ould I fly it will indeed be a
comfort to have you with me as well as Amuba, who has already promised
to go with me; but at present nothing is determined. I have seen my
father and told him everything, and he will decide for me."

"Then he will not denounce you," Amuba said. "I thought that he would
not."

"No; and he has spoken so kindly that I am amazed. It did not seem
possible to me that an Egyptian would have heard of such a dreadful
occurrence without feeling horror and destation of the person who did
it, even were he his own son. Still more would one expect it from a
man who, like my father, is a high priest to the gods."

"Your father is a wise as well as a learned man," Jethro said: "and
he knows that the gods cannot be altogether offended at an affair for
which fate and not the slayer is responsible. The real slayer of the
cat is the twig which turned the arrow, and I do not see that you are
any more to blame, or anything like so much to blame, as is the hawk
at whom you shot."

This, however, was no consolation to Chebron, who threw himself down
on a couch in a state of complete prostration. It seemed to him that
even could this terrible thing be hidden he must denounce himself and
bear the penalty. How could he exist with the knowledge that he was
under the ban of the gods? His life would be a curse rather than a
gift under such circumstances. Physically, Chebron was not a coward,
but he had not the toughness of mental fibre which enables some men to
bear almost unmoved misfortunes which would crush others to the
ground. As to the comforting assurances of Amuba and Jethro, they
failed to give him the slightest consolation. He loved Amuba as a
brother, and in all other matters his opinion would have weighed
greatly with him; but Amuba knew nothing of the gods of Egypt, and
could not feel in the slightest the terrible nature of the act of
sacrilege, and therefore on this point his opinion could have no
weight.

"Jethro," Amuba said, "you told me you were going to escort Mysa one
day or other to the very top of the hills, in order that she could
thence look down upon the whole city. Put it into her head to go this
morning, or at least persuade her to go into the city. If she goes
into the garden she will at once notice that the cat is lost; whereas
if you can keep her away for the day it will give us so much more
time."

"But if Ameres decides that you had best fly, I might on my return
find that you h