and you might now enjoy your wealth in peace with your wife.”
“I am alone,” said Paaker.
“Then, if you come home again, let Katuti seek you out the prettiest wife in Egypt,” said the Regent smiling. “She sees herself every day in her mirror, 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 invisible toils. Up to the present moment he had been proud of his devotion to his calling, of his duties as Mohar; and now he had discovered that the king, whose chain of honor hung round his neck, undervalued him, and perhaps only suffered him to fill his arduous and dangerous post for the sake of his father, while he, notwithstanding the temptations offered him in Thebes by his wealth, had accepted it willingly and disinterestedly. He knew that his skill with the pen was small, but that was no reason why he should be despised; often had he wished that he could reconstitute his office exactly as Ani had suggested, but his petition to be allowed a secretary had been rejected by Rameses. What he spied out, he was told was to be kept secret, and no one could be responsible for the secrecy of another.
As his brother Horus grew up, he had followed him as his obedient assistant, 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; badly enough, as the pioneer thought, and yet not without credit; for the fellow knew how to write smooth words with a graceful pen.
Paaker, accustomed to solitude, became absorbed in thought, forgetting everything that surrounded him; even the widow herself, who had sunk on to a couch, and was observing him in silence.
He gazed into vacancy, while a crowd of sensations rushed confusedly through his brain. He thought himself cruelly ill-used, and he felt too that it was incumbent on him to become the instrument of a terrible fate to some other person. All was dim ‘and chaotic in his mind, his love merged 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 expended upon them—and with what a grudging hand they had rewarded him; he knew of but one indemnification for his wasted life, and in that he believed so firmly that he counted on it as if it were capital which he had invested in sound securities. But at this moment his resentful feelings embittered the sweet dream of hope, and he strove in vain for calmness and clear-sightedness; when such cross-roads as these met, no amulet, no divining rod could guide him; here he must think for himself, and beat his own road before he could walk in it; and yet he could think out no plan, and arrive at no decision.
He grasped his burning forehead in his hands, and started from his brooding reverie, to remember where he was, to recall his conversation with the mother of the woman he loved, and her saying that she was capable 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 mind what commissions you have to give me. The money for your son shall be conveyed to you to-day before sunset. May I not pay my respects to Nefert?”
“Not now, she is praying in the temple.”
“But to-morrow?”
“Willingly, my dear friend. She will be delighted to see you, and to thank you.”
“Farewell, Katuti.”
“Call me mother,” said the widow, and she waved her veil to him as a last farewell.
CHAPTER XIX.
As soon as Paaker had disappeared behind the shrubs, Katuti struck a little sheet of metal, a slave appeared, and Katuti asked her whether Nefert 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 few minutes later Nefert entered the hall.
“You want me?” she said; and after kissing her mother she sank upon her couch. “I am tired,” she exclaimed, “Nemu, take a fan and keep the flies 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 in private.”
The dwarf shrugged his shoulders and got up, but Nefert looked at her mother with an irresistible appeal.
“Let him stay,” she said, as pathetically as if her whole happiness depended upon it. “The flies torment me so, and Nemu always holds his tongue.”
She patted the dwarf’s big head as if he were a lap-dog, and called the white cat, which with a graceful leap sprang on to her shoulder and stood there with its back arched, to be stroked by her slender fingers.
Nemu looked enquiringly at his mistress, but Katuti turned to her daughter, 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 the same. Of course, if you wish it—”
“Nemu may stay then,” said Katuti, and her voice had the tone of that of a nurse who gives way to a naughty child. “Besides, he knows what I have to talk about.”
“There now!” said Nefert, kissing the head of the white cat, and she gave the fan back to the dwarf.
The widow looked at her daughter with sincere compassion, she went up to her and looked for the thousandth time in admiration at her pretty face.
“Poor child,” she sighed, “how willingly I would spare you the frightful news which sooner or later you must hear—must bear. Leave off your foolish play with the cat, I have things of the most hideous gravity to tell you.”
“Speak on,” replied Nefert. “To-day I cannot fear the worst. Mena’s star, the haruspex told me, stands under the sign of happiness, and I enquired of the oracle in the temple of Besa, and heard that my husband is 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 in it; the evening before last I saw you had been crying, and yesterday you did not look well; even the pomegranate flowers in your hair did not suit you.”
“Your brother,” sighed Katuti, “has occasioned me great trouble, and we might 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 the mummy of your father—”
“Horrible!” cried Nefert. “We must appeal at once to the king;—I will write to him myself; for Mena’s sake he will hear me. Rameses is great and noble, and will not let a house that is faithfully devoted to him fall into disgrace through the reckless folly of a boy. Certainly I will