Page:Orczy--the gates of Kamt.djvu/305

 "I swear!"

"Oh, son of Ra, beloved of the gods, dost swear before all men that thou wilt be true to her, whom thou wilt take to thyself as wife?"

"I swear!"

"Wilt swear it on the names of the gods of Kamt, of Ra, of Osiris and of Horus? of Anubis and Set? Wilt swear it upon thy manhood and upon thy honour?"

"I swear it!"

Hugh Tankerville, calm and impassive, had pledged his honour to be true to her who even now was plotting his death and his shame.

I seemed to remember all now as in a flash. The sight of Ur-tasen's face as he watched the high priest of Isis administering this oath to my friend, for the space of a second, illumined a corner of my dulled intellect. I saw it all with the vividness of reality: the murdered Pharaoh lying beside the cataract; Hugh wandering unsuspectingly thither, with the shaven priests of Isis creeping on his trail, like jackals after their prey: then the mob yelling and cursing: Hugh, helpless in the face of the terrible accusations; the hall of justice: the doom from which probably even his own personality could not save him: and all the while I tried to shriek. I opened my parched lips, and but a few dull, guttural sounds escaped my throat, and Hugh could not hear. He was there within a few yards of me, pledging his manhood, his honour, to a pagan murderess, and I could do nothing, for I was in a dream, which gripped my throat and numbed my limbs. Once it seemed to me as if Hugh held up his head suddenly, while a look of surprise came into his eyes: encouraged, I tried again; my head fell back as if weighted with lead, the lids closed over my aching eyes, the vision of the snow-white temple, the brilliant crowd, the