Page:Orczy--the gates of Kamt.djvu/148

 the carrion birds and beasts of the arid valley of death?"

The Pharaoh gave an indifferent shrug of the shoulders, as if the matter had ceased to concern him at all. This Ur-tasen interpreted as a royal assent, for he commanded:

"Take the woman away and bind her with ropes. Let twenty men stand round to guard her, lest she fulfil her impious threat. Let her neither sleep, nor eat, nor drink. To-morrow, at break of day, when the first rays of Osiris peep behind the hills, she shall be led forth through the mysterious precincts of the temple of Ra and cast out through the gates of Kamt for ever into the wilderness."

"By all the gods of heaven, earth or hell," said Hugh, very quietly, "I declare unto you that she shall not." And before I could stop him he had literally bounded forward, and slipping past the dumfounded judge and jury had reached the centre of the hall and was stooping over the prostrate woman.

It was a terrible moment, an eternity of awful suspense to me. I did not know what Hugh would do, dared not think of what any rashness on his part might perhaps entail.

"Touch her not, oh, beloved of the gods," shouted Ur-tasen, warningly; "she has been judged and found guilty; her touch is pollution. The gods by my mouth have decreed her fate."

"Her fate is beyond thy ken and thy decree, oh, man," said Hugh, with proud solemnity, as once again his tall stature towered above them all, "and she now stands before a throne where all is mercy and there is no revenge."

The men round had stooped and tried to lift the