colorless
and pathetically drooped. A white hand, resting on the slight frame of
the small opening, was tightly clenched.

The picture was one of weary despair.

The soldier, blanched and shaken, took a step forward as if to speak,
but some realization brought him back to rigid attention against the
stela.

The light litter passed on.

The regular tread of the men grew fainter and fainter and silence
settled again about the well.

The soldier stood erect, gray-faced and immovable, his eyes fixed, his
teeth set, his hand gripping the pike, till the insects, reassured,
began to chirr close about him. Then his lids quivered; the pike
leaned in his grasp; his jaw relaxed, weakly. He shifted his position
and frowned, flung up his head and resumed his vigil. The moments went
on and yet he retained his tense posture. The hour passed and with it
his physical endurance.

Then his emotion gathered all its forces, all the compelling sensations
of disappointment, rebuff, heart-hurt, jealousy, hopelessness, and
stormed his soul. He turned about and, stretching his arms across the
top of the stela, hid his face and surrendered.

Around him was the unbroken circle of the earth and above the blue
desert of sky, solitary, soundless. And the union of earth and heaven,
like a mundane and spiritual collusion, lay between him and the little
litter.

The beat of a horse's hoofs in the distance roused him after a long
time, and hastily turning his back toward the new-comer, he resumed at
once his soldierly attitude.

The traveler bore down on him from the west and reined his horse at the
intersection of the two roads. He looked up the straight highway
toward Pa-Ramesu, then turned in the saddle and gazed toward Tanis.
His indecision was not a wayfarer's casual hesitancy in the choice of
roads. By the anxiety written on his face, life, fortune or love might
be at stake upon the correct selection of route. Once or twice he
looked at the soldier, but showed no inclination to ask advice, even
had the man-at-arms turned his way.

It was one of fate's opportunities to be gracious. Here was Kenkenes
seeking for the maiden whom he and the soldier loved, and it lay in the
power of the unelect to direct the fortunate. But Kenkenes did not
know the warrior, and Atsu had no desire to turn his unhappy face to
the new-comer. The young man grew more and more troubled, his
indecision more marked. Suddenly he dropped the reins, an