Under the influence of the endless intrigues of those around him, or suspicious of those intrigues, the instinct to deceive began in his young spirit to rouse itself. Rameses felt that the priests did not divine the subject of his conversation with Hiram, nor the plans which were forming in his head. It sufficed those blinded persons, that he was amusing himself; from this they inferred that the management of the state would remain in their hands forever. "Have the gods so darkened their minds," thought Rameses, "that they do not even ask themselves why Hiram gave me a loan so considerable? And perhaps that crafty Tyrian has been able to lull their suspicious hearts? So much the better! So much the better!" He had a marvellously agreeable feeling when he thought that the priests had blundered. He determined to keep them in that blunder for the future; hence he amused himself madly. Indeed the priests were mistaken, both in Rameses and Hiram. The artful Tyrian gave himself out before them as very proud of his relations with Rameses, and the prince with no less success played the rôle of a riotous stripling. Mefres was even convinced that the prince was thinking seriously of expelling the Phœnicians, that meanwhile he and his courtiers were contracting debts and would never pay them. But the temple of Astaroth with its numerous courts and gardens was filled with devotees all the time. Every day, if not every hour, though the heat was excessive, some company of pilgrims to the great goddess arrived from the depth of Asia. Those were strange pilgrims. Wearied, streaming with perspiration, covered with dust, they advanced with music, and dancing, and songs sometimes of a very lewd character. The day passed for them in unbridled license in honor of the goddess. It was possible not only to recognize every such company from afar, but to catch its odor, since those people always brought immense bouquets of fresh flowers in their hands, and in bundles all the male cats that had died in the course of the current year. The devotees gave these cats to dissectors in Pi-Bast to be stuffed or embalmed, and bore them home later on as valued relics. On the first day of the month Mesori (May-June), Prince Hiram informed Rameses that he might appear at the temple of Astaroth that evening. When it had grown dark on the streets after sunset, the viceroy girded a short sword to his side, put on a mantle with a hood, and unobserved by any servant, slipped away to the house of Hiram. The old magnate was waiting for the viceroy. "Well," said he, with a smile, "art thou not afraid, prince, to enter a Phœnician temple where cruelty sits on the altar and perversity ministers?" "Fear?" repeated Rameses, looking at him almost contemptuously. "Astaroth is not Baal, nor am I a child which they might throw into your god's red-hot belly." "But does the prince believe this story?" Rameses shrugged his shoulders.