the image of Athor was a long table overlaid with a
slab of red sandstone. Here the offerings were left and here Kenkenes
laid Atsu, a true sacrifice to the love deity. Reverently the young
man closed the eyes and straightened the chilling limbs. Going into
his patrimony of jewels sewn in his belt, he took an emerald, and
putting it in the hands, crossed them above the breast. Then he laid
his mantle over the bier.

At the threshold he found a soft stone and with that he wrote upon the
head of the long table the name of the dead man, and Mendes, his native
city. Under this he wrote further to the villagers, charging them, in
the name of the goddess, to care for the body reverently and return it
to the tomb of Atsu's fathers. Having made note of the emerald as
remuneration for their labors, he completed the inscription without
signature.

Thus he insured the safety and preservation of the bones of Atsu, and
in the eye of the average Egyptian he had served the soldier well. But
Kenkenes was not satisfied.

As he left the shrine he muttered with trembling lips:

"Bless him! The fate is not kind which yields to such goodness no
reward save gratitude. There must be, because of the great God's
justness, some especial blessing laid up for Atsu."

In the time he had spent in the sanctuary the atmosphere had grown hazy
and the sun shone obscurely. To the east were tumbled and darkening
masses, which gathered even as he looked and joined till they stretched
in a vast and unillumined sweep about the horizon. The wind had died
and the heat bathed him in perspiration.

Once again his eyes sought the pillar and found it above him, still
somewhat to the east, yet in form unchanged, in hue undimmed.
Something within him associated the column of cloud with Israel and
Israel's God.

He went to his horse and found him terrified and unmanageable. After
vain efforts to soothe the creature, he walked away a little space,
clasping his hands.

"O Thou mysterious God! By these tokens Thy hand is upon the earth and
upon the heavens. Even as Thou hast shielded me thus far, withdraw not
Thy sheltering hand from about me, Thy worshiper, in this, Thy latest
hour of mystery."

He skirted the village, now filling with frightened peasants, and took
the path of Israel.

It led in a southeasterly direction toward a far-off hill, barely
outlined through the haze of the distance. Meanwhile the darkness
settled and over the sea