"Not so," answered the young Queen, "all he gave me was very bad dreams,
and in every one of them was mixed up that waiting woman of my father,
Merytra, of whom you spoke to me. If I believed in omens I should say
that she was about to bring some evil upon our House."

"It may well be so, Queen," answered Asti, "and in that case I think
that she is at the work. At any rate, watching from the little window
of my room, by the light of the moon I saw her return across the temple
court at midnight. Moreover, it seemed to me that she was carrying
something beneath her robe."

"Whence did she return?"

"From the city, I suppose. She has Pharaoh's pass, and can go in and
out when she will. I have caused Mermes to question the officer of the
guard, and he says that she came to the gate accompanied by a tall man
wrapped in a dark cloak, who spoke with her earnestly, and left her.
From this description I think it must have been the astrologer, Kaku,
with whom she was talking at the feast."

"That is bad news, Nurse. What else have you to tell?"

"Only this, Queen. The gates are guarded more closely even than we
thought. I tried to send out a man to Thebes this morning with a message
on my own account--never mind what it was--and the sentries turned him
back."

"By the gods!" exclaimed Tua, "before I have reigned a year every gate
in Memphis shall be melted down for cooking vessels, and I will set
their captains to work in the desert mines. Nay, such threats are