expanded and quivered wrathfully. + +"Have a care, thou insolent!" he exclaimed. + +Kenkenes did not seem to hear him. He had turned toward Meneptah. + +"I have dared over-far, my King," he said, "because of my love for +Egypt and my concern for thee. Bear with me further, I pray thee." + +Meneptah bent his head in assent. + +"Suffer mine inquiry, O Son of Ptah. Wilt thou tell me upon whose +persuasion thou hast gathered thine army and set forth to pursue +Israel?" + +"Upon the persuasion of Har-hat, my minister." + +"Yet this question further, my King. Wherefore would he have thee +overtake these people?" + +"Since it was foolish to let them go, being my slaves, my builders and +very needful to Egypt. But most particularly to execute vengeance upon +them for the death of my Rameses, and for the first-born of Egypt." + +"Ye hear," Kenkenes said to the nobles. Then he faced Har-hat. The +fan-bearer's countenance showed a remarkable increase of temper, but +there was no sign of apprehension or discomfiture upon it. + +"Thou hast beheld the grace of thy king under question," Kenkenes said +calmly. "Therefore thou art denied the plea that submission to the +same thing will belittle thee. Thy best defense is patience and prompt +answer." + +"Perchance the king will recall his graceful testimony," Har-hat +replied with heat, "when he learns he hath been entangled in the guilty +pursuit of a miscreant after--" + +Kenkenes stopped him with a menacing gesture. + +"Say it not; nor tempt me further! Thou speakest of a quarrel between +thee and me, and of that there may be more hereafter. Now, thou art to +answer to mine impeachment of thee as an offender against the Pharaoh." + +Har-hat received the declaration with a wrathful exclamation. + +"Thou! Thou to accuse me! I to plead before thee! By the gods, the +limit is reached. The ranks of Egypt have been juggled, the law of +deference reversed! A noble to bow to an artisan! Age to give account +of itself to green youth!" + +"And thou pratest of law! The benefits of law are for him who obeys +it; the reverence of youth is for the honorable old. But thou wastest +mine opportunity. Thou shalt silence me no longer. + +"Thy dearest enemy, O Har-hat," Kenkenes continued, "would not impugn +thy wits. He deserves the epithet himself who calls thee fool. But be +not puffed up for this thing I have said. Thou hast made a weapon of +thy wits and it shall recoil upon thee. Thou seest Egypt; not in all +the world is there another empire so piteously humbled. Her fields are +white with bones instead of harvests; her cities are loud with mourning +instead of commerce; the desert hath overrun the valley. And this from +the hands of the Hebrews' God! Who doubts it? Hath Egypt won any +honor in this quarrel with Israel? Look upon Egypt and learn. Hath +the army of the Pharaoh availed him aught against these afflictions? +Remember the polluted waters, the pests, the thunders, the darkness, +the angel of death and tell me. 'Vengeance?' Vengeance upon a God who +hath blasted a nation with His breath? Chastisement of a people whose +murmurs brought down consuming fire upon the land? And yet, for +vengeance and chastisement hast thou urged the king to follow after +Israel. I know thee better, Har-hat! That serviceable wit of thine +hath not failed thee in an hour. Thou hast not wearied of life that +thou courtest destruction by the Hebrews' God. Never hast thou meant +to overtake Israel! Never hast thou thought further to provoke their +God! Rather was it thine intent here, somewhere in the desert, thyself +to be a plague upon Meneptah and wear his crown after him!" + +Confident were the words, portentous the manner as though proof were +behind, astounding the accusation. One by one the ministers had fallen +away from Har-hat and placed themselves by the king. After a long time +of humiliation for them, the supplanter, the insulter, was overtaken, +his villainy uncovered to the eyes of the king. Kenkenes had justified +them, and their triumph had come with a gust of wrath that added +further to their relief. + +Hotep gazed fixedly at Kenkenes. Where had this young visionary, +new-released from prison, found evidence to impeach this powerful +favorite? How was he fortified? What would be his next play? How +much more did he know? And while Hotep asked himself these things, +trembling for Kenkenes, Har-hat put the same questions to himself. The +roll of papyrus, with its seals, still in the young man's hands, was +significant. He folded his arms and forced the issue. + +"Your proof," he demanded. + +"Both the hour and need of my proof are past. Already art thou +convicted." Kenkenes indicated the king and the ministers behind him. +The fan-bearer followed the motion of the arm and for the first time +met the gaze of the angry group. + +Kenkenes had not ventured blindly, nor dared without deep and shrewd +thought. When the artist-soul can feel the fiercer passions it has the +capacity to work them out in action. Kenkenes, having been wronged, +grew vengeful, and therefore had it within him to aspire to vengeance. +He knew his handicap, but had estimated well his strength. With +calmness and deliberation he had studied conditions, assembled all +contingencies and fortified himself against them, gathered hypotheses, +summarized his evidence and brought about that which he had planned to +accomplish--the destruction of Har-hat's rule over Meneptah. + +Har-hat was alone. Before him were all the powers of the land arrayed +against him. Behind him in Tanis was Seti, the heir, who hated him, +and the queen who had turned her back upon him. He had not seen the +need of friends during the days of his supremacy over Meneptah. Now, +not all his denials, eloquence, subtleties could establish him again in +the faith of the frightened king. His ministership had crumbled beyond +reconstruction. What would avail him, then, to defend himself? What +proof had he to offer against this impeachment? The young man's +argument met him at every avenue toward which he might turn for escape. +At best his future in Egypt would be mere toleration; the worst, +condign punishment. + +A flame of feeling surged into his face. With a wide sweep of his arm, +as though to thrust away pretense, he faced the ministers, all the +defiance and audacity of his nature faithfully manifested in his manner. + +"Why wait ye? Would ye see me cringe? Would ye hear me deny, protest, +deprecate? Go to! ye glowering churls, I disappoint you! Flock to the +king; dandle the royal babe a while! Endure the stress a little, for +ye will not serve him long. And thou," whirling upon Kenkenes, +"dreamest thou I fear this bloody God of Israel, or all the gibbering, +incense-sniffing, pedestal-cumbering gods of earth? I will show thee, +thou ranting rabble spawn! See which of us hath the yellow-haired +wanton when I return. For I go to wrest spoil and fighting men from +Israel. Then, by all the demons of Amenti! then, I say! look to thy +crown, thou puny, puling King!" + +With a bound he broke through the cordon of royal guards, leaped into +his chariot, and putting his horses to a gallop, drove at full speed to +his place at the head of the army. There, in an instant, clear and +long-drawn, his command to mount rang over the desert. Front and rear, +wing and wing, the trumpets took up the call, "To horse!" A second +command in the strong voice, a second winding of the many trumpets, and +with a rush of air and jar of earth the great army of the Pharaoh swept +like the wind toward the sea. + +Kenkenes, Menes, Nechutes and those of the royal guard that had started +in pursuit of the traitor, did well to save themselves from +annihilation under the hoofs of twenty thousand horse. Bewildered and +amazed, they were an instant realizing what was taking place. + +"He is running away with the army!" they said to themselves in a daze. +"He is running away with the army!" And they knew that not all the +efforts of the guards and the ministers and the Pharaoh himself would +avail, for the army had received its orders from its great commander +and no man but he might turn it back. + +So the short-poled chariots, multi-tinted and gorgeous, wheel to wheel, +axle-deep in a cloud of dust, glittered out across the desert--sixty +ranks, ten abreast. Far to the left moved the horsemen, the dust of +their rapid passage hiding their galloping mounts up to the stirrup. +To the watchers by the king they seemed like an undulant sea of quilted +helmets and flying tassels, while the sunlight smote through a level +and straight-set forest of spears. They were seasoned veterans, many +of them heroes of a quarter-century of wars. They had followed Rameses +the Great into Asia and had extended the empire and the prowess of arms +to the farthest corners of the known world. They had drunk the sweets +of unalloyed victory from the blue Nile to the Euphrates and had filled +Egypt with booty, scented with the airs of Arabia, gorgeous from the +looms of India, and heavy with the ivory and gold of Ethiopia. + +Now they went in formidable array in pursuit of two millions of slaves +to dye their axes in unresisting blood, to return, not as victors over +a heroic foe, but as drivers of men, herders of sheep and cattle, and +laden with inglorious spoil. + +Behind them, in regular ranks, beaten by their drivers into an awkward +run, came the sumpter-mules, and after them the rumbling carts filled +with provision. + +Meneptah, raging and weeping, saw his army leave him and gallop in an +aureole of dust toward the Red Sea. + +Thus it was that "the Pharaoh drew nigh," but came no farther after +Israel. + + + + +CHAPTER XLIV + +THE WAY TO THE SEA + +Kenkenes did not remain long in the apathy of amazement and +helplessness. Consternation possessed him the instant he roused +himself sufficiently to realize and speculate. He had saved the king +and exposed Har-hat, but the accomplishing of this temporary good had +forced the probable commission of a great evil. If death in some form +did not overtake the fan-bearer he could enrich and strengthen himself +from Israel. Then, even if Meneptah's army did not continue to follow +him, he would be enabled to buy mercenaries and return equipped to do +battle with Meneptah, even as he had vowed. The flower of the military +was with him; the Pharaoh was incapable and Egypt demoralized. The +success of the traitor seemed assured. What then of Rachel, of his own +father, of the faithful ministers, of all whom Kenkenes had loved or +befriended? The thought filled him with resolution and vigor. + +"If the Lord God of Israel overtake him not," he said, returning to the +king, "then must I! For, in my good intent, it seems that I have +undone thee. Hotep," he continued, taking the scribe's hands, "let my +father know that I died not with the first-born. Also, thou seest the +danger into which the nation hath descended in this hour. Help thou +the king! I return not. Farewell." + +He kissed the scribe on the lips, and freeing himself from his clinging +hands, ran through the broken line of the royal guards. + +The army was already a compact cluster in the center of a rolling cloud +of dust to the south. + +When Nechutes had aroused him before daybreak, the cup-bearer had +brought Hotep with him, and while the messenger broke his fast, he had +availed himself of the scribe's presence to learn many things. Not the +smallest part of his information was the fact that the Pharaoh's scouts +had located Israel encamped on a sedgy plain at the base of a great +hill on the northern-most arm of the Red Sea. Meneptah's army had +marched twenty-five miles due south of Pithom and pitched its tents for +the night. It was twenty-five miles from that point to Baal-Zephon or +the hill before which Israel had camped. The fugitives had chosen the +smoothest path for travel, keeping along the Bitter Lakes that their +cattle might feed. Their track led in a southeasterly direction. + +But Har-hat, making off with the army, had struck due south. He had +chosen this line for more than one advantage it offered. The Arabian +desert approached the sea in a series of plateaux or steps. The most +westerly was surmounted by a ridge of high hills, higher probably than +any other chain within the boundaries of Egypt. The most easterly +overlooked the sea-beach and was originally, it may be, the old sea +margin. At points the table-land advanced within sight of the water; +at other localities an intervening space of several miles lay between +it and the sea. The summit was flat, at least smooth enough for the +passage of horsemen, and at all times it was a good field for strategic +manoeuverings by an army arrayed against anything which might be on the +beach below. + +If Meneptah's scouts had reported truly, Israel had behind it a hill, +east of it the sea. West of it the army would approach. South only +could it flee, into a torrid, arid, uninhabited desert. + +The slaves were entrapped. The pursuer had but to follow the pursued +in the only open direction, and overtake the starving, thirsting +multitude at last. But from Har-hat's movement he had meant to +continue along this plateau, out of sight of Israel, until he had +posted part of his army in the way of escape to the south. Kenkenes +reached this conclusion without much pondering. He had his own +manoeuverings in mind. Of the captain of Israel, Prince Mesu, he would +discover, first, if the Lord God had prepared him against Har-hat. +This grave question answered to the repose of his mind concerning the +welfare of Israel, the path of his next duty would be clearly laid for +him. He would join the army and take the life of the fan-bearer, for +the sake of all he loved, and Egypt. In the course of the day's events +his motive had been exalted from the personal desire for revenge to the +high intent of a patriot. He felt most confident that he would forfeit +his own life in the act. + +Not an instant did he hesitate. + +Ahead of him was the narrow bed of a miniature torrent which rolled out +of the desert during the infrequent rains. Now it was dry, packed +hard, free of all obstructions except the great boulders, and led in a +comparatively straight line toward the sea. It was an ideal stretch +for running. + +He summoned all his forces, gathering, in a mighty mental effort, all +that depended on his speed, and took the path with a leap. The dazed +king and his ministers saw him with whom they had that moment talked +stretch a vast and ever-widening breach between them with a bat-like +swoop, and while they watched he was swallowed up in distance. + +The bed of the torrent served him for the first few miles. Then it +turned abruptly toward the Bitter Lakes. He left it and entered the +rougher country. Thereafter no great bursts of speed were possible, +because the runner had to pick his way. He ran, not with a steady +pace, each stride equal to the preceding, but with bounds, aside and +forward, dimly calculating the safety of the footfall. + +Suddenly a column of sand rose under his feet, and he dashed through +it. Blinded and choking, he cleared his eyes, caught his breath and +ran on. A gust of wind, like a breath of flame, met him from the east +and passed. Then he realized that the atmosphere had thickened, as if +an opaque cloud of heat had enveloped the earth. He glanced at the sky +and saw that it was strewn with fragmentary clouds, but a little south +and east of him was the pillar, unmoving and gilded royally. + +There was storm in the air. + +Finally the region began to grow level, proving the proximity to the +sea. In another moment he came upon the old sea bed. It was sandy, +sedge-grown, with here and there a palm, and tremendously trampled. + +Israel had passed this way. + +The clash and ring of meeting metal fell on his ear. He looked and saw +ahead of him two men fighting with a third. Three horses with empty +saddles nervously watched the fray. + +The single combatant was a soldier in the uniform of a common fighting +man. One of the pair was a tall Nubian in a striped tunic; the other +was an Egyptian, short, fat, purple of countenance--Unas! + +With a furious exclamation, Kenkenes slackened his pace only long +enough to undo the falchion at his side and rushed to the fight. It +did not matter to him who the soldier was or what his cause. The fact +that he was fighting the emissaries of Har-hat was sufficient +indorsement of the lone soldier. But even as he sprang forward, Unas +sank on the sand, moved convulsively once or twice and lay still. + +The soldier staggered back from the second servitor and fell. The +Nubian, standing over him, swung his heavy weapon aloft, but Kenkenes +thrust his falchion over the fallen man and caught the blow, as it +descended, upon the broad back of the blade. + +"Set receive your cursed soul," the Nubian snarled. Kenkenes leaped +across the prostrate soldier, and simultaneously the weapons went up, +descended and clashed. Then followed a wild and fearful battle. + +The Egyptian falchion was nothing more than a sword-shaped ax. +Therefore, these were not tongues of steel which would whip their +supple length one across the other and fill the air with the lightning +of their play and the devilish beauty of their music. The vanquished +would not taste the nice death of a spitted heart. There was yet the +method of the stone-ax warriors in this battle, and he who fell would +be a fearful thing to see. + +Perhaps it was because Kenkenes was stronger and more agile; perhaps he +remembered Deborah at that moment, or perhaps he was simply a better +fighter. Whatever the cause his blade went up and descended at last, +before the Nubian could parry, and the second servitor of Har-hat fell +on his face and died. + +Chilled by the instant sobering, which follows the taking of life, the +young man sickened and whirled away from the quivering flesh. Plunging +his falchion in the sand to hide its stain, he went back to the fallen +soldier. + +He knew by the look on the gray face, by the dark pool that had grown +beside him, that the warrior had fought his last fight. Kenkenes +raised the man's head, and heard these words, faintly spoken: + +"He sent them in pursuit. I knew he meant to do it, but I could not +get near to kill him. So I followed them. But thou art her lover; do +thou protect her now." + +"Her! Rachel?" Kenkenes cried. "Who art thou?" + +"Atsu, once her taskmaster, always her--" the voice died away. + +"Where is she?" Kenkenes implored. "In the name of thy gods, go not +yet! Where is she?" + +The lips parted in answer, but no sound came. The arm went up as if to +point, but it fell limp without indicating direction, and with a sigh +the soldier turned his face away. + +Sobbing, wild with anxiety and grief, Kenkenes shook the inert body, +pleading frantically for some sign to guide him to Rachel. But there +was no response, for the dead speak not out of Amenti. + +At last Kenkenes laid the body down and stood up. It had come to him +very plainly that, but for Atsu, already these dead servitors would +have been beyond overtaking in pursuit of his love. Though a worshiper +of Israel's God, Kenkenes was still Egyptian in his instincts. The man +who had died to save Rachel he could not bury uncoffined in a grave of +sand, where the natural processes of dissolution would destroy him +utterly. His and Rachel's debts to Atsu were great, and the demand was +made upon him now to discharge all that was possible in the one act of +caring for the dead soldier's remains. Kenkenes could not bear the +body back to the group he had left about the king, for he had a mission +which concerned all the living who were dear to him. Furthermore the +sky was threatening, the desert was a terrible place during high winds, +and he dared not delay. + +Suddenly a thought struck him. Travelers and sea-faring men had told +him that there were settlements along the Red Sea. Might he not go +forward, on his way after Israel, till he found one of these? + +He led the largest horse past the dead servitors, and persuading it to +stand, lifted the body of Atsu upon its back. With difficulty he +mounted, and supporting the limp burden with one arm, turned again +toward the southeast. + +As he went forward, Kenkenes meditated on the signs of this recent and +tragic event. He had searched throughout the length and breadth of +Goshen for Rachel and none had seen her or heard of her since she had +fled from Har-hat into the desert, eight months before he had seen her +last. Israel was more ignorant of the whereabouts of Rachel than he. +He could not tell whether Har-hat knew where she was, nor could he +guess from the position of the fighters in which direction the servants +had meant to ride. The tracks of their horses were not to be +discovered in the great trampled roadway Israel had made. + +Of this thing Kenkenes was sure. If Rachel were with Israel she had +joined it after he had left Goshen. In that case he was going to her, +to ask after her safety, when he inquired after all Israel. If she +were still in Egypt he would stop Har-hat's search for ever. This +recollection added to his determination and intensified his zeal. + +At the beginning of the great fields of sea-grass he came upon a little +hamlet. It was a considerable distance inland, and the chief industry +of the people could have been only the gathering of sedge for hay, or +the curing of herb and root for medicines. Some of the villagers were +in sight but the most of them were out in the direction of the lakes, +laboring in the marsh grass. + +In the course of the past year's events Kenkenes had learned to be a +cautious and skilful fugitive. He did not care to be caught and taxed +with the death of the man whose body he bore. The village shrine was +the structure nearest to him. It was built of sun-dried brick, with +three walls, the fourth side open to the sunrise. Kenkenes dismounted +and reconnoitered. The shrine was empty, and none of the villagers was +near. + +He lifted the dead man from the horse and bore the body into the +sanctuary. Before the image of Athor was a long table overlaid with a +slab of red sandstone. Here the offerings were left and here Kenkenes +laid Atsu, a true sacrifice to the love deity. Reverently the young +man closed the eyes and straightened the chilling limbs. Going into +his patrimony of jewels sewn in his belt, he took an emerald, and +putting it in the hands, crossed them above the breast. Then he laid +his mantle over the bier. + +At the threshold he found a soft stone and with that he wrote upon the +head of the long table the name of the dead man, and Mendes, his native +city. Under this he wrote further to the villagers, charging them, in +the name of the goddess, to care for the body reverently and return it +to the tomb of Atsu's fathers. Having made note of the emerald as +remuneration for their labors, he completed the inscription without +signature. + +Thus he insured the safety and preservation of the bones of Atsu, and +in the eye of the average Egyptian he had served the soldier well. But +Kenkenes was not satisfied. + +As he left the shrine he muttered with trembling lips: + +"Bless him! The fate is not kind which yields to such goodness no +reward save gratitude. There must be, because of the great God's +justness, some especial blessing laid up for Atsu." + +In the time he had spent in the sanctuary the atmosphere had grown hazy +and the sun shone obscurely. To the east were tumbled and darkening +masses, which gathered even as he looked and joined till they stretched +in a vast and unillumined sweep about the horizon. The wind had died +and the heat bathed him in perspiration. + +Once again his eyes sought the pillar and found it above him, still +somewhat to the east, yet in form unchanged, in hue undimmed. +Something within him associated the column of cloud with Israel and +Israel's God. + +He went to his horse and found him terrified and unmanageable. After +vain efforts to soothe the creature, he walked away a little space, +clasping his hands. + +"O Thou mysterious God! By these tokens Thy hand is upon the earth and +upon the heavens. Even as Thou hast shielded me thus far, withdraw not +Thy sheltering hand from about me, Thy worshiper, in this, Thy latest +hour of mystery." + +He skirted the village, now filling with frightened peasants, and took +the path of Israel. + +It led in a southeasterly direction toward a far-off hill, barely +outlined through the haze of the distance. Meanwhile the darkness +settled and over the sea the somber bastion of cloud heaved its sooty +bulk up the sky. The air stagnated and the whole desert was soundless. + +A round and tumbled mass, blue-black but attended by a copper-colored +rack, detached itself from a shelf-like stratum of cloud, and +elongating, seemed to descend to the surface of the sea. Daylight went +out instantly and a prolonged moan came from the distant east. +Blinding flashes of lightning illuminated the whirling mass and almost +absolute darkness fell after each bolt. Out of the inky midnight +toward the east came an ever-increasing sound of a maddened sea, +gathering in volume and fury and menace. Kenkenes flung himself on his +face and waited. + +He did not have long to wait. + +With a noise of mighty rending, reinforced by a continuous roll of +savage thunder, the storm struck. A spinning cone of wind caught a +great expanse of sand, and lifting the loose covering, carried a huge +twisting column inland--death and entombment for any living thing it +met. With it went a great blast of spray, stones, sea-weed, masses of +sedge uprooted bodily, much wreckage, palm trees, small huts which went +to pieces as they were carried along, wild and domestic animals, +anything and everything that lay in the path of the storm. + +The rotatory movement passed with the first whirl, but a hurricane, +blowing with overcoming velocity, pressed like a wall against anything +that strove to face it. Its hoarse raving filled Kenkenes' ears with +titanic sound. The breath was snatched from his nostrils; his eyelids, +tightly closed, were stung with sharply driven sand. Though he +struggled to his feet and attempted to proceed, he staggered and +wandered and was prone to turn away from the solid breast of the mighty +blast. He could not hope to make headway blinded, yet he dared not +lift his face to the sand. He could make a shelter over his eyes that +he might watch his feet, but he could not discover path and direction +in this manner. + +The day was far advanced, and already the army had outstripped him. +Might not Har-hat at this hour be descending with his veterans, +seasoned against the simoons of Arabia, upon Israel, demoralized in the +storm? + +Desperate, the young man dropped his hands and flung up his head. + +He was standing in a soft light, very faintly diffused about him but +narrowing ahead of him, brightening, as it contracted, into almost +daytime brilliance to the south. The illuminated strip was not wide; +the plateau to the west was dark; the farther east likewise +storm-obscured. Taking courage, he raised his eyes for an instant. +The drifting sand would not permit a longer contemplation, but in that +fleeting glimpse he discovered the source of the supernatural radiance. +The pillar was tinged like a cloud in the sunset, with a mellow and +benign fire. + +Kenkenes did not marvel and was not perplexed. The miracles no longer +amazed him, but he had not become indifferent or unthankful. Each +forward step he took was a declaration of faith; the thrill of relief +in his veins, a psalm of thanksgiving. The stones were as many and as +sharp, the way as untender, and the mighty tempest strove against him +as powerfully, but he followed the ray, trusting it implicitly. + +Night fell unnoticed for it merged with the supernatural darkness of +the day. + +At the summit of the slope which led down to the water's edge, he +paused. Below him was a gentle declivity ending to the south in +darkness. There was not a glimmer of radiance on the sea. Far to the +east could be heard the sound of infuriated surges, storming the rocks, +but dense darkness shrouded all the distance. Only the beach directly +under him was alight. The shadows cast were blacker than daylight +shadows, and the radiance had a touch of gold, which gilded everything +beneath it. The poorest object was enriched, the gaudiest subdued. + +Had the number of Israel been ten thousand or even a hundred thousand, +Kenkenes might have had some conception of the multitude. The millions +massed below him on the sand were not to be looked on except as a vast +unit. + +The tribes were divided, the herds were collected at the rear or inland +side, and the lepers were isolated, but no order in detail was +possible. Tents were down, goods were being gathered, and much +commotion was apparent. Even at a distance Kenkenes could see that +consternation and dismay were rife among Israel. The whole valley was +murmurous with subdued outcry, and a multitudinous lowing and bleating +of the herds swept up, blown wildly by the hurricane. + +The senses, too, are limited in their grasp, even as the brain has +bounds upon its conception. The dimensions, movement and sound of the +multitude over-taxed the eye and ear. + +Was it the storm or the army that had frightened them? + +Slipping and sliding in his haste, he descended the slope without care +for the sound he made. The hillocks and hollows that interposed +irritated him. His impatience made him forget his great weariness. +Israel's helpless ones to the sword, Israel's treasure open to the +enrichment of a traitor, Israel's fighting-men driven to rally to his +standard--Rachel's people, to be mastered by Har-hat! + +Great was his intent and its scope, and how cheaply attained if it cost +but two lives--his enemy's and his own! How much depended upon him! +His enthusiasm and zeal put out of his sight all his young reluctance +to surrender life and the world. He could have explained, truthfully, +from his own feelings, what it is that enables men to suffer an eager +martyrdom. + +Two Hebrews outside the limits of the camp halted him. + +"I bring tidings to your captain," he explained. The answer was swept +from the speaker's lips and carried astray by the wind, but he caught +these words. + +"Thou art an Egyptian. Thy kind hath no friendship for Israel." + +"I am of Egypt, but I am one with you in faith. Conduct me to the +prince, I pray you." + +"Take him," said one to the other. "He is but one." + +The Hebrew, thus addressed, motioned Kenkenes to follow him, and turned +toward the encampment. + +They passed through a lane between two tribes. Kenkenes guessed, +looking first upon one and then the other, that there were one hundred +thousand in the two. Strip a city of her plan and shape, her houses, +her pleasures and commerce; leave only her people, their smallest +possessions, and all their fears; beset such a city with an army on +three sides, the sea on the fourth and a furious hurricane over +all--and in such state and of such appearance were these two tribes. + +Kenkenes fortified himself and resisted with all his might the +contagious panic that seemed about to attack him. As well as he might, +he concentrated his mind upon other things. He noted that the shadows +were long like those of afternoon. Turning his head, he saw that the +pillar stood behind the encampment and that its light was thrown +forward and downward, not backward and outward. Very manifestly, the +benefits of the miracle were only for the believers in Jehovah. The +marvel brought into the young man's mind some natural speculation +concerning the great miracle-worker to whom his guide was leading him. +What manner of man was he about to look upon,--a sorcerer, a trafficker +in horrors, a confounder of men? + +Ahead, particularly illumined by the celestial light, was a group of +elders--great, grave men, misted in the flying fleeces of their own +beards. They bent firmly against the blast and the broad streaming of +their ample drapings added much to the idea of supernatural power and +resistance they inspired. + +The Hebrew leading Kenkenes slackened his step as if hesitating to +approach so venerable a council, when suddenly the group separated, +revealing a majestic man about whom it had been clustered. + +After a word in his own tongue, delivered with bent head and +deferential attitude, the Hebrew stood aside. + +Kenkenes prepared to meet a prince of Egypt, whatever the personality +of the Israelite. He dropped on one knee, bent his head and extended +his hand with the palm toward Moses. The great man took the fingers +and bade the young Egyptian arise. Forty years a courtier, forty years +a shepherd, but the graces of the one had not been forgotten in the +simplicities of the other. When Kenkenes gained his feet, lo! he faced +the wondrous stranger he had seen in the tomb of the Incomparable +Pharaoh. + +At a sign from Moses Kenkenes came near to him, that the howl of the +tempest and the turmoil of Israel might not drown their voices. + +"Thou art weary, my son," the Israelite said, glancing at the tired +face and dusty raiment. "Hast thou come from afar?" + +"From Goshen to Tanis, and hither, O Prince." + +"Afoot?" + +"Even so." + +"Thou hast journeyed farther than Israel, and Israel is most weary. I +trust thy journey is done." + +And this was the confounder of Egypt, the vicar of God--this kindly +noble! + +"Not yet, O Prince; but its dearest mission endeth here. I come of the +blood of the oppressors, but I am full of pity for thy people's wrongs. +Knowest thou that the Egyptians pursue thee? Is thy hand made strong +with resource? Hath the Lord God prepared thee against them?" + +"From whom art thou sent?" the Israelite asked pointedly. + +"I am come of mine own accord." + +"Wherefore?" + +"Because I am one with Israel in faith." + +The great Lawgiver surveyed him in silence for a moment, but the +penetrative brilliance in his eyes softened. + +"Wast thou taught?" he asked at last. + +"In casting away the idols, nay; in finding the true God, I was." + +In the pause that followed, Israel lifted up its voice, and to Kenkenes +it seemed that the people besought their great captain, urgingly and +chidingly. The Lawgiver listened for a little space. His gaze was +absent, the lines of his face were sad. Something in his attitude +seemed to say, "What profiteth all Thy care, O Lord? Behold Thy +chosen--these men of little faith!" + +Then, as if some thought of the young proselyte, the Egyptian, arose in +contrast, his eyes came back to Kenkenes again. + +"Thou hast filled me with gladness, my son," he said simply. + +Kenkenes bowed his head and made no answer. Presently the Israelite +spoke to the panic-stricken people nearest to him. In the tone and the +words he used there was a world of paternal kindliness--a composite of +confidence, reassurance, and implied protection, that should have +soothed. + +"Fear ye not; stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. For the +Egyptians ye have seen this day, ye shall see again no more for ever." + +At the words, Kenkenes lifted his head quickly. The Hebrew had +answered his question, but how enigmatically! Was Israel to escape, or +Har-hat to be destroyed? In either case, the young man wondered +concerning himself. Again the eyes of the Lawgiver returned to him, as +if the sight of the young Egyptian was grateful to him. + +"Abide with us," he said. "Saith not thy faith, 'Fear not; the Lord +shall fight for thee?'" + +Kenkenes' face wore a startled expression; how had the Israelite +divined his purpose? "Saith not thy faith?" Faith? He confessed +faith, but faith had not spoken that thing to him. Slowly and little +by little it began to manifest itself to him, that he had wavered in +his trust; that the purpose of his visit to Israel had questioned the +fidelity of his God's care; that so surely had he doubted, he had +defied danger and fought with death to ask after the intent of the +Lord; that he had meant to perform the duty which the Lord had left +undone. The realization came with a rush of shame. In the asking he +had betrayed his wavering, and Moses had tactfully told him of it. A +surge of color swept over his face. + +"Thou hast recalled my trust to me, my Prince," he said in a lowered +tone. "Till now, I knew not that it had failed me. But remember thou, +it was my love for Israel--O, and my love for mine own--that made me +fear. Forgive me, I pray thee." + +The Lawgiver laid his hand on the young man's shoulder but did not +answer at once. The growing clamor about them had reached the acme of +insistence. The nearest people pressed through the tribal lines and, +rushing forward, began to throw themselves on their knees, tumbling in +circles about the majestic Hebrew. Others kept their feet, and with +arms and clenched hands above their heads, shouted vehemently. Their +cries were partly in Egyptian, partly in their own tongue, but the +cause of their terror and the burden of their supplications were the +same. The Egyptians were upon them! Even the dumb beasts were swept +into the panic and the illuminated beach shook with sound. + +After a little sad contemplation of the clamoring horde about him, the +Lawgiver drew nearer to Kenkenes and said in his ear, because the +tumult drowned his voice: + +"The Lord will fight for thee; thine enemy can not flee His strong +hand. Wait upon Him and behold His triumph." + +Kenkenes bowed his head in acquiescence. + + + + +CHAPTER XLV + +THROUGH THE RED SEA + +The voices of the storm found harmonious tones of different pitch and +swelled in glorious accord from the faintest breath of melody to an +almighty blast that stunned the senses with stupendous harmony. Then +the chord seemed to melt and lose itself in the wild dissonances of the +hurricane. + +The turmoil of Israel began to subside, growing fainter, ceasing among +the ranks nearest the sea, failing toward the rear, dying away like a +sigh up and down the long encampment. The people that had been on +their knees rose slowly. The bleating of the flocks quieted into +stillness. Commotion ceased and Israel held its breath. + +The Lawgiver had passed from among them, and those that followed him +with their eyes saw that he was moving toward the sea, seemingly at the +very limit of the outer radiance and still going on. First to one and +then to another, it became apparent that the extent of the illuminated +beach was widening. Hither and thither over the multitude the +intelligence ran, in whispers or by glances. Having showed his +neighbor each looked again. Ripple-worn sand, shells, barnacle-covered +rocks, slowly came within the pale of the radiance and Moses moved with +it. Eight stalwart Hebrews, bearing a funeral ark, shrouded with a +purple pall, fringed with gold, emerged from among the people and, +taking a place in front of the Lawgiver, walked confidently down the +sand toward the east. + +The radiance progressed step by step. Wet rocks entered the glow, +lines of sea-weed, immense drifts of debris, the brink of a ledge, the +shadow before it, and then a sandy bottom. + +A long line of old men, two abreast, the wind making the picture +awesome as it tossed their beards and gray robes, followed the +Lawgiver. After these several litters, borne by young men, proceeded +in imposing order. + +Except for the raving of the tempest there was no sound in Israel. + +A double file of camels with sumptuous housings moved with dignified +and unhasty tread after the litters. By this time, the foremost ranks +of the procession were some distance ahead, the limit of radiance just +in advance, and lighting with special tenderness the funeral ark. Here +were the bones of that noblest son of Jacob. Having brought Israel +into Egypt, Joseph was leading it forth again. + +Pools, lighted by the ray, glowed like sheets of gold, darkling here +and there with shadow; long ledges of rock, bearded with deep-water +growth, sparkled rarely in the light; stretches of sodden sand, colored +with salts of the waters, and littered with curious fish-life, lay +between. + +Where was the sea? + +After the camels followed a score of mules, little and trim in contrast +to the tall shaggy beasts ahead of them. They were burden-bearing +animals, precious among Israel, for they were laden with the records of +the tribes, much treasure in jewels and fine stuffs, incense, writing +materials, and such things as the people would need, and were not to be +had from among them, or like to be found in the places to which they +might come. These passed and their drivers with them. + +The next moment, Kenkenes was caught in the center of a rushing wave of +humanity. He fought off the consternation that threatened to seize him +and tried to care for himself, but a reed on the breast of the Nile at +flood could not have been more helpless. Behind Israel were the +Egyptians, ahead of it miraculous escape; the one impulse of the +multitude was flight. That any remembered his mate or his children, +his goods, his treasure or his cattle, was a marvel. + +The foremost ranks, moving in directly behind the leaders, had adopted +their pace. Furthermore, as the advance-guard, they had a greater +sense of security, and before them was all the east open for flight. +Not so with the hindmost; they were near the dreaded place from which +the army would descend; ahead of them was a deliberate host; within +them, soul-consuming fear and panic. The rear rushed, the forward +ranks walked, and the center caught between was jammed into a compact +mass. + +Neither halt nor escape was possible. Press as the hindmost might upon +those forward, the pace was slackened, instead of quickened. The +advance grew slower as it extended back through the ranks, for each +succeeding line lost a modicum in the length of the step, till at the +rear they were pushing hard and barely moving. No wonder they sobbed, +prayed, panted, surged, swayed and pressed. How they reviled the +snail-like leaders, not knowing that the sturdy pace lagged in the body +of the multitude. So they hasted and progressed only inch by inch. + +After the first moment of battle against the human sea, Kenkenes +recognized the futility of resistance and suffered himself to be borne +along. There was no turning back now, had he been so disposed. He had +left behind him his purposes, unaccomplished. + +He had received no explicit promise from Moses, and if he had given ear +to the doubts of his own reason, he might have been sorely afraid, much +troubled for Egypt and all he loved therein. But he went with the +multitude passively, even contentedly; he did not speculate how his God +would fight for him; his faith was perfect. + +As for his presence with Israel, no one heeded him. Sometimes it came +his way to be helpful; an old man lost his feet and becoming +panic-stricken was soothed only when the young Egyptian put a strong +arm about him and held him till his feet touched earth again. Children +became heavy in the arms of parents and the little Hebrews had no fear +of the young man who carried them, a while, instead. But no one +stopped to take notice that this was an Egyptian, totally unlike those +among the "mixed multitude" that had come to join Israel; nor did any +wonder what a nobleman of the blood of the oppressors did among the +fleeing slaves. Indeed, if the host had any thought beyond the impulse +of self-preservation, it was only a dim realization that they were +walking over a most rocky, oozy and untender road and that the smell of +the sea was very strong about them. + +In the early hours of the morning, having become so accustomed to the +roar of the wind and the sound of the moving multitude, Kenkenes ceased +to be conscious of it. Other sounds, which hours before would have +failed to reach his ears, became distinct. The crying of tired +children reached him, and he detected even snatches of talk among the +ranks some distance away from him. Thus a clamor of noise, secondary +in force, grew about him. Above it all, at last, came a sound that +would have made him halt if he could. + +He tried to think it one of the many voices of the storm, but the +second time he heard it, he knew what it was. + +Far to the rear, a trumpet-call, beautiful and spirited, rose upon the +air. + +The Egyptian army was in pursuit! + +Israel heard it, and crying aloud in its terror, swept forward, as if +the trumpet-call had commanded it. Kenkenes felt a quickening of +pulse, a momentary tremor, but no more. + +He became conscious finally of a warmth penetrating his sandals. He +knew that he had been struggling up a slope for a long time, and now he +realized that he was again on the dry, sun-heated sand of the desert. +The multitude ceased to crowd, the pressure about him diminished; the +ranks began to widen to his left and right; the leaders halted +altogether, and though there was still much movement among the body and +rear of the host, people turned to look upon their neighbors. + +The overhanging cloud parted from the eastern horizon, leaving a strip +of sky softly lighted by the coming morn. Without any preliminary +diminution of its force, the wind failed entirely. + +Kenkenes, with many others, looked back and saw that the pillar, +illuminated, but no longer illuminating, had halted above a solitary +figure of seemingly super-human stature in the morning gray, standing +on an eminence, overlooking the sea. + +The arm was uplifted and outstretched, tense and motionless. + +From his superior height, Kenkenes saw, over the heads of the immense +concourse, two lines of foam riding like the wind across the sea-bed +toward each other. Between them was a great body of plunging horses; +overhead a forest of fluttering banners; and faint from the commotion +came shouts and wild notes of trumpets. Then the two lines of foam +smote against each other with a fearful rush and a muffled report like +the cannonading of surf. A mountain of water pitched high into the air +and collapsed in a vast froth, which spread abroad over the churning, +wallowing sea. The falling wind dashed a sheet of spray over the +silent host on the eastern shore. Sharp against the white foam, dark +objects and masses sank, arose, and sank again. + +At that moment the sun thrust a broad shaft of light between the +horizon and the lifted cloud. + +It discovered only the sea, raving and stormy, and afar to the west a +misty, vacant, lifeless line of shore. + +"And the waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen, and +all the host of the Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there +remained not so much as one of them." + +So perished Har-hat and the flower of the Egyptian army. + + + + +CHAPTER XLVI + +WHOM THE LADY MIRIAM SENT + +Of the ensuing day, Kenkenes had no very distinct memory. Very fair +and beautiful, one recollection remained--a recollection of another +figure on the eminence, and by the flash of white upthrown arms, and +the blowing of a somber cloud of hair, this time it was a woman. How +the morning sun glittered on the shaken timbrel; how the spotless +draperies went wild in the wind; how the group of lissome maidens on +the sand below wound in and out, in a mazy dance; how the multitude was +swept into transports of beatification; how the men became prophets and +the women, psalmists; how the vast wilderness reverberated with a great +chant of exultation--all this he remembered as a sublime dream. + +Thereafter, Israel moved inland and down the coast some distance, for +the sea began to surrender its dead. Of the stir and method of the +removal he did not remember, but of the encampment and the reassembling +of the tribes he recalled several incidents. He was numb and +sleep-heavy beyond words, and while leaning, in a semi-conscious +condition, against some household goods, he was discovered by the +owner, who was none other than the friendly son of Judah, his assistant +in his search for Rachel in Pa-Ramesu. The man's honest joy over +Kenkenes' safety was good to look upon. A few words of explanation +concerning his very apparent exhaustion were fruitful of some comfort +to the young Egyptian. The Hebrew's wife had a motherly heart, and the +weary face of the comely youth touched it. Therefore, she brought him +bread and wine and made him a place in the shadow of her +tent-furnishings where he might sleep till what time the family shelter +could be raised. + +But Kenkenes did not rest. He fell asleep only to dream of Rachel, and +awoke asking himself why he had abandoned the search for her; why he +had left Egypt without her; and why he had not gone to Moses at once +for aid to further his seeking through Israel. + +He arose from his place, sick with all the old suspense and heartache. +He would begin now to look for Rachel and cease not till he found her +or died of his weariness. + +He stepped forth directly in the path of a party of women. He moved +aside to give them room, and glancing at the foremost, recognized her +immediately as the Lady Miriam. She stopped and looked at him. + +"Thou art he who found Jehovah in Egypt?" she asked. + +He bowed in assent. + +"Thy faith is entire," she commented. "Also, have I cause to remember +thee. Thou didst display a courteous spirit in Tape, a year agone." + +"Thou hast repaid me with the flattery of thy remembrance, Lady +Miriam," he replied. + +"Thy speech publishes thee as noble," she went on calmly. "Thy name?" + +"Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, the murket." + +Her lips parted suddenly and her eyes gleamed. + +"See yonder tent," she said, indicating a pavilion of new cloth, reared +not far from the quarters of Moses. "Repair thither and await till I +send to thee." + +Without pausing for an answer she swept on, her maidens following, damp +of brow and bright of eye. + +Kenkenes turned toward the tent. A Hebrew at the entrance lifted the +side without a word and signed him to enter. + +The interior was not yet fully furnished. A rug of Memphian weave +covered the sand and a taboret was placed in the center. + +Presently the serving-man entered with a laver of sea-water, and an +Israelitish robe, fringed and bound at the selvage with blue. With the +despatch and adroitness of one long used to personal service, he +attended the young Egyptian, and dressed him in the stately garments of +his own people. When his service was complete, he took up the bowl and +cast-off dress and went forth. + +After a time he brought in a couch-like divan, dressed it with fringed +linen and strewed it with cushions; next, he suspended a cluster of +lamps from the center-pole; set a tiny inlaid table close to the couch, +and on the table put a bottle of wine and a beaker; and brought last a +heap of fine rugs and coverings which he laid in one corner. The tent +was furnished and nobly. The man bowed before Kenkenes, awaiting the +Egyptian's further pleasure, but at a sign from the young man, bowed +again and retired. + +Kenkenes went over to the divan and sat down on it, to wait. + +Presently some one entered behind him. He arose and turned. Before +him was the most welcome picture his bereaved eyes could have looked +upon. His visitor was all in shimmering white and wore no ornament +except a collar of golden rings. What need of further adornment when +she was mantled and crowned with a glory of golden hair? Except that +the face was marble white and the eyes dark and large with quiet +sorrow, it was the same divinely beautiful Rachel! + +It may have been that he was beyond the recuperative influence of +sudden joy, or that the unexpected restoration of his love might have +swept away his forces had he been in full strength; but whatever the +cause, Kenkenes sank to his knees and forward into the eager arms flung +out to receive him. Her cry of great joy seemed to come to him from +afar. + +"Kenkenes! O my love! Not dead; not dead!" + +Then it was he learned that she had despaired, grieving beyond any +comfort, for she had counted him with the first-born of Egypt. And +even though thoughts came to him but slowly now, he said to himself: + +"Praise God, I did not think of it, or I had gone distracted with her +trouble." + +How rich woman-love is in solicitude and ministering resource! It made +Rachel strong enough to raise him, and having led him back to the +divan, gently to lay him down among the cushions. The wine was at her +hand, and she filled the beaker, and held it while he drank. Then she +kissed him and, hiding her face in his breast, wept soft tears. And +though he held her very close and had in his heart a great longing to +soothe her, he could not speak. + +After a little she spoke. + +"I had not dreamed that there was such artifice in Miriam. She told me +of a nobleman that had served God and Israel, and was in need of +comfort in his tent. But she bridled her tongue and governed her +expression so cunningly, that I did not dream the hero was mine--mine!" + +Then on a sudden she disengaged herself from his arms and gaining her +feet, cried out with her hands over her blushing face: + +"And now, I know why she and Hur--O I know why they came with me, and +brought me to the tent!" + +"Nay, now; may I not guess, also?" Kenkenes laughed, though a little +puzzled over her evident confusion. "They had a mind to peep and spy +upon our love-making. Perchance they are without this instant; come +hither and let us not disappoint them." + +She dropped her hands and looked at him with flaming cheeks and smiling +eyes. There was more in her look than he could fathom, but he did not +puzzle longer when she came back to her place and hid her face away +from him. + +It is the love of riper years, that makes the lips of lovers silent. +But Kenkenes and Rachel were very young and wholly demonstrative, and +they had need of many words to supplement the testimony of caresses. +They had much to tell and they left no avowal unmade. + +But at last Kenkenes' voice wearied and Rachel noted it. So in her +pretty authoritative way, she stroked his lashes down and bade him +sleep. When she removed her hands and clasped them above his head, his +eyes did not open. + +As she bent over him, she noted with a great sweep of tenderness how +young he was. In all her relations with Kenkenes she had seen him in +the manliest roles. She had depended upon him, looked up to him, and +had felt secure in his protection. Now she contemplated a face from +which content had erased the mature lines that care had drawn. The +curve of his lips, the length of the drooping lashes, the roundness of +cheek, and the softness of throat, were youthful--boyish. With this +enlightenment her love for him experienced a transfiguration. She +seemed to grow older than he; the maternal element leaped to the fore; +their positions were instantly reversed. It was hers to care for him! + +After a long time, his arms relaxed about her, and she undid them and +disposed them in easy position. Lifting the fillet from his brow, she +smoothed out the mark it had made and settled the cushions more softly +under his head. From the heap of coverings she took the amplest and +the softest and spread it over him. Remembering that the wind from the +sea blew shrewdly at night, she laid rugs about the edges of the tent +which fluttered in the breeze and returned again to his side. + +After another space of rapt contemplation of his unconscious face she +went forth and drew the entrance together behind her. + +The next daybreak was the happiest Israel had known in a hundred years. +Egypt, overthrown and humbled, was behind them; God was with them, and +Canaan was just ahead--perhaps only beyond the horizon. Few but would +have laughed at the glory of Babylonia, Assyria and the great powers. + +For had it not been promised that out of Israel nations should be made, +and kings should come? + +The march was to be taken up immediately, and in the cool of the +morning the host was ready to advance. + +Rachel had not permitted herself to be seen until the tent of Miriam +was struck. She knew that Kenkenes was without, waiting for her, and +with the delightful inconsistency of maidenhood, she dreaded while she +longed to meet her beloved again. And when the moment arrived she +slipped across the open space to the camel that was to bear her into +Canaan, but in the shadow of the faithful creature, Kenkenes overtook +her and folded her in his arms. + +"A blessing on thee, my sweet! And I am blest in having thee once +more." + +"Didst thou sleep well?" she asked. + +"Most industriously, since I made up what I lost and overlapped a +little. And yet I was abroad at dawn prowling about thy tent lest thou +shouldst flee me once again. Rachel--" his voice sobered and his face +grew serious--"Rachel, wilt thou wed me this day?" + +"If it were only 'aye' or 'nay' to be said, I should have said it long +ago," she answered with averted eyes, "but there are many things that +thou shouldst know, Kenkenes, before thou demandest the answer from me." + +"Name them, Rachel," he said submissively; "but let me say this first. +Mine eyes are not mystic but most truthfully can I tell this moment, +which of us twain will rule over my tent." + +"And thou art ready for the tent and shepherd life of Israel?" she +asked gravely, but before he could answer she went on. + +"Hear me first. So tender hast thou been of me; so much hast thou +sacrificed for my sake that it were unkind to bind thee to me in the +life-long sacrifice and life-long hardships that I may know. Thine +enemy and mine is dead, and Egypt rid of him. There is much in Egypt +to prosper thee; there, thy state is high; there, thou hast opportunity +and wealth. Israel can offer thee God and me. Even the faith thou +couldst keep in Egypt, so thou wert watchful. And further, thou art +the murket's son, and building takes the place of carving for thee, +now. But, here, O Kenkenes, thou must lay thy chisel down for ever, +for the faith of the multitude, so newly weaned from idolatry, is too +feeble to be tried with the sight of images." + +Kenkenes heard her with a passive countenance. She gave him news, +indeed--facts of a troublous nature, but he held his peace and let her +proceed. + +"And this, yet further. Once in that time when I was a slave and thou +my master and loved me not--" + +His dark eyes reproached her. + +"Didst love me, then, of a truth? But it matters not--and yet"--coming +closer to him, "it matters much! In that time ere thou hadst told me +so, we talked of Canaan, thou and I. I boasted of it, being but newly +filled with it and freshly come from Caleb who taught us. Then, Israel +was enslaved and not yet so vastly helped by Jehovah. But alas! I have +seen Israel freed, and attended by its God, and by the tokens of its +conduct, Israel is far, far from Canaan. I am of Israel and whosoever +weds with me, will be of Israel likewise. It may not be that I shall +escape my people's sorrows. Shall I bring them upon thy head, also, my +Kenkenes?" + +After a little he answered, sighing. + +"Thou dost not love me, Rachel." + +"Kenkenes!" + +"Aye, I have said. Thou wouldst send me away from thee, back into +Egypt." + +"O, seest thou not? I would have thee know thy heart; I would not have +thee choose blindly; I do but sacrifice myself," she cried, +panic-stricken. + +"And yet, thou wouldst deny me that same delight of sacrifice. Can I +not surrender for thee as well?" + +She drooped her head and did not answer. + +"Ah! thou speakest of the benefits of Egypt," he continued. "What were +Egypt without thee, save a great darkness haunted and vacant? Besides, +there is no Egypt beyond this sea. She hath risen and crossed with +Israel--all her beauty and her glory and her beneficence. For thou art +Egypt and shalt be to me all that I loved in Egypt." + +He took her hands. + +"Why may I not as justly doubt thy knowledge of thy heart?" he asked +softly. + +Seeing that she surrendered, he persisted no further in his protest. + +"When wilt thou wed me, my love?" + +She drew back from him a little, though she willingly left her hands +where they were, and Kenkenes, noting the flush on her cheeks, the +pretty gravity of her brow, and the well-known air she assumed when she +discoursed, smiled and said fondly to himself: + +"By the signs, I am to be taught something more." + +"Thou knowest, my Kenkenes," she began, "the Hebrews are married +simply. There is feasting and dancing and the bride is taken to the +house of her father-in-law. Thereafter there is still much feasting, +but the wedding ceremony is done at the home-bringing of the bride." + +"I hear," said Kenkenes when she paused. + +"I am without kindred; thou art here without house. There can be no +wedding feast for us, nor dancing nor singing, for Israel is on the +march." + +"Of a truth," Kenkenes assented. + +"So there is only the essential portion of the ceremony left to us--the +home-bringing of the bride." + +"It is enough," said Kenkenes. + +"Hur and Miriam brought me to thy tent last night." + +With his face lighting, Kenkenes drew her to him and put his arm about +her. + +"So if thou wilt, we shall say--that--from--that moment--" + +Her voice grew lower, her words more unready and failed altogether. + +"From that moment," he said eagerly, reassuring her. "From that +moment--" + +"From that moment, I have been thy wife!" + + + + +CHAPTER XLVII + +THE PROMISED LAND + +One sunset, shortly after his marriage, word came to the tent of +Kenkenes that an Amalekite chieftain on his way to Egypt had paused for +the night just without the encampment of Israel. + +"Here may be an opportunity to speak with thy father," Rachel +suggested. The prospect of talking once again to those he had left +behind was one too full of pleasure for the young Egyptian to receive +calmly. Hurriedly he despatched one of his serving men to the +Amalekite to bid him await a message. But Rachel called the messenger +back. + +"Tell the Amalekite that thou comest from an Egyptian noble. For such +thy master is, and this chieftain is more willing to take command from +Egypt than from Israel." + +The servant in his enthusiasm and the importance of his mission told +the Amalekite that he came from a prince of Egypt. + +The chieftain was a youth who had just succeeded his father over his +people and was on his way to Memphis bearing tribute to Meneptah. To +this tributary nation Egypt was remote, splendid and full of glamour. +The name was synonymous of the world and all the glories thereof, and +particularly had it appealed to the active imagination of this youth. +He had seen many Egyptians, but they were naked prisoners laboring in +the mines of Sinai, or overseers or scribes or the ancient exile who +was governor of the province,--and surely these were not representative +of the land. + +Now he was to get a glance at real Egypt. + +In the early hours of the dawn a follower came to his pallet and told +him in awed tones that the prince was without. Tremulous with +pleasurable trepidation, he went out into the misty daybreak twilight +of the open. And there he met an imperial stranger who towered over +him as a palm over a shrub. At a single glance the Amalekite saw that +there was a circlet of gold about the brow, that the face was fine and +that the garments swept the sands. All this was significant, but when +the stranger delivered him two rolls, one addressed to the chief of the +royal scribes of the Pharaoh, the other to the royal murket, and paid +him with a jewel, the Amalekite, convinced and satisfied, prostrated +himself. + +But we may not know what the youth thought when he found that there +were few in all Egypt like this princely stranger. + +After these writings came, with all fidelity, to the hands of those who +loved him in Egypt, silence fell between them and Kenkenes. + +Meneptah erected no more monuments after the eighth year of his reign, +for in that year Mentu, the murket, died. None could fill his place, +since to his name was attached the title "the Incomparable," as +befitted the artist of that great Pharaoh, likewise titled, who had so +loved him and his genius. Meneptah, in memory of Mentu and his artist +son who had served his king so well, set up no sculptor nor any murket +in his place. It was the one graceful act in the life of the feeble +king, the one resolution to which he held most tenaciously. + +Though Mentu's union with Senci was short, it was most happy, save +perhaps for the absence of Kenkenes. But after the letter came from +the well-beloved son there was more cheer in the heart of the father. +Kenkenes was not dead, only absent, as he would have been had he lived +in Tanis or Thebes. Furthermore, the young man had spoken glowingly +and at length on the future of Israel and the Promised Land, and Mentu +told himself that he might visit Kenkenes one day in that new country. + +Since there were no children in their house, Senci and the murket +spoiled Anubis, and in the eyes of his devoted master the ape had +earned his soft life. Shortly after the departure of Kenkenes Mentu +discovered the ape burying something in the sand of the courtyard +flower-beds. In spite of the favorite's vigorous protests Mentu +overturned the tiny heap of earth and discovered therein the +lapis-lazuli signet. There was but one explanation of the ape's +possession of the gem. He had torn the scarab from about the neck of +Unas when he flew in his face, the moment the light went out. After +his nature, he kept the jewel because it was bright. + +All these things--the discovery of the signet in the tomb, the safety +of Kenkenes when all the other first-born had died, and the testimony +of the miracles to the power of Israel's God--made the good murket +think deeply. Indeed, all Egypt thought deeply after the Exodus of +Israel, and to such extremes was this sober thinking carried that +through very fear many added the name of the Hebrews' God to the +Pantheon. Mentu did not go so far, because he saw the inconsistency in +such procedure, but he shook his head and pondered and was not wholly +satisfied with many things in the Osirian creed. + +Of the love of Hotep and Masanath something yet remains to be told. It +was common to examine the entire family of a traitor as to their +complicity in his misdeeds, and the option lay with the Pharaoh whether +or not they should bear some of his punishment. Har-hat was dead, the +army destroyed at his hands. When the news of the disaster reached +Tanis Meneptah's anger and grief knew no bounds. + +After Rameses had been interred at Thebes beside his fathers, and the +court had returned to Memphis, the king summoned Masanath, the sole +representative of the family of Har-hat, to give reason why she should +not be accused of complicity in the treason of her father. + +Meneptah had taken counsel with none on this step. Perhaps he had an +inkling that it would be unpopular; perhaps he thought he was but +fulfilling the law. Hotep was at On comforting his family, who mourned +over Bettis, and most of the other ministers were scattered over Egypt +lamenting their own dead, and few expected the ungallant act of the +king. + +But one day, when all the court had reassembled, Masanath came into the +great council chamber. Alone and dressed in mourning, she seemed so +little and defenseless that Meneptah stirred uncomfortably in his +throne. Slowly she approached the dais and fell on her knees before +the king. The great gathering of courtiers held its breath, wondering +and pitying. + +Such was the scene upon which Hotep came all unknowing. At a glance he +understood the situation. It was too much for his well-bridled spirit. +With a cry, full of horror, indignation and compassion, he dropped his +writing-case and scroll, and, rushing forward, flung himself on his +knees beside her, one arm about her, the other extended in supplication +to the Pharaoh. + +Meneptah, who, from the moment of Masanath's entrance into the council +chamber, had begun to repent his ill-advised act, was glad to be won +over. At the end of Hotep's impassioned story he came down from the +dais, and raising Masanath, kissed her and put her into the young man's +arms. Supplementing his pardon with command, he ordered his scribe to +marry the sad little orphan at once and take her away from the scene of +her sorrows till Isis restored her in spirits again. + +The alacrity with which this royal command was obeyed proved how +acceptable it was to the lovers. By the next sunset they were going by +a slow and sumptuous boat down the broad bosom of the Nile toward the +sea, but they had no care whether or not they ever reached their +destination. + +After some months spent on the coast, Masanath grew stronger and began +to live with much appreciation of the joys of existence. On their +return to Memphis Hotep was made fan-bearer in Har-hat's place, and for +the remaining fourteen years of Meneptah's reign practically ruled over +Egypt. + +Vastly different, however, was his favoritism from the favoritism of +Har-hat. During the wise administration of the young adviser Egypt +recovered something of her former glory, lost in the dreadful +plague-ridden days preceding the Exodus. The army was reorganized +first, for Ta-user's party began to make demonstrations the hour that +the news of the Red Sea disaster reached the Hak-heb. All public +building and national extravagance were halted, and the surplus +treasure was expended in restocking the fields and granaries and +restoring commerce. Within five years after the Exodus the great check +Egypt had met in her nineteenth dynasty was not greatly apparent. + +So the land recovered from the plagues, but its ruler never. The death +of Rameses lay like a heavy sin and torturing remorse on his +conscience. He wept till the feeble eyes lost their sight, but not +their susceptibility to tears. At last, succumbing to melancholia, he +became a child, for whom Hotep reigned and for whom the queen cared +with touching devotion. + +The story of Seti is history. It is needless to say that his rough +usage at the hands of Ta-user awakened him, but it was long before he +found courage to return to Io, the sweetheart of his childhood. Yet, +when he did, after the manner of her kind, she wept over him and took +him back without a word of reproach. So the fair-faced sister of Hotep +came to be queen over Egypt and took another title with Nefer-ari as +prefix, and the quaint Danaid name, Io, was lost to all lips but Seti's +and Hotep's. + +After Seti came to the throne he continued Hotep in the advisership and +prepared to reign happily. But in a little time the Thebaid, long +disaffected, seceded from the federation of Egypt and crowned +Amon-meses king of Thebes. Seti gathered his army, marched against the +rebellious district, put Amon-meses to the sword and reduced the +Thebaid to submission. Then he returned to Memphis for another space +of prosperity. + +At the end of a year Ta-user and Siptah, after much browbeating of the +Hak-heb, raised funds sufficient to purchase mercenaries. Then, with +Ta-user at the head in barbaric splendor, they descended on Memphis. + +The course Seti pursued has puzzled historians. He gathered up his +family, his court, his treasure, and without so much as lifting a +spear, fled into Ethiopia. After some time Ta-user sent to him and +conferred upon him the title of the Prince of Cush. + +To the friends of the young Pharaoh it was patent that he feared to +meet Ta-user. Having succumbed once to her influence, to his undoing +and the misery of his beloved Io, he dared not come under the +all-compelling eyes of the sorceress again. So he surrendered his +crown and his country for his soul's sake. + +But fifty years after, Seti's son, the formidable Set-Nekt, returned +into Egypt and restored the Rameside house on a basis so solid that +another glorious dynasty arose thereon, second only in brilliance to +that which had gone out in the anarchy of Siptah and Ta-user's reign. +This done, he wreaked personal vengeance upon the usurpers of his +father's throne. He broke open the tomb of Siptah and Ta-user, threw +out their bodies to the jackals, obliterated the inscriptions, enlarged +the crypt, put his own and his father's history on the walls and used +it for his mausoleum when he died. + +And this was the deadliest retaliation he could inflict in his father's +name. + +Much of this Kenkenes learned from the lips of Egyptian merchants whom +he met in Canaan, forty years after the Exodus. + +Kenkenes was a proselyte who had found his God for himself. He +believed as he drew his breath and as his heart beat, involuntarily and +without any lapse. Never could a son of Israel have surrendered +himself more eagerly to the law. Its good and its purposes were ever +before his eyes, and his footsteps led in the paths that it lighted. +Though he saw not the Lord in a burning bush nor talked with Him on +Sinai, he found Him on the lonely uplands of the sheep-ranges and heard +Him in the voiceless night on the limitless desert. The young Egyptian +was not yet twenty years old at the time of the numbering before Sinai, +and he entered the Promised Land with Joshua and Caleb. For verily he +walked with God all the days of his life. + +It must not be supposed that there was no serene life nor any happiness +in the long wandering of forty years. A generation of oriental adults +practically dies out in that time. The passing of the elders of +Israel, though it was accomplished by plagues and sendings for +iniquities, was as the passing of the old in the Orient to-day. The +encampment was not continually filled with calamity and great +mourning--far from it. There were long stretches of peace and plenty, +extending almost uninterruptedly for years, and those who followed the +law escaped the intervals of catastrophe. + +Kenkenes was among the chosen people but not of them, partly because he +was of the execrated race of the oppressors and partly because the most +of Israel had nothing in common with the nobleman. But Moses loved him +and found joy in his company. Joshua loved him and had him by his side +when Israel warred. Caleb and Aaron loved him because he was godly, +and Miriam was proud of him and was mild in his presence. He took no +public part in the people's affairs, yet who shall say that he was not +near when Bezaleel wrought the wondrous angels for the ark? Who shall +say that his purest jewel did not enter the breast-plate of the high +priest? There are many names embraced in that general term, "every +wise-hearted man among them that wrought the work of the tabernacle." + +So when Israel took up the forty years of pasture-hunting in Paran, +Kenkenes made his tent beautiful and pitched it always apart from the +multitude, and here he was contented all the days that Israel tarried +in that place. Under his care his flocks increased, his cattle +multiplied and his camels were not few, and he laid up riches for the +four stalwart sons and the golden-haired daughter who were to live +after him. + +From the moment of his union with his beautiful wife, through the long +years of semi-isolation that he knew thereafter, he grew closer and +closer to Rachel. She filled all his needs as Israel failed to supply +them, and he missed neither friend nor neighbor when she was near. +Rachel knew wherein she was more fortunate than other women and her +content and her devotion were beyond measure. So Kenkenes and Rachel +were lovers all the days of their lives. + +If ever they grew reminiscent there was one name spoken more tenderly +than any other--the name of Atsu. Kenkenes would grow sad of +countenance and he would look away, but there was no jealousy in his +heart for the tears of Rachel weeping over the task-master who died for +her. + +The collar of golden rings became popular in Israel, and, after many +modifications effected by time and fashion, it came at last to be the +insignia of the virtuous woman. For centuries it was worn and no one +knows when the custom died out. + +The genius of Kenkenes did not die. His voice enriched with age, and +the rocky vales wherein his flocks wandered had melodious echoes +whenever he followed the sheep. But he never used chisel upon stone +again. His sons were artists after him, but they were handicapped +also. And so it continued for many generations until the Temple of +Solomon was built. Then, though the plans came from the Lord, and +artisans were brought from Tyre, it was the descendants of Kenkenes who +made the Temple beautiful "with carved figures of cherubim and palm +trees and open flowers, within and without." + + + +THE END + + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +When the Chaldeans prostrated themselves before Nebuchadnezzar, they +cried: "O King, live forever!" When patrician Rome hailed Nero in the +Circus, the acclaim was: "Vivat Imperator!" When the faithful saluted +the Caliph, they said: "May thy shadow never grow less." + +Humanity, living in eternal contemplation of the tomb, offers its +highest tribute in bespeaking immortality for its great. + +But Egypt did not invoke the gift of deathlessness upon the Pharaoh; +she declared it. He was an Immortal and died not. Though he more +nearly justified the confident declaration of his people, he but proved +that there is no sublunar immortality, though in Egypt--almost. + +The Pharaoh lived with a triple purpose: the perpetuity of his empire, +of his dynasty, of his individuality. He steeped his body in +indestructibility and wrote his name in adamant. He employed the +manifold means at the command of his era, and whether his monument were +a colossus, a temple or a city, he builded well. + +While Europe was yet a vast tract of gloomy forests, and morasses, and +plains, while the stone that was to rear Troy was yet scattered on the +slopes of Ida, Mena, the first Pharaoh of the first Dynasty, deflected +the Nile against the Arabian hills and built Memphis in its bed. So +say the writings that are graven in stone. If this be true, this story +deals with a quaint but efficient civilization that was already three +thousand years old, fourteen centuries before Christ. + +An effort has been made to conform to the history of the time as it +comes down to us in the form of biblical accounts and the writings of +contemporaneous chroniclers. The author has taken liberty with +accepted history in the age of Meneptah's first-born and in placing +Hebrews in the quarries at Masaarah. The escape of Kenkenes in the +Passover is not intended to contradict the biblical statement that not +one of the eldest born was spared. Rather, it is offered, as an +hypothesis, that the Angel of Death would have passed over any true +believer in Jehovah, regardless of his nationality. Furthermore, the +author has given the Greek spelling to some names, the Egyptic to +others, the purpose being to present those pronunciations most familiar +to readers. + +For all facts herein set forth, the author is indebted to a multitude +of authorities, chiefly to Wilkinson, Birch, Rawlinson, Ebers, and +Erman. + + + + +LIST OF CHARACTERS AND PLACES + +Abydos,--A-by'-dos, city of Upper Egypt and burial-place of Osiris. + +Amenti,--A-men'-tee, the realm of Death. + +Amon-meses,--A'-mon-mee'-seez, half-brother to Meneptah and hostile to +him. + +Anubis,--A-niu'-bis, pet ape named after the jackal-headed god. + +Apepa,--A-pay'-pah, a Hyksos monarch who befriended Joseph. + +Asar-Mut,--A-sar-Moot', half-brother to Meneptah and high priest to +Ptah. + +Athor,--Ah'-thor, the feminine love-deity. + +Atsu,--At'-soo, a noble Egyptian, vice-commander over the works at +Pa-Ramesu, afterwards degraded. + +Baal-Zephon,--Bay'-al-Zee'-phon, a hill at the northern end of the Red +Sea. + +Bast,--Bahst, the cat-headed goddess, patron deity of Bubastis. + +Besa,--Bee'-sah, a dwarf-like deity similar to the Roman Cupid. + +Bettis,--Bet'-tis, older sister to Hotep and Io. + +Bubastis,--Biu-bast'-is, city in lower Egypt near Goshen. + +Deborah,--Deb'-or-ah, an aged woman of Israel, Rachel's attendant. + +Hak-heb,--Hayk'-heb, a village on the Nile, shipping point for +Nehapehu, fifty miles south of Memphis. + +Har-hat,--Hahr'-hat, fan-bearer, or prime minister to the Pharaoh; +father of Masanath. + +Hathors,--Hah'-thorz, seven personifications of Athor, usually seven +cows, similar to the fates of Roman and Greek mythology. + +Hotep,--Hoe'-tep, the royal scribe, friend of Kenkenes, brother of +Bettis and Io. + +Hyksos,--Hick'-soz, the Shepherd Kings. + +Imhotep,--Eem-hoe'-tep, the physician god. + +Ipsambul,--Ip-sahm'-bool, a temple cut from living rock. + +Io,--Eye'-o, younger sister to Hotep and Bettis, in love with Seti. + +Isis,--Eye'-sis, consort to Osiris and goddess of wisdom. + +Jambres,--Jam'-breez, a priest in disgrace, sometime astrologer to +Rameses II and to Meneptah. + +Kenkenes,--Ken-ken'-eez, son of Mentu, the murket. + +Khem,--Kem, the Egyptian Pan. + +Khu-n-Aten,--Khoon-Ah'-ten, Amenhotep IV, a Pharaoh of the eighteenth +dynasty, who attempted to reform the national faith. + +Loi,--Lo'-ee, high-priest to Amen at Karnak. + +Ma,--Mah, the goddess of truth. + +Masaarah,--Mah-saar'-ah, a limestone quarry opposite Memphis. + +Masanath,--Ma-sayn'-ath, second daughter to Har-hat, beloved of Hotep. + +Meneptah,--Me-nep'-tah, successor to Rameses II, and Pharaoh of the +Exodus. + +Menes,--Meen'-eez, captain of the royal guard. + +Mentu,--Men'-too, the murket or royal architect, father of Kenkenes. + +Merenra,--Mer-en'-rah, commander over the works at Pa-Ramesu. + +Mesu,--May'-soo, Moses, the Law-giver. + +Mizraim,--Miz'-ray-im, the Hebrew name for Egypt. + +Mut,--Moot, the mother goddess. + +Nari,--Nahr'-ee, the handmaiden of Masanath. + +Nechutes,--Nee-koo'-teez, the royal cup-bearer. + +Nehapehu,--Nee-hay'-pe-hiu, a fertile pocket in the Libyan desert, +fifty miles south of Memphis. + +Neferari Thermuthis,--Nef-er-ahr'-ee Ther-moo'-this, first consort to +Rameses II and foster mother of Moses. + +Nomarch,--Nome'-ark, governor of a civil division called a nome. + +On, Heliopolis,--near the site of the modern Cairo. + +Osiris,--Oh-sy'-ris, the great god of Egypt, the principle of good, the +creator. + +Pa-Ramesu,--Pay-Ram'-e-soo, a treasure city begun by Rameses II. + +Paraschites,--Par-a-shy'-teez, embalmers, an unclean class. + +Pentaur,--Pen'-tor, an Egyptian priest and poet of the time of Rameses +II. + +Pepi,--Pay'-pee, servant of Masanath. + +Pharaoh,--Fay'-roe, title given to the Egyptian monarchs. + +Pithom,---Py'-thom, a treasure city built by Rameses II. + +Ptah,--P-tah', the patron deity of Memphis. + +Punt,--Poont, Arabia. + +Ra,--Rah, the sun god, patron deity of On. + +Rachel,--daughter of Maai of Israel, beloved of Kenkenes. + +Rameses,--Ram'-e-seez, a popular name for Egyptian kings; the name of +Meneptah's older son and also the name of Meneptah's father, the +Incomparable Pharaoh. + +Ranas,--Rah'-nas, the servant of Snofru. + +Sema,--See'-mah, an aged servant of Mentu. + +Senci,--Sen'-cee, a lady of noble birth, aunt of Hotep and his sisters. + +Set,--the god of war and evil. + +Seti,--Set'-ee, second son to Meneptah, beloved of Io. + +Siptah,--Sip'-tah, son of Amon-meses and claimant to the Egyptian +throne. + +Snofru,--Sno'-froo, priest of Ra at On. + +Tahennu,--Tah-hen'-niu, a fair-haired tribe on the Mediterranean, which +was exterminated by Seti I. + +Ta-meri,--Tam'-e-ree, daughter of the nomarch of Memphis and beloved by +Nechutes. + +Tanis,--Tay'-nis, the Egyptian name for Zoan. + +Tape,--Tay'-pay, Thebes. + +Ta-user,--Tay'-oo'-ser, a princess of the realm and beloved of Siptah. + +Thebaid,--Thee-bay'-id, civil division embracing Thebes and surrounding +towns. + +Thebes,--Theebz, capital of Upper Egypt and largest city in Egypt. + +Toth,--Tote, the male deity of wisdom and law. + +Tuat,--Tiu'-ayt, the Egyptian Hades. + +Unas,--Yu'nas, servant to Har-hat. + +Wady Toomilat,--Wah'-dee Toom'-ee-laht, great Rameside road leading +into the Orient. + +Zoan,--Zoe'-an, the capital of the Delta. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Yoke, by Elizabeth Miller + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOKE *** + +***** This file should be named 16583.txt or 16583.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/5/8/16583/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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