ell, Ki, as you can pass in here without my leave, why do
you ask it? In short, what do you want with me, now that those Hebrew
prophets have put you on your back?"

"Hush, Ana. Never grow angry, it wastes strength, of which we have so
little to spare, for you know, being so wise, or perhaps you do not
know, that at birth the gods give us a certain store of it, and when
that is used we die and have to go elsewhere to fetch more. At this rate
your life will be short, Ana, for you squander it in emotions."

"What do you want?" I repeated, being too angry to dispute with him.

"I want to find an answer to the question you asked so roughly: Why the
Hebrew prophets have, as you say, put me on my back?"

"Not being a magician, as you pretend you are, I can give you none, Ki."

"Never for one moment did I suppose that you could," he replied blandly,
stretching out his hands, and leaving the staff which had fallen from
them standing in front of him. (It was not till afterwards that I
remembered that this accursed bit of wood stood there of itself without
visible support, for it rested on the paving-stone of the gateway.)
"But, as it chances, you have in this house the master, or rather the
mistress of all magicians, as every Egyptian knows to-day, the lady
Merapi, and I would see her."

"Why do you say she is a mistress of magicians?" I asked indignantly.

"Why does one bird know another of its own kind? Why does the water here
remain pure, when all other water turns to blood? Why do not the frogs
croak in Seti's halls, and why do the flies avoid his meat? Why, also,
did the statue of Amon melt before her glance, while all my magic fell
back from her breast like arrows from a shirt of mail? Those are the
questions that Egypt asks, and I would have an answer to them from the
beloved of Seti, or of the god Set, she who is named Moon of Israel."

"Then why not go seek it for yourself, Ki? To you, doubtless, it would
be a small matter to take the form of a snake or a rat, or a bird, and
creep or run or fly into the presence of Merapi."

"Mayhap it would not be difficult, Ana. Or, better still, I might visit
her in her sleep, as I visited you on a certain night at Thebes, when
you told me of a talk you had held with a woman in the avenue of the
Sphinxes, and of what it cost you in gold and tears. But, as it chances,
I wish to appear as a man and a friend, and to stay a while. Bakenkhonsu
tells me that he finds life here at M