Katuti's daughter had in the last few hours felt like one born blind,
and who suddenly receives his sight. He looks at the brightness of the
sun, and the manifold forms of the creation around him, but the beams of
the day-star blind its eyes, and the new forms, which he has sought to
guess at in his mind, and which throng round him in their rude reality,
shock him and pain him. To-day, for the first time, she had asked
herself wherefore her mother, and not she herself, was called upon to
control the house of which she nevertheless was called the mistress, and
the answer had rung in her ears: "Because Mena thinks you incapable of
thought and action." He had often called her his little rose, and she
felt now that she was neither more nor less than a flower that blossoms
and fades, and only charms the eye by its color and beauty.

"My mother," she said to Bent-Anat, "no doubt loves me, but she has
managed badly for Mena, very badly; and I, miserable idiot, slept and
dreamed of Mena, and saw and heard nothing of what was happening to
his--to our--inheritance. Now my mother is afraid of my husband, and
those whom we fear, says my uncle, we cannot love, and we are always
ready to believe evil of those we do not love. So she lends an ear to
those people who blame Mena, and say of him that he has driven me out
of his heart, and has taken a strange woman to his tent. But it is false
and a lie; and I cannot and will not countenance my own mother even, if
she embitters and mars what is left to me--what supports me--the breath
and blood of my life--my love, my fervent love for my husband."

Bent-Anat had listened to her without interrupting her; she sat by her
for a time in silence. Then she said:

"Come out into the gallery; then I will tell you what I think, and
perhaps Toth may pour some helpful counsel into my mind. I love you,
and I know you well, and though I am not wise, I have my eyes open and a
strong hand. Take it, come with me on to the balcony."

A refreshing breeze met the two women as they stepped out into the air.
It was evening, and a reviving coolness had succeeded the heat of the
day. The buildings and houses already cast long shadows, and numberless
boats, with the visitors returning from the Necropolis, crowded the
stream that rolled its swollen flood majestically northwards.

Close below lay the verdant garden, which sent odors from the rose-beds
up to the princess's balcony. A famous artist had laid it out