The Yoke Part 57

It was an hour after sunrise. Her raft, built of papyrus, was boat-shaped and graceful as a swan. Pepi was at the long-handled sweep in the stern. Masanath sat in the middle, which was heaped with nets, throw-sticks, and bows and arrows. A pair of decoy birds, tame and unfettered, stood near her, craning their small heads, puzzled at the movement of the boat which was undecipherable since they were motionless. Nari sat in the prow, her hands folded, her face quite expressionless. The service of the day was out of the routine, but as a good servant, she was capable of adapting herself to the change.

The little craft darted away from the painted landing for pleasure boats, and reaching midstream, was turned toward the north. The current caught it and swept it along like a leaf.

As they pa.s.sed the stone wharf at Masaarah, Nari looked toward the quarries with a show of interest on her face. She even caught her breath to speak. Masanath noted her animation.

"What is it, Nari?"

"Naught but a bit of gossip that came to mine ears, last night, and the sight of Masaarah urged me to tell it again. It is said the Hebrews of these quarries rose against the new driver and drove him out of the camp, crying, 'Return us our Atsu, return us our Atsu.'"

"What folly!" Masanath exclaimed. "If they had been the host which crowds Goshen to her bounds, it might serve. But this handful in rebellion against Egypt! The military of the Memphian nome will crush them as if they had been so many ants."

"I know," the serving-woman admitted. "The soldier I had it from, said that the city commandant would move against them by noon this day."

"The G.o.ds help them!" Pepi put in.

"Thy prayer is too late, Pepi," Masanath answered. "The G.o.ds should have cautioned them ere they took the step. And yet," she continued, musing, "straits may become so sore that aught but endurance is welcome."

Her servants looked at her and at each other, understanding.

Nari went on:

"But the soldier told me further that the Israelites had spent the night chanting and dancing before their G.o.d, and it seems from this spot that the quarries are empty. They do not fear, boasting their G.o.d's care."

Masanath shook her head. "He must look to them at once, ere the soldiery fall upon them. His time for aid is short," she said.

A silence fell, and the raft pa.s.sed below Masaarah. Again Nari spoke, proving that she had heard and thought upon the last words of her mistress.

"Are not the G.o.ds omnipotent and everywhere?"

"Aye, so hast thou been taught, Nari."

"Our G.o.ds, and the G.o.ds of every nation like them?" the serving-woman persisted.

"The G.o.ds of Egypt are so, and each nation boasts its G.o.ds equally potent."

"Mayhap the Hebrews' G.o.d will help them," Nari ventured.

Masanath was silent for a moment. "He hath deserted them for long,"

she said at last, "but they are hard-pressed. Mayhap their loud supplications will reach Him in His retreat."

"They boast that He hath returned."

"Let Him prove Himself," Masanath insisted stoutly.

When next she spoke there was no hint of the past serious talk in her voice.

"A pest on the ban," she exclaimed. "Look at the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. It fairly swarms with teal and coot, and see the snipe on the sand." She stood up and watched the sandy strip they were nearing. They were a goodly distance out from the sh.o.r.e, but Pepi poled nearer midstream. "The pity of it," she sighed; "but I doubt not the place swarms with crocodile, also."

She sat down again, and looked at the decoy birds. Their timidity had increased into actual fear. Masanath reached a soothing hand toward one of them and it fled. The motion of the poling-arm of Pepi frightened it again, and with a flirt of its wings it retreated toward Masanath.

"Stop a moment, Pepi," she said. "Let me quiet this frightened thing.

I can not fathom its terror."

"The unquiet soul, my Lady," Nari whispered, in awe.

"Strange that the G.o.ds gifted the creatures with keener sight than men," Masanath answered, somewhat disturbed. She moved toward the bird, talking softly, but the persuasion was as useless as if the decoy had been a wild thing. At the nearer approach of the small hand it took wings and flew. The mate followed, unhesitating. The shining distance toward the west swallowed them up.

The trio on the raft looked at one another.

"Nay, now, saw ye the like before?" Masanath exclaimed, the tone of her voice divided between astonishment and irritation at the loss of her pets.

"Let us leave this vicinity," Pepi said, suiting the action to the word, "it is unholy." He seized the sweep and drove the raft about, poling with wide strokes. At that moment, a cry, which was more of a hoa.r.s.e whisper, broke from his lips.

"Body of Osiris! The river! the river!"

Masanath leaned on one hand and looked over the side of the raft. With a bound and a shivering cry, Nari was cowering beside her, the little craft tossing on the waves at the force of the leap. Instantly, Pepi was at her other side, on his knees, praying and shaking. And together the trio huddled, but only one, Masanath, was brave enough to watch what was happening.

From the bottom of the Nile a turbid convection was taking place, as if the river silt had been stirred up, but the fuming current was a.s.suming a dull red tinge. The action had been rapid. Already the stain had predominated, streaks of clear water, only here and there, clarifying the opaque coloring. The boat rode half its depth in red, the paddle dripped red, the splashes of water within on the bottom were red, the sun shone broadly into the mirroring red, a sliding, reeking red! A lavender foam broke its bubbles against the drifting raft and a tepid, invisible vapor, like a moist breath, exhaled from the ensanguined surface.

Schools of fish, struggling and leaping, filled the s.p.a.ce immediately above the water, and c.u.mbered the raft with a writhing ma.s.s.

Numberless crocodiles bounded into the air, braying, snorting, rending one another and churning the river into froth by their hideous battle.

Dwellers of the deep water drifted into the upper tide--monsters of the muck at the Nile bottom, turtles, huge crawfish, water-newts, spotted snakes, curious bleached creatures that had never seen the day, great drifts of insects, with frogs, tadpoles--everything of aquatic animate life, came up dead or dying terribly. Along either bank water-buffalo and wallowing swine, which had been in the pools near the river, clambered ponderously, snorting at every step.

Vessels were putting about and flying for the sh.o.r.e. From the prow of one tall boat, with distended sails, a figure was seen to spring high and disappear under the red torrent. Rioting crews of river-men fought for first landing at the accessible places on the banks. Memphis shrieked and the pastures became compounds of wild beasts that deafened heaven with their savage bellowing.

Pepi and Nari had no thought of saving themselves. It was Masanath who must save them. They clung to her, dragging her down with their arms when she attempted to rise. Bereft of reason, they made the liquid echoes of the river ring with wild cries of mortal terror.

Masanath had sufficient instinct left to urge her to fly. With a mighty effort she shook off her servants and sprang to the sweep.

Instantly they made to follow her, but she threatened them with a hunting-stick. The combined weight of the three in the stern would have swamped the frail boat.

Seizing the sweep she poled with superhuman strength toward the nearest sh.o.r.e--the Marsh of the Discontented Soul. If she remembered the spirit, she forgot her fear of it. Any terror was acceptable other than isolation on this mile-wide torrent of blood.

The raft grounded, and as a viscous wash of red lapped across it, she leaped forth, landing with both feet in the horror. She floundered out and crying to her servants to follow her, fled like a mad thing up the sandy stretch toward the distant wall of rock.

The boat, lightened of her weight, received a backward thrust as she leaped, and drifted out of the reeds. The heavy current caught it and swept it across the smitten river to the Memphian sh.o.r.e. It bore two insensible figures.

Masanath ran, thinking only to leave the ghastly flood behind. Her wet over-dress flapped about her ankles. It, too, was stained, and she tore if off as she ran. Ahead of her was a sagging limestone wall, with no gap, but Masanath, hardly sane, would have dashed herself against it, if hands had not detained her.

"Blood! Blood!" she shrieked. "Holy Ptah save us!"

"Peace!" some one made answer. "G.o.d is with us."

The voice was calm and rea.s.suring, the hands firm. Here, then, was one who was strong and unafraid, and therefore, a safe refuge. No longer called upon to care for herself, Masanath fell into the arms of the brave unknown and ceased to remember.

Consciousness returned to her slowly and incompletely. Horror had dazed her, and her surroundings, but faintly discovered in an all-enveloping gloom, were not conducive to mental repose and clearness.

She became aware, first, that she was somewhere hidden from the sunshine and beyond reach of the strange odor from the Nile.