nd thee not, at my father's
house, at dawn to-day. But tell me. Why didst thou not go?"

"I--I feared--" she faltered after a silence.

"My father? Nay, now, dost thou fear me? Not so; and my father is but
myself, grown old. He was only a little less mad with fear than I,
when he discovered that thou shouldst have come to him so long ago, and
camest not. It damped his joy in having me again, and I left him pale
with concern. Did I not tell thee how good he is?"

"Aye, it was not that I feared him, but that I feared that thou--" And
she paused and again he helped her.

"That I was dead? That I had played thee false? Rachel! But how
couldst thou know? Forgive me. Since the tenth night I left thee I
have been in prison."

"In prison!" she exclaimed, lifting her face. "Alas, that I did not
think of it. It is mine to beg thy forgiveness, Kenkenes, and on my
very knees!"

"So thou didst think it, in truth!" She hid her face again and craved
his pardon.

But he pressed her to him and soothed her.

"Nay, I do not chide thee. Had I been in thy place, I might have
thought the same. But it is past--gone with the horrors of this
horrible season--Osiris be thanked!"

"Thanks be to the God of Israel," she demanded from her shelter.

"And the God of Israel," he said obediently.

"Nay, to the God of Israel alone," she insisted, raising her head.

He laughed a little and patted her hands softly together.

"It was but the habit in me that made me name Osiris. There is no god
for me, but Love."

"So long, so long, Kenkenes, and not any change in thee?" she sighed.
"How hath Egypt been helped of her gods, these grievous days?"

"The gods and the gods, and ever the gods!" he said. "What have we to
do with them? Deborah bade me turn from them and this I have done with
all sincerity. Much have I pondered on the question and this have I
concluded. Egypt's holy temples have been vainly built; her worship
has been wasted on the air. There was and is a Creator, but, Rachel,
that Power whose mind is troubled with the great things is too great to
behold the petty concerns of men. My fortunes and thine we must
direct, for though we implored that Power till we died from the fervor
of our supplications, It could not hear, whose ears are filled with the
murmurings of the traveling stars. Why we were created and forgotten,
we may not know. How may we guess the motives of anything too great
for us to conceive