“Yet I will climb them,” muttered Khian.
“Begone, child, and bid Ru bring the leech, and swiftly,” went on Kemmah.
With one quick glance at Khian, Nefra glided away. Kemmah watched her go, saying to herself as she turned to minister to him:
“How strange a thing is love that can send so many to their deaths, or by its strength draw the dying back to life again. But of the love of these two what will be born?”
Then she gave Khian milk to drink and bade him lie still and silent.
Yet he would not obey who, having drunk, asked her dreamily:
“Think you, good Nurse, that the Spirit of the Pyramids of whom all talk in this holy land is as fair as that lady who has left us?”
“The Spirit of the Pyramids! Can I never be rid of these pyramids? Who, then, and what is this Spirit?”
“That is just what I would find out, Nurse, even if I lose my life in seeking it, as it seems that already almost I have done. My soul is aflame with desire to look upon this Spirit, for something within tells me that until I do so never shall I find happiness.”
“Here the story runs otherwise,” answered Kemmah. “Here it is said that those who look on her, if there be such a one, find madness.”