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Many rumors were afloat, most of them contradictory; but one was accurate, and confirmed by the temple servants, to the great regret of the crowd—Bent-Anat was excluded from the Feast of the Valley.
She stood on her balcony with her brother Rameri and her friend Nefert, and looked down on the river, and on the approaching God.
Early in the previous morning Bek-en-Chunsu, the old high-priest of the temple of Anion had pronounced her clean, but in the evening he had come to communicate to her the intelligence that Ameni prohibited her entering the Necropolis before she had obtained the forgiveness of the Gods of the West for her offence.
While still under the ban of uncleanness she had visited the temple of Hathor, and had defiled it by her presence; and the stern Superior of the City of the Dead was in the right—that Bek-en-Chunsu himself admitted—in closing the western shore against her. Bent-Anat then had recourse to Ani; but, though he promised to mediate for her, he came late in the evening to tell her that Ameni was inexorable. The Regent at the same time, with every appearance of regret, advised her to avoid an open quarrel, and not to defy Ameni’s lofty severity, but to remain absent from the festival.
Katuti at the same time sent the dwarf to Nefert, to desire her to join her mother, in taking part in the procession, and in sacrificing in her father’s tomb; but Nefert replied that she neither could nor would leave her royal friend and mistress.
Bent-Anat had given leave of absence to the highest members of her household, and had prayed them to think of her at the splendid solemnity.
When, from her balcony, she saw the mob of people and the crowd of boats, she went back into her room, called Rameri, who was angrily declaiming at what he called Ameni’s insolence, took his hands in hers, and said:
“We have both done wrong, brother; let us patiently submit to the consequences of our faults, and conduct ourselves as if our father were with us.”
“He would tear the panther-skin from the haughty priest’s shoulders,” cried Rameri, “if he dared to humiliate you so in his presence;” and tears of rage ran down his smooth cheeks as he spoke.
“Put anger aside,” said Bent-Anat. “You were still quite little the last time my father took part in this festival.”
“Oh! I remember that morning well,” exclaimed Rameri, “and shall never forget it.”
“So I should think,” said the princess. “Do not leave us, Nefert—you are now my sister. It was a glorious morning; we children were collected in the great hall of the King, all in festival dresses; he had us called into this room, which had been inhabited by my mother, who then had been dead only a few months. He took each of us by the hand, and said he forgave us everything we might have done wrong if only we were sincerely penitent, and gave us each a kiss on our forehead. Then he beckoned us all to him, and said, as humbly as if he were one of us instead of the great king, ‘Perhaps I may have done one of you some injustice, or have kept you out of some right; I am not conscious of such a thing, but if it has occurred I am very sorry’—we all rushed upon him, and wanted to kiss him, but he put us aside smiling, and said, ‘Each of you has enjoyed an equal share of one thing, that you may be sure—I mean your father’s love; and I see now that you return what I have given you.’ Then he spoke of our mother, and said that even the tenderest father could not fill the place of a mother. He drew a lovely picture of the unselfish devotion of the dead mother, and desired us to pray and to sacrifice with him at her resting-place, and to resolve to be worthy of her; not only in great things but in trifles too, for they make up the sum of life, as hours make the days, and the years. We elder ones clasped each other’s hands, and I never felt happier than in that moment, and afterwards by my mother’s grave.” Nefert raised her eyes that were wet with tears.
“With such a father it must be easy to be good,” she said.
“Did your mother never speak good words that went to your heart on the morning of this festival?” asked Bent-Anat.
Nefert colored, and answered: “We were always late in dressing, and then had to hurry to be at the temple in time.”
“Then let me be your mother to-day,” cried the princess, “and yours too, Rameri. Do you not remember how my father offered forgiveness to the officers of the court, and to all the servants, and how he enjoined us to root out every grudge from our hearts on this day? ‘Only stainless garments,’ he said, ‘befit this feast; only hearts without spot.’ So, brother, I will not hear an evil word about Ameni, who is most likely forced to be severe by the law; my father will enquire into it all and decide. My heart is so full, it must overflow. Come, Nefert, give me a kiss, and you too, Rameri. Now I will go into my little temple, in which the images of our ancestors stand, and think of my mother and the blessed spirits of those loved ones to whom I may not sacrifice to-day.”
“I will go with you,” said Rameri.
“You, Nefert—stay here,” said Bent-Anat, “and cut as many flowers as you like; take the best and finest, and make a wreath, and when it is ready we will send a messenger across to lay it, with other gifts, on the grave of your Mena’s mother.”
When, half-an-hour later, the brother and sister returned to the young wife, two graceful garlands hung in Nefert’s bands, one for the grave of the dead queen, and one for Mena’s mother.
“I will carry over the wreaths, and lay them in the tombs,” cried the prince.
“Ani thought it would be better that we should not show ourselves to the people,” said his sister. “They will scarcely notice that you are not among the school-boys, but—”
“But I will not go over as the king’s son, but as a gardener’s boy—” interrupted the prince. “Listen to the flourish of trumpets! the God has now passed through the gates.”
Rameri stepped out into the balcony, and the two women followed him, and looked down on the scene of the embarkation which they could easily see with their sharp young eyes.
“It will be a thinner and poorer procession without either my father or us, that is one comfort,” said Rameri. “The chorus is magnificent; here come the plume-bearers and singers; there is the chief prophet at the great temple, old Bek-en-Chunsu. How dignified he looks, but he will not like going. Now the God is coming, for I, smell the incense.”
With these words the prince fell on his knees, and the women followed his example—when they saw first a noble bull in whose shining skin the sun was reflected, and who bore between his horns a golden disk, above which stood white ostrich-feathers; and then, divided from the bull only by a few fan-bearers, the God himself, sometimes visible, but more often hidden from sight by great semi-circular screens of black and white ostrich-feathers, which were fixed on long poles, and with which the priests shaded the God.
His mode of progress was as mysterious as his name, for he seemed to float slowly on his gorgeous throne from the temple-gates towards the stream. His seat was placed on a platform, magnificently decorated with bunches and garlands of flowers, and covered with hangings of purple and gold brocade, which concealed the priests who bore it along with a slow and even pace.
As soon as the God had been placed on board his barge, Bent-Anat and her companions rose from their knees.
Then came some priests, who carried a box with the sacred evergreen tree of Amon; and when a fresh outburst of music fell on her ear, and a cloud of incense was wafted up to her, Bent-Anat said: “Now my father should be coming.”
“And you,” cried Rameri, “and close behind, Nefert’s husband, Mena, with the guards. Uncle Ani comes on foot. How strangely he has dressed himself like a sphinx hind-part before!”
“How so?” asked Nefert.
“A sphinx,” said Rameri laughing, it has the body of a lion, and the head of a man,103 and my uncle has a peaceful priest’s robe, and on his head the helmet of a warrior.”
“If the king were here, the distributor