bility
and pugnacity.

Tanis was within hearing of the plaints of Israel, and the atmosphere
quivered with omen and portent. Moses appeared in this place and that,
each time nearer the temporary capital, and wherever he came he left
rejoicing or shuddering behind him.

Meanwhile the fan-bearer laughed his way into the throne. Meneptah's
weakness for him grew into stubborn worship. The old and trusted
ministers of the monarch took offense and sealed their lips; the new
held their peace for trepidation. The queen, heretofore meek and
self-effacing, laid aside her spindle one day and, meeting her lord at
the door of the council chamber; protested in the name of his dynasty
and his realm.

But the king was beyond help, and the queen, angry and hurt, bade him
keep Har-hat out of her sight, and returned to her women. Thereafter
even Meneptah saw her rarely.

The rise of the fan-bearer was achieved in an incredibly short time.
It proved conclusively that until this period an influence against
Har-hat had been at work upon Meneptah, and seeing that Rameses had
subsided, having cause to propitiate the father of the woman he would
wed, the courtiers began to blame the prince and talk of him to one
another.

He seemed lost in a dream. In the council chamber he lounged in his
chair with his eyes upon nothing and apparently hearing nothing. But
the slow shifting of the spark in his sleepy eyes indicated to those
who observed closely that he heard but kept his own counsel. If
Meneptah spoke to him he but seconded Har-hat's suggestions. But once
again the observant ones noted that the fan-bearer did not advise at
wide variance with any of the prince's known ideas. Thus far the most
caviling could not see that Har-hat's favoritism had led to any
misrule, but the field of possibilities opened by his complete
dominance over the Pharaoh was crowded with disaster, individual and
national.

The betrothal of Rameses to Har-hat's daughter gave further material
for contention. It seemed to indicate that the fan-bearer had builded
for himself for two reigns.

Hotep's situation was most poignantly unhappy. He was fixed under the
same roof with the man that had taken his love by piracy; he must greet
him affably and reverently every day; he must live in daily
contemplation of the time when he must meet Masanath also as his
sovereign--the wife of the prince, whom he must serve till death.
Hardest of all, he must wear a seren