Yes, it was she who answered the kingwhich no other
dared to do. Nay, O King, his name is Ramose, she exclaimed astonished. Our guide
passed onthrough many gloomy passages, and we followed, leaving the shoutsbehind us.
O King, she cried and pointed to the wall. After themcame other women whom I took to
be attendants because their heads werebowed.
Thus I pay you and someone else for a certain
honest kiss.
Great King, he is my own and only son begotten
bythe good god, Pharaoh Apries, when I was his wife. As the soldiers haled me
towards the curtains the captain who haddeparted to give orders
returned.
Then a fool made presents to a knave, he replied
coarsely,and the courtiers laughed.
He took me by the hand, he led me away,and I
remember no more till I found myself in this place.
She came to theking whose body shook and whose face
was ashen with fear. Then over againstme, at the far end of the hall, the shadow
reappeared and thickened.
Some of that glittering mob were overthrownand
trampled, among them my mother.
Will you help me to hold it, or will yougive
yourselves up? Fly to the roof, I answered, and take your poison with you, Wife,to
swallow if there be need. Yes, the wife of the greatest monarch in all the world!
Food and wine are set in the eating-chamber, as theprophet commanded, and one waits
you there.
Then when all seemed lost the God we worshipped
spoke a word in heavenand saved us. For a while he sat staring atme, his face alive
with hate as though I were his bitterest foe. Metep called at our door awaking us
from sleep.
You have heard, he said in that horrible soft voice
of his. After themcame other women whom I took to be attendants because their heads
werebowed. Yet I think that before long you will revile his name, and loudly, inall
our ears.