throne, upon his knees,
the royal crown shaken from his head, Abi grasped the feet of Neter-Tua
and screamed to her to forgive and spare him, whilst above, shining like
fire, That which sat upon the throne pointed with her sceptre at the
ruin and the rout, and laughed and laughed again.

Soon all were gone save the mumbling priests, the dying, the dead, and
Abi with his officers.

The clouds rolled off, the moon and the stars shone out, filling the
place with gentle light. Then Tua spoke, looking down at the wretched
Abi who grovelled before her.

"Say, now, Husband," she asked, "who is god in Egypt?"

"Amen your father," he gasped.

"And who is Pharaoh in Egypt?"

"You, and no other, O Queen."

"Ah!" she said, "it was over that matter that we quarrelled, did we not?
which forced me, whom you thought so helpless, to find helpers. Look,
there are their footsteps; they walk heavily, do they not, my Uncle?"
and she nodded towards the huge fragments of the broken obelisks.

He glanced behind him at his ruined hall, at the dying and the dead.
"You are Pharaoh and no other," he repeated with a shudder. "Give breath
to your servant, and let him live on in your shadow."

"The first is not mine to give," she answered coldly, "though perchance
it may please Amen to hold you back a little while from that place
where you must settle your account with him who went before me, and his
companions who died in your streets. I hope so, for you have work to do.
As for the second--arise, you Priests and Officers, and see this Prince
of yours do homage to the Queen of Egypt."

They rose, and clung to each other trembling, for all the heart was out
of them. Then she pointed to her foot with the sceptre in her hand,
and in their presence Abi knelt down and kissed her sandal. After him
followed the others, the priests, the captains, the head-stewards, and
the butlers, till at length came Kaku, the astrologer, who prostrated
himself before her, trembling in every limb. But him she would not
suffer even to touch her sandals.

"Tell me," she said, drawing back her foot, "you who are a magician, and
have studied the secret writings, how does it chance that you still live
on, when for lesser crimes so many lie here dead, you who are stained
with the blood of Pharaoh?"

Hearing these words from which he presaged the very worst, Kaku beat his
head upon the ground, babbling denials of this awful crime, and at the
same time began to impl