But regrets were useless.
He knew he had to die.
Had it been on the battlefield, pitted against a foe, he would have been proud to die—because he knew no disgrace would be attached to it.
But to die in a sack, like a mangy dog or vicious cat, was so hurtful to his self-respect and so humiliating that he cried with vexation.
The water got to his lungs. His stomach was full of it. His brain grew dizzy.
The singing in his ears had become like the roaring of the waters of a great cataract.
Mercifully unconsciousness came, and had not the conspirators been discussing their schemes of rioting and rebellion at night by the banks of the Nile, Madcap Max would never have been the hero of this story.
Shula rubbed Max briskly.
He straightened out the madcap’s body and laid it face downward.
The conspirators began kneading the poor fellow’s back—sitting on it, treading it, kneeling on it, and using every means of which they knew to restore life.