Mahmoud was crouched on the hot sand, in the shade of a great granite figure of an old Egyptian king. On the temple wall at his right hand was incised the figure of a large hawk, which had a certain life-like stare and stride. Below lay the thick green lake; a little pied kingfisher fluttered and poised over it. Mahmoud’s donkey had strayed a little from his owner, and was pulling at some few blades of thin, straggling weed. The Father of the Box, who had ridden him out to Karnak, had some foolish prejudice against tying up donkeys’ heads. Mahmoud explained that it prevented the donkey from having a headache; but Englishmen always want things done in their own way.
Yet as Mahmoud sat dreaming, his eyes fixed on the water, he was thinking of none of these things. Rather he was dreaming of little Fatma, Fatma whom he had run and played with as a little girl—but now she was old enough to be married. He had seen Fatma as they came out; she was carrying a waterpot on her head, and the slender fingers were tipped with henna; her hair was plaited over her brow, and the large blue-studded rings in her ears swayed as she ran. She held her veil firmly in her small, white teeth, and only gave him one look, half shy, half merry, as she passed.
Mahmoud’s father and mother said he must be married this year. He wished to marry no one but little Fatma; but ah! the marriage-gift.
He stared at the smooth, thick water, and droned a little song—“Oh, great holy gardener, let me into the garden.”
The sun was just going down, and as Mahmoud turned idly, half lost in his dreaming, the rays struck the wall where was the image of the hawk, and the boy stood breathless, for the hawk was all of gold, and as he looked the fierce head turned a little.
Through his maze came the voice of the Father of the Box, crying to him to get the donkey.
A moment he started and turned, but when he looked again there was nothing but the stone hawk carved on the wall; and again came the call, as the Englishman and the “box” came round the corner.
Mahmoud gasped and panted: “The chicken is all gold.”
“Oh, the Golden Horus,” said the Father of the Box, giving the precious camera into Mahmoud’s hand. “Hurry up and fetch the donkey, it is getting dark and damp.”
But he did not ask how a donkey-boy should know the Golden Horus.