You love your husband; duty calls him from you, and you feel lonely and neglected; that is quite natural.

But those whom I love, my father and my brothers, are also gone to the war; my mother is long since dead; the noble woman, whom the king left to be my companion, was laid low a few weeks since by sickness.

Look what a half-abandoned spot my house is! Which is the lonelier do you think, you or I ?" "I," said Nefert.

"For no one is so lonely as a wife parted from the husband her heart longs after." "But you trust Mena's love for you ?" asked Bent-Anat.
Nefert pressed her hand to her heart and nodded assent: "And he will return, and with him your happiness." "I hope so," said Nefert softly.
"And he who hopes," said Bent Anat, "possesses already the joys of the future.

Tell me, would you have changed places with the Gods so long as Mena was with you?
No! Then you are most fortunate, for blissful memories--the joys of the past--are yours at any rate.