Once or twice Pentaur and his companions had had to defend themselves
against hostile mountaineers, who rushed suddenly upon them out of the
woods. When they were about two days’ journey still from the end of
their march, they had a bloody skirmish with a roving band of men that
seemed to belong to a larger detachment of troops.
The nearer they got to Kadesh, the more familiar Kaschta showed himself
with every stock and stone, and he went forward to obtain information;
he returned somewhat anxious, for he had perceived the main body of the
Cheta army on the road which they must cross. How came the enemy here in
the rear of the Egyptian army? Could Rameses have sustained a defeat?
Only the day before they had met some Egyptian soldiers, who had told
them that the king was staying in the camp, and a great battle was
impending. This however could not have by this time been decided, and
they had met no flying Egyptians.
“If we can only get two miles farther without having to fight,” said
Uarda’s father. “I know what to do. Down below, there is a ravine, and
from it a path leads over hill and vale to the plain of Kadesh. No one
ever knew it but the Mohar and his most confidential servants. About
half-way there is a hidden cave, in which we have often stayed the
whole day long. The Cheta used to believe that the Mohar possessed magic
powers, and could make himself invisible, for when they lay in wait for
us on the way we used suddenly to vanish; but certainly not into the
clouds, only into the cave, which the Mohar used to call his Tuat. If
you are not afraid of a climb, and will lead your horse behind you for a
mile or two, I can show you the way, and to-morrow evening we will be at
the camp.”
Pentaur let his guide lead the way; they came, without having occasion
to fight, as far as the gorge between the hills, through which a full
and foaming mountain torrent rushed to the valley. Kaschta dropped from
his horse, and the others did the same. After the horses had passed
through the water, he carefully effaced their tracks as far as the road,
then for about half a mile he ascended the valley against the stream.
At last he stopped in front of a thick oleander-bush, looked carefully
about, and lightly pushed it aside; when he had found an entrance,
his companions and their weary scrambling beasts followed him without
difficulty, and they presently found themselves in a grove of lofty
cedars. Now they had to squeeze themselves between masses of rock, now
they labored up and down over smooth pebbles, which offered scarcely
any footing to the horses’ hoofs; now they had to push their way
through thick brushwood, and now to cross little brooks swelled by the
winter-rains.
The road became more difficult at every step, then it began to grow
dark, and heavy drops of rain fell from the clouded sky.
“Make haste, and keep close to me,” cried Kaschta. “Half an hour more,
and we shall be under shelter, if I do not lose my way.”
Then a horse broke down, and with great difficulty was got up again;
the rain fell with increased violence, the night grew darker, and the
soldier often found himself brought to a stand-still, feeling for the
path with his hands; twice he thought he had lost it, but he would not
give in till he had recovered the track. At last he stood still, and
called Pentaur to come to him.
“Hereabouts,” said he, “the cave must be; keep close to me--it is
possible that we may come upon some of the pioneer’s people. Provisions
and fuel were always kept here in his father’s time. Can you see me?
Hold on to my girdle, and bend your head low till I tell you you may
stand upright again. Keep your axe ready, we may find some of the Cheta
or bandits roosting there. You people must wait, we will soon call you
to come under shelter.”
Pentaur closely followed his guide, pushing his way through the dripping
brushwood, crawling through a low passage in the rock, and at last
emerging on a small rocky plateau.
“Take care where you are going!” cried Kaschta. “Keep to the left, to
the right there is a deep abyss. I smell smoke! Keep your hand on your
axe, there must be some one in the cave. Wait! I will fetch the men as
far as this.”
The soldier went back, and Pentaur listened for any sounds that might
come from the same direction as the smoke. He fancied he could perceive
a small gleam of light, and he certainly heard quite plainly, first
a tone of complaint, then an angry voice; he went towards the light,
feeling his way by the wall on his left; the light shone broader and
brighter, and seemed to issue from a crack in a door.
By this time the soldier had rejoined Pentaur, and both listened for a
few minutes; then the poet whispered to his guide:
“They are speaking Egyptian, I caught a few words.”
“All the better,” said Kaschta. “Paaker or some of his people are in
there; the door is there still, and shut. If we give four hard and
three gentle knocks, it will be opened. Can you understand what they are
saying?”
“Some one is begging to be set free,” replied Pentaur, “and speaks of
some traitor. The other has a rough voice, and says he must follow his
master’s orders. Now the one who spoke before is crying; do you hear? He
is entreating him by the soul of his father to take his fetters off. How
despairing his voice is! Knock, Kaschta--it strikes me we are come at
the right moment--knock, I say.”
The soldier knocked first four times, then three times. A shriek rang
through the cave, and they could hear a heavy, rusty bolt drawn back,
the roughly hewn door was opened, and a hoarse voice asked:
“Is that Paaker?”
“No,” answered the soldier, “I am Kaschta. Do not you know me again,
Nubi?”
The man thus addressed, who was Paaker’s Ethiopian slave, drew back in
surprise.
“Are you still alive?” he exclaimed. “What brings you here?”
“My lord here will tell you,” answered Kaschta as he made way for
Pentaur to enter the cave. The poet went up to the black man, and the
light of the fire which burned in the cave fell full on his face.
The old slave stared at him, and drew back in astonishment and terror.
He threw himself on the earth, howled like a dog that fawns at the feet
of his angry master, and cried out:
“He ordered it--Spirit of my master! he ordered it.” Pentaur stood
still, astounded and incapable of speech, till he perceived a young man,
who crept up to him on his hands and feet, which were bound with thongs,
and who cried to him in a tone, in which terror was mingled with a
tenderness which touched Pentaur’s very soul.
“Save me--Spirit of the Mohar! save me, father!” Then the poet spoke.
“I am no spirit of the dead,” said he. “I am the priest Pentaur; and I
know you, boy; you are Horus, Paaker’s brother, who was brought up with
me in the temple of Seti.”
The prisoner approached him trembling, looked at him enquiringly and
exclaimed:
“Be you who you may, you are exactly like my father in person and
in voice. Loosen my bonds, and listen to me, for the most hideous,
atrocious, and accursed treachery threatens us the king and all.”
Pentaur drew his sword, and cut the leather thongs which bound the young
man’s hands and feet. He stretched his released limbs, uttering thanks
to the Gods, then he cried:
“If you love Egypt and the king follow me; perhaps there is yet time to
hinder the hideous deed, and to frustrate this treachery.”
“The night is dark,” said Kaschita, “and the road to the valley is
dangerous.”
“You must follow me if it is to your death!” cried the youth, and,
seizing Pentaur’s hand, he dragged him with him out of the cave.
As soon as the black slave had satisfied himself that Pentaur was the
priest whom he had seen fighting in front of the paraschites’ hovel, and
not the ghost of his dead master, he endeavored to slip past Paaker’s
brother, but Horus observed the manoeuvre, and seized him by his woolly
hair. The slave cried out loudly, and whimpered out:
“If thou dost escape, Paaker will kill me; he swore he would.”
“Wait!” said the youth. He dragged the slave back, flung him into the
cave, and blocked up the door with a huge log which lay near it for that
purpose.
When the three men had crept back through the low passage in the rocks,
and found themselves once more in the open air, they found a high wind
was blowing.
“The storm will soon be over,” said Horus. “See how the clouds are
driving! Let us have horses, Pentaur, for there is not a minute to be
lost.”
The poet ordered Kaschta to summon the people to start but the soldier
advised differently.
“Men and horses are exhausted,” he said, “and we shall get on very
slowly in the dark. Let the beasts feed for an hour, and the men get
rested and warm; by that time the moon will be up, and we shall make up
for the delay by having fresh horses, and light enough to see the road.”
“The man is right,” said Horus; and he led Kaschta to a cave in the
rocks, where barley and dates for the horses, and a few jars of wine,
had been preserved. They soon had lighted a fire, and while some of the
men took care of the horses, and others cooked a warm mess of victuals,
Horus and Pentaur walked up and down impatiently.
“Had you been long bound in those thongs when we came?” asked Pentaur.
“Yesterday my brother fell upon me,” replied Horus. “He is by this time
a long way ahead of us, and if he joins the Cheta, and we do not reach
the Egyptian camp before daybreak, all is lost.”
“Paaker, then, is plotting treason?”
“Treason, the foulest, blackest treason!” exclaimed the young man. “Oh,
my lost father!--”
“Confide in me,” said Pentaur going up to the unhappy youth who had
hidden his face in his hands. “What is Paaker plotting? How is it that
your brother is your enemy?”
“He is the elder of us two,” said Horus with a trembling voice. “When my
father died I had only a short time before left the school of Seti, and
with his last words my father enjoined me to respect Paaker as the head
of our family. He is domineering and violent, and will allow no one’s
will to cross his; but I bore everything, and always obeyed him, often
against my better judgment. I remained with him two years, then I went
to Thebes, and there I married, and my wife and child are now living
there with my mother. About sixteen months afterwards I came back to
Syria, and we travelled through the country together; but by this time I
did not choose to be the mere tool of my brother’s will, for I had grown
prouder, and it seemed to me that the father of my child ought not to be
subservient, even to his own brother. We often quarrelled, and had a
bad time together, and life became quite unendurable, when--about eight
weeks since--Paaker came back from Thebes, and the king gave him to
understand that he approved more of my reports than of his. From my
childhood I have always been softhearted and patient; every one says I
am like my mother; but what Paaker made me suffer by words and deeds,
that is--I could not--” His voice broke, and Pentaur felt how cruelly he
had suffered; then he went on again:
“What happened to my brother in Egypt, I do not know, for he is very
reserved, and asks for no sympathy, either in joy or in sorrow; but from
words he has dropped now and then I gather that he not only bitterly
hates Mena, the charioteer--who certainly did him an injury--but has
some grudge against the king too. I spoke to him of it at once, but only
once, for his rage is unbounded when he is provoked, and after all he is
my elder brother.
“For some days they have been preparing in the camp for a decisive
battle, and it was our duty to ascertain the position and strength of
the enemy; the king gave me, and not Paaker, the commission to prepare
the report. Early yesterday morning I drew it out and wrote it; then my
brother said he would carry it to the camp, and I was to wait here. I
positively refused, as Rameses had required the report at my hands,
and not at his. Well, he raved like a madman, declared that I had taken
advantage of his absence to insinuate myself into the king’s favor, and
commanded me to obey him as the head of the house, in the name of my
father.
“I was sitting irresolute, when he went out of the cavern to call his
horses; then my eyes fell on the things which the old black slave
was tying together to load on a pack-horse--among them was a roll
of writing. I fancied it was my own, and took it up to look at it,
when--what should I find? At the risk of my life I had gone among the
Cheta, and had found that the main body of their army is collected in
a cross-valley of the Orontes, quite hidden in the mountains to the
north-east of Kadesh; and in the roll it was stated, in Paaker’s own
hand-writing, that that valley is clear, and the way through it open,
and well suited for the passage of the Egyptian war-chariots; various
other false details were given, and when I looked further among his
things, I found between the arrows in his quiver, on which he had
written ‘death to Mena,’ another little roll of writing. I tore it open,
and my blood ran cold when I saw to whom it was addressed.”
“To the king of the Cheta?” cried Pentaur in excitement.
“To his chief officer, Titure,” continued Horus. “I was holding both
the rolls in my hand, when Paaker came back into the cave. ‘Traitor!’
I cried out to him; but he flung the lasso, with which he had been
catching the stray horses, threw it round my neck, and as I fell choking
on the ground, he and the black man, who obeys him like a dog, bound
me hand and foot; he left the old negro to keep guard over me, took the
rolls and rode away. Look, there are the stars, and the moon will soon
be up.”
“Make haste, men!” cried Pentaur. “The three best horses for me, Horus,
and Kaschta; the rest remain here.”
As the red-bearded soldier led the horses forward, the moon shone forth,
and within an hour the travellers had reached the plain; they sprang on
to the beasts and rode madly on towards the lake, which, when the sun
rose, gleamed before them in silvery green. As they drew near to it they
could discern, on its treeless western shore, black masses moving hither
and thither; clouds of dust rose up from the plain, pierced by flashes
of light, like the rays of the sun reflected from a moving mirror.
“The battle is begun!” cried Horus; and he fell sobbing on his horse’s
neck.
“But all is not lost yet!” exclaimed the poet, spurring his horse to
a final effort of strength. His companions did the same, but first
Kaschta’s horse fell under him, then Horus’s broke down.
“Help may be given by the left wing!” cried Horus. “I will run as fast
as I can on foot, I know where to find them. You will easily find the
king if you follow the stream to the stone bridge. In the cross-valley
about a thousand paces farther north--to the northwest of our
stronghold--the surprise is to be effected. Try to get through, and warn
Rameses; the Egyptian pass-word is ‘Bent-Anat,’ the name of the king’s
favorite daughter. But even if you had wings, and could fly straight to
him, they would overpower him if I cannot succeed in turning the left
wing on the rear of the enemy.”
Pentaur galloped onwards; but it was not long before his horse too gave
way, and he ran forward like a man who runs a race, and shouted the
pass-word “Bent-Anat”--for the ring of her name seemed to give him
vigor. Presently he came upon a mounted messenger of the enemy; he
struck him down from his horse, flung himself into the saddle, and
rushed on towards the camp; as if he were riding to his wedding.