The young men did not resume their talk.  The dawn in Egypt was a solemn hour.  Kenkenes raised his eyes to the heights of the west.  On the shore a group approached the Nile edge, and Hotep guessed by the cluster of fans and standards that it was the Pharaoh at his morning devotions to Nilus.  The white points on the hilltops reddened and caught fire.

Softly and absently Kenkenes began to sing a hymn to the sunrise.  Hotep rested his cheek on one hand and listened.  More solemn, more appealing the notes grew, fuller and stronger, until the normal power of the rich voice was reached.  The liquid echo on the water gave it a mellow embellishment, and Hotep saw the central figure of the group on shore lift his hand for silence among the courtiers.

But Kenkenes sang on unconscious even of his nearest auditor.  After the nature of humanity he was nearer to his gods in trouble than in tranquillity.

The white fronts of Memphis receded slowly, for neither took up the oars.  Hotep hesitated to break the silence that fell after the end of the hymn.  The shadow on the singer’s face proved that the heart would have flinched at any effort to soothe it.  It was the young sculptor’s privilege to speak first.

After a long silence, Kenkenes roused himself.

“Look to the course of the bari, Hotep, and chide it with an oar if it means to beach us.  I doubt me much if I am fit to control it with the wine of this wind on my brain.”

Hotep took up the oars and rowed strongly.  “Thine offense does not sit heavily on thy conscience,” he said.

“I have made my peace with Athor.”

“Hath she given thee her word?”

“Nay, no need.  For I did not offend her.  Rather hath she abetted me—­urged me in my trespass.  She persuaded me to become vagrant with her, and I followed the divine runaway into the desert.  I doubt not I was chosen because I was as lawless as her needs required.  Athor is beautiful and would prove herself so to her devotees.  And to me was the lovely labor appointed.”

Hotep looked at him mystified.

“By the gods,” he said at last, “thou hadst better get in out of this wind.”

Kenkenes laughed genuinely.  “My babble will take meaning ere long.  If thou questionest me, I must answer, but I am determined not to betray my secret yet.”

“Go we to On?” Hotep asked plaintively, after a long interval of industry for him and dream for Kenkenes.  The young sculptor sat up and looked at the opposite shore.  “Nay,” he cried, “we are long past the place where we should have landed.  Yonder is the Marsh of the Discontented Soul.  Let me row back.”