"Mena has not written for so long," Nefert said softly.  "Ah! here is the
steward!"

Katuti turned to the officer, who had entered the veranda through a side
door:

"What do you bring," she asked.

"The dealer Abscha," was the answer, "presses for payment.  The new
Syrian chariot and the purple cloth--"

"Sell some corn," ordered Katuti.

"Impossible, for the tribute to the temples is not yet paid, and already
so much has been delivered to the dealers that scarcely enough remains
over for the maintenance of the household and for sowing."

"Then pay with beasts."

"But, madam," said the steward sorrowfully, "only yesterday, we again
sold a herd to the Mohar; and the water-wheels must be turned, and the
corn must be thrashed, and we need beasts for sacrifice, and milk,
butter, and cheese, for the use of the house, and dung for firing."

[In Egypt, where there is so little wood, to this day the dried dung
of beasts is the commonest kind of fuel.]

Katuti looked thoughtfully at the ground.

"It  must  be,"  she  said  presently.  "Ride  to Hermonthis, and say to
the keeper of the stud that he must have ten of Mena's golden bays driven
over here."

"I have already spoken to him," said the steward, "but he maintains that
Mena strictly forbade him to part with even one of the horses, for he is
proud of the stock.  Only for the chariot of the lady Nefert "

"I require obedience," said Katuti decidedly and cutting short the
steward's words, "and I expect the horses to-morrow."

"But the stud-master is a daring man, whom Mena looks upon as
indispensable, and he--"

"I command here, and not the absent," cried Katuti enraged, "and I
require the horses in spite of the former orders of my son-in-law."

Nefert, during this conversation, pulled herself up from her indolent
attitude.  On hearing the last words she rose from her couch, and said,
with a decision which surprised even her mother--

"The orders of my husband  must  be  obeyed.  The horses that Mena loves
shall stay in their stalls.  Take this armlet that the king gave me; it
is worth more than twenty horses."

The steward examined the trinket, richly set with precious stones, and
looked enquiringly at Katuti.  She shrugged her shoulders, nodded
consent, and said--

"Abscha shall hold it as a pledge till Mena's booty arrives.  For a year
your husband has sent nothing of importance."

When the steward was gone, Nefert stretched herself again on her couch
and said wearily:

"I thought we were rich."

"We might be," said Katuti bitterly; but as she perceived that Nefert's
cheeks again were glowing, she said amiably, "Our high rank imposes great
duties on us.  Princely blood flows in our veins, and the eyes of the
people are turned on the wife of the most brilliant hero in the king's
army.  They shall not say that she is neglected by her husband.  How long
Mena remains away!"

"I hear a noise in the court," said Nefert.  "The Regent is coming."

Katuti turned again towards the garden.

A breathless slave rushed in, and announced that Bent-Anat, the daughter
of the king, had dismounted at the gate, and was approaching the garden
with the prince Rameri.

Nefert left her couch, and went with her mother to meet the exalted
visitors.

As the mother and daughter bowed to kiss the robe of the princess, Bent-
Anat signed them back from her.  "Keep farther from me," she said; "the
priests have not yet entirely absolved me from my uncleanness."

"And in spite of them thou art clean in the sight of Ra!"  exclaimed the
boy who accompanied her, her brother of seventeen, who was brought up at
the House of Seti, which however he was to leave in a few weeks--and he
kissed her.

"I shall complain to Ameni of this wild boy," said Bent-Anat smiling.
"He would positively accompany me.  Your husband, Nefert, is his model,
and I had no peace in the house, for we came to bring you good news."

"From Mena?"  asked the young wife, pressing her hand to her heart.

"As you say," returned Bent-Anat.  "My father praises his ability, and
writes that he, before all others, will have his choice at the dividing
of the spoil."

Nefert threw a triumphant glance at her mother, and Katuti drew a deep
breath.

Bent-Anat stroked Nefert's cheeks like those of a child.  Then she turned
to Katuti, led her into the garden, and begged her to aid her, who had so
early lost her mother, with her advice in a weighty matter.

"My father," she continued, after a few introductory words, "informs me
that the Regent Ani desires me for his wife, and advises me to reward the
fidelity of the worthy man with my hand.  He advises it, you understand-
he does not command."

"And thou?"  asked Katuti.

"And I," replied Bent-Anat decidedly, "must refuse him."

"Thou must!"

Bent-Anat made a sign of assent and went on:

"It is quite clear to me.  I can do nothing else."

"Then thou dost not need my counsel, since even thy father, I well know,
will not be able to alter thy decision."

"Not God even," said Anat firmly.  "But you are Ani's friend, and as I
esteem him, I would save him from this humiliation.  Endeavor to persuade
him to give up his suit.  I will meet him as though I knew nothing of his
letter to my father."

Katuti looked down reflectively.  Then she said--"The Regent certainly
likes very well to pass his hours of leisure with me gossiping or playing
draughts, but I do not know that I should dare to speak to him of so
grave a matter."

"Marriage-projects are women's affairs," said Bent-Anat, smiling.

"But the marriage of a princess is a state event," replied the widow.
"In this case it is true the uncle

[Among the Orientals--and even the Spaniards--it was and is common
to give the name of uncle to a parent's cousin.]

only courts his niece, who is dear to him, and who he hopes will make the
second half of his life the brightest.  Ani is kind and without severity.
Thou would'st win in him a husband, who would wait on thy looks, and bow
willingly to thy strong will."

Bent-Anat's eyes flashed, and she hastily exclaimed: "That is exactly
what forces the decisive irrevocable 'No' to my lips.  Do you think that
because I am as proud as my mother, and resolute like my father, that I
wish for a husband whom I could govern and lead as I would?  How little
you know me!  I will be obeyed by my dogs, my servants, my officers, if
the Gods so will it, by my children.  Abject beings, who will kiss my
feet, I meet on every road, and can buy by the hundred, if I wish it,
in the slave market.  I may be courted twenty times, and reject twenty
suitors, but not because I fear that they might bend my pride and my
will; on the contrary, because I feel them increased.  The man to whom I
could wish to offer my hand must be of a loftier stamp, must be greater,
firmer, and better than I, and I will flutter after the mighty wing-
strokes of his spirit, and smile at my own weakness, and glory in
admiring his superiority."

Katuti listened to the maiden with the smile by which the experienced
love to signify their superiority over the visionary.

"Ancient times may have produced such men," she said.  "But if in these
days thou thinkest to find one, thou wilt wear the lock of youth,

[The lock of youth was a curl of hair which all the younger members
of princely families wore at the side of the head.  The young Horus
is represented with it.]

till thou art grey.  Our thinkers are no heroes, and our heroes are no
sages.  Here come thy brother and Nefert."

"Will you persuade Ani to give up his suit!"  said the princess urgently.

"I will endeavor to do so, for thy sake," replied Katuti.  Then, turning
half to the young Rameri and half to his sister, she said:

"The chief of the House of Seti, Ameni, was in his youth such a man as
thou paintest, Bent-Anat.  Tell us, thou son of Rameses, that art growing
up under the young sycamores, which shall some day over-shadow the land-
whom dost thou esteem the highest among thy companions?  Is there one
among them, who is conspicuous above them all for a lofty spirit and
strength of intellect?"

The young Rameri looked gaily at the speaker, and said laughing: "We are
all much alike, and do more or less willingly what we are compelled, and
by preference every thing that we ought not."

"A mighty soul--a youth, who promises to be a second Snefru, a Thotmes,
or even an Amem?  Dost thou know none such in the House of Seti?"  asked
the widow.  "Oh yes!"  cried Rameri with eager certainty.

"And he is--?"  asked Katuti.

"Pentaur, the poet," exclaimed the youth.  Bent-Anat's face glowed with
scarlet color, while her, brother went on to explain.

"He is noble and of a lofty soul, and all the Gods dwell in him when he
speaks.  Formerly we used to go to sleep in the lecture-hall; but his
words carry us away, and if we do not take in the full meaning of his
thoughts, yet we feel that they are genuine and noble."

Bent-Anat breathed quicker at these words, and her eyes hung on the boy's
lips.

"You know him, Bent-Anat," continued Rameri.  "He was with you at the
paraschites' house, and in the temple-court when Ameni pronounced you
unclean.  He is as tall and handsome as the God Mentli, and I feel that
he is one of those whom we can never forget when once we have seen them.
Yesterday, after you had left the temple, he spoke as he never spoke
before; he poured fire into our souls.  Do not laugh, Katuti, I feel it
burning still.  This morning we were informed that he had been sent from
the temple, who knows where--and had left us a message of farewell.  It
was not thought at all necessary to communicate the reason to us; but we
know more than the masters think.  He did not reprove you strongly
enough, Bent-Anat, and therefore he is driven out of the House of Seti.
We have agreed to combine to ask for him to be recalled; Anana is drawing
up a letter to the chief priest, which we shall all subscribe.  It would
turn out badly for one alone, but they cannot be at all of us at once.
Very likely they will have the sense to recall him.  If not, we shall all
complain to our fathers, and they are not the meanest in the land."

"It is a complete rebellion," cried Katuti.  "Take care, you lordlings;
Ameni and the other prophets are not to be trifled with."

"Nor we either," said Rameri laughing,  "If Pentaur is kept in
banishment, I shall appeal to my father to place me at the school at
Heliopolis or Chennu, and the others will follow me.  Come, Bent-Anat, I
must be back in the trap before sunset.  Excuse me, Katuti, so we call
the school.  Here comes your little Nemu."

The brother and sister left the garden.

As soon as the ladies, who accompanied them, had turned their backs,
Bent-Anat grasped her brother's hand with unaccustomed warmth, and said:

"Avoid all imprudence; but your demand is just, and I will help you with
all my heart."




CHAPTER XI.

As soon as Bent-Anat had quitted Mena's domain, the dwarf Nemu entered
the garden with a letter, and briefly related his adventures; but in such
a comical fashion that both the ladies laughed, and Katuti, with a lively
gaiety, which was usually foreign to her, while she warned him, at the
same time praised his acuteness.  She looked at the seal of the letter
and said:

"This is a lucky day; it has brought us great things, and the promise of
greater things in the future."  Nefert came close up to her and said
imploringly: "Open the letter, and see if there is nothing in it from
him."

Katuti unfastened the wax, looked through the letter with a hasty glance,
stroked the cheek of her child, and said:

"Perhaps your brother has written for him; I see no line in his
handwriting."

Nefert on her side glanced at the letter, but not to read it, only to
seek some trace of the well-known handwriting of her husband.

Like all the Egyptian women of good family she could read, and during the
first two years of her married life she had often--very often--had the
opportunity of puzzling, and yet rejoicing, over the feeble signs which
the iron hand of the charioteer had scrawled on the papyrus for her whose
slender fingers could guide the reed pen with firmness and decision.

She examined the letter, and at last said, with tears in her eyes:

"Nothing!  I will go to my room, mother."

Katuti kissed her and said, "Hear first what your brother writes."

But Nefert shook her head, turned away in silence, and disappeared into
the house.

Katuti was not very friendly to her son-in-law, but her heart clung to
her handsome, reckless son, the very image of her lost husband, the
favorite of women, and the gayest youth among the young nobles who
composed the chariot-guard of the king.

How fully he had written to-day--he who weilded the reed-pen so
laboriously.

This really was a letter; while, usually, he only asked in the fewest
words for fresh funds for the gratification of his extravagant tastes.

This time she might look for thanks, for not long since he must have
received a considerable supply, which she had abstracted from the income
of the possessions entrusted to her by her son-in-law.

She began to read.

The cheerfulness, with which she had met the dwarf, was insincere, and
had resembled the brilliant colors of the rainbow, which gleam over the
stagnant waters of a bog.  A stone falls into the pool, the colors
vanish, dim mists rise up, and it becomes foul and clouded.

The news which her son's letter contained fell, indeed, like a block of
stone on Katuti's soul.

Our deepest sorrows always flow from the same source as might have filled
us with joy, and those wounds burn the fiercest which are inflicted by a
hand we love.

The farther Katuti went in the lamentably incorrect epistle--which she
could only decipher with difficulty--which her darling had written to
her, the paler grew her face, which she several times covered with her
trembling hands, from which the letter dropped.

Nemu squatted on the earth near her, and followed all her movements.

When she sprang forward with a heart-piercing scream, and pressed her
forehead to a rough palmtrunk, he crept up to her, kissed her feet, and
exclaimed with a depth of feeling that overcame even Katuti, who was
accustomed to hear only gay or bitter speeches from the lips of her
jester--

"Mistress! lady!  what has happened?"

Katuti collected herself, turned to him, and tried to speak; but her pale
lips remained closed, and her eyes gazed dimly into vacancy as though a
catalepsy had seized her.

"Mistress!  Mistress!"  cried the dwarf again, with growing agitation.
"What is the matter? shall I call thy daughter?"

Katuti made a sign with her hand, and cried feebly: "The wretches! the
reprobates!"

Her breath began to come quickly, the blood mounted to her cheeks
and her flashing eyes; she trod upon the letter, and wept so loud and
passionately, that the dwarf, who had never before seen tears in her
eyes, raised himself timidly, and said in mild reproach: "Katuti!"

She laughed bitterly, and said with a trembling voice:

"Why do you call my name so loud! it is disgraced and degraded.  How the
nobles and the ladies will rejoice!  Now envy can point at us with
spiteful joy--and a minute ago I was praising this day!  They say one
should exhibit one's happiness in the streets, and conceal one's misery;
on the contrary, on the contrary!  Even the Gods should not know of one's
hopes and joys, for they too are envious and spiteful!"

Again she leaned her head against the palm-tree.  "Thou speakest of
shame, and not of death," said Nemu, "and I learned from thee that one
should give nothing up for lost excepting the dead."

These words had a powerful effect on the agitated woman.  Quickly and
vehemently she turned upon the dwarf saying.

"You are clever, and faithful too, so listen!  but if you were Amon
himself there is nothing to be done--"

"We must try," said Nemu, and his sharp eyes met those of his mistress.

"Speak," he said, "and trust me.  Perhaps I can be of no use; but that I
can be silent thou knowest."

"Before long the children in the streets will  talk of what this tells
me," said Katuti, laughing with bitterness, "only Nefert must know
nothing of what has happened--nothing, mind; what is that? the Regent
coming! quick, fly; tell him I am suddenly taken ill, very ill; I cannot
see him, not now!  No one is to be admitted--no one, do you hear?"

The dwarf went.

When he came back after he had fulfilled his errand, he found his
mistress still in a fever of excitement.

"Listen," she said; "first the smaller matter, then the frightful, the
unspeakable.  Rameses loads Mena with marks of his favor.  It came to a
division of the spoils of war for the year; a great heap of treasure lay
ready for each of his followers, and the charioteer had to choose before
all the others."

"Well?"  said the dwarf.

"Well!"  echoed Katuti.  "Well! how did the worthy householder care for
his belongings at home, how did he seek to relieve his indebted estate?
It is disgraceful, hideous!  He passed by the silver, the gold, the
jewels, with a laugh; and took the captive daughter of the Danaid
princes, and led her into his tent."

"Shameful!"  muttered the dwarf.

"Poor, poor Nefert!"  cried Katuti, covering her face with her hands.

"And what more?"  asked Nemu hastily.

"That," said Katuti, "that is--but I will keep calm--quite calm and
quiet.  You know my son.  He is heedless, but he loves me and his sister
more than anything in the world.  I, fool as I was, to persuade him to
economy, had vividly described our evil plight, and after that
disgraceful conduct of Mena he thought of us and of our anxieties.  His
share of the booty was small, and could not help us.  His comrades threw
dice for the shares they had obtained--he staked his to win more for us.
He lost--all--all--and at last against an enormous sum, still thinking of
us, and only of us, he staked the mummy of his dead father.

[It was a king of the fourth dynasty, named Asychis by Herodotus,
who it is admitted was the first to pledge the mummies of his
ancestors.  "He who stakes this pledge and fails to redeem the debt
shall, after his death, rest neither in his father's tomb nor in any
other, and sepulture shall be denied to his descendants."  Herod.
11. 136.]

He lost.  If he does not redeem the pledge before the expiration of the
third month, he will fall into infamy, the mummy will belong to the
winner, and disgrace and ignominy will be my lot and his."

Katuti pressed her hands on her face, the dwarf muttered to himself, "The
gambler and hypocrite!"  When his mistress had grown calmer, he said:

"It is horrible, yet all is not lost.  How much is the debt?"

It sounded like a heavy curse, when Katuti replied, "Thirty Babylonian
talents."--[L7000 sterling in 1881.]

The dwarf cried out, as if an asp had stung him.  "Who dared to bid
against such a mad stake?"

"The Lady Hathor's son, Antef," answered Katuti, "who has already gambled
away the inheritance of his fathers, in Thebes."

"He will not remit one grain of wheat of his claim," cried the dwarf.
"And Mena?"

"How could my son turn to him after what had happened?  The poor child
implores me to ask the assistance of the Regent."

"Of the Regent?"  said the dwarf, shaking his big head.  "Impossible!"

"I know, as matters now stand; but his place, his name."

"Mistress," said the dwarf, and deep purpose rang in the words, "do not
spoil the future for the sake of the present.  If thy son loses his honor
under King Rameses, the future King, Ani, may restore it to him.  If the
Regent now renders you all an important service, he will regard you as
amply paid when our efforts have succeeded, and he sits on the throne.
He lets himself be led by thee now because thou hast no need of his help,
and dost seem to work only for his sake, and for his elevation.  As soon
as thou hast appealed to him, and he has assisted thee, all thy
confidence and freedom will be gone, and the more difficult he finds it
to raise so large a sum of money at once, the angrier he will be to think
that thou art making use of him.  Thou knowest his circumstances."

"He is in debt," said Katuti.  "I know that."

"Thou should'st know it," cried the dwarf, "for thou thyself hast forced
him to enormous expenses.  He has won the people of Thebes with dazzling
festive displays; as guardian of Apis

[When Apis (the sacred bull) died under Ptolemy I.  Soter, his
keepers spent not only the money which they had received for his
maintenance, in his obsequies but borrowed 50 talents of silver from
the king.  In the time of Diodurus 100 talents were spent for the
same purpose.]

he gave a large donation to Memphis; he bestowed thousands on the leaders
of the troops sent into Ethiopia, which were equipped by him; what his
spies cost him at, the camp of the king, thou knowest.  He has borrowed
sums of money from most of the rich men in the country, and that is well,
for so many creditors are so many allies.  The Regent is a bad debtor;
but the king Ani, they reckon, will be a grateful payer."

Katuti looked at the dwarf in astonishment.  "You know men!"  she said.

"To my sorrow!"  replied Nemu.  "Do not apply to the Regent, and before
thou dost sacrifice the labor of years, and thy future greatness, and
that of those near to thee, sacrifice thy son's honor."

"And my husband's, and my own?"  exclaimed Katuti.  "How can you know
what that is!  Honor is a word that the slave may utter, but whose
meaning he can never comprehend; you rub the weals that are raised on you
by blows; to me every finger pointed at me in scorn makes a wound like an
ashwood lance with a poisoned tip of brass.  Oh ye holy Gods!  who can
help us?"

The miserable woman pressed her hands over her eyes, as if to shut out
the sight of her own disgrace.  The dwarf looked at her compassionately,
and said in a changed tone:

"Dost thou remember the diamond which fell out of Nefert's handsomest
ring?  We hunted for it, and could not find it.  Next day, as I was going
through the room, I trod on something hard; I stooped down and found the
stone.  What the noble organ of sight, the eye, overlooked, the callous
despised sole of the foot found; and perhaps the small slave, Nemu, who
knows nothing of honor, may succeed in finding a mode of escape which is
not revealed to the lofty soul of his mistress!"

"What are you thinking of?"  asked Katuti.

"Escape," answered the dwarf.  "Is it true that thy sister Setchem has
visited thee, and that you are reconciled?"

"She offered me her hand, and I took it?"

"Then go to her.  Men are never more helpful than after a reconciliation.
The enmity they have driven out, seems to leave as it were a freshly-
healed wound which must be touched with caution; and Setchem is of thy
own blood, and kind-hearted."

"She is not rich," replied Katuti.  "Every palm in her garden comes from
her husband, and belongs to her children."

"Paaker, too, was with you?"

"Certainly only by the entreaty of his mother--he hates my son-in-law."

"I know it," muttered the dwarf, "but if Nefert would ask him?"

The widow drew herself up indignantly.  She felt that she had allowed the
dwarf too much freedom, and ordered him to leave her alone.

Nemu kissed her robe and asked timidly:

"Shall I forget that thou hast trusted me, or am I permitted to consider
further as to thy son's safety?"  Katuti stood for a moment undecided,
then she said:

"You were clever enough to find what I carelessly dropped; perhaps some
God may show you what I ought to do.  Now leave me."

"Wilt thou want me early to-morrow?"

"No."

"Then I will go to the Necropolis, and offer a sacrifice."

"Go!"  said Katuti, and went towards the house with the fatal letter in
her hand.

Nemu stayed behind alone; he looked thoughtfully at the ground, murmuring
to himself.

"She must not lose her honor; not at present, or indeed all will be
lost.  What is this honor?  We all come into the world without it,
and most of us go to the grave without knowing it, and very good folks
notwithstanding.  Only a few who are rich and idle weave it in with the
homely stuff of their souls, as the Kuschites do their hair with grease
and oils, till it forms a cap of which, though it disfigures them, they
are so proud that they would rather have their ears cut off than the
monstrous thing.  I see, I see--but before I open my mouth I will go to
my mother.  She knows more than twenty prophets."




CHAPTER XII.

Before the sun had risen the next morning, Nemu got himself ferried over
the Nile, with the small white ass which Mena's deceased father had given
him many years before.  He availed himself of the cool hour which
precedes the rising of the sun for his ride through the Necropolis.

Well acquainted as he was with every stock and stone, he avoided the high
roads which led to the goal of his expedition, and trotted towards the
hill which divides the valley of the royal tombs from the plain of the
Nile.

Before him opened a noble amphitheatre of lofty lime-stone peaks, the
background of the stately terrace-temple which the proud ancestress of
two kings of the fallen family, the great Hatasu, had erected to their
memory, and to the Goddess Hathor.

Nemu left the sanctuary to his left, and rode up the steep hill-path
which was the nearest way from the plain to the valley of the tombs.

Below him lay a bird's eye view of the terrace-building of Hatasu, and
before him, still slumbering in cool dawn, was the Necropolis with its
houses and temples and colossal statues, the broad Nile glistening with
white sails under the morning mist; and, in the distant east, rosy with
the coming sun, stood Thebes and her gigantic temples.

But the dwarf saw nothing of the glorious panorama that lay at his feet;
absorbed in thought, and stooping over the neck of his ass, he let the
panting beast climb and rest at its pleasure.

When he had reached half the height of the hill, he perceived the sound
of footsteps coming nearer and nearer to him.

The vigorous walker had soon reached him, and bid him good morning, which
he civilly returned.

The hill-path was narrow, and when Nemu observed that the man who
followed him was a priest, he drew up his donkey on a level spot, and
said reverently:

"Pass on, holy father; for thy two feet carry thee quicker than my four."

"A sufferer needs my help," replied the leech Nebsecht, Pentaur's friend,
whom we have already seen in the House of Seti, and by the bed of the
paraschites' daughter; and he hastened on so as to gain on the slow pace
of the rider.

Then rose the glowing disk of the sun above the eastern horizon, and from
the sanctuaries below the travellers rose up the pious many-voiced chant
of praise.

Nemu slipped off his ass, and assumed an attitude of prayer; the priest
did the same; but while the dwarf devoutly fixed his eyes on the new
birth of the Sun-God from the eastern range, the priest's eyes wandered
to the earth, and his raised hand fell to pick up a rare fossil shell
which lay on the path.

In a few minutes Nebsecht rose, and Nemu followed him.

"It is a fine morning," said the dwarf; "the holy fathers down there seem
more cheerful to-day than usual."

The surgeon laughed assent.  "Do you belong to the Necropolis?"  he said.
"Who here keeps dwarfs?"

"No one," answered the little man.  "But I will ask thee a question.
Who that lives here behind the hill is of so much importance, that a
leech from the House of Seti sacrifices his night's rest for him?"