Part 36 (1/2)
She saw me in my battered mail and the blood flowed up to her breast and brow and in her eyes there caht that is lit only by the torch of woer were hers the eyes of a priestess; they were the eyes of a woman who burns with mortal passion
”Amada,” I whispered, ”Amada found at last”
”Shabaka,” she whispered back, ”returned at last, to me, your home,” and she stretched out her arms toward me
But before I could take her into mine, she uttered a little cry and shrank away
”Oh! not here,” she said, ”not here in the presence of this Holy One atches all that passes in heaven and earth”
”Then perchance, Aypt on yonder field to-day, and knows for whose sake it was done”
”Hearken, Shabaka I auerdon Moreover as a woht I desire so much as to feel your kiss upon me For it and it alone I am ready to risk my spirit's death and torment But for you I fear Twice have I sworn myself to this Goddess and she is very jealous of those who rob her of her votaries I fear that her curse will fall not only on me, but on you also, and not only for this life but for all lives that iven to us For your own sake, I pray you leave , and doubtless they will offer you the throne Take it, Shabaka, for in it I ask no share
Take it and leave me to serve the Goddess till my death”
”I too serve a Goddess,” I answered hoarsely, ”and she is named Love, and you are her priestess Little I care for Isis who serve the Goddess Love Come, kiss me here and now, ere perchance I die Kiss h, and so let us be wed”
Onein the wind of passion, like a tall reed on the banks of Nile, and then, ah! then she sank upon ainst my own
AND AFTER
For a few moments I, Shabaka, seemed to be lost in a kind of delirium and surrounded by a rose-hued mist Then I, Allan Quater, and looked up It was a lock, a beautiful old clock on a mantelpiece opposite to me and the hands showed that it had just struck the hour of ten
Now I re asleep, I did not knohy, I had seen that clock and those hands in the sa the second stroke of ten Oh! what did it all ht seconds?
There was a weight upon lanced round to see what it was and discovered the beautiful head of Lady Ragnall eetly sleeping there Lady Ragnall! and in that very strange dream which I had dreamed she was the priestess called Amada Look, there was the o I had been in a shrine with Aht, in circumstances so intinall!
Anall! A shrine! A boudoir! Oh! Imad!
I could not disturb her, it would have been--well, unseemly So I, Shabaka, or Allan Quater curiously coether, when suddenly Anall woke
”I wonder,” she said without lifting her head from my shoulder, ”what happened to the holy Tanofir I think that I heard hi of Pharaoh's grave at that spot, and saying that he must do so at once as his tio away Oh!up
I too rose and we stood facing each other
Between us, in front of the fire stood the tripod and the bowl of black stone at the bottom of which lay a pinch of white ashes, the remains of the _Taduki_ We stared at it and at each other
”Oh! where have we been, Shaba--Iat me round-eyed
”I don't know,” I answered confusedly ”To the East I suppose That is--it was all a dream”
”A dream!” she said ”What nonsense! Tell me, were you or were you not in a sanctuary just noith e two years ago and killed hiive me a necklace of wonderful rosy pearls which we put upon the neck of the statue as a peace-offering because I had broken my vows to the Goddess--those that you won fro?”
”No,” I answered triu of the sort Is it likely that I should have taken those priceless pearls into battle? I gave them to Karema to keep after my mother returned them to me on her death-bed; I remember it distinctly”