hers cooked a warm mess of victuals, Horus
and Pentaur walked up and down impatiently.

"Had you been long bound in those thongs when we came?" asked Pentaur.

"Yesterday my brother fell upon me," replied Horus. "He is by this time a
long way ahead of us, and if he joins the Cheta, and we do not reach the
Egyptian camp before daybreak, all is lost."

"Paaker, then, is plotting treason?"

"Treason, the foulest, blackest treason!" exclaimed the young man. "Oh,
my lost father!--"

"Confide in me," said Pentaur going up to the unhappy youth who had
hidden his face in his hands. "What is Paaker plotting? How is it that
your brother is your enemy?"

"He is the elder of us two," said Horus with a trembling voice. "When my
father died I had only a short time before left the school of Seti, and
with his last words my father enjoined me to respect Paaker as the head
of our family. He is domineering and violent, and will allow no one's
will to cross his; but I bore everything, and always obeyed him, often
against my better judgment. I remained with him two years, then I went to
Thebes, and there I married, and my wife and child are now living there
with my mother. About sixteen months afterwards I came back to Syria, and
we travelled through the country together; but by this time I did not
choose to be the mere tool of my brother's will, for I had grown prouder,
and it seemed to me that the father of my child ought not to be
subservient, even to his own brother. We often quarrelled, and had a bad
time together, and life became quite unendurable, when--about eight weeks
since--Paaker came back from Thebes, and the king gave him to understand
that he approved more of my reports than of his. From my childhood I have
always been softhearted and patient; every one says I am like my mother;
but what Paaker made me suffer by words and deeds, that is--I could
not--" His voice broke, and Pentaur felt how cruelly he had suffered;
then he went on again:

"What happened to my brother in Egypt, I do not know, for he is very
reserved, and asks for no sympathy, either in joy or in sorrow; but from
words he has dropped now and then I gather that he not only bitterly
hates Mena, the charioteer--who certainly did him an injury--but has some
grudge against the king too. I spoke to him of it at once, but only once,
for his rage is unbounded when he is provoked, and after all he is my
elder brother.

"For some days they have been preparing in