In the dining-hall laughed and chattered a number of young servants as they ate their onions and cakes of doora and dates. A small earthenware vase full of oil, in which dipped a wick, gave them light,--for night had fallen,--and cast a yellow light upon their brown cheeks and bodies which no garment veiled. Some were seated on ordinary wooden seats, others leaned against the wall with one leg drawn up. "Where does the master go like that every evening?" said a little, sly-looking maid, as she peeled a pomegranate with pretty, monkey-like gestures. "The master goes where he pleases," replied a tall slave, who was chewing the petals of a flower. "Is he to tell you what he does? It is not you, in any case, who will keep him here." "Why not I as well as another?" answered the child, piqued. The tall slave shrugged her shoulders. "Hora herself, who is fairer and more beautiful than any of us, could not manage it. Though he bears an Egyptian name and is in the service of the Pharaoh, he belongs to the barbarous race of Israel, and if he goes out at night, it is no doubt to be present at the sacrifices of children which the Hebrews perform in desert places, where the owl hoots, the hyena howls, and the adder hisses." Tahoser quietly left the room without a word, and concealed herself in the garden behind the mimosa bushes. After waiting two hours, she saw Poeri issue forth into the country. Light and silent as a shadow, she started to follow him. IX Poeri, who was armed with a strong palm stick, walked towards the river along a causeway built over a field of submerged papyrus which, leafy at their base, sent up on either hand their straight stalks six and eight cubits high, ending in a tuft of fibre and looking like the lances of an army in battle array. Holding in her breath and walking on tiptoe, Tahoser followed him on the narrow road. There was no moon that night, and the thick papyrus would in any case have been sufficient to conceal the young girl, who remained somewhat behind.