the news from other sources—­they offered sacrifices not only to Baal and Seth, their own gods, whom so many of you were ready to serve ere the accursed sorcerer, Mesu, seduced you, but also to Father Amon and the sacred nine of our eternal deities.  If he will do the same, we will rise hand in hand to the highest place, of that he may be sure—­and well he merits it.  The obligation still due him I shall gratefully discharge in other ways, which must for the present remain secret.  But you may tell your uncle now from me that I shall find means to protect Nun, his noble father, when the vengeance of the gods and of Pharaoh falls upon the rest of your race.  Already—­tell him this also—­the sword is whetted, and a pitiless judgment is impending.  Bid him ask himself what fugitive shepherds can do against the power of the army among whose ablest leaders he is numbered.  Is your father still alive, my son?”

“No, he was borne to his last resting-place long ago,” replied the youth in a faltering voice.

Was the fever of his wound attacking him?  Or did the shame of belonging to a race capable of acts so base overwhelm the young heart?  Or did the lad cling to his kindred, and was it wrath and resentment at hearing them so bitterly reviled which made his color vary from red to pale and roused such a tumult in his soul that he was scarcely capable of speech?  No matter!  This lad was certainly no suitable bearer of the message the prophet desired to send to his uncle, and Bai beckoned to Hornecht to come with him under the shadow of a broad-limbed sycamore-tree.

The point was to secure Hosea’s services in the army at any cost, so he laid his hand on his friend’s shoulder, saying: 

“You know that it was my wife who won you and others over to our cause.  She serves us better and more eagerly than many a man, and while I appreciate your daughter’s beauty, she never tires of lauding the winning charm of her innocence.”

“And Kasana is to take part in the plot?” cried the soldier angrily.

“Not as an active worker, like my wife,—­certainly not.”

“She would be ill-suited to such a task,” replied the other in a calmer tone, “she is scarcely more than a child.”

“Yet through her aid we might bring to our cause a man whose good-will seems to me priceless.”

“You mean Hosea?” asked the captain, his brow darkening again, but the prophet added: 

“And if I do?  Is he still a real Hebrew?  Can you deem it unworthy the daughter of a distinguished warrior to bestow her band on a man who, if our plans prosper, will be commander-in-chief of all the troops in the land?”

“No, my lord!” cried Hornecht.  “But one of my motives for rebelling against Pharaoh and upholding Siptah is that the king’s mother was a foreigner, while our own blood courses through Siptah’s veins.  The mother decides the race to which a man belongs, and Hosea’s mother was a Hebrew woman.  He is my friend, I value his talents; Kasana likes him. . . .”