Once again he took her hand and kissed it, because the act was more eloquent than words at that moment.
"It is near sunset," she said softly, "give me leave to depart."
"Farewell, and the divine Mother attend thee."
She bowed and left him.
That night in the dim work-room Kenkenes brought forth upon papyrus a face of Athor, so full of love and yearning that he knew his own heart had given his fingers direction and inspiration. He sought no further.
To-morrow in the niche in the desert he would carve the want of his own soul in the countenance of the goddess.
CHAPTER XV
THE GODS OF EGYPT
It was Kenkenes' first love and so was most rapturous, but it did not cast a glamour over the stern perplexities that it entailed. He knew the suspense that is immemorial among lovers, and further to trouble him he had the harsh obstacle of different society. Rachel was a quarry-slave, a member of the lowest rank in the Egyptian scale of classes. She was an Israelite, an infidel and a reviler of the gods.
He was a descendant of kings, a devout Osirian and welcomed in Egypt's high places.