such a thing as that of any one they do not like very much;
and I know you like me, for you show me that you do every day by bringing
me flowers, when you carry the game that your father gets to the steward.
Tell me, will you do me and the princess too a very great service?
Yes?--and willingly? Yes? I knew you would! Now listen. A friend of the
great lady Bent-Anat, who will come here to-night, must be hidden for a
day, perhaps several days, from his pursuers. Can he, or rather can they,
for there will probably be two, find shelter and protection in your
father's house, which lies high up there on the sacred mountain?"

"Whoever I take to my father," said the boy, "will be made welcome; and
we defend our guests first, and then ourselves. Where are the strangers?"

"They will arrive in a few hours. Will you wait here till the moon is
well up?"

"Till the last of all the thousand moons that vanish behind the hills is
set."

"Well then, wait on the other side of the stream, and conduct the man to
your house, who repeats my name three times. You know my name?"

"I call you Silver-star, but the others call you Uarda."

"Lead the strangers to your hut, and, if they are received there by your
father, come back and tell me. I will watch for you here at the door of
the tent. I am poor, alas! and cannot reward you, but the princess will
thank your father as a princess should. Be watchful, Salich!"

The girl vanished, and went to the drivers of the gang of prisoners,
wished them a merry and pleasant evening, and then hastened back to
Bent-Anat, who anxiously stroked her abundant hair, and asked her why she
was so pale.

"Lie down," said the princess kindly, "you are feverish. Only look,
Nefert, I can see the blood coursing through the blue veins in her
forehead."

Meanwhile the drivers drank, praised the royal wine, and the lucky day on
which they drank it; and when Uarda's father suggested that the prisoners
too should have a mouthful one of his fellow soldiers cried: "Aye, let
the poor beasts be jolly too for once."

The red-beard filled a large beaker, and offered it first to a forger and
his fettered companion, then he approached Pentaur, and whispered:

"Do not drink any-keep awake!"

As he was going to warn the physician too, one of his companions came
between them, and offering his tankard to Nebsecht said:

"Here mumbler, drink; see him pull! His stuttering mouth is spry enough
for drinking!"

CHAPT