“Impossible—at least without making so much noise as to rouse the soldiers.”
“Perhaps they are revellers,” she said reflectively, “and, having free access to the wine cellars, have frequent carousals and even stupid drunkenness.”
“Very likely; almost certainly,” Seti exclaimed. “They are the boon companions of Sextus; and, like him, will not miss an opportunity of indulgence. If we can only gain over the custodes, we might so drug their wine as to stupefy their drunkenness still more, so that loud noises would not rouse them. This deserves to be thought of; and, fortunately, I happen to have with me for another purpose a drug which I think will answer. But we must not depend on this plan alone. If one expedient should fail, we must have another to fall back upon.”
“And what is that?”
“We must persuade the custodes to get possession of the key of the dungeon. This ought not to be impossible, if the soldiers have a drunken carouse every night, as seems to me very likely. But we cannot be very specific in our plans till we have seen the peddler and custodes, and know exactly what the situation is.”
Rachel said nothing more, but pored over the plan of the palace. At length she drew from a small ivory box by her side an ink horn and papyrus, and proceeded to make a fair copy of the plan—adding some jottings of explanation as Seti had given them. She then put both original and copy in his hands. He compared the two, nodded, and looked at her inquiringly.
“I mean, if it is possible, to get this to him with the iron bar.”
He silently returned the copy.
Meanwhile the pinnace had been steadily pressing on its way. It passed through the canal, it turned up the Nile, it went sweeping by crocodile and hippopotamus and ibis sporting in the water or sunning by the banks, it met corn ship, and Roman galley, and Nubian dory, and skin-raft loaded with brick and stone, and, occasionally, a pleasure barge freighted to overflowing with the laughter and song of the young and gay. The peasants on the banks for a moment stopped work at their trenching and water wheels to gaze at the beautiful vessel, the Nautilus of the Nile, and perchance to envy those who reclined under its snowy wings and silken canopy. Ah, little did they know what anxieties were aching away at the heart of all that beauty and costliness! The breeze toyed with the sails, the waters rippled and gleamed and laughed away from the decorated prow, the oars rose and sank in a water-song of their own that kept time with the low chant of the rowers—there was music of all sorts filtering through the dreamy air—but under that awning of silk and purple there was only the music of prayer and, it may be, of some hope that the Most High would not allow the wicked to triumph. But prayer was the chief thing. Much silent planning and resolving was done during the latter part of the voyage, but there was more silent praying than either.