Part 61 (1/2)
Galusha started. ”Eh?” he queried. ”Thinking? Oh, yes--yes!--I suppose I was thinking, Primmie. I--ah--sometimes do.”
”You 'most always do. I never see anybody think as much as you do, Mr.
Bangs. Never in my born days I never. And lately--my savin' soul! Seems as if you didn't do nothin' BUT think lately. Just set around and think and twiddle that thing on your watch chain.”
The thing on the watch chain was a rather odd charm which Mr. Bangs had possessed for many years. ”Twiddling” it was a habit of his. In fact, he had twiddled it so much that the pivot upon which it had hung broke and Martha had insisted upon his sending the charm to Boston for repairs. It had recently been returned.
”What is that thing, Mr. Bangs?” asked Primmie. ”I was lookin' at it t'other day when you left your watch chain layin' out in the sink.”
”In the sink? You mean BY the sink, don't you, Primmie?”
”No, I don't, I mean IN it. You'd forgot your watch and Miss Martha she sent me up to your room after it. I fetched it down to you and you and her was talkin' in the kitchen and you was was.h.i.+n' your hands in the sink basin. Don't you remember you was?”
”Was I? I--I presume I was if you say so. Really I--I have forgotten.”
”Course you have. And you forgot your watch, too. Left it layin' right alongside that tin washbasin full of soapsuds. 'Twas a mercy you didn't empty out the suds on top of it. Well, I snaked it out of the sink and chased out the door to give it to you and you was halfway to the lighthouse and I couldn't make you hear to save my soul. 'Twas then I noticed that charm thing. That's an awful funny kind of thing, Mr.
Bangs. There's a--a bug on it, ain't there?”
”Why--ah--yes, Primmie. That charm is a very old scarab.”
”Hey? A what? I told Miss Martha it looked for all the world like a pertater bug.”
Galusha smiled. He held out the charm for her inspection.
”I have had that for a long time,” he said. ”It is a--ah--souvenir of my first Egyptian expedition. The scarab is a rather rare example. I found it myself at Saqqarah, in a tomb. It is a scarab of the Vth Dynasty.”
”Hey? Die--what?”
”The Vth Dynasty; that is the way we cla.s.sify Egyptian--ah--relics, by dynasties, you know. The Vth Dynasty was about six thousand years ago.”
Primmie sat down upon the chair she had been dusting.
”Hey?” she exclaimed. ”My Lord of Isrul! Is that bug thing there six thousand year old?”
”Yes.”
”My savin' soul! WHAT kind of a bug did you say 'twas?”
”Why, I don't know that I did say. It is a representation of an Egyptian beetle, Ateuchus Sacer, you know. The ancient Egyptians wors.h.i.+ped the beetle and so they--”
”Wait! Wait a minute, Mr. Bangs. WHAT did you say they done to it?”
”I said they wors.h.i.+ped it, made a G.o.d of it, you understand.”
”A G.o.d! Out of a--a pertater bug! Go long, Mr. Bangs! You're foolin', ain't you?”
”Dear me, no! It's quite true, Primmie, really. The ancient Egyptians had many G.o.ds, some like human beings, some in the forms of animals. The G.o.ddess Hathor, for example, was the G.o.ddess of the dead and is always represented in the shape of a cow.”
”Eh! A cow! Do you mean to sit there and tell me them folks--er--er--went to church meetin' and--and flopped down and said their prayers to a COW?”
Galusha smiled. ”Why, yes,” he said, ”I presume you might call it that.
And another G.o.d of theirs had the head of a hawk--the bird, you know.
The cat, too, was a very sacred animal. And, as I say, the beetle, like the one represented here, was--”