The Yoke | Page 3

but brightened her hair and wrought the hue of health in her cheeks. Her forehead was low, broad, and white as marble; her neck and arms white, and the hands, busied with the hair, were strong, soft, dimpled and white. The grace of her womanhood had not been overcome by the slave-labor, which she had known from infancy.
"Good morning, Deborah. Why--thy bed--have I slept under it?" she asked.
"Since the middle of the last watch," the old woman assented.
"But why? Did Merenra come?" the girl inquired anxiously.
"Nay; but I heard some one ere the camp was astir and I covered thee."
"And thou hast had no sleep since," the girl said, with regret in her voice. "Thou dost reproach me with thy goodness, Deborah."
She went to the amphora and poured water into the laver, drew forth from the box a horn comb and a vial of powdered soda from the Natron Lakes, and proceeded with her toilet.
"Came some one, of a truth?" she asked presently.
Deborah pointed to the smoking bowl. Rachel inspected the fowl.
"Marsh-hen!" she cried in surprise.
"Atsu brought it."
"Atsu?"
"Even so. From his own bounty and for Rachel," Deborah explained.
Rachel smiled.
"Thou art beset from a new direction," the old woman continued dryly, "but thou hast naught to fear from him."
"Nay; I know," Rachel murmured, arranging her dress.
The garb of the average bondwoman was of startling simplicity. It consisted of two pieces of stuff little wider than the greatest width of the wearer's body, tied by the corners over each shoulder, belted at the waist with a thong and laced together with fiber at the sides, from the hips to a point just above the knee. It was open above and below this simple seam and interfered not at all with the freedom of the wearer's movements. But Rachel's habit was a voluminous surplice, fitting closely at the neck, supplied with wide sleeves, seamed, hemmed and of ample length. Deborah was literally swathed in covering, with only her withered face and hands exposed. There was a hint of rank in their superior dress and more than a suggestion of blood in the bearing of the pair; but they were laborers with the shepherds and serving-people of Israel.
"He would wed thee, after the manner of thy people, and take thee from among Israel," Deborah continued.
The girl drooped her head over the lacing of her habit and made no answer. The old woman looked at her sharply for a moment.
"Well, eat; Rachel, eat," she urged at last. "The marsh-hen will stand thee in good stead and thou hast a weary day before thee."
Rachel looked at the old woman and made mental comparison between the ancient figure and her strong, young self. With great deliberation she divided the fowl into a large and small part.
"This," she said, extending the larger to Deborah, "is thine. Take it," waving aside the protests of the old woman, "or the first taste of it will choke me."
Deborah submitted duly and consumed the tender morsel while she watched Rachel break her fast.
"What said Atsu?" Rachel asked, after the marsh-hen was less apparent.
"Little, which is his way. But his every word was worth a harangue in weight. Merenra and his purple-wearing visitor, the spoiler, the pompous wolf, departed for Pithom last night, hastily summoned thither by a royal message. But the commander returns to-morrow at sunset. This morning, every tenth Hebrew in Pa-Ramesu is to be chosen and sent to the quarries. Atsu will send thee and me, whether we fall among the tens of a truth or not. So we get out of the city ere Merenra returns. He called the ruse a cruel one and not wholly safe, but he would sooner see thee dead than despoiled by this guest of Merenra's--or any other. I doubt not his heart breaketh for thy sake, Rachel, and he would rend himself to spare thee."
"The Lord God bless him," the girl murmured earnestly.
"Where dost thou say we go?" she asked after a little silence.
"To the quarries of Masaarah, opposite Memphis."
The color in the young Israelite's face receded a little.
"To the quarries," she repeated in a half-whisper.
"Fearest thou?"
"Nay, not for myself, at all, but we may not have another Atsu over us there. I fear for thee, Deborah."
The old woman waved her hands.
"Trouble not concerning me. I shall not die by heavy labor."
But the girl shook her head and gazed out of the low entrance of the tent. Her face was full of trouble. Once again the old woman looked at her with suspicion in her eyes. Presently the girl asked, coloring painfully:
"Was Atsu commanded to hold me for this guest of Merenra's--ah!" she broke off, "did Atsu name him?"
"Not by the titles by which the man would as lief be known," Deborah answered grimly, "but I remember he called him 'the governor.'"
There was