The Pharaoh And The Priest Part 97

He overestimated, therefore, the danger of the struggle and redoubled every caution. To have all chances on his side he had recourse to stratagem. He sent confidential men to meet the Libyans; he commanded them to feign that they were fugitives, to enter the enemies' camp and draw from Musawasa his best forces, the disbanded Libyan soldiers.

"Tell them," said Rameses to his agents, "that I have axes for the insolent, and compa.s.sion for obedience. If in the coming battle they will throw their weapons down and leave Musawasa, I will receive them back to the army of his holiness, and command to pay all arrears, as if they had never left the service."

Patrokles and the other generals saw in this a very prudent measure; the priests were silent, Mentezufis sent a despatch to Herhor and next day received an answer.

The neighborhood of the Soda Lakes was a valley some tens of kilometres long, enclosed between two lines of hills, extending from the southeast toward the northwest. The greatest width did not exceed ten kilometres; there were places narrower, almost ravines.

Throughout the whole length of that valley extended one after another about ten swampy lakes filled with bitter, brackish water. Wretched plants and bushes grew there ever coated with sand, ever withering,--plants which no beast would take to its mouth. Along both sides were sticking up jagged limestone hills, or immense heaps of sand in which a man might sink deeply.

The white and yellow landscape had a look of dreadful torpor, which was heightened by the heat, and also by the silence. No bird was ever heard there, and if any sound was given forth it was from a stone rolling down along a hillside.

Toward the middle of the valley rose two groups of buildings a few kilometres from each other; these were a fortress on the east, and gla.s.s factories on the west, to which Libyan merchants brought fuel.

Both these places had been deserted because of the conflict. Tehenna's corps was to occupy both these points, and secure the road to Egypt for Musawasa's army forces.

The Libyans marched slowly from the town of Glaucus southward, and on the evening of the fourteenth day of Hator, they were at the entrance to the valley of the Soda Lakes, feeling sure that they would pa.s.s through in two days unmolested. That evening at sunset the Egyptian army moved toward the desert, pa.s.sed over more than forty kilometres of sand in twelve hours, and next morning was on the hills between the huts and the fortress and hid in the many ravines of that region.

If some man that night had told the Libyans that palm-trees and wheat were growing in the valley of the Soda Lakes they would have been astonished less than if he had declared that the Egyptians had barred the way to it.

After a short rest, during which the priests had discovered and cleared out a few wells of water somewhat endurable for drinking, the Egyptian army began to occupy the hills extending along the northern side of the valley.

The viceroy's plan was quite simple. He was to cut off the Libyans from their country, and push them southward into the desert, where heat and hunger would kill them.

With this object he disposed his army on the northern side of the valley and divided it into three corps. The right wing, that which extended most toward Libya, was led by Patrokles, who was to cut off the invaders from their own town of Glaucus. The left wing, that nearest to Egypt, commanded by Mentezufis, was to stop the Libyans from advancing. Finally, the direction of the centre, at the gla.s.s huts, was taken by Rameses, who had Pentuer near his person.

On the fifteenth of Hator about seven in the morning, some tens of Libyan hors.e.m.e.n moved at a brisk trot through the valley. They stopped a moment at the huts, looked around, and, seeing nothing suspicious, rode back again.

At about ten in the forenoon in a heat which seemed to suck sweat and draw blood from men's bodies, Pentuer said to the viceroy,--

"The Libyans have entered the valley and pa.s.sed Patrokles' division.

They will be here in an hour from now."

"Whence knowest thou this?" asked the astonished prince.

"The priests know everything," replied Pentuer, smiling.

Then he ascended one of the cliffs cautiously, took from a bag a very bright object and turning it in the direction of the holy Mentezufis began to give certain signs with his hand.

"Mentezufis is informed already," said Pentuer.

The prince could not recover from astonishment and answered,--

"My eyes are better than thine, and my hearing is not worse, I think; still I see nothing, I hear nothing. How, then, dost thou see the enemy and converse with Mentezufis?"

Pentuer directed the prince to look at a distant hill, on the summit of which was a thornbush. Rameses looked at that point and shaded his eyes on a sudden. In the bush something flashed brightly.

"What unendurable glitter is that?" cried he. "It might blind a man."

"That is the priest who is aiding the worthy Patrokles; he is giving us signs," replied Pentuer. "Thou seest, then, worthy lord, that we, too, can be useful in war time."

He was silent. From the distance of the valley came a certain sound; at first low, gradually it grew clearer. At this sound the Egyptian soldiers hidden at the sides of the hill began to spring up, look at their weapons, and whisper. But the sharp commands of officers quieted them, and again the silence was deathlike along the cliffs on the north side.

Meanwhile that distant sound in the valley increased and pa.s.sed into an uproar in which, on the bases of thousands of voices a man could distinguish songs, sounds of flutes, squeaks of chariots, the neighing of horses, and the cries of commanders. The prince's heart was now beating with violence; he could not resist his curiosity, and he clambered up to a rocky height whence a large part of the valley was visible.

Surrounded by rolls of yellow dust the Libyan corps was approaching deliberately, and seemed like a serpent some miles in length, with blue, white, and red spots on its body.

At its head marched from ten to twenty hors.e.m.e.n, one of whom, wearing a white mantle, was sitting on his horse as on a bench, both his legs on the left side of the animal. Behind the hors.e.m.e.n marched a crowd of slingers in gray shirts, then some dignitary in a litter, over whom a large parasol was carried. Farther was a division of spearmen in blue and red shirts, then a great band of men almost naked, armed with clubs, again slingers and spearmen, behind them a red division with scythes and axes. They came on more or less in ranks of four; but in spite of shouts of officers, that order was interrupted, and each four treading on others, broke ranks continually.

Singing and talking loudly, the Libyan serpent crawled out into the broadest part of the valley, opposite the huts and the Soda Lakes.

Order was disturbed now more considerably. Those marching in advance stopped, for it had been said that there would be a halt at that point; the columns behind hurried so as to reach the halt and rest all the earlier. Some ran out of the ranks, and laying down their weapons, rushed into the lake, or took up in their palms its malodorous water; others, sitting on the ground, took dates from bags, or drank vinegar and water from their bottles.

High above the camp floated a number of vultures.

Unspeakable sadness and terror seized Rameses at this spectacle.

Before his eyes flies began to circle; for the twinkle of an eye he lost consciousness; it seemed to him that he would have yielded his throne not to be at that place, and not to see what was going to happen. He hurried down from the cliff looking with wandering eyes straight out in front of him.

At that moment Pentuer approached and pulled him by the arm vigorously.

"Recover, leader," said he; "Patrokles is waiting for orders."

"Patrokles?" repeated the prince, and he looked around quickly.

Before him stood Pentuer, deathly pale, but collected. A couple of steps farther on was Tutmosis, also pale; in his trembling hand was an officer's whistle. From behind the hill bent forth soldiers, on whose faces deep emotion was evident.

"Rameses," repeated Pentuer, "the army is waiting."

The prince looked at the priest with desperate decision.

"Begin!" said he in a stifled whisper.

Pentuer raised his glittering talisman, and made some signs in the air with it. Tutmosis gave a low whistle; that whistle was repeated in distant ravines on the right and the left. Egyptian slingers began to climb up the hillsides.

It was about midday.

Rameses recovered gradually from his first impressions and looked around carefully. He saw his staff, a division of spearmen and axemen under veteran officers, finally slingers, advancing along the cliff leisurely. And he was convinced that not one of those men had the wish to die or even to fight and move around in that heat, which was terrible.

All at once, from the height of some hill was heard a mighty voice, louder than the roar of a lion,--

"Soldiers of the pharaoh, slay those Libyan dogs! The G.o.ds are with you."

To this unearthly voice answered two voices no less powerful: the prolonged shout of the Egyptian army, and the immense outcry of the Libyans.

The prince had no need to conceal himself longer, and ascended an eminence whence he could see the hostile forces distinctly. Before him stretched a long line of Egyptian slingers who seemed as if they had grown up from the earth, and a couple of hundred yards distant the Libyan column moving forward in dust clouds. The trumpets, the whistles, the curses of barbarian officers were heard calling to order. Those who were sitting sprang up; those who were drinking s.n.a.t.c.hed their weapons and ran to their places; chaotic throngs developed into ranks, and all this took place amid outcries and tumult. Meanwhile the Egyptian slingers cast a number of missiles each minute. They were as calm and well ordered as at a manuvre. The decurions indicated to their men the hostile crowds against which they must strike, and in the course of some minutes they covered them with a shower of stones and leaden bullets. The prince saw that after every such shower a Libyan crowd scattered and very often one man remained on the earth behind the others.

Still the Libyan ranks formed and withdrew outside the reach of missiles, then their slingers pushed forward and with equal swiftness and coolness replied to the Egyptians. At times there were bursts of laughter in their ranks and shouts of delight at the fall of some Egyptian slinger.

Soon above the heads of the prince and his retinue stones began to whizz and whistle. One, cast adroitly, struck the arm of an adjutant, and broke the bone in it; another knocked the helmet from a second adjutant; a third, falling at the prince's feet, was broken against the cliff and struck the leader's face with fragments as hot as boiling water.

The Libyans laughed loudly and shouted out something: apparently they were abusing the viceroy.