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."