[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of thefile for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making anentire meal of them. D. W. ]

UARDA

Volume 4. 

By Georg Ebers

CHAPTER XV. 

The afternoon shadows were already growing long, when a splendid chariotdrew up to the gates of the terrace-temple. Paaker, the chief pioneer, stood up in it, driving his handsome and fiery Syrian horses. Behind himstood an Ethiopian slave, and his big dog followed the swift team withhis tongue out. 

As he approached the temple he heard himself called, and checked the paceof his horses. A tiny man hurried up to him, and, as soon as he hadrecognized in him the dwarf Nemu, he cried angrily:

"Is it for you, you rascal, that I stop my drive? What do you want?"

"To crave, " said the little man, bowing humbly, "that, when thy businessin the city of the dead is finished, thou wilt carry me back to Thebes. "

"You are Mena's dwarf?" asked the pioneer. 

"By no means, " replied Nemu. "I belong to his neglected wife, the ladyNefert. I can only cover the road very slowly with my little legs, whilethe hoofs of your horses devour the way-as a crocodile does his prey. "

"Get up!" said Paaker. "Did you come here on foot?"

"No, my lord, " replied Nemu, "on an ass; but a demon entered into thebeast, and has struck it with sickness. I had to leave it on the road. The beasts of Anubis will have a better supper than we to-night. "

"Things are not done handsomely then at your mistress's house?" askedPaaker. 

"We still have bread, " replied Nemu, "and the Nile is full of water. Much meat is not necessary for women and dwarfs, but our last cattle takea form which is too hard for human teeth. "

The pioneer did not understand the joke, and looked enquiringly at thedwarf. 

"The form of money, " said the little man, "and that cannot be chewed;soon that will be gone too, and then the point will be to find a recipefor making nutritious cakes out of earth, water, and palm-leaves. Itmakes very little difference to me, a dwarf does not need much--but thepoor tender lady!"

Paaker touched his horses with such a violent stroke of his whip thatthey reared high, and it took all his strength to control their spirit. 

"The horses' jaws will be broken, " muttered the slave behind. "What ashame with such fine beasts!"

"Have you to pay for them?" growled Paaker. Then he turned again to thedwarf, and asked:

"Why does Mena let the ladies want?"

"He no longer cares for his wife, " replied the dwarf, casting his eyesdown sadly. "At the last division of the spoil he passed by the gold andsilver; and took a foreign woman into his tent. Evil demons have blindedhim, for where is there a woman fairer than Nefert?"

"You love your mistress. "

"As my very eyes!"

During this conversation they had arrived at the terrace-temple. Paakerthrew the reins to the slave, ordered him to wait with Nemu, and turnedto the gate-keeper to explain to him, with the help of a handful of gold, his desire of being conducted to Pentaur, the chief of the temple. 

The gate-keeper, swinging a censer before him with a hasty action, admitted him into the sanctuary. You will find him on the thirdterrace, " he said, "but he is no longer our superior. "

"They said so in the temple of Seti, whence I have just come, " repliedPaaker. 

The porter shrugged his shoulders with a sneer, and said: "The palm-treethat is quickly set up falls down more quickly still. " Then he desired aservant to conduct the stranger to Pentaur. 

The poet recognized the Mohar at once, asked his will, and learned thathe was come to have a wonderful vision interpreted by him. 

Paaker explained before relating his dream, that he did not ask thisservice for nothing; and when the priest's countenance darkened he added:

"I will send a fine beast for sacrifice to the Goddess if theinterpretation is favorable. "

"And in the opposite case?" asked Pentaur, who, in the House of Seti, never would have anything whatever to do with the payments of theworshippers or the offerings of the devout. 

"I will offer a sheep, " replied Paaker, who did not perceive the subtleirony that lurked in Pentaur's words, and who was accustomed to pay forthe gifts of the Divinity in proportion to their value to himself. 

Pentaur thought of the verdict which Gagabu, only two evenings since, hadpassed on the Mohar, and it occurred to him that he would test how farthe man's superstition would lead him. So he asked, while he suppresseda smile:

"And if I can foretell nothing bad, but also nothing actually good?"--

"An antelope, and four geese, " answered Paaker promptly. 

"But if I were altogether disinclined to put myself at your service?"asked Pentaur. "If I thought it unworthy of a priest to let the Gods bepaid in proportion to their favors towards a particular person, likecorrupt officials; if I now showed you--you--and I have known you from aschool-boy, that there are things that cannot be bought with inheritedwealth?"

The pioneer drew back astonished and angry, but Pentaur continuedcalmly--

"I stand here as the minister of the Divinity; and nevertheless, I see byyour countenance, that you were on the point of lowering yourself byshowing to me your violent and extortionate spirit. 

"The Immortals send us dreams, not to give us a foretaste of joy orcaution us against danger, but to remind us so to prepare our souls thatwe may submit quietly to suffer evil, and with heartfelt gratitude acceptthe good; and so gain from each profit for the inner life. I will notinterpret your dream! Come without gifts, but with a humble heart, andwith longing for inward purification, and I will pray to the Gods thatthey may enlighten me, and give you such interpretation of even evildreams that they may be fruitful in blessing. 

"Leave me, and quit the temple!"

Paaker ground his teeth with rage; but he controlled himself, and onlysaid as he slowly withdrew:

"If your office had not already been taken from you, the insolence withwhich you have dismissed me might have cost you your place. We shallmeet again, and then you shall learn that inherited wealth in the righthand is worth more than you will like. "

"Another enemy!" thought the poet, when he found himself alone and stooderect in the glad consciousness of having done right. 

During Paaker's interview with the poet, the dwarf Nemu had chatted tothe porter, and had learned from him all that had previously occurred. 

Paaker mounted his chariot pale with rage, and whipped on his horsesbefore the dwarf had clambered up the step; but the slave seized thelittle man, and set him carefully on his feet behind his master. 

"The villian, the scoundrel! he shall repent it--Pentaur is he called!the hound!" muttered the pioneer to himself. 

The dwarf lost none of his words, and when he caught the name of Pentaurhe called to the pioneer, and said--

"They have appointed a scoundrel to be the superior of this temple; hisname is Pentaur. He was expelled from the temple of Seti for hisimmorality, and now he has stirred up the younger scholars to rebellion, and invited unclean women into the temple. My lips hardly dare repeatit, but the gate-keeper swore it was true--that the chief haruspex fromthe House of Seti found him in conference with Bent-Anat, the king'sdaughter, and at once deprived him of his office. "

"With Bent-Anat?" replied the pioneer, and muttered, before the dwarfcould find time to answer, "Indeed, with Bent-Anat!" and he recalled theday before yesterday, when the princess had remained so long with thepriest in the hovel of the paraschites, while he had talked to Nefert andvisited the old witch. 

"I should not care to be in the priest's skin, " observed Nemu, "forthough Rameses is far away, the Regent Ani is near enough. He is agentleman who seldom pounces, but even the dove won't allow itself to beattacked in is own nest. "

Paaker looked enquiringly at Nemu. 

"I know, " said the dwarf "Ani has asked Rameses' consent to marry hisdaughter. "

"He has already asked it, " continued the dwarf as Paaker smiledincredulously, "and the king is not disinclined to give it. He likesmaking marriages--as thou must know pretty well. "

"I?" said Paaker, surprised. 

"He forced Katuti to give her daughter as wife to the charioteer. That I know from herself. She can prove it to thee. "

Paaker shook his head in denial, but the dwarf continued eagerly, "Yes, yes! Katuti would have had thee for her son-in-law, and it was the king, not she, who broke off the betrothal. Thou must at the same time havebeen inscribed in the black books of the high gate, for Rameses usedmany hard names for thee. One of us is like a mouse behind the curtain, which knows a good deal. "

Paaker suddenly brought his horses to a stand-still, threw the reins tothe slave, sprang from the chariot, called the dwarf to his side, andsaid:

"We will walk from here to the river, and you shall tell me all you know;but if an untrue word passes your lips I will have you eaten by my dogs. "

"I know thou canst keep thy word, " gasped the little man. "But go alittle slower if thou wilt, for I am quite out of breath. Let Katutiherself tell thee how it all came about. Rameses compelled her to giveher daughter to the charioteer. I do not know what he said of thee, butit was not complimentary. My poor mistress! she let herself be caughtby the dandy, the ladies' man-and now she may weep and wail. When I passthe great gates of thy house with Katuti, she often sighs and complainsbitterly. And with good reason, for it soon will be all over with ournoble estate, and we must seek an asylum far away among the Amu in thelow lands; for the nobles will soon avoid us as outcasts. Thou mayst beglad that thou hast not linked thy fate to ours; but I have a faithfulheart, and will share my mistress's trouble. "

"You speak riddles, " said Paaker, "what have they to fear?"

The dwarf now related how Nefert's brother had gambled away the mummy ofhis father, how enormous was the sum he had lost, and that degradationmust overtake Katuti, and her daughter with her. 

"Who can save them, " he whimpered. "Her shameless husband squanders hisinheritance and his prize-money. Katuti is poor, and the little words"Give me! scare away friends as the cry of a hawk scares the chickens. My poor mistress!"

"It is a large sum, " muttered Paaker to himself. "It is enormous!"sighed the dwarf, "and where is it to be found in these hard times? Itwould have been different with us, if--ah if--. And it would be a formof madness which I do not believe in, that Nefert should still care forher braggart husband. She thinks as much of thee as of him. "

Paaker looked at the dwarf half incredulous and half threatening. 

"Ay--of thee, " repeated Nemu. "Since our excursion to the Necropolisthe day before yesterday it was--she speaks only of thee, praising thyability, and thy strong manly spirit. It is as if some charm obliged herto think of thee. "

The pioneer began to walk so fast that his small companion once more hadto ask him to moderate his steps. 

They gained the shore in silence, where Paaker's boat was waiting, whichalso conveyed his chariot. He lay down in the little cabin, called thedwarf to him, and said:

"I am Katuti's nearest relative; we are now reconciled; why does she notturn to me in her difficulty?"

"Because she is proud, and thy blood flows in her veins. Sooner wouldshe die with her child--she said so--than ask thee, against whom shesinned, for an "alms. "

"She did think of me then?"

"At once; nor did she doubt thy generosity. She esteems thee highly--Irepeat it; and if an arrow from a Cheta's bow or a visitation of the Godsattained Mena, she would joyfully place her child in thine arms, andNefert believe me has not forgotten her playfellow. The day beforeyesterday, when she came home from the Necropolis, and before the letterhad come from the camp, she was full of thee--

 ["To be full (meh) of any one" is used in the Egyptian language for "to be in love with any one. "]

nay called to thee in her dreams; I know it from Kandake, her blackmaid. " The pioneer looked down and said:

"How extraordinary! and the same night I had a vision in which yourmistress appeared to me; the insolent priest in the temple of Hathorshould have interpreted it to me. "

"And he refused? the fool! but other folks understand dreams, and I amnot the worst of them--Ask thy servant. Ninety-nine times out of ahundred my interpretations come true. How was the vision?"

"I stood by the Nile, " said Paaker, casting down his eyes and drawinglines with his whip through the wool of the cabin rug. "The water wasstill, and I saw Nefert standing on the farther bank, and beckoning tome. I called to her, and she stepped on the water, which bore her up asif it were this carpet. She went over the water dry-foot as if it werethe stony wilderness. A wonderful sight! She came nearer to me, andnearer, and already I had tried to take her hand, when she ducked underlike a swan. I went into the water to seize her, and when she came upagain I clasped her in my arms; but then the strangest thing happened--she flowed away, she dissolved like the snow on the Syrian hills, whenyou take it in your hand, and yet it was not the same, for her hairturned to water-lilies, and her eyes to blue fishes that swam awaymerrily, and her lips to twigs of coral that sank at once, and from herbody grew a crocodile, with a head like Mena, that laughed and gnashedits teeth at me. Then I was seized with blind fury; I threw myself uponhim with a drawn sword, he fastened his teeth in my flesh, I pierced histhroat with my weapon; the Nile was dark with our streaming blood, and sowe fought and fought--it lasted an eternity--till I awoke. "

Paaker drew a deep breath as he ceased speaking; as if his wild dreamtormented him again. 

The dwarf had listened with eager attention, but several minutes passedbefore he spoke. 

"A strange dream, " he said, "but the interpretation as to the future isnot hard to find. Nefert is striving to reach thee, she longs to bethine, but if thou dost fancy that she is already in thy grasp she willelude thee; thy hopes will melt like ice, slip away like sand, if thoudost not know how to put the crocodile out of the way. "

At this moment the boat struck the landing-place. The pioneer startedup, and cried, "We have reached the end!"

"We have reached the end, " echoed the little man with meaning. "There isonly a narrow bridge to step over. "

When they both stood on the shore, the dwarf said, "I have to thank thee for thy hospitality, and when I can servethee command me. "

"Come here, " cried the pioneer, and drew Nemu away with him under theshade of a sycamore veiled in the half light of the departing sun. 

"What do you mean by a bridge which we must step over? I do notunderstand the flowers of speech, and desire plain language. "

The dwarf reflected for a moment; and then asked, "Shall I say nakedlyand openly what I mean, and will you not be angry?"

"Speak!"

"Mena is the crocodile. Put him out of the world, and you will havepassed the bridge; then Nefert will be thine--if thou wilt listen to me. "

"What shall I do?"

"Put the charioteer out of the world. "

Paaker's gesture seemed to convey that that was a thing that had longbeen decided on, and he turned his face, for a good omen, so that therising moon should be on his right hand. 

The dwarf went on. 

"Secure Nefert, so that she may not vanish like her image in the dream, before you reach the goal; that is to say, ransom the honor of yourfuture mother and wife, for how could you take an outcast into yourhouse?"

Paaker looked thoughtfully at the ground. 

"May I inform my mistress that thou wilt save her?" asked Nemu. "I may?--Then all will be well, for he who will devote a fortune to lovewill not hesitate to devote a reed lance with a brass point to it to hislove and his hatred together. "

CHAPTER XVI. 

The sun had set, and darkness covered the City of the Dead, but the moonshone above the valley of the kings' tombs, and the projecting masses ofthe rocky walls of the chasm threw sharply-defined shadows. A weirdsilence lay upon the desert, where yet far more life was stirring than inthe noonday hour, for now bats darted like black silken threads throughthe night air, owls hovered aloft on wide-spread wings, small troops ofjackals slipped by, one following the other up the mountain slopes. Fromtime to time their hideous yell, or the whining laugh of the hyena, brokethe stillness of the night. 

Nor was human life yet at rest in the valley of tombs. A faint lightglimmered in the cave of the sorceress Hekt, and in front of theparaschites' but a fire was burning, which the grandmother of the sickUarda now and then fed with pieces of dry manure. Two men were seated infront of the hut, and gazed in silence on the thin flame, whose impurelight was almost quenched by the clearer glow of the moon; whilst thethird, Uarda's father, disembowelled a large ram, whose head he hadalready cut off. 

"How the jackals howl!" said the old paraschites, drawing as he spokethe torn brown cotton cloth, which he had put on as a protection againstthe night air and the dew, closer round his bare shoulders. 

"They scent the fresh meat, " answered the physician, Nebsecht. "Throwthem the entrails, when you have done; the legs and back you can roast. Be careful how you cut out the heart--the heart, soldier. There it is!What a great beast. "

Nebsecht took the ram's heart in his hand, and gazed at it with thedeepest attention, whilst the old paraschites watched him anxiously. Atlength:

"I promised, " he said, "to do for you what you wish, if you restore thelittle one to health; but you ask for what is impossible. "

"Impossible?" said the physician, "why, impossible? You open thecorpses, you go in and out of the house of the embalmer. Get possessionof one of the canopi, [Vases of clay, limestone, or alabaster, which were used for the preservation of the intestines of the embalmed Egyptians, and represented the four genii of death, Amset, Hapi, Tuamutef, and Khebsennuf. Instead of the cover, the head of the genius to which it was dedicated, was placed on each kanopus. Amset (tinder the protection of Isis) has a human head, Hapi (protected by Nephthys) an ape's head, Tuamutef (protected by Neith) a jackal's head, and Khebsennuf (protected by Selk) a sparrow-hawk's head. In one of the Christian Coptic Manuscripts, the four archangels are invoked in the place of these genii. ]

lay this heart in it, and take out in its stead the heart of a humanbeing. No one--no one will notice it. Nor need you do it to-morrow, orthe day after tomorrow even. Your son can buy a ram to kill every daywith my money till the right moment comes. Your granddaughter will soongrow strong on a good meat-diet. Take courage!"

"I am not afraid of the danger, " said the old man, "but how can I ventureto steal from a dead man his life in the other world? And then--in shameand misery have I lived, and for many a year--no man has numbered themfor me--have I obeyed the commandments, that I may be found righteous inthat world to come, and in the fields of Aalu, and in the Sun-bark findcompensation for all that I have suffered here. You are good andfriendly. Why, for the sake of a whim, should you sacrifice the futurebliss of a man, who in all his long life has never known happiness, andwho has never done you any harm?"

"What I want with the heart, " replied the physician, "you cannotunderstand, but in procuring it for me, you will be furthering a greatand useful purpose. I have no whims, for I am no idler. And as to whatconcerns your salvation, have no anxiety. I am a priest, and take yourdeed and its consequences upon myself; upon myself, do you understand?I tell you, as a priest, that what I demand of you is right, and if thejudge of the dead shall enquire, 'Why didst thou take the heart of ahuman being out of the Kanopus?' then reply--reply to him thus, 'BecauseNebsecht, the priest, commanded me, and promised himself to answer forthe deed. '"

The old man gazed thoughtfully on the ground, and the physician continuedstill more urgently:

"If you fulfil my wish, then--then I swear to you that, when you die, Iwill take care that your mummy is provided with all the amulets, and Imyself will write you a book of the Entrance into Day, and have it woundwithin your mummy-cloth, as is done with the great. 

 [The Books of the Dead are often found amongst the cloths, (by the leg or under the arm), or else in the coffin trader, or near, the mummy. ]

That will give you power over all demons, and you will be admitted to thehall of the twofold justice, which punishes and rewards, and your awardwill be bliss. "

"But the theft of a heart will make the weight of my sins heavy, when myown heart is weighed, " sighed the old man. 

Nebsecht considered for a moment, and then said: "I will give you awritten paper, in which I will certify that it was I who commanded thetheft. You will sew it up in a little bag, carry it on your breast, andhave it laid with you in the grave. Then when Techuti, the agent of thesoul, receives your justification before Osiris and the judges of thedead, give him the writing. He will read it aloud, and you will beaccounted just. "

 [The vignettes of Chapter 125 of the Book of the Dead represent the Last Judgment of the Egyptians. Under a canopy Osiris sits enthroned as Chief Judge, 42 assessors assist him. In the hall stand the scales; the dog headed ape, the animal sacred to Toth, guides the balance. In one scale lies the heart of the dead man, in the other the image of the goddess of Truth, who introduces the soul into the hall of justice Toth writs the record. The soul affirms that it has not committed 42 deadly sins, and if it obtains credit, it is named "maa cheru, " i. E. "the truth-speaker, " and is therewith declared blessed. It now receives its heart back, and grows into a new and divine life. ]

"I am not learned in writing, " muttered the paraschites with a slightmistrust that made itself felt in his voice. 

"But I swear to you by the nine great Gods, that I will write nothing onthe paper but what I have promised you. I will confess that I, thepriest Nebsecht, commanded you to take the heart, and that your guilt ismine. "

"Let me have the writing then, " murmured the old man. 

The physician wiped the perspiration from his forehead, and gave theparaschites his hand. "To-morrow you shall have it, " he said, "and Iwill not leave your granddaughter till she is well again. "

The soldier engaged in cutting up the ram, had heard nothing of thisconversation. Now he ran a wooden spit through the legs, and held themover the fire to roast them. The jackals howled louder as the smell ofthe melting fat filled the air, and the old man, as he looked on, forgotthe terrible task he had undertaken. For a year past, no meat had beentasted in his house. 

The physician Nebsecht, himself eating nothing but a piece of bread, looked on at the feasters. They tore the meat from the bones, and thesoldier, especially, devoured the costly and unwonted meal like someravenous animal. He could be heard chewing like a horse in the manger, and a feeling of disgust filled the physician's soul. 

"Sensual beings, " he murmured to himself, "animals with consciousness!And yet human beings. Strange! They languish bound in the fetters ofthe world of sense, and yet how much more ardently they desire that whichtranscends sense than we--how much more real it is to them than to us!"

"Will you have some meat?" cried the soldier, who had remarked thatNebsecht's lips moved, and tearing a piece of meat from the bone of thejoint he was devouring, he held it out to the physician. Nebsecht shrankback; the greedy look, the glistening teeth, the dark, rough features ofthe man terrified him. And he thought of the white and fragile form ofthe sick girl lying within on the mat, and a question escaped his lips. 

"Is the maiden, is Uarda, your own child?" he said. 

The soldier struck himself on the breast. "So sure as the king Ramesesis the son of Seti, " he answered. The men had finished their meal, andthe flat cakes of bread which the wife of the paraschites gave them, andon which they had wiped their hands from the fat, were consumed, when thesoldier, in whose slow brain the physician's question still lingered, said, sighing deeply:

"Her mother was a stranger; she laid the white dove in the raven's nest. "

"Of what country was your wife a native?" asked the physician. 

"That I do not know, " replied the soldier. 

"Did you never enquire about the family of your own wife?"

"Certainly I did: but how could she have answered me? But it is a longand strange story. "

"Relate it to me, " said Nebsecht, "the night is long, and I likelistening better than talking. But first I will see after our patient. "

When the physician had satisfied himself that Uarda was sleeping quietlyand breathing regularly, he seated himself again by the paraschites andhis son, and the soldier began:

"It all happened long ago. King Seti still lived, but Rameses alreadyreigned in his stead, when I came home from the north. They had sent meto the workmen, who were building the fortifications in Zoan, the town ofRameses. --[The Rameses of the Bible. Exodus i. Ii. ]--I was set over sixmen, Amus, --[Semites]--of the Hebrew race, over whom Rameses kept such atight hand. 

 [For an account of the traces of the Jews in Egypt, see Chabas, Melanges, and Ebers, AEgypten und die Bucher Moses]

Amongst the workmen there were sons of rich cattle-holders, for inlevying the people it was never: 'What have you?' but 'Of what race areyou?' The fortifications and the canal which was to join the Nile andthe Red Sea had to be completed, and the king, to whom be long life, health, and prosperity, took the youth of Egypt with him to the wars, andleft the work to the Amus, who are connected by race with his enemies inthe east. One lives well in Goshen, for it is a fine country, with morethan enough of corn and grass and vegetables and fish and fowls, and Ialways had of the best, for amongst my six people were two mother'sdarlings, whose parents sent me many a piece of silver. Every one loveshis children, but the Hebrews love them more tenderly than other people. We had daily our appointed tale of bricks to deliver, and when the sunburnt hot, I used to help the lads, and I did more in an hour than theydid in three, for I am strong and was still stronger then than I am now. 

"Then came the time when I was relieved. I was ordered to return toThebes, to the prisoners of war who were building the great temple ofAmon over yonder, and as I had brought home some money, and it would takea good while to finish the great dwelling of the king of the Gods, Ithought of taking a wife; but no Egyptian. Of daughters of paraschitesthere were plenty; but I wanted to get away out of my father's accursedcaste, and the other girls here, as I knew, were afraid of ouruncleanness. In the low country I had done better, and many an Amu andSchasu woman had gladly come to my tent. From the beginning I had set mymind on an Asiatic. 

"Many a time maidens taken prisoners in war were brought to be sold, buteither they did not please me, or they were too dear. Meantime my moneymelted away, for we enjoyed life in the time of rest which followed theworking hours. There were dancers too in plenty, in the foreign quarter. 

"Well, it was just at the time of the holy feast of Amon-Chem, that a newtransport of prisoners of war arrived, and amongst them many women, whowere sold publicly to the highest bidder. The young and beautiful oneswere paid for high, but even the older ones were too dear for me. 

"Quite at the last a blind woman was led forward, and a withered-lookingwoman who was dumb, as the auctioneer, who generally praised up themerits of the prisoners, informed the buyers. The blind woman had stronghands, and was bought by a tavern-keeper, for whom she turns the handmillto this day; the dumb woman held a child in her arms, and no one couldtell whether she was young or old. She looked as though she already layin her coffin, and the little one as though he would go under the grassbefore her. And her hair was red, burning red, the very color of Typhon. Her white pale face looked neither bad nor good, only weary, weary todeath. On her withered white arms blue veins ran like dark cords, herhands hung feebly down, and in them hung the child. If a wind were torise, I thought to myself, it would blow her away, and the little onewith her. 

"The auctioneer asked for a bid. All were silent, for the dumb shadowwas of no use for work; she was half-dead, and a burial costs money. 

"So passed several minutes. Then the auctioneer stepped up to her, andgave her a blow with his whip, that she might rouse herself up, andappear less miserable to the buyers. She shivered like a person in afever, pressed the child closer to her, and looked round at every one asthough seeking for help--and me full in the face. What happened now wasa real wonder, for her eyes were bigger than any that I ever saw, and ademon dwelt in them that had power over me and ruled me to the end, andthat day it bewitched me for the first time. 

"It was not hot and I had drunk nothing, and yet I acted against my ownwill and better judgment when, as her eyes fell upon me, I bid all that Ipossessed in order to buy her. I might have had her cheaper! Mycompanions laughed at me, the auctioneer shrugged his shoulders as hetook my money, but I took the child on my arm, helped the woman up, carried her in a boat over the Nile, loaded a stone-cart with mymiserable property, and drove her like a block of lime home to the oldpeople. 

"My mother shook her head, and my father looked as if he thought me mad;but neither of them said a word. They made up a bed for her, and on myspare nights I built that ruined thing hard by--it was a tidy hut once. Soon my mother grew fond of the child. It was quite small, and we calledit Pennu--[Pennu is the name for the mouse in old Egyptian]--because itwas so pretty, like a little mouse. I kept away from the foreignquarter, and saved my wages, and bought a goat, which lived in front ofour door when I took the woman to her own hut. 

"She was dumb, but not deaf, only she did not understand our language;but the demon in her eyes spoke for her and understood what I said. Shecomprehended everything, and could say everything with her eyes; but bestof all she knew how to thank one. No high-priest who at the great hillfestival praises the Gods in long hymns for their gifts can return thanksso earnestly with his lips as she with her dumb eyes. And when shewished to pray, then it seemed as though the demon in her look wasmightier than ever. 

"At first I used to be impatient enough when she leaned so feebly againstthe wall, or when the child cried and disturbed my sleep; but she hadonly to look up, and the demon pressed my heart together and persuaded methat the crying was really a song. Pennu cried more sweetly too thanother children, and he had such soft, white, pretty little fingers. 

"One day he had been crying for a long time, At last I bent down overhim, and was going to scold him, but he seized me by the beard. It waspretty to see! Afterwards he was for ever wanting to pull me about, andhis mother noticed that that pleased me, for when I brought home anythinggood, an egg or a flower or a cake, she used to hold him up and place hislittle hands on my beard. 

"Yes, in a few months the woman had learnt to hold him up high in herarms, for with care and quiet she had grown stronger. White she alwaysremained and delicate, but she grew younger and more beautiful from dayto day; she can hardly have numbered twenty years when I bought her. What she was called I never heard; nor did we give her any name. She was'the woman, ' and so we called her. 

"Eight moons passed by, and then the little Mouse died. I wept as shedid, and as I bent over the little corpse and let my tears have freecourse, and thought--now he can never lift up his pretty little finger toyou again; then I felt for the first time the woman's soft hand on mycheek. She stroked my rough beard as a child might, and with that lookedat me so gratefully that I felt as though king Pharaoh had all at oncemade me a present of both Upper and Lower Egypt. 

"When the Mouse was buried she got weaker again, but my mother took goodcare of her. I lived with her, like a father with his child. She wasalways friendly, but if I approached her, and tried to show her anyfondness, she would look at me, and the demon in her eyes drove me back, and I let her alone. 

"She grew healthier and stronger and more and more beautiful, sobeautiful that I kept her hidden, and was consumed by the longing to makeher my wife. A good housewife she never became, to be sure; her handswere so tender, and she did not even know how to milk the goat. Mymother did that and everything else for her. 

"In the daytime she stayed in her hut and worked, for she was veryskillful at woman's work, and wove lace as fine as cobwebs, which mymother sold that she might bring home perfumes with the proceeds. Shewas very fond of them, and of flowers too; and Uarda in there takes afterher. 

"In the evening, when the folk from the other side had left the City ofthe Dead, she would often walk down the valley here, thoughtful and oftenlooking up at the moon, which she was especially fond of. 

"One evening in the winter-time I came home. It was already dark, and Iexpected to find her in front of the door. All at once, about a hundredsteps behind old Hekt's cave, I heard a troop of jackals barking sofuriously that I said to myself directly they had attacked a human being, and I knew too who it was, though no one had told me, and the woman couldnot call or cry out. Frantic with terror, I tore a firebrand from thehearth and the stake to which the goat was fastened out of the ground, rushed to her help, drove away the beasts, and carried her back senselessto the hut. My mother helped me, and we called her back to life. Whenwe were alone, I wept like a child for joy at her escape, and she let mekiss her, and then she became my wife, three years after I had boughther. 

"She bore me a little maid, that she herself named Uarda; for she showedus a rose, and then pointed to the child, and we understood her withoutwords. 

"Soon afterwards she died. 

"You are a priest, but I tell you that when I am summoned before Osiris, if I am admitted amongst the blessed, I will ask whether I shall meet mywife, and if the doorkeeper says no, he may thrust me back, and I will godown cheerfully to the damned, if I find her again there. "

"And did no sign ever betray her origin?" asked the physician. 

The soldier had hidden his face in his hand; he was weeping aloud, anddid not hear the question. But, the paraschites answered:

"She was the child of some great personage, for in her clothes we found agolden jewel with a precious stone inscribed with strange characters. Itis very costly, and my wife is keeping it for the little one. "

CHAPTER XVII. 

In the earliest glimmer of dawn the following clay, the physicianNebsecht having satisfied himself as to the state of the sick girl, leftthe paraschites' hut and made his way in deepest thought to the 'TerraceTemple of Hatasu, to find his friend Pentaur and compose the writingwhich he had promised to the old man. 

As the sun arose in radiance he reached the sanctuary. He expected tohear the morning song of the priests, but all was silent. He knocked andthe porter, still half-asleep, opened the door. 

Nebsecht enquired for the chief of the Temple. "He died in the night, "said the man yawning. 

"What do you say?" cried the physician in sudden terror, "who is dead?"

"Our good old chief, Rui. "

Nebsecht breathed again, and asked for Pentaur. 

"You belong to the House of Seti, " said the doorkeeper, "and you do notknow that he is deposed from his office? The holy fathers have refusedto celebrate the birth of Ra with him. He sings for himself now, aloneup on the watch-tower. There you will find him. "

Nebsecht strode quickly up the stairs. Several of the priests placedthemselves together in groups as soon as they saw him, and began singing. He paid no heed to them, however, but hastened on to the uppermostterrace, where he found his friend occupied in writing. 

Soon he learnt all that had happened, and wrathfully he cried: "You aretoo honest for those wise gentlemen in the House of Seti, and too pureand zealous for the rabble here. I knew it, I knew what would come of itif they introduced you to the mysteries. For us initiated there remainsonly the choice between lying and silence. "

"The old error!" said Pentaur, "we know that the Godhead is One, we nameit, 'The All, ' 'The Veil of the All, ' or simply 'Ra. ' But under the nameRa we understand something different than is known to the common herd;for to us, the Universe is God, and in each of its parts we recognize amanifestation of that highest being without whom nothing is, in theheights above or in the depths below. "

"To me you can say everything, for I also am initiated, " interruptedNebsecht. 

"But neither from the laity do I withhold it, " cried Pentaur, "only tothose who are incapable of understanding the whole, do I show thedifferent parts. Am I a liar if I do not say, 'I speak, ' but 'my mouthspeaks, ' if I affirm, 'Your eye sees, ' when it is you yourself who arethe seer. When the light of the only One manifests itself, then Ifervently render thanks to him in hymns, and the most luminous of hisforms I name Ra. When I look upon yonder green fields, I call upon thefaithful to give thanks to Rennut, that is, that active manifestation ofthe One, through which the corn attains to its ripe maturity. Am Ifilled with wonder at the bounteous gifts with which that divine streamwhose origin is hidden, blesses our land, then I adore the One as the GodHapi, the secret one. Whether we view the sun, the harvest, or the Nile, whether we contemplate with admiration the unity and harmony of thevisible or invisible world, still it is always with the Only, the All-embracing One we have to do, to whom we also ourselves belong as those ofhis manifestations in which lie places his self-consciousness. Theimagination of the multitude is limited . . . . . "

"And so we lions, ["The priests, " says Clement of Alexandria, "allow none to be participators in their mysteries, except kings or such amongst themselves as are distinguished for virtue or wisdom. " The same thing is shown by the monuments in many places]

give them the morsel that we can devour at one gulp, finely chopped up, and diluted with broth as if for the weak stomach of a sick man. "

"Not so; we only feel it our duty to temper and sweeten the sharp potion, which for men even is almost too strong, before we offer it to thechildren, the babes in spirit. The sages of old veiled indeed thehighest truths in allegorical forms, in symbols, and finally in abeautiful and richly-colored mythos, but they brought them near to themultitude shrouded it is true but still discernible. "

"Discernible?" said the physician, "discernible? Why then the veil?"

"And do you imagine that the multitude could look the naked truth in theface, [In Sais the statue of Athene (Neith) has the following, inscription: "I am the All, the Past, the Present, and the Future, my veil has no mortal yet lifted. " Plutarch, Isis and Osiris 9, a similar quotation by Proclus, in Plato's Timaeus. ]

and not despair?"

"Can I, can any one who looks straight forward, and strives to see thetruth and nothing but the truth?" cried the physician. "We both of usknow that things only are, to us, such as they picture themselves in theprepared mirror of our souls. I see grey, grey, and white, white, andhave accustomed myself in my yearning after knowledge, not to attributethe smallest part to my own idiosyncrasy, if such indeed there beexisting in my empty breast. You look straight onwards as I do, but inyou each idea is transfigured, for in your soul invisible shaping powersare at work, which set the crooked straight, clothe the commonplace withcharm, the repulsive with beauty. You are a poet, an artist; I only seekfor truth. "

"Only?" said Pentaur, "it is just on account of that effort that Iesteem you so highly, and, as you already know, I also desire nothing butthe truth. "

"I know, I know, " said the physician nodding, "but our ways run side byside without ever touching, and our final goal is the reading of ariddle, of which there are many solutions. You believe yourself to havefound the right one, and perhaps none exists. "

"Then let us content ourselves with the nearest and the most beautiful, "said Pentaur. 

"The most beautiful?" cried Nebsecht indignantly. "Is that monster, whom you call God, beautiful--the giant who for ever regenerates himselfthat he may devour himself again? God is the All, you say, who sufficesto himself. Eternal he is and shall be, because all that goes forth fromhim is absorbed by him again, and the great niggard bestows no grain ofsand, no ray of light, no breath of wind, without reclaiming it for hishousehold, which is ruled by no design, no reason, no goodness, but by atyrannical necessity, whose slave he himself is. The coward hides behindthe cloud of incomprehensibility, and can be revealed only by himself--Iwould I could strip him of the veil! Thus I see the thing that you callGod!"

"A ghastly picture, " said Pentaur, "because you forget that we recognizereason to be the essence of the All, the penetrating and moving power ofthe universe which is manifested in the harmonious working together ofits parts, and in ourselves also, since we are formed out of itssubstance, and inspired with its soul. "

"Is the warfare of life in any way reasonable?" asked Nebsecht. "Isthis eternal destruction in order to build up again especially well-designed and wise? And with this introduction of reason into the All, you provide yourself with a self-devised ruler, who terribly resemblesthe gracious masters and mistresses that you exhibit to the people. "

"Only apparently, " answered Pentaur, "only because that which transcendssense is communicable through the medium of the senses alone. When Godmanifests himself as the wisdom of the world, we call him 'the Word, ''He, who covers his limbs with names, ' as the sacred Text expressesitself, is the power which gives to things their distinctive forms; thescarabaeus, 'which enters life as its own son' reminds us of the everself-renewing creative power which causes you to call our merciful andbenevolent God a monster, but which you can deny as little as you can thehappy choice of the type; for, as you know, there are only male scarabei, and this animal reproduces itself. "

Nebsecht smiled. "If all the doctrines of the mysteries, " he said, "have no more truth than this happily chosen image, they are in a badway. These beetles have for years been my friends and companions. I know their family life, and I can assure you that there are males andfemales amongst them as amongst cats, apes, and human beings. Your 'goodGod' I do not know, and what I least comprehend in thinking it overquietly is the circumstance that you distinguish a good and evilprinciple in the world. If the All is indeed God, if God as thescriptures teach, is goodness, and if besides him is nothing at all, where is a place to be found for evil?"

"You talk like a school-boy, " said Pentaur indignantly. "All that is, is good and reasonable in itself, but the infinite One, who prescribeshis own laws and his own paths, grants to the finite its continuancethrough continual renewal, and in the changing forms of the finiteprogresses for evermore. What we call evil, darkness, wickedness, is initself divine, good, reasonable, and clear; but it appears in anotherlight to our clouded minds, because we perceive the way only and not thegoal, the details only, and not the whole. Even so, superficiallisteners blame the music, in which a discord is heard, which the harperhas only evoked from the strings that his hearers may more deeply feelthe purity of the succeeding harmony; even so, a fool blames the painterwho has colored his board with black, and does not wait for thecompletion of the picture which shall be thrown into clearer relief bythe dark background; even so, a child chides the noble tree, whose fruitrots, that a new life may spring up from its kernel. Apparent evil isbut an antechamber to higher bliss, as every sunset is but veiled bynight, and will soon show itself again as the red dawn of a new day. "

"How convincing all that sounds!" answered the physician, "all, even theterrible, wins charm from your lips; but I could invert your proposition, and declare that it is evil that rules the world, and sometimes gives usone drop of sweet content, in order that we may more keenly feel thebitterness of life. You see harmony and goodness in everything. I haveobserved that passion awakens life, that all existence is a conflict, that one being devours another. "

"And do you not feel the beauty of visible creation, and does not theimmutable law in everything fill you with admiration and humility?"

"For beauty, " replied Nebsecht, "I have never sought; the organ issomehow wanting in me to understand it of myself, though I willinglyallow you to mediate between us. But of law in nature I fully appreciatethe worth, for that is the veritable soul of the universe. You call theOne 'Temt, ' that is to say the total--the unity which is reached by theaddition of many units; and that pleases me, for the elements of theuniverse and the powers which prescribe the paths of life are strictlydefined by measure and number--but irrespective of beauty orbenevolence. "

"Such views, " cried Pentaur troubled, "are the result of your strangestudies. You kill and destroy, in order, as you yourself say, to comeupon the track of the secrets of life. Look out upon nature, develop thefaculty which you declare to be wanting, in you, and the beauty ofcreation will teach you without my assistance that you are praying to afalse god. "

"I do not pray, " said Nebsecht, "for the law which moves the world is aslittle affected by prayers as the current of the sands in your hour-glass. Who tells you that I do not seek to come upon the track of thefirst beginning of things? I proved to you just now that I know moreabout the origin of Scarabei than you do. I have killed many an animal, not only to study its organism, but also to investigate how it has builtup its form. But precisely in this work my organ for beauty has becomeblunt rather than keen. I tell you that the beginning of things is notmore attractive to contemplate than their death and decomposition. "

Pentaur looked at the physician enquiringly. 

"I also for once, " continued Nebsecht, "will speak in figures. Look atthis wine, how pure it is, how fragrant; and yet it was trodden from thegrape by the brawny feet of the vintagers. And those full ears of corn!They gleam golden yellow, and will yield us snow-white meal when they areground, and yet they grew from a rotting seed. Lately you were praisingto me the beauty of the great Hall of Columns nearly completed in theTemple of Amon over yonder in Thebes. 

 [Begun by Rameses I. Continued by Seti I. , completed by Rameses II. The remains of this immense hall, with its 134 columns, have not their equal in the world. ]

How posterity will admire it! I saw that Hall arise. There lay massesof freestone in wild confusion, dust in heaps that took away my breath, and three months since I was sent over there, because above a hundredworkmen engaged in stone-polishing under the burning sun had been beatento death. Were I a poet like you, I would show you a hundred similarpictures, in which you would not find much beauty. In the meantime, wehave enough to do in observing the existing order of things, andinvestigating the laws by which it is governed. "

"I have never clearly understood your efforts, and have difficulty incomprehending why you did not turn to the science of the haruspices, "said Pentaur. "Do you then believe that the changing, and--owing to theconditions by which they are surrounded--the dependent life of plants andanimals is governed by law, rule, and numbers like the movement of thestars?"

"What a question! Is the strong and mighty hand, which compels yonderheavenly bodies to roll onward in their carefully-appointed orbits, notdelicate enough to prescribe the conditions of the flight of the bird, and the beating of the human heart?"

"There we are again with the heart, " said the poet smiling, "are you anynearer your aim?"

The physician became very grave. "Perhaps tomorrow even, " he said, "I may have what I need. You have your palette there with red and blackcolor, and a writing reed. May I use this sheet of papyrus?"

"Of course; but first tell me . . . . "

"Do not ask; you would not approve of my scheme, and there would only bea fresh dispute. "

"I think, " said the poet, laying his hand on his friend's shoulder, "thatwe have no reason to fear disputes. So far they have been the cement, the refreshing dew of our friendship. "

"So long as they treated of ideas only, and not of deeds. "

"You intend to get possession of a human heart!" cried the poet. "Thinkof what you are doing! The heart is the vessel of that effluence of theuniversal soul, which lives in us. "

"Are you so sure of that?" cried the physician with some irritation, "then give me the proof. Have you ever examined a heart, has any onemember of my profession done so? The hearts of criminals and prisonersof war even are declared sacred from touch, and when we stand helpless bya patient, and see our medicines work harm as often as good, why is it?Only because we physicians are expected to work as blindly as anastronomer, if he were required to look at the stars through a board. At Heliopolis I entreated the great Urma Rahotep, the truly learned chiefof our craft, and who held me in esteem, to allow me to examine the heartof a dead Amu; but he refused me, because the great Sechet leads virtuousSemites also into the fields of the blessed. 

 [According to the inscription accompanying the famous representations of the four nations (Egyptians, Semites, Libyans, and Ethiopians) in the tomb of Seti I. ]

And then followed all the old scruples: that to cut up the heart of abeast even is sinful, because it also is the vehicle of a soul, perhaps acondemned and miserable human soul, which before it can return to theOne, must undergo purification by passing through the bodies of animals. I was not satisfied, and declared to him that my great-grandfatherNebsecht, before he wrote his treatise on the heart, must certainly haveexamined such an organ. Then he answered me that the divinity hadrevealed to him what he had written, and therefore his work had beenaccepted amongst the sacred writings of Toth, [Called by the Greeks "Hermetic Books. " The Papyrus Ebers is the work called by Clemens of Alexandria "the Book of Remedies. "]

which stood fast and unassailable as the laws of the world; he wished togive me peace for quiet work, and I also, he said, might be a chosenspirit, the divinity might perhaps vouchsafe revelations to me too. Iwas young at that time, and spent my nights in prayer, but I only wastedaway, and my spirit grew darker instead of clearer. Then I killed insecret--first a fowl, then rats, then a rabbit, and cut up their hearts, and followed the vessels that lead out of them, and know little more nowthan I did at first; but I must get to the bottom of the truth, and Imust have a human heart. "

"What will that do for you?" asked Pentaur; "you cannot hope to perceivethe invisible and the infinite with your human eyes?"

"Do you know my great-grandfather's treatise?"

"A little, " answered the poet; "he said that wherever he laid hisfinger, whether on the head, the hands, or the stomach, he everywhere metwith the heart, because its vessels go into all the members, and theheart is the meeting point of all these vessels. Then Nebsecht proceedsto state how these are distributed in the different members, and shows--is it not so?--that the various mental states, such as anger, grief, aversion, and also the ordinary use of the word heart, declare entirelyfor his view. "

"That is it. We have already discussed it, and I believe that he isright, so far as the blood is concerned, and the animal sensations. Butthe pure and luminous intelligence in us--that has another seat, " and thephysician struck his broad but low forehead with his hand. "I haveobserved heads by the hundred down at the place of execution, and I havealso removed the top of the skulls of living animals. But now let mewrite, before we are disturbed. "

 [Human brains are prescribed for a malady of the eyes in the Ebers papyrus. Herophilus, one of the first scholars of the Alexandrine Museum, studied not only the bodies of executed criminals, but made his experiments also on living malefactors. He maintained that the four cavities of the human brain are the seat of the soul. ]

The physician took the reed, moistened it with black color prepared fromburnt papyrus, and in elegant hieratic characters

 [At the time of our narrative the Egyptians had two kinds of writing-the hieroglyphic, which was generally used for monumental inscriptions, and in which the letters consisted of conventional representations of various objects, mathematical and arbitrary symbols, and the hieratic, used for writing on papyrus, and in which, with the view of saving time, the written pictures underwent so many alterations and abbreviations that the originals could hardly be recognized. In the 8th century there was a further abridgment of the hieratic writing, which was called the demotic, or people's writing, and was used in commerce. Whilst the hieroglyphic and hieratic writings laid the foundations of the old sacred dialect, the demotic letters were only used to write the spoken language of the people. E. De Rouge's Chrestomathie Egyptienne. H. Brugsch's Hieroglyphische Grammatik. Le Page Renouf's shorter hieroglyphical grammar. Ebers' Ueber das Hieroglyphische Schriftsystem, 2nd edition, 1875, in the lectures of Virchow Holtzendorff. ]

wrote the paper for the paraschites, in which he confessed to havingimpelled him to the theft of a heart, and in the most binding mannerdeclared himself willing to take the old man's guilt upon himself beforeOsiris and the judges of the dead. 

When he had finished, Pentaur held out his hand for the paper, butNebsecht folded it together, placed it in a little bag in which lay anamulet that his dying mother had hung round his neck, and said, breathingdeeply:

"That is done. Farewell, Pentaur. "

But the poet held the physician back; he spoke to him with the warmestwords, and conjured him to abandon his enterprise. His prayers, however, had no power to touch Nebsecht, who only strove forcibly to disengage hisfinger from Pentaur's strong hand, which held him as in a clasp of iron. The excited poet did not remark that he was hurting his friend, untilafter a new and vain attempt at freeing himself, Nebsecht cried out inpain, "You are crushing my finger!"

A smile passed over the poet's face, he loosened his hold on thephysician, and stroked the reddened hand like a mother who strives todivert her child from pain. 

"Don't be angry with me, Nebsecht, " he said, "you know my unlucky fists, and to-day they really ought to hold you fast, for you have too mad apurpose on hand. "

"Mad?" said the physician, whilst he smiled in his turn. "It may be so;but do you not know that we Egyptians all have a peculiar tenderness forour follies, and are ready to sacrifice house and land to them?"

"Our own house and our own land, " cried the poet: and then addedseriously, "but not the existence, not the happiness of another. "

"Have I not told you that I do not look upon the heart as the seat of ourintelligence? So far as I am concerned, I would as soon be buried with aram's heart as with my own. "

"I do not speak of the plundered dead, but of the living, " said the poet. "If the deed of the paraschites is discovered, he is undone, and youwould only have saved that sweet child in the hut behind there, to flingher into deeper misery. "

Nebsecht looked at the other with as much astonishment and dismay, as ifhe had been awakened from sleep by bad tidings. Then he cried: "All thatI have, I would share with the old man and Uarda. "

"And who would protect her?"

"Her father. "

"That rough drunkard who to-morrow or the day after may be sent no oneknows where. "

"He is a good fellow, " said the physician interrupting his friend, andstammering violently. "But who 'would do anything to the child? She isso so . . . . She is so charming, so perfectly--sweet and lovely. "

With these last words he cast down his eyes and reddened like a girl. 

"You understand that, " he said, "better than I do; yes, and you alsothink her beautiful! Strange! you must not laugh if I confess--I am buta man like every one else--when I confess, that I believe I have atlength discovered in myself the missing organ for beauty of form--notbelieve merely, but truly have discovered it, for it has not only spoken, but cried, raged, till I felt a rushing in my ears, and for the firsttime was attracted more by the sufferer than by suffering. I have sat inthe hut as though spell-bound, and gazed at her hair, at her eyes, at howshe breathed. They must long since have missed me at the House of Seti, perhaps discovered all my preparations, when seeking me in my room! Fortwo days and nights I have allowed myself to be drawn away from my work, for the sake of this child. Were I one of the laity, whom you wouldapproach, I should say that demons had bewitched me. But it is notthat, "--and with these words the physician's eyes flamed up--"it is notthat! The animal in me, the low instincts of which the heart is theorgan, and which swelled my breast at her bedside, they have mastered thepure and fine emotions here--here in this brain; and in the very momentwhen I hoped to know as the God knows whom you call the Prince ofknowledge, in that moment I must learn that the animal in me is strongerthan that which I call my God. "

The physician, agitated and excited, had fixed his eyes on the groundduring these last words, and hardly noticed the poet, who listened to himwondering and full of sympathy. For a time both were silent; thenPentaur laid his hand on his friend's hand, and said cordially:

"My soul is no stranger to what you feel, and heart and head, if I mayuse your own words, have known a like emotion. But I know that what wefeel, although it may be foreign to our usual sensations, is loftier andmore precious than these, not lower. Not the animal, Nebsecht, is itthat you feel in yourself, but God. Goodness is the most beautifulattribute of the divine, and you have always been well-disposed towardsgreat and small; but I ask you, have you ever before felt so irresistiblyimpelled to pour out an ocean of goodness on another being, whether forUarda you would not more joyfully and more self-forgetfully sacrifice allthat you have, and all that you are, than to father and mother and youroldest friend?"

Nebsecht nodded assentingly. 

"Well then, " cried Pentaur, "follow your new and godlike emotion, be goodto Uarda and do not sacrifice her to your vain wishes. My poor friend!With your--enquiries into the secrets of life, you have never lookedround upon itself, which spreads open and inviting before our eyes. Doyou imagine that the maiden who can thus inflame the calmest thinker inThebes, will not be coveted by a hundred of the common herd when herprotector fails her? Need I tell you that amongst the dancers in theforeign quarter nine out of ten are the daughters of outlawed parents?Can you endure the thought that by your hand innocence may be consignedto vice, the rose trodden under foot in the mud? Is the human heart thatyou desire, worth an Uarda? Now go, and to-morrow come again to me yourfriend who understands how to sympathize with all you feel, and to whomyou have approached so much the nearer to-day that you have learned toshare his purest happiness. "

Pentaur held out his hand to the physician, who held it some time, thenwent thoughtfully and lingeringly, unmindful of the burning glow of themid-day sun, over the mountain into the valley of the king's gravestowards the hut of the paraschites. 

Here he found the soldier with his daughter. "Where is the old man?"he asked anxiously. 

"He has gone to his work in the house of the embalmer, " was the answer. "If anything should happen to him he bade me tell you not to forget thewriting and the book. He was as though out of his mind when he left us, and put the ram's heart in his bag and took it with him. Do you remainwith the little one; my mother is at work, and I must go with theprisoners of war to Harmontis. "

CHAPTER XVIII. 

While the two friends from the House of Seti were engaged inconversation, Katuti restlessly paced the large open hall of her son-in-law's house, in which we have already seen her. A snow-white catfollowed her steps, now playing with the hem of her long plain dress, andnow turning to a large stand on which the dwarf Nemu sat in a heap; whereformerly a silver statue had stood, which a few months previously hadbeen sold. 

He liked this place, for it put him in a position to look into the eyesof his mistress and other frill-grown people. "If you have betrayed me!If you have deceived me!" said Katuti with a threatening gesture as shepassed his perch. 

"Put me on a hook to angle for a crocodile if I have. But I am curiousto know how he will offer you the money. "

"You swore to me, " interrupted his mistress with feverish agitation, that you had not used my name in asking Paaker to save us?"

"A thousand times I swear it, " said the little man. 

"Shall I repeat all our conversation? I tell thee he will sacrifice hisland, and his house-great gate and all, for one friendly glance fromNefert's eyes. "

"If only Mena loved her as he does!" sighed the widow, and then againshe walked up and down the hall in silence, while the dwarf looked out atthe garden entrance. Suddenly she paused in front of Nemu, and said sohoarsely that Nemu shuddered:

"I wish she were a widow. " "The little man made a gesture as if toprotect himself from the evil eye, but at the same instant he slippeddown from his pedestal, and exclaimed:

"There is a chariot, and I hear his big dog barking. It is he. Shall Icall Nefert?"

"No!" said Katuti in a low voice, and she clutched at the back of achair as if for support. 

The dwarf shrugged his shoulders, and slunk behind a clump of ornamentalplants, and a few minutes later Paaker stood in the presence of Katuti, who greeted him, with quiet dignity and self-possession. 

Not a feature of her finely-cut face betrayed her inward agitation, andafter the Mohar had greeted her she said with rather patronizingfriendliness:

"I thought that you would come. Take a seat. Your heart is like yourfather's; now that you are friends with us again it is not by halves. "

Paaker had come to offer his aunt the sum which was necessary for theredemption of her husband's mummy. He had doubted for a long timewhether he should not leave this to his mother, but reserve partly andpartly vanity had kept him from doing so. He liked to display hiswealth, and Katuti should learn what he could do, what a son-in-law shehad rejected. 

He would have preferred to send the gold, which he had resolved to giveaway, by the hand of one of his slaves, like a tributary prince. Butthat could not be done so he put on his finger a ring set with a valuablestone, which king Seti I. , had given to his father, and added variousclasps and bracelets to his dress. 

When, before leaving the house, he looked at himself in a mirror, he saidto himself with some satisfaction, that he, as he stood, was worth asmuch as the whole of Mena's estates. 

Since his conversation with Nemu, and the dwarf's interpretation of hisdream, the path which he must tread to reach his aim had been plainbefore him. Nefert's mother must be won with the gold which would saveher from disgrace, and Mena must be sent to the other world. He reliedchiefly on his own reckless obstinacy--which he liked to call firmdetermination--Nemu's cunning, and the love-philter. 

He now approached Katuti with the certainty of success, like a merchantwho means to acquire some costly object, and feels that he is rich enoughto pay for it. But his aunt's proud and dignified manner confounded him. 

He had pictured her quite otherwise, spirit-broken, and suppliant; and hehad expected, and hoped to earn, Nefert's thanks as well as her mother'sby his generosity. Mena's pretty wife was however absent, and Katuti didnot send for her even after he had enquired after her health. 

The widow made no advances, and some time passed in indifferentconversation, till Paaker abruptly informed her that he had heard of herson's reckless conduct, and had decided, as being his mother's nearestrelation, to preserve her from the degradation that threatened her. Forthe sake of his bluntness, which she took for honesty, Katuti forgave themagnificence of his dress, which under the circumstances certainly seemedill-chosen; she thanked him with dignity, but warmly, more for the sakeof her children than for her own; for life she said was opening beforethem, while for her it was drawing to its close. 

"You are still at a good time of life, " said Paaker. 

"Perhaps at the best, " replied the widow, "at any rate from my point ofview; regarding life as I do as a charge, a heavy responsibility. "

"The administration of this involved estate must give you many, anxioushours--that I understand. " Katuti nodded, and then said sadly:

"I could bear it all, if I were not condemned to see my poor child beingbrought to misery without being able to help her or advise her. You oncewould willingly have married her, and I ask you, was there a maiden inThebes--nay in all Egypt--to compare with her for beauty? Was she notworthy to be loved, and is she not so still? Does she deserve that herhusband should leave her to starve, neglect her, and take a strange womaninto his tent as if he had repudiated her? I see what you feel about it!You throw all the blame on me. Your heart says: 'Why did she break offour betrothal, ' and your right feeling tells you that you would havegiven her a happier lot. "

With these words Katuti took her nephew's hand, and went on withincreasing warmth. 

"We know you to-day for the most magnanimous man in Thebes, for you haverequited injustice with an immense benefaction; but even as a boy youwere kind and noble. Your father's wish has always been dear and sacredto me, for during his lifetime he always behaved to us as an affectionatebrother, and I would sooner have sown the seeds of sorrow for myself thanfor your mother, my beloved sister. I brought up my child--I guarded herjealously--for the young hero who was absent, proving his valor in Syria--for you and for you only. Then your father died, my sole stay andprotector. "

"I know it all!" interrupted Paaker looking gloomily at the floor. 

"Who should have told you?" said the widow. "For your mother, when thathad happened which seemed incredible, forbid us her house, and shut herears. The king himself urged Mena's suit, for he loves him as his ownson, and when I represented your prior claim he commanded;--and who mayresist the commands of the sovereign of two worlds, the Son of Ra? Kingshave short memories; how often did your father hazard his life for him, how many wounds had he received in his service. For your father's sakehe might have spared you such an affront, and such pain. "

"And have I myself served him, or not?" asked the pioneer flushingdarkly. 

"He knows you less, " returned Katuti apologetically. Then she changedher tone to one of sympathy, and went on:

"How was it that you, young as you were, aroused his dissatisfaction, hisdislike, nay his--"

"His what?" asked the pioneer, trembling with excitement. 

"Let that pass!" said the widow soothingly. "The favor and disfavor ofkings are as those of the Gods. Men rejoice in the one or bow to theother. "

"What feeling have I aroused in Rameses besides dissatisfaction, anddislike? I insist on knowing!" said Paaker with increasing vehemence. 

"You alarm me, " the widow declared. "And in speaking ill of you, hisonly motive was to raise his favorite in Nefert's estimation. "

"Tell me what he said!" cried the pioneer; cold drops stood on his brownforehead, and his glaring eyes showed the white eye-balls. 

Katuti quailed before him, and drew back, but he followed her, seized herarm, and said huskily:

"What did he say?"

"Paaker!" cried the widow in pain and indignation. "Let me go. It isbetter for you that I should not repeat the words with which Ramesessought to turn Nefert's heart from you. Let me go, and remember to whomyou are speaking. "

But Paaker gripped her elbow the tighter, and urgently repeated hisquestion. 

"Shame upon you!" cried Katuti, "you are hurting me; let me go! Youwill not till you have heard what he said? Have your own way then, butthe words are forced from me! He said that if he did not know yourmother Setchem for an honest woman, he never would have believed you wereyour father's son--for you were no more like him than an owl to aneagle. "

Paaker took his hand from Katuti's arm. "And so--and so--" he mutteredwith pale lips. 

"Nefert took your part, and I too, but in vain. Do not take the wordstoo hardly. Your father was a man without an equal, and Rameses cannotforget that we are related to the old royal house. His grandfather, hisfather, and himself are usurpers, and there is one now living who has abetter right to the throne than he has. "

"The Regent Ani!" exclaimed Paaker decisively. Katuti nodded, she wentup to the pioneer and said in a whisper:

"I put myself in your hands, though I know they may be raised against me. But you are my natural ally, for that same act of Rameses that disgracedand injured you, made me a partner in the designs of Ani. The kingrobbed you of your bride, me of my daughter. He filled your soul withhatred for your arrogant rival, and mine with passionate regret for thelost happiness of my child. I feel the blood of Hatasu in my veins, andmy spirit is high enough to govern men. It was I who roused the sleepingambition of the Regent--I who directed his gaze to the throne to which hewas destined by the Gods. The ministers of the Gods, the priests, arefavorably disposed to us; we have--"

At this moment there was a commotion in the garden, and a breathlessslave rushed in exclaiming "The Regent is at the gate!"

Paaker stood in stupid perplexity, but he collected himself with aneffort and would have gone, but Katuti detained him. 

"I will go forward to meet Ani, " she said. "He will be rejoiced to seeyou, for he esteems you highly and was a friend of your father's. "

As soon as Katuti had left the hall, the dwarf Nemu crept out of hishiding-place, placed himself in front of Paaker, and asked boldly:

"Well? Did I give thee good advice yesterday, or no?"

Put Paaker did not answer him, he pushed him aside with his foot, andwalked up and down in deep thought. 

Katuti met the Regent half way down the garden. He held a manuscriptroll in his hand, and greeted her from afar with a friendly wave of hishand. 

The widow looked at him with astonishment. 

It seemed to her that he had grown taller and younger since the last timeshe had seen him. 

"Hail to your highness!" she cried, half in joke half reverently, andshe raised her hands in supplication, as if he already wore the doublecrown of Upper and Lower Egypt. "Have the nine Gods met you? have theHathors kissed you in your slumbers? This is a white day--a lucky day--I read it in your face!" "That is reading a cipher!" said Ani gaily, but with dignity. "Read this despatch. "

Katuti took the roll from his hand, read it through, and then returnedit. 

"The troops you equipped have conquered the allied armies of theEthiopians, " she said gravely, "and are bringing their prince in fettersto Thebes, with endless treasure, and ten thousand prisoners! The Godsbe praised!"

"And above all things I thank the Gods that my general Scheschenk--myfoster-brother and friend--is returning well and unwounded from the war. I think, Katuti, that the figures in our dreams are this day taking formsof flesh and blood!"

"They are growing to the stature of heroes!" cried the widow. "And youyourself, my lord, have been stirred by the breath of the Divinity. Youwalk like the worthy son of Ra, the Courage of Menth beams in your eyes, and you smile like the victorious Horus. "

"Patience, patience my friend, " said Ani, moderating the eagerness of thewidow; "now, more than ever, we must cling to my principle of over-estimating the strength of our opponents, and underrating our own. Nothing has succeeded on which I had counted, and on the contrary manythings have justified my fears that they would fail. The beginning ofthe end is hardly dawning on us. "

"But successes, like misfortunes, never come singly, " replied Katuti. 

"I agree with you, " said Ani. "The events of life seem to me to fall ingroups. Every misfortune brings its fellow with it--like every piece ofluck. Can you tell me of a second success?"

"Women win no battles, " said the widow smiling. "But they win allies, andI have gained a powerful one. "

"A God or an army?" asked Ani. 

"Something between the two, " she replied. "Paaker, the king's chiefpioneer, has joined us;" and she briefly related to Ani the history ofher nephew's love and hatred. 

Ani listened in silence; then he said with an expression of much disquietand anxiety:

"This man is a follower of Rameses, and must shortly return to him. Manymay guess at our projects, but every additional person who knows them maybe come a traitor. You are urging me, forcing me, forward too soon. Athousand well-prepared enemies are less dangerous than one untrustworthyally--"

"Paaker is secured to us, " replied Katuti positively. "Who will answerfor him?" asked Ani. 

"His life shall be in your hand, " replied Katuti gravely. "My shrewdlittle dwarf Nemu knows that he has committed some secret crime, whichthe law punishes by death. "

The Regent's countenance cleared. 

That alters the matter, " he said with satisfaction. "Has he committed amurder?"

"No, " said Katuti, "but Nemu has sworn to reveal to you alone all that heknows. He is wholly devoted to us. "

"Well and good, " said Ani thoughtfully, but he too is imprudent--much tooimprudent. You are like a rider, who to win a wager urges his horse toleap over spears. If he falls on the points, it is he that suffers; youlet him lie there, and go on your way. "

"Or are impaled at the same time as the noble horse, " said Katutigravely. "You have more to win, and at the same time more to lose thanwe; but the meanest clings to life; and I must tell you, Ani, that I workfor you, not to win any thing through your success, but because you areas dear to me as a brother, and because I see in you the embodiment of myfather's claims which have been trampled on. "

Ani gave her his hand and asked:

"Did you also as my friend speak to Bent-Anat? Do I interpret yoursilence rightly?"

Katuti sadly shook her head; but Ani went on: "Yesterday that would havedecided me to give her up; but to-day my courage has risen, and if theHathors be my friends I may yet win her. "

With these words he went in advance of the widow into the hall, wherePaaker was still walking uneasily up and down. 

The pioneer bowed low before the Regent, who returned the greeting with ahalf-haughty, half-familiar wave of the hand, and when he had seatedhimself in an arm-chair politely addressed Paaker as the son of a friend, and a relation of his family. 

"All the world, " he said, "speaks of your reckless courage. Men like youare rare; I have none such attached to me. I wish you stood nearer tome; but Rameses will not part with you, although--although--In point offact your office has two aspects; it requires the daring of a soldier, and the dexterity of a scribe. No one denies that you have the first, but the second--the sword and the reed-pen are very different weapons, one requires supple fingers, the other a sturdy fist. The king used tocomplain of your reports--is be better satisfied with them now?"

"I hope so, " replied the Mohar; "my brother Horus is a practised writer, and accompanies me in my journeys. "

"That is well, " said Ani. "If I had the management of affairs I shouldtreble your staff, and give you four--five--six scribes under you, whoshould be entirely at your command, and to whom you could give thematerials for the reports to be sent out. Your office demands that youshould be both brave and circumspect; these characteristics are rarelyunited; but there are scriveners by hundreds in the temples. "

"So it seems to me, " said Paaker. 

Ani looked down meditatively, and continued--Rameses is fond of comparingyou with your father. That is unfair, for he--who is now with thejustified--was without an equal; at once the bravest of heroes and themost skilful of scribes. You are judged unjustly; and it grieves me allthe more that you belong, through your mother, to my poor but royalhouse. We will see whether I cannot succeed in putting you in the rightplace. For the present you are required in Syria almost as soon as youhave got home. You have shown that you are a man who does not feardeath, and who can render good service, and you might now enjoy yourwealth in peace with your wife. "

"I am alone, " said Paaker. 

"Then, if you come home again, let Katuti seek you out the prettiest wifein Egypt, " said the Regent smiling. "She sees herself every day in hermirror, and must be a connoisseur in the charms of women. "

Ani rose with these words, bowed to Paaker with studied friendliness, gave his hand to Katuti, and said as he left the hall:

"Send me to-day the--the handkerchief--by the dwarf Nemu. "

When he was already in the garden, he turned once more and said to Paaker

"Some friends are supping with me to-day; pray let me see you too. "

The pioneer bowed; he dimly perceived that he was entangled in invisibletoils. Up to the present moment he had been proud of his devotion to hiscalling, of his duties as Mohar; and now he had discovered that the king, whose chain of honor hung round his neck, undervalued him, and perhapsonly suffered him to fill his arduous and dangerous post for the sake ofhis father, while he, notwithstanding the temptations offered him inThebes by his wealth, had accepted it willingly and disinterestedly. He knew that his skill with the pen was small, but that was no reason whyhe should be despised; often had he wished that he could reconstitute hisoffice exactly as Ani had suggested, but his petition to be allowed asecretary had been rejected by Rameses. What he spied out, he was toldwas to be kept secret, and no one could be responsible for the secrecy ofanother. 

As his brother Horus grew up, he had followed him as his obedientassistant, even after he had married a wife, who, with her child, remained in Thebes under the care of Setchem. 

He was now filling Paaker's place in Syria during his absence; badlyenough, as the pioneer thought, and yet not without credit; for thefellow knew how to write smooth words with a graceful pen. 

Paaker, accustomed to solitude, became absorbed in thought, forgettingeverything that surrounded him; even the widow herself, who had sunk onto a couch, and was observing him in silence. 

He gazed into vacancy, while a crowd of sensations rushed confusedlythrough his brain. He thought himself cruelly ill-used, and he felt toothat it was incumbent on him to become the instrument of a terrible fateto some other person. All was dim 'and chaotic in his mind, his lovemerged in his hatred; only one thing was clear and unclouded by doubt, and that was his strong conviction that Nefert would be his. 

The Gods indeed were in deep disgrace with him. How much he had expendedupon them--and with what a grudging hand they had rewarded him; he knewof but one indemnification for his wasted life, and in that he believedso firmly that he counted on it as if it were capital which he hadinvested in sound securities. But at this moment his resentful feelingsembittered the sweet dream of hope, and he strove in vain for calmnessand clear-sightedness; when such cross-roads as these met, no amulet, nodivining rod could guide him; here he must think for himself, and beathis own road before he could walk in it; and yet he could think out noplan, and arrive at no decision. 

He grasped his burning forehead in his hands, and started from hisbrooding reverie, to remember where he was, to recall his conversationwith the mother of the woman he loved, and her saying that she wascapable of guiding men. 

"She perhaps may be able to think for me, " he muttered to himself. "Action suits me better. "

He slowly went up to her and said:

"So it is settled then--we are confederates. "

"Against Rameses, and for Ani, " she replied, giving him her slender hand. 

"In a few days I start for Syria, meanwhile you can make up your mindwhat commissions you have to give me. The money for your son shall beconveyed to you to-day before sunset. May I not pay my respects toNefert?"

"Not now, she is praying in the temple. "

"But to-morrow?"

"Willingly, my dear friend. She will be delighted to see you, and tothank you. "

"Farewell, Katuti. "

"Call me mother, " said the widow, and she waved her veil to him as a lastfarewell. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

As soon as Paaker had disappeared behind the shrubs, Katuti struck alittle sheet of metal, a slave appeared, and Katuti asked her whetherNefert had returned from the temple. 

"Her litter is just now at the side gate, " was the answer. 

"I await her here, " said the widow. The slave went away, and a fewminutes later Nefert entered the hall. 

"You want me?" she said; and after kissing her mother she sank upon hercouch. "I am tired, " she exclaimed, "Nemu, take a fan and keep theflies off me. "

The dwarf sat down on a cushion by her couch, and began to wave the semi-circular fan of ostrich-feathers; but Katuti put him aside and said:

"You can leave us for the present; we want to speak to each other inprivate. "

The dwarf shrugged his shoulders and got up, but Nefert looked at hermother with an irresistible appeal. 

"Let him stay, " she said, as pathetically as if her whole happinessdepended upon it. "The flies torment me so, and Nemu always holds histongue. "

She patted the dwarf's big head as if he were a lap-dog, and called thewhite cat, which with a graceful leap sprang on to her shoulder and stoodthere with its back arched, to be stroked by her slender fingers. 

Nemu looked enquiringly at his mistress, but Katuti turned to herdaughter, and said in a warning voice:

"I have very serious things to discuss with you. "

"Indeed?" said her daughter, "but I cannot be stung by the flies all thesame. Of course, if you wish it--"

"Nemu may stay then, " said Katuti, and her voice had the tone of that ofa nurse who gives way to a naughty child. "Besides, he knows what I haveto talk about. "

"There now!" said Nefert, kissing the head of the white cat, and shegave the fan back to the dwarf. 

The widow looked at her daughter with sincere compassion, she went up toher and looked for the thousandth time in admiration at her pretty face. 

"Poor child, " she sighed, "how willingly I would spare you the frightfulnews which sooner or later you must hear--must bear. Leave off yourfoolish play with the cat, I have things of the most hideous gravity totell you. "

"Speak on, " replied Nefert. "To-day I cannot fear the worst. Mena'sstar, the haruspex told me, stands under the sign of happiness, and Ienquired of the oracle in the temple of Besa, and heard that my husbandis prospering. I have prayed in the temple till I am quite content. Only speak!--I know my brother's letter from the camp had no good news init; the evening before last I saw you had been crying, and yesterday youdid not look well; even the pomegranate flowers in your hair did not suityou. "

"Your brother, " sighed Katuti, "has occasioned me great trouble, and wemight through him have suffered deep dishonor--"

"We-dishonor?" exclaimed Nefert, and she nervously clutched at the cat. 

"Your brother lost enormous sums at play; to recover them he pledged themummy of your father--"

"Horrible!" cried Nefert. "We must appeal at once to the king;--I willwrite to him myself; for Mena's sake he will hear me. Rameses is greatand noble, and will not let a house that is faithfully devoted to himfall into disgrace through the reckless folly of a boy. Certainly I willwrite to him. "

She said this in a voice of most childlike confidence, and desired Nemuto wave the fan more gently, as if this concern were settled. 

In Katuti's heart surprise and indignation at the unnatural indifferenceof her daughter were struggling together; but she withheld all blame, andsaid carelessly:

"We are already released, for my nephew Paaker, as soon as he heard whatthreatened us, offered me his help; freely and unprompted, from puregoodness of heart and attachment. "

"How good of Paaker!" cried Nefert. "He was so fond of me, and youknow, mother, I always stood up for him. No doubt it was for my sakethat he behaved so generously!"

The young wife laughed, and pulling the cat's face close to her own, heldher nose to its cool little nose, stared into its green eyes, and said, imitating childish talk:

"There now, pussy--how kind people are to your little mistress. "

Katuti was vexed daughter's childish impulses. 

"It seems to me, " she said, "that you might leave off playing andtrifling when I am talking of such serious matters. I have long sinceobserved that the fate of the house to which your father and motherbelong is a matter of perfect indifference to you; and yet you would haveto seek shelter and protection under its roof if your husband--"

"Well, mother?" asked Nefert breathing more quickly. 

As soon as Katuti perceived her daughter's agitation she regretted thatshe had not more gently led up to the news she had to break to her; forshe loved her daughter, and knew that it would give her keen pain. 

So she went on more sympathetically:

"You boasted in joke that people are good to you, and it is true; you winhearts by your mere being--by only being what you are. And Mena tooloved you tenderly; but 'absence, ' says the proverb, 'is the one realenemy, ' and Mena--"

"What has Mena done?" Once more Nefert interrupted her mother, and hernostrils quivered. 

"Mena, " said Katuti, decidedly, "has violated the truth and esteem whichhe owes you--he has trodden them under foot, and--"

"Mena?" exclaimed the young wife with flashing eyes; she flung the caton the floor, and sprang from her couch. 

"Yes--Mena, " said Katuti firmly. "Your brother writes that he would haveneither silver nor gold for his spoil, but took the fair daughter of theprince of the Danaids into his tent. The ignoble wretch!"

"Ignoble wretch!" cried Nefert, and two or three times she repeated hermother's last words. Katuti drew back in horror, for her gentle, docile, childlike daughter stood before her absolutely transfigured beyond allrecognition. 

She looked like a beautiful demon of revenge; her eyes sparkled, herbreath came quickly, her limbs quivered, and with extraordinary strengthand rapidity she seized the dwarf by the hand, led him to the door of oneof the rooms which opened out of the hall, threw it open, pushed thelittle man over the threshold, and closed it sharply upon him; then withwhite lips she came up to her mother. 

"An ignoble wretch did you call him?" she cried out with a hoarse huskyvoice, "an ignoble wretch! Take back your words, mother, take back yourwords, or--"

Katuti turned paler and paler, and said soothingly:

"The words may sound hard, but he has broken faith with you, and openlydishonored you. "

"And shall I believe it?" said Nefert with a scornful laugh. "Shall Ibelieve it, because a scoundrel has written it, who has pawned hisfather's body and the honor of big family; because it is told you by thatnoble and brave gentleman! why a box on the ears from Mena would be thedeath of him. Look at me, mother, here are my eyes, and if that tablethere were Mena's tent, and you were Mena, and you took the fairest womanliving by the hand and led her into it, and these eyes saw it--aye, overand over again--I would laugh at it--as I laugh at it now; and I shouldsay, 'Who knows what he may have to give her, or to say to her, ' and notfor one instant would I doubt his truth; for your son is false and Menais true. Osiris broke faith with Isis--but Mena may be favored by ahundred women--he will take none to his tent but me!"

"Keep your belief, " said Katuti bitterly, "but leave me mine. "

"Yours?" said Nefert, and her flushed cheeks turned pale again. "Whatdo you believe? You listen to the worst and basest things that can besaid of a man who has overloaded you with benefits! A wretch, bah! anignoble wretch? Is that what you call a man who lets you dispose of hisestate as you please!"

"Nefert, " cried Katuti angrily, "I will--"

"Do what you will, " interrupted her indignant daughter, "but do notvilify the generous man who has never hindered you from throwing away hisproperty on your son's debts and your own ambition. Since the day beforeyesterday I have learned that we are not rich; and I have reflected, andI have asked myself what has become of our corn and our cattle, of oursheep and the rents from the farmers. The wretch's estate was not socontemptible; but I tell you plainly I should be unworthy to be the wifeof the noble Mena if I allowed any one to vilify his name under his ownroof. Hold to your belief, by all means, but one of us must quit thishouse--you or I. "

At these words Nefert broke into passionate sobs, threw herself on herknees by her couch, hid her face in the cushions, and wept convulsivelyand without intermission. 

Katuti stood behind her, startled, trembling, and not knowing what tosay. Was this her gentle, dreamy daughter? Had ever a daughter dared tospeak thus to her mother? But was she right or was Nefert? Thisquestion was the pressing one; she knelt down by the side of the youngwife, put her arm round her, drew her head against her bosom, andwhispered pitifully:

"You cruel, hard-hearted child; forgive your poor, miserable mother, anddo not make the measure of her wretchedness overflow. "

Then Nefert rose, kissed her mother's hand, and went silently into herown room. 

Katuti remained alone; she felt as if a dead hand held her heart in itsicy grasp, and she muttered to herself:

"Ani is right--nothing turns to good excepting that from which we expectthe worst. "

She held her hand to her head, as if she had heard something too strangeto be believed. Her heart went after her daughter, but instead ofsympathizing with her she collected all her courage, and deliberatelyrecalled all the reproaches that Nefert had heaped upon her. She did notspare herself a single word, and finally she murmured to herself: "Shecan spoil every thing. For Mena's sake she will sacrifice me and thewhole world; Mena and Rameses are one, and if she discovers what we areplotting she will betray us without a moment's hesitation. Hitherto allhas gone on without her seeing it, but to-day something has been unsealedin her--an eye, a tongue, an ear, which have hitherto been closed. Sheis like a deaf and dumb person, who by a sudden fright is restored tospeech and hearing. My favorite child will become the spy of my actions, and my judge. "

She gave no utterance to the last words, but she seemed to hear them withher inmost ear; the voice that could speak to her thus, startled andfrightened her, and solitude was in itself a torture; she called thedwarf, and desired him to have her litter prepared, as she intended goingto the temple, and visiting the wounded who had been sent home fromSyria. 

"And the handkerchief for the Regent?" asked the little man. 

"It was a pretext, " said Katuti. "He wishes to speak to you about thematter which you know of with regard to Paaker. What is it?"

"Do not ask, " replied Nemu, "I ought not to betray it. By Besa, whoprotects us dwarfs, it is better that thou shouldst never know it. "

"For to-day I have learned enough that is new to me, " retorted Katuti. "Now go to Ani, and if you are able to throw Paaker entirely into hispower--good--I will give--but what have I to give away? I will begrateful to you; and when we have gained our end I will set you free andmake you rich. "

Nemu kissed her robe, and said in a low voice: "What is the end?"

"You know what Ani is striving for, " answered the widow. "And I have butone wish!"

"And that is?"

"To see Paaker in Mena's place. "

"Then our wishes are the same, " said the dwarf and he left the Hall. 

Katuti looked after him and muttered:

"It must be so. For if every thing remains as it was and Mena comes homeand demands a reckoning--it is not to be thought of! It must not be!"

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Ardently they desire that which transcends senseEvery misfortune brings its fellow with itMedicines work harm as often as goodNo good excepting that from which we expect the worstObstinacy--which he liked to call firm determinationOnly the choice between lying and silencePatronizing friendlinessPrinciple of over-estimating the strength of our opponentsProvide yourself with a self-devised rulerSuccesses, like misfortunes, never come singlyThe beginning of things is not more attractive