Yes, here was Hathor, Goddess of Beauty, Goddess of Love, as none in Egypt had ever conceived her!
Menna’s brain worked fast. The statue he vowed to make his own. Bar and his minions were despatched to do away with Renny!
What a sensation would this work produce at Court, and especially upon the mind of the art-loving Pharaoh! Menna allowed himself visions of a naturalistic school modeled upon the Syrian, an essentially realistic school which should utterly banish the hieratic canons imposed upon the Egyptian craftsmen by the dictates of precedent and the will of an all-powerful priesthood.
Meantime, thought the Overseer, the statue must be kept from sight, at least, until Renny was safely out of the way.
He sent off a chairman to bring clay, string and his signet ring. With his own hands he covered the statue with the quarryman’s mats which still clustered in one corner of the little chamber.
In less time than it takes to tell it the tinted figure of the little Princess disappeared from sight. Menna closed the door and, slipping to the bronze bolt, bound it with cord and set his scarab-seal upon a clay pellet which he fastened thereto. This done, he hurried home. To-day was a momentous day with Menna, Overseer of the King’s Estates.
CHAPTER XVI
The Curse of Huy, Great High Priest of Amen
What Belur the Hittite Ambassador had said, concerning the expected outbreak of a religious war throughout Egypt, was true. Moreover, no one was greatly surprised at his report of the disaffection of Egypt’s Asiatic vassals.