Page:Orczy--the gates of Kamt.djvu/277

 gardens. To-night, more sick than ever, he found his way to the precincts of the temple of Isis, but faintness overtook him—faintness so great that the priests of the goddess laid him on a couch within the sacred building and tended him with loving care. But he is too sick to attend the wedding festivities, and the priests of Isis will have charge of him while Tanis goes raving mad with joy. Tanis will forget the sick Pharaoh in her tumultuous happiness, and those few who will remember him will know that the holy monarch is well cared for by the most learned in the land."

I confess that not even then did I really understand the devilish plan which the high priest of Ra had conceived. That it was in some way to encompass Hugh's ruin was of course evident, but what connection the dead Pharaoh was to have with it, or the mysterious and poetic retreat by the cataract, I could not as yet imagine. The Queen, too, was evidently as much at sea as I was, for she repeated mechanically:

"My mind is dull, Ur-tasen. Still I do not understand."

"During the joyous ceremony," continued the high priest, "the sick Pharaoh again evades his thoughtful guardians, as he often has evaded his attendants, and his roaming footsteps lead him to the waters of the sacred cataract, the secluded spot wherein the royal scions of ancient Kamt whisper first of love and home. The shrine of the goddess is enclosed by high walls shut off by copper gates; these are never opened save on glorious nights—like to-night will be when the widow of Hor-tep-ra will await her stranger lord. But the holy Pharaoh, finding the sacred grove still deserted, doth lay himself there to rest …"

The high priest paused, then added, in a whisper so low that I could hardly hear: