“Give me but faith in the hypothesis and I shall say, of a surety,” he replied.

“Thou hast said.  Shall we not go on, my master?”

“I am Kenkenes, the son of Mentu,” he told her.

She bent her head in acknowledgment of the introduction and moved forward as if to climb up by the projecting edges of the strata.  But he put a powerful arm about her and lifted her into the valley.  With a light bound he was beside her.  Ahead of them was profound darkness, hedged by black and close-drawn walls and canopied by distant and unillumining stars.  She resumed her place behind him though he was moved to protest, but her deliberate manner seemed to demand its way.  So they continued slowly.

“Thou givest me interest in the God of Israel,” he said, to reopen the subject.  “The Egyptian dwells in his gods, but thou sayest that the God of Israel dwells in Israel.”

“Even so.  But thou speakest of Israel’s God, even after the fashion of my people.  They are jealous, saying that the true God hath but one love and that is Israel.  If they would think it, let them, but He is the all-God, of all the earth, the One God—­thy God as well as mine.”

“Mine!” Kenkenes exclaimed.

“Thou hast said.”

“Now, by all things worshipful, this is news.  I had ever thought that our gods are those to whom we bow.  Either thou sayest wrong or I have been remiss in my devotions.”

“Nay, listen,” she said earnestly, stepping to his side.  “Already have I told thee of the captain of Israel.  He was reared among princes in the house of the Pharaoh, and he is learned in all the wisdom of Egypt.  He instructeth the elders concerning Jehovah, and from mouth to mouth his wisdom traverseth till it reacheth the ears of the young.  This, then, I have from the lips of Moses, who speaketh naught but the truth.  In early times all on earth had perished for wickedness by the sending of the One God, save a holy man and his three sons.  These men worshiped the God of Abraham, who was the father of Israel.  One of the sons founded thy race, saith Moses, and one established mine.  The tribes that went into Egypt worshiped the same God.  Lo, is it not written in the early tombs?  So Moses testifieth, but if thou doubtest, go question thy historians.  And some of the tribes called that God Ra, others, Ptah, and yet others, Amen.  But in time they quarreled and each tribe refused to admit the identity of the three-named One God, saying, ’Thy god sendeth plague and affliction, and ours sendeth rich harvests and the Nile floods.’  Did not the same God do each of these things in His wisdom?  Even so.  But when they were at last united into one great people, they had forgotten the quarrel, forgotten that in the beginning they had worshiped one God, and they bowed down to three instead.  Nay, if there were but one among you who dared, there are loose threads fluttering, which, if drawn, might unravel the whole fabric of idolatry and disclose that which it hides—­the One God—­the God of Abraham.”