The Tales of Ancient Egypt (10 Historical Novels). Georg Ebers

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СКАЧАТЬ have thought of you too,” said Uarda. “Just now, when I was sitting with my sick grandmother, it passed through my mind how nice it would be if I had a brother just like you. Do you know what I should do if you were my brother?”

      “Well?”

      “I should buy you a chariot and horse, and you should go away to the king’s war.”

      “Are you so rich?” asked Rameri smiling.

      “Oh yes!” answered Uarda. “To be sure, I have not been rich for more than an hour. Can you read?”

      “Yes.”

      “Only think, when I was ill they sent a doctor to me from the House of Seti. He was very clever, but a strange man. He often looked into my eyes like a drunken man, and he stammered when he spoke.”

      “Is his name Nebsecht?” asked the prince.

      “Yes, Nebsecht. He planned strange things with grandfather, and after Pentaur and you had saved us in the frightful attack upon us he interceded for us. Since then he has not come again, for I was already much better. Now to-day, about two hours ago, the dog barked, and an old man, a stranger, came up to me, and said he was Nebsecht’s brother, and had a great deal of money in his charge for me. He gave me a ring too, and said that he would pay the money to him, who took the ring to him from me. Then he read this letter to me.”

      Rameri took the letter and read. “Nebsecht to the fair Uarda.”

      “Nebsecht greets Uarda, and informs her that he owed her grandfather in Osiris, Pinem—whose body the kolchytes are embalming like that of a noble—a sum of a thousand gold rings. These he has entrusted to his brother Teta to hold ready for her at any moment. She may trust Teta entirely, for he is honest, and ask him for money whenever she needs it. It would be best that she should ask Teta to take care of the money for her, and to buy her a house and field; then she could remove into it, and live in it free from care with her grandmother. She may wait a year, and then she may choose a husband. Nebsecht loves Uarda much. If at the end of thirteen months he has not been to see her, she had better marry whom she will; but not before she has shown the jewel left her by her mother to the king’s interpreter.”

      “How strange!” exclaimed Rameri. “Who would have given the singular physician, who always wore such dirty clothes, credit for such generosity? But what is this jewel that you have?”

      Uarda opened her shirt, and showed the prince the sparkling ornament.

      “Those are diamonds—it is very valuable!” cried the prince; “and there in the middle on the onyx there are sharply engraved signs. I cannot read them, but I will show them to the interpreter. Did your mother wear that?”

      “My father found it on her when she died,” said Uarda. “She came to Egypt as a prisoner of war, and was as white as I am, but dumb, so she could not tell us the name of her home.”

      “She belonged to some great house among the foreigners, and the children inherit from the mother,” cried the prince joyfully. “You are a princess, Uarda! Oh! how glad I am, and how much I love you!”

      The girl smiled and said, “Now you will not be afraid to touch the daughter of the unclean.”

      “You are cruel,” replied the prince. “Shall I tell you what I determined on yesterday—what would not let me sleep last night—and for what I came here today?”

      “Well?”

      Rameri took a most beautiful white rose out of his robe and said:

      “It is very childish, but I thought how it would be if I might put this flower with my own hands into your shining hair. May I?”

      “It is a splendid rose! I never saw such a fine one.”

      “It is for my haughty princess. Do pray let me dress your hair! It is like silk from Tyre, like a swan’s breast, like golden star-beams—there, it is fixed safely! Nay, leave it so. If the seven Hathors could see you, they would be jealous, for you are fairer than all of them.”

      “How you flatter!” said Uarda, shyly blushing, and looking into his sparkling eyes.

      “Uarda,” said the prince, pressing her hand to his heart. “I have now but one wish. Feel how my heart hammers and beats. I believe it will never rest again till you—yes, Uarda—till you let me give you one, only one, kiss.”

      The girl drew back.

      “Now,” she said seriously. “Now I see what you want. Old Hekt knows men, and she warned me.”

      “Who is Hekt, and what can she know of me?”

      “She told me that the time would come when a man would try to make friends with me. He would look into my eyes, and if mine met his, then he would ask to kiss me. But I must refuse him, because if I liked him to kiss me he would seize my soul, and take it from me, and I must wander, like the restless ghosts, which the abyss rejects, and the storm whirls before it, and the sea will not cover, and the sky will not receive, soulless to the end of my days. Go away—for I cannot refuse you the kiss, and yet I would not wander restless, and without a soul!”

      “Is the old woman who told you that a good woman?” asked Rameri.

      Uarda shook her head.

      “She cannot be good,” cried the prince. “For she has spoken a falsehood. I will not seize your soul; I will give you mine to be yours, and you shall give me yours to be mine, and so we shall neither of us be poorer—but both richer!”

      “I should like to believe it,” said Uarda thoughtfully, “and I have thought the same kind of thing. When I was strong, I often had to go late in the evening to fetch water from the landing-place where the great water-wheel stands. Thousands of drops fall from the earthenware pails as it turns, and in each you can see the reflection of a moon, yet there is only one in the sky. Then I thought to myself, so it must be with the love in our hearts. We have but one heart, and yet we pour it out into other hearts without its losing in strength or in warmth. I thought of my grandmother, of my father, of little Scherau, of the Gods, and of Pentaur. Now I should like to give you a part of it too.”

      “Only a part?” asked Rameri.

      “Well, the whole will be reflected in you, you know,” said Uarda, “as the whole moon is reflected in each drop.”

      “It shall!” cried the prince, clasping the trembling girl in his arms, and the two young souls were united in their first kiss.

      “Now do go!” Uarda entreated.

      “Let me stay a little while,” said Rameri. “Sit down here by me on the bench in front of the house. The hedge shelters us, and besides this valley is now deserted, and there are no passers by.”

      “We are doing what is not right,” said Uarda. “If it were right we should not want to hide ourselves.”

      “Do you call that wrong which the priests perform in the Holy of Holies?” asked the prince. “And yet it is concealed from all eyes.”

      “How you can argue!” laughed Uarda. “That shows you can write, and are one of his disciples.”

      “His, СКАЧАТЬ