"I think he came not into Ascalon of his own free will," answered Ishtar. "He galloped through the gate like one who rides for life, with a cloud of Egyptian horsemen at his heels."
"I wish with all my heart they had caught and flayed him alive!" laughed the other. "But I might have known him better than to think he would look at that cream-faced Rekamat, for all her delicate gait and her tawny hair. So he escaped with the skin of his teeth, say you, and was last seen safe in Ascalon. I pray you, is he there now?"
"I know not," answered Ishtar. "O Kalmim, I will trust you. I am so miserable. He entered the city with—with Sarchedon. And the walls were guarded, the watch set, because of the false Egyptian, so that a mouse could scarce creep out unnoticed. Nevertheless, we glided through the gate at sunrise, he and I, and—and, right or wrong, we fled into the wilderness."
"Like a pair of pelicans!" exclaimed the other in high glee. "And so, being in the wilderness, you made yourselves a nest no doubt, and folded your wings in peace, as it had been behind the city wall!"
"The children of Anak surprised us sleeping," sobbed Ishtar, whose tears were beginning to flow afresh. "They killed our dromedary, poor beast, and spoiled our goods—all that we had—a lump of bread and a handful of dates. They spared our lives in pity, but they set me down beside the Well of Palms, and they sold him into captivity. O Kalmim, comfort me, for indeed I fear I shall never see him more!"
Light-hearted and impressionable, the other was ready enough with sympathy, advice, and perhaps assistance, up to the point at which it could inconvenience herself.
"Take heart," said she; "the world is wide, but woman has her wits, as the bird of the air has its wings. Can you not discover where he is gone? Knowing this, surely the bow is bent, and the arrow fitted to the string. You need but let it fly."
"I was guided by Nisroch," was the tearful answer; "for I came hither into the market from the halls of my ruined home and the bones of my dead father. O Kalmim, I watched by them all last night, to drive the wild-dogs away."
Again she laid her face on the other's shoulder, and wept.
Kalmim was greatly moved.