| After many days had gone by, they were still trying after their daily fashion and the prince chanced upon them. They took the youth to their house. They washed him. They gave fodder to his team of horses and did all sorts of things for the prince. They even smeared him with ointment and bandaged his feet. They gave bread to his groom. They engaged him in conversation, saying, “Where are you from, you handsome lad?” He said to them, “I am the son of a chariot-fighter of the land of Egypt. My mother died and my father took another wife, a step-mother. She came to hate me and I fled before her.” They embraced him and kissed him on all his limbs. After some more days had passed, he said to the princes, “What have you been doing here all these months and days?” They explained, “It’s been three months since we’ve been leaping here. If one of us reaches the top of the tower of the daughter of the lord of Naharin, she will be given to him for a wife.” He said to them, “If only I could cure my feet, I’d go to jump in your company.” They went off according to their daily habit of leaping. The youth got up and went along for the purpose of watching from a distance, but the eye of the daughter of the lord of Naharin was upon him. When some more time had lapsed, the lad came in order to leap with the children of the princes. He leapt up and reached the window of the daughter of the prince of Naharin. She kissed him. She embraced his entire body. Therefore, someone went to inform her father. It was said to him, “Somebody has reached the window of your daughter.” The prince of Naharin questioned him, asking “Which son of the princes is he?” It was was said to him, “A son of a chariot-officer. He fled from the land of Egypt before his step-mother.” So the prince of Naharin became very irate. He said, “Shall I give my daughter to the refugee from Egypt? Let him go back!” Someone came to tell him [the lad] “Why not travel back to where you came from?” But the daughter seized him and swore by god, saying, “By Pre-Harakhti, if he is taken away from me I will neither eat nor drink and shall die directly!” Then the messenger went off to repeat all she had said to her father and he ordered people to slay him where he was. The daughter said, “By Pre, if he is murdered, as soon as the sun sets, I will die. I will not live one hour longer than he.“ GO TO NEXT |