THE ALTERNATIVE
When I came to myself after a few minutes, the scene inside the
temple had changed. The Pharaoh was lying rigid upon the marble floor
and the hanging lamp overhead threw a weird, flickering light upon his
livid, hideously distorted face. Beside him, ghastly pale, with eyes
staring full of horror upon the dead body of her son, Queen Maat-kha
stood silent, with arms folded across her bosom, her lips tightly set.
She was listening to the high priest of Ra, who was speaking to her in
slow and solemn tones, while he pointed upwards to the sanctuary of
the goddess.
“Thy sin, Maat-kha, is beyond forgiveness. Thou knowest it; thy body
and thy soul are doomed to eternal death. Thy very memory will be
accursed in Kamt as the centuries roll slowly away.”
She did not reply. I think she was absolutely dazed. No doubt that
even a British jury would have found extenuating circumstances for her
crime. She had been provoked beyond what her reason could stand.
Momentarily it had fled, escaped her body, leaving her a prey to all
the furious passions which her maddened jealousy had roused within
her. Now reason had returned, and with it horror, repulsion, and
hideous, terrible remorse.
I was still very shaky on my legs, and somehow instinct kept me where
I was, waiting to see the sequel to this awful and weird tragedy.
There was dead silence after the high priest had spoken, and the echo
of his last solemn words still reverberated in the vast and mysterious
temple. From afar the last sounds of life and bustle from the bridal
city reached this lonely, poetic spot only as a murmur from dreamland.
Maat-kha stood as rigid and inert as her dead son, only from time to
time a nervous shiver went right through her, and she gathered her
veil close to her as if she felt cold.
“I am waiting for thy answer, Maat-kha,” said the high priest.
She looked up at him, half-appealing, half-defiant. There was no
sorrow on her face for the dead son whom she had never loved, no fear
of the punishment with which the high priest threatened her. She said
very quietly:
“What answer dost thou expect of me?”
“I wish to know if, after thy madness, thou dost understand the
hideousness of thy crime, and dost fear the vengeance of the goddess
whose temple thou didst desecrate?”
“My hands did act, but not my will. He taunted me and my reason fled.
I had no wish to kill him, only to silence his poisonous tongue.”
“Hold thy peace, woman! Do not slander the dead and heap more sorrow
and humiliation upon thy doomed head.”
“What wouldst thou have me do, Ur-tasen? Madness seized me. I am
accursed. Wilt thou give me the boon of a dagger with which to send my
sinful soul to the foot of the throne of Osiris? who perhaps will
understand, and understanding, pardon.”
“Thy soul is not worthy to appear before the gods. Judgment would
decree that thy body be allowed to rot, lest so vile a soul find once
more habitation upon earth and live to commit other most horrible
crimes.”
A shudder went through her; for the first time she seemed to realise
that some awful punishment would inevitably follow her sin. She looked
wildly round her as if in search of help or sympathy, then again
appealingly at the high priest before her.
“There is no help for thee, woman. Look not around. The very walls of
the temple of Isis frown shuddering down upon thee. Nay! look not for
help, for not even he, whom thou deemest all-powerful, could save thee
if he would.”
The words of Ur-tasen recalled me to myself. I realised that in a
moment the whole aspect of Hugh’s future had changed, and it was but
just that he should be apprised of the tragedy which had taken place,
and of the awful doom which suddenly threatened Queen Maat-kha. There
was no object in my staying here any longer to hear Ur-tasen’s solemn
invectives against the unfortunate woman, and I had almost turned to
go, when it seemed to me that in the remote corner of the temple,
behind Queen Maat-kha, there was some one standing and like myself
watching the weird and terrible scene. I could only see a dim outline
thrown darkly against the light curtain, but somehow that outline, the
heavy hair, the quaint, straight attitude, forcibly reminded me of
Princess Neit-akrit.
Surely I was mistaken. What could Neit-akrit be doing alone at night
in the temple of Isis? and why should she have stood motionless and
still while so awful a tragedy was being enacted before her? And yet,
persistently I looked at the slight and upright figure and continued
my _rôle_ of eavesdropping, scenting vaguely danger hovering in the
air.
At mention of Hugh’s name Maat-kha had closed her eyes. A look of
infinite pain spread over her face, and slowly two heavy tears rolled
down her cheeks.
But Ur-tasen was merciless.
“How he will loathe thee, Maat-kha,” he said very quietly. “Hast
thought of that? He never loved thee dearly: thy beauty had not even
the power to ensnare his senses, but I think he honoured thee as a
woman and as a queen: whereas now he will turn from thee as from a
noisome reptile. With his own hand he will sign the decree which will
cast thee out of Kamt, and as thy flesh begins to wither on thy bones,
out there in the valley of death, thy dying soul can contemplate the
picture of happy, prosperous Kamt, wherein the stranger, the
well-beloved of the gods, dispenses justice and wisdom beside
Neit-akrit of the house of Usem-ra.”
A prolonged moan of anguish escaped the unfortunate woman’s lips: she
turned to the high priest and very calmly she asked:
“Ur-tasen, why dost thou put this torture to my soul? Speak! What dost
thou want of me?”
“I but want the salvation of thy soul, Maat-kha, seeing how grievously
thou hast sinned. I but wish to adjure thee to think of the vengeance
of the gods.”
“I will think of that by-and-by,” she said, “now…”
“Now thou dost think only of what thou hast lost and what Neit-akrit
has gained.”
“No, no, no, no! Ur-tasen, no! thou dost not know of what thou
speakest. See! I will drag myself on my knees before thee. I will weep
both my eyes out for repentance! I will go forth into the valley of
death cheerfully and calmly, accepting thy decrees and blessing thy
name. I will cause all my wealth, my jewels, my palaces to be left to
thee, as thine own property, when I am gone, if thou wilt part my
lover and Neit-akrit for ever.”
She had sunk down upon her knees, and laying her pale forehead on the
marble floor before the high priest, she beat the ground with her head
and kissed the tip of his pointed sandals. I thought the high priest’s
face suddenly assumed a satisfied, triumphant expression. He folded
his arms across his chest and looked down upon the suppliant at his
feet.
“Wilt come up before the image of the goddess, oh, Maat-kha! and at
her very feet swear that thou wilt do my bidding, whatsoever I might
command?”
She raised her head, and in the dim, flickering light I could see that
she darted an inquiring, amazed look upwards at him.
“Dost believe that I am powerful?” he asked.
“I believe that thou dost hate him who is beloved of the gods.”
“Wilt swear to do my bidding?” he repeated.
“Dost wish to harm him?”
“Not unless thou also dost wish it.”
“I love him, Ur-tasen,” she said in truly heart-rending tones.
“Wouldst see him then in the arms of Neit-akrit?”
“I would sooner see him dead at my feet,” she replied, with renewed
passion, “slain by my hands, as was my son, the Pharaoh.”
“Swear to do my bidding, Maat-kha, and Neit-akrit will never wed the
stranger king.”
She rose slowly to her feet and turned towards the sanctuary of the
goddess.
“Lead the way, Ur-tasen,” she said with absolute calm. “I will swear
to do thy bidding.”
The sanctuary was at the farther end of the building. Already the high
priest, followed by Maat-kha, was rapidly disappearing in the vastness
of the temple. Helpless, I looked round me. The conviction had
gradually forced itself upon my mind that Ur-tasen
[IMAGE: images/img250.jpg
CAPTION: “I will cause all my wealth,… to be left to thee,… if thou
wilt part my lover and Neit-akrit forever”]
had concocted some evil plan against Hugh, for which he required the
co-operation of the Queen. Her terrible unpremeditated act had given
him an enormous power over her, and, working upon her mad jealousy, he
meant evidently to make her his ally in his nefarious scheme. At any
cost I was bound to hear what that man and that woman would say to one
another during the next few minutes, and there was the whole length of
a vast temple and the thickness of marble gates between me and them.
On the floor, beneath the lamp, the livid mask of the dead Pharaoh
seemed to grin at my helplessness. It seemed as if, dead, he would be
able to wreak that vengeance upon the man he hated which, living, he
had never dared accomplish.
Already I could see Maat-kha prostrate before the goddess, with arms
stretched upwards, swearing no doubt to add another deadly sin to her
crime, and in Ur-tasen’s attitude, standing erect and commanding by
her side, there was an unmistakable air of exultant triumph.
There was no question that, from where I was, there could not be the
slightest chance of my hearing what those two said. Certain of not
being watched, determined to know the extent of the projected evil
before I warned Hugh of his danger, I thought of rapidly skirting the
temple walls, in the hope of finding some other gate or entrance
nearer to the sanctuary from whence I could watch and listen. The
precincts of the temple were absolutely deserted, as far as I could
see, and, in any case, my feet were shoeless, and the shadows between
the pillars were long and dense. I had every chance of slipping round
unperceived.
I made slow and very cautious progress. The temple was vast and it
took me two or three minutes’ measured creeping before I reached its
more distant side. As I had hoped, another gateway, also of marble
tracery, led into this part of the temple, and to my delight I found
that this gateway was opened sufficiently to allow me to slip inside,
which I did.
I found myself, however, not in the temple itself, but in a kind of
chamber or passage, I did not know which, for it was very dark. Some
five feet from the ground a narrow opening, scarce the width of an
arm, in the granite wall, showed beyond it the brilliantly-lighted
sanctuary. At first, in looking through this aperture, I could
scarcely see, for the dazzling brightness of the innumerable hanging
lamps, and the thick fumes of burning herbs, shut everything out from
my view. But gradually, as my anxious gaze travelled round, I saw
Ur-tasen and Maat-kha not ten feet away from me to my left; but the
gossamer curtain hung between the sanctuary and them, and I could only
vaguely distinguish their forms. Beyond them I could see nothing but
gloom; the dim shadow, which I had fancied to be Princess Neit-akrit,
had apparently disappeared, if indeed it had ever been there, and the
high priest and the Queen evidently thought themselves alone.
“He often used to evade his attendants at nighttime,” Maat-kha was
saying, apparently in answer to a query from the priest, “and wander
about aimlessly in the gardens or the palace. I had come into the
temple to pray, bidding my women go and leave me in peace for an hour,
when suddenly I saw the Pharaoh before me.”
“I know the rest, for I saw and heard all,” replied the high priest,
quietly.
“And thou didst not move a finger to save him from death, and thy
Queen from a crime ten thousand times worse than any torment?” she
exclaimed with a smothered shriek.
“The will of the gods is inscrutable,” he replied calmly. “I am but a
servant of all-creating Ra. ’Tis he ordered me to be silent when the
holy Pharaoh fell smitten by his mother’s hand. His will must guide
thee, too. Thou hast sworn to do my bidding.”
“I will obey,” she said very meekly.
“Listen then to the commands of Ra, of Osiris, and of Horus, of Set,
and of Anubis and all the gods in Kamt, whose wrath, if thou disobey,
will fall heavily upon thy criminal head. I command thee to go anon,
when thy women come to attend upon thee, back to thy palace peacefully
and silently. The priests of Ra will guard the body of the Pharaoh
until such time as the soulless corpse will have helped to fulfil the
deed of vengeance which the gods of Kamt have decreed.”
“I do not understand.”
“Listen, Maat-kha,” said Ur-tasen, more eagerly, as he bent his shaven
crown close to her ear; “at the midnight hour, when Isis is high in
the heavens, the stranger, who with sacrilegious arrogance doth style
himself beloved of the gods, will plight his troth to thee. Ignorant
of thy terrible crime, he will swear that he will love and be true to
thee, and reverence thee as men of Kamt do reverence the wife whom
Isis places in their arms. Do thou be silent and at peace--none but I
have seen the evil midnight deed--do thou be silent and at peace, and
place thy hand in that of the stranger.”
There was a pause, while I pictured to myself the unfortunate Maat-kha
listening to the priest’s commands, not daring to cling to the thin
thread of hope which he was so enigmatically holding out to her.
“After the solemn marriage ceremony,” resumed Ur-tasen, “by the custom
of our beloved land, the royal bridegroom remains in the temple of
Isis, waiting and alone. All those who have come bidden to the feast
retire to their homes, to ponder of what they have seen, or to join
the populace in their revelry in honour of the joyous night. But the
royal bridegroom waits in solitude and prayer; waits until his bride
is ready to receive him, at the first streak of dawn, when Isis
herself sinks fainting into the arms of Osiris her beloved, and
suffuses the vault of heaven with the roseate hue of her bridal blush.
Then the royal bridegroom goes forth to meet his bride, and his
footsteps lead him through the garden of Isis to that secluded nook,
beside the sacred cataract, where stands the hallowed shrine of the
goddess, and where foot of man ne’er treads, save he be of royal
blood, and hath not yet received the first kiss of his bride. Dost
remember the spot, oh, Maat-kha?” he added. “There didst thou go
twenty years ago, one summer night, beneath the light of sinking Isis;
there didst thou hear the sound of the path crunch beneath the foot of
Hor-tep-ra; there didst thou give the first bridal kiss to him whose
son thou hast murdered, within the very temple of the goddess.”
“I remember,” she murmured dreamily, “and oh! how oft have I not
thought of that solemn meeting within the sacred precincts, with him
whom I love beyond all things earthly--with him who to me, to all
Kamt, is sacred, nay! divine.”
“It will not be thou, oh, Maat-kha! who wilt meet the bridegroom
beneath the shrine of Isis.”
“Who then, oh, mighty priest of Ra?” she asked with sudden terror.
“The dead body of thy murdered son.”
“I do not understand.”
“Nay! thy mind must be strangely overclouded. The Pharaoh did oft in
his life evade his attendants and wander about aimlessly in his
palaces and his gardens. To-night, more sick than ever, he found his
way to the precincts of the temple of Isis, but faintness overtook
him--faintness so great that the priests of the goddess laid him on a
couch within the sacred building and tended him with loving care. But
he is too sick to attend the wedding festivities, and the priests of
Isis will have charge of him while Tanis goes raving mad with joy.
Tanis will forget the sick Pharaoh in her tumultuous happiness, and
those few who will remember him will know that the holy monarch is
well cared for by the most learned in the land.”
I confess that not even then did I really understand the devilish plan
which the high priest of Ra had conceived. That it was in some way to
encompass Hugh’s ruin was of course evident, but what connection the
dead Pharaoh was to have with it, or the mysterious and poetic retreat
by the cataract, I could not as yet imagine. The Queen, too, was
evidently as much at sea as I was, for she repeated mechanically:
“My mind is dull, Ur-tasen. Still I do not understand.”
“During the joyous ceremony,” continued the high priest, “the sick
Pharaoh again evades his thoughtful guardians, as he often has evaded
his attendants, and his roaming footsteps lead him to the waters of
the sacred cataract, the secluded spot wherein the royal scions of
ancient Kamt whisper first of love and home. The shrine of the goddess
is enclosed by high walls shut off by copper gates; these are never
opened save on glorious nights--like to-night will be when the widow
of Hor-tep-ra will await her stranger lord. But the holy Pharaoh,
finding the sacred grove still deserted, doth lay himself there to
rest…”
The high priest paused, then added, in a whisper so low that I could
hardly hear:
“He who calls himself beloved of the gods hath no love for the sick
Pharaoh, who stands between him and absolute power.… The night is
lonely… the gardens silent… and the Pharaoh helpless. The stranger has
the strength of a lion… the strength which breaks the golden wand of
the high priest of Ra with one touch of the hand… and which smothers
the last cries of a dying man as easily as the carrion of the
wilderness devour their prey…”
“Thou wouldst…”
“I would break the might of him who has ensnared the people of Kamt
and broken their allegiance.… The priests of Isis will softly follow
in the wake of the stranger, as he turns his footsteps within the
hallowed nook.… Horror-struck, they will see the murderer standing
beside his victim, then they will loudly call upon the people of Kamt
to quit their rejoicings, to forget their songs and laughter and
behold the hideous crime committed by him who dared to call himself
the son of Ra!”
“Ur-tasen!” shouted the Queen, appalled at the hideousness of so vile
a plot.
But I did not wait to hear more--cared not to hear how the man of
evil, that cowardly, treacherous priest, succeeded in forcing the
unfortunate, criminal woman’s will. My only thought was to fly to
Hugh, to warn him of the base plots which threatened him, of the
villainy of the woman to whom he had all but pledged his troth. Thank
God! that monstrous oath had not yet been spoken, and my friend Hugh
Tankerville had not, by any pagan ritual, sworn to love a murderess.
Thank God!--_our_ God--who led my footsteps to this idolatrous temple
to-night, whereby I was allowed to see and hear, and warn Hugh in
time.
“_If_ thou refuse,” I heard finally Ur-tasen saying in threatening
accents; then he paused, and added with a touch of satire, “Thou art
still at liberty to refuse, Maat-kha, to break the oath thou didst
swear just now. The body of thy murdered son still lies there, and I,
the high priest, can yet summon the people of Tanis and show them
their criminal Queen, she who then, to-morrow, will be for ever cast
out of Kamt, a prey to the jackals and vultures, while in Tanis the
wedding festivities will not even have been put off for so trifling a
matter, seeing that the beloved of the gods, the son of Ra, will still
be there, ready to wed Neit-akrit of the house of Usem-ra. Ay! thou
canst still refuse, and think, when the gates of Kamt are shut for
ever upon thee, of that same nook beside the sacred cataract, where
the stranger will wait for the beautiful princess with the ardent hair
and the eyes as blue as the waters of the lake; surely these will soon
help him to forget the erstwhile Queen, the criminal, murderous
Maat-kha.”
I knew that she would give in, of course. Her love for Hugh was a
barbaric, sensuous one, which would ten thousand times prefer to see
the loved one dead than happy in another’s arms. There was no object
in my listening any further. The plot was hideously vile and
treacherous, and perfectly well-conceived. I shuddered as I thought of
what might have happened had not divine Providence led me here.
It did not need much reflection as to what I should do. My first
impulse had been to go to the top of the temple steps and there to
shout until I had assembled the people of Tanis round me, and then to
show them the dead body of the Pharaoh, its murderess and her
accomplice. In any case I had not many minutes before me, as
undoubtedly in the next few moments Maat-kha would give in and
Ur-tasen would order the dead body to be removed.
I went back to the gateway through which I had slipped into this
chamber not a quarter of an hour ago… it was shut.
That was strange! I tried to find the opening… impossible to move the
gates.… I only succeeded in bruising my hands and smashing my nails.
The gate was of solid marble, the tracery a foot thick. It was
obviously childish to attempt to force it open. As for any sign of
lock or hinge, I certainly could see none. These Egyptians have secret
springs to every door that leads to their temples.… Moreover, it was
pitch dark all round me. Only between the carving the brilliant
moonlight came weirdly creeping through.