Meneptah," he cried. "Spare me this man! He saved
my own life when the crew would have cast me overboard. Let me pay my
debt."

"Let him be spared, as thou wilt have it so," spoke Pharaoh, "but
revenge dogs the feet of foolish mercy, and many debts are paid ere all
is done."

Thus it chanced that Kurri was given to Meriamun to be her jeweller
and to work for her in gold and silver. To the Wanderer was allotted a
chamber in the Royal Palace, for the Pharaoh trusted that he would be
a leader of his Guard, and took great pleasure in his beauty and his
strength.

As he left the Hall of Audience with Rei, the Queen Meriamun lifted her
eyes again, and looked on him long, and her ivory face flushed rosy,
like the ivory that the Sidonians dye red for the trappings of the
horses of kings. But the Wanderer marked both the sudden fear and the
blush of Meriamun, and, beautiful as she was, he liked it ill, and his
heart foreboded evil. When he was alone with Rei, therefore, he spoke to
him of this, and prayed the old man to tell him if he could guess at all
the meaning of the Queen.

"For to me," he said, "it was as if the Lady knew my face, and even
as if she feared it; but I never saw her like in all my wanderings.
Beautiful she is, and yet--but it is ill speaking in their own land of
kings and queens!"

At first, when the Wanderer spoke thus, Rei put it by, smiling. But the
Wanderer, seeing that he was troubled, and remembering how he had prayed
him to pluck the spear-point from his helmet, pressed him hard with
questions. Thus, partly out of weariness, and partly for love of him,
and also because a secret had long been burning in his heart, the old
man took the Wanderer into his own room in the Palace, and there he told
him all the story of Meriamun the Queen.

VI

THE STORY OF MERIAMUN

Rei, the Priest of Amen, the Master Builder, began his story unwillingly
enough, and slowly, but soon he took pleasure in telling it as old men
do, and in sharing the burden of a secret.

"The Queen is fair," he said; "thou hast seen no fairer in all thy
voyagings?"

"She is fair indeed," answered the Wanderer. "I pray that she be
well-mated and happy on her throne?"

"That is what I will tell thee of, though my life may be the price of
the tale," said Rei. "But a lighter heart is well worth an old man's
cheap risk, and thou may'st help me and her, when thou knowest all.
Pharaoh Meneptah, her lord, the King, is the son of th