eethe and foam, and on
them, like a broken lily, floats the wreck of my lost honour. Talk not
to me of honour, Rei, teach me rather how I may win my hero to my arms."

"Thou art mad indeed," he groaned; "nevertheless--I had forgotten--this
must needs end in words and tears. Meriamun, I bring thee tidings. He
whom thou desireth is lost to thee for ever--to thee and all the world."

She heard, then sprang from the couch and stood over him like a lioness
over a smitten stag, her fierce and lovely face alive with rage and
fear.

"Is he dead?" she hissed in his ear. "Dead! and I knew it not? Then thou
hast murdered him, and thus I avenge his murder."

With the word she snatched a dagger from her girdle--that same dagger
with which she had once struck at Meneptah her brother, when he would
have kissed her--and high it flashed above Rei the Priest.

"Nay," she went on, letting the knife fall; "after another fashion shalt
thou die--more slowly, Rei, yes, more slowly. Thou knowest the torment
of the palm-tree? By that thou shalt die!" She paused, and stood above
him with quivering limbs, and breast that heaved, and eyes that flashed
like stars.

"Stay! stay!" he cried. "It is not I who have slain this Wanderer, if
he indeed is dead, but his own folly. For he is gone up to look upon the
Strange Hathor, and those who look upon the Hathor do battle with the
Unseen Swords, and those who do battle with the Unseen Swords must lie
in the baths of bronze and seek the Under World."

The face of Meriamun grew white at this word, as the alabaster of the
walls, and she cried aloud with a great cry. Then she sank upon the
couch, pressing her hand to her brow and moaning:

"How may I save him? How may I save him from that accursed witch? Alas!
It is too late--but at least I will know his end, ay, and hear of the
beauty of her who slays him. Rei," she whispered, not in the speech of
Khem, but in the dead tongue of a dead people, "be not wrath with me.
Oh, have pity on my weakness. Thou knowest of the Putting-forth of the
Spirit--is it not so?"

"I am instructed," he answered, in the same speech; "'twas I who taught
thee this art, I, and that Ancient Evil which is thine."

"True--it was thou, Rei. Thou hast ever loved me, so thou swearest, and
many a deed of dread have we dared together. Lend me thy Spirit, Rei,
that I may send it forth to the Temple of the False Hathor, and learn
what passes in the temple, and of the death of him--w