Part 24 (1/2)
Then she paused and seemed to grow disturbed; she sighed, wrung her hands a little, and said in a choking voice:
”I am but one woman alone among you. My father, Pharaoh, is dead, and you bid me lay down my rank and henceforth rule only through him who trapped Pharaoh and brought him to his end. What, then, can I do?”
”Be a good maid and obey your husband, b.a.s.t.a.r.d,” mocked a voice, and during the roar of laughter that followed Tua looked at the speaker, an officer of Abi's, who had taken a great part in the slaughter of their escort.
Very strangely she looked at him, and those who stood by the man noted that his lips became white, and that he turned so faint that had it not been for the press about him he would have fallen. Presently he seemed to recover, and asked the priests who were near to let him join their circle, as among the outer throng the heat was too great for him to bear. Thereon one of them nodded and made room for him, and he pa.s.sed in, which Tua noted also.
Now she was speaking again.
”Ill names to throw at Egypt's anointed queen, crowned and accepted by the G.o.d himself in the sanctuary of his most holy temple,” she said, her eyes still resting on the brutal soldier. ”Yet it is your hour, and she must bear them who has no friends in Memphis. Oh! what shall I do?” and again she wrung her hands. ”Good People, it was sworn to me that Amen, greatest of the G.o.ds, set his spirit within me when I was born, and vowed that he would help me in the hour of my need. Of your grace, then, give me s.p.a.ce to pray to Amen. Look,” and she pointed before her, ”yonder sinks the red ball of the sun; soon, soon it will be gone--give me until it enters the gateways of the West to pray to Amen, and then if no help comes I will bow me to your bidding, and do homage to this n.o.ble Prince of the Hyksos blood, who snared Pharaoh his brother, and by help of his magicians and of his spy, Merytra, brought him to his end.”
”Yes, my people, give her the s.p.a.ce she asks,” called Abi, who feared nothing from Amen, a somewhat remote personage, and was afraid lest some tumult should happen in the course of which this lovely, new-made wife of his might be slain or injured.
So they gave her the s.p.a.ce of time she asked. Standing up, Tua raised her arms and eyes towards heaven, and began to pray aloud:
”Hear me, Amen my Father, in the House of thy Rest, as thou hast sworn to do. O Amen my Father, thou seest my strait. Is it thy will that thy daughter should degrade herself and thee before this man who slew his king and brother, to whom thou hast commanded her to give the name of husband? If it be so, I will obey; but if it be not so, then show thy word by might or marvel, and cause him and his folk who mock my majesty and name me b.a.s.t.a.r.d, to bow down before me. O Amen, they deny thee in their hearts who wors.h.i.+p other G.o.ds, as did the barbarians who begat them and threw down thy shrines in Egypt, but I know that thou sentest me forth, and in thee I put my trust, aye, even if thou slay me. Amen my Father, yonder sinks that glory in which thou dost hide thy spirit. Now, ere it be gone and night falls upon the world, declare thyself in such fas.h.i.+on that all men may know that indeed I am thy child; or if this be thy decree, desert me and Egypt, and leave me to my shame.”
She ended her prayer and, sinking back upon the throne, rested her chin upon her hand, and gazed steadily upon the splendour of the sinking sun.
Nor did she gaze alone, for every man in that vast hall turned himself about, and stared at its departing glory. There in the red light they stood, and stared, and since the place was open to the sky, the shadows of the two towering obelisks without fell on them like the shadows of swords whereof the points met together at the foot of Tua's throne. They did not believe that anything would happen, no, not even the priests believed it who here at Memphis, the city of Ptah, thought little of Amen, the G.o.d of Thebes. They thought that this piteous prayer was but a last cry of dying faith wrung from a proud and fallen woman in her wretchedness.
And yet, and yet they stared, for she had spoken with a strange certainty like one who knew the G.o.d, and was she not named Star of Amen, and were there not wondrous tales as to her birth, and had not a lotus-bloom seemed to turn to gold and jewels in the hand of this young, anointed Queen who bore the Cross of Life upon her breast? No, nothing would happen, but still they stared.
It was a very strange sunset. For days the heat had been great, but now it was fearful, also a marvellous stillness reigned in heaven and earth.
Nothing seemed to stir in all the city, no dog barked, no child cried, no leaf quivered upon the tall palms; it might have been a city of the dead.
Dense clouds arose upon the sky, and moved, though no wind blew. Where the sun's rays touched them they were gold and red and purple, but above these of an inky blackness. They took strange shapes those clouds, and marshalled themselves like a host gathering for battle. There were the commanders moving quickly to and fro; there the chariots, and there the sullen lines of footmen with their gleaming spears. Now one cloud higher than the rest seemed to shoot itself across the arch of heaven, and its fas.h.i.+on was that of a woman with outspread hair of gold. Her feet stood upon the sun, her body bent itself athwart the sky, and upon the far horizon in the east her hands held the pale globe of the rising moon.
The watchers were frightened at this cloud. ”It is Isis with the moon in her arms,” said one. ”Nay, it is the mother G.o.ddess Nout brooding upon the world,” answered another. And though they only spoke softly, in that awful silence their voices reached Tua on the throne, and for the first time her face changed, for on it came a cold, curious smile.
Kaku began to whisper into Abi's ear, and there was fear in the eyes of both of them. He pointed with his finger at two stars, which of a sudden shone out through the green haze above the sunset glow, and then turned and looked at the Queen, urging his master eagerly. At last Abi spoke.
”Ra is set,” he said. ”Come, let us make an end of all this folly.”
”Not yet,” answered Tua quietly, ”not yet awhile.”
As she said the words, of a sudden, as though at a given signal, all the long lines of palm trees that grew in the rich gardens upon the river banks were seen to bow themselves towards the east, as though they did obeisance to the Queen upon her throne. Thrice they bowed thus, without a wind, and then were straight and still once more. Next the clouds rushed together as though a black pall had been drawn across the heavens, only in the west the half-hidden globe of the sun shone on through an opening in them, shone like a great and furious eye. By slow degrees it sank, till nothing was left save a little rim of fire. All the hall grew dark, and through the darkness Neter-Tua could be heard calling on the name of Amen.
”Ra is dead!” shouted a voice. ”Have done, b.a.s.t.a.r.d, Ra is dead!”
”Aye,” she answered in a cold triumphant cry, ”but Amen lives. Behold his sword, ye Traitors!”
As the words left her lips the heavens were cleft in twain by a fearful flash of lightning, and in it the people saw that once again the palm-trees bowed themselves, this time almost to the ground. Then with a roar the winds were loosed, and beneath their feet the solid earth began to heave as though a giant lifted it. Thrice it heaved like a heaving wave, and the third time through the thick cover of the darkness there rose a shriek of terror and of agony followed by the awful crash of falling stones.
Now the whole sky seemed to melt in fire, and in that fierce light was seen Tua, Star of Amen, seated on her throne, holding her sceptre to the heavens, and laughing in triumphant merriment. Well might she laugh, for the two great obelisks without the gate that the old Hyksos lion had set up there to stand ”to all eternity,” had fallen across the low pylons and the doors and crushed them. On to the heads of those who watched beneath they had fallen, shattering in their fall and carrying death to hundreds. Beneath the electrum cap of one of them that had been hurled from it in its descent right into the circle of the priests, lay a shapeless ma.s.s. It was that man who had mocked the Queen and turned faint beneath her gaze.
Through the western ruin of the hall those who were left alive within it fled out, a maddened mob, trampling each other to death by scores, fighting furiously to escape the vengeance of Amen and his daughter.
Within the enclosure the priests lay prostrate on their faces, each praying to his G.o.d for mercy. In front of the throne, upon his knees, the royal crown shaken from his head, Abi grasped the feet of Neter-Tua and screamed to her to forgive and spare him, whilst above, s.h.i.+ning like fire, That which sat upon the throne pointed with her sceptre at the ruin and the rout, and laughed and laughed again.
Soon all were gone save the mumbling priests, the dying, the dead, and Abi with his officers.