Bent-Anat’s journey to the Emerald-Hathor was long since ended. As far as Keft she had sailed down the Nile with her escort, from thence she had crossed the desert by easy marches, and she had been obliged to wait a full week in the port on the Red Sea, which was chiefly inhabited by Phoenicians, for a ship which had finally brought her to the little seaport of Pharan. From Pharan she had crossed the mountains to the oasis, where the sanctuary she was to visit stood on the northern side.
The old priests, who conducted the service of the Goddess, had received the daughter of Rameses with respect, and undertook to restore her to cleanness by degrees with the help of the water from the mountain-stream which watered the palm-grove of the Amalekites, of incense-burning, of pious sentences, and of a hundred other ceremonies. At last the Goddess declared herself satisfied, and Bent-Anat wished to start for the north and join her father, but the commander of the escort, a grey-headed Ethiopian field officer—who had been promoted to a high grade by Ani—explained to the Chamberlain that he had orders to detain the princess in the oasis until her departure was authorized by the Regent himself.
Bent-Anat now hoped for the support of her father, for her brother Rameri, if no accident had occurred to him, might arrive any day. But in vain.
The position of the ladies was particularly unpleasant, for they felt that they had been caught in a trap, and were in fact prisoners. In addition to this their Ethiopian escort had quarrelled with the natives of the oasis, and every day skirmishes took place under their eyes—indeed lately one of these fights had ended in bloodshed.
Bent-Anat was sick at heart. The two strong pinions of her soul, which had always borne her so high above other women—her princely pride and her bright frankness—seemed quite broken; she felt that she had loved once, never to love again, and that she, who had sought none of her happiness in dreams, but all in work, had bestowed the best half of her identity on a vision. Pentaur’s image took a more and more vivid, and at the same time nobler and loftier, aspect in her mind; but he himself had died for her, for only once had a letter reached them from Egypt, and that was from Katuti to Nefert. After telling her that late intelligence established the statement that her husband had taken a prince’s daughter, who had been made prisoner, to his tent as his share of the booty, she added the information that the poet Pentaur, who had been condemned to forced labor, had not reached the mountain mines, but, as was supposed, had perished on the road.
Nefert still held to her immovable belief that her husband was faithful to his love for her, and the magic charm of a nature made beautiful by its perfect mastery over a deep and pure passion made itself felt in these sad and heavy days.
It seemed as though she had changed parts with Bent-Anat. Always hopeful, every day she foretold help from the king for the next; in truth she was ready to believe that, when Mena learned from Rameri that she was with the princess, he himself would come to fetch them if his duties allowed it. In her hours of most lively expectation she could go so far as to picture how the party in the tents would be divided, and who would bear Bent-Anat company if Mena took her with him to his camp, on what spot of the oasis it would be best to pitch it, and much more in the same vein.
Uarda could very well take her place with Bent-Anat, for the child had developed and improved on the journey. The rich clothes which the princess had given her became her as if she had never worn any others; she could obey discreetly, disappear at the right moment, and, when she was invited, chatter delightfully. Her laugh was silvery, and nothing consoled Bent-Anat so much as to hear it.
Her songs too pleased the two friends, though the few that she knew were grave and sorrowful. She had learned them by listening to old Hekt, who often used to play on a lute in the dusk, and who, when she perceived that Uarda caught the melodies, had pointed out her faults, and given her advice.
“She may some day come into my hands,” thought the witch, “and the better she sings, the better she will be paid.”
Bent-Anat too tried to teach Uarda, but learning to read was not easy to the girl, however much pains she might take. Nevertheless, the princess would not give up the spelling, for here, at the foot of the immense sacred mountain at whose summit she gazed with mixed horror and longing, she was condemned to inactivity, which weighed the more heavily on her in proportion as those feelings had to be kept to herself which she longed to escape from in work. Uarda knew the origin of her mistress’s deep grief, and revered her for it, as if it were something sacred. Often she would speak of Pentaur and of his father, and always in such a manner that the princess could not guess that she knew of their love.
When the prisoners were passing Bent-Anat’s tent, she was sitting within with Nefert, and talking, as had become habitual in the hours of dusk, of her father, of Mena, Rameri, and Pentaur.
“He is still alive,” asserted Nefert. “My mother, you see, says that no one knows with certainty what became of him. If he escaped, he beyond a doubt tried to reach the king’s camp, and when we get there you will find him with your father.”
The princess looked sadly at the ground. Nefert looked affectionately at her, and asked:
“Are you thinking of the difference in rank which parts you from the man you have chosen?”
“The man to whom I offer my hand, I put in the rank of a prince,” said Bent-Anat. “But if I could set Pentaur on a throne, as master of the world, he would still be greater and better than I.”
“But your father?” asked Nefert doubtfully.
“He is my friend, he will listen to me and understand me. He shall know everything when I see him; I know his noble and loving heart.”
Both were silent for some time; then Bent-Anat spoke:
“Pray have lights brought, I want to finish my weaving.”
Nefert rose, went to the door of the tent, and there met Uarda; she seized Nefert’s hand, and silently drew her out into the air.
“What is the matter, child? you are trembling,” Nefert exclaimed.
“My father is here,” answered Uarda hastily. “He is escorting some prisoners from the mines of Mafkat. Among them there are two chained together, and one of them—do not be startled—one of them is the poet Pentaur. Stop, for God’s sake, stop, and hear me. Twice before I have seen my father when he has been here with convicts. To-day we must rescue Pentaur; but the princess must know nothing of it, for if my plan fails—”
“Child! girl!” interrupted Nefert eagerly. “How can I help you?”
“Order the steward to give the drivers of the gang a skin of wine in the name of the princess, and out of Bent-Anat’s case of medicines take the phial which contains the sleeping draught, which, in spite of your wish, she will not take. I will wait here, and I know how to use it.”
Nefert immediately found the steward, and ordered him to follow Uarda with a skin of wine. Then she went back to the princess’s tent, and opened the medicine case.116
“What do you want?” asked Bent-Anat.
“A remedy for palpitation,” replied Nefert; she quietly took the flask she needed, and in a few minutes put it into Uarda’s hand.
The girl asked the steward to open the wine-skin, and let her taste the liquor. While she pretended to drink it, she poured the whole contents of the phial into the wine, and then let Bent-Anat’s bountiful present be carried to the thirsty drivers.
She herself went towards the kitchen tent, and found a young Amalekite sitting on the ground with the princess’s servants. He sprang up as soon as he saw the damsel.
“I have brought four fine partridges,”117 he said, “which I snared myself, and I have brought this turquoise for you—my brother found it in a rock. This stone brings good luck, and is good for the eyes; it gives victory over our enemies, and keeps away bad dreams.”
“Thank you!” said Uarda, and taking the boy’s hand, as he gave her the sky-blue stone, she led him forward into the dusk.
“Listen, Salich” she said