ng to the trellis, and prayed with full hearts.

When they rose night was spreading over the landscape, for the twilight
is short in Thebes. Here and there a rosy cloud fluttered across the
darkening sky, and faded gradually as the evening star appeared.

"I am content," said Bent-Anat. "And you? have you recovered your peace
of mind?"

Nefert shook her head. The princess drew her on to a seat, and sank down
beside her. Then she began again "Your heart is sore, poor child; they
have spoilt the past for you, and you dread the future. Let me be frank
with you, even if it gives you pain. You are sick, and I must cure you.
Will you listen to me?"

"Speak on," said Nefert.

"Speech does not suit me so well as action," replied the princess; "but I
believe I know what you need, and can help you. You love your husband;
duty calls him from you, and you feel lonely and neglected; that is quite
natural. But those whom I love, my father and my brothers, are also gone
to the war; my mother is long since dead; the noble woman, whom the king
left to be my companion, was laid low a few weeks since by sickness. Look
what a half-abandoned spot my house is! Which is the lonelier do you
think, you or I?"

"I," said Nefert. "For no one is so lonely as a wife parted from the
husband her heart longs after."

"But you trust Mena's love for you?" asked Bent-Anat.

Nefert pressed her hand to her heart and nodded assent:

"And he will return, and with him your happiness."

"I hope so," said Nefert softly.

"And he who hopes," said Bent Anat, "possesses already the joys of the
future. Tell me, would you have changed places with the Gods so long as
Mena was with you? No! Then you are most fortunate, for blissful
memories--the joys of the past--are yours at any rate. What is the
present? I speak of it, and it is no more. Now, I ask you, what joys can
I look forward to, and what certain happiness am I justified in hoping
for?

"Thou dost not love any one," replied Nefert. "Thou dost follow thy own
course, calm and undeviating as the moon above us. The highest joys are
unknown to thee, but for the same reason thou dost not know the bitterest
pain."

"What pain?" asked the princess.

"The torment of a heart consumed by the fires of Sechet," replied Nefert.

The princess looked thoughtfully at the ground, then she turned her eyes
eagerly on her friend.

"You are mistaken," she said; "I know what love and longing are. But you
need on