to his knees and forward into the eager arms flung
out to receive him. Her cry of great joy seemed to come to him from
afar.

"Kenkenes! O my love! Not dead; not dead!"

Then it was he learned that she had despaired, grieving beyond any
comfort, for she had counted him with the first-born of Egypt. And
even though thoughts came to him but slowly now, he said to himself:

"Praise God, I did not think of it, or I had gone distracted with her
trouble."

How rich woman-love is in solicitude and ministering resource! It made
Rachel strong enough to raise him, and having led him back to the
divan, gently to lay him down among the cushions. The wine was at her
hand, and she filled the beaker, and held it while he drank. Then she
kissed him and, hiding her face in his breast, wept soft tears. And
though he held her very close and had in his heart a great longing to
soothe her, he could not speak.

After a little she spoke.

"I had not dreamed that there was such artifice in Miriam. She told me
of a nobleman that had served God and Israel, and was in need of
comfort in his tent. But she bridled her tongue and governed her
expression so cunningly, that I did not dream the hero was mine--mine!"

Then on a sudden she disengaged herself from his arms and gaining her
feet, cried out with her hands over her blushing face:

"And now, I know why she and Hur--O I know why they came with me, and
brought me to the tent!"

"Nay, now; may I not guess, also?" Kenkenes laughed, though a little
puzzled over her evident confusion. "They had a mind to peep and spy
upon our love-making. Perchance they are without this instant; come
hither and let us not disappoint them."

She dropped her hands and looked at him with flaming cheeks and smiling
eyes. There was more in her look than he could fathom, but he did not
puzzle longer when she came back to her place and hid her face away
from him.

It is the love of riper years, that makes the lips of lovers silent.
But Kenkenes and Rachel were very young and wholly demonstrative, and
they had need of many words to supplement the testimony of caresses.
They had much to tell and they left no avowal unmade.

But at last Kenkenes' voice wearied and Rachel noted it. So in her
pretty authoritative way, she stroked his lashes down and bade him
sleep. When she removed her hands and clasped them above his head, his
eyes did not open.

As she bent over him, she noted with a great swee