Three days had passed since the pioneer’s departure, and although it was
still early, busy occupation was astir in Bent-Anat’s work-rooms.
The ladies had passed the stormy night, which had succeeded the exciting
evening of the festival, without sleep.
Nefert felt tired and sleepy the next morning, and begged the princess
to introduce her to her new duties for the first time next day; but the
princess spoke to her encouragingly, told her that no man should put
off doing right till the morrow, and urged her to follow her into her
workshop.
“We must both come to different minds,” said she. “I often shudder
involuntarily, and feel as if I bore a brand--as if I had a stain here
on my shoulder where it was touched by Paaker’s rough hand.”
The first day of labor gave Nefert a good many difficulties to overcome;
on the second day the work she had begun already had a charm for her,
and by the third she rejoiced in the little results of her care.
Bent-Anat had put her in the right place, for she had the direction of a
large number of young girls and women, the daughters, wives, and widows
of those Thebans who were at the war, or who had fallen in the field,
who sorted and arranged the healing herbs. Her helpers sat in little
circles on the ground; in the midst of each lay a great heap of fresh
and dry plants, and in front of each work-woman a number of parcels of
the selected roots, leaves, and flowers.
An old physician presided over the whole, and had shown Nefert the first
day the particular plants which he needed.
The wife of Mena, who was fond of flowers, had soon learnt them all, and
she taught willingly, for she loved children.
She soon had favorites among the children, and knew some as being
industrious and careful, others as idle and heedless:
“Ay! ay!” she exclaimed, bending over a little half-naked maiden with
great almond-shaped eyes. “You are mixing them all together. Your
father, as you tell me, is at the war. Suppose, now, an arrow were
to strike him, and this plant, which would hurt him, were laid on the
burning wound instead of this other, which would do him good--that would
be very sad.”
The child nodded her head, and looked her work through again. Nefert
turned to a little idler, and said: “You are chattering again, and doing
nothing, and yet your father is in the field. If he were ill now, and
has no medicine, and if at night when he is asleep he dreams of you, and
sees you sitting idle, he may say to himself: ‘Now I might get well, but
my little girl at home does not love me, for she would rather sit with
her hands in her lap than sort herbs for her sick father.’”
Then Nefert turned to a large group of the girls, who were sorting
plants, and said: “Do you, children, know the origin of all these
wholesome, healing herbs? The good Horus went out to fight against Seth,
the murderer of his father, and the horrible enemy wounded Horus in the
eye in the struggle; but the son of Osiris conquered, for good always
conquers evil. But when Isis saw the bad wound, she pressed her son’s
head to her bosom, and her heart was as sad as that of any poor human
mother that holds her suffering child in her arms. And she thought: ‘How
easy it is to give wounds, and how hard it is to heal them!’ and so she
wept; one tear after another fell on the earth, and wherever they wetted
the ground there sprang up a kindly healing plant.”
“Isis is good!” cried a little girl opposite to her. “Mother says Isis
loves children when they are good.”
“Your mother is right,” replied Nefert. “Isis herself has her dear
little son Horus; and every human being that dies, and that was good,
becomes a child again, and the Goddess makes it her own, and takes it to
her breast, and nurses it with her sister Nephthys till he grows up and
can fight for his father.”
Nefert observed that while she spoke one of the women was crying. She
went up to her, and learned that her husband and her son were both dead,
the former in Syria, and the latter after his return to Egypt. “Poor
soul!” said Nefert. “Now you will be very careful, that the wounds of
others may be healed. I will tell you something more about Isis. She
loved her husband Osiris dearly, as you did your dead husband, and I my
husband Mena, but he fell a victim to the cunning of Seth, and she could
not tell where to find the body that had been carried away, while you
can visit your husband in his grave. Then Isis went through the land
lamenting, and ah! what was to become of Egypt, which received all its
fruitfulness from Osiris. The sacred Nile was dried up, and not a blade
of verdure was green on its banks. The Goddess grieved over this
beyond words, and one of her tears fell in the bed of the river, and
immediately it began to rise. You know, of course, that each inundation
arises from a tear of Isis. Thus a widow’s sorrow may bring blessing to
millions of human beings.”
The woman had listened to her attentively, and when Nefert ceased
speaking she said:
“But I have still three little brats of my son’s to feed, for his wife,
who was a washerwoman, was eaten by a crocodile while she was at work.
Poor folks must work for themselves, and not for others. If the princess
did not pay us, I could not think of the wounds of the soldiers, who do
not belong to me. I am no longer strong, and four mouths to fill--”
Nefert was shocked--as she often was in the course of her new
duties--and begged Bent-Gnat to raise the wages of the woman.
“Willingly,” said the princess. “How could I beat down such an
assistant. Come now with me into the kitchen. I am having some fruit
packed for my father and brothers; there must be a box for Mena too.”
Nefert followed her royal friend, found them packing in one case the
golden dates of the oasis of Amon, and in another the dark dates of
Nubia, the king’s favorite sort. “Let me pack them!” cried Nefert;
she made the servants empty the box again, and re-arranged the
various-colored dates in graceful patterns, with other fruits preserved
in sugar.
Bent-Anat looked on, and when she had finished she took her hand.
“Whatever your fingers have touched,” she exclaimed, “takes some pretty
aspect. Give me that scrap of papyrus; I shall put it in the case, and
write upon it:
“‘These were packed for king Rameses by his daughter’s clever helpmate,
the wife of Mena.’”
After the mid-day rest the princess was called away, and Nefert remained
for some hours alone with the work-women.
When the sun went down, and the busy crowd were about to leave, Nefert
detained them, and said: “The Sun-bark is sinking behind the western
hills; come, let us pray together for the king and for those we love in
the field. Each of you think of her own: you children of your fathers,
you women of your sons, and we wives of our distant husbands, and let us
entreat Amon that they may return to us as certainly as the sun, which
now leaves us, will rise again to-morrow morning.”
Nefert knelt down, and with her the women and the children.
When they rose, a little girl went up to Nefert, and said, pulling her
dress: “Thou madest us kneel here yesterday, and already my mother is
better, because I prayed for her.”
“No doubt,” said Nefert, stroking the child’s black hair.
She found Bent-Anat on the terrace meditatively gazing across to the
Necropolis, which was fading into darkness before her eyes. She started
when she heard the light footsteps of her friend.
“I am disturbing thee,” said Nefert, about to retire.
“No, stay,” said Bent-Anat. “I thank the Gods that I have you, for my
heart is sad--pitifully sad.”
“I know where your thoughts were,” said Nefert softly. “Well?” asked the
princess.
“With Pentaur.”
“I think of him--always of him,” replied the princess, “and nothing else
occupies my heart. I am no longer myself. What I think I ought not to
think, what I feel I ought not to feel, and yet, I cannot command it,
and I think my heart would bleed to death if I tried to cut out those
thoughts and feelings. I have behaved strangely, nay unbecomingly,
and now that which is hard to endure is hanging over me, something
strange-which will perhaps drive you from me back to your mother.”
“I will share everything with you,” cried Nefert. “What is going to
happen? Are you then no longer the daughter of Rameses?”
“I showed myself to the people as a woman of the people,” answered
Bent-Anat, “and I must take the consequences. Bek en Chunsu,
the high-priest of Amon, has been with me, and I have had a long
conversation with him. The worthy man is good to me, I know, and my
father ordered me to follow his advice before any one’s. He showed me
that I have erred deeply. In a state of uncleanness I went into one
of the temples of the Necropolis, and after I had once been into the
paraschites’ house and incurred Ameni’s displeasure, I did it a second
time. They know over there all that took place at the festival. Now I
must undergo purification, either with great solemnity at the hands of
Ameni himself, before all the priests and nobles in the House of
Seti, or by performing a pilgrimage to the Emerald-Hathor, under whose
influence the precious stones are hewn from the rocks, metals dug out,
and purified by fire. The Goddess shall purge me from my uncleanness
as metal is purged from the dross. At a day’s journey and more from the
mines, an abundant stream flows from ‘the holy mountain-Sinai,’ as it is
called by the Mentut--and near it stands the sanctuary of the Goddess,
in which priests grant purification. The journey is a long one, through
the desert, and over the sea; But Bek en Chunsu advises me to venture
it. Ameni, he says, is not amiably disposed towards me, because I
infringed the ordinance which he values above all others. I must submit
to double severity, he says, because the people look first to those of
the highest rank; and if I went unpunished for contempt of the sacred
institutions there might be imitators among the crowd. He speaks in the
name of the Gods, and they measure hearts with an equal measure. The
ell-measure is the symbol of the Goddess of Truth. I feel that it is all
not unjust; and yet I find it hard to submit to the priest’s decree, for
I am the daughter of Rameses!”
“Aye, indeed!” exclaimed Nefert, “and he is himself a God!”
“But he taught me to respect the laws!” interrupted the princess. “I
discussed another thing with Bek en Chunsu. You know I rejected the suit
of the Regent. He must secretly be much vexed with me. That indeed would
not alarm me, but he is the guardian and protector appointed over me
by my father, and yet can I turn to him in confidence for counsel,
and help? No! I am still a woman, and Rameses’ daughter! Sooner will I
travel through a thousand deserts than humiliate my father through his
child. By to-morrow I shall have decided; but, indeed, I have already
decided to make the journey, hard as it is to leave much that is here.
Do not fear, dear! but you are too tender for such a journey, and to
such a distance; I might--”
“No, no,” cried Nefert. “I am going, too, if you were going to the four
pillars of heaven, at the limits of the earth. You have given me a new
life, and the little sprout that is green within me would wither again
if I had to return to my mother. Only she or I can be in our house, and
I will re-enter it only with Mena.”
“It is settled--I must go,” said the princess. “Oh! if only my father
were not so far off, and that I could consult him!”
“Yes! the war, and always the war!” sighed Nefert. “Why do not men rest
content with what they have, and prefer the quiet peace, which makes
life lovely, to idle fame?”
“Would they be men? should we love them?” cried Bent-Anat eagerly. “Is
not the mind of the Gods, too, bent on war? Did you ever see a more
sublime sight than Pentaur, on that evening when he brandished the stake
he had pulled up, and exposed his life to protect an innocent girl who
was in danger?”
“I dared not once look down into the court,” said Nefert. “I was in such
an agony of mind. But his loud cry still rings in my ears.”
“So rings the war cry of heroes before whom the enemy quails!” exclaimed
Bent-Anat.
“Aye, truly so rings the war cry!” said prince Rameri, who had entered
his sister’s half-dark room unperceived by the two women.
The princess turned to the boy. “How you frightened me!” she said.
“You!” said Rameri astonished.
“Yes, me. I used to have a stout heart, but since that evening I
frequently tremble, and an agony of terror comes over me, I do not know
why. I believe some demon commands me.”
“You command, wherever you go; and no one commands you,” cried Rameri.
“The excitement and tumult in the valley, and on the quay, still agitate
you. I grind my teeth myself when I remember how they turned me out
of the school, and how Paaker set the dog at us. I have gone through a
great deal today too.”
“Where were you so long?” asked Bent-Anat. “My uncle Ani commanded that
you should not leave the palace.”
“I shall be eighteen years old next month,” said the prince, “and need
no tutor.”
“But your father--” said Bent-Anat.
“My father”--interrupted the boy, “he little knows the Regent. But I
shall write to him what I have today heard said by different people.
They were to have sworn allegiance to Ani at that very feast in the
valley, and it is quite openly said that Ani is aiming at the throne,
and intends to depose the king. You are right, it is madness--but there
must be something behind it all.”
Nefert turned pale, and Bent-Anat asked for particulars. The prince
repeated all he had gathered, and added laughing: “Ani depose my father!
It is as if I tried to snatch the star of Isis from the sky to light the
lamps--which are much wanted here.”
“It is more comfortable in the dark,” said Nefert. “No, let us have
lights,” said Bent-Anat. “It is better to talk when we can see each
other face to face. I have no belief in the foolish talk of the people;
but you are right--we must bring it to my fathers knowledge.”
“I heard the wildest gossip in the City of the Dead,” said Rameri.
“You ventured over there? How very wrong!”
“I disguised myself a little, and I have good news for you. Pretty Uarda
is much better. She received your present, and they have a house of
their own again. Close to the one that was burnt down, there was a
tumbled-down hovel, which her father soon put together again; he is a
bearded soldier, who is as much like her as a hedgehog is like a white
dove. I offered her to work in the palace for you with the other girls,
for good wages, but she would not; for she has to wait on her sick
grandmother, and she is proud, and will not serve any one.”
“It seems you were a long time with the paraschites’ people,” said
Bent-Anat reprovingly. “I should have thought that what has happened to
me might have served you as a warning.”
“I will not be better than you!” cried the boy. “Besides, the
paraschites is dead, and Uarda’s father is a respectable soldier, who
can defile no one. I kept a long way from the old woman. To-morrow I am
going again. I promised her.”
“Promised who?” asked his sister.
“Who but Uarda? She loves flowers, and since the rose which you gave
her she has not seen one. I have ordered the gardener to cut me a basket
full of roses to-morrow morning, and shall take them to her myself.”
“That you will not!” cried Bent-Anat. “You are still but half a
child--and, for the girl’s sake too, you must give it up.”
“We only gossip together,” said the prince coloring, “and no one shall
recognize me. But certainly, if you mean that, I will leave the basket
of roses, and go to her alone. No--sister, I will not be forbidden this;
she is so charming, so white, so gentle, and her voice is so soft and
sweet! And she has little feet, as small as--what shall I say?--as small
and graceful as Nefert’s hand. We talked most about Pentaur. She knows
his father, who is a gardener, and knows a great deal about him. Only
think! she says the poet cannot be the son of his parents, but a good
spirit that has come down on earth--perhaps a God. At first she was very
timid, but when I spoke of Pentaur she grew eager; her reverence for him
is almost idolatry--and that vexed me.”
“You would rather she should reverence you so,” said Nefert smiling.
“Not at all,” cried Rameri. “But I helped to save her, and I am so happy
when I am sitting with her, that to-morrow, I am resolved, I will put
a flower in her hair. It is red certainly, but as thick as yours,
Bent-Anat, and it must be delightful to unfasten it and stroke it.”
The ladies exchanged a glance of intelligence, and the princess said
decidedly:
“You will not go to the City of the Dead to-morrow, my little son!”
“That we will see, my little mother!” He answered laughing; then he
turned grave.
“I saw my school-friend Anana too,” he said. “Injustice reigns in the
House of Seti! Pentaur is in prison, and yesterday evening they sat in
judgment upon him. My uncle was present, and would have pounced upon the
poet, but Ameni took him under his protection. What was finally decided,
the pupils could not learn, but it must have been something bad, for
the son of the Treasurer heard Ameni saying, after the sitting, to old
Gagabu: ‘Punishment he deserves, but I will not let him be overwhelmed;’
and he can have meant no one but Pentaur. To-morrow I will go over,
and learn more; something frightful, I am afraid--several years of
imprisonment is the least that will happen to him.”
Bent-Anat had turned very pale.
“And whatever they do to him,” she cried, “he will suffer for my sake!
Oh, ye omnipotent Gods, help him--help me, be merciful to us both!”
She covered her face with her hands, and left the room. Rameri asked
Nefert:
“What can have come to my sister? she seems quite strange to me; and you
too are not the same as you used to be.”
“We both have to find our way in new circumstances.”
“What are they?”
“That I cannot explain to you!--but it appears to me that you soon may
experience something of the same kind. Rumeri, do not go again to the
paraschites.”