The declaration swept him off his feet.

“Gods! but thou dost hate me,” he cried.  Panic possessed her for a moment, remembering Hotep, but it was too late.  She returned the prince’s gaze without wavering, though her hands shook pitifully.  After what seemed to her an interminable time, he spoke again.

“Perchance I am unwise in taking thee,” he said.  “Perchance I but give thee opportunity to spit me on a dagger in my sleep.”

The tears brimmed over her lashes this time.

“Thou dost slander me!” she exclaimed passionately.

“Then I do not understand thee, Masanath,” he asserted.

“Of a surety,” she declared, withdrawing a hand that she might dry the evidences of her indignation from her cheeks.  “Take the example home to thyself!  Thou hast been loved in thy time, and if ever there was awakened any feeling in thy heart in response it was repugnance.  What if one of these women had it in her power to take thee against thy will?  By this time thou hadst been dead of thy frantic hate of her, if self-murder had not been done!”

“Even so,” he answered with a short laugh; “but I will not set thee free, Masanath, if thou didst convict me a monster in mine own eyes.  If thou art good thou wilt love me or do thy duty by me.  If thou art base, I have wedded mine own deserts.”

He took the hand she had withdrawn and prepared to go on, but she interposed.

“Not yet have I asked my boon.”

“I am no longer in debt to thy father.”

“I ask no favor for my father at thy hands.  Rather am I come to crave a boon for myself.”

“Speak.”

“My father asked an Israelite maiden at the hands of the Pharaoh a year agone, and she was beloved by my friend and thine.  She fled from my father and was hidden by the man she loved—­”

“Aye, I know the story.  Hotep brought it to mine ears months ago.  The man was Kenkenes, and thy father overtook him and threw him into prison in Tape.  What more?”

“The gods keep me in my love for thee, O my father! for thou dost strain it most heavily,” Masanath thought.  After an unhappy silence she went on.

“Thou hast given me news.  I know little of the tale save that the day the darkness fell Kenkenes met his love on the eastern shore of the Nile opposite Memphis, and there my father’s servants came upon them and fought with him for the possession of the Israelite.  The Israelite is gone, and my father’s servants are still seeking for her, and I would not have her taken.”

“Thou art a queen.  What is she, a slave, to thee?”

“A sister, my comforter, my one friend!”

“Thou canst find sisters and comforters and friends among high-born women of Egypt.  I had laid Kenkenes’ folly concerning this Israelite to the moonshine genius in him.  But the slave is a sorceress, for the madness touches whosoever looks upon her.  Behold her worshipers—­first, thy father, Kenkenes, Hotep and thyself, and the gods know whom else.  She would better be curbed before she bewitches Egypt.”