erings, and the
sacrifices. One only God, infinite, eternal, formless, colourless, fills
the immensity of the heavens which you people with a multitude of
phantoms. Our God has created us; you have created your gods."

Although Tahoser was deeply in love with Poeri, his words affected her
strangely, and she drew back in terror. The daughter of the high-priest
had been brought up to venerate the gods whom the young Hebrew was
boldly blaspheming; she had offered up on their altars bouquets of
flowers, and she had burned perfumes before their impassible images;
amazed and delighted, she had walked through their temples splendid with
brilliant paintings. She had seen her father performing the mysterious
rites; she had followed the procession of priests who bore the symbolic
bari through the enormous pylons and the endless sphinx avenues; she had
admired tremblingly the psychostasis where the trembling soul appears
before Osiris armed with the whip and the pedum, and she had noted with
a dreamy glance the frescoes representing the emblematic figures
travelling towards the regions of the West. She could not thus yield up
all her beliefs. She was silent for a few moments, hesitating between
religion and love. Love won the day, and she said:

"You shall tell me of your God; I will try to understand him."

"It is well," said Poeri; "you shall be my wife. Meanwhile remain here,
for the Pharaoh, no doubt in love with you, is having you sought
everywhere by his emissaries. He will never discover you under this
humble roof, and in a few days we shall be out of his power. But the
night is waning and I must depart."

Poeri went off, and the two young women, lying side by side on the soft
bed, soon fell asleep, holding each other's hands like two sisters.

Thamar, who during the foregoing scene had remained crouched in her
corner of the room, looking like a bat hanging from a corner by its
talons, and had been muttering broken words and frowning, now unfolded
her bony limbs, rose to her feet, and bending over the bed, listened to
the breathing of the two sleepers. When the regularity of their
breathing convinced her that they were sound asleep, she went towards
the door, walking with infinite precaution. Once outside, she sprang
with swift steps in the direction of the Nile, shaking off the dogs who
hung on with their teeth at the edge of her tunic, or dragging them
through the dust until they let go; or she glared at them with suc