<h2><SPAN name="chap13"></SPAN>CHAPTER XIII.<br/>AMADA RETURNS TO ISIS</h2>
<p>We fought a very terrible fight that evening there by the banks of Nile. Our
position was good, but we were outnumbered by four or five to one, and the
Easterns and their mercenaries were mad at the death of the Satrap by my hand.
Time upon time they came on furiously, charging up the slope like wild bulls.
For the most part we relied upon our archers to drive them back, since our
half-trained troops could scarcely hope to stand against the onset of veterans
disciplined in war. So taking cover behind the rocks we rained arrows on them,
shooting the horses in the chariots, and when these were down, pouring our
shafts upon the footmen behind. Myself I took my great black bow and drew it
thrice, and each time I saw a noble fall, for no mail could withstand the
arrows which it sent, and of that art I was a master. None in Egypt could shoot
so far or so straight as I did, save perhaps Peroa himself. I had no time to do
more since always I must be moving up and down the line encouraging my men.</p>
<p>Three times we drove them back, after which they grew cunning. Ceasing from a
direct onslaught and keeping what remained of their chariots in reserve, they
sent one body of men to climb along the slope of the hill where the rocks gave
them cover from our arrows, and another to creep through the reeds and growing
crops upon the bank of the river where we could not see to shoot them well,
although the slingers in the ships did them some damage.</p>
<p>Thus they attacked us on either flank, and while we were thus engaged their
centre made a charge. Then came the bitterest of the fighting for now the bows
were useless, and it was sword against sword and spear against spear. Once we
broke and I thought that they were through. But I led a charge against them and
drove them back a little way. Still the issue was doubtful till I saw Bes rush
past me grinning and leaping, and with him a small body of Greeks whom we held
in reserve, and I think that the sight of the terrible dwarf whom they thought
a devil, frightened the Easterns more than did the Greeks.</p>
<p>At any rate, shouting out something about an evil spirit whom the Egyptians
worshipped, by which I suppose they meant that god after whom Bes was named,
they retreated, leaving many dead but taking their wounded with them, for they
were unbroken.</p>
<p>At the foot of the slope they reformed and took counsel, then sat down out of
bowshot as though to rest. Now I guessed their plan. It was to wait till night
closed in, which would be soon for the sun was sinking, and then, when we could
not see to shoot, either rush through us by the weight of numbers, or march
back to where the cliffs were lower and climb them, thus passing us on the
higher open land.</p>
<p>Now we also took counsel, though little came of it, since we did not know what
to do. We were too few to attack so great an army, nor if we climbed the cliffs
could we hope to withstand them in the desert sands, or to hold our own against
them if they charged in the dark. If this happened it seemed that all we could
do would be to fight as long as we could, after which the survivors of us must
take refuge on our boats. So it came to this, that we should lose the battle
and the greater part of the Easterns would win back to Sais, unless indeed the
main army under Peroa came to our aid.</p>
<p>Whilst we talked I caused the wounded to be carried to the ships before it grew
too dark to move them. Bes went with them. Presently he returned, running
swiftly.</p>
<p>“Master,” he said, “the evening wind is blowing strong and
stirs the sand, but from a mast-head through it I caught sight of Peroa’s
banners. The army comes round the bend of the river not four furlongs away. Now
charge and those Easterns will be caught between the hammer and the stone, for
while they are meeting us they will not look behind.”</p>
<p>So I went down the lines of our little force telling them the good news and
showing them my plan. They listened and understood. We formed up, those who
were left of us, not more than a thousand men perhaps, and advanced. The
Easterns laughed when they saw us coming down the slope, for they thought that
we were mad and that they would kill us every one, believing as they did that
Peroa had no other army. When we were within bowshot we began to shoot, though
sparingly, for but few arrows were left. Galled by our archery they marshalled
their ranks to charge us again. With a shout we leapt forward to meet them, for
now from the higher ground I saw the chariots of Peroa rushing to our rescue.</p>
<p>We met, we fought. Surely there had been no such fighting since the days of
Thotmes and Rameses the Great. Still they drove us back till unseen and
unsuspected the chariots and the footmen of Peroa broke on them from behind,
broke on them like a desert storm. They gave, they fled this way and that, some
to the banks of the Nile, some to the hills. By the light of the setting sun we
finished it and ere the darkness closed in the Great King’s army was
destroyed, save for the fugitives whom we hunted down next day.</p>
<p>Yes, in that battle perished ten thousand of the Easterns and their
mercenaries, and upon its field at dawn we crowned Peroa Pharaoh of Egypt, and
he named me the chief general of his army. There, too, fell over a thousand of
my men and among them those six hunters whom I had won in the wager with the
Great King and brought with me from the East. Throughout the fray they served
me as a bodyguard, fighting furiously, who knew that they could hope for no
mercy from their own people. One by one they were slain, the last two of them
in the charge at sunset. Well, they were brave and faithful to me, so peace be
on their spirits. Better to die thus than in the den of lions.</p>
<p class="p2">
In triumph we returned to Memphis, I bringing in the rear-guard and the spoils.
Before Pharaoh and I parted a messenger brought me more good news. Sure tidings
had come that the King of kings had been driven by revolt in his dominions to
embark upon a mighty war with Syria, Greece and Cyprus and other half-conquered
countries, in which, doubtless by agreement, the fires of insurrection had
suddenly burned up. Also already Peroa’s messengers had departed to tell
them of what was passing on the Nile.</p>
<p>“If this be true,” said Peroa when he had heard all, “the
Great King will have no new army to spare for Egypt.”</p>
<p>“It is so, Pharaoh,” I answered. “Yet I think he will conquer
in this great war and that within two years you must be prepared to meet him
face to face.”</p>
<p>“Two years are long, Shabaka, and in them, by your help, much may be
done.”</p>
<p>But as it chanced he was destined to be robbed of that help, and this by the
work of Woman the destroyer.</p>
<p>It happened thus. Amidst great rejoicings Pharaoh reached Memphis and in the
vast temple of Amen laid down our spoils in the presence of the god, thousands
of right hands hewn from the fallen, thousands of swords and other weapons and
tens of chariots, together with much treasure of which a portion was given to
the god. The high priests blessed us in the name of Amen and of the other gods;
the people blessed us and threw flowers in our path; all the land rejoiced
because once more it was free.</p>
<p>There too that day in the temple with ancient form and ceremonial Peroa was
crowned Pharaoh of Egypt. Sceptres and jewels that had been hid for generations
were brought out by those who knew the secret of their hiding-places; the
crowns that had been worn by old Pharaohs, were set upon his head; yes, the
double crown of the Upper and the Lower Land. Thus in a Memphis mad with joy at
the casting off of the foreign yoke, he was anointed the first of a new
dynasty, and with him his queen.</p>
<p>I too received honours, for the story of the slaying of Idernes at my hands and
of how I held the pass had gone abroad, so that next to Pharaoh, I was looked
upon as the greatest man in Egypt. Nor was Bes forgotten, since many of the
common people thought that he was a spirit in the form of a dwarf whom the gods
had sent to aid us with his strength and cunning. Indeed at the close of the
ceremony voices cried out in the multitude of watchers, demanding that I who
was to marry the Royal Lady of Egypt should be named next in succession to the
throne.</p>
<p>The Pharaoh heard and glanced first at his son and then at me, doubtfully,
whereon, covered with confusion, I slipped away.</p>
<p>The portico of the temple was deserted, since all, even the guards, had crowded
into the vast court to watch the coronation. Only in the shadow, seated against
the pedestal of one of the two colossal statues in front of the outer pylon
gate and looking very small beneath its greatness, was a man wrapped in a dark
cloak whom noting vaguely I took to be a beggar. As I passed him, he plucked at
my robe, and I stopped to search for something to give to him but could find
naught.</p>
<p>“I have nothing, Father,” I said laughing, “except the gold
hilt of my sword.”</p>
<p>“Do not part with that, Son,” answered a deep voice, “for I
think you will need it before all is over.”</p>
<p>Then while I stared at him he threw back his hood and I saw that beneath was
the ancient withered face and the long white beard of my great-uncle, the holy
Tanofir, the hermit and magician.</p>
<p>“Great things happen yonder, Shabaka. So great that I have come from my
sepulchre to see, or rather, being blind, to listen, who thrice in my life days
have known the like before,” and he pointed to the glittering throng in
the court within. “Yes,” he went on, “I have seen Pharaohs
crowned and Pharaohs die—one of them at the hand of a conqueror. What
will happen to this Pharaoh, think you, Shabaka?”</p>
<p>“You should be better able to answer that question than I, who am no
prophet, my Uncle.”</p>
<p>“How, my Nephew, seeing that your dwarf has borne away my magic Cup? I do
not grudge her to him for he is a brave dwarf and clever, who may yet prove a
good prop to you, as he has done before, and to Egypt also. But she has gone
and the new vessel is not yet shaped to my liking. So how can I answer?”</p>
<p>“Out of the store of wisdom gathered in your breast.”</p>
<p>“So! my Nephew. Well, my store of wisdom tells me that feasts are
sometimes followed by want and rejoicings by sorrow and victories by defeat,
and splendid sins by repentance and slow climbing back to good again. Also that
you will soon take a long journey. Where is the Royal Lady Amada? I did not
hear her step among those who passed in to the Crowning. But even my hearing
has grown somewhat weak of late, except in the silence of the night,
Shabaka.”</p>
<p>“I do not know, my Uncle, who have only been in Memphis one hour. But
what do you mean? Doubtless she prepares herself for the feast where I shall
meet her.”</p>
<p>“Doubtless. Tell me, what passes at the temple of Isis? As I crept past
the pylon feeling my way with my beggar’s staff, I thought—but how
can you know who have only been in Memphis an hour? Yet surely I heard voices
just now calling out that you, Shabaka, should be named as the next successor
to the throne of Egypt. Was it so?”</p>
<p>“Yes, holy Tanofir. That is why I have left who was vexed and am sworn to
seek no such honour, which indeed I do not desire.”</p>
<p>“Just so, Nephew. Yet gifts have a way of coming to those who do not
desire them and the last vision that I saw before my Cup left me, or rather
that she saw, was of you wearing the Double Crown. She said that you looked
very well in it, Shabaka. But now begone, for hark, here comes the procession
with the new-anointed Pharaoh whose royal robe you won for him yonder in the
pass, when you smote down Idernes and held his legions. Oh! it was well done
and my new Cup, though faulty, was good enough to show me all. I felt proud of
you, Shabaka, but begone, begone! ‘A gift for the poor old beggar! A
gift, my lords, for the poor blind beggar who has had none since the last
Pharaoh was crowned in Egypt and finds it hard to live on
memories!’”</p>
<p class="p2">
At our house I found my mother just returned from the Coronation, but Bes I did
not find and guessed that he had slipped away to meet his new-made wife,
Karema. My mother embraced me and blessed me, making much of me and my deeds in
the battle; also she doctored such small hurts as I had. I put the matter by as
shortly as I could and asked her if she had seen aught of Amada. She answered
that she had neither seen nor heard of her which I was sure she thought
strange, as she began to talk quickly of other things. I said to her what I had
said to the holy Tanofir, that doubtless she was making ready for the feast
since I could not find her at the Crowning.</p>
<p>“Or saying good-bye to the goddess,” answered my mother nodding,
“since there are some who find it even harder to fall from heaven to
earth than to climb from earth to heaven, and after all you are but a man, my
son.”</p>
<p>Then she slipped away to attire herself, leaving me wondering, because my
mother was shrewd and never spoke at random.</p>
<p>There was the holy Tanofir, too, with his talk about the temple of Isis, and he
also did not speak at random. Oh! now I felt as I had done when the shadow of
the palm-tree fell on me yonder in the palace garden.</p>
<p>The mood passed for my blood still tingled with the glory of that great fight,
and my heart shut its doors to sadness, knowing as I did, that I was the most
praised man in Memphis that day. Indeed had I not, I should have learned it
when with my mother I entered the great banqueting-hall of the palace somewhat
late, for she was long in making ready.</p>
<p>The first thing I saw there was Bes gorgeously arrayed in Eastern silks that he
had plundered from the Satrap’s tent, standing on a table so that all
might see and hear him, and holding aloft in one hand the grisly head of
Idernes and in the other that of the hawk-eyed noble whom he had slain, while
in his thick, guttural voice he told the tale of that great fray. Catching
sight of me, he called aloud,</p>
<p>“See! Here comes the man! Here comes the hero to whom Egypt owes its
liberty and Pharaoh his crown.”</p>
<p>Thereon all the company and the soldiers and servants who were gathered about
the door began to shout and acclaim me, till I wished that I could vanish away
as the holy Tanofir was said to be able to do. Since this was impossible I
rushed at Bes who leapt from the table like a monkey and, still waving the
heads and talking, slipped from the hall, I know not how, followed by the loud
laughter of the guests.</p>
<p>Then heralds announced the coming of Pharaoh and all grew silent. He and his
company entered with pomp and we, his subjects, prostrated ourselves in the
ancient fashion.</p>
<p>“Rise, my guests,” he cried. “Rise, my people. Above all do
you rise, Shabaka, my beloved cousin, to whom Egypt and I owe so much.”</p>
<p>So we rose and I took my seat in a place of honour having my mother at my side,
and looked about me for Amada, but in vain. There was the carven chair upon
which she should have been among those of the princesses, but it was empty. At
first I thought that she was late, but when time went by and she did not
appear, I asked if she were ill, a question that none seemed able to answer.</p>
<p>The feast went on with all the ancient ceremonies that attended the crowning of
a Pharaoh of Egypt, since there were old men who remembered these, also the
scribes and priests had them written in their books.</p>
<p>I took no heed of them and will not set them down. At length Pharaoh pledged
his subjects, and his subjects pledged Pharaoh. Then the doors were opened and
through them came a company of white-robed, shaven priests bearing on a bier
the body of a dead man wrapped in his mummy-cloths. At first some laughed for
this rite had not been performed in Egypt since she passed into the hands of
the Great Kings of the East and therefore was strange to them. Then they grew
silent since after all it was solemn to see those death-bearing priests
flitting in and out between the great columns, now seen and now lost in the
shadows, and to listen to their funeral chants.</p>
<p>In the hush my mother whispered to me that this body was that of the last
Pharaoh of Egypt brought from his tomb, but whether this were so I cannot say
for certain. At length they brought the mummy which was crowned with a
snake-headed circlet of the royal <i>uræus</i> and still draped with withered
funeral wreaths, and stood it on its feet opposite to Peroa just behind and
between my mother and me in such a fashion that it cut off the light from us.</p>
<p>The faint and heavy smell of the embalmer’s spices struck upon my
nostrils, a dead flower from the chaplets fell upon my head and, glancing over
my shoulder, I saw the painted or enamelled eyes in the gilded mask staring at
me. The thing filled me with fear, I knew not of what. Not of death, surely,
for that I had faced a score of times of late and thought nothing of it. Indeed
I am not sure that it was fear I felt, but rather a deep sense of the vanity of
all things. It seemed to come home to me—Shabaka or Allan Quatermain, for
in my dream the inspiration or whatever it might be, struck through the spirit
that animated both of us—as it had never done before, that everything is
<i>nothing</i>, that victory and love and even life itself have no meaning;
that naught really exists save the soul of man and God, of whom perchance that
soul is a part sent forth for a while to do His work through good and ill. The
thought lifted me up and yet crushed me, since for a moment all that makes a
man passed away, and I felt myself standing in utter loneliness, naked before
the glory of God, watched only by the flaming stars that light his throne. Yes,
and at that moment suddenly I learned that all the gods are but one God, having
many shapes and called by many names.</p>
<p>Then I heard the priests saying,</p>
<p>“Pharaoh the Osiris greets Pharaoh the living on the Earth and sends to
him this message—‘As I am, so shalt thou be, and where I am, there
thou shalt dwell through all the ages of Eternity.’”</p>
<p>Then Pharaoh the living rose and bowed to Pharaoh the dead and Pharaoh the dead
was taken away back to his Eternal House and I wondered whether his <i>Ka</i>
or his spirit, or whatever is the part of him that lives on, were watching us
and remembering the feasts whereof he had partaken in his pomp in this pillared
hall, as his forefathers had done before him for hundreds or thousands of
years.</p>
<p>Not until the mummy had gone and the last sound of the chanting of the priests
had died, did the hearts of the feasters grow light again. But soon they
forgot, as men alive always forget death and those whom Time has devoured, for
the wine was good and strong and the eyes of the women were bright and victory
had crowned our spears, and for a while Egypt was once more free.</p>
<p>So it went on till Pharaoh rose and departed, the great gold earrings in his
ears jingling as he walked, and the trumpets sounding before and after him. I
too rose to go with my mother when a messenger came and bade me wait upon
Pharaoh, and with me the dwarf Bes. So we went, leaving an officer to conduct
my mother to our home. As I passed her she caught me by the sleeve and
whispered in my ear,</p>
<p>“My son, whatever chances to you, be brave and remember that the world
holds more than women.”</p>
<p>“Yes,” I answered, “it holds death and God, or they hold
it,” though what put the words into my mind I do not know, since I did
not understand and had no time to ask her meaning.</p>
<p>The messenger led us to the door of Peroa’s private chamber, the same in
which I had seen him on my return from the East. Here he bade me enter, and Bes
to wait without. I went in and found two men and a woman in the chamber, all
standing very silent. The men were Pharaoh who still wore his glorious robe and
Double Crown, and the high priest of Isis clothed in white; the other was the
lady Amada also clothed in the snowy robes of Isis.</p>
<p>At the sight of her thus arrayed my heart stopped and I stood silent because I
could not speak. She too stood silent and I saw that beneath her thin veil her
beautiful face was set and pale as that of an alabaster statue. Indeed she
might have been not a lovely living woman, but the goddess Isis herself whose
symbols she bore about her.</p>
<p>“Shabaka,” said Pharaoh at length, “the Royal Lady of Egypt,
Amada, priestess of Isis, has somewhat to say to you.”</p>
<p>“Let the Royal Lady of Egypt speak on to her servant and affianced
husband,” I answered.</p>
<p>“Count Shabaka, General of the armies,” she began in a cold clear
voice like to that of one who repeats a lesson, “learn that you are no
more my affianced husband and that I who am gathered again to Isis the divine,
am no more your affianced wife.”</p>
<p>“I do not understand. Will it please you to be more plain?” I said
faintly.</p>
<p>“I will be more plain, Count Shabaka, more plain than you have been with
me. Since we speak together for the last time it is well that I should be
plain. Hear me. When first you returned from the East, in yonder hall you told
us of certain things that happened to you there. Then the dwarf your servant
took up the tale. He said that he gave my name to the Great King. I was wroth
as well I might be, but even when I prayed that he should be scourged, you did
not deny that it was he who gave my name to the King, although Pharaoh yonder
said that if you had spoken the name it would have been another matter.”</p>
<p>“I had no time,” I answered, “for just then the messengers
came from Idernes and afterwards when I sought you you were gone.”</p>
<p>“Had you then no time,” she asked coldly, “beneath the palms
in the garden of the palace when we were affianced? Oh! there was time in
plenty but it did not please you to tell me that you had bought safety and
great gifts at the price of the honour of the Lady of Egypt whose love you
stole.”</p>
<p>“You do not understand!” I exclaimed wildly.</p>
<p>“Forgive me, Shabaka, but I understand very well indeed, since from your
own words I learned at the feast given to Idernes that ‘the name of
Amada’ slipped your lips by chance and thus came to the ears of the Great
King.”</p>
<p>“The tale that Idernes and his captain told was false, Lady, and for it
Bes and I took their lives with our own hands.”</p>
<p>“It had perhaps been better, Shabaka, if you had kept them living that
they might confess that it was false. But doubtless you thought them safer
dead, since dead men cannot speak, and for this reason challenged them to
single combat.”</p>
<p>I gasped and could not answer for my mind seemed to leave me, and she went on
in a gentler voice,</p>
<p>“I do not wish to speak angrily to you, my cousin Shabaka, especially
when you have just wrought such great deeds for Egypt. Moreover by the law I
serve I may speak angrily to no man. Know then that on learning the truth,
since I could love none but you according to the flesh and therefore can never
give myself in marriage to another, I sought refuge in the arms of the goddess
whom for your sake I had deserted. She was pleased to receive me, forgetting my
treason. On this very day for the second time I took the oaths which may no
more be broken, and that I may dwell where I shall never see you more, Pharaoh
here has been pleased, at my request to name me high priestess and prophetess
of Isis and to appoint me as a dwelling-place her temple at Amada where I was
born far away in Upper Egypt. Now all is said and done, so farewell.”</p>
<p>“All is not said and done,” I broke out in fury. “Pharaoh, I
ask your leave to tell the full story of this business of the naming of the
lady Amada to the King of kings, and that in the presence of the dwarf Bes.
Even a slave is allowed to set out his tale before judgment is passed upon
him.”</p>
<p>Peroa glanced at Amada who made no sign, then said,</p>
<p>“It is granted, General Shabaka.”</p>
<p>So Bes was called into the chamber and having looked about him curiously,
seated himself upon the ground.</p>
<p>“Bes,” I said, “you have heard nothing of what has
passed.” (Here I was mistaken, for as he told me afterwards he had heard
everything through the door which was not quite closed.) “It is needful,
Bes, that you should repeat truly all that happened at the court of the King of
kings before and after I was brought from the boat.”</p>
<p>Bes obeyed, telling the tale very well, so well that all listened earnestly,
without error moreover. When he had finished I also told my story and how,
shaken by all I had gone through and already weak from the torment of the boat,
the name of Amada was surprised from me who never dreamed that the King would
at once make demand of her, and who would have perished a thousand times rather
than such a thing should happen. I added what I had learned afterwards from our
escort, that this name was already well known to the Great King who meant to
make use of it as a cause of quarrel with Egypt. Further, that he had let me
escape from a death by horrible torments because of some dream that he had
dreamed while he rested before the banquet, in which a god appeared and told
him that it was an evil thing to slay a man because that man had bested him at
a hunting match and one of which heaven would keep an account. Still because of
the law of his land he must find a public pretext for loosing one whom he had
once condemned, and therefore chose this matter of the lady Amada whom he
pretended to send me to bring to him.</p>
<p>When I had finished, as Amada still remained silent, Pharaoh asked of Bes how
it came about that he told one story on the night of our return and another on
this night.</p>
<p>“Because, O Pharaoh,” answered Bes rolling his eyes, “for the
first time in my life I have been just a little too clever and shot my arrow
just a little too far. Hearken, Pharaoh, and Royal Lady, and High Priest. I
knew that my master loves the lady Amada and knew also that she is quick of
tongue and temper, one who readily takes offence even if thereby she breaks her
own heart and so brings her life to ruin, and with it perchance her country.
Therefore, knowing women whom I have studied in my own land, I saw in this
matter just such a cause of offence as she would lay hold of, and counselled my
master to keep silent as to the story of the naming of her before the King.
Some evil spirit made him listen to this bad counsel, so far at least, that
when I lied as to what had chanced, for which lie the lady Amada prayed that I
might be scourged till my bones broke through the skin, he did not at once tell
all the truth. Nor did he do so afterwards because he feared that if he did I
should in fact be scourged, for my master and I love each other. Neither of us
wishes to see the other scourged, though such is my lot to-night,” and he
glanced at Amada. “I have said.”</p>
<p>Then at last Amada spoke.</p>
<p>“Had I known all this story from the first, perhaps I should not have
done what I have done to-day and perhaps I should have forgiven and forgotten,
for in truth even if the dwarf still lies, I believe your word, O Shabaka, and
understand how all came about. But now it is too late to change. Say, O Priest
of the Mother, is it not too late?”</p>
<p>“It is too late,” said the priest solemnly, “seeing that if
such vows as yours are broken for the second time, O Prophetess, the curse of
the goddess will pursue you and him for whom they were broken, yes, through
this life and all other lives that perchance may be given to you upon the earth
or elsewhere.”</p>
<p>“Pharaoh,” I cried in despair, “I made a bond with you. It is
recorded in writing and sealed. I have kept my part of the bond; my treasure
you have spent; your enemies I have slain; your army I have commanded not so
ill. Will you not keep yours and bid the priests release this lady from her vow
and give her to me to whom she was promised? Or must I believe that you refuse,
not because of goddesses and vows, but because yonder is the Royal Lady of
Egypt, the true heiress to the throne who might perchance bear children, which
as prophetess of Isis she can never do. Yes, because of this and because of
certain cries that came to your ears in the hour of your crowning before
Amen-ra and all the gods?”</p>
<p>Peroa flushed as he heard me and answered,</p>
<p>“You speak roughly, Cousin, and were you any other man I might be tempted
to answer roughly. But I know that you suffer and therefore I forgive. Nay, you
must believe no such things. Rather must you remember that in this bond of
which you speak, it was set down that I only promised you the lady Amada with
her own consent, and this she has withdrawn.”</p>
<p>“Then, Pharaoh, hearken! To-morrow I leave Egypt for another land, giving
you back your generalship and sheathing the sword that I had hoped to wield in
its defence and yours when the last great day of trial by battle comes, as come
it will. I tell you that I go to return no more, unless the lady Amada yonder
shall summon me back to fight for her and you, promising herself to me in
guerdon.”</p>
<p>“That can never be,” said Amada.</p>
<p>Then I became aware of another presence in the room, though how and when it
appeared I do not know, but I suppose that it had crept in while we were lost
in talk. At least between me and Pharaoh, crouched upon the ground, was the
figure of a man wrapped in a beggar’s cloak. It threw back the hood and
there appeared the ashen face and snowy beard of the holy Tanofir.</p>
<p>“You know me, Pharaoh,” he said in his deep, solemn voice. “I
am Tanofir, the King’s son; Tanofir the hermit, Tanofir the seer. I have
heard all that passes, it matters not how and I come to you with a message, I
who read men’s hearts. Of vows and goddesses and women I say nothing. But
this I say to you, that if you break the spirit of your bond and suffer yonder
Shabaka to go hence with a bitter heart, trouble shall come on you. All the
Great King’s armies did not die yonder by the banks of Nile, and mayhap
one day he will journey to bury the bones of those who fell, and with them
<i>yours</i>, O Pharaoh. I do not think that you will listen to me to-night,
and I am sure that yonder lady, full of the new-fanned flame of the jealous
goddess, will not listen. Still let her take counsel and remember my words: In
the hour of desperate danger let her send to Shabaka and demand his help,
promising in return what he has asked and remembering that if Isis loves her,
that goddess was born upon the Nile and loves Egypt more.”</p>
<p>“Too late, too late, <i>too late!</i>” wailed Amada.</p>
<p>Then she burst into tears and turning fled away with the high priest. Pharaoh
went also leaving me and Bes alone. I looked for the holy Tanofir to speak with
him, but he too was gone.</p>
<p>“It is time to sleep, Master,” said Bes, “for all this talk
is more wearisome than any battle. Why! what is this that has your name upon
it?” and he picked a silk-wrapped package from the floor and opened it.</p>
<p>Within were the priceless rose-hued pearls!</p>
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