the low, wide-branching sycamore tree near the
shore. A narrow boat, now concealed from view by the dense growth of
rushes, had brought her to the spot.

The beautiful, motherless young creature, needing counsel, had come to
old Tabus to appeal to her art of prophecy and, if she wanted them,
to render her any little services; for the old dame on the island
was closely bound to Ledscha, the daughter of one of the principal
ship-owners in Tennis, and had once been even more closely united to the
girl.

Now, as the sun was about to set, the latter gave herself up to a wild
tumult of sweet memories, anxious fears, and yearning expectation.

Not until a cool breath from the neighbouring sea fanned her brow did
she throw down the cord and implement with which she had been adding a
few meshes to a net, and rising, gaze sometimes across the water at a
large white house in the northern part of the city, sometimes at the
little harbour or the vessels on the horizon steering toward Tennis,
among which her keen eyes discovered a magnificent ship with bright-hued
sails.

Drawing a long breath, she enjoyed the coolness which precedes the
departure of the daystar.

But the effect of this harbinger of night upon her surroundings was
even more powerful than upon herself, for the sun in the western horizon
scarcely began to sink slowly behind the papyrus thicket on the shore
of the straight Tanite arm of the Nile, dug by human hands, than one new
and strange phenomenon followed another.

First a fan, composed of countless glowing rays which spread in dazzling
radiance over the west, rose from the vanishing orb and for several
minutes adorned the lofty dome of the deep-blue sky like the tail of
a gigantic peacock. Then the glitter of the shining plumes paled. The
light-giving body from which they emanated disappeared and, in its
stead, a crimson mantle, with gold-bordered, crocus-yellow edges, spread
itself over the space it had left until the gleaming tints merged into
the deeper hues of the violet.

But the girl paid no heed to this splendid spectacle. Perhaps she
noticed how the fading light diffused a delicate rose-hued veil over
the light-blue sails, embroidered with silver vines, of the approaching
state galley, making its gilded prow glitter more brightly, and saw one
fishing boat after another move toward the harbour, but she gave the
whole scene only a few careless glances.

Ledscha cared little for the poor fishermen