“If God has already won,” Ben said in a low voice, “if He really is more powerful than Pharaoh, then why are we still here?”

He and Enoch walked side by side through the streets of Rameses. They leaned toward each other, Ben’s shoulder rubbing Enoch’s elbow, so that they could speak quietly and still be heard. It was early afternoon, several days after the locusts had all been blown away on a strong wind from the sea. And yet Pharaoh, to no one’s surprise, had once again refused to let the Israelites leave.

“Why is God waiting for Pharaoh to change his mind and say we can go?” Ben continued.

“Shh,” Enoch cautioned him, glancing around. “Everyone is upset. Just trust God and wait.”

Ben almost laughed. “I do trust God, Enoch. But what is He —”

A fist-sized rock crashed off the building next to Ben and bounced into the street, leaving a white mark on the wall. Ben and Enoch both jumped and then glanced all around. Everywhere they looked they saw Egyptians with hostile faces. Any one of them could have thrown the stone. “Go away, Hebrews, and leave us in peace!” someone shouted. “Tell your Moses that your problems aren’t our fault!”

“Come, Ben,” Enoch whispered. “Hurry.”

Only when they were safe in the courtyard of the Red House did Enoch pull Ben behind a palm tree and say quietly, “It isn’t just that God is more powerful than Pharaoh. Of course He is. But He has also proven Himself to be more powerful than the gods of the Egyptians.”

Ben was confused. “There are no other gods. There is only one God, the God of Abraham, Isaac —”

Enoch waved his hands impatiently. “I know that, Ben. Of course there is only one God. But don’t you see? God is using these plagues to prove that to the Egyptians. What gods do the Egyptians worship?”

Ben shrugged. “They have so many gods, I can’t keep them all straight. There is Hapi, the god of the Nile —”

Enoch grinned. “Yes, and what did God do to his water?”

Ben’s eyes opened a little wider. “Turned it to blood.”

“Could Hapi stop God from doing that?”

Ben shook his head.

“What other gods?”

Ben pointed toward the squatty statue in the bubbling fountain in the corner of the courtyard. “Heket. The frog god.”

Enoch nodded, still grinning. “You see? What did the Master of all do with Heket’s frogs? Neither Pharaoh nor his gods are a match for our God.”

Ben nodded. “Yes, I said this same thing to Joel on the day the locusts came. And soon Pharaoh and the Egyptians too will know who is Master of all.”

The boys sat quietly, thinking, watching a flock of geese fly high above. “What will God do next, then?” Ben asked. “Which Egyptian god will He embarrass next? And when? The Egyptians already hate us because of the plagues. Their crops and their livestock are gone. Even our own people are getting more and more angry and upset. My father and grandfather are being beaten worse than ever at the brickyards. If things get any worse —”

“They will get worse,” Enoch said. “They have to if God is to prove Himself to the Egyptians.” Then he shrugged. “I don’t know what will happen next. But I believe this: Before we leave Egypt, God must show that He is more powerful than the highest Egyptian god of all.”

Ben looked up into Enoch’s earnest eyes and nodded. “Ra,” he said. “The god of the sun.”

No one was surprised, an hour later, when the wind from the southwest picked up. This was, after all, the time of year for the khamsin, the hot desert wind. And no one was surprised to see the sunlight begin to dim as vague clouds of reddish-brown sand and dust began to move across the sky from the southwest. The khamsin often carried such clouds of dust. But by midafternoon the sky was as dark as twilight, and the mistress ordered all the lamps lit in the Red House. People began casting worried looks outside and muttering to each other in low, serious voices. Never before had the sand carried by the khamsin made the sky so dark in the middle of the day.

The mistress walked into the storeroom where Ben was sorting and counting candles. “Have we enough?” she asked quietly.

“Yes,” Ben said. “More than enough. Enough to last for many days.”

She nodded, then counted the jars of oil. “I would like to have ten more jars of oil this size. Run over to the merchant’s shop and tell him to bring ten more before nightfall.”

“But we always have these dust storms this time of year, your ladyship.”

She was so distracted she didn’t even reprove him for arguing with her. “I fear that this one is different, Ben. I sense the hand of Moses in this darkness. And I expect the worst.”

By the time Ben had placed the order for the oil and started back for the Red House, it was almost as black as night. And the air was thick with sand, so thick and dark that he couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead. He walked with one hand trailing along the stone wall to his left so that he would know where he was. The other hand held a fold of the light cloak he wore across his nose and mouth, his eyes squeezed into slits.

Now and then huddled shapes would pass near him. Their feet shuffled along the gritty cobblestones of the sidewalk, their arms outstretched to keep them from bumping into something they couldn’t see. Few people were out. No one spoke.

The wall to his left ended. To get back to the Red House, he would have to cross the street here. He turned and set his back directly against the corner of the wall so that he was heading —he hoped —straight across the street. He took a deep, gritty, choking breath and set out into the rapidly darkening murk. Now he could only see as far as his outstretched hand, and the wind drove the grains of sand against his skin with such force that they stung.

One step at a time, one foot in front of the other, short steps. How far had he come —maybe halfway across the street? There was no way to judge. But if he kept on as he was —

Ben cried out in a sudden rush of fear as something bumped hard and fast against his legs, and he spun, crashing to the ground with a thud. The air rushed out of his lungs, and he lay still, moaning, trying to catch his breath. What had it been? A dog? A goat?

He felt around him. He had no idea which direction he should move.

The darkness was complete now. He could see nothing, not even his hand in front of his face. Ben was so terrified by the darkness that he almost found it impossible to move. And then he realized why. This darkness, so thick with sand and dust, was closing over him just as the Nile had closed over his head when he’d fallen in years before. Cutting off all light, making it impossible to breathe, choking him . . .

He fought the fear. He had to move.

On his hands and knees, his cloak pulled over his head, Ben crawled for what seemed like hours, bumping into walls and then following them, with no idea which way he was heading. God, he prayed, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, please hear my prayer. I know that You are sending this darkness to show Pharaoh and the Egyptians that You are the only God. But I am only an Israelite, caught in the middle of Your lesson. I want to go home!

Tears dripped from his closed eyes. His hands and knees were raw and sore from crawling. But he kept going. Soon he realized that the ground over which he crawled was now rough and uneven, and softer. He was no longer on the street but on open, unpaved ground. Where was he? He tried to think of somewhere in the city that wasn’t paved.

Then he began to climb a soft hill of sand —a dune. There were no sand dunes in the city. He had somehow crawled right out of the city.

After he had crawled over several dunes, scraping through scrubby desert bushes sometimes, he realized that the wind wasn’t quite as loud. Then he noticed that there was actually a little light filtering through the cloak over his head. He pulled it aside slightly and peered out. Yes, the storm was letting up just a little.

At the top of the next dune, Ben stood carefully, bracing himself against the wind that remained, and cautiously looked out through his slitted eyes.

He knew where he was. He stood on the dunes that sat southwest of the village where he lived. He thought he could just make out his village in the valley below him. He began to walk down the dunes.

Something rustled in some scrubby bushes near him, then broke free and began running rapidly toward him. With a cry, Ben turned to run, tripped over a trailing end of his cloak, and fell face-first into the sand. He looked up in time to see a rabbit scurrying away.

A rabbit. Just a rabbit, and Ben’s heart was beating as if he were about to die. Was there nothing he wasn’t afraid of?

He had only been fooling himself when he had felt so triumphant about overcoming his fear of the locusts. So what? There would always be something else to frighten him. He would never be a man, strong and unafraid like his father. A man? Ha! He would never even make a good boy, like Joel, who could do the things he wanted without having to worry first about his fears. Ben was more like a girl.