The Yoke Part 81

Still she curbed herself. "Nay, O Prince; I am come to ask naught of thee which--a wife--may not justly ask of--her--lord."

He left the curtain and came close to her. "Had the words come smoothly over thy lips, they would have meant any wife--any husband. But thy very faltering names thee and me. What is the boon that thou mayest justly ask of me?"

"My father--."

"Hold! There, too, I make a restriction. Already have I suffered thy father sufficiently."

Tears leaped into her insulted eyes, and in the bright light, shining from a lamp above her head, her emotion was very apparent.

"Thou hast begun well in thy siege of my heart, Rameses," she said. "I am like to love thee, if thou dost woo me with affronts!"

"I am as like to win thee with rough words as I am with soft speeches. I had thought thee above pretense, Masanath."

"I pretend not," she cried, stamping her foot. "And if thou wouldst know how I esteem thee, I can tell thee most truthfully."

He laughed and caught her hands. "Nay, save thy judgment. Thou hast a long life with me before thee, and the minds of women can change in the blink of an eye. Furthermore, I love thee none the less because thou art so untamed. Thou art the world I would subdue. So thou dost not give allegiance to another conqueror, I shall not grieve over thy rebellion.

Is there another?" he asked.

"I would liefer wed with well-nigh any other man in Egypt than with thee, Rameses," she replied deliberately.

The declaration swept him off his feet.

"G.o.ds! but thou dost hate me," he cried. Panic possessed her for a moment, remembering Hotep, but it was too late. She returned the prince's gaze without wavering, though her hands shook pitifully. After what seemed to her an interminable time, he spoke again.

"Perchance I am unwise in taking thee," he said. "Perchance I but give thee opportunity to spit me on a dagger in my sleep."

The tears brimmed over her lashes this time.

"Thou dost slander me!" she exclaimed pa.s.sionately.

"Then I do not understand thee, Masanath," he a.s.serted.

"Of a surety," she declared, withdrawing a hand that she might dry the evidences of her indignation from her cheeks. "Take the example home to thyself! Thou hast been loved in thy time, and if ever there was awakened any feeling in thy heart in response it was repugnance. What if one of these women had it in her power to take thee against thy will? By this time thou hadst been dead of thy frantic hate of her, if self-murder had not been done!"

"Even so," he answered with a short laugh; "but I will not set thee free, Masanath, if thou didst convict me a monster in mine own eyes. If thou art good thou wilt love me or do thy duty by me. If thou art base, I have wedded mine own deserts."

He took the hand she had withdrawn and prepared to go on, but she interposed.

"Not yet have I asked my boon."

"I am no longer in debt to thy father."

"I ask no favor for my father at thy hands. Rather am I come to crave a boon for myself."

"Speak."

"My father asked an Israelite maiden at the hands of the Pharaoh a year agone, and she was beloved by my friend and thine. She fled from my father and was hidden by the man she loved--"

"Aye, I know the story. Hotep brought it to mine ears months ago. The man was Kenkenes, and thy father overtook him and threw him into prison in Tape. What more?"

"The G.o.ds keep me in my love for thee, O my father! for thou dost strain it most heavily," Masanath thought. After an unhappy silence she went on.

"Thou hast given me news. I know little of the tale save that the day the darkness fell Kenkenes met his love on the eastern sh.o.r.e of the Nile opposite Memphis, and there my father's servants came upon them and fought with him for the possession of the Israelite. The Israelite is gone, and my father's servants are still seeking for her, and I would not have her taken."

"Thou art a queen. What is she, a slave, to thee?"

"A sister, my comforter, my one friend!"

"Thou canst find sisters and comforters and friends among high-born women of Egypt. I had laid Kenkenes' folly concerning this Israelite to the moonshine genius in him. But the slave is a sorceress, for the madness touches whosoever looks upon her. Behold her worshipers--first, thy father, Kenkenes, Hotep and thyself, and the G.o.ds know whom else. She would better be curbed before she bewitches Egypt."

"It is her goodness and her grace that win, Rameses. If that be sorcery, let it prevail the world over. Give her freedom and save her spotlessness."

"Har-hat shall not take her, I promise thee. I shall send her back to her place in the brick-fields."

Masanath recoiled in horror. "To the brick-fields!" she cried. "Rachel to the brick-fields!"

"I have said. Her Israelitish spotlessness will be secure there, and the reduction of her charms will be the saving of Kenkenes."

"Alas! what have I done?" she cried. "I am as fit for the brick-fields as Rachel. O, if thou but knew her, Rameses!"

"Nay, it is as well that I do not; she might bewitch me. And seeing that she is born of slaves, how shall she be pampered above her parents? Put the folly from thy mind, Masanath, and trouble me not concerning a single slave. Shall I let one go, seeing that I am holding the body at the sacrifice of Egypt?"

Great was Masanath's distress to make her seize him so beseechingly.

"Turn not away, my Lord," she begged. "See what havoc I have wrought for Rachel when I sought to help her. And behold the honesty of thy boast of love for me. My first boon and thou dost deny it!"

He laughed, and slipping an arm about her, pressed her to him.

"First am I a king--next a lover," he said. "Thy prayer seeketh to come between me and my rule over the Israelites. Ask for something which hath naught to do with my scepter."

"Surely if thou sendest her to the brick-fields Kenkenes will go into slavery with her," she persisted, enduring his clasp in the hope that he might soften.

"Then it were time for the dreamer to be awakened by his prince."

"Thou wilt not come between them!" she exclaimed.

"Nay, no need. Seven days of the lash and the sun of the slave-world will heal Kenkenes."

"Thou shalt see!" Masanath declared, endeavoring to free herself. "And the G.o.ds judge thee for thy savage use of maidenhood!"

Again he laughed, and this time he kissed her in spite of her resistance.

"The G.o.ds judge me rather for this sweeter use of maidenhood," he said.

"Let them continue to prosper me in it and hasten the day of her willingness. Meanwhile," he continued, still holding her, as if he enjoyed the mastery over her, "get thee back to thy sleep and put the thought of slaves out of thy mind. To-morrow thou settest thy feet in the path to the throne; to-morrow there will be ceremonies and prayers and blessings out of number; and to-morrow sunset thou art no longer betrothed but a bride! My bride! Go now, and be proud of me if thou canst not love me!"

He released her and, as he entered his apartments, lifted the curtain and stood for an instant looking back at her.

Masanath saw him through her despairing tears--strong, immovable, terrible--in his youth and his purposes and his capabilities.