Part 28 (1/2)

”They're impersonal there. They don't hurt one's self-importance.”

”In Cairo they belong to a number and a gla.s.s case,” Mike said. ”They lose their individuality.”

”Here they are a part of Egypt, that ancient, undying Egypt! You and I, like those dogs, Mike, won't have even bones to record us after three thousand years. Our bowels of tenderness will not lie intact in alabaster jars! Oh, Mike, take me in your arms! I want humanity, I want the things of to-day, I want all which that mummy has ridiculed!

I hated it, Mike! I love life and your love! I want to forget that we are here to-day and gone to-morrow, mere human gnats.”

Mike held her close to his heart. Meg could hear it beating. Oh, beloved humanity! Oh, dear human flesh and blood!

”That's lovely, Mike--that's you and me! That's our certain human love, our happiness! It is worth while, and it's not going to be like the running out of an hour-gla.s.s while an egg is boiling! It's going to last for ages and ages, isn't it? Say it is, Mike!”

”Yes, beloved.” Mike kissed her hands.

She drew them away. ”Don't kiss them, Mike. I feel as if they will be dried skeletons by to-morrow, and as if your lips, dearest, will have shrunk and shrunk right back until your teeth gape out of your hideous brown skull up to the blue above. Do you wonder that Akhnaton prayed so ardently that his spirit might come out and see the sun?”

Meg's head was buried in her hands. She was visualizing again the wonderful scene, which had taught her the mockery of all things which had formerly appeared so precious and important. It seemed to her at the moment that to sit down in the desert under the blue sky, and there wait for death, was the only thing to do. Nothing really mattered.

Eternity enthralled her. Her happiness with Mike was but the swift hurrying of a white cloud across a summer sky, the work of the Exploration School a mere ill.u.s.tration of worldly vanity. In the great chaos which possessed her soul there was no light to comfort her. In looking into the past she had unexpectedly seen into the future. She had beheld the scorn and callousness of eternity.

Oddly enough, it was Michael who helped her to pull herself together and turn her thoughts to practical things, to the needs of the day.

His more mystical nature, his familiarity with the mythology of Egypt and other occult subjects, had in a measure prepared his mind for the things which had burst suddenly upon Meg's practical nature. He had been subconsciously prepared for the tomb to be one of unusual importance. The soothsayer's prediction had not been mere charlatanry to him. His secret thoughts were so constantly focussed on what is termed the superhuman, that Meg's wonder and horror formed only a minor part of his emotions.

A thousand thoughts had flashed through his mind when he first saw the amazing display of jewels and faience and gold, the resplendent queen, whose royal magnificence had mocked at time. The inexhaustible wealth of buried Egypt forced before his eyes the treasure of gold of which Akhnaton had spoken, that imperial wealth which he had buried behind the hills of his fair capital. He felt convinced that it was there; he felt convinced that his friend in el-Azhar had seen it, just as the Arab soothsayer had seen the royal effigy dressed as a bride.

Mike had little conversation even for Meg. His mind was hara.s.sed and absorbed. The fresh impetus which he had received was pounding like a sledge-hammer at his natural and supernatural forces. His natural self was the devil's advocate, and a very able one. It argued against the super-instincts which led him to the treasure. It made him practical.

It made him, as Freddy would have declared, ”sanely critical of the insane.” It admitted the apparent folly of the thing into which he was drifting.

He pulled Meg up from her seat on the sand. He realized that her domestic duties were what her nerves needed; they had lately been greatly taxed, first by her vision of Akhnaton and now by the excitement of their entry into the tomb.[1]

A lover's kisses and strong human arms had done much for Meg. She had a horror of hysterical females. She pulled herself together and determined to be practical. Only a few moments before she had felt an almost uncontrollable desire to burst into tears. How thankful she was that Mike had saved her from the humiliation!

But how in the world was she going to bring herself back to the paltry things of every day? How was she ever again going to feel that life was real and actual?

She entered the hut with unwilling feet and troubled mind; for some unaccountable reason its atmosphere depressed her; she wished to avoid it--she felt a curious apprehension of bad news or of coming evil. At the same time, practical work would be beneficial.

As they came in together, Mohammed Ali greeted Michael with the news that ”One lady and one gentleman has come, very long time they wait.

Lady she stays inside, gentleman he go up the valley.”

Instantly life was real again, and Meg a living, angry woman. ”She”

who stayed inside could only mean Mrs. Mervill. The tomb was forgotten, as was the royal bride. They belonged to the past; the present was all-engrossing.

The present hour was the living reality and Michael, her lover, and her own love were the things that mattered, the woman in the hut the one brilliant vision. Life was vital, urgent. A gnat's life would be long enough if it was to be pa.s.sed with the woman whom she knew, in the coming struggle, would fight with tools which she, Meg, would not dare or deign to touch. As vivid as her vision of the tomb was her memory of Millicent Mervill's beauty. She could see it illuminating their desert hut; she could feel it eclipsing her own less vivid colouring as the sun had eclipsed the rays of Akhnaton.

Mike looked at her. Meg's cheeks were pale, her eyes deeply shadowed.

He hated the woman inside the tent. What had she come for?

A silent kiss separated them. With the kiss Meg's heart took courage.